Other HORNS -- avantgarde-usa

[kjohnsonhp]

Just curious...I've read mention on this board about other brands of horn speakers and that if we heard them we may defect to the broader world of other brands. Are there other brands in the Klipsch price range? I saw these Avantgarde-USA speakers (avantgarde-usa.com) in ABSOLUTE SOUND and saw that they were marketed as a "value" speaker at $7k/pr--of course a value compared to their traditional technology competition up to $20K/pr.

I've heard about the vintage Fraziers which are really affordable but I always assumed the other horn options were low volume, high price, niche audiophile speakers.

So are there other horn options no more expensive than the Klischorns used.

Again it's more curiosity than anything.

The other unique design that interests me is electrostatic hybrid--Martin Logan being the popular name. How would you compare that technology and sound which I assume is dramatically different than our horns? They seem to have trouble with bass and blending it with the panels, and unlike our horns they are hungry for big expensive power. I've heard them once in 1985 when Martin Logan first started with the Monoliths and now recently. It's just seems like a facinating technology and sound....kinda like organic light emitting wall displays.

[maxg]

Well - I am not too sure about other horn loaded speakers in the Klipsch price range. I do know of some DIY speakers using Lowther Horns that come in at less money but if you have to build it yourself it is not really a fair comparison.

I suppose that I could add that my currently employed speakers are a pair of Sansui speakers from 1975 that employ horn loaded tweeters but as these are no longer made it is probably of little relevance.

As for a comparison with panel speakers I have spent a fair amount of time listening to a friends (Tony) Quad 989's recently so I will venture to tackle that one.

If I were to summarize the differences I would say that the issue is recording studio sound verses live performance.

Both Tony and I acknowledge that our systems have strengths against each other. Both recognise we could not live with the other's system.

I find Tony's presentation soulless - he finds mine harsh. In fact my summary of listening to Tony's system was that at low volumes on large classical works (Rimsky-Korsakov - Sherherazade in this case) his system did a passable impression of having a soul, but otherwise it was totally lifeless.

I should say that amongst the audiophile community here the vast majority of people would prefer Tony's system over mine as it provide that detailed presentation audiophiles seem to flock to.

OF course it is worth pointing out that the Quads are not a hybrid design. These are panels that go all the way down to about 35 Hz. In my mind there are pros and cons to this design.

The obvious pro is that there is no issue of cross-over and melding-in the very different sound of a woofer for the bass (a problem, for example, with the Final 0.3's which are otherwise a magnificently musical speaker - albeit only when coupled to some very serious amplification). The con is that the Bass comes over very differently from a more normal setup and does take some getting used to. Simply put you do get some deep bass sounds but with no, or minimal, spl. The effect is something akin to a good pair of headphones.

Martin Logan speakers are something I have had only very limited experience of. On most of the occasions I have heard them, they have played well and that hybrid design does get around the problem of the lack of spl. It is worth noting though that each time I have come across them they have been mated to extremely expensive front ends with the sort of power outputs you would normally asociate with hydro-electric damn projects.

Obviously we aint talking cheap here for a decent panel system. Whatever you spend on the speakers you can easily end up spending 5 times that amount of money on amplification.

[CaptnBob]

I had a pair of hybrid electro-stats once upon a time. My three main objections to them:

It aways seemed to be bass and .......................... treble. Just not a very unified sound.

They sounded fine if you were sitting down, in the proper spot. If you stood up, the treble went away. If you wandered off axis, the treble went away.

They didn't have the dynamic range I was used to. They did sound very polite and etched, but no "gusto."

And two advantages.

They did sound very natural on things like acoustic guitar and voices.

You can sell all of your pipe organ records because you won't be playing them any more.