How might the Rhythm Prisms compare to a stand mount monitor? I am thinking something with relatively low sensitivity and big sound from a small container without waveguides (as is popular these days). I know this is a pretty subjective question, but I wondered if anyone had some thoughts on the topic. Just wondered how this might compare to a traditional Scanspeak revelator or illuminator set up, what the advantages are with each approach.
That would be a most interesting clash of philosophies!
The high-end conventional (Scanspeak) approach has the theoretical advantage in best imaging for one, as well as inner detail.
The Rhythm Prism approach has the theoretical advantage in sweet spot width, macrodynamics, and compatibility with a wider range of amplifiers.
That leaves a whole lot of potentially disputed territory: Naturalness of timbre, freedom from listening fatigue, freedom from coloration, bass extension and quality, impact, midrange clarity, coherence, suitability to a wide variety of music, sounds the most like live music, sounds good at a wide range of loudness levels, lets you hear the most variation from one recording to another, and probably a lot of other stuff I can't think of right now.
Now, why would naturalness of timbre be in dispute? Conventional wisdom no doubt holds that a small high-quality woofer and tweeter will sound more natural than a big prosound woofer and horn. Well, my theory is that the reverberant field matters a lot more than is generally appreciated, and my design pays a lot of attention to getting it right. Whether that will tip the scales, I can't say for sure without an actual comparison.
Likewise with freedom from coloration. A horn is inherently a higher-coloration device than a dome or ribbon tweeter, if we look only at the on-axis response. But once we factor in the off-axis contribution, a good waveguide-style constant-directivity horn may end up being highly competitive.
There are some very good conventional-style stand-mount speakers on the market, and it's rather presumptuous of me to expect a prosound-type speaker to compete with them on their home turf. More than likely each speaker would have its relative areas of superiority, leaving the final choice a matter of personal preference and prioritiy to a certain extent. But in my opinion at least (which cannot possibly be biased!!), there's enough uncertainty about the relative merits of the two opposing philosophies in a small-room domestic setting to make a direct comparison potentially quite interesting.
I'd like to hear the thoughts of others who are, theoretically at least, less biased than myself.
