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Do 1st Order XO's produce a smaller

In my mind I'm trying to come to terms with two possible conflicting desires:

1. The desire for transparency, accuracy, dynamics and a wide halographic soundstage presentation.

2. The desire for a much larger sweet spot to compensate for multiple listening positions. I want the advantage of on-axis detail, but I don't want this space to be limited by inches or a few feet.

The concept of time coherency makes perfect sense to me and seems to be a superior design philosophy in conjunction with the ability to control phase shift (smear). However, based on what I've read it appears most of the 1st order time coherent designs being created today have relatively narrow sweet spots. If you're on-axis these designs can be musical nirvana, but what if you're off-axis or move to another location in the room? Typically you tend to lose the benefit of this design.

Conversely one has the option of going the Ohm "Walsh" or Meridian route and get an incredibly wide/deep soundstage because of the 360 degree sound dispersion. I've heard you can move around within a room and the sound quality does not deteriorate significantly. In other words this type of speaker design fills up an entire room and sounds great where ever you are sitting or standing. However, are we giving up a critical level of accuracy with this design approach? With sound esstentially arriving at our ears at different times are we really getting an accurate representation of each instrument? Is the music being smeared in some way?

I guess like most audiophiles I want my cake and eat it too! I want transparency/accuracy/dynamics as well as a wide and deep soundstage that doesn't depend on a 12" on-axis listening/positioning limitation. Are there any designs that meet these qualifications?
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bombaywalla's avatar
bombaywalla
1,958 posts
 
I have the GMA C1.5i & the sweet spot is fairly wide when I am in the "official"/intended sweet-spot. Moving my head 6" left & right has very little effect (an effect for sure but practically not too different from the real sweet-spot). Standing up from my sweet-spot destroys all the fun in a blink of an eye! This is an issue w/ most dynamic driver front-firing speakers. The Ohm Walshes & Shahinians could be diff. in this dept, I have no personal experience.
When friends & family come over to listen I have to sit alongside them in the "un-hot" seat & it's much less fun there than in the hot seat. I get the direct effect of the speaker I'm sitting in front of & the imaging is way off. The soundstage has collapsed by now & all I hear is music. Very little depth. The music still sounds very good but the illusion is long gone. Maybe this is my room's limitations OR maybe this is the nature of a 1st order XO speaker?
Anyway, despite this, I ain't changing my speakers anytime soon!
dawgbyte's avatar
dawgbyte OP
325 posts
 
Howdy bombaywalla... your post does confirm the only hesitancy I have regarding 1st or time coherent speakers.

Like I said I'm struggling with what is more important to me. Because my listening/HT room is open to a kitchen area I'm not sure if it's better for the 360 approach of the Walsh design or Gallo Ref. III's or a first order design like those of the C-3's. If only I had access to in home demos.

Cheers,
DB
cdc
1,773 posts
 
Go with a single driver Jordan JX-92s speaker from www.carolinaaudio.com. "First order" no crossover design and only driver so no driver blending or sweet spot problem.

Gotta wonder what's going on with Phasecorrect's statements.
dawgbyte's avatar
dawgbyte OP
325 posts
 
Konus Audio Systems (http://www.konus-audio.com) single driver speakers are supposed to be even better than the Carolina Audio version. Having said that, I've read enough reviews on single driver designs to suspect they just don't demonstrate the full spectrum of dynamics that a full three-way can provide.
dubzilla
67 posts
 
My Europas also have a rather narrow sweet spot. With that said, once outside of the sweet-spot, there still is a sense of seperation and imaging, but it's not nearly as intense, for lack of a better word. Of course, I'm listening to them from about 6 feet away, so that might have something to do with it. I also have a rather oddly shaped room. I would still buy them again in a second, since I tend to only do critical listening from that sweet spot anyway.
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