Here’s why I cannot accept Wilson’s design philosophy (and yes, I have listened to number of Wilson models over the years and, except for an early Watt/Puppy combo, they have never grabbed my attention):
Vandersteen are time and phase coherent; their drivers are in the same acoustic polarity with first order crossovers that do minimum damage to phase/time based components of timbre.
Wilson Sophia, on the other hand (according to Stereophile):
"In the time domain, the Sophia’s step response (fig.7) reveals that its tweeter and woofer are connected in positive acoustic polarity, the midrange in inverted polarity—which is what is needed, in conjunction with the phase shift provided by the crossover, to ensure that the outputs of the drive-units add to give a flat response in the farfield in the crossover regions."
Read more at http://www.stereophile.com/content/wilson-audio-specialties-sophia-loudspeaker-measurements#rl7vxTdM...
Wilson is not, and never will be, a viable speaker option for me; their approach and designs (and prices!) make absolutely no sense to me.
Vandersteen are time and phase coherent; their drivers are in the same acoustic polarity with first order crossovers that do minimum damage to phase/time based components of timbre.
Wilson Sophia, on the other hand (according to Stereophile):
"In the time domain, the Sophia’s step response (fig.7) reveals that its tweeter and woofer are connected in positive acoustic polarity, the midrange in inverted polarity—which is what is needed, in conjunction with the phase shift provided by the crossover, to ensure that the outputs of the drive-units add to give a flat response in the farfield in the crossover regions."
Read more at http://www.stereophile.com/content/wilson-audio-specialties-sophia-loudspeaker-measurements#rl7vxTdM...
Wilson is not, and never will be, a viable speaker option for me; their approach and designs (and prices!) make absolutely no sense to me.