[OzarkTom]

I too worry about the metal drivers. I have never liked them since the mid 80's.

[roscoeiii]

We will see what A Jones can do with them. Man makes some fine speakers and sure he had his reasons for that choice. Time will tell.

[genjamon]

He describes why he chose the metal drivers in that video.  In the earlier minutes of the video, as I recall.  I was only half-listening while at work, but I recall one reason he gave was that their material resonant characteristics weren't in the audio band, so wouldn't muck with their output.  I'm sure there's more to it than that.  Watch the video - maybe I missed something else about them.

[Jonathon Janusz]

Danny, out of curiosity, with folks discussing the coaxials developed for the new Elac models and your reservations about metal drivers, are there any coaxial drivers out there currently that you do like?  I know the p-audio drivers did well but are now long gone, but I'm interested to know if there is anything you like out there right now either in the pro-audio space or among the more domestic/audiophile marketed coaxial drivers?  I just have in my head that a GR designed speaker with a good 'smaller' coax and a pair of 8" servos could be a really good speaker that would fit well in a lot of spaces.  An evolution of the V2, sort of.

[Danny Richie]

Danny, out of curiosity, with folks discussing the coaxials developed for the new Elac models and your reservations about metal drivers, are there any coaxial drivers out there currently that you do like?  I know the p-audio drivers did well but are now long gone, but I'm interested to know if there is anything you like out there right now either in the pro-audio space or among the more domestic/audiophile marketed coaxial drivers?  I just have in my head that a GR designed speaker with a good 'smaller' coax and a pair of 8" servos could be a really good speaker that would fit well in a lot of spaces.  An evolution of the V2, sort of.

Funny that you asked that.

I have been developing a new coaxial driver. Samples are now ready to be sent. So I will have them here for testing shortly.

[mlundy57]

Smart move. Develop your own driver and you won't have to worry about the manufacturer discontinuing it, or selling the company and leaving you high and dry.

[Doublej]

Smart move. Develop your own driver and you won't have to worry about the manufacturer discontinuing it, or selling the company and leaving you high and dry.

Is Danny manufacturing his own drivers or just developing one to be manufactured by someone else? In the latter case you still have to get someone to manufacture it or not so sell the company to a new owner that wants to take it in a new direction, drop you as a customer or decide that they are not making enough money on it  and jacking the price up significantly.

[Danny Richie]

Is Danny manufacturing his own drivers or just developing one to be manufactured by someone else? In the latter case you still have to get someone to manufacture it or not so sell the company to a new owner that wants to take it in a new direction, drop you as a customer or decide that they are not making enough money on it  and jacking the price up significantly.

The drivers that GR Research offers (besides the BG drivers that we stocked and sold) are all proprietary drivers that I designed and had made. I bring them in 500 to 1000 units at a time. So I know I have some control over the things you just mentioned. It also helps me keep the retail prices lower than any competitors. 

[Jonathon Janusz]

Funny that you asked that.

I have been developing a new coaxial driver. Samples are now ready to be sent. So I will have them here for testing shortly.

Nice!  Can you share any more details yet?  I'm picturing either a 6.5" or 8" diameter, treated paper, polycarbonate frame, maybe neo magnets, and either a dome tweeter or a poly diaphragm compression tweeter, two versions of cone - high and low Q for either box or OB, and a swappable tweeter back cap either closed off for boxed use or molded open with a proper waveguide for OB.  A coaxial version of the no holds barred M165 or maybe its big brother. 

[Russell Dawkins]

The level 1 mod doesn't change anything about the original design. It retains Andrew's voicing and design. The only addition is the small cap that by-passes the tweeter resistor. It lefts up the rolled of highs a little. That's it. Nothing else changes about the design. It short it just offers improved clarity, imaging, and resonance control.

And it's a cheap upgrade. $76.

I differ with this statement. Lifting the treble is not retaining Andrew's voicing and design. It is changing it.

Do you not think the treble roll-off was a design decision on Andrew's part? Do you not call that changing the voicing?

[Danny Richie]

I differ with this statement. Lifting the treble is not retaining Andrew's voicing and design. It is changing it.

Do you not think the treble roll-off was a design decision on Andrew's part? Do you not call that changing the voicing?

First of all, the answer to your last question is no. Lifting the rolled off top end is not a voicing change. The voicing or tonal balance of a speaker takes place much lower in range.

As for your second question. No, I do not think the rolled off top end is part of Andrews design decision. No one would take a tweeter with a flat response and deliberately roll off the top end. No designer says hey, let's hurt the imaging of the speaker by suppressing the spacial cues in the top octave. It is an issue with that particular dome tweeter.  In fact, in the Youtube interview that someone posted a link to Andrew identified it as being a problem with dome tweeters. I don't agree with that statement. I don't see rolled of top ends being a dome tweeter problem but is does happen with some dome tweeters and in particular the one he choose for the Elac speakers. He further commented how the new tweeter used in the coaxial design, that  he is now releasing, doesn't have the rolled off top end problem. 

[maty]

ELAC B5 Debut Series 5.25" Bookshelf Speakers by Andrew Jones

-> http://noaudiophile.com/ELAC_B5/

The standard grill giving a full body 1-2dB smother from 2k on up, and the tweeter grill is limited to about 11k on up.. but I found subjectively it messed with the sound a lot more than is indicated in this graph.

This response looks very good, +-2dB for all of the important parts I can measure reliably (700Hz and up). The dip centered at 900Hz appears to be a reflection from the stand I had the speaker on because it does not show up in other measurements including the close driver results as seen above. Below 700Hz we can see the mess my room makes of the speaker, but it does give us an idea of the bass extention. We can see here it's comfortably down the 50Hz, while the close driver measurement of the port above shows it putting out good bass to 40Hz...

Very well debut but it is a debut. Better to wait for the new series of concentric speaker I think, or future Danny Ritchie's concentric or ... if you want to listen very good recordings, properly interpreted. For current commercial music, so badly recorded, little to object

[devinkato]

Funny that you asked that.

I have been developing a new coaxial driver. Samples are now ready to be sent. So I will have them here for testing shortly.

Any news on these?  <holding breath>

[corndog71]

Any news on these?  <holding breath>

I wouldn't recommend holding your breath.  Danny's great but he has a bad habit of getting guys pumped up over a new design many months before they actually become available.

[drewm]

Any news on these?  <holding breath>

I don't think you should get your hopes up either. Coaxial speakers are extremely difficult to design when attempting to target a flat frequency response. The tradeoff in designing the woofer cone to actually be good at midrange frequencies vs be a good waveguide for the tweeter is something pretty much all coaxial speakers to date have failed at. If a flat frequency response is what you're looking for, Danny's current designs cannot be beat. If it's great off-axis frequency response that you're looking for, any of Danny's designs due to his low selected crossover points also cannot be beat. A coaxial would be even better at time alignment off-axis sure, but at a tradeoff of a less flat frequency response and significantly increased cost due to manufacturing complexity.

I do think Danny may have some unique tricks up his sleeve, but you still have to overcome physics.

[Danny Richie]

Measurements of the prototypes look real good and the response is very smooth. We even used a few tricks to minimize any loading of the high frequencies in the throat. Samples are coming with my next batch of M-130 and M-130/16 woofers. 500 of them are about to hit the water on their way over and the coaxial samples are coming with them.

[Coldfusion]

Yes, he's an actual designer!

It's funny, in that interview Andrew talks about the roll off problem of the tweeter on the Debut that Danny's level 1 mod fixes.

[gregfisk]

It's funny, in that interview Andrew talks about the roll off problem of the tweeter on the Debut that Danny's level 1 mod fixes.

That is correct and a good point. I don't know why Jason gets off on being so disrespectful to people with his one liner nonsense.

[Wind Chaser]

I don't know why Jason gets off on being so disrespectful to people with his one liner nonsense.

+1

[maty]

[Review] Elac Debut B6 loudspeaker by Herb Reichert

-> http://www.stereophile.com/content/elac-debut-b6-loudspeaker

Measurements:

-> http://www.stereophile.com/content/elac-debut-b6-loudspeaker-measurements