What does a "dynamic sounding speaker" mean?

[DonH50]

In which case please accept my apologies. I actually made the post at 3 am and wasn't entirely awake.

OK, thank you. Clearly you do not feel me competent in other areas based on your comment. I try to post only on technical stuff so hopefully we won't cross paths again. @steve williams is welcome to remove my "expert" label if it offends people; audio is not my day job.

To add a bit of context, I met Paul Klipsch numerous times in the past and actually was thinking of that and not the recent Stereophile review (which I need to read). I have almost zero recent experience with horns. If I were to hold one of them up as an example, it would be something like JBL's M2, and not the Klipschorn unless it has drastically changed. I have heard a Tractix and think it is an improvement but still prefer my Maggies (and now Revels).

Onwards - Don

 

[bonzo75]

OK, thank you. Clearly you do not feel me competent in other areas based on your comment. I try to post only on technical stuff so hopefully we won't cross paths again. @steve williams is welcome to remove my "expert" label if it offends people; audio is not my day job.

To add a bit of context, I met Paul Klipsch numerous times in the past and actually was thinking of that and not the recent Stereophile review (which I need to read). I have almost zero recent experience with horns. If I were to hold one of them up as an example, it would be something like JBL's M2, and not the Klipschorn unless it has drastically changed. I have heard a Tractix and think it is an improvement but still prefer my Maggies (and now Revels).

Onwards - Don

Don, I have followed your posts and respect them including your technical Maggie insight as well as your anecdotes.

My expert post was not directed at you. You did not come out and make a comment about a whole genre of equipment you did not have experience with

I don't think user211 intended that either. Because you posted in between people lost track of who was being referred to where

 

[DonH50]

Don, I have followed your posts and respect them including your technical Maggie insight as well as your anecdotes.

My expert post was not directed at you. You did not come out and make a comment about a whole genre of equipment you did not have experience with

I don't think user211 intended that either. Because you posted in between people lost track of who was being referred to where

Thanks, that makes sense. I don't know Tom, and disagree with flaming folk in general, but am not competent to comment (have not been on WBF much lately). Nor am I competent to comment upon horns; I have heard many over the decades but they have rarely been in my main system (not since HS/early college with those big BIC 6's, and a friend's Altec VOT pair). More experience with them in live sound reinforcement than homes. I know enough to know a lot of stereotypes about them are wrong but there are also plenty of poorly-done examples -- just like any other speaker design. A good horn sounds to me like a good speaker, period.

Off-topic: I do remember vividly my first time meeting Paul. It came up recently in another thread. I was working as a tech and installer for a high-end stereo (not HT then) store back maybe 1979/1980 when the owner sent me on the sales floor to help set up for some demos and such. Some old geezer (probably younger than me now; I was like 18 then) commented on the horns and I made some disparaging remark. He was quite vigorous and knowledgeable in his defense. Yup, Paul. Oops. He was great guy (and somewhat a character) and I learned a lot. I heard he could be cantankerous but my handful of direct interactions were always a blast.

 

[bonzo75]

I totally agree and there are many more bad horns than good horns

 

[the sound of Tao]

Do you find any of that frequency dependent?

Much of the discussion here lapses into the technology of different, er, formats. If the question is "What does a 'dynamic sounding speaker' mean?, I would not think a good answer would be 'horns'. By what criteria do we gauge a speaker to be dynamic sounding? Can we answer that without saying whose technology is more so than anothers?

Tim the Pap horns as I have them are very much of a piece (coherence is one of the qualities that I am probably more focussed on/sensitive to) but they are still frequency limited as indeed are most residential setups. I’ve modified them by some good margin to get them performing much better than stock in most areas but in particular to just tease out the bottom end to make them more than competive with the Maggie 20.7s across the board.

What then lifts them to the top against the Maggie 20.7s and Harbeth 40.2s for me is that they are effortless and unfettered and also they have the competitive advantage of being able to be driven by the 50 watt SET which among many things also levers them out of analysis and puts them across more immediately into the full engagement of a more essential and connected experience.

I suppose I have taken the easy way out (definitely) by just giving horns as a type as an example for why I hear them as more expressive of dynamics than say box or panel and by and large I do believe this to be true as a theme of the topology.

Just now heading out to work taking 30 landscape design students for a Saturday field trip around some benchmark sustainable landscape designs in Sydney including the Jean Nouvel and Sir Norman Foster designed One Central apartment and landscape... and they call it work but great challenge so will definitely put my thinking cap on later in the weekend to try and get a better description of what the pap horns are doing more specifically in the dynamics department.

 

[tima]

Is any speaker with at least one horn driver considered 'a horn'? Seems like many 'horns' include other drivers, sometimes with the horn serving just the upper frequencies. Aren't these hybrids?

What are characteristics of a dynamic speaker? Would one be what l call (inappropriately?) 'Rise time' - something like the relative amount of time it takes to go from one amplitude to another? I don't have the vocabulary here. Maybe 'response to signal time' ?

 

[Audiophile Bill]

Is any speaker with at least one horn driver considered 'a horn'? Seems like many 'horns' include other drivers, sometimes with the horn serving just the upper frequencies. Aren't these hybrids?

What are characteristics of a dynamic speaker? Would one be what l call (inappropriately?) 'Rise time' - something like the relative amount of time it takes to go from one amplitude to another? I don't have the vocabulary here. Maybe 'response to signal time' ?

Yes I think the collective herein (myself included) describe a hybrid horn speaker as a horn speaker. Actually you’ll find very few actual horn speakers from top to bottom of the frequency response. Most compromise in the lowest bass mainly due to the physics involved in horn loading down there.

 

[bonzo75]

Yes I think the collective herein (myself included) describe a hybrid horn speaker as a horn speaker. Actually you’ll find very few actual horn speakers from top to bottom of the frequency response. Most compromise in the lowest bass mainly due to the physics involved in horn loading down there.

I don't use hybrids as horns when I am describing

 

[tima]

I don't use hybrids as horns when I am describing

... and there are many more bad horns than good horns

I admit to not realizing the small (?) scope of your use of "horns" - assuming you agree with Bill that there are "very few actual horn speakers from top to bottom of the frequency response." Is it fair to say you find an even smaller scope of what you conside "good horns" ?

Two questions:

- do lower frequency horn drivers tend to be fairly large? Can you give average or typical dimensions?

- do 'pure horns' (to you just horns) require fairly large rooms to work at their optimum?

I don't know what a fairly large room is in the UK. Here it's probably larger than, say, 24' x 18' x 8'.

 

[bonzo75]

That room is a large room. And yes, horns usually need a medium to large room to start sounding good, but once they get space, they are mostly agnostic of the rest of the acoustics and you can walk around the room enjoying music. While that room will be excellent, it will grow better as the room grows bigger, I have heard one of my favorite horns in an almost 60 ft by 25 or so feet warehouse.

I heard that close up (3 feet) and far off (50 feet) , both sounded excellent.

Horns like universum and trios can start sounding good in a 6m x 5m room and start getting better after that. As do Bill's swings. They will probably sound good even in a smaller room.

So in short in a medium room they might sound alright but you won't really hear their true potential

Speakers like Diesis are not exactly these type of horns, and can sound better in a smaller room.

General's Pnoes are in a very big challenging room and they sound great close up in that room as well, but I think they might create bass issues in small rooms. Cannot be sure as I haven't heard in a smaller room. Same with Pietro's yamamura, it is in a very big room but we listen to it sitting at 4m

Bass solutions in horns differ, but all the good ones I have heard have big drivers and mouths.

Hybrids like duos and horns symphony can sound good in smaller rooms, though bigger ones like Liszt really need extremely large rooms for the drivers to align..

And yes, the scope of good horns is extremely small and mostly bespoke.

There are other sensitive speakers like vintage tannoy, Altec, the devores, which are alternatives to horns that lets one use low watt amps and can have large drivers, coherency, and flow and tone. They usually have some sort of compromise to extremely good expensive non efficient alternatives but I would prefer them as they would do most music better at a very low price in an average room. The extremely good non efficient alternatives would require a lot of investment and good acoustics treatment to get that orchestra sounding better.

I am writing on the mobile in a train on the way to compare Allnic 7000 with Ypsilon phono and Lyra atlas on kuzma XL4 and a Lampi GG1 at dctom

 

[morricab]

I admit to not realizing the small (?) scope of your use of "horns" - assuming you agree with Bill that there are "very few actual horn speakers from top to bottom of the frequency response." Is it fair to say you find an even smaller scope of what you conside "good horns" ?

Two questions:

- do lower frequency horn drivers tend to be fairly large? Can you give average or typical dimensions?

- do 'pure horns' (to you just horns) require fairly large rooms to work at their optimum?

I don't know what a fairly large room is in the UK. Here it's probably larger than, say, 24' x 18' x 8'.

I use backloaded TQWT type Horns. These can be made relatively compact and still provide bass to 40hz. Aries Cerat uses a 3 meter long folded backloaded exponential horn that gets into the low 30s. That three way design (Symphonia) will fit into a room of 30 square meters ok. It’s big but not huge.

 

[bonzo75]

Neither pnoe nor yamamura which are backloaded are compact.

The other thing in horn consideration is how many drivers. The multiway ones are difficult to make. Gian would ideally like a multi way but no good one exists that he likes, especially at a reasonable price. I would be quite happy with either the universum or Tang's Cessaro like he has set it up.

Full rangers are usually compromised. There is only one good Yamamura left and that's my favorite speaker and the pnoe sounds great only when set up like the General, and it can disappoint even if he swaps one component in the chain to something not matching.

Apart from that I would go two way, like Bill's swings, or make something similar with AER drivers

 

[morricab]

That room is a large room. And yes, horns usually need a medium to large room to start sounding good, but once they get space, they are mostly agnostic of the rest of the acoustics and you can walk around the room enjoying music. While that room will be excellent, it will grow better as the room grows bigger, I have heard one of my favorite horns in an almost 60 ft by 25 or so feet warehouse.

I heard that close up (3 feet) and far off (50 feet) , both sounded excellent.

Horns like universum and trios can start sounding good in a 6m x 5m room and start getting better after that. As do Bill's swings. They will probably sound good even in a smaller room.

So in short in a medium room they might sound alright but you won't really hear their true potential

Speakers like Diesis are not exactly these type of horns, and can sound better in a smaller room.

General's Pnoes are in a very big challenging room and they sound great close up in that room as well, but I think they might create bass issues in small rooms. Cannot be sure as I haven't heard in a smaller room. Same with Pietro's yamamura, it is in a very big room but we listen to it sitting at 4m

Bass solutions in horns differ, but all the good ones I have heard have big drivers and mouths.

Hybrids like duos and horns symphony can sound good in smaller rooms, though bigger ones like Liszt really need extremely large rooms for the drivers to align..

And yes, the scope of good horns is extremely small and mostly bespoke.

There are other sensitive speakers like vintage tannoy, Altec, the devores, which are alternatives to horns that lets one use low watt amps and can have large drivers, coherency, and flow and tone. They usually have some sort of compromise to extremely good expensive non efficient alternatives but I would prefer them as they would do most music better at a very low price in an average room. The extremely good non efficient alternatives would require a lot of investment and good acoustics treatment to get that orchestra sounding better.

I am writing on the mobile in a train on the way to compare Allnic 7000 with Ypsilon phono and Lyra atlas on kuzma XL4 and a Lampi GG1 at dctom

Universums don’t fit your previous definition of what you call a horn. The bass is not horn loaded but some kind of reflex or aperiodic design.
Trios are only full Horn I’d you use basshorns but even those are hybrid as they are too short to go very low and become DSP boosted conventional radiators at the lowest octaves.

Genersl’s PNOE are not horn loaded in the highs and same is true for all single driver, back loaded systems.

True horns then would be Klipschorn and sibling La Scala, big Voltis, AC Symphonia, JBL Hartsfield, JBL Paragon, Tune Audio Anima (I think bass is a horn), maybe Tannoy Westminster. My La Boheme doesn’t quite fit your criteria because there is no front horn on the midbass driver so it is largely direct radiation.

IMO, it is a horn speaker if most of the design is horn loade (not just the tweeter range) and has well above average sensitivity because of that loading. I don’t really consider our Dynamikks speakers as horn speakers because only the tweeter is horn loaded but they share a lot of traits with horn speakers thanks to tweeter horn loading and high overall sensitivity.

 

[morricab]

Neither pnoe nor yamamura which are backloaded are compact.

The other thing in horn consideration is how many drivers. The multiway ones are difficult to make. Gian would ideally like a multi way but no good one exists that he likes, especially at a reasonable price. I would be quite happy with either the universum or Tang's Cessaro like he has set it up.

Full rangers are usually compromised. There is only one good Yamamura left and that's my favorite speaker and the pnoe sounds great only when set up like the General, and it can disappoint even if he swaps one component in the chain to something not matching.

Apart from that I would go two way, like Bill's swings, or make something similar with AER drivers

Cessaro Wagner is an example of a not too large horn that is probably a lot easier to integrate into a room than most horns. My La Bohemes use (I think...no literature exists so it is an educated guess) a TQWT loading, which is a type of horn loading with a conical expansion and some mass loading (giving it a bit of a reflex element as well). This gives a horn loading in a compact space. Both are folded type horns of the backloaded persuasion.

Frontloaded ones like Klipsch or JBL Hartsfield tend to be quite large

 

[bonzo75]

Universums don’t fit your previous definition of what you call a horn. The bass is not horn loaded but some kind of reflex or aperiodic design.
Trios are only full Horn I’d you use basshorns but even those are hybrid as they are too short to go very low and become DSP boosted conventional radiators at the lowest octaves.

Genersl’s PNOE are not horn loaded in the highs and same is true for all single driver, back loaded systems.

True horns then would be Klipschorn and sibling La Scala, big Voltis, AC Symphonia, JBL Hartsfield, JBL Paragon, Tune Audio Anima (I think bass is a horn), maybe Tannoy Westminster. My La Boheme doesn’t quite fit your criteria because there is no front horn on the midbass driver so it is largely direct radiation.

IMO, it is a horn speaker if most of the design is horn loade (not just the tweeter range) and has well above average sensitivity because of that loading. I don’t really consider our Dynamikks speakers as horn speakers because only the tweeter is horn loaded but they share a lot of traits with horn speakers thanks to tweeter horn loading and high overall sensitivity.

If that's the definition of the hybrid then I include hybrid in my horn definition. My definition of. Hybrids was unos, duos, horns symphony, Liszt, and Acapella violon types where the bass is active closed cone to match up to the speed of the top horn.

 

[bonzo75]

Cessaro Wagner is an example of a not too large horn that is probably a lot easier to integrate into a room than most horns. My La Bohemes use (I think...no literature exists so it is an educated guess) a TQWT loading, which is a type of horn loading with a conical expansion and some mass loading (giving it a bit of a reflex element as well). This gives a horn loading in a compact space. Both are folded type horns of the backloaded persuasion.

Frontloaded ones like Klipsch or JBL Hartsfield tend to be quite large

The Wagner was extremely disappointing. I got to compare it to orangutan O96 in a large room with airtight el34 and the 10w 300b with the top airtight phono and the tenor phono and the brinkmann balance. While the devore was much superior, I would get any non efficient cone speaker like B&W over Wagner any day

 

[Audiophile Bill]

I don't use hybrids as horns when I am describing

Yes Brad beat me to it.

But without wishing to be anal, even many bass horns aren’t loaded all the way down. As I said loading down to very low nether regions is a difficult task due to physics. There are some examples but mostly diy. Our Scandinavian friends often build such monsters.

For whatever reason I discount a tapped bass horn from my full horn definition.

 

[tima]

I don't understand all of it but this a good discussion. Thank you.

 

[bonzo75]

I don't understand all of it but this a good discussion. Thank you.

No point without a lot of listening, and even then it won't help. Otherwise all DIY horn builders would have built good horns with the amount of theory they know. You just need to stumble on someone who has experimented enough and got it right

 

[tima]

As I said loading down to very low nether regions is a difficult task due to physics.

Do low frequency compression drivers (the diaphragm?) tend to be relatively large in diameter? Or is it mostly the throat/mouth size. I'm trying to get a better handle on the 'physics' you mention - longer wavelengths and the mechanical to acoustic 'interface'.

No point without a lot of listening, and even then it won't help. Otherwise all DIY horn builders would have built good horns with the amount of theory they know. You just need to stumble on someone who has experimented enough and got it right

Yes, good point, particularly about the listening. Here in the states we grow up with conventional designs, planars and stats. I probably can't appreciate the case(s) you guys are making without more listening than there is opportunity - some but not much.