Gryphon Audio Pendragon

[Ron Resnick]

Thank you, Gary and LL21!

I know that Flemming, in his wide room, and Dato' Danon Han, in his narrower room, both locate the AMTs on the inside.

 

[PKN]

I am a competing but friendly loudspeaker designer....... so take this with a pinch of salt (or whatever other condiment you care to use).

You may find that the speakers sound very much better if you have the midrange/tweeter panels set up with the tweeters on the INSIDE instead of outside.

Hello Gary,

We are aware of this, but it is not without reason that they are placed the way they are.

The placement of the mids and high are related to the width of the listening space. Most rooms are a little larger or wider than the one my dad has. In the case of my dad's room dimensions it is advised to place the tweeters on outside of the midrange ribbons The speakers are placed fairly close, so to keep the sound image wide(r) Gryphon themselves recommend to place them this way. Typically these speakers are used in rooms that are (much) larger than the space we have here, which would logically dictate that the speakers would be placed wider and the tweeter/mid range panels would be placed inverted. Which is why in Gryphon's own pictures they are placed that way. Their listening space is rather large.

We can put them wider than they are currently placed, but to minimize room interaction due to proximity to the sidewalls, we won't do this.

I hope this clarifies why they are placed the way they are.

 

[PKN]

Thank you, Gary and LL21!

I know that Flemming, in his wide room, and Dato' Danon Han, in his narrower room, both locate the AMTs on the inside.

The second person may actually benefit from inverting the panels.

Edit: Just to make sure people don't think I'm making this up to cover up for a 'mistake' on our end.

Here goes, straight from the manual.



I rest my case *sound of hammer*

 

[LL21]

Great to know! Thanks PKN.

 

[Ron Resnick]

The second person may actually benefit from inverting the panels.

Edit: Just to make sure people don't think I'm making this up to cover up for a 'mistake' on our end.

Here goes, straight from the manual.

View attachment 38323

I rest my case *sound of hammer*

Objection, your Honor!

Thank you for posting this excerpt from the manual. Actually, now this issue is confusing.

Both Gryphon Audio had, and Dato' Danon Han had, the bass towers on the outside, yet the AMTs were positioned on the inside of the M/T panels (contrary to the suggestion in this excerpt of the manual).

PKN, at 20 feet wide, why do you consider the room to be a "narrow" room? Even though Gryphon has what I think is a large and wide room the bass towers were on the outside, also. (I do not see how the width of the Gryphon room could be considered narrow.)

 

[Ron Resnick]

I am a competing but friendly loudspeaker designer....... so take this with a pinch of salt (or whatever other condiment you care to use).

You may find that the speakers sound very much better if you have the midrange/tweeter panels set up with the tweeters on the INSIDE instead of outside.

Dear Gary,

What is the reason behind this?

Does this configuration allow the highest frequencies from the inside (18 kHz and up from the AMTs) to achieve the best integration with the lowest frequencies on the outside (250 Hz and below)?

Does it have to do with different directionality of high frequencies versus lower frequencies?

Does it have to do with the midrange frequencies blending as well as possible with the bass frequencies by putting those two drivers as close as possible?

 

[LL21]

Dear Gary,

What is the reason behind this?

Does this configuration allow the highest frequencies from the inside (18 kHz and up from the AMTs) to achieve the best integration with the lowest frequencies on the outside (250 Hz and below)?

Does it have to do with different directionality of high frequencies versus lower frequencies?

Does it have to do with the midrange frequencies blending as well as possible with the bass frequencies by putting those two drivers as close as possible?

Or is it that these speakers are angle/tilted in...and therefore the tweeters need to be a physical distance away from the listener relative to the other speaker drivers?

 

[PKN]

Objection, your Honor!

Thank you for posting this excerpt from the manual. Actually, now this issue is confusing.

Both Gryphon Audio had, and Dato' Danon Han had, the bass towers on the outside, yet the AMTs were positioned on the inside of the M/T panels (contrary to the suggestion in this excerpt of the manual).

PKN, at 20 feet wide, why do you consider the room to be a "narrow" room? Even though Gryphon has what I think is a large and wide room the bass towers were on the outside, also. (I do not see how the width of the Gryphon room could be considered narrow.)

Hi Ron,

I will add a picture later that shows another pendragon setup using this exact same placement (it can be found in a PDF on the gryphon website, and I'll post the details later when I have access to my laptop)

Anyway, to answer your question, in our room the bass towers are approximately 3.3 foot away from the side walls. Which is the way we have them set up. Now to put that picture into a better perspective, the distance between the mid ribbons (not the panels) is 8.5 foot. This is narrow.

However, as we are currently listening to the system, we have been debating the whole thing for a while. Actually, not so much a debate as neither one of us is convinced the difference would be noticeable at out current near field experience.

At any rate, we are happy with how it sounds, I suppose that is the best benchmark.

 

[kkfan]

Objection, your Honor!

 

[PKN]

Sorry about the late reply, I promised to post the picture of the inverted setup. Instead of going through the effort of peeling it out of the PDF it exists in, I'll just post the link.

http://www.gryphon-audio.dk/media/9966/hf-nov14_gryphon.pdf

Scroll down a few pages. and there you go, a setup about equal in terms of room width and placement. set up 100% the same way as we've done.

 

[garylkoh]

Dear Gary,

What is the reason behind this?

Does this configuration allow the highest frequencies from the inside (18 kHz and up from the AMTs) to achieve the best integration with the lowest frequencies on the outside (250 Hz and below)?

Does it have to do with different directionality of high frequencies versus lower frequencies?

Does it have to do with the midrange frequencies blending as well as possible with the bass frequencies by putting those two drivers as close as possible?

It has to do with both. The Pendragons crossover the midrange ribbon to the bass towers IIRC 250Hz. Hence, we need to have the midrange drivers as close to the woofer towers as possible for a better blend. When I helped Danon set up his speakers (with his urging and permission since these are not my designs) we put the midrange as close to the woofers as possible. That might also be why the manual recommends that the woofer towers be arranged on the inside between the mid/tweet panels when used in a narrow room with the tweeters on the outside. IMHO 20 foot is not too narrow a room to need the tweeters on the outside.

Nevertheless, as I am not the designer of these speakers, I will keep quiet now.......

 

[Ron Resnick]

Thank you, PKN.

But since we see both configurations in use aren't we still left with the two original questions?

1) In theory which configuration makes more sense -- the AMTs on the inside or the outside?

(Left to my own devices, with the woofer towers on the outside, I would choose to locate the AMTs on the inside so the ribbon drivers are closer to the woofer towers -- as we see in the Gryphon and Danon Han photos. But, as I think about it, perhaps the ribbon drivers on the outside of the woofer towers (and having the AMTs on the outside) might increase soundstage width?)

2) In practice which configuration sounds better?

 

[Ron Resnick]

Thank you, Gary!

(I am still puzzled, however, because I think Danon has a relatively narrow room and yet the woofer towers are on the outside of the panels, and the AMTs are on the inside.)

 

[Folsom]

It has to do with both. The Pendragons crossover the midrange ribbon to the bass towers IIRC 250Hz. Hence, we need to have the midrange drivers as close to the woofer towers as possible for a better blend. When I helped Danon set up his speakers (with his urging and permission since these are not my designs) we put the midrange as close to the woofers as possible. That might also be why the manual recommends that the woofer towers be arranged on the inside between the mid/tweet panels when used in a narrow room with the tweeters on the outside. IMHO 20 foot is not too narrow a room to need the tweeters on the outside.

Nevertheless, as I am not the designer of these speakers, I will keep quiet now.......

250hz gives you 4 feet of wavelength for room to move. The thing about that is it's center to center of the drivers, and the main baffle is wide. The tower drivers are in the center. (I know you know that Gary, just working it out for others)

Sadly, I was going to calculate this out but the internet no longer provides dimensions. Kind of a pain that they are NOT in the manual... Considering their size, it would be very nice to be able to plan ahead. They use to be on the net, as I calculated them out once for width of a room...

 

[Syntax]

A good sounding Set Up ...

 

[Barry]

I'd like to thank Gary Koh for his very well written "Genesis Loudspeaker Set Up Procedure" manual found on the Genesis website in the Support section. In it, he shares a number of excellent speaker positioning tips and he provides specific music selections for proper setup. It tells you what to listen for, and what adjustments to make, to get the best sound. As he notes, the advice is useful even if you don't own Genesis loudspeakers, but it doesn't hurt if you own any dipole planars with subwoofer towers. You can tell a lot of work went into this and that Gary's a very perceptive listener (no surprise there).

Oh, i'm not a customer but maybe I should be

 

[PKN]

Thanks everyone for your input.

While I feel the discussion is interesting, I already know my dad won't place them any different as they are set up now. So that ends that.



The one thing I've learned over the many years of listening to high end and top end, is that the closer to the top you get, the more critical things become. It is for this reason I appreciate the sound of my own setup, I realize it has shortcomings, but its flaws add to the charm. I just have a pair of B&W 802 Diamonds. I love them. (my toddler son doesn't find them interesting either as they have no pretty strings running up and down their design. )

 

[Folsom]

PKN can you measure yours, distance from center to edge on both fullrange and bass towers?

 

[PKN]

PKN can you measure yours, distance from center to edge on both fullrange and bass towers?

I can, though not before this weekend.

 

[analog brother]

awesome set-up!!!!
love the black acoustic panels. are they made of bits of wood, or foam?