What I thought. Townshend and the one you tried are different, but it sounds like they produce the same or very similar effects. Whenever this happens- different implementation, same result - I always take this as confirmation we are on the right track. In this case, the track is telling us frequencies too high to be heard as such nevertheless somehow affect the character of sounds at much lower frequencies.
Townshend Maximum Supertweeters
Yes, Maximum. I don’t come up with the names, I just review the stuff, okay? ;) And I got em because everyone keeps telling me I should, and once again they are right. Whew! That was easy!
Kidding! We will now laboriously delve into why you cannot live without these tweeters, that you can’t even hear.
For sure I can’t. My hearing rolls off somewhere north of 15k. If that. These things extend to 90k. Why? What difference can it possibly make?
Who knows? And since when has that stopped me?
So out they come and what have we here? Two heavy black bricks, with a screen on the front and a couple binding posts on the back. In between the posts is a little knob you use to turn them off and set the levels. On the bottom are rudimentary rubber dimple feet. Guess I was expecting Pods or something, this being Townshend. No such luck.
They go on top of the Moabs. Well there is already a BDR Shelf on top, and a HFT dead center right where this thing is supposed to go. Moving HFT even an inch changes the sound so executive decision, the Maximum Supertweeters go just outboard of the HFT. They are first just placed there not even connected, just in case this somehow messes with the sound. It doesn’t.
Okay so now you need to know my system is all messed up. No, not the usual mess I mean really seriously messed up. No turntable. Chris Brady has the bearing for some resurfacing and stuff. So we are slumming with the heavily modded Oppo. Not to fear, Ted Denney sent me some of his latest Atmosphere X (review to come) which with the right tuning bullet the Oppo now sounds....digital. Oh well. KBO.
The usual: Demag. Warmup. Listen a while. Hook em up. What level? Who knows? Moabs are 98dB. How ya gonna know anyway? How can it even matter? How do you even set the level of something you can’t hear? Level 3, good as any. Plug em in. No change. Not the slightest peep out of these things. Total dud. Knew it. Sit back down.
What the...? No way. There is not the slightest hint of top end coming from these things. They may as well not be there at all. Except the whole presentation is somehow different. Top to bottom. No way!
I get up and turn the black magic off. Sit back down. Crap. Flat, grainy, digital. Turn em back on. Deep, liquid, analog.
No, not analog like my turntable. They are just supertweeters after all not magic. But way more analog than it was. More dimensional, more solid, more liquid detailed. More black between the notes, and in the black it is now easier to hear the natural acoustic decay. I do NOT want to go back to listening to CD without this! I cannot wait to hear it with my table.
And I haven’t even had time to get them dialed in yet!
Kidding! We will now laboriously delve into why you cannot live without these tweeters, that you can’t even hear.
For sure I can’t. My hearing rolls off somewhere north of 15k. If that. These things extend to 90k. Why? What difference can it possibly make?
Who knows? And since when has that stopped me?
So out they come and what have we here? Two heavy black bricks, with a screen on the front and a couple binding posts on the back. In between the posts is a little knob you use to turn them off and set the levels. On the bottom are rudimentary rubber dimple feet. Guess I was expecting Pods or something, this being Townshend. No such luck.
They go on top of the Moabs. Well there is already a BDR Shelf on top, and a HFT dead center right where this thing is supposed to go. Moving HFT even an inch changes the sound so executive decision, the Maximum Supertweeters go just outboard of the HFT. They are first just placed there not even connected, just in case this somehow messes with the sound. It doesn’t.
Okay so now you need to know my system is all messed up. No, not the usual mess I mean really seriously messed up. No turntable. Chris Brady has the bearing for some resurfacing and stuff. So we are slumming with the heavily modded Oppo. Not to fear, Ted Denney sent me some of his latest Atmosphere X (review to come) which with the right tuning bullet the Oppo now sounds....digital. Oh well. KBO.
The usual: Demag. Warmup. Listen a while. Hook em up. What level? Who knows? Moabs are 98dB. How ya gonna know anyway? How can it even matter? How do you even set the level of something you can’t hear? Level 3, good as any. Plug em in. No change. Not the slightest peep out of these things. Total dud. Knew it. Sit back down.
What the...? No way. There is not the slightest hint of top end coming from these things. They may as well not be there at all. Except the whole presentation is somehow different. Top to bottom. No way!
I get up and turn the black magic off. Sit back down. Crap. Flat, grainy, digital. Turn em back on. Deep, liquid, analog.
No, not analog like my turntable. They are just supertweeters after all not magic. But way more analog than it was. More dimensional, more solid, more liquid detailed. More black between the notes, and in the black it is now easier to hear the natural acoustic decay. I do NOT want to go back to listening to CD without this! I cannot wait to hear it with my table.
And I haven’t even had time to get them dialed in yet!
133 responses Add your response
I decided to try supertweeters in my main system and ordered the Taket Batpro2s which I received yesterday afternoon. Like the Townshend’s they allow for adjustment, in this case 0 thru 4. I have them placed on top of my Daedalus Argos V2s in line with the 2 Argos tweeters that sit "one over the other" . The Batpro2s don’t come with cables so I ordered Anticables Level 2.1s speaker cables ( I may upgrade the cable as I go along). My front end is digital - Mojo EVO DAC, SimAudio 260DT transport, Wadia 171i transport . Thus far I only have about 7 hours with the Batpro2s in my system but to my ears they add some extra body/weight across the frequency range. I am still experimenting between the settings but none of them create brightness or glare, nor have the converse effect of dulling the sound. YMMV. I can’t comment on how these compare sound-wise to the Townshends as I have not heard those. What I will say is that if your budget doesn’t allow for the price of the Townshends, or you want to lessen your experimental cash outlay you might consider giving the Taket Batpro2s a try. The total cost for the Batpro2s along with the separate Anticable purchase was roughly $700. |
What will it be? Past or future? Tyranny or freedom? In every revolution there is one man with a vision. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=deq6_p47g54 |
jasonbourne52631 posts06-14-2021 7:20amThe capacity of Humans for self-deception is apparently unlimited - Mr. Spock the Vulcan ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ haha Richard Gray dug out from his stash room a pair of *super tweeter ribbons* Tag on rear is Pyramid Loudspeaker Corp, So i gave thema shot , to see if they out shoots his Magnovox 1963 tweeter horn which is IMHO probably the best tweeter ever made. So hooked them up, ha!, sounded so weak and thin, maybe 82db, These things from what I am told sold for like $4k a pair and some were actually sold. I wouldn;'t give a dime for em. I just got my AMT chinese Neo's in, $70 a pair, says 98db. HA! again lucky if these things are 90db. Thats 8 db off from what I was hoping. Again, the Magnovox horn tweeter is the benchmark, the gold standard, the top dawg to out shoot. . Honestly i really do not believe there is a tweeter that will surapss the Magnovox horn, made in 1963 right here in the USA. China can NOT make quality speakers, It is impossible, They do not have the engineering. But they sure make the world;'s finest opamps for digital. |
Here's an interesting test if you own these supertweeters, or even another brand. I've seen several comments on this thread questioning the audibility of the supertweeters because of our limited ability to sense or hear very high frequency information. Well, one contributor here said that Max Townshend advised that he reverse the polarity be swapping the leads. I emailed Max and asked why. He said that it gives a feeling of airy spaciousness, which is pretty much the response I expected after many times hooking up interconnects incorrectly. I tried it today with music I know well; first correct phase, and then inverted. Inverted phase was clearly unfocused whereas correct phase sounded focused with clearly defined images. For me, this clearly proves the audibility of the contribution made by the supertweeters. I already knew what they were doing, but I think that this could be a good test for doubters. |
Whatever limit there is, it has to be well above 20k. Probably above 40k and maybe twice that. This article explains why. http://www.townshendaudio.com/PDF/The-world-beyond-20kHz.pdf Part of the story is even though we don't hear such high frequencies as such, we do have specialized cells within the ear canal that do detect and respond to them. Instead of hearing it as a distinct tone it seems this is used to tell us information about the source and character of the sound. It makes sense because if a dry twig snaps or a leaf crumbles and you can tell from the sound it was a tiger and not a mouse, well the one you can eat but the other can eat you and so if you are not a pretty good audiophile hey you, out of the gene pool! Ideally you want to know this even without having to think about it. I have seen studies showing the response to seeing a snake is so fast it cannot possibly have time to travel up the neurons all the way to the Neo-cortex and back, the reflex had to have been triggered further down like in the brain stem. Down to where you literally do not even have time to think. So like that. |
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I used Townshend Maxs for several months--they do indeed add atmosphere and improve the soundstage as advertised. Front firing they added a bit of "glare," however, and seemed to give me a headache. I switched to rear-firing, aimed upwards at the ceiling corners, after lots of experimentation. Eventually I switched to Audiokensis Sound Generator Horns that aim toward ceiling corners behind the speakers as well. They sounded more natural to my ears and in my system they helped the high end on my full-range speakers. Both products are excellent and the best choice depends on the rest of one's system. |
The effect in terms of the resulting sound is similar. The Supertweeters lean more to improved presence and drive, Schumann more to the smooth liquid side. Both improve imaging and depth. But the similarities end with the way they work. Supertweeters are acoustic, SG electromagnetic spectrum. But, yeah. The same only different, as the French would say. |
They don't really "blend" in the sense of a normal tweeter, because the output from these is almost entirely too high to hear. They use a switch with 5 levels. The first two are I think 4dB increments, the top three are 2dB. Something like that. So you don't hear it as a tweeter, and none of the normal effects one would expect actually happen. Imaging, for example. Normally one would expect it to be ruined by adding a tweeter so far apart. If the output was in the tweeter band it almost certainly would. But in this case the output is so high it is not heard as a discrete source, not heard at all even, and so imaging actually improves. There is a point where if I turn them up too much certain things take on a harsh character. Cymbals go from ringing and sizzling to grating. There's a sense of more air and presence but also this harsh edge. Moabs at 98dB are pretty sensitive speakers, but Townshend makes them to go with horns, some horns can go to 104dB, so it makes sense the Level 3 mine are at is about right. Even though they don't blend in terms of tone, there is still some work to do getting them down closer to tweeter level where they will probably integrate better. Hard to imagine the imaging getting even better, but we will see! |
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facten, When I owned and used the Townshend super tweeters they seemed to add a level of air or spaciousness that was not obtainable by my speakers. Once I installed the Focal Sopra 2's they added the same amount (or perhaps more) of the same qualities that I heard with the super tweeters. I just didn't think the Townshend's added anything more to the Sopra's. ozzy |
Not technically "SuperTweeters" - but during the last 14 months I spent a LOT - I mean a LOT of time in the listening room tweaking gear. I was given a pair of Heil ESS air-motion tweeter/drivers many years ago. They were used in a pair of DIY main speakers mounted in (essentially) boards with two Dynaudio 8" drivers mounted both above and below them. Completely open baffle - zero crossover used - there were subwoofers in his system. I disassembled it all when I got them and saved the tweeters. During the pandemic (having a lot of free time to tinker) I set them on top of a pair of old Boston Accoustics A40 Series 1s. Amazing. Sat them on top of some B&W 686s2's. Amazing. Sat them on top of a pair of Klipsch REF IV RF62 Tower Speakers. I've never LOOOOVED these towers, but they served well in my basement surround sound system. Adding the Heil ESS tweets to the top - revolutionized the system. The Klipsch are powered by a MAC6700 and the ESS Tweets driven by MC250. The openness and airiness - the detail. The soundstage. I've heard amazing speakers - been in the pro audio game my entire life (I'm 50) and even though this seems like a band-aid to a marginal pair of speakers - (Head's up: It IS) - I have never heard something I love more than this setup. I'd spend tens of thousands to achieve what I've got in the basement theater. We've been shut for a year - so I didn't believe myself. As the world opens back up, my friends have come over to listen. I asked them to sit down and listen. Don't just tell me it sounds good because they think that's what I want to hear - tell me what you REALLY think. Each and every one of them suggest it's the best setup they've ever heard (these are not audiophiles, so weight opinion as you see fit). I recommend highly experimenting with "things" like super tweeters. Just because you can't hear above 20kHz doesn't mean a driver (and source music) being able to go way up there - doesn't still give your head, your ears and your body some "feeling" that it's there. We search for subwoofers that can extend to 20Hz and below - because you can "feel" the bass down there. I think the human body can perceive it. Headroom. I added (I know, gasp) a JBL EQ between the output of the preamp and MC250 to tame the ESS's a bit in certain frequencies I found a touch harsh. "CUT" only - no boost anywhere in the chain. I have to tell you, it's magical. |
Having a relatively small listening room I decided against upgrading my existing speakers as upgrade meant buying something even bigger !! So bought myself a set of supertweeters some time ago and recently the podiums - I'm on my way to a one make system - er Townshend ..... might get there before MC, but I wouldn't bet on it. Max suggests connecting the supertweeters out of phase, I use setting three/four for most of my listening. |
I would like to understand more why they shouldn't be placed on the top of the speaker, or what the tradeoffs are by doing so? Townshend's video shows them placed on top and doesn't mention doing otherwise.For the exact same reasons isolation works, if micro vibrations can be lessened as much as possible, hopefully it will improve the sound. Well at least to me it makes some sense - have I tried it? No but I'm willing. |
Thanks, that is precisely the issue! Andrewkelley just PMd me with his succinct review and analysis of his newly setup DBA: "Holy F---n F--k. This is awesome." He has a fine career in reviewing ahead I can see. The point is this (DBA) is another one where people measuring the wrong thing keep thinking they can get there with EQ. Inevitably they are able to believe this only until they actually experience the DBA. Then, well read his review again. I keep coming back to this article. http://www.townshendaudio.com/PDF/The-world-beyond-20kHz.pdf There are some fascinating parallels here that I am trying to figure out. For example, doing a DBA has taught me that really low bass is mono. Yet at the same time it is with a DBA highly localized. How? Low bass is really just volume, with no location. Higher frequencies are highly localized. The only thing I can think of is our brains seamlessly integrate the two without our being aware of it. Anyone who has experienced bass in my system, probably any system with a DBA, will experience it as seamlessly integrated into the holographic sound stage. It is all but impossible to fight the illusion of bass being stereo. It isn't. But it sure seems like it is. We need better measurement. Until we get it, the ears have it. |
After reading all of the posts above, many with knowledgeable reasoning that supports the belief that these supertweeters can't really work as they claim to, and as I experience them, I reminded of that saying that goes something like "If the measurements don't support the experience, you're measuring the wrong thing." Maybe that's the issue. |
antigrunge2-
The germaine issue here is that old geezers can‘t hear above 12 kHz if they are lucky to even get that far. Yet they can tell when a supertweeter with a 15kHz cutoff is present and the effects are wholly beneficial. Go figure what to measure for starters.For sure. Listening to Hotel California (Hell Freezes Over) last night, the bass thump at the beginning has such definition it is like you hear and feel every individual oscillation of the note. Then after a couple times a conga drum doubles up on it and it is so clearly two individual drums. Heard this a million times and the tone of the additional drum was there but not to this degree of separation. There is now going on in my system a number of things each of which contributes to unraveling and highlighting the unique individual character of each instrument. They all have their own timbre, that unique set of resonances and harmonics that distinguishes one from another. The supertweeter is another one that somehow teases out even more detail. A must have for advanced audiophile listening, indeed! |
Sorry stereo5, but it is so depressing. There are much worse things than hearing loss at high frequencies. Tinnitus, for example. If all you have is a rolloff at the top end that is actually quite benign. Sure you can't hear certain things but it really doesn't interfere all that much. There is an old audiophile expression, sins of omission are better than sins of commission. A speaker that rolls off - at either end - is better than a speaker that is too bright or boomy. The one that is missing your mind can fill in the blanks but the one that is adding you have no choice but to endure, and this gets tiresome a lot worse and faster. Similar sort of thing happened with the Supertweeters last night. I turned the level up from 3 to 4, the same effect of improved imaging, greater natural detail, etc only more of it- and now also with more shine and air. Cymbals shimmer more. But now on 4 it occasionally veered a bit into having a harsh edge. Where on 3 it was never like that. In fact on 3 the sound is even more liquid than with them turned off. On 5 forget about it. 4 seemed perfect except every once in a a while, 5 no way. But even though 4 was largely better most of the time than 3, when it was bad it was additive bad. Sins of commission. Much worse than the other. We will see what happens when they are moved around. Early days. Lots to learn. So many tweaks, so little time. Oh well, we are getting older, the body is going, but on the other hand maybe we take fewer things for granted and appreciate what we do have more, eh? |
If it is the MElody amp reviewed here: 6moons audio reviews: Melody Hifi M880 its a few years old but probably quite good having been given a blessing by the late John Potis. I sought his advice and he graciously provided that back when I was doing my last big system upgrade and considering going back to Ohm Walsh speakers at the time. Good guy, straight shooter, very knowledgeable, good ears! |
The germaine issue here is that old geezers can‘t hear above 12 kHz if they are lucky to even get that far. Yet they can tell when a supertweeter with a 15kHz cutoff is present and the effects are wholly beneficial. Go figure what to measure for starters. My take is simply that harmonic overtones, and CD does cover harmonics up to 22kHz, have a profound impact on the perception of the base notes, the exact nature of which requires measurements not yet invented. To anybody prepared to listen carefully, supertweeters, and particularly on digital, are a must for advanced audiophile listening |
Yes, I know all that stuff. Learned back in my impressionable youth. Since then it has been demoted to stuff nice to know but of little consequence. Really only useful in internet arguments where the person never risks being confronted with reality. My listening room, for example. That is where the Nyquist theorem meets the road, and slides right into the ditch. Along with a lot of other meaty sounding sound bites that turns out in the end to be pure word salad. https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367 Read the comments. This is where the rubber meets the road. If there was a Great Audio Theorem Graveyard this is it. This is where they all go to die. Not all of them. Tubes, turntables, symmetrical speaker placement, they all thrive, they are going gangbusters. Nyquist, he OD'd on Nyquil. The comb filter died, replaced with the TC brush. Visitors welcome. Encouraged, even. Guaranteed to be an ear-opening experience. |
I'm far less impressionable than you insinuate. The 44.1k is in reference to the Nyquist theorem, i'll assume you're familiar with it. Despite being a postulate more than a theorem, it continues to govern the slope of digital filtering applied to the sample frequency. As such Redbook CD's have ZERO frequency content above 22khz. Supertweeters can offer no added value to them. Analog - different story all together. |
Still not getting it. Some engineer, or marketer, told you something, the number 44.1 stuck in your head, and now it is still stuck there even after new information comes along that should have you questioning the validity of all you have been told. Yes I am deliberately being provocative. That is my job. To try and get people to think. For themselves. Not at all easy, but the great thing is it sometimes feels like I have the field all to myself. No no no I know that is not true. But it sure feels that way. I mean, just look up ^ pure wrote regurgitation, with an insult thrown in for good measure. An insult, for the record, is not an argument. |
Not only digital, but based on the chart none of the instruments listed produce sound in the range above 20khz either which is one of the reasons why redbook CD was designed the way it was and most systems only shoot for out to 20khz. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/8b/4a/6f/8b4a6fd7b8d65711eed41850a194284e.jpg So there is not even any music there above 20khz for the transducer to reproduce regardless of format. Just noise. Maybe with a synthesizer or a dog whistle. Looks like the fishing hole is empty over 20khz so if you catch something up there it isn’t a fish. |
Understood, and agree. Convert is a better term here than recover. My assertion is that a supertweeter could only provide an improvement when the mastered sample rate exceeds 44.1, where the filtering can be applied more gently and allow some of the hypersonic frequencies to remain. It couldnt provide any improvement with 44.1khz-mastered CD's, because there is no hypersonic signal content on the CD. Analog - totally different story, but i do digital 100%, and most high res digital is a misrepresentation, so I'm not seeing how supertweeters provide any enhancement at this time for an all digital setup. |
Miller Carbon. Maybe my question wasn't well phrased; I'm not questioning our ability to hear ultrasonic content, or the effect it might have on the 20-20k frequencies. My question asks "isnt (all) the ultrasonic content stripped out in the A-to-D conversion, and if so how would a supertweeter recover what was stripped out"? |
Yes most hifi over the years including digital is designed to work well from 20 hz to 20khz the standard range usually considered appropriate for human ears. Anything above that is even more of a potshot than that extreme already may be. A lot of potentially fatiguing noise can occur naturally in that range so that is something worth considering case by case....how much better sound versus noise as a result. Also if the device has response down to 10khz then it would seem best applied in systems that can use a boost in that upper range which with music is where "air" occurs. The result would likely be a sense of more "air" and perhaps a tad more "pierce" in that case which many might find desirable in some cases. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/8b/4a/6f/8b4a6fd7b8d65711eed41850a194284e.jpg A sound meter and some white noise played into the device should be all needed to determine the effects at least in the typical human audio range up to 20khz. I would think some using it might want to consider an active crossover for it to blend it in properly for best/flat response similar to adding a subwoofer. As mentioned above, another consideration is more high frequencies will always result in a smaller soundstage (higher frequencies are more directional) unless the device artificially disperses the high frequencies in some way. Whether that is a good or bad thing also will vary case by case. Focal speakers tend to deliver more "air" than many in my experience, so would tend to think a supertweet with Focals in general is not the best pairing. Maybe still perhaps for some of us with older ears who are most likely to benefit from a 10Khz+ frequency boost? |
That is why I can’t wait to hear with my turntable. Digital does indeed have the so-called brick wall cutoff. Yet it does indeed work with digital. Analog has no such restriction. Really looking forward to it. Also look forward to the day more people put as much effort into trying to read and understand as they do trying to not read and understand. Not picking on you, you might well be truly trying to understand. Even though you seem not to have read the linked article, which would answer at least some of your questions. Maybe it’s just me. Maybe I am just an exceptionally good reader. The following lines from the paper linked above caught my eye: Did you get that? Only a small amount of our hearing comes from these frequency responding cells. We seem to understand their function. The vast majority of cells however, we do not understand their function at all. How is it audiophiles are anything less than fascinated by this??? |
Interesting observation, Ozzy. My previous Talon Khorus looked like a 3 way but they always told me no they are a two-way with a Supertweeter. Thought it was just marketing, bragging about their tweeter going higher. It was a metal dome, not ribbon, so I doubt it went up into the 90kHz region where the Townshend works, where the magic seems to happen. But now I wonder if maybe even though it didn't extend that high it did go high enough to get a little taste, and maybe that is one of the reasons I liked them so much? |