This is a good thing?
Maybe the audio Junkie will weigh in as well.
In My Ears We Trust
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Good? Not sure about that but I am interested in what Danny has to say and figured some of you may be also. I am very surprised at his findings on a speaker that expensive. The edge diffraction and magnetic parts in the signal path is mostly what surprises me. My guess on the freq response is maybe they are correcting for common room issues. I don’t doubt they are great sounding speakers as much as people love them.
One can always find fault. Sonic relevance is critical. I keep in mind this is coming from a fellow that has something to sell. I get that Wilson Audio speakers may not be everyone’s flavor of the month, but no reason to pull the cherries out of the ice cream and insert black walnuts.
Mmmmm…Black Walnuts!
I enjoy them as well, but for those seeking cherries, well….
Sure, but these seem like big faults at that price point. I thought the flatter the response the better but I’m a noob so I don’t really know. I’m not trying to argue I am just curious.
I’ll be looking forward to that interview about as much as I’m looking forward to it being -2 outside tomorrow.
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I didn’t know you liked the extreme cold, lol
Danny’s knowledge appears to be quite narrow and he seems to believe that a flat curve and other measurements, as he interprets them, predicts the best sound in every case.
I watched part 2 of his analysis and I found his comments about the Wilson XVX and the WAMM to be hilarious.
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I can’t argue since I really don’t know much but the edge diffraction and iron nut’s at that price seems off. Maybe I’m expecting too much since I’m not at that price point. So are we saying a flat response isn’t desired? Are common room issues considered by designers and adjustments are made in the response to compensate? Again not trying to argue I’d like to understand.
Fair enough.
I pursued flat response with the TOTL Revel speakers. I found them lacking, sterile, harsh and not the least bit engaging. Others swear by them.
Measurements only take one so far IME.
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That makes sense to me. I understand listening is the real tell.
If it were true there would be only ONE speaker
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Creating speakers that measure flat is a science (I have a “science project” set of speakers that I fiddle with sometimes - crossover tweaking, sometimes active crossover etc.).
But to make a set of speakers that are enjoyable to listen to for extended sessions - that’s an art.
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I would love to hear what Chris Brunhaver thinks. I can see half a db or a full db here and there but this seems excessive. Then add in the edge diffraction and iron nut’s in the signal path for a speaker this expensive makes no sense to me. Anyway here is the video Jay’s Audio Lab released today for anyone interested.
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I haven’t spent the time to watch this whole 20 minute video but scrubbed through Danny’s original video. I originally met Danny back in 2002 back when I was working at a hobbyist/kit speaker and driver design company called Adire Audio in my early 20’s. He was displaying his kit speakers at a trade show and doing crossover design for a start-up speaker company called Epiphany Audio.
Later, when I worked at Bohlender Graebener, I was helping in OEM sales and he was buying tweeters and I spoke on the phone with him quite a bit.
A lot of his approach on youtube is a bit of an over simplification or is shilling for his design services or “upgrade kit” business (saying how great his crossover parts and tube connectors or whatever are) and isn’t always technically correct but I think it’s pretty approachable for someone on youtube trying the learn a little.
However, he is almost always talking down about what everyone else does and tries to promote his own efforts. I have a former colleague that calls this kind of a person a “fart sniffer”. Someone who things that even their own farts smell pretty good. Haha.
The Watt Puppy 8 was released in 2006 and Wilson has slowly resolved some of the issue that Danny points out in newer models, like running the midrange way too low and with a very peaky/non-optimal crossover. Many of their designs are still plagued with a lot diffraction issues, though the spatially averaged responses and voicing has gotten to be quite good.
The little square-ish baffles around their tweeters to allow for mechanical adjustment causes a lot of issues. In the case of the watt puppy 8, the tweeter is almost equidistant from 3 sides of the enclosure, causing the huge dip/peak in the response.
https://www.linkwitzlab.com/diffraction.htm
They also do the crossover design by ear, sitting at the listening position with a bit crossover board and long lead wires run to them and don’t really use much in the way of measurements. As such, there are some eyebrow raising issues in the mid/tweeter crossover, and not proper high-pass on the mid and there should be a conjugate network on the woofers to lower their upper impedance peak and minimize the interaction with the lowpass fitler and peaking around 60-80 Hz and impedance dip there. This “doing it by ear” is part of how these eccentricities can sneak in. This era of Wilson was a little unforgiving and “hard” sounding at times. I don;t think that is the case with current wilson stuff.
Darren, when he was here at PS had a set of Sasha DAW and I thought that they sounded awesome. Slightly colored in the midrange but otherwise very high resolution and dynamic and punchy.
Obviously, Wilson has been extremely successful and has an enviable brand image. I do like how their build a woofer cabinet a lot (though a lot of the more recent changes are just “bling” though something people are obviously responding to). I think that the production engineering and fit and finish and craftsmanship are off the charts but the actual engineering (squashing “issues” and understanding the fundemental engineering behind a lot of this stuff is lacking.
For better and worse, I think that Dave was considered “god” and they won’t really question and improve a number of things in the future. I sure most of it is “this is how we do it because that’s how we’ve always done it”.
It would be fun to get some new engineering blood in there (who actually really deeply knows their stuff technically) to help slightly steer things in a way of greater technical excellence but still have some of the history and stewardship of the company from someone like Daryl. I don’t see that happening though.
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I don’t Danny is pushing his mods, as his main business is selling kits. People are sending him their speakers because they’re looking to improve them, and Danny has proven himself as more than capable of doing so. A lot of times the mods are just upgrading the quality of the parts in the crossovers and binding posts, and adding No Rez to the cabinets. For the money, the Wilson Watt Puppies had some serious deficiencies, like cabinet diffraction and magnetic parts in the signal path.
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Will be interesting to evaluate the new speakers Danny is planning to release that he’s touting as being next level. These will not be released as a kit because of the sophistication of the design.
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Second part of the interview
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Thank you for responding, Cheers!