Been a fan of ribbons ever since hearing my first pair of Amazing Loudspeakers by Bob Carver. Didn’t have two nickels to rub together but purchased them anyways back in 1990 after being blown away by their accuracy and sound. Still in our main system today even after countless sessions listening to so many different speakers through the years. The ribbons fake you into thinking the piano is right there in your room. Thanks for the vid Paul.
I wouldn't call the Amazing even remotely accurate. It has two resonant peaks at about 6 kHz and 12 kHz which emphasized sibilance. The bass was both exaggerated and underdamped therefore sounding loose, slow and just too much of it. Carver's ALS speaker is much better, still not entirely accurate but much better in performance.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt Thanks Carlos for your thoughts. I believe you are referencing the reviews from Stereophile mag on the prototypes that were tested in 1989. Bob's changes helped alleviate the issues you mentioned. That being said there is still a slight resonance around the 5k mark that can be noticed on the rarest of occasions by our family (for instance Natalie Merchant's Tiger Lily song, I may know the Word) but for the most part it's just not heard. And on George Winston piano pieces (or any piano piece), the ribbons sing. In regards to bass, if anything it is tight due to the low baffle design in the rear but lacking impact. We pair ours with two subs which work well to bring out that impact. Also a big fan of Bob's ALS. On a final note we use a 350Watt hybrid solid state amp to power the woofers and tubes to power the ribbon tweeters. These speakers are power hungry but will please when powered correctly.
@@jb.2986 I owned both the original Amazing and ALS. The Amazing did need more than a bit of modification. I found them both not to have enough transient attack that I prefer. Oddly enough, I still own a pair of large hybrid ribbon/cone speakers but listen to them rarely although they do come alive when played at louder volumes. Having owned hundreds of speakers, I ultimately went the route of ultra high-end custom speakers. Glad to hear you made your Carvers work for you. Cheers!
ädäm öddyö öslö quit€ imprässiFF. sädlie theres 4 ways 5 dig it -.- and öc duden€$$ surelie knöwn ml s+mt ärent nö lönger made... live like? münich quotet ml´$ äs tech dätä knöt necessäryy xD id övvnlee äFFiX zedd tö my tängyy örb xp XD this dudes knöt knöwink if his ämp is 2k ör 20k still well hängs sämwerr $wiss mi ^ ^
Thanks for answering my question Paul. The Jumetite CR610 was a speaker developed by Gilbert Hobrough and Mark Glazer. Only 8 pair were made. George Benson bought a pair, as did Lol Victor Borge. The downward aluminum ribbon design is a patent of Hobrough’s, whose primary life focus was photogammetry (3 dimensional imaging). Everything made in house at Jumetite Labs, and took 10 years of research before being made. Sound wise they disappear, and instruments fill my room. They startle me often as I’m always turning my head thinking that a sound is coming from another place in my home or from outside. The effect is ethereal. I love my Quad 57’s, but something beyond them is happening here for me.
I got ribbons for my studio monitors (adam A7X) without auditioning. The moment I heard the ribbons, I immediately replaced my HT with Martin Logans. The ribbon is heaven 😇
After 23 years, in 2023 I bought thin-film AMT ribbon tweeter speaker GoldenEar BRX and I love them so much that I bought a 3rd one as the center speaker for the home teater. source=Apple Music lossless
I still use a pair of Carver AL-III loudspeakers that I bought in 1995, They are dated for sure, but I have had the ribbons rebuilt once and I rebuilt the crossovers with much better parts than the originals that I obtained from GR Research. Properly set up, they sound so open and realistic. There are much better speakers out there for sure, but not for this price : )
Unrelated but it's super cool that you worked for infinity! The p363 floorstanding speaker was my first nice unit like ten years ago (: still have it as a center channel... Its paired with jbl loft bookshelfs, a jbl woofer and a Harmon kardon receiver...not the most expensive system but it's perfect for my art room ❤️
@@bassandtrebleclef - Same here. I think there is a point where audiophiles are paying for exclusivity rather than sound improvement. There are speakers in the $2K-$5K range that are absolutely killer.
I have a pair of ML Motion 40i’s and they are considered 9/10 speakers (critically speaking) and I spent a couple K on them. 10’s? You’re looking at 5 figures easy, maybe more..
cheapest ribbon cost a lot, and only the planar magnetic ribbon style is easy to work with(because it can cross over low enough), but only if its not to tall or wide. then you have to decide its going to be a line source or point source design.
I completely agree. If only PS audio would invest in a low-mid planar driver that covers the 150-750 Hz area convincingly! Infinity did it with Epsilons. It just needs a bigger planar...probably 2-3 times bigger than the one covering the midrange. You got the bass part right but I always feel that the 200-500Hz region is very critical for a world class speaker.
At the end of the '60s, I built a pair of speakers incorporating Decca Kelly ribbon tweeters. They were magic. One unintended result, at a party somebody left a wine glass on top of one speaker and it shattered. Never seen that again. When I emigrated, they got left behind, but after a while I discovered Magnaplanar which allowed me to renew my love affair with ribbons.
I had decca ribbons once and found they burnt out easily. Mine had a transformer that lowered the impedance to power a foil ribbon. They were crossed over at 3500 and were quite large using a horn to amplify the delicate signal and provide loading i think
@paul, who makes those absorber panels you have freestanding in front of the side walls? I've been looking for a substantial, yet mobile absorber panel like this.
Got an Alpine 6337 ribbon/dome combo so rare I just keep it dormant. Maybe this year I will show it off on my speaker Project. Anybody try the Beston ribbon from Parts express? Looks alot like the JVC back in the day.
When I see ribbons at an audio show I'm always sceptical. I used to own Magnepans, I now own Martin Logans, so I'm not opposed to that kind of speaker design, but a ribbon tweeter is a tricky bugger. Often they start ringing and rattling in a very unpleasant way, causing highs to sound very pointy, almost sawtooth-like. Some people call this 'transparency', but it's not. The sound silts up when it gets busy and there's just harsh, no detailed reproduction. Sometimes however and i find that's often in combination with a midrange unit that produces quite a lot of high frequencies, or even a full range unit, a ribbon can sound fantastic. They are capable of transparency in a way virtually no conventional dynamic tweeter can. But most of the time, designers get it wrong. And I guess that's also why designers just don't risk using ribbons. I do like the idea of a separate midrange ribbon. I really wonder how the FR20's sound, pity I can't hear them here in the Netherlands.
'Ole Audiophile to Paul: Our first experience with ribbons were a pair of Infinity Quantum 2s. We've had several since. Difficult to impliment? As in most are generally in-efficient by a wide margin? That's been our experience with them. Great excuse to purchase that power amp they need to perform best, it was the Infinitys that destroyed several big power amps not equipped for lower than 4 ohm loads. Back then, our amp resources were severely limited. Mac & Crown were suggested firmly, Adcom was brand new & there was a popular heathkit model (a Hafler?) if one had the smarts.
I really don't know if I could buy any speakers without a ribbon or AMT high end driver. Just too spoiled by it now. A good soft-dome tweeter is always great...but I am ribbon/AMT hooked..
Absolutely. Since hearing them, nothing else is natural enough or equates their ability to leave only the music in the room. Never have I forgotten speakers so much in my life as when I started listening to this ribbon design. Really just the music being staged in my room.
To me. It's the speed of the drivers tuff to match up. AT THE show. Wife was working. The music being played when I was over. Easy music could not hear the bass laying behind limping behind tweeters.
Im using beston ribbon. 2 in vifa open baffle duo vertical open baffle ,then a single carbon fiber (usher) building a bandpass,notch filter 500hz to 5khz. 70 hz hi pass filter. The subs have separate amp 500watt 70 hz down duo 18 ,dayton. Best i have ever built.
@@jonathanginofilippi sure, the tweeters only need a 3-4 cubic inches of airspace filled with fiberglass. The mids, like the BG Neo 10, GRS 10" or Radian LM10 need 2 liters of sealed airspace, with a bottom end of ~200Hz and use a woofer/sub to take over below that range.
One thing I don't like the thick barrier between the bottom of the midrange and the tweeter why can't you just make this a couple of mm thick and setback from the baffle face level with the drivers, another thing you could do is try tilting the tweeter one or two degrees up to get better dispersion between the two drivers but the barrier I think is the biggest issue!
Again, great video, Paul. Great to hear the FR 20 have planar drivers for the midrange and high end. I have never heard a planar speaker and/or headphone in real life (hopefully I will soon!), but what I’ve heard from several mastering engineers is that even headphones with planar diaphragms are extremely detailed. They’re also expensive (thousands of dollars).
If you were interested you could try the Fostex T50rp, it’s a planar magnetic headphone around $250 and is a gateway headphone into the planar world!! It’s is very hard to drive though so you’ll need a good amp
Filtering the reason for not using the ribbon tweeters down to cost only does not explain why so many high(er)-end or even cost no-object speakers use dome tweeters.
Paul, majority of cost regarding a loudspeaker come from the cabinet itself. This is a well-known fact amongst the HiFi community. Why are your speaker so expensive when they are made in China? Look at Arendal sound. Their Flagship 100lb tower speaker costs only 3,700 shipped. Also made in China.
@@sudd3660 That's how it's used, but shouldn't be. I mean, we don't call row boats, ships and hybrid cars aren't called EVs. Typically, professional reviewers refer to anything not a true ribbon, which most people can't even describe, as pseudo or quasi-ribbon. If one wants to see a true ribbon one can look up the original Apogee speakers with their true ribbon midrange and tweeter.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt do talk in more accurate term is always better then generalize, i personally would not call a planar magnetic driver a ribbon. but it is a ribbon like membrane in it. folder ribbon tweeters also, those yellow accordion things. true ribbons are those free floating i think you are saying. and i can agree with that.
@@carlosoliveira-rc2xt Or the Magnepan ribbon tweeter on the 3 and 20 and 30, or the Clarisys or the Analysis speakers, etc. True ribbons are used here and there but as Paul says most speakers use domes. A ribbon should be held on two sides only. If held on four sides (or however many sides of a polygon it may be) then the transducer should be called a planar. But many companies no longer make that distinction.
@@TheDanEdwards True ribbons are held north and south and loosely suspended. As I stated almost everything now should be referred to as a quasi or pseudo-ribbon. On a further note, floorstanding speakers should be addressed as such and not towers unless they're like 6 feet tall. Irritates me when every other online amateur reviewer refers to a 3 foot tall speaker as a tower.
If only I knew what ribbons were? I just love music I suppose rather than the science & expensive gear If you got the money, I suppose there's always a way to get people to part with it. Many record studios spend good money to set up their equipment I know they listen through decent Genelec 8341A priced at £2450, so why the need to buy speakers above that price for the home. Is it psychological the more you spend the better you hear ?. Is it just the phile in you.
You don’t need to spend loads on good gear. You don’t need to buy new. But yes, you should be trying to get to the point where the speaker sound wise vanishes from the room, leaving a stage of performers in your listening area. I always wonder why folks never question the amount of money they spend on iPhones and other electronic items that have a shelf life of maybe 5 years. Music is my passion. The audio gear just makes the experience of listening at home, well, pretty amazing.
It’s a bit of a bummer that many very expensive speakers are using cheap traditional tweeters. PS audio is on a good path for speakers, but they need to combine their excellency in speakers with electronics and beat the KEF LS 60 (which I have).
Traditional, perhaps superficially but cheap no way. In my playground pure beryllium and diamond layered tweeters are used. Could you mention please these VERY expensive speakers using CHEAP traditional tweeters? Many inexpensive two ways go the cheap AMT route because......well, they're cheap! Implementation is more important than the type of tweeter.
Two companies at the peak of the industry, Magico and Wilson Audio, do not use ribbons in their flagship speakers. I don't think they used domes just to skimp on cost 😕
I will happily make the assumption in this case and for a very good reason. How much are PS Audio FR30s? Are they nearly as expensive as Magico M9's eye-watering six figure amount? Now is it fair to assume that Magico went with domes not because of cost-cutting measures? If that's not convincing enough you can keep on your merry path and not assume that Santa isn't real
My HiFi dealer makes custom speakers with hand-built air motion transformers that crossover at 500 Hz, and he told me that Magico came out with a speaker with an AMT tweeter that sounded terrible because the other drivers weren't well matched to the AMT's extremely fast speed.
I'm not used to many different headphones, at least long-term, but surely most of them were dynamic drivers. - But then I switched to some of the Fostex RPs, which have planar drivers, and I couldn't believe the detail and clarity that came out of them. Sure, a little harsh, which with some equalizing can be tweaked, but I'm never going "back". - Too bad planar drivers for speakers are often out of my budget, or I'd probably go with those for speakers as well. - Yea, the Fostex-headphones aren't cheap, but still under 200, and I got a demo one from some store at like 100, which was a steal. - But anyway, I also feel like they should be more common, and perhaps then they'd also be less expensive.
Ribbons and AMTs can have extremely high perceived resolution. But for me their timbre is just unnatural. They call attention to themselves just like a horn. I prefer a well balanced with natural driver integration for a cohesive sound. Sure the Ribbons/AMTs/Horns can be impressive in short increments but become grating quickly for me.
an FR inspired planar ribbon bookshelf (with bassss!!) I think would make all of ours decade. Sub 5 grand pair. Don't know how the rest of you feel about that though..
As you can see from other comments, not everyone thinks that ribbons are The Truth. I got to hear all sorts of speaker concepts and designs at RMAF (may it rest in peace) over the years, and my preferences don't go toward ribbons. If yours do, then bless you both and I wish you a long and happy life of your system.
