The on-paper interrelated issues with widebanders is distortion (resonance), frequency deviation and dispersion. I don’t know Bache, but I do know Reference 3A and Horning Hybrid. Both lines use mechanically rolled of mid/woofer in to a tweeter that is connected to a capacitor. Subjectively I did not find either line to be a standard of mid-high frequency integration, although I like them both. The most coherent box speaker I know is Voxativ, although there is penalty with roll off over 10k as there is a widebander but not a separate tweeter. (The experience is well worth the rolloff, imo and probably the money as well). There are brands with more traditional crossover points like YG (1.75kHz), ATC (varies) and KEF (2.4kHz) that I think are extremely well executed. Vandersteen also does an awesome job in integration using quasi-widebanders with 1st order crossover with the tweeter point at 5kHz. The former three though have better dispersion, though. There is a lot of variety in execution, and it is fun to sample them. It would be cool if more companies like Reference 3a and Vandersteen would execute minimal crossover designs with carbon fiber drivers.
Why Aren't More Speaker Designers Building Augmented Widebanders?
Over the years I've owned a number of different speakers - KLH, Cerwin
Vega, Polk, Opera Audio, Ars Aures, and Merlin VSM. One thing they all
had in common was a crossover point in the 2000 hz (+ or -) range. I've
read reviews of speakers where the reviewer claimed to be able to hear
the crossover point, manifested as some sort of discontinuity. I've
never heard that. My Merlin VSM's for example sounded completely
seamless. Yet my new Bache Audio Metro 001 speakers, with a single
wideband driver covering the range of 400 hz to 10,000 hz, augmented by a
woofer and a super tweeter, sounds different from all of these other
speakers. The midrange of the Bache 001's is cleaner, more coherent,
more natural than I have heard before. Music flows from the speakers in a
more relaxed manner, and subjectively dynamic range is greater, with no
etch or brightness, and no loss of resolution compared with the
Merlins. I have to conclude that Bache's design has an inherent
advantage over more traditional designs with a crossover point or points
in the midrange frequencies. I wonder why more speaker designers
haven't tried this approach?