kenjit,
It’s not like you are bringing up a problem that designers of time/phase coherent speakers have never considered. Obviously, any good speaker designer going for time/phase coherence is going to design with those problems in mind.
This is why Thiel, for instance, designed and manufactured their own drivers specifically suited for their goals. Their last midrange driver was a marvel of engineering, and purportedly extended up to around 20kHz with good linearity. (I forget the specs for the tweeter but I remember they were amazing too). Not to mention all the specific engineering put in to specific voice coil designs, motor systems for low distortion, etc.
I’ve owned many speaker designs, and auditioned many, and the Thiel 2.7 and 3.7s are simply the most coherent I’ve ever heard especially in the mids to treble (and exceptional from mids down in to bass). As well as being super smooth. They were very highly lauded in review after review for incredible clarity, smoothness, neutrality, dynamics etc.
Whether the time/phase coherence gives an advantage is one thing (I can only say the Thiels image with a specificity and density that I’ve rarely heard before). But the idea that other design parameters must necessarily be sacrificed to achieve it, in terms of the overall performance or sound, doesn’t seem to be true. (As John Atkinson also said after being very impressed when measuring the Thiel 3.7s).
It’s not like you are bringing up a problem that designers of time/phase coherent speakers have never considered. Obviously, any good speaker designer going for time/phase coherence is going to design with those problems in mind.
This is why Thiel, for instance, designed and manufactured their own drivers specifically suited for their goals. Their last midrange driver was a marvel of engineering, and purportedly extended up to around 20kHz with good linearity. (I forget the specs for the tweeter but I remember they were amazing too). Not to mention all the specific engineering put in to specific voice coil designs, motor systems for low distortion, etc.
I’ve owned many speaker designs, and auditioned many, and the Thiel 2.7 and 3.7s are simply the most coherent I’ve ever heard especially in the mids to treble (and exceptional from mids down in to bass). As well as being super smooth. They were very highly lauded in review after review for incredible clarity, smoothness, neutrality, dynamics etc.
Whether the time/phase coherence gives an advantage is one thing (I can only say the Thiels image with a specificity and density that I’ve rarely heard before). But the idea that other design parameters must necessarily be sacrificed to achieve it, in terms of the overall performance or sound, doesn’t seem to be true. (As John Atkinson also said after being very impressed when measuring the Thiel 3.7s).