Forgive me if this has long since been asked and answered: Will the AN3’s come with grilles, at least as an option? These have my very strong interest, but the grilles may help with spousal acceptance 
Great question and I am uncertain of the answer. We’re making some pretty decent changes in the driver configuration on the front baffle at the moment and I want to see how that works. However, in the end, we realize the spousal acceptance factor is a big deal
and will give some serious consideration to grilles and acceptable looks.
Thanks. There is another reason too, that being that there is ALWAYS some moron who will walk right into someone’s living room and start poking dust caps. 
At the risk of agreeing with myself, getting the spoken voice right is the opinion of several leading speaker designers. If first impressions were gained from spoken voice recordings, rather than the soundtrack of Gladiator, there wouldn’t be a problem. For the record, Harbeth always play spoken voice recordings at their demonstrations and at shows.
p.s. I normally post to Paul’s Post first thing in the bath or by voice dictation. Thankfully not dropped a device yet. Hopefully not too much information. Chris1948 posts at the same time and possibly in the same circumstances. It’s all about time zones.
Grilles aren’t an optional extra. They effect the sound. If you can get the grilles off your P3ESR, and they are purposely designed to be very difficult to remove as they are meant to be left on, try blowing though them. You couldn’t blow out a candle.
As a regular, this is a big issue. The audience at the world famous Wigmore Hall is dropping off and not being replaced. Can walk in for most performances. On the other hand, went to Romeo & Juliet at Covent Garden on Saturday and every ticket for the entire run was sold out a while ago. A week or two before that for the opera, much of the stalls crowd had flown in from France and Italy.
Ballet and opera have gained in popularity from live open and cinematic broadcasts that are either free or about $15. The Royal Ballet is releasing its stars to undertake high profile film roles (they have enough world-class principals to manage without for a few months).
Hi-fi companies have made affordable and attractive consumer products, but sometimes I think the high-end industry look down on those companies as making inferior products with contempt. More fool them.
Many speaker manufacturers use magnets very successfully to position the grilles. Even on sub US$ 1k speakers, but also on +10k speakers.
Spouse, dust, UV light protection on the rubber driver rim, extending the life time of the drivers, morons poking into dust caps or trying to play the harp on the AMT’s, enough reasons to consider grilles.
Whether they should be considered optional, that is the big question. They are generally rather transparent for the music from the speakers but always influence the sound. In case speakers are voiced without grilles, applying a grill might negatively affect the sound, and if they are voiced with the grill, leaving them off might also negatively affect the sound. But how much this effects the sound ?
Some measurement comparison data would be good, although I know this will not convince those who who don’t like grilles out of principle or those who think scientific measurements are irrelevant.
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I would think, however they are voiced, grills would be a must. Preservation is enough reason to have them. One can always remove them to listen, then, replace them for protection when not in use.
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Manufacturers really should advise whether the speakers have been voiced with the grilles on or off or, as some do, state that the grille is designed to be acoustically transparent.
A classic example are the Quad ESL57 that had a rather thick glove that was improved from the ESL63 onwards. Some people take the glove off, at risk of electrocution, but it’s not necessary.
PMC Fact have buried magnets so you wave the grille at the speaker and it magically attaches. I think they put them in before they apply the veneer.
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Yeah my current speakers (Vandersteen Treos) are voiced with the grilles on, but I would be fine with taking them off for best sound. Just would like to have them be available for WAF and protection against guests, small children, etc
I am particularly against running speakers with grillls.
My TAD cr1’s have permanent grills on the coincident tweeter/midrange because the eggshell thin vapor deposited beryllium can be broken easily pushing a finger through.
However there is a removable round metal grill for the woofer only. Even with the minimal footprint of it, It actually messes with the imaging when they are on .
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Paul, I’m curious if you’ve looked at the The SA 8535 Ribbon Compact Driver by Stage Accompany?
It looks really impressive.
Wow. That seems fairly radical at this stage. What’s going on?
I haven’t had a bath in years! I post from a conventional PC, clad in dressing gown and nightshirt with a pint mug of freshly roasted coffee to hand. Then I have a shower! This is probably more information than anyone wanted.
I always get the ablutions over first - before any other activity.
+1 on adding grilles as a standard accessory. While it’s certainly no deal breaker for me if a speaker comes without a grille, it’s nice to have. I place my hifi in the living room. If I have people over, particularly people who are clueless about hifi, I like to have the grilles on for protection. Then again, these speakers don’t have a dome tweeter, which is the most vulnerable and tempting target for prying fingers. Grilles might also be good for UV protection if placed in front of a south facing window that gets a good amount of direct sunlight.
I’ll be in a position to let you know more in a few weeks. Basic shape and functionality is the same but in order to get more slam from 200Hz down we may need some more drivers and that’s just the start.
I’ll say it again…wow!.. this is a very big development in my eyes buried in a thread where a lot of the discussion has been about aesthetics. Congrats on the continual push for improvement Paul!
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Thanks! We’ve connected with a brilliant driver designer who’s fundamentally reshaped our thinking on much of what we knew. Fast paced changes always abound. More on this later. Get ready for something quite extraordinary (and what we had at the show was no
slouch).
Any chance we can hear the new design at the show in CA this June?