[marvda1]

If you take three speaker designers, say Dennis Murphy, Joseph D'Appolito, and Albert Von Schweikert and give them the same cabinet and drivers and tell them to design the crossover.
The question is will the three speakers sound the same?
How do you think they would sound differently and in what areas would they sound alike?

[ehider]

I know a little about all of these designers and here is my best guess on how each will approach the situation:

- Dennis Murphy seems to focus more on the on-axis measurements than the plethora of other valuable measurements, like lobing issues and time based measurements (based on the work that I've seen him do). Therefore his speakers may be based more on the overall amplitute measurements of just the on-axis frequency response i.e. one simple measurement. He may use something like a 4th order crossover, which is one of the easisest ways to get a singular one axis flat measurement (but not necessarily the best sounding speaker IMHO). If making a great speaker sound great only required a basic set of frequency reponse measurements..... if it was only that easy!

- Joe may focus more on the sum of the driver's outputs and try to correspond their additive effects of one another with the association of the chosen electircal crossover charactaristics (ever heard of a "D'Appolito configuration"? Guess where that came from?). Joe may also spend more time doing A/B comparisions of various crossover concepts than just trying to "shoot for the best measurements". He's got the best (and most deserved reputation IMHO) of these three deisgners with arguably the most successfull and well praised speakers of the various models offered by many a manufacturer. Experience does count for something mind you!

- Albert Von Schwikert will ask one of his buddies "what do you think we should do?". He won't do any of the deisgn on the crossover based on what I know of him. Albert has been using many creative (and flawed designs) on the unsuspecting public for many years as he trys to figure out "how to do it right". I've been amazed that more audiophiles haven't called him out on this dasterdly tactic. He's had so many variations of his speaker line, with each being proclaimed as "a serious sonic breakthrough", only to completly re-hash or retire a design alltogether in less than 24 months! Now I do think Albert is really focused on bringing great speakers to market. I just don't think he has the depth of knowledge (as he proclaims) nor the experience (execpt with making his customers ginea pigs with 1st/2nd/3rd generation product so he can learn to do it better). BTW: His latest designs that use really over the top cabinets & drivers are sonically very impressive IMHO. Just too damn expensive and hords of prior owners as his "learning curve" to get much respect from this seasoned audiophile!

I'm wide open to any responses from any of the speaker designers called out here. I as an audiophile can only make assumptions based on the prior design choices of each of these deisgners. If they do more than I've assumed (or something radically different) I'd be more than appreciative that they respond to my above hypothosis' of how they would go about designing their chosen crossovers.

[John Ashman]

Albert Von Schwikert will ask one of his buddies "what do you think we should do?".

 

I signed up as a VS dealer once (sound unheard) because of all the hoopla.  I got tired of answering the question "If these VS speakers are so hot, how come those cheap NHTs sound so much better?"  

Back to your regularly scheduled thread.......

[ooheadsoo]

Wait a sec.  You're putting DM down without even giving him a fair shake.

Dennis Murphy has always preferred second order slopes, not fourth, and he always posts the off axis measurements of his original free designs.  He has only used fourth order slopes for drivers that have ringing issues (read metal cones, magnesium etc.) where he needed the steeper slope to supress the ringing.  Critical listening is also important to Dennis.  Dennis has always mentioned that in listening tests, he has preferred his second order implementations when viable.  Many of these comments are on madisound where they routinely disappear after a month (since madisound has no archive) or so, but some of them are on his website as well.  This is not to put down VS (don't know much about this popular commercial designer's actual work and JD, whose rep is sky high amongst those in the know as a pioneer, though not universally acclaimed according to some listener reports - but hey, who is?

[ehider]

Pleeeeeeeeeze, please, please don't get defensive if anyone thinks I'm "putting any of these designers down" here!  IMHO all three of them have brought VERY excellent sounding speakers to market .

I seriously considered not answering this poster's thread because of the how some audiophiles on these forums hold each of these designers in high regard and cannot stand to hear anything potentaly critical . None the less, I would like to ask us all to try to answer the comparitives of all three of these designers against each other (as the thread's author asked us):

  BTW: My last statement of my original response re-iterated one more time below:  

I'm wide open to any responses from any of the speaker designers called out here. As an audiophile, I can only make assumptions based on the prior design choices of each of these deisgners efforts. If they do more than I've assumed (or something radically different) I'd be more than appreciative that they respond to my above hypothosis' of how they would go about designing their chosen crossovers.

[Rick Craig]

If you take three speaker designers, say Dennis Murphy, Joseph D'Appolito, and Albert Von Schweikert and give them the same cabinet and drivers and tell them to design the crossover.
The question is will the three speakers sound the same?
How do you think they would sound differently and in what areas would they sound alike?

I don't know what Albert would do but Dennis and Joe I'm familiar with. The main difference would be tonal balance.

[Rick Craig]

Pleeeeeeeeeze, please, please don't get defensive if anyone thinks I'm "putting any of these designers down" here!  IMHO all three of them have brought VERY excellent sounding speakers to market .

I seriously considered not answering this poster's thread because of the how some audiophiles on these forums hold each of these designers in high regard and cannot stand to hear anything potentaly critical . None the less, I would like to ask us all to try to answer the comparitives of all thre ...

Another thing I'll add is that sometimes the speaker isn't what the designer would build given a choice so it may not really reflect their best work and / or personal preferences. I've seen this happen with both Dennis and Joe when they've designed speakers for others.