The strong opinions around ceramic speakers


OK, so this is a recurring theme for me, and if you’ve seen me post on this before, sorry. Your subscription doesn’t guarantee unique content here. I was reading the Munich High-End coverage over at DIYaudio.com and this topic came up again. Many there aren’t fond of ceramics, and neither am I.

I’ve gotten to hear a number of ceramic driver speakers and despite being very positively disposed to them based on the technology in both the cone/dome material as well as the motors themselves I’ve never liked a single speaker based on them. I mean, based on the specs I should love these things, but I don’t. Is this a type of speaker tuning that is applied, or something else?

I’m including diamond speakers here, BTW.

Now, companies like Kharma could care less what I like or don’t like, but I am seriously asking this question a different way, if you have liked ceramic speakers, which one’s and why, what did you pair with them? What is the closest non-ceramic speaker you DID like?

This is an interesting topic for me because it is a dimension where there's a broad divergence between measurements (very good) and experience (meh) and that difference can help tell us something about who an audiophile is.

erik_squires

Hey @Verdantaudio

They certainly are unique.  Instead of a single-layer ceramic, they use a 3 layer composite ceramic.  Reminds me of the Focal W cones, but in this case all 3 layers are ceramic.

Their literature alludes to some of the theories I've read by DIYers about the resonant frequencies of Accuton drivers needing to be tamed to sound good.

The better applications of ceramic driver speakers sound amazing- e.g. Marten, Von Schwiekert.  

Some others have a cupped twinge to the upper mids that is unacceptable especially Revel and Ayon

@avanti1960 I sure hope I get to hear either of these brands soon.

I’m curious, were the speakers you liked 100% ceramics?

Can you compare their performance to other, non-ceramic speakers you like?