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Why pay so much for super high end?

Most speakers costing $50,000+ use Seas, Scan Speak or Accuton.

In DIY forums most speakers designed use bargain drivers and usually are only 2.0 designs not bookshelf or center speakers to complete a surround system.

I’d love to have a Scan Speak 11 speaker system for atmos with 3 way bookshelves, center and floorstanders.

Why aren’t the designs out there and why are you guys pissing away all your money.

Personally I won’t get an upgrade from my speakers unless it’s of this caliber and neither can I afford nor want to donate money to these thieves.

A 3rd party 11 speaker atmos scan Speak system would be nice but I’m not spending $250,000.

Why on earth aren’t there designs out there for this and why do you all piss away your money?

I don’t get why hi fi isn’t all DIY even honest factory direct companies mark up 300%.

Unless you pull in $1+ million a year and don’t have any time I don’t get it.

Are you guys lazy?

Someone easily could design a great crossover and cabinets for everyone and the days of paying over $3,500 for a pair of loud speakers if you got some time or know a friend who could build cabinets would be over. I know of people who could design cabinets that rival $100,000 speakers and cost less than 1% than that.  Someone with some experience could easily design a diamond, beryllium and soft dome and various versions for various tastes.

I don’t get it. Speakers are so simple.  Crossovers cabinets and drivers.

You guys just throw your money away I don’t understand it why?


funaudiofun
2psyop's avatar
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2psyop
1,558 posts
 
Has anyone (including the OP) seen the cutaway of a Magico speaker enclosure?
Has anyone read about their drivers? I don’t know for sure, but I don’t think anyone can make these kinds of speakers in their basement or garage.

Are they worth the price, I don’t know? But I don’t think there are many DIY projects that sound anywhere near that good?

Am I missing something?
soundsrealaudio's avatar
soundsrealaudio
756 posts
 
The thing about the waves off the back of the driver is that they have an output that is equal to the output into your room. The usual way to deal with that is add MDF bracing upon bracing which adds weight and more weight which lowers the resonance and makes the problem worse.  High resonance is much easier to deal with. Ping on a wine glass, to shut it down you merely touch it with your finger. That won't happen when you rap on a larger and heavier pan for example. Take out the 12" woofer from a speaker and you can see how vulnerable they are. 
Ideally to deal with resonance a speaker should be small and light. Or as small as possible and still maintain enough volume to load the drivers. 

The other advancement that makes a huge difference is composite technology. That is what happens when you touch the vibrating wine glass. Your finger and the glass work together to stop the resonance. Some speakers do that. My guess is that most don't. Vandersteen uses some carbon fiber in their model 7. Carbon fiber is excellent because sound waves pass through those long carbon molecules which vibrate and turn to heat. Works on planes that avoid radar detection. The radar waves don't bounce back to the source rather they are quickly converted to heat. 

It is easy to recognize how fast and clean electro static speakers are. The back waves are dumped into the room and the cabinet doesn't have to deal with them. They obviously have other problems.


phusis's avatar
phusis
1,196 posts
 
The thing about the waves off the back of the driver is that they have an output that is equal to the output into your room. The usual way to deal with that is add MDF bracing upon bracing which adds weight and more weight which lowers the resonance and makes the problem worse.  High resonance is much easier to deal with. Ping on a wine glass, to shut it down you merely touch it with your finger. That won't happen when you rap on a larger and heavier pan for example. Take out the 12" woofer from a speaker and you can see how vulnerable they are.
Ideally to deal with resonance a speaker should be small and light. Or as small as possible and still maintain enough volume to load the drivers.


So in effect a plea for small(er) speakers? Resonances of higher frequencies may be easier to deal with, but where present are potentially more obtrusively audible, or? What about the shortcomings of small speakers as going by their limited radiation area and SPL capabilities (not as a means of max. SPL per se, but rather their ease of reproduction at more "normal" listening levels)? Sheer impact, physicality and emotional connection would go by the wayside, as I see it, if small and low sensitivity was all there ever was. What then is ultimately won?
dlcockrum's avatar
dlcockrum
2,190 posts
 
http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/carver-als-line-source-loudspeaker-system/

Even Bob had to use a subwoofer.
randy-11
1,913 posts
 
He's a genius, no question.  But... does the $15,000 Carver ALS sound better than a somewhat cheaper Maggie?

______________________________
Legacy - I have heard they sound good, but no experience.

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Why would sound waves go thru the molecules of carbon fiber??  The post above gives good info on some advantages of panels (dipole radiators) but when I saw the analogy of sound waves to microwaves (much shorter wavelength and EMF, I almost tossed my latte...)
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