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Finally found THE SPEAKER!!!

I have been a HiFi guy starting at 12 years old with my father passing along the love. We would spend almost every weekend auditioning speakers looking to find the perfect system. We purchased many speakers over the years and they all had their pros and cons, but the trade off always seemed to be nuanced and delicate vs. dynamic and punchy. When auditioning speakers people would always ask what kind of music do you like to listen to? Rock, female vocals, classical, etc... We had/have eclectic taste and would listen to it all. Why could't a speaker just play all of it?!?! Anyway my love for music, sound, etc... became my profession as I am now an Oscar nominated Supervising Sound Editor with well over 150 movies under my belt.

For the last 5 years I have been looking for speakers that can play films at reference levels with all the detail and punch, yet when I want to listen to music can give that nuanced and detailed imaging, space, air, articulation without being harsh and fatiguing. I have listened to SO MANY speakers and spent hundreds of hours auditioning everything I could find. I would fall in love with something for music and then try play one of my films at reference level and it just never gave me the impact I was looking for. I get it - hard to move a lot of air and still be nuanced and articulate. There are some excellent compression drivers/horns that can do the impact stuff, but for me they always have that harsh edge when it comes to music. The flip side with dome type tweeters I have found things have to be pushed to the edge to try to give that theatrical impact. Looking for the quick transient response of an electrostatic, with the punch of compression driver type of system.

Then a dealer recommend I listen to some speakers from Wisdom Audio. I have to admit I was pretty skeptical at first. I read about these and it all sounded like marketing to me, but the dealer I was talking with said he was blown away by them. So I reached out to the company and setup a demo. They use planar magnetics which is not exactly new, but is very difficult to manufacture. I asked them to have one of my films available to listen to. I chose one that I knew extremely well that has a LOT of dynamic punch as well as subtle nuance. I live in Los Angeles and the company is in Carson City, Nevada. I bought an airplane ticket and I was off. I was treated to a tour of the factory and shown how the speakers were made. USA manufactured!! Then we spent a few hours listening to all types of music on different ranges of speakers. I LOVED what I was hearing with the music part of the audition. Then I asked to hear my film in their theater. I expected to be disappointed based on what I had experienced in the past. Then it happened... I heard the film play and it sounded AMAZING! These speakers could do it all!!! No compression, no fatigue, HiFi sound and still able to play theatrical film tracks as they are meant to be heard. In fact - better! I called my wife in disbelief that my search for "The Speakers" was finally over! I even called my father to tell him what I had just heard. It was the impressive! I remind you - I do this for a living!

Since we are undergoing a major remodel at our home, my wife expected that the family room was going to be filled with big speakers as she has become accustomed to living with me. With some of these Wisdom Audio speakers, they are actually designed to be flush mounted in the wall. I thought there is no way a wall mounted speaker could ever sound as good as a traditional speaker. I was so wrong!! So not only did I find the perfect speaker, but not big boxes in the room 3 feet away from any walls! My wife was thrilled.

If you have never heard speakers by Wisdom Audio you need to find a dealer where you can audition them, or fly to the factory for a private demo!

Best,
Andrew
drewde
drewde OP
53 posts
 
gone - Don't know what to tell you. Not marketing. Sorry my first posts had to be something I was excited to share with the community. 

Yes My travel was before the pandemic. Lost a friend to Covid.  A few other friends of mine lost family members as well. Please don't judge others so harshly as you never know the bag of rocks we are all carrying.

I have been busy with work, life, family and helping take care of my now elderly parents. I came across this site a while back and get the weekly posts sent to my email and click on the topics that interest me. I didn't post earlier as I was really looking for other components and just didn't have the time.

I still am looking other speaker options for the whole house system, smaller TV rooms, amplifiers - probably need class-d to drive the planar magnetics, Trying to figure out the best surround processor for the main room, etc...

Anyways... glad to answer any questions if you have them. 

Best,
Andrew
drewde OP
53 posts
 
audioman58 - Interesting... That worries me a bit for sure. I have heard them playing louder than is safe for hearing safety. Because they don't distort and don't have speaker compression at high levels like we/I am used to with traditional drivers I found it easy to keep cranking them up to a dangerous level and not even know it was that loud until I used my sound meter on my phone. Crazy!

How much power was your amp capable of outputting. I believe the planar drivers stay at a 4 Ohm resistance across all frequencies which should make them amp friendly. 

I will need to ask my dealer if they have reliability issues that he is aware of. I will let you know what I find out. Thanks for the heads up!!!
drewde OP
53 posts
 
tvad - Thanks for feedback! Yes it is a crazy lifestyle for sure. When I met my wife I was already working in the business, but I was just starting out so my hours were even worse!!! Luckily she was getting her PhD from UCLA and so she would come by the studio to study while I was working all hours of the night! She knew what she was getting into when she married me!!!!
whart's avatar
whart
3,043 posts
 
A facility with 75+ editing rooms is a pretty serious operation. So I looked you up based simply on the information in this thread and found you at Pixar, which would make sense.
As to whether your are "real" or a shill, I would think you could work out an endorsement deal (with your company's blessing) if your aim was simply to hock this company's product.
I've always found home theatre and "purist audio" (for lack of a better word) to be two completely different things. Ideally, in theory, one system should be able to do both, but my experience, at least in the home has been contrariwise.
I grew up and learned to listen on electrostats (Quad 57's) which I still own and use in a second system (having been refurbished a couple years ago). And, use horns with quite a few woofers in the main system to accomplish what the Quads cannot-- deep bass as well as that dynamic "jump" factor, but understand the drawbacks of both types of design pretty well.
What kind of amplifier are you going to use with these, and out of curiosity, is there dead space requirement beyond normal construction for in wall use of  these? Planars, like stats, have a bi-polar characteristic, do they not? And require some distance from the wall behind them?
I sometimes post here, and sometimes I don't. But, welcome in any case. I spent a fair amount of time in studios back in the day---not sound for film but some pretty big facilities, and man, that "thwack" that you could achieve with those big-assed JBL or Westlake type monitors was impressive if not a little fatiguing. 
Good luck with your construction and enjoy your new speakers.
Bill Hart
 



dadork
632 posts
 
@drewde You don't have to explain yourself to anyone on here about when and where or why you flew anywhere to do anything. Last I looked it was a free country and you can still purchase an airline ticket legally.
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