Zu Druid MK IVs vs. Essences

Bjesien,
I respect your opinion, but really that`s all it is. You or someone else could(and do) make the same statement about Wilson,Thiel,B/W Manaplanar etc. People simply like what they like. High End audio is nothing but "subjective choice" at the end of the day. If you`re happy with your system`s sound, great! be happy and don`t worry if another person`s taste does`nt match your own.

Point taken. I guess it is not fair or respectful of the design or tastes of other people. I apologize for that. I think I am still feeling sore about losing a bunch of cash on them too. I picked them up from a dealer at a discount prior to Zu dropping dealers and going back to the old pricing strategy. Perhaps therapy would be better than venting?

I respect your opinion, but really that`s all it is

Agreed. Same goes for me and Dock's comments about the measured response. Just think of it as a service to prospective buyers and the OP - to be aware of some of the limitations of the products under discussion. Perhaps Bjesein might not have lost $600 if he had been forewarned here on Audiogon and been able to make a more considered or informed decision.

FWIW - these speakers do wonderfully well with a flea powered amplifier. They definitely have some major advantages for some.

>>shows that the Zu Druid is a Paul Voight type design<<

It isn't. In Druid there is no interior taper and no progressivity in managing the rear wave. Also, the driver is placed at the top of the tube, which is not the usual Voight approach. It's also not a transmission line, though the speaker might externally resemble that. Druid was the first instance of Zu's proprietary acoustic impedance matching model, and it is only a partial implementation, relying on both a specific cabinent interior volume as well as precise distance from driver to the floor via the floor-facing vent and the user-adjustable plinth-to-floor gap. The result is that the floor gap has much more than 3db effect on the free-space frequency anomalies. The speaker does not sound like the free-space test curve. If it did, no one would have bought it.

In later Zu models that are not sealed, the Griewe acoustic impedance model is complete, though slightly differently implemented in the straight cabinet and tapered cabinet speakers. In those cases the free-space (off-floor) performance is far closer to the on-floor performance, because the Griewe model is enforced within the cabinet rather than nakedly dependent on a user-adjusted gap between cabinet and floor. However, in Druid, the user adjustable floor gap does give the listener a valuable tuning device for managing the always problemmatic speaker/room interactions in the bass frequencies, in normal domestic construction.

Phil