Visit to Audiophile Bill to hear his horns project

[ddk]

Bill, I always return home from you super relaxed, hearing of your trials and tribulations. However, whatever stresses you describe perfecting your designs, your 200% enthusiasm for your project shines thru, and is fully reflected in your product.

I cant comment on all the uber spkrs out there. All I know is I've heard various examples of Wilson, Magico, Rockport, YG, Kharma, AG Trio and Duo, Cessaro Liszt and Beta, Pnoe, and while these examples all do many things right, none of them achieve the effortless invisibility I heard today.

What was so impressive was the lack of flagging up of the attribute itself. A good example is the Apogee Divas I visited a few years back. It too had effortless imaging. Really impressive pinpoint capabilities. But they kept drawing attention to themselves. So the music was there in all its glory, but so were the Divas right behind it.

Bill's horns. Again, the music was laid out, but now in an unshowy holistic way, the message communicated but the messenger carefully concealed Lol.

It sounds strange to say you would buy anything not to be aware of it. But this is deffo what you want w spkrs. And what you get w these horns. Hugely impressive.

You just described the difference between an impressive system and natural sound !

Congrats @Audiophile Bill!

david

 

[spiritofmusic]

Dave, you mean we can shut that other thread down now? Surely you want to prolong the misery Lol.

 

[ddk]

Dave, you mean we can shut that other thread down now? Surely you want to prolong the misery Lol.

OR, prolong the ecstasy!
david

 

[spiritofmusic]

Love/hate. Often simultaneously.

 

[ALF]

Love/hate. Often simultaneously.

They run along the same continuum...

vbw,
-a

 

[Audiophile Bill]

Dear Bill,

How will you know when this test bed version is finished, the design truly is pencils-down finalized, and ready for production?

(Or will each pair be slightly different as you make on-the-fly improvements during production?)

Hi Ron,

Perilously close now. There are some minor changes still to complete including a newly revised curved baffle and wiring loom testing / listening. On the latter, I’ll probably have to hire Kedar to sit in the room for a week listening to Scheherazade on repeat as we siphon through all the different metallurgy, conductor types, shielding (or not). Now and again, I’ll throw a dessert or something his way to fuel the madness. Lol.

In terms of production itself, each pair will effectively be unique in the “cosmetic” sense since none of this is based on any veneers or mdf or ply thus the timber grain structure will have its own profile. Moreover there is a choice of hardwood and inlay options. Finally whilst the topology will be fully consistent, there will be different “levels” based on which level of AER you would pick for your budget.

I have had to be very disciplined indeed to focus on the finish line but finally the end is in sight. The thousands of hours, blood (yes woodworking causes a fair amount of that), sweat (yes the build of this is simply off the charts even when I use CNC for specialist parts of the design), and tears (the frustration of all the iterations etc has caused some of that too) have been worth it. I am really happy with the sound especially now across all genres and I was thrilled to read Marc’s feedback.

Best.

 

[Audiophile Bill]

You just described the difference between an impressive system and natural sound !

Congrats @Audiophile Bill!

david

Hi David,

Thanks for the kind words of support and for taking an interest in this.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Bill, I have a reasonable audio memory from other great systems I've heard in the past. And I feel I can reasonably chart where your horns locate in relation to these.

Obviously conclusions good and bad are just snapshots. I'm not Ked...I haven't heard those spkrs I've liked in multiple situations in different rooms w different ancilliaries.

One exception to that are the Cessaro Liszts...heard them three times, the first stellar, the second average, the third meh.

So, comparing Bill's horns to other fantastic spkrs that layer backwards ie ZAxis Paul's modded MLogans/Concert Fidelity hybrids, MLogan Prodigies/MF Kilowatts SS, Barry's AG Duos/45 tubes, Cessaro Liszts/Bakoon SS, Kharma Exquisite/Tenor hybrids, Apogee Divas/Kondo-Spectrals...all of these combinations were/are superb in so many ways. And yet each of them had signature give aways that limited their ultimate invisibility/transparency. Whether lack of full tone/texture, over-tendency to artificially pinpoint image, the opposite ie ghostly floaty lack of substance, tonal character on choice of materials, crossover audibility.

Bill's horns feel like the first spkr I've listened to that draws zero attention to itself. The best recorded stuff we listened to just hung in the air, filling a natural space, unconstrained but disciplined, airy and grounded, so archetype-free that you really only concentrated on the music and not the system. I can't stress enough how refreshing that was, and how rare. Only one other system I've heard comes close, but Bill has the edge.

The only comments on possible improvements would be that beefier amps needed for more energetic music like my LZ and Rush...just to fill out mids punch, and that source choices would be different in my case...an idler/LT arm thru these spkrs might have the edge over belt/pivoted.

Indeed in my room, 4x bigger than Bill's, I'd certainly need to keep my 70W 211s, or a move to 8W Mayer 6cb5a. That's Bill's advice.

 

[Zero000]

On the latter, I’ll probably have to hire Kedar to sit in the room for a week listening to Scheherazade on repeat as we siphon through all the different metallurgy, conductor types, shielding (or not). Now and again, I’ll throw a dessert or something his way to fuel the madness. Lol.

I think you should impose a ban. He played that at my old place too many times.

Maybe the easy way is accidental damage in the form of a large, deep scratch

And feeding the animals is dangerous! You have been warned

So Marc compared to a BD4 equipped Pnoe, would you say Bill's efforts are on a par or better?

Tough question, I know. You are "on the spotlight"

 

[spiritofmusic]

IN the spotlight...just as bad?
I really only heard the Pnoes properly for one day, but in restricted circumstances...we just seemed to play classical all day, tbh the Pnoes were great on transparency but lacking in heft and texture.
But I have to caveat that...the music was totally unfamiliar to me, I didn't connect w the Pnoes. Their biggest failing was bass, I'd say they just drifted lower down.
We played Can ("Vitamin C", I think) and despite the energy and space being infectious, the bassline didn't seem grounded and fully fleshed out. Indeed it sounded better on my Zus when I played it on returning home.
Bill's horns seem like a better proposition across rock and electronic music, while maintaining all the magic of transparency I heard at the Pnoes demo.

 

[Zero000]

Yeah they have to sound quite different lower down the scale. A lot more conventional I would guess.

I was going to correct the 'on' but couldn't be arsed.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Justin, I know your sound. Other than one OB based system, it has the most phenomenal slam I've heardin a home system. Bill's horns are not gonna fully match yr Duettas in the deep bass but the Pnoes are way below the level you'd consider for a full-range, bass-potent system. It's not even close.

The whole point of my review was to stress how "of a piece" Bill's horns sound, from horns into subs. Bill is maintaining texture and speed into the bass registers as seamlessly as anything I've heard. Now, granted I don't hear AG Duos horns/woofers disconnect as much as some, so my opinion is what it is. But one of the first Qs that I put to Bill yday was how difficult was it to get the subs and horn to blend, I'm obviously not hearing any lack of coherence.

There's nothing conventional about Bill's solutions.

 

[bonzo75]

I mistakenly speed read "Justin, I know your sound" as "Justin, I know you are sound" and was a bit worried if Marc was

 

[spiritofmusic]

Noone is sound in this hobby

 

[Audiophile Bill]

Marc I just bought 3 of your albums on Discogs - shall look forward to receiving those.

 

[Zero000]

There's nothing conventional about Bill's solutions.

No maybe not but it is cone bass. That's gonna sound more familiar than Pnoe bass almost no matter how it is configured.

BD4 is lightning quick so speed/slam comments come as no surprise.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Bill, Larry Coryell "Spaces" is an amazing album, especially the pressing I have. I'd put it in the top half dozen best sounding LPs that I own. It's at that early fusion crossover period, 1969/70, where showing off and bombast hadn't quite taken off, and the music is allowed to breathe. That track did more than anything to cement what's great in your horns.

The Adrian Legg "Technopicker" album is such a joyous experience, again beautifully recorded.

The Dregs "Dregs Of The Earth" LP is a good example of really musical prog/fusion crossover, again with superb sonics. Lots of crossover styles on this one, and leader/composer Steve Morse was heavily influenced by string quartets. Indeed he often described his band as "rock and roll/electronic chamber music".

 

[bonzo75]

No maybe not but it is cone bass. That's gonna sound more familiar than Pnoe bass almost no matter how it is configured.

BD4 is lightning quick so speed/slam comments come as no surprise.

Bill's bass is not BD4. He has 4 woofers in each horn to do some midbass and lower bass

 

[spiritofmusic]

No maybe not but it is cone bass. That's gonna sound more familiar than Pnoe bass almost no matter how it is configured.

BD4 is lightning quick so speed/slam comments come as no surprise.

Sure Justin, physics is physics after all. It's all in the implementation, imho.

Noone who listens to a lot of hard rock, prog, fusion, electronica, dub etc, is ever gonna choose the Pnoe. So, Pnoe has commendable purity of purpose. But if I know most pure girls, they just don't wanna get down and dirty. Bill's horns sound like a choir girl who has a wide choice of hobbies Lol.

 

[Zero000]

Bill's bass is not BD4. He has 4 woofers in each horn to do some midbass and lower bass

I didn't think BD4 was doing bass, Ked. Because it can't in Bill's config.