Mark lets go for more shall we, Persona, Persona, Persona, Persona, Persona happy now.
Kenjit it is not about distortion it is about perception.
We have in our shop the LS 50 and they are great speakers for the price, however, the Kef R3 monitor is better, and the Kef Reference One is far better.
As you generally go up in price you get greater clarity, based on denser non resonant cabinets, faster drivers with less coloration based on bigger magnets, distortion minimizing techniques, more advanced cone materials and drivers which are engineered better, add in better crossover components and you get a substantially better speaker.
So here are three different Kef models which all sound great but as you step up the ladder the clarity gets greater, the dynamics improve, the imaging gets more focused and you also get tighter bass as well as more of it.
The reason a company can sell a more expensive set of speakers is that there is an audible improvement with the more expensive versions.
Take the KEF R11 a $5,000.00 set of speakers vs the Kef Reference 5 a $19,000.00 set of speakers, both speakers look very similar and employ similar drivers, however, the Reference drivers use a more advanced version of the drivers, the cabinet is much more advanced and is much denser, the weight difference is 57lbs vs 120lbs.
Sonically the R11 is very good, but the Ref 5 just crushes it, you hear more information, the dynamic kick is far better the bass is tighter.
You are hearing the same music but you are experiencing more of it.
Another good analogy is like switching from a cheap lens on a 35mm camera to a much more expensive one, all of a sudden colors are more vibrant and tiny details are evident.
Better speakers with more advanced driver technology generally produce far greater amounts of information.
The Borsteen loudspeakers use very expensive ceramic diamond tweeters and midrange/woofers these drivers cost a lot more than the Graphene woofer/midrange drivers and a soft dome SEAS tweeter.
So given the same set of electronics you would hear more with the Borsteen speakers are they worth $30k personally we wouldn't recommend a $30k two way but we heard their big $120k pair and they were impressive.
Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ
