HELP Best speakers btw 1000$ and 3000$. Real tests

Sinae,

If you look at the Reference 3A site, the line is described as "phase coherent," and the baffles are raked (and the tweeters offset) to allow for time alignment of the drivers. Whether the Reference 3A line is more phase and time coherent than other speakers I cannot say as I'm not a physics whiz and don't understand all the theory. Hope that helps a little.

Luvstolisten makes a point that I've heard elsewhere, that is, that 1st order crossovers require drivers that can cover a wide frequency range because the handoff "slope" between the drivers is not as gradual as higher-order designs. This is one reason that Ref 3A builds their own mid-bass drivers in house. In theory, they are able to work mechanical kinks out of the driver design through all kinds of mechanical tweaks, rather than having to compensate for driver misbehavior with crossover complexity. Hence also, a mid-bass driver directly coupled to the amplifier, and only a single capacitor to protect the tweeter.

Axiom M80 v3s, $1500 a pair.

Luvs2listen,

"Minimum phase system response is another matter altogether, and very difficult to achieve over the entire audible range with multi-way systems. A true first order crossover, one with 6dB/octave acoustic slopes over a couple octaves around the crossover can produce a minimum phase system response. But getting quality drivers with smooth response in the overlap region is a tall order."

Very good description. Those type of speakers are extremely difficult to design. That's why I recommended Vandersteen in my first post. No one does it better. When I say that, though, I'm not implying that one has to like them. I'm just saying that they are the best at getting phase and time correct speakers right. Everyone has different tastes.

There are big tradeoffs going for the transient perfect designs. The biggest, in my opinion, is the rather poor power response that can result. Move off the design axis, and the transient perfect character disappears due to changing the distance to the acoustic centers of each driver. It's much easier to maintain a smooth off axis response using higher order filters.

Going beyond 4th order acoustic doesn't seem necessary unless pushing drivers close to their limits of usability (metal cones near their breakup modes for example.) My personal favorites are 2nd order 3-ways. They tend to offer seamless transition from driver to driver and allow reasonable control of out of band energy, allowing each driver to perform cleanly and without strain.

This might be a little off topic but for some reason I am having difficulty submitting a new thread.

Check out a no compromise digitally activated bookshelf for a silly price ($2,500) deputed at this years CES 2013. It really is a leave no stones left unturned approach to a desktop loudspeaker. The constrained layer damping and the drive units themselves already more than justify the price and its seems like the DSP, wireless connectivity, fully balanaced DAC topology with switchable filters and latest nCore inspired Hypex modules are thrown in for free. I really hope there are more details about the speakers such as the dimensions, digital connectivity on the website (www.moosaudio.com) though.
I wouldn't mind if they release a flagship version of it in the future with bigger drivers and nCore amplification along with better styled cabinet.
Meridian better watch out! This speaker offers way better connectivity, DSP, drivers, dacs and similar cabinets at 1/3 of the price of your bookshelf offering!

I hope one day Magico will offer the option of wireless integrated no compromise speakers such as these. I have really taken a liking to Magico's all aluminum cabinets and cutting edge drive units but you can easily swap the expensive crossovers for a way superior DSP active implementation. I bet the amplification, DSP, DACs and wireless connectivity cost just as much if not lesser than the overbuilt crossovers in Magico loudspeakers. I find passive crossovers such a waste of resources! Good ones are so expensive and also so difficult to do right, and that is not to mention the electrical losses here.

What are your views on this? I am simply astounded at what is offered here. I have actually not seen anything like this and especially at this price!