Why not horns?

Ralph,

I would agree - they are at their very best in farfield applications (12 feet+). This allows the narrower dispersion to better integrate with the room. Horns are outstanding in larger rooms and large venues - in these applications they can outperform conventional dynamic designs both in low distortion and in sound quality. As you get to really big spaces, conventional designs just can't cut the mustard in terms of dynamics, overall SPL whilst maintaining low distortion).

Movie theaters sound absolutely awesome and they almost ALL uses horns.

"Why don't you use horns?"

Well you asked, so I'm going to tell you even if this post does not offer any glamorous contribution to this thread.

I have no quarrel with people who love their horns. More power to them. But for those of us who are very happy with their systems that use more traditional cone/dome-type drivers, why should we be interested in them?

If I were starting over, it might be fascinating to experiment with horns. But at this point I am not seeking some new (for me) speaker paradigm that offers supposedly "better sound." That's why I don't use horns. Very pragmatic, if somewhat boring, answer.

Happy listening (no matter why type of system you like).

Proselytizing? Me? Well, perhaps I am. But I'm not twisting arms or pushing anyone. I don't care if you don't like horns. I just notice that there are people out there who would argue passionately about the enormous difference between power cords but dismiss all horns with a single flippant comment about honk. Plainly they do not all sound like PA systems.
These devices are badly undervalued and misunderstood. They hold a lot of potential and have realized much of it. But some of the responses we've read here demonstrate that I am correct about the confusion surrounding horn based loudspeakers. The real purpose of this thread was to get people talking and to get the record straight. I think there has been some success.

Generalizations about horn systems tend to short-change models that are exceptions to the "rules", and in high-end audio it is the exceptions that are usually the most interesting.

I started out with as strong a prejudice against horns as you'd ever be likely to find. Over the years my perception has changed (with John Wolff's designs acting as the catalyst), and I now believe that the downsides can be overcome while the upsides offer worthwhile improvements, particularly in radiation pattern uniformity and dynamic contrast.

Recently I received an e-mail from a manufacturer of high-end solid state components, and referring to a horn system he said this: "I have not heard speakers that were more 'relaxing'. Honestly they were so damn smooth."

I have every reason to believe Macrojack's perception of his horn system, as I'm somewhat familiar with the work of its designer and he certainly qualifies as "exceptional".

Duke
dealer/manufacturer

There is a saying in Zen,

If you are off by an inch, you are off by a million miles.

This particularly applies to horn loudspeakers.

Horn speaker design is either on, or its not, and if its not on, by virtue of its greater dynamics and higher overall efficiency, horn speakers which are not well designed (most) are rather more awful than their direct radiator brethren.

The conical horns you are now enjoying and find worth remarking on are a notable deviation from everything that has come before in commercial horn design. It's not something that people on Audiogon will be likely to discern, but I am glad that this thread may bring horn speakers to the attention of a larger public on this site.

Jonathan Weiss
Oswaldsmill Audio (OMA)