Looks like you can order Genesis speakers by the ton once again. They're back! Look at page 14 of Feb/Mar 03's TAS.

God, I remember working for a mid-fi store in the early 80's and Genesis was brought in as a newcomer. The biggest thing the sales rep could come up with was that the voice coils on the woofers had ruber o-rings mounted on the back of them to keep from slamming into the magnet when bottoming-out. He played Al Jeraeu's (sp) cd and yes I could here a difference in the bass he pointed out from a low bass guitar note to a floor drum. But then again the best thing in the room were Bose 701's. The 501's just looked and sounded like a de-humidifier.

I think the Genesis company you were introduced to in the mid 80's is a different company. There was a company called Genesis that made fairly low priced ($2 - $3K as I recall) floorstanding speakers. Their model 33 was well received, as I recall.

The other, newer Genesis was formed in the, uh, early 90's (?) by Arnie Nudell (founder of Infinity) and a couple of partners, in Colorado. The company's mission was to make the most bestest speakers of anyone on the planet (Arnie is not subject to excessive self depreciation or modesty), and their top of the line model was Sea Cliff's reference system for several years. It resembled the old Infinity Quantum Reference Standards - four big towers, mid/high ribbons on winged panels, servo-driven woofer cabinets 8 feet high, etc. Buko dollars.

Infinity filed bankruptcy (chapter 11?) a while back, assets were purchased by new investors, Arnie is now something like "chief designer", company is now back online.

Thank God you guys aren't talking about Phil Collin's band...

fini

I've been reading the PS Audio Forum for a while now. I bought one of their products so I was reading about it and asking questions.
Paul McGovan, the P in PS Audio mentioned that Genesis would soon be back in business. This came up while discussing subwoofers.

He is a believer in servo controled sub woofers,
but he doesn't like the Velodyne products. He said that they are not musical at all and he can only recommend them for home theater use. He believes that any good sounding subwoofer needs to be servo controled. He said that the mass of a woofer is so great that there is no way to control it's movement without active motional feedback.
He helped design the Martin Logan servo controled Descent subwoofer. That may or may not be the reason that he believes that this is one of the best sounding sub woofers that you can buy.

Getting back to Genesis. Paul said that they will be introducing the (928), a dual woofer design that uses a switching amplifier and servo control done right. That this should be the sub that everyone has been waiting for.

The only non servo sub that he almost likes the sound of is from HSU. I asked him what he thinks of SVS. He said that he never heard of them.

Ah, yes, Q-Man, but it is likely he will hear of SVS... as the little company grows out of Sonnotube obscurity to best HSU by most tester's standards. And now that the B4 boxster is about to go from betatester bashing to consumer blockbusting, The beta test report has been on two different threads recently.

One of the interesting sidelights that relates to your post, Q-Man, is that Tom Vodhanel who designs the SVS subs has great respect for the servo approach... particularly for pro subs in a stage setting. If I were a betting man, I would bet there are some SVS plans for a servo based home sub in Tom V's drawers. =HornEd

uh, is that a literary oxymoron?

Naw, just up close and personal secret stuff... Where will Tom's secret file be fifty years from now? Depends... =HornEd

PS: bkrop, was that (ox y moron) an Spanglish character assasination? Nah, Spanish would be "el buey y imbécil" ... actually, there's no intellectual drawer el oxímoro in Spanish because they know their los cajones from their ropa interior!

I guess it's up to Gumpesque "Drawers are what drawers do" ... and given the magnitude of the KSW-15 migration, the sequel to RSW-15 may include a servo to justify a Velo 18 price point!

Genesis belly up and now Dunlavy, too!...sure glad I didn't buy Dunlavy SC-IV's back in '93! I wuz smart and got Amrita Reference Standards!

LONG LIVE KLIPSCH!

There are/were 2 Genesis speaker companies. One is Genesis Physics Corp. and the other is/was the old Infinity engineers that made hugely expensively systems that looked like the Infinity Reference Standard. I listened to the IRS a few times and hated it. The Genesis Physics speakers were moderately expensive consumer products. Generally they sounded good, but emphasized deep bass and had *hot* tweeters. My best friend from home had a pair of IIIs. They are still available from an old employee at www.humanspeakers.com.

Are any of these Genesis companies the ones that made the speakers with woofers that had green foam surrounds and an inverted dome tweeter in the late seventies, early eighties. My friend had a pair with 8" drivers on top a large square plate with the inverted dome tweeter on it in the center and a 10" passive radiator on the bottom? Just curious I do remember them sounding fairly decent.

Horn Ed,
I've been reading about the SVS B4, it has my attention. You heard me say it before, I like my Sunfire Signature. Now the poor little thing is having a hard time keeping up with all the bass horns that have earned their piece of real estate in the room. With the shortage of prime property, I sure as heck don't want to go with multiple subs. Also, after you had me read the papers written by Floyd E. Toole I too am a believer that one sub location will be better then two or three. It just needs to be monster sub. I don't want to get into stacked Ultras. I ruled out the HGS-18. Ears almost had me convinced to try a Revel B15. Then Paul makes the Martin Logan Descent sound like it might be worth given a listen to. Now rumors of this Genesis sub. I don't think that any of them can give me what the B4 may be capable of. In a review the Ultras were able to keep up with Klipschorns, so the B4 should suit me just fine.

I'm seriously thinking of giving a B4 a try in the future. I first need to finish up my Altec mods. I ran into a few glitches and there is one thing that I still don't like. So, I'll be tinkering with them for a while yet.

I've been toying with another crazy idea, how to build a very large bass horn to use as a subwoofer. You must remember the drawings that I sent you of the proposed new theater room. That room will have a large attic space above it. That space could easily house over a 50' long bass horn. The mouth of the horn could even be up to 20' by 30' and be incorporated into a cathedral ceiling. If designed right, the mouth of the horn could be made to look like a ceiling. No one would know that they were looking up or should I say down the throat of a bass horn. It would be like sitting right in the horn.

Q-man,

I think Avantegard have the very thing you are looking for - a horn loaded subwoofer, but be warned they are very big and very pricey.

From memory they have a pic on their site with an array of 6 of them together (but I may be losing my mind)...

Q-Man, I got to know Tom Vodhanel from several different perspectives... and you can bet that however good the B4 is he will be up to topping it. The stacked Ultras have served me well... better than a Rel from other days. The Rel big had more slam but the Ultras go deeper and are smoothly transparent with either the KLF-30 HT or when I want to do some serious pipe organ related music on the K-horns, Belle, etc.

I expect there will be a B4 here by and by... but, like you, I am looking into building my own horn-loaded subwoofer... but I was thinking of building it underground at my mountain retreat. Putting it in an attic is a novel concept. I'll have to think about that. Funny you should mention your drawings, I had them out the other day... I'll have to send you a new set of mine... when I can make it without all these damn erasures. I print them out on the computer and then take the lead pencil to them. It's great fun... and gives me a chance to think about how good life must be on Merritt Island... when it's not freezing! Stay warm. =HornEd

Frzninvt,

You are remembering the Genesis Physics Corp. IIs or IIIs. the IIIs were 3-ways with nauseating green foam surrounds and an 8" active and 10" passive radiator. My friend had IIIs and I've spent many hours in front of them.

 Definitely back..............................

I seen several prices, the highest being $285,000

  http://www.genesisloudspeakers.com/g1p2.html

They seem to have dubbed the same phrase Klipsch has in recent years with the Palladium line: "Luxury Audio" (whatever that is)

How many times has Arnie Noodle's companies gone bankrupt?