Just wanted to say that I am REALLY enjoying watching the development of these speakers. Are there things I’m not happy with? Sure - they’re way out of my price range. But that’s not the point. The point is I see plenty of people questioning the method, the ideas, the process, the cost, etc. Gang, if you don’t like how they sound when they’re done or you can’t afford them, don’t buy them. In the mean time, enjoy the behind the scenes that no other company (that I’m aware of) is giving us. It’s fascinating and I thank Paul and crew for being so open about the whole thing.
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Agreed, it is a hoot to watch. Plus I learn tidbits.
For those of us not in the AN price range, the Stellar trickle-down should be a thing of beauty. This period is the painful bit. Sausage being made.
Speakers are one area where I subscribe to trickle-down theory ; )
I don’t really see Maggies as linesources. At least not at all in the same way as a speaker with columns of multiple tweeters and mids. Point source speakers, and point-source-ish speakers (since we’re usually talking about non-concentric drivers*) can conjure voices and instruments that are proportionate to the system/room in space. At least to me - and I’ll own up to my bias.
When I go to shows and hear 9’ tall saxophones and Dianna Kralls and so on, it does not strike me as natural in any way. I did hear a friend’s large (7’ tallish) MTM’s conjure a crazy realistic sax player the other day, but that is because they tend to act more like point sources. And I’ve not particularly been an MTM fan in the past, JSYK.
- My first studio monitors were Tannoy concentrics, and while I was young, and bought the concept mentally for a while, I’ve since had an inability to deal with a tweeter mounted in any sort of cone, including horns or a midrange driver cone. Front baffle waveguide? OK. But concentrics? Not feeling it.
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@stevensegal I happened to be in the lucky position to have had a chance to Chris, in the half hour phone conference about speaker designs, he came across as a very knowledgeable experienced and friendly person. We should all embrace young people in the industry and PS Audio or any other company offering people like Chris Brunhaver and Darren Meyers a platform to show their capabilities and continue to develop them self. All I hear Paul saying are improvements. You mention Dutch & Dutch and I will definitely give those a listen as they seemed to have proof to have tackled our Dutch real estate problem. Down to 20 Hz 10 cm (4”) from the wall, that actually is part of the complete sound production system, can be tweeted to any custom curve. Top reviews on sound quality everywhere. Solid Oak, high living room and spouse acceptance factor and best, full active. What I want to say, Dutch & Dutch are a group of talented young students that had a great idea and vision for something completely revolutionary that seems to work.
The point being, this is what I trust a guy like Chris Brunhaver will do for PS Audio for those who embrace their own amps, the DSD natural sound not processed by PCM DSP, and analog high and midrange handling in the speakers.
Nevertheless being Dutch, having a rather small living room, I am very tempted to support our young local geniuses and industry.
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I’m struggling hard not to say, everyone who loves music must be a bass junkey 
Says me who‘s currently in bass heaven even more after a pre change
I miss bass with my stereo set ups in the home office and living room. But there is absolutely no support for a SubWoofer in our living room, even the home office is actually too small to add an extra box in there.
That is why I was pleasantly surprised to hear that the Dutch & Dutch 8c are going down to 20 Hz actually utilizing the front wall and yet put every musician in the orchestra on it’s place, allowing the speakers to disappear. At least that is what the good comments are about. The reason that they have Aluminum domes without sounding harsh, is the wall reflection and cardoit phenomena / principle that lets the room become part of the sound production system.
You just need a deep bass fundament like the AN3 seem to offer.
I have come to appreciate organ music as we are in the lucky position to visit an old church with great organ and a great composer, musician and organ player every week. So enough material to compare, but organ music without bass is like spaghetti without sauce or pepper and Parma cheese. Dutch & Dutch demonstrated organ music to probably more experienced listeners than me and they seemed impressed.
So let’s go and hear I am curious.
8c’s will likely overwhelm most small rooms. Or be a waste. I appreciate the concept that they can be dialed in, but there are limits.
This is something that happens all the time in Audiophiledom - the crazy large system in a room that is utterly inadequate to house it.
Rudy - if you want bass with your smaller systems, get a small sub appropriate for the room.
I only commented as I must say I was a little surprised about these turn of events, given a demo speaker had been presented at Chicago, and now its a new design by a new designer.
From the European viewpoint, it does seem quite remarkable that perhaps the three most successful speaker products in recent years have all been integrated active products from Holland, initially for the pro market but always intended for the consumer market as well. The companies are Grimm, Kii and Dutch&Dutch. It does not surprise me because Holland has tremendous pedigree in audio electronics manufacture and research, as is evident from the substantial teams behind Grimm and Kii, of course Phillips have been world leaders and people like Kharma make some of the best speakers in the world.
So it did strike me as a bit odd that one person out of the blue should have such an impact on effectively a legacy design. It’s good to see younger people involved, but experience counts. Pete Thomas at PMC entrusted his son to lead a project resulting in the £65,000 Fenestria, but he already had loads of experience and he had the R&D support of one of the worlds leading speaker businesses. It still took 5 years, including all new drivers and their first piston driver in a consumer speaker.
It would be interesting to know how many speaker designers of the leading speakers I liked best at the last hifi show were well known and long established geniuses and how many less known creative brains…I guess 20/80. Every genius needs early chances to get a known genius.
I have a set of D&D 8c in a fairly large room but with no concessions to audio fidelity. Not much furniture and lots of glass. They are 9” from the front wall, roughly 8’ apart and toed in roughly 15 degrees. Unless you stand directly in front of one of the speakers they literally do not exist. The music comes from everywhere. If you sit in the sweet spot the soundstage is awesome. The team at D&D have certainly done their homework and due diligence. They will play low but they could still use a sub. They are amazingly true to the source and add no color of their own to the music. I haven’t done any tuning on them at all and may not.
They are physically too big for a small room and would overwhelm it as beef said.
I am sure that the AN’s will be very good as they will have bigger drivers. I would love to try a set when they are ready for the market. I feel that for certain setups high end powered loudspeakers are the way to go. Yes you are stuck with the electronics the designers chose but it is also a lot simpler kit.
Hi BadBeef I appreciate the tip I have contemplated it a lot. But like I said. That other box?!
But 8c’s are built for studios as well, or even in the first place, why would they overwhelm a small room? They are full blow DSP and if I buy them from the right dealer, they custom tune them in my living room.
I am a wood freak used to work in a carpentry shop to pay for my studies. You see? Dutch built, solid oak, and 2 not too big boxes instead of 3 (R speaker, L speaker, sub) or rather 4 or 5, if you count the power amplifier’s in the rack that won’t be needed for passive speakers.
But: BUT it needs to be able to reproduce the quite good sound produced by the SGCD, if it adds its own character (which studio monitors typically don’t) they are no good to me. Let’s see or rather listen.
By all means. Try them.
@Rudolf_Appel Vintage King has a 30 day money back policy if you want to try a set out.
(assuming you are in the USA)
Because most studios are not small rooms.
What I find amusing about all the hoopla around the 8c is that in the audiophile world DSP is a bit of a sin. I originally come from the car audio world where (for obvious acoustical reasons) a DSP is a must and is considered an improvement rather than “not being true to the source” or “not a straight wire with gain”. Now this one speaker comes out and everyone is head over heels about its ability to be tuned to the environment. The world is a funny place.
Who is your “everyone?”
We have positively discussed active speakers, speakers with DSP, out-board dedicated DSP, etc. here for years.
At this point all of the “major” speaker manufacturers are following the trend. Focal, B&W, KEF, Dynaudio, ATC. The five of them make up a large percentage of all speakers sold so the Dutch and Dutch is just a singular example.
Obviously I’m generalizing. But, how many conversations or reviews are there about sources, DACs, amps, speakers, cables. Now, how many are about DSP? Yes it’s common for HT but not for 2 ch stereo.
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I drove a UHAUL from Ottawa, Canada to Scottsdale, AZ our little Honda Civic hitched wheels up (no trailer) 4.5 years ago with my Wife & our Son keeping me awake. God Bless alll the Truckers out there ! There were a huge gift on the road. And then there was our little “Incident” in Northeast PA…
Hope that Chris’ experience was better than mine.