What creates the effortlessness in sound reproduction?

There are about six or eight critical system factors that result in the "effortless" sound of speakers. It's a holistic system result, not just the speakers.   

Peter is above board. The shameless ones are those with ulterior agendas. 

Even without hearing the speakers he linked to I can see that they have many of the criteria necessary to achieve effortless sound reproduction - given the proper electronics and cables ahead of them. 

Larger drivers, extended frequency response, plenteous power, overbuilt x-over or active x-over, larger speakers well past 4', etc. Many speakers have a few of these traits, but this one he linked to seems to have the necessary attributes to create the effortless sound discussed here. 

I have reviewed larger Legacy Audio speakers for Dagogo.com, such as the V and the Valor, and these are fundamentally superior in creating the sense of ease and capability beyond the norm. So, Peter's link is not just shameless promotion, it's a snapshot of the characteristics in a speaker that lend themselves to "effortlessness".  

Btw, it seems the speaker uses a 12" mid. Those with discernment might look to see that also Legacy's Valor similarly uses prodigious midrange. Why is that? Because it is fundamentally superior. Period. End of discussion. Size matters, and big gets fundamentally better sound in the end. Sorry for budget audiophiles, but that's the realty. 

Now you know.  :) 

I will add that one of the reasons that panels, such as the Kingsound King III electrostatic I reviewed for Dagogo.com, are so popular is that they can capture some of the immensity and openness of huge speakers. It’s a much more affordable way to go; one does not need to spend $80K to get some of the attributes of "effortlessness", but some will be sacrificed, such as macrodynamics. No way a panel will come close to the impact of such dynamic hybrid speakers. Not even close. Subs would be mandatory. That is why I pair the Legacy Audio XTREME XD Subs (also reviewed) with the King III to capture some of what is lost when moving to a panel. :)


Simply put, "effortlessness" is on a spectrum, like all other parameters of performance. It's not an end point, but a very widely experienced phenomenon that is open-ended. 

Larger drivers being slower is a misnomer. Often smallish drivers are wrongly claimed to image better, sound quicker, etc. It's mostly attempted justification for a lesser rig. Listen sometime to how much distortion a 6.5" woofer puts out in comparison to 15". I prefer not to introduce that level of distortion into low end performance. :)
As usual, YMMV

grannyring,  I agree with you that some companies/drivers are much better at attaining an effortless sound than others. Dali makes an excellent product, and I have thought of reviewing one several times. 

I am spoiled by regular use of larger speakers, which has skewed my expectation, standard of what constitutes refined sound. I would struggle to accept a monitor or smallish floor standing speaker as my reference. If the bulk of my experience was with speakers with 6-7" bass driver(s) likely I would agree with you entirely.

 I struggle to think of any driver under 8" across the industry that has an effortless sound when listening at higher levels compared to much larger drivers. Others disagree, so be it. The perceptions and expectations of audiophiles in terms of sound are as wide as the performance of systems themselves. I'm not expecting anyone who has not used much larger systems in their home to agree with me.  They may work hard to get a smallish speaker to sound far more relaxed and effortless relatively compared to their earlier systems, so they think it's got a high degree of that attribute. In my experience not so in comparison with far more formidable speakers. 

The smallest dynamic driver I have heard in my room that can put out 20Hz +/- 3dB and not sound strained is the Audio Technology 11" in the Vapor Audio Joule White speakers  (reviewed for Dagogo.com)  YMMV