Why not horns?


I've owned a lot of speakers over the years but I have never experienced anything like the midrange reproduction from my horns. With a frequency response of 300 Hz. up to 14 Khz. from a single distortionless driver, it seems like a no-brainer that everyone would want this performance. Why don't you use horns?
macrojack
I just read my above post and discovered some very poor wording. I said that Duke and Jonathan are manufacturers of small scale loudspeakers. What I should have indicated is that they are limited production, not small scale. From what I've read, they both are well regarded, well received and quite popular state of the art options.
You can have my horns when you pry my cold, dead hands off of them. :-)

So many generalized statements about horns, kind of like the ones we horn guys make about monkey coffins and other boxes.
Maybe someone should start a thread about why people settle for cone and dome boxes.
Let's not be adversarial about this. Any speaker is a legitimate option. Horns are being rediscovered after years in P.A. oblivion. The process has been slow because of bias born of popular myth and actual poor performance. Now there are legitimate contenders for best available sound honors to be found in the horn community. My effort here is to open the door to consideration for horn designs among the broader audiophile membership. Those who choose to ignore the invitation to consider horns have their reasons. That's fine. Some of them may reconsider, however, if they see intelligent conversation endorsing the choice. That is what I hope we are doing with our comments.

Did I mention that horns will bring a level of excitement to movies that conventional audiophile speaker designs cannot ever match? It's true. That's why movie theaters still use horns even though they have the technology and budget available to install any other type they might want.

If you are getting a little bit bored these days, if your last few system changes just haven't lit you up, then maybe you are tired of your speakers' limitations. That's what I've heard from several guys I've talked with recently. It happened to me too. Check out the horn speakers a lot more carefully next time you attend an audio show. Maybe you're fun will come back to you through a megaphone.
Herman... My thoughts are along the lines cited by Apollo66.

Sorry, I can't give you a list of all the horns I have heard. And, since 1958 I never owned one. (It was then that I discovered their performance with horn music Dixieland Jazz). Based on what I did hear along the way I never saw any reason to do further investigation of horns.

Perhaps the new generation of horns are different. However they are too expensive. A technology that requires such cost is inferior.

To cover the full spectrum...
I can't stand horns.
Ported box speakers make good bird houses.
Acoustic suspension speakers are OK.
Line array speakers are good
Planar speakers are the best.

Have I failed to insult anyone out there? :-)
"To cover the full spectrum...
I can't stand horns.
Ported box speakers make good bird houses.
Acoustic suspension speakers are OK.
Line array speakers are good
Planar speakers are the best."

Just for fun, I'll add fuel to the fire and assert that omni Walsh drivers are the best.

I've owned planars and various box designs. Never horns. Horns are new territory I might explore someday.