2. speakers
  3. 159732-2248

Danny Richie "fixes" the Linkwitz Arion loudspeaker

For some time now I have been directing those interested in loudspeaker design to Danny Richie’s GR Research Tech Talk Tuesday videos on YouTube. Here is his latest: an examination of the Linkwitz Arion loudspeaker. You may be asking yourself: if Siegfried Linkwitz is the genius he is touted to be, how is it Danny found the Orion to be lacking, and was able to find solutions for it’s failings? I’ll leave that to you to answer. In the meantime, after watching and listening to this video, you may want to watch all the Tech Talk Tuesday videos. They may just make you a more informed loudspeaker consumer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCA-eSPUkJA.









bdp24
bdp24's avatar
bdp24 OP
10,222 posts
 

Siegfried Linkwitz certainly appeared to me to be a genius. However, he designed the Orion with a required digital active crossover, and needing 8 channels of amplification. Not a loudspeaker I would want to own.

SL had his design priorities, as did/do Paul Klipsch, Peter Walker, Arnie Nudell, Richard Vandersteen, Jim Winey, Bruce Thigpen, Roger Sanders, Dave Wilson, Eric Alexander, and (shudder) Amar Bose.

Danny Richie has his, and his customers and clients (including companies making loudspeakers designed by him) seem to be amongst the most satisfied I know of (yes, myself included). To each his own!

I have learned that even the best hi-fi designers may have a blind spot. I think very highly of Roger Modjeski (Music Reference, RAM Tubes), yet discovered his in a blog he posted on his MR AudioCircle Forum. He questioned the rationale for bass traps, saying we pay more for loudspeakers that reproduce the lowest frequencies, then install bass traps to absorb the low frequencies those loudspeakers are reproducing? That statement/question revealed to me that as good an electronic engineer/amplifier designer as he was, he was not aware of room modes.

clio09
3,372 posts
 
@bdp24 he most certainly was aware of room nodes, he just believed there was a better way of dealing with them than using bass traps.
oldhvymec
5,101 posts
 
I'm of the same opinion. If you don't make it everywhere, you don't have to control it everywhere.  Rule number 1. controlling the bass, is 90% of the answer, when it comes to distortion... in ALL 7 of the frequencies ranges I address. sub, bass, MB, Low mids, mids, highs and UHF.

They are addressed normally by room treatment, with the exception of 100hz and below.. Traps kill what you really don't need to be making, to begin with...

Regards
bdp24's avatar
bdp24 OP
10,222 posts
 

Good to hear @clio09. May I ask what that way is? One way to make bass more uniform throughout the room is by way of the DBA: Distributed Bass Array. But regardless, in rooms having dimensions shorter than the longest wavelength being produced, there are going to be standing waves, areas of high and low pressure. It is the room "ringing."

True, bass traps are very inefficient, but I got lucky and found a bunch of ASC Tube Traps for ten bucks apiece, including a pair of 16"!

oldhvymec
5,101 posts
 
Another thing, I’ve worked with a few sound engineers, quite a few. Of the 30 or so I’ve met on job sites, only one had any desire to build or have anything to so with speakers. WHY? There is no money in it. Every one of those engineers were working on sound walls, or how to move that noise, from that valley, to that forest. NOT SPEAKERS, or room designers, ZERO money in it..

SO WE as audio buffs, really don’t get the best when it comes to speaker design...Kinda bottom of the bucket if you want to know the truth.

I also like the guy that says he’s a speaker makers, at least to be able to carry a tune in a sing along, or pick up a pair of spoons, a wash board or something and PLAY... NOT grab the MIC and away we go... YUK!!! Anyone can be taught to have a trained ear.

But to have MOJO in a speaker when they are done.. RARE!!!
VERY rare...

regards
More to discover