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In the Forum: Horn-Loaded Speakers
In the Thread: Canadian Speaker Proposal

Post Subject: Speaker ProposalPosted by de charlus on: 6/22/2013

I am not "working backwards" from a tweeter. I presently use Harbeth M40.1s, but having recently heard the Living Voice Vox Olympian and an Audio Tekne horn implementation of Ale Acoustics drivers, the experiences opened up new vistas of what is possible in audio reproduction; that said, I have no wish to spend $250k on speakers. In short, the driver units I allude to above are the best I have heard within their frequency ranges, and all are drivers best employed in spherical horn configurations with the exception of the plasma tweeter; does this mean that I should simply disregard the excellence of this tweeter and go for a uniform topology across the driver range? I don't see why, simply because such an approach could be challenging.

My own experience with Acapellas is that they are not as great as the sum of their parts; in particular, my perception has been that the tweeter could be better integrated with the MF driver or drivers. This has been MY experience; that you appear to be delighted with your Acapellas can only be a good thing, and I am gratified that you have found speaker nirvana. I have not - at least, not within a reasonable price range - but I assure you that my regard for the Vitavox S2s, AK151s and Ale 45Super, 160Supers is just as high as that for the Acapella tweeter.

"What is wrong" with what I'm listening to now is that when I was auditioning systems about 10 years ago, I went in with a considerable budget and high expectations that orchestral events could be believably reproduced within my listening room, mainly because I had been assured that this was the case by audiophile friends and legion glossy magazines. However, after many, many disappointing auditions of pretty much all extant topologies and most of the Sacred Cows of audio - aside, as it happens, from spherical horns - I alighted upon a system that I thought adequately musical and left it at that, believing that the audiophile's pursuit was that of the Emperor's New Clothes. However, recent experiences have found me thinking otherwise, and after all, just because a Rubik's Cube has inordinate different possibilities, this does not mean that it's difficult to solve - one simply follows a hypothesis to its conclusion. What I wish to do is to take the Cessaro Gamma for my model, substituting Vitavox and Ale drivers for the TAD ones that Cessaro employ due to the (I believe) greater musicality of the former, and using the Acapella tweeter instead of their TAD tweeter. Is it your assertion that mine is a mission doomed to failure because I wish to employ drivers from different manufacturers, because I wish to employ two different topologies (which would be strange, given your enthusiasm for Acapella speakers) in the same speaker, or because what I'm proposing to build is not an Acapella speaker in and of itself?

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