State of the industry - Roy Gregory Editorial

[PeterA]

I just read PeterA thread on DDK equipment and “shock and awe” no expensive power cords?
Do you have power cord insurance? Cuz if you do, you could always use a little more Expensive one !Am I right or am I right or am I right, right, right, right?”

At ddk’s, there is right, righter, and rightest.

 

[christoph]

It's Ned Ryerson's birthday.

Binnnnggg

 

[marty]

There was the Hill Plasmatronic speaker in the 1970s that actually had a Plasma midrange/tweeter! I think it went down to around 700Hz...good luck getting a plasma to cover the whole range without burning down the house!

Forget the house. I'm surprised I don't have a brain tumor yet from all the time I listened to those at shows. The smell of ozone in those rooms was overwhelming.

 

[tima]

Am I right or am I right or am I right, right, right, right?”

Turning the ball over, it says: The Answer is Cloudy."
I'm using ching-chang.

 

[marty]

Why let a 57 page thread die? So to compare state of the industry, here are the first speakers ever made, western electrics

Beautiful album!

 

[KeithR]

To keep the thread going I propose the industry has split into two separate areas
low cost highly technically highly components which most people can afford
and Uber expensive components which some are real state of the art representations and others improvements of questionable technical significance which are hard to justify on any technical or subjective basis

What’s funny is Uber luxury high end components have worse resale than the value oriented Schitt stuff, Holos, etc.

 

[awsmone]

What’s funny is Uber luxury high end components have worse resale than the value oriented Schitt stuff, Holos, etc.

It’s probably actually quite understandable, they have high quality to value ratios, and there are more people who can afford these products competing for them, so they are snapped up quicker

 

[awsmone]

Turning the ball over, it says: The Answer is Cloudy."
I'm using ching-chang.

Bing

 

[microstrip]

Forget the house. I'm surprised I don't have a brain tumor yet from all the time I listened to those at shows. The smell of ozone in those rooms was overwhelming.

A good friend has listened to speakers using an Acapella ionic tweeter and tells everyone that it had the best treble reproduction he has listened by orders of magnitude. I find it a fascinating device - in some sense it is the perfect massless driver.

 

[awsmone]

A good friend has listened to speakers using an Acapella ionic tweeter and tells everyone that it had the best treble reproduction he has listened by orders of magnitude. I find it a fascinating device - in some sense it is the perfect massless driver.

Little potted history on plasma speakers

https://www.psaudio.com/copper/article/the-once-and-future-tweeter/

 

[SlapEcho]

Little potted history on plasma speakers

https://www.psaudio.com/copper/article/the-once-and-future-tweeter/

Interesting article! Thank you.

Coming from an electrical and mechanical background I've thought about it quite a bit and seriously think there's plenty of room for improvement in this field. There has been a lot of advancement in material sciences in the last decade which could be applied to plasma loudspeaker technologies.

 

[dcathro]

A good friend has listened to speakers using an Acapella ionic tweeter and tells everyone that it had the best treble reproduction he has listened by orders of magnitude. I find it a fascinating device - in some sense it is the perfect massless driver.

I have heard the Lansche plasma tweeter on many occasions - ! have several friends who have them.

They are definitely the purest, cleanest and quickest driver that I have heard.

 

[morricab]

A good friend has listened to speakers using an Acapella ionic tweeter and tells everyone that it had the best treble reproduction he has listened by orders of magnitude. I find it a fascinating device - in some sense it is the perfect massless driver.

Heard them many times as well as Ion tweeters used in Lansche speakers. It is very pure but still the integration into the whole design is more important I would say.

 

[rbbert]

Heard them many times as well as Ion tweeters used in Lansche speakers. It is very pure but still the integration into the whole design is more important I would say.

This has always been my problem with Acapella and Lansche; the frequency spectrum covered by the tweeters is astonishingly well reproduced, but the speaker systems as a whole felt disconnected and unsatisfying.

 

[MarcelNL]

the plasma tweeters I dabbled around with (DIY) were nowhere near loud enough to do much for any speaker with decent efficiency (let's say 100dB/W/m). time aligning them with the FR woofers was also difficult as the arc tends to twist (and shout) around a bit. They do sound clean and fast indeed! Nice concept, I ditched it after too many molten parts and too little SPL to show for.

 

[Lee]

I loved the technology of the Lansche speakers but I never felt it sounded good. Pretty hard to beat a well-engineered soft dome tweeter.

 

[Verastarr]

Anyone care to debate why our audio industry shows are NOT the "Same old $hit" in a different more "special" box ? Im not here to fight , just to see if anyone has an argument that can stand up. I say the latest ridiculous priced gear is a hoax, a sham. Exponential prices for exclusivity only. Fake pumped MSRP, Horrible resale value, and borderline contempt for the buyers.

 

[PeterA]

Anyone care to debate why our audio industry shows are NOT the "Same old $hit" in a different more "special" box ? Im not here to fight , just to see if anyone has an argument that can stand up. I say the latest ridiculous priced gear is a hoax, a sham. Exponential prices for exclusivity only. Fake pumped MSRP, Horrible resale value, and borderline contempt for the buyers.

Asking this question and making those comments may not start an argument, but they do upset the conventional thinking and will likely get some pushback. It’s a worthwhile conversation to have.

I agree with you that the prices are ridiculous, but I recently spoke to a manufacturer who assures me his prices for machining have become equally outrageous. And this is for a product that is not about bling but about mass and lots of metal. Prices have certainly gone up and parts availability is an issue. I think getting the engineers and workers is a problem to. Manufacturers are selling less at higher prices to stay in business.

I also think the high prices are so that the dealers and distributors can offer big discounts. Makes everyone happy.

 

[Gregm]

(...) I recently spoke to a manufacturer who assures me his prices for machining have become equally outrageous. And this is for a product that is not about bling but about mass and lots of metal. Prices have certainly gone up and parts availability is an issue.

I was told the exact same story and facts bear it out: parts availability is down and prices have soared (aluminium is up by ±100%, apparently, and certain diodes have hit 6-7x their original prices...).
This of course explains the increases -- but what about the original high asking price?

I also think the high prices are so that the dealers and distributors can offer big discounts. Makes everyone happy.

Interesting point, makes sense

 

[ddk]

Anyone care to debate why our audio industry shows are NOT the "Same old $hit" in a different more "special" box ? Im not here to fight , just to see if anyone has an argument that can stand up. I say the latest ridiculous priced gear is a hoax, a sham. Exponential prices for exclusivity only. Fake pumped MSRP, Horrible resale value, and borderline contempt for the buyers.

Depends by what you mean by same old shit, there were some great old shows at Alexis Park and we’ve had some incredible gear in the past too you need to be more specific about the old
david