Clearwave Speakers?

Mapman,

The Clearwave was actually designed around the Accuton drivers. NOT the RAAL. The Accutons were chosen for the open effortless midrange, speed, detail, bass slam and control. Find me a better driver than the Accutons for midrange presence. Better yet, do a search of all the speakers employing the Accutons for bass/mids and check their price.....usually in the $20k range.

The reviewer hounded on the RAAL, but maybe because he simply likes it. Who really knows? Reality is the Clearwave was designed around the dual Accutons and was originally designed and built with a silk dome tweeter. The Clearwave was not built around the RAAL, or even the tweeter for that matter. Quite the opposite. Read the review again, it was clearly the reviewer's take on his love for the RAAL, not reality of the design. Despite this, the RAAL really is that good and does warrant highlight. Just don't let it overshadow the rest of the speaker which was designed as a no-holds barred attack at state of the art.

The internals, cabinet and everything else in the speaker are anything but inexpensive. In fact I think you would find most of the internals reserved for speakers with a price tag far north of $10k or even $15k. At $7200 this speaker is not inexpensive, but not outrageous either.

I don't want to get into an uncomfortable debate, just sharing my knowledge of this fantastic speaker and I wanted to correct your assumptions.

Acurus,

Noted. THanks.

The reviewer in this case seemed off the mark to me in his approach.

I am not familiar with details of the Accuton but have heard some good things and have read where RAAL ( or perhaps even just ribbon tweeters in general) may not be well suited to a large 2-way full range design in general, ie other drivers, in the case of a 2-way design like this the bass driver(s), will be tasked to cover the midrange to a greater extent perhaps than with other tweeters?

This makes sense to me based on recollection of various designs using ribbon tweeters that I have heard over the years.

The ones using ribbon tweeters that seem to do better to me in terms of midrange presence along with the rest are smaller two ways with limited bass extension and larger 3 ways. ALso perhaps planars using larger ribbon tweeters like Magnepan, but that is a whole different ballgame.

I am glad to see that someone was able to come to the defense of the design! I would like to hear these sometime.

I have seen 3 way RAAL designs (Philharmonic speakers) that report very impressive flat frequency response. Are there frequency response charts for the CLearwaves available? That would probably alleviate any concerns somewhat in lieu of actually hearing.

Last RMAF I was very interested in buying this very speaker. I was able to spend about an hour with them by myself in the Wyred4Sound, with my music.

My impression was that they are a smooth and refined sounding speaker, but ultimately too laid back for my taste. If that's the sound you're looking for, these do it very well. But I was hoping for something a bit more lively and energetic sounding ... so I went a different direction.

J_fav, those speakers were not broken in, they later changed a lot. I do not find them laid back.

Nothing wrong with sound being somewhat "laid back". I've heard many great sounding systems that are, probably the majority. That also often translates to less fatigue, longer listening sessions, and more enjoyment in the end. ALso probably healthier for the ears over the long haul. Could be an advantage with the Clearwave that goes along with the name? YMMV.

Brian, in your gorgeous but I would assume also quite lively sounding log home/room, you might never have to worry much about laid back sound!

I recall once in college taking my original OHM Walsh 2s, which were notoriously laid back, to a rental log cottage for a week during spring break and the sound there was suddenly breathtakingly in your face (which worked well for a bunch of college kids on spring break) and no longer laid back! Totally different presentation!