Quote:
Originally Posted by Roland  With the greatest respect Andy, I think thats a load of cobblers! Horn loudspeakers are far from accurate and there is no science that I can think of to suggest that they produce better time domain response than a direct radiating system. That you may enjoy listening too them is a personal view that I know not everyone will share. My personal experience with 5.1 is if done well switching to stereo removes the level of "immersion". Perhaps you would enjoy a 5.1 horn system?
Regards
Roland |
Cobblers?! It is nice to hear some native English after I've been in Poland for such a long time.
Yes, indeed, as I said above, the K&H 5.1 setup I heard was very nice, but as I also implied, a single pair of 0500s sounds a good deal more immersive than a 5.1 setup of direct-radiators.
(Yes, the K&H range does count as horn-loaded, especially the 0500s - I spoke to the designer - 'waveguide' is simply a new marketing term for horn).
As to a scientific reason to suggest improved time-domain response of horn-loaded transducers, one need look no further than the concept of acoustic impedance.
(For now we can discount amplifiers as a source of time-domain error for the sake of simplification).
If we examine the sources of time-domain distortion in transducers we come to mechanical error relating to the physical operating principle.
If we consider this mechanical error in relation to acoustic impedance we see a relationship.
Error is proportional to impedance difference.
The horn raises acoustic impedance at the transducer, which reduces mechanical error.
Certainly, I would agree that design is critical but in simple terms the horn-loaded transducer has a very large advantage.
Andy