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Proac 2.5 Response tweeter upgrade with Ribbon Tweeter?

Greetings,
Has anyone tried replacing the tweeter (mine is Scanspeak 2010 851300) on the Proac 2.5 Response (mine is a clone) with a ribbon tweeter? Would it match or is this just a silly idea?
Thx for any comments or advice,
mozartbrain
mozartbrain OP
18 posts
 
@jperry 
Thank you for your comment.
I love my Proac Response 2.5 speakers but would like a little more 'body' to the sound and deeper bass. I'm also very interested in the ribbon tweeters that are said to be much 'sweeter' and extending.
Could you comment on these and any other differences that you experienced when upgrading to your D40r's from the 2.5 response's?
Thx so much, 
archguy's avatar
archguy
45 posts
 
At their best, ribbon tweeters can supply amazing, effortless, shimmering highs.  I'm definitely a fan.  However, ribbons' native impedance is usually so low that they need especially careful integration into the rest of a speaker system.  Often a conversion transformer is required, and the crossover(s) also require intensive analysis. 

What this means is that it's next-to-impossible simply to switch out a dome tweeter for a ribbon in an existing speaker.  You're much better off selling those speakers and purchasing some which have a ribbon already integrated into their configuration. 
jperry
2,449 posts
 
"more 'body' to the sound and deeper bass"

It looks like you are using a tube amp with medium to low power. The Proac 2.5 is very inefficient, but can produce deep bass (see the review in Stereophile). You should borrow if possible a fairly powerful solid state amp (high damping factor and 100-200 wpc)  to see how that works with your speakers.
atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,834 posts
 
It looks like you are using a tube amp with medium to low power. The Proac 2.5 is very inefficient, but can produce deep bass (see the review in Stereophile).
FWIW we sold our M-60 amplifier to a lot of Response 2.5 owners back when the speaker was in production. You don't need a solid state amp to get good bass on that speaker- you just need an amp with bandwidth (the M-60 is full power to 2 Hz). A solid state amp is not likely to get a 'sweeter sound' that is also sought.
twoleftears's avatar
twoleftears
5,318 posts
 

For many years I drove my 2.5's very successfully with a Cary SET 300B amp putting out about 13w max.  This combination was recommended by Arnie, the guy who founded Audiogon years ago.  It was rumored that Denis Had used Proacs when voicing his amps.

@mozartbrain If you read a lot of review of the 48R carefully, you'll see that they say that the ribbon is well integrated, better than most, but that if you system is already fairly revealing, they may give too much of a good thing.  I've tried in vain to find feedback on the D48, with the dome tweeter.

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