Audiophilepure

Throughout the years I auditioned speakers of various drivers count and published my findings on a few flagship speaker systems of the larger physiques with the lowest drivers count, the most meritorious among them being the single-driver, dual-concentric Tannoy Churchill Wideband, the Tannoy Westminster Royal SE, the oversized horn of the Destination Audio Vista and the large electrostatic panels of the Sound Lab Majestic 645. Most noteworthy is the fact that Tannoy’s 15-inch dual-concentric driver was the only one with a solitary dual-concentric driver to exhibit nil excursion playing some of the most rambunctious passages I could muster from my music library. The importance of a woofer’s property of resistance to excursion cannot be overstated for a distortion-free sound, a problem resolved by the electrostatic membrane drive system summarily.

https://www.whathifi.com/speakers/hi-fi-speakers/proac-d20r

he technical highlight here is the use of ProAc’s well-proven ribbon tweeter. This 10 x 60mm design has long been used to good effect in the company’s premium Response range. It has a damped chamber behind the diaphragm to help with dynamics and clarity, and unusually uses an Alnico magnet-based motor system rather than the more fashionable Neodymium alternative on performance grounds. The company makes a slightly cheaper version of this speaker with a capable soft dome tweeter, but in our experience, its ribbon models tend to produce clearer and more insightful results, though they prove more exacting in terms of angling towards the listening position.

The D20R’s 16.5cm mid/bass unit is almost as impressive as the tweeter. It has a woven glass fibre cone, a generous motor system mounted to a rigid chassis and an unusual acrylic phase plug to help even out the response at the top end of its operating frequency range. The mid/bass is tuned by a downward firing port that exits in the gap between the base of the cabinet and the plinth. Such a design is claimed to make the speaker’s bass performance more consistent across a wider range of placements in a room, and that proves true in use, though these floorstanders still need space around them to shine. ProAc claims an impressive 28Hz low-end extension, but doesn’t quote the output level limit at that frequency.

https://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/equipment-reviews/1937-focal-theva-no2-loudspeaker

I was keen to compare the Theva N°2s against my DIY Amigas. The radiating area of the Amiga’s single 7″ Dayton midwoofer is almost exactly the same as that of the two 5″ Slatefiber woofers in the Theva N°2. The two speakers are also similar in their cabinet dimensions. Yet the Amiga manages to have far deeper bass extension. This may be due to a lower resonant frequency of the larger Amiga’s Dayton cone, which allows for a lower port tuning. Doubling up on the woofers gives the Theva N°2 a clear advantage in low-frequency efficiency, but the Amiga can play deeper. This was clearly audible.

The Theva N°2’s more limited bass extension is amply compensated by its warm, pleasant midbass. On “Gold Dust Woman,” the Amigas reached a bit deeper in their rendering of the lowest bass-guitar notes and had greater leg-shaking power in that register. But the Theva N°2s’ bass was warmer and had a bit more punch and texture.

One of the reasons piano sounded so good with the Krypton3X was how seamlessly the notes transitioned from the middle ranges down through the lower registers. At every point in a well- recorded piano track, the notes had a convincing weight and dimension to their tone. The upper midrange transitioning into the treble region was also very smooth to the ear with plenty of detail and resolution on horns, brass, and strings while not venturing into sounding jarring or overcooked. As relatively big as the Amphions are, they sounded like they played even bigger. While they didn’t have an overly large soundstage, they ran with more of a narrower and more focused presentation, the speakers did have a large dynamic capacity. They loved to be pushed, so when the volume went higher, they scaled really well. For me, these speakers were best enjoyed when sitting in the sweet spot. Sitting well off-axis or listening casually while doing other things in the room didn’t quite grab me as some other speakers might. But sitting in my listening chair, things like massed strings played back at volume over the Krypton3X had a scale and dimension to them that was impressive and memorable.

https://www.stereophile.com/content/focal-diva-utopia-wireless-streaming-active-loudspeaker

The analog connection between the preamp and primary speaker did not induce any hum or hash that I could hear, ears close to the speaker and volume cranked up beyond comfortable listening level.

Listeners who like vinyl as well as streaming won’t have to compromise with the Diva Utopia system, except in that the only analog connection isn’t balanced. The same goes for someone with a large collection of CDs they haven’t ripped to a server, as long as their CD player has a TosLink output. The only downside is all those connections, running cables from wherever the turntable or CD player resides to the rear of the primary speaker. In the setup described above, I used a 6′ cable from my phono preamp to the rear of the primary speaker, which in my setup was the right one.

https://www.stereophile.com/content/audia-flight-fls10-integrated-amplifier

With a slightly mellow midbass and a potent, agile bottom end, the Audia Flight isn’t warm in a bloated, nostalgic way, but its sensuous shimmer keeps pulling you in. More than once, I perceived phantom tubes in the system, although my ears also told me that second-order harmonic distortion is reassuringly low.

The FLS10 sounded even more commanding than it looked in my room and on paper (200Wpc into 8 ohms, almost double that into 4). Basswise, the amplifier doesn’t produce slam as brutally visceral as my beloved Krell reference does, but for the first time I’m considering that the Krell may be overly prodigious, and that the Audia Flight has it beat for musicality.

I enjoyed every minute I spent with the FLS10, and every recording I played through it. Its departure will leave a bittersweet void

https://www.stereophile.com/content/mofi-electronics-sourcepoint-888-loudspeaker

The crossover between the midrange and woofers is set to 130Hz; that between the midrange and the coaxially mounted 1.25″ soft-dome tweeter is at 1.6kHz. The tweeter therefore operates over a wider passband than usual. When I interviewed Andrew Jones for my SourcePoint 10 review, he explained that the coaxial unit’s lower-frequency cone acts as a waveguide for the tweeter. The waveguide reduces the tweeter’s excursion requirement, so it can be operated down to a lower frequency than would be possible if it lacked a waveguide. With a waveguide, “the improvement in efficiency or sensitivity and the reduction in excursion more than make up for the fact that you’re crossing over at 1.6k. It enables you to get a very good progressive, consistent off-axis performance,” Jones told me, adding that using a dome with a slightly larger diameter, 1.25″ rather than the usual 1″, with a wide roll surround, provides extra dynamic range capability at the lower frequencies.