ribbon or electrostatic speakers

Audiokinesis, always interested in new speakers. When you have more info ie; website, price, lit., etc. please email me. You stated you will be peddling the Gilmore Audio, are you a dealer? If so, where are you located? Have you heard these new speakers? If so, how do they compare with the Apogee Scintillas or Divas? Thanks!

Hands down the best bass I've heard from a panel speaker was from a pair of Sound Labs, followed closely by a pair of Apogee Divas. Admittedly, there was a + 6-9 DB peak centered around the 40 HZ region of the Soundlabs, but it was tight, tight, and did I say tight, which made the presentation quite visceral without mucking up the mid or upper bass. The Divas had noticably more grunt down under 30 HZ but lacked the sense of bass to midbass slam that the Soundlab's bump brought to the table. This made the Divas more menacing...in a good way though.

That being said, I've gotten truly excellent results using sealed subwoofers with system Q's ~.6. Normally, such a low Q would result in a rather lean and dry low end, but I just juice it up a bit (+4-6 DB)in the 20-40 HZ octave and actively cross it over to the bass panels of my Apogees at 70 hz (and yes, I do cut the lower octave out of the Apogee's bass panel). The result is, in a word, thrilling. In two words, "shock & awe".

You may want to check out the Vmps hybrid designs, these have everything your looking for in a ribbon design speaker and can be had from bookshelf to huge design and at many price levels.

Dave

Seadog, Except for perhaps the largest Soundlabs, your friend is never going to replace the Scintillas sonically. Well experienced listeners rate my system best ever.

There are two avenues of repair available.

1) All of the factory tools and supplies are in the hands of a fourteen year Apogee veteran. He has successfully refurbished several that I know of.

2) Graz out of Australia makes better than new replacement ribbon kits for all models. The ribbons come with easy to understand instructions. Scores of people have taken this path.

I know from my own experience the Scintilla is tricky to get perfect - but it can do perfect. They need to be moved around into a lot of positions, for and aft, side to side, and toe in. When Scintillas have arrived, your friend will know. The Scintillas will be seamless from very low bass to highs beyond hearing and will sound true to nature throughout the audible range.

I placed mine on masonite so they could be slid easily around, carefully measuring to all walls. I power them with Pass Labs X600 monos. These can be picked up mint off Audiogon for 7K.

I live on the west coast. Maybe I can be of help to your friend. I would be pleased if your friend would contact me privately.

Hello Seadogs,

I'm a dealer for Sound Lab and several other speaker lines, as well as a few lines of electronics that work well with the speakers I sell. I will be a dealer for the Gilmore Audio speakers (assuming they sound really good - I haven't heard them yet). I will of course have much more useful comments to make once I have a pair on hand, but from what I understand in lightness of the ribbon diaphragm, bass excursion capability, and ease of driving, the Gilmores delve into exciting territory for a full-range planar.

I'm located in New Orleans. My living room is my showroom, and my gimmick is offering a free bed & breakfast stay to out-of-town customers, plus airfare reimbursement with purchase. So far over 80% of the people who take me up on my offer and fly here to audition Sound Labs end up buying a pair (this doesn't count people who are in town for some other reason and come by for an audition), and the only sales I have failed to make have been when the customer wanted something with greater dynamic scale. In the past I've lost those sales to big cone-and-dome speakers; with the Gilmores I hope to have a planar that can compete in that arena as well.

I think there will be several Gilmore dealers here and there; you might want to contact the distributor, Harry Blazer of Glacier Audio (www.glacieraudio.com), to see if there will be one close to you.

Best of luck in your quest,

Duke