Why not horns?

Those are very nice looking horns and seemingly not overly large either. Not cheap but not as expensive as some I have seen.

I wonder how they sound?

Too much for my budget currently though.

BTW I am dabbling with setting up a third mostly A/V system in my house. I have an old NAD 7020 receiver that I keep as a spare available to use and may consider the Klipsch horn route that I have been dabbling with here in that I have some room for decent but not overly large floorstanders that will be placed not too far from the rear wall in this case. I may start out by using my existing souped up OHM Ls here to start, but floorstanders would really fit in visually here better.

For those of you who are ready to take a long step up, I just learned about this rig for sale. Check it out.

These horns will change the way you experience audio.

http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?spkrfull&1295725784&/Acoustic-Horn/Bd-ah!-300-w-b-c

Listener614 - You needn't assume anything about us. You can read the thread and find out the facts as to what kind of horns we use. It's all right there in black and yellow. Nothing could be planar.

Be careful, though, you might subject yourself to retraction effect.

Diffraction effects. That's why. Now I haven't heard Avantdgarde Audio Classico speakers ($80,000) but that sounds promising. I assume you horn guys are Avantgarde owners...

I'm just a lowlife planar speaker fan.

T-bone - I don't look anymore. I don't want to be tempted. My horns are good enough. State of the art is way too expensive to contemplate. They've finally moved the carrot so far ahead that I can no longer see it.

Anything appreciably better than what I have retails for a year's worth of my Social Security.

Macrojack,
The bass is horn-loaded. The upper frequencies are omnidirectional because of the driver construction. It is "low" efficiency. I find the GP Unikorns can sound sublime in the right room.

For more fun, take a look at the Duevel Bella Luna. It is a very interesting implementation. The top of the line is the Duevel Sirius, which both goes lower and is more efficient. But it ain't cheap.

My understanding is the Unicorn is GPs attempt to make a full range speaker using only their DDD Walsh driver. They accomplish it via horn loading the driver to provide the low end that would otherwise not be there in lieu of a separate driver.

I've never seen a Walsh driver that could be considered efficient and there is no horn loading of most of its frequency range possible (due to its omni nature) to help make it so . I suspect that accounts for low efficiency of these compared to many horns.

Mapman - My curiosity got the best of me so I checked out the GP website. The Unicorn does look fascinating. The efficiency is strangely low for a horn system and the power handling modest but I'm sure anything from that company has merit. Alas, I can't afford them.

"I believe" indicates that you are guessing. I don't know enough about the intricacies of speaker design to evaluate your speculation.
Maybe someone else can explain how it works. Anybody?

The cabinet is a rear loaded horn I believe. It is used to extend the low end output of the DDD driver I believe.

A Walsh driver, including the ddd, transmits sound through wave bending for higher frequencies and operates pistonically for low frequencies, which is where the horn is applied much like it would be in any rear horn loaded design I believe.

Mapman- I've been unable to determine where the horn is in this design and I can't really get my head around the concept of an omni horn.

Please explain.

Check these out:

GP Unicorns.

Uses a single full range horn loaded Walsh DDD drivers.

Does anyone else out there have experience using XTA?

I had a visit last week from David Wall of Snob Productions. He installed and calibrated my XTA DP-224 Speaker Management System for me.
This effort replaced my DBX Drive Rack PA.

With a tool like the XTA in the hands of a skilled sound engineer like David, every parameter can be adjusted and all guesswork eliminated.

I don't think it is possible to get to this place with pre-packaged speaker systems. One amp per driver and universal adjustment capability has proved to be the answer for me. Turns out my horns are even better than I previously thought.

I placed my AN15s back in my system and paired them with the Faital driver. The 18s DEFINITELY can't handle above 100hz. They're awesome subs for certain, but midbass is not their forte. The AN15s totally trounce them in terms of naturalness and speed of the midbass. Much less edgy and far more effortless and uncompressed. I'll potentially build a set of amps for the subs and use them for below 100hZ. Or maybe I'll just sell them because I'm fairly happy with the AN15s until the Alnico version comes out. The 18s are monsters though, really great subs, just don't know if I need them at the moment.

The FP driver is stellar though. I ran some tests on fuzzmeasure and it's EXTREMELY low distortion across its frequency band down to about 400hz. It's about -70dB compared to the last compression driver (a B&C driver) I tested, which was up at -50dB harmonic distortion. The neat thing is the FP driver's 2nd and third harmonic distortion graphs are identically low. Proof is in the listening -- sounds fantastic.

Limited production using finest materials since only selling a few costs are reflected in retail also yen is stronger than dollar last I looked. Now are GOTO or ALE worth the outlay I say yes but not in all cases I feel fostex t500amk2 to be better sounding tweeters than either ALE or GOTO. If looking for compression bass then these and maybe cogent are your only options. And yes I have used drivers from both.

I wrote the above entry yesterday with an eye toward hyperbole. Then this morning I wondered about the numbers and did this calculation.

My drivers weigh 7.3 lbs each or 116.8 ounces. Gold bullion is selling today for $1324.66 per ounce. So that works out to $154,720.29 per driver.

That is actually 4 times the price of the ALE drivers,so I exaggerated much more than I actually thought. Nonetheless, I'm still left wondering what could possibly make those drivers so costly. Does anyone know?

Compression drivers for $76,000 per pair leaves me wondering what could possibly justify such a price. If my drivers were blocks of pure gold they might not be worth that much money.

:-) Yeah, I think the ALEs are beyond most everyone's budget. Interesting that you run the Faital that low.

Verneal, I think your comments are stuck in a groove.
My horns do not appear to be much larger in footprint than your Thiels.

I have heard of ALE. Though $76k for a pair of drivers is a bit over my budget. And those aren't as high bandwidth. The Faital drivers (got my second one today) sound great down to about 350hz with a 48dB XO filter. I don't think there are any CHDs on the market that go this low with as flat a response. Sounds fantastic. Though it's showing me how much of a bad link my 18" drivers are.

I'm debating about building an open baffle bass set up, but putting the open baffle in the corners of the room... that effectively turns the entire room into a bass horn. Might be interesting to try at some point.

Mintzar, ever heard of ALE Acoustic? ;-)

Vernneal - All of those points you mention could effect one's decision about whether or not he wants (or can have) horns. But you left out relativity. How big of a speaker is too big or how costly is too expensive, will be different for everyone. Here are some facts about my system, which works well in my space. Individual readers can then compare my circumstances against theirs and determine via real facts whether or not horns could work for them. Bear in mind that smaller and cheaper horn options are available. Mine are just one example that I know well.

In order:

Size: Woofer boxes have a footprint of 24 inches wide by 21 inches deep. Horns are mounted on top of woofers for a total height of 51 inches.

Ugly: Completely and utterly arbitrary - varies with appearance and taste.

Room size: My room is 15 feet wide (system wall) by 22 feet long. The ceiling slopes from 10 feet at the left wall to 8 feet on the right wall.
Listening distance is about 12 feet from from drivers.

Costly: I bi-amp. My horns, compression drivers, woofers, cabinets, power amps and DBX drive Rack PA all taken together cost me less than $5000. That is chump change to many audiophiles and a ridiculous amount of money to others.

I live in a 1400 sq. ft. ranch house with an advantageous floor plan. My system doubles as a 2 channel home theater with a 50 inch plasma hanging on the wall behind my components.

I added the last few facts just to add emphasis to the affordability of the horn option.

Why not? Too large. Ugly/wife factor. Listening room too small. Costly

http://www.usspeaker.com/Faital%20Pro%20HF20AT-1.htm

http://www.prosoundservice.com/m9_view_item.html?m9:item=BC-DCX50

I am confident in the claims you make about your new compression driver which I linked above. The other link is my driver. Aside from the fact that mine is a coax, they seem pretty similar.

I only received half of my order (only one driver) so I'm waiting on the other Faital Pro HF20AT driver. That being said, this single driver in mono sounds the most like real music of any speaker I've ever heard regardless of price.

I have it attached to my active XO crossing over at 500hz. The sound is incredibly clear and uncompressed. Even from a single speaker in mono the speaker totally disappears and sounds 20x its size. I am like a kid at christmas waiting for the second driver to arrive. Couldn't be more thrilled with this driver -- then again it's the most expensive CD on the market.

A lot $ for fostex fe126e. Check out horn shoppe you could buy near 2 new pair http://www.thehornshoppe.com/ I had a few customers use this type of treatment on rare fe206esr. Owners had to replace drivers. Buyer beware.

I've thought these to be interesting:

Cardersound

Any comments?

I am planning on testing the Faital pro 2" compression driver in a horn in the next few weeks. The Faital driver is considered the best compression driver that US Speaker sells (according to Al, the owner of usspeaker) with a very flat response 500hz-18khz and ultra low distortion. It will be crossed over with an active 48dB slope to my 18" drivers, which will handle below 500hz (and they do so QUITE well).

They will be good competition for my 15" Audio Nirvana Full-Range drivers, which I found to be some of the best speakers I've ever heard regardless of price.

My system is a high-resolution DSP-based system with amplification of my own design. If the horns are distorting I'll know it right off the bat.

I'll post back with my findings once I get around to putting this project together.

I have been living with a pair of Morrow Audio MA3 interconnects between my dac and preamp for the last month or so(after break in)and I want to say my system has NEVER sounded better....modified Lascalas......(not talking about my vinyl).....

Jeff1225- If you read back through this and other horn threads you will find my system described and justified for critics exhaustively. There are links to manufacturers demonstrating and explaining components such as horn, driver, crossover, woofer, etc. I have included links to photos and links to articles that I felt might be helpful.

If you are referring to a link next to my signature like you have, I don't know how to do that. It would probably be a useful shortcut for me though.

In these depressive times of big brother cock ups, its nice to hear someone that is busy now, and tomorrow.

Macrojack.
I'm surprised that you never posted your system to help the cause of the horn....

I have Avantgardes and I'm in love.

All quiet on the horn front. Apparently everyone is so content with their speakers that there is nothing else to say.

Glad Bills busy hes one of the good guys in audio.

I'm getting email inquiries daily about the status of Bill Woods. So I checked into the matter. Several people who have contacted Bill report that he is not taking any more horn orders for a year so as to catch up with demand.

Turns out this is true. Bill is in demand with the pros and with certain speaker manufacturers. He has taken on a huge contract and feels he has to postpone taking additional horn orders until he has the time to fill those orders properly.

Meanwhile, he will be busy with design and consulting commitments. No rest for the best.

Macro, I am in same corner when it comes to sound for pound (sterling/dollar). I have gotten good sound (I think so) from my horns, purchased very reasonably on here.
If I had to I would possibly try and have a go at making a DIY pair, but as I am happy with the Oris's and simply over the moon with my H1's, I have no need to venture down that road.The H1's are my perfect speaker and I could not be happier and would never sell them.
If I ever venture to New York, I will for sure make Highwater Sound (jeff is a nice guy) my first port of call.
Got the hear the latest version of the Aspara Acoustics HL1 and their top of the range HLR.

The JBL has a passive crossover built into the cabinet but there are connections on the back for separate driver hook up. At first I used the JBL XO and just disconnected the mid-range horn in the JBL and connected my AH300 horn instead.

Then when I got the dbx, I ran out of my preamp to the inputs of the dbx and then on to an amplifier that drives my horns and another amp that drives my woofers. Currently I have replaced the JBL woofers with a pair of RCF L15P530 woofers. The only thing from the JBLs that I still use is the box.

My crossover frequency between my woofers and my horns is 300 Hz. I use a 24 db/octave LR filter in both directions, one half meter of time delay, and a small amount of shaping. I'm sure I don't have it optimized but I'm quite happy with the sound overall. Does this explanation make sense?

MJ,

So what is handled in your configuration by the JBLs versus the custom horn loaded drivers?

Are teh JBLs biampable or is the complete full range speaker in play but fed only a certain frequency range by the dbx acting as a crossover?

Here is the newer PA+ version. It does all the same things that mine does. I use it as a crossover, time delay and EQ.
http://www.dbxpro.com/PA+/

With this device you can shape your sound any way that you want.

macro,

I see it.

Its not clear to me what the dbx does and whether a separate crossover of some sort is needed?

Thanks.

Mapman - Scan back up this very page about 10 entries and you will see a pretty complete recipe for my speakers that I submitted on July 20. If I wasn't clear or didn't provide enough info, feel free to ask me questions.

Macro,

Can you provide a single post with the recipe for your speakers including the end cost?

PErhaps the info has been provided but I either missed it or it is in too many bits and pieces to soak in cleanly.

Gawdbless - When you were talking about wooden cones I took you to mean conical wooden horns. JohnK apparently thought you were talking about conventional drivers with wooden cones. It is apparent you guys are cross talking and missing each other's meanings.

I agree that $53,000 is way too much to pay for speakers when you simply don't have that kind of money, which I don't. However, I have been trying to notify you people that you can acquire the same performance and comparable cosmetics for approximately 10% of that investment.

I've spelled it all out repeatedly. I've told you how to investigate for yourself. If you want me to do more, I can set you up for half of $53,000 or $26,500 plus shipping. And I can get you a deal on a bridge too. Have you ever seen the Brooklyn Bridge? How would you like to be the one charging tolls on that baby?

Mapman - My setup is shown on the Acoustic Horn website. I have provided several links earlier in this thread but no one seems to have noticed.

Go to "Testimonials" and scroll down to "Tom in Denver". I'm not actually in Denver but that isn't too important. You should be able to enlarge the photos with just one click. The speakers are still the same even though I have changed most of the rest of the pictured gear.

Thanks for the explanation JohnK, you lost me in the first sentence though. Makes me wonder why wood is still used then if there is better available? $53,000 is just plain ludicrous for a pair of speakers in my eyes. Would love to hear them one day though.

These are nice looking:

Zingalis

Anyone heard them?

macro,

Have you provided pictures of your setup?

That would help others get a better picture of where you are coming from.

Vernneal - That's subject to personal circumstances. My horns are 24" wide by 21" deep by 52" tall. Not small and not enormous. Because they are back near the front wall, their space consumption isn't particularly egregious, however, the 18" diameter horn mouth is pretty eyecatching. In other words, the aren't really too big but they are pretty conspicuous.

Given the need for space behind them, I would say that most panels are effectively larger.

why not horns???
too damn big