Are advances in technology making speakers better?

@larryi --

+1

Advance in tech only gets you so far when the overall package of a speaker is diminished in size; it’s the one thing we can’t miniaturize without severe sonic implications. Like on the driver side: a several thousand $$ 1" dome tweeter is still a 1" dome tweeter, the same with an expensive 6 1/2" woofer, etc. I’ve read Mr. Atkinson’s and others from Stereophile’s praise of Edgar Villchur’s AR-1 speakers and what it initiated, and while we see the ramifications of the acoustic suspension design of his flourishing in its basics to this day - the success of which they’re so eager to bow to - one shouldn’t equate smaller speakers with their being the better sounding alternative, as much at least as their widespread domestic success while fitting the narrative of an "audiophile" magazine’s paradigm or dogma even that has more or less banished large, high efficiency speakers decades ago.

The quality of materials has improved markedly, but the philosophy of physics determining good speaker design remains conflicting among manufacturers.  Therefore what to believe is lost to the consumer. 

Shortening this complex topic to cardinal violations interfering with waveform reproduction:  1. cone drivers containing coils for midranges and higher, 2. sharp edges producing diffraction.  3. symmetry of driver placement, 4. passive crossovers with large value components, most containing coils, 5. improper impedance mismatched lead-in connections, 6. use of cheap copper alloys in the connections, etc, etc

If you think this excludes almost all speakers, then it should come as no surprise why few have heard the remarkable phenomena of when the artist appears in the listening room.  It is a jaw dropping, if not a life changing, experience.  That good. 

Your answer to this simply boils down to: 1. Alot of study and hard work building your own, or 2. spending an extreme fortune, which is still not guaranteed to solve your problem. 

I went with #1, followed the rules of physics, avoided the violations, a few of which were stated above, and achieved the performer-in-your-listening-room result.  So it works.  It was also a 30 year project. 

There are alot of good responses in thie thread.  Take every one of them.

Ok guys. I get all the thinking going on here… but have you guys listened to speakers over the five decades? The difference in sound quality is just jaw dropping. The detail, articulation of bass, sound stage. Sure the woofer size has decreased phenomenally as the magnet size increases allowing sooo much more detail. Treble has gone from shrill trebly distortion to natural realistic brass sounding (cymbals and bells).

There is simply no comparison to what my 18” Altec Voice of the Theater speakers could do in the 1970’s and, for instance, my current Sonus Faber Amati Traditional of today. Unless, you are into only nostalgia the sound quality is astronomically better.

My Triangle 3 way CELIUS SE speakers are Stereophile Class A at $3000.....They are 15 years old... bright, VERY detailed and have a heavy bass. My Heresy IV’s are horn speakers and 15 years newer technology. They have a nice tight snappy bass....A beautiful silky smooth but detailed midrange.and crystal clear highs that are easy on the ears but are true to the music recording....You just want to listen to music.....I feel like I’m part of the show..NO Klipsch honkiness on the new cross-overs and Tracktrix horns ..that’s all gone now.The newer Klipsch models are Much improved over the older Klipsch models....Technology marches on !

@grislybutter ah yes. I keep my phones for at least 5 years before moving on, even though others may chuckle at me. The only reason to upgrade is when it can't run the apps you want or because the new versions of software simply aren't written well enough (too much bloat) to not require a new, screaming processor. 

As others note, when Andrew Jones or any other engineer sit down to design a speaker, the targeted size of that speaker, and the market they are shooting for of course limits what can be done. 

But I don't think MoFi would have been happy if Andrew had come up with a 24" concentric driver in a 250 lb. cabinet, even if he could have grabbed that lower octave.  At the end of the day they aren't a "boutique" manufacturer, but one that wants to sell a "reasonable" quantity of speakers to recoup their investment in Jones' salary, the tooling costs, setting up a factory, and make a little $$ in the process. 

I am concerned a bit about Steve Guttenberg's observation that maybe the new SP10 were on the "bright" side.  Did any of you hearing them think that? Of course set up might be the key.