People love to hate history, but there are an awful lot of things like this its hard to see how anyone has any chance of ever understanding without understanding the history.
So many things we take for granted today simply did not exist back when Paul came out with the Klipschorn. The biggest one, the one that really matters most yet is probably hardest for anyone under 60 to believe, is that back then a high power amplifier might have made, by the standards of today, maybe as much as two or even three watts.
Back then amps, if they were rated at all, were peak not RMS, and tested cold not hot, and hardly ever across the full 20-20kHz we take for granted today. I know this for a fact because buying my first stereo back in 1970 they bragged about its 8 watts or whatever it was not being peak.
So even as recent as 1970 amps making more than a handful of watts - even as measured by the lax standards of the day - were very uncommon. Paul Klipsch introduced the Klipschorn way before that, in 1946. He not only patented the design, but built it to standards significantly higher than was the norm at the time.
Easy to knock it now, but the fact is Klipsch came out with the perfect technology, and the perfect product, at the perfect time. Klipsch dominated for something like 30 years.
Then another company came out with a completely different design that could actually compete with the Klipsch in terms of volume and slam and smoothness, except that it was incredibly inefficient. Which didn't matter, because the same company also came out with a monster 300 watt amp!
That company was Bose.
The amp went nowhere but it didn't matter. Both companies, Klipsch and Bose, came out with products so much better than anything else around at the time they dominated to such an extent they became almost synonymous with high end audio. Which wasn't even a thing back then. They were something even better. They were "good stereo". If you wanted a "good stereo" that was it. Not that anyone ever had it. Not the point. Its the impression.
Then along came this one guy who wondered what would happen if you seriously studied exactly what it takes to reproduce sound at a level and quality people will actually start to feel like its real. How loud would it have to be? How immersive? How free of distortion? Across what frequency range? And exactly how would you measure all that, for consistency, so we can be sure we're all talking about the same thing?
Another thing we take for granted. But back when Tomlinson Holman began his eXperiments the movies people went to see typically featured one 12" or maybe 15" speaker somewhere behind the screen. The first movie to be released in theaters using sound systems based on Holmans early work became a big hit. It was a long time ago in a neighborhood far far away but you may have heard of it: Star Wars.
Within just a few years you couldn't watch a movie or shop for a stereo without seeing the THX logo. Who knows THX came from Tomlinson Holman eXperiment? Unfortunately for THX they didn't really have a product. They could only license a logo, based on a standard. Which was such a good standard it became, uh, standard across the industry. Which is why after going supernova it has now faded from sight.
History. Fascinating subject. Really don't get why more don't get it. How else you gonna understand that Klipsch, like Bose and THX, is really a victim of its own success?
