Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,346
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Hi Carolyn,

Can you please inform us what kind of caps are you cureently using for the Genesis 1.2 xovers? . . .

Are you (still) offering the woofer amps (only) in class d? . . . Are customers - who like me do not like class d amps - allowed to order non class d amps with the Genesis 1.2 loudspeakers? . . .

Are there any advantages - from a musical point of view - in your and Gary's view by using class d amps for the bass towers?

+1
 

carolkoh

[Industry Expert] Member Sponsor
Sep 17, 2010
907
226
955
Seattle, WA
www.genesisloudspeakers.com
Hi Carolyn,

Can you please inform us what kind of caps are you currently using for the Genesis 1.2 xovers?

Proprietary caps - made for us in the USA by Reliable Capacitor - we use few branded caps - Salesmen always try to get Gary to try/use their company's caps, but you know what, it really stinks after two years of development and you are ready to go into production, you make an order, they accept, then short you and tell you "Oh sorry, not making that one anymore, you can apply the credit to your next order."

Are you (still) offering the woofer amps (only) in class d? I am using the non class d amps that Paul designed for Arnie. Are customers - who like me do not like class d amps - allowed to order non class d amps with the Genesis 1.2 loudspeakers?

Hard to condense 10 years of Gary's design philosophy and development of the Genesis Class D amplifier into a few short paragraphs. I'm going to guess that you've not read any of the reviews we've had over the years or interviews with Gary about his design and musical philosophy. In short - Yes, our servo-bass amps are class D - No, we do not make any other type of Amp with a servo-bass circuit and all our amplifiers are class D. But follow below...

Are there any advantages - from a musical point of view - in your and Gary's view by using class d amps for the bass towers?

Basically - Gary has managed to create a Class D amplifier with an "analog" sound. With all the advantages of Class D - quiet, efficient, no heat issues, replacing tubes, etc. etc. He can explain MUCH better as he's the designer - I'm all about the sound and musicality - he uses me to do test listening during development as I am a trained musician and have perfect pitch - and he watches my reaction as I listen to a piece of music I am familiar with. "No goose bumps? Bah! Not good enough."

We have a video front and center on our website : http://www.genesisloudspeakers.com/ In which Gary's explains his design philosophy. It's got pretty pictures of the last G1 we built and party shots too - some denizens of this forum visited, so you might recognize some people.

Best,
Carol
 

Audiocrack

Well-Known Member
Aug 10, 2012
2,175
687
1,158
Proprietary caps - made for us in the USA by Reliable Capacitor - we use few branded caps - Salesmen always try to get Gary to try/use their company's caps, but you know what, it really stinks after two years of development and you are ready to go into production, you make an order, they accept, then short you and tell you "Oh sorry, not making that one anymore, you can apply the credit to your next order."



Hard to condense 10 years of Gary's design philosophy and development of the Genesis Class D amplifier into a few short paragraphs. I'm going to guess that you've not read any of the reviews we've had over the years or interviews with Gary about his design and musical philosophy. In short - Yes, our servo-bass amps are class D - No, we do not make any other type of Amp with a servo-bass circuit and all our amplifiers are class D. But follow below...



Basically - Gary has managed to create a Class D amplifier with an "analog" sound. With all the advantages of Class D - quiet, efficient, no heat issues, replacing tubes, etc. etc. He can explain MUCH better as he's the designer - I'm all about the sound and musicality - he uses me to do test listening during development as I am a trained musician and have perfect pitch - and he watches my reaction as I listen to a piece of music I am familiar with. "No goose bumps? Bah! Not good enough."

We have a video front and center on our website : http://www.genesisloudspeakers.com/ In which Gary's explains his design philosophy. It's got pretty pictures of the last G1 we built and party shots too - some denizens of this forum visited, so you might recognize some people.

Best,
Carol

Thanks Carol for your reply.
 

Al M.

VIP/Donor
Sep 10, 2013
8,676
4,465
963
Greater Boston
Ron, what a great review, your writing is really enjoyable and more informative than the usual. And congratulations, Audiocrack, on such great systems!

I am wondering if the lighter and more forward tonal balance, with greater treble energy, on the La Assoluta might be due to the speakers being driven by SET amps (while the nominal sensitivity of the speakers is high at 96 dB). When amps start to run beyond their natural output the tonal balance of the sound may tilt, and as reported, the listening volume was rather loud.
 

Audiocrack

Well-Known Member
Aug 10, 2012
2,175
687
1,158
Ron, what a great review, your writing is really enjoyable and more informative than the usual. And congratulations, Audiocrack, on such great systems!

I am wondering if the lighter and more forward tonal balance, with greater treble energy, on the La Assoluta might be due to the speakers being driven by SET amps (while the nominal sensitivity of the speakers is high at 96 dB). When amps start to run beyond their natural output the tonal balance of the sound may tilt, and as reported, the listening volume was rather loud.

Thanks Al for your kind words. I think you have a point in this regard that the presentation of my se Gakuoh is more direct or upfront than my pp Gakuoh. You could say that the latter is more "gemütlich" in its presentation.

So I believe that the combination of a single ended triode amp (LA) versus push pull amp (G 1.1), digital (LA) versus analog (G 1.1) and lastly the different presentation of a cones loudspeaker (LA) versus a planar loudspeaker (G 1.1) explains Ron's comments. Furthermore please keep in mind - as Ron mentiones in his description - that he is less familiar with cones loudspeakers than with planars as he listened to the latter type of speakers for many years. Lastly, my LA's might not yet be fully played in yet and we need more time to realize their full potential.

Believe me, the Tidal LA's are phenomenal loudspeakers but of course in the end personal taste dictates one's final judgement.
 

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,346
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Thank you very much, Al!
 

GaryProtein

VIP/Donor
Jul 25, 2012
2,542
31
385
NY
Except for woofers, cones are for ice cream. :D
 

bonzo75

Member Sponsor
Feb 26, 2014
22,434
13,467
2,710
London

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,346
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Possibly due to the dispersion of the round ribbon tweeters I did not hear the Genesis to project solo vocalists with as clearly defined an image as I hear from MartinLogan, Rockport, Wilson or Analysis Audio speakers. The solo vocalist image on the Genesis is a little bit diffuse. (The reward for this issue, if it even is an issue at all, is that the off-axis listening range is a lot wider than other planar speakers I have auditioned. Exactly as Gary Koh promises the Genesis can be enjoyed by more than one person in the “sweet spot.”)

I would be very interested to get Gary's thought on this. Is it correct that the dispersion of the ring radiator tweeter has a tendency to make a solo vocalist image less clearly defined, in deference to a wider listening area?
 

Mike Lavigne

Member Sponsor & WBF Founding Member
Apr 25, 2010
12,467
11,363
4,410
Ron and Audiocrack,

I was traveling last week and just got around to reading this thread.

Ron,

great write-up and very objectively done, which is so hard to do with 'uber' system's such as Audiocrack's. it is difficult to get past the sensual overloads that happen in such systems and be able to sit back and get analytical.....of maybe even not a generally recommended approach. but you seemed to pull it off with aplomb. Bravo! I 'got' what you were saying......which told me as much about the complicated person you are as much as those 2 world class super systems. which is what happens when we encounter a system. listener + system = result.

Audiocrack; it seems I know a little more about both your wonderful systems; which, of course, are living, breathing, labors of love for you.

and great to read about the experience from you both.

thanks.
 

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,346
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Ron and Audiocrack,

I was traveling last week and just got around to reading this thread.

Ron,

great write-up and very objectively done, which is so hard to do with 'uber' system's such as Audiocrack's. it is difficult to get past the sensual overloads that happen in such systems and be able to sit back and get analytical.....of maybe even not a generally recommended approach. but you seemed to pull it off with aplomb. Bravo! I 'got' what you were saying......which told me as much about the complicated person you are as much as those 2 world class super systems. which is what happens when we encounter a system. listener + system = result.

Audiocrack; it seems I know a little more about both your wonderful systems; which, of course, are living, breathing, labors of love for you.

and great to read about the experience from you both.

thanks.

Mike, Thank you so much for your kind words! I am thrilled that you liked the review!
 

MadFloyd

Member Sponsor
May 30, 2010
3,076
774
1,700
Mass
Ron,

Great review! I look forward to reading many more. :)
 

Detlof

Member Sponsor
Nov 5, 2015
307
3
0
Thank you Ron! Examplary and beautifully written. Look forward for more.....
 

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,346
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Thank you very much, gentlemen! I appreciate the support!
 

GaryProtein

VIP/Donor
Jul 25, 2012
2,542
31
385
NY
I would be very interested to get Gary's thought on this. Is it correct that the dispersion of the ring radiator tweeter has a tendency to make a solo vocalist image less clearly defined, in deference to a wider listening area?

I don't recall exactly where the crossover points are on the G1.X series, but I believe they are similar to what I have set on my IRS-V, which is 106 Hz and 4700 Hz with 12 dB/octave slopes with PassLabs XVR1 crossovers.

This essentially means that practically the entire vocal range comes out the midrange ribbons and only sibilants come out the tweeters and the very deepest vocal bass notes come out the woofers.

A soloist from dipole line source ribbons is sometimes more diffuse than direct radiator cones, but I would rather sacrifice a little on vocal soloists that I rarely listen to in order to have orchestras and large ensembles sound fuller and more three dimensional. For me that's a very small sacrifice.

Regarding off axis listening, the IRS and Genesis sound very similar everywhere in the room (but not sitting in a chair with your head against a wall). I will say you cannot sit too close, and Gary Koh states in his set-up instructions, you must sit far enough back so everything will integrate. I sit about 21 feet from the speakers. Some people like to sit closer.

I tend to sit a little farther away for large ensembles (21 feet) and a little closer (15-16 feet) for string quartets. When listening to an orchestra, I like to be transported to the concert hall and I like to bring the string quartet into my living room.
 
Last edited:

garylkoh

WBF Technical Expert (Speakers & Audio Equipment)
Sep 6, 2010
5,599
225
1,190
Seattle, WA
www.genesisloudspeakers.com
Ron,

Thank you for an excellent balanced and objective review that is also a fabulous read. I concur with your review - including the point about the slightly diffuse image of the solo vocalist.

I've been to a couple of "live" recording sessions where I managed to snag the live mic feed and the mixed and unmastered digital files. In no case have the imaging been as sharply delineated as the audiophile's preference. Hence, this sharply delineated image is not one of my design goals. Even with a string quartet, listening unamplified live does not give as clearly delineated an image as what I can imagine as an audiophile.

With my designs, you can achieve that by toe-ing the speakers and pointing them at your ears. However, this massively reduces size of the sweet spot and it becomes a speaker for one person. You also lose the ability to sit anywhere in the room and enjoy your system. Hence, again not one of my design goals. You would be better served with a pair of speakers designed to be toed-in (but then your wife and you won't be able to enjoy the music equally together). Because of the dispersion pattern, the imaging also suffers when the room is too narrow.

This is not due to the design of the Genesis tweeters. Audiocrack's older Genesis 1.1 probably has Arnie's round ribbons. The Ring Radiator I developed a few years ago, and it has better dispersion. Neither will help with this center image as the frequencies of the imaging are much lower. The tweeters operate much higher in frequency - in the sibilance frequencies and up.

Upper bass/lower midrange is not 200Hz to 400Hz. Middle C is 261Hz. What you hear as "body" and "richness" should be in the range of 80Hz to 200Hz.

With line-source loudspeakers, because the line-source only radiate horizontally and does not disperse vertically, you do not get the floor-boundary reinforcement that comes as a result of floor bounce. Even with a thickly carpeted floor (which absorbs the higher frequency but reflects the lower frequencies) you will get this reinforcement. With my designs, the servo is fast enough not to muddy up when the low-pass is set to higher than 110Hz. Hence, for customers who desire this additional richness, we can create a up to 6dB "hump" from 100Hz to 180Hz by adjusting the low-pass frequency. I don't know what frequencies the woofers of the other speakers mentioned are crossed-over at, but I doubt that they would be much above 100Hz given their size. What you are hearing is the floor-boundary reinforcement of the mid-bass driver. (Wavelength of 110Hz is 10 feet)

This cheatsheet for a mixing engineer gives you a much better idea of the frequencies involved with music:
http://www.threepbeats.com/equalization/understanding-frequency-bands/

If you can make it to CES, we'll have the 2-tower Genesis Forte line-source loudspeaker on demo.
 

garylkoh

WBF Technical Expert (Speakers & Audio Equipment)
Sep 6, 2010
5,599
225
1,190
Seattle, WA
www.genesisloudspeakers.com
I have heard the Genesis at Gary's warehouse. Despite being a massive space, it needed a lot of distance for the lobing to go away. The way you could tell full integration had happened was by going forward and back. If you heard a tonal change, then you were too close. I have done the same test with a number of other array type speakers and the issue is the same for all of them.

Ha! This proves that Amir has better ears than Carolyn and I put together. He heard the custom narrow-wing Dragons, and since it was a custom order, I had to take special pains to be sure that the narrow wings and hence modified crossover did not lobe more than the standard-sized G1.

Neither Carol not I could hear any lobing as close as 6 feet away with any sort of music. We had to get up to 3 feet to hear any lobing with music. Using a steady-state sine wave, I do hear some lobing at 6 feet, but that's only at specific frequencies. Since the speakers are 7 feet tall, I doubted that any one would use them at less than 6 feet.
 

garylkoh

WBF Technical Expert (Speakers & Audio Equipment)
Sep 6, 2010
5,599
225
1,190
Seattle, WA
www.genesisloudspeakers.com
Hi Carolyn,

Can you please inform us what kind of caps are you cureently using for the Genesis 1.2 xovers? No Duelund silver caps (at all) I believe?

Are you (still) offering the woofer amps (only) in class d? I am using the non class d amps that Paul designed for Arnie. Are customers - who like me do not like class d amps - allowed to order non class d amps with the Genesis 1.2 loudspeakers? I am asking because a speaker like eg the Gryphon Pendragon is using non class d woofer amps to apparently great effect.

Are there any advantages - from a musical point of view - in your and Gary's view by using class d amps for the bass towers?

Thanks and kind regards.

I make sure that you can't hear the amps - hence the point does not matter anymore. The crossover/servo system is now driven at the same point as the midrange/tweeter crossover. I then have to ensure that the servo system has the same sound as my mid/tweet crossover.

Since the Pendragon has the woofer amp driven in parallel with the amp driving the midrange/tweeter, the sound of the woofer amplifier might be different from the sound of the midrange/tweeter amplifier.
 

Detlof

Member Sponsor
Nov 5, 2015
307
3
0
I've been to a couple of "live" recording sessions where I managed to snag the live mic feed and the mixed and unmastered digital files. In no case have the imaging been as sharply delineated as the audiophile's preference. Hence, this sharply delineated image is not one of my design goals. Even with a string quartet, listening unamplified live does not give as clearly delineated an image as what I can imagine as an audiophile.

That made fascinating reading for me. I run to every live string quartets I possibly can and I absolutely concur with the above. This may be the reason that I often did not take to many electronics that rate high in audiophile esteem. What i mostly missed also were aura and bloom around the instruments. Does not as yet seem possible to reproduce, possibly also because razor sharp image presentation seems more often than not the preffered design goal. Wonder if I am right in this. Just a hunch.
 
Last edited:

bonzo75

Member Sponsor
Feb 26, 2014
22,434
13,467
2,710
London
I haven't heard the Genesis, but I think Stats and ribbon panels do the best reproduction of live solo and small ensembles, vocals and strings. Stats are focused while ribbons not as much. So I am bit ambivalent to that imaging, but there is more to it than the imaging that gives realism. And if you add SS to stats it is more focused, with valves it is less, and I am quite happy with valves, especially those like Jadis which are even less focused. For orchestra, I loved the imaging of Trios with bass horns on an orchestra, where I could see different instruments. I think the whole picture balances out and I don't focus on one aspect like imaging
 

About us

  • What’s Best Forum is THE forum for high end audio, product reviews, advice and sharing experiences on the best of everything else. This is THE place where audiophiles and audio companies discuss vintage, contemporary and new audio products, music servers, music streamers, computer audio, digital-to-analog converters, turntables, phono stages, cartridges, reel-to-reel tape machines, speakers, headphones and tube and solid-state amplification. Founded in 2010 What’s Best Forum invites intelligent and courteous people of all interests and backgrounds to describe and discuss the best of everything. From beginners to life-long hobbyists to industry professionals, we enjoy learning about new things and meeting new people, and participating in spirited debates.

Quick Navigation

User Menu

Steve Williams
Site Founder | Site Owner | Administrator
Ron Resnick
Site Co-Owner | Administrator
Julian (The Fixer)
Website Build | Marketing Managersing