Sanders Sound Systems - electrostatic

[Angela]

One more thing. In that you tube video I posted what tt/cart/arm combo is that.

Sorry, missed this question earlier. Here are specifics :

• Merrill-Scillia Research MS21 turntable ($24,000)
• Triplanar tonearm ($4000)
• Ortofon Jubilee cartridge ($2000)

 

[JonFo]

Wow!

First, kudos to Roger for sharing so much detail in such a clear and edifying manner. If only more posts on audio forums carried this kind of insight and detail, our collective IQ’s would go up rather than down

As a much less capable audiophile and speaker tweaker, I can only bow before Rogers amazing experience and knowledge. But I did want to share my thoughts on some of the topics touched on here.

First, I totally concur with Rodger on the following points:
- Electronic crossovers are a must-have
- You must use enough of and the right kinds of amplification for ESL’s
o IMHO, min 200w on woofers, >800w on panels.
o Low-bass (<60Hz) separated to correctly located subs with own amplification.

It took me the better part of decade to arrive at these conclusions as well; I only wish I had been able to read more of Roger’s writing before then, it would have saved me some time.

On power amplification topologies and specs for ESL’s, Roger is spot on, his amp designs are the best for ESL’s. I have a loooong wish-list of his amps (about 8 of them) that I plan to upgrade my system with. I often wonder why more ESL owners don’t rush to buy these, they are notably superior to pretty much anything else out there on ESL’s.

On hybrid ESL design and trade-offs, I also concur that a full-range electrostat is just too compromised to ever be a viable solution (at least for me). One can achieve pretty seamless integration of Stat and dynamics if using the correct tools (DSP-based speaker processors and bi-amping).

I agree with Rodger on the TL being a much more benign and useful alignment than sealed or vented for a single woofer. And for low-bass, I highly recommend the infinite-baffle alignment (with truly large rear-wave cavity) as being the perfect match to an ESL, as an IB sub has vanishingly low distortion with incredible air movement capability.

Also, I’d suggest that another option for mating dynamic drivers to ESL’s is to look at line-arrays. I did this with my custom center channel, matting a 4’ line array of Adire Extremis drivers with a MartinLogan SL3 panel. From a dispersion characteristic as well as sheer dynamic mid-bass power, this has been a big success. For one, because as a line source, the mid-bass has an SPL decay characteristic that closely matches that of the line-source ESL.

Again, excellent postings Roger and Angela, please keep it up.

- Jonathan

 

[Gregadd]

Jontathan -Did you have an opinion on the narrow sweet spot?
If only I could get Roger West of Soundlabs to come here to discuss his full range electrostatics.

 

[Steve Williams]

Jontathan -Did you have an aopinion on the narow sweet spot?
If only I could get Roger West of Soundlabs to come here to discuss his full range electrostatics.

Have you asked him?

 

[Gregadd]

Steve his site has some basic explanations. I thought tthe invitation might carry more weight from a customer.

 

[Angela]

Wow!

First, kudos to Roger for sharing so much detail in such a clear and edifying manner. If only more posts on audio forums carried this kind of insight and detail, our collective IQ’s would go up rather than down

As a much less capable audiophile and speaker tweaker, I can only bow before Rogers amazing experience and knowledge. But I did want to share my thoughts on some of the topics touched on here.

First, I totally concur with Rodger on the following points:
- Electronic crossovers are a must-have
- You must use enough of and the right kinds of amplification for ESL’s
o IMHO, min 200w on woofers, >800w on panels.
o Low-bass (<60Hz) separated to correctly located subs with own amplification.

It took me the better part of decade to arrive at these conclusions as well; I only wish I had been able to read more of Roger’s writing before then, it would have saved me some time.

On power amplification topologies and specs for ESL’s, Roger is spot on, his amp designs are the best for ESL’s. I have a loooong wish-list of his amps (about 8 of them) that I plan to upgrade my system with. I often wonder why more ESL owners don’t rush to buy these, they are notably superior to pretty much anything else out there on ESL’s.

On hybrid ESL design and trade-offs, I also concur that a full-range electrostat is just too compromised to ever be a viable solution (at least for me). One can achieve pretty seamless integration of Stat and dynamics if using the correct tools (DSP-based speaker processors and bi-amping).

I agree with Rodger on the TL being a much more benign and useful alignment than sealed or vented for a single woofer. And for low-bass, I highly recommend the infinite-baffle alignment (with truly large rear-wave cavity) as being the perfect match to an ESL, as an IB sub has vanishingly low distortion with incredible air movement capability.

Also, I’d suggest that another option for mating dynamic drivers to ESL’s is to look at line-arrays. I did this with my custom center channel, matting a 4’ line array of Adire Extremis drivers with a MartinLogan SL3 panel. From a dispersion characteristic as well as sheer dynamic mid-bass power, this has been a big success. For one, because as a line source, the mid-bass has an SPL decay characteristic that closely matches that of the line-source ESL.

Again, excellent postings Roger and Angela, please keep it up.

- Jonathan

wow, thanks for the kind words, Jonathan and a bigger wow when I followed your link and checked out your HT. Very clever use of old panels for lighting and a wonderful set up. It shows lots of planning and excellent execution. I haven't had a chance to look at the center channel yet, but I will tonight.

whohoo!

 

[Angela]

I believe that I heard this iteration of the Sanders at THE Show in 2009, but I am not sure that it is the same as what HP reviewed. However, I will say that what I heard impressed me greatly, as it did for Marty, although he was not quite as excited as I was. I have been a long-term electrostat fan because of the "nature" of their sound, even though I suspect that this "nature" is not necessarily the truest sound out there. Let me make my bias completely clear- I like this sound because it pleases me, not because it is necessarily the truest. Despite the fact that I owned a set of Wisdom M-75 Limited Edition References (hand picked for response), I must admit that I liked the stat personality better.

Given my bias, I found the Sanders to be among the best sounding stats and least obvious hybrids I have heard yet, and therefore liked them a lot. There is little doubt that they are highly directional and thus you must sit in the sweet spot to get the best results. Granted you can change the angles of the speakers or the size of equilateral triangle as HP says to change the image, but this is still a very socially unfriendly speaker due to a very small sweet spot.

Back in the days when I had an A grade system and room, my friends would joke that there should be a jig like one used for brain surgery in the "correct" position at the sweet spot. I even provided pillows to raise the head height of vertically challenged listeners. They were right and when you had your head in "the spot" magical things happened. Listening with my family was not one of them. When audiophiles came over, we took turns listening and when it was not our turn, we stood and observed the chosen one.

Maybe I am getting old, but this longer works for me. I like people more than my sound system. Yeah, I still choose the correct 3-4 seats in a 500-2000 seat theater when I go to a movie or concert because it is an event and usually there are two adjacent seats that qualify, thus allowing me to be happy in my selfishness for two hours. However, I live with my sound system and listen to music, watch TV and movies with it. I want it to disappear and I want ALL of my company to enjoy the experience.

Simple physics and acoustics clearly demonstrates that for a sound to sound real and thus believable (meaning my brain interprets it as real) the sound wave must START in a phase coherent manner, because that is the way sounds occur in the real world. Through triangulation and parallax of the signals obtained at your ears and eyes, your brain determines its position and you are satisfied that the sound is real and located at a specific position. When the sounds bounce off of environmental obstacles, your brain is able to use this information (phase alterations and time delays) to help understand the environment, thus maintaining the live aspects of the sound. The reason why I enjoy listening to my very phase coherent BG speakers on my deck after the sound winds its way through windows and sliders is because it started out initially extremely phase coherent and thus still sounds real as it emanates from my windows and doors, much like the voice of someone talking standing next to my speakers when I am hearing it from my deck. The difference is I believe that they and the music are in my living room and I am hearing it on my deck. Still quite pleasing since as a non-psychotic person, that was all I expected in the first place.

So unless you are lone listener with a system and environment with a vice-like sweet spot, regardless of how good these speakers are you have to determine your priorities versus other aspects of life.

here's a reply from Roger

[FONT=&quot]Thank you for your kind compliments on my speaker designs. I would like to clarify a couple of points regarding directionality and the size of a speaker's sweet spot.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Understand that all stereo speakers, regardless of their dispersion characteristics, have an infinitely small sweet spot. This is that point when you are exactly equidistant from both the left and right speakers. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]If you are at different distances from the speakers, their sound will arrive at different times. This puts them out of phase to some degree. A precise image can only be obtained when the sound from the speakers are in-phase where their sound arrives at your ears simultaneously. Therefore it is a physical impossibility for any speaker to have a "wide" sweet spot.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Since you cannot circumvent the laws of physics, if a speaker seems to have a wide sweet spot (where the image appears to be identical over a wide area), then that can only mean that its image is flawed. The usual cause of this is that wide dispersion speakers excite room acoustics. This produces a great deal of delayed and out-of-phase information that mixes with the sound from the speakers and confuses the phase information. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Without accurate phase information, the image is degraded to the point that you simply can't tell when you are in the actual, true, sweet spot. As a result, you get a relatively poor image over a wide area. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]In my current speaker designs, I chose to avoid compromise and strive for the most perfect image possible. This required that I eliminate the room acoustics which degrade the imaging of speakers. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]To do so, I took advantage of the precision wave and phase coming off the front of a large, planar panel to direct the sound directly to the listener instead of spraying the sound all over the room, which ruins the phasing (and transient response and frequency response). I note with satisfaction that you found that I succeeded in this endeavor as, "magical things happened" when you experienced the sweet spot of my speakers. This is as it should be.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]I appreciate that some listeners like to share their listening experiences with others and that you like to have guests sit side by side while listening in your home. It is most regrettable that the laws of physics don't allow all side-by-side listeners to be in the sweet spot with any set of stereo speakers -- only the center listener will be in the sweet spot. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]But why should we sacrifice the quality of the image at the sweet spot just because others are listening? Listeners to either side of the sweet spot will never hear an excellent image, so the "chosen one" at the sweet spot might as well hear the best image possible.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]But it doesn't have to be that way. It is possible for multiple listeners to all hear superb imaging. The way to do so is for everybody to sit in tandem instead of side-by-side. Then all listeners can be equidistant from the speakers and therefore in the sweet spot. Let me stress again that this is true for [FONT=&quot]all stereo speakers, not just highly directional ones.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]You may be used to side-by-side seating, but this is not a requirement for social situations. After all, you commonly have passengers in the rear seat of your car where you are in tandem, and you converse easily with them. So why not when listening to music?[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]If you feel that side-by-side seating is necessary, then listeners outside the sweet spot will still hear excellent sound with the outstanding detail only available from ESLs. It is true that the image will not be ideal -- but it is not ideal when listening to any set of stereo speakers when you are out of the sweet spot. The only difference with my directional speakers is that when you are in the sweet spot, the image is so remarkable that you really can tell when you are there. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]I do not feel that the term "head in a vise" is either fair or accurate. Ask any of the hundreds of customers who own my speakers and they will tell you that there is no such sensation or problem. To listen, they simply sit down and relax in their listening chair and listen to music they would with any speaker. There is no sense of needing to locate their head in any sort of precision manner. They just sit down and enjoy the music with the outstanding image quality offered by speakers that eliminate room acoustics.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]In summary, if you want really great imaging that is truly holographic and 3-dimensional, then you must listen at a stereo speaker system's sweet spot. For a single listener, this is no problem regardless of a speaker's dispersion characteristics. Multiple listeners must sit in tandem to hear the best imaging. Side-by-side listening will always compromise image quality with any stereo speaker system, but may be an acceptable trade-off for some social situations.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Great listening,[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]-Roger[/FONT]

 

[amirm]

Roger, thank you so much for you great contributions. You write extremely well. It is so wonderful that you have reasons for what you do, rather than, "I know better."

Question for you: if I am not remembering wrong, I think I read from our resident writer Tom, that such speakers tend to have an exaggerated sense of imaging height-wise. I had not thought about that. Could some of the excellent imaging we hear from such larger surfaces actually be beyond the representations of the original recording?

 

[Steve Williams]

Roger I understand your point about being equidistant if listeners are in tandem and hence in the sweet spot BUT I am not so sure that claim can be made for all speakers, to wit my X-2s as there is only one sweet spot based on how the upper speaker modules are spiked and in which detente position the modules are.

IOW one ideal sweet spot based on speaker module set up but if listeners are in tandem then not as "sweet"

 

[JonFo]

Jonathan -Did you have an opinion on the narrow sweet spot?

As Roger already detailed, all speakers have a limited 'perfect spot', and those that have wider dispersions mask that due to high concentration of room reflections relative to direct sound.

Based on my experiments over a ten year period in my custom-designed HT room, built specifically for my Monolith/Sequel/center setup, I've found that to provide the best soundstage, imaging for electrostats the best option is dampen the energy of the rear wave for several reasons:
- Decrease out of phase energy for improved mid-bass performance
- Decrease reflected, delayed sound for reduction in comb-filtering and a tightening of the soundstage
- Allows front-wave arrival to be louder, cleaner and therefore perceived as the 'primary' signal for more seating locations

The last point is a very important reason why so many ESL setups seem to have the tight 'one small spot', as one has to be placed in just the spot where the front wave arrival dominates the room reflected energy (including that of the rear wave). Moving slightly out of the bubble allows all that reflected energy to collapse the sound field.

But a well treated room eliminates much of that problem, and one can have a several foot wide 'sweet spot', and seats to the sides or ahead or behind are still quite good.

In my room, the entire front wall is treated with RealTraps MiniTrap HF, and the side walls are completely covered with custom acoustic treatments I designed and built, and my Monoliths have incredible imaging in 2ch and that nice wide (relatively speaking) sweet spot. The timing and room mode management is so good, that many recordings sound like they are multichannel, even if only 2ch.

And of course, good room control is a must for multichannel imaging, which to me is a very, very high priority, as I listen to a lot of mch recordings.

 

[amirm]

Angela, I find many of Roger's articles to be of general education value beyond your own specific products. As such, I like to pull up some of the articles into our Technical forum. Assuming you are interested in the increased visibility, we can do that in one of two ways;

1. You help sanitize the current ones by taking away the "call to action" parts ("buy one to try out") and then post them in the Technical section.

2. Or given how generous Roger is with his writing , write new articles of your choosing along these themes and post them there.

Of course, you are welcome to sign them as Roger and your company affiliation.

 

[Angela]

Hi, Amir

Roger tries to educate audiophiles about audio whenever he can, so I am positive that he would support your request. We are so busy right now, but I think we can find the time to accommodate you. Be back in touch soon!

Cheers,
Angela

 

[amirm]

That's great Angela. And I do appreciate that you have a business to run so timing is totally up to you . In case it is not obvious, please tell Roger that even though I did not know him before his contributions here, I have become a fan.

 

[Steve Williams]

Angela, the other thought Amir and I had is to set up a dedicated forum in our Manufacturers forum for Sanders Sound Systems

 

[Gregadd]

I concur Steve.

 

[Steve Williams]

I'll wait to hear from Angela

 

[earlinarizona]

1) I noticed on your very old projects that you had the panels stacked up in a two high, tall configuration. Then one of the subs was a stand alone IMF style, while the other was at the bottom with a long tube going vertical. The question is, does the extra height make a difference since the panels are to focused? Is the sound grander, more room fill or was this done just for more ELS area to produce volume?
2) On these setups did you use additional amplifiers for the top panels or just piggyback off the bottom screens?
3) Would 2 or 3 side by side Model 10's accomplish the same thing? I understand you can lower the xover point to about 100hz but are there any other problems with 2 or 3 wide? You told me some of the advantages on the phone the other week.

 

[earlinarizona]

Panel Size and output question. If I look at a pair of Quad 2905 ELS it has a speaker area of aprox 1350 sq inches and is 27 wide. The King ELS averages about 1586 sq inches and is 28 wide. The Soundlab Majestic has about 3744 sq inches and is 39 inches wide. The Model 10 screen has about 630 sq inches per screen and is 15 inches wide. To equal just a pair of Quads it seems like 2 pairs of the model 10 would be about right and the King is also close to that. Is it that your panels put out so much more then Quad and King? As for the Soundlabs the panels have to do full range so the extra area is needed. Have you actually set up two of your speakers side by side and done comparison.
I have to tell you after being an audiophile for over 30 years and owning most ELS and many box speakers, your model 10 is clearly the best in detail I have heard. At CES and Colorado your sound was the walk away win.

 

[earlinarizona]

When it comes to direct in line listening I was doing it in my car years ago and this is why you can believe Rogers thoughts are right on the money. This makes for some fun reading as I installed a B & W 801 home speaker and all tube amps into my car. BUT BUT the main thing that got it all melded was what Roger talks about. No reflections, Directly sound to the ears. The car even had a laser installed so you would align your listening position with where my ears were when the system was adjusted.
Time Magazine Write-up
http://www.milbert.com/Files/Autos/Earl/time2.jpg
http://www.milbert.com/Files/Autos/Earl/time3.jpg
http://www.milbert.com/Files/Autos/Earl/time4.jpg
http://www.milbert.com/Files/Autos/Earl/time1.jpg

 

[Gregadd]

earlinarizona. You are and wild and crazy guy. We should have a beer sometime.