I thought really hard of what’s really stopping me from buying the FR5’s. And my final thoughts is the tweeter. Since this speaker is not your absolute best speaker, would you consider selling this speaker with a dome tweeter? And maybe not going so deep in bass. Maybe only 40hz and up? I think you would sell a bunch of speakers because it’s the right size, great looks and going with a technology that we are all familiar with a dome tweeter. I think Prolac does this by offering both ribbon and dome
Seriously? The custom flat panel ribbon tweeter (and midrange for FR10, 20, 30) is the reason to get an FR series speaker
Have you heard them?
I went to go see hear them at a Hi-Fi store. They were too big for me and the sound. It was good but not $5,000 good
Have to agree, that tweeter is the deal maker.
Sounds like the OP would like to design and build his own. Let us know how that goes.
Was it the speaker, or the set up, or perhaps the room that made you come to that conclusion?
It was intended to be an example of what is available, and to look elsewhere. With that, look elsewhere.
Consider this as an alternative. I’ve heard it and the FR-5’s in my home on my system in a head to head comparison. To my ears and in the context of my system the Reynaud was the clear winner. The owner of the FR-5’s who was there for the comparison agreed and subsequently changed speakers, I’ve owned a pair of the Bliss Jubilee’s for five years now.
oh. im going to take a look at these thank you
We are evaluating some other tweeter technologies, doing acoustic waveguide work and doing some woofer/transducer experiments these days, looking at lower priced stuff too and active options. I’m not only looking at our split gap motors but some hybrid Neo motors inspired by the work or Purifi and others.
My hope is offer more compelling products at various price points and with the best driver technology we can when we add new models and update things.
I have been enhancing our in-house simulation tools for drive units and have added a lot of features to our FEA modeler including full suspension modeling (for stiffness, compliance, and buckling analysis) including non axisymmetric 3D structures. I will share some of this work on the forum if there’s interest
Do you think the market would accept a dome tweeter option from us? Not in the Aspen series but say in another product?
I don’t know the answer. I do know the history (at least the talked about history) of the development of the FR series, and is fascinating. As I continue to improve my system, bit by bit, I am squeezing even more quality out of the FR20’s, and they still amaze me at just how good they are. Hearing critics of the wonderful tweeter in the FR5, without context, is just strange to me. (criticism with context can be good, if a basis of the criticism is a genuine understanding with the goal to improve knowledge)
If there was a sense of purpose for a dome tweeter, and a successful sonic outcome that fits with that purpose, then yes, that could work and be successful.
I don’t what country you reside in but if it’s the US you may have a hard time finding a pair to demo. If in Europe it should be much easier.
As somewhat of an equipment hoarder like some others on this forum I own two pairs of speakers with AMT/ribbon style tweeters. The Reynaud Abscisse Jubilee with Reynaud’s own AMT design and the Qualio IQ Ultra’s with the Mundorf AMT. While I fully appreciate what this style of tweeter has to offer, in the end the main speakers in my two systems, the Verity Arindal and the Rosso Fiorentino Voltera 2, have soft dome tweeters as I prefer their more “emotional” take on the top end. As I run pairs of Rythmik F12 subs in both systems my Bliss Jubilee’s are my “change up” speaker when I get the urge to do the bookshelf sub thing.
I’m not sure anybody is criticising the FR tweeter at least I’m not. I was just relaying what I preferred in a head to head demonstration. I own speakers with similar tweeters to the FR series so I understand what they offer and why some people prefer them. But if that is what most people preferred then dome tweeters wouldn’t make up the majority of the market and companies like Scan Speak, SB Acoustics, AT and others wouldn’t keep developing newer models.
Yes, I think if you develped a speaker "similar’ to the FR5 with a soft dome tweeter like the D6700 or even higher up the line it would be a successful alternative to the FR5.
I was not talking about your post. You put some context with a frame of reference. The original post did not.
You hit the nail on the head. I’m not criticizing the FR5 at all—I’m simply offering feedback from a consumer’s perspective about what I would personally like to see.
If this is something I want, and I consider myself a fairly typical consumer, then it’s hard for me to believe there’s no market for it. I may not represent everyone, but I doubt I’m the only person looking for these qualities in a speaker.