Why most ribbon tweeters are so bad
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 พ.ย. 2020
- Find out the negative and positive sides from having a ribbon tweeter.
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If you need help with your HIFI system or general advice, then send me a mail to: realhifihelp@gmail.com (my name is Larry)
For free help, then look at my videos and comments. Then there are several 1000’s of hours put into these videos for the entire community. (circa 450 videos)
I think you're hearing the price and not the sound.
I have used speakers with decent tweeters from Seas, Scan-Speak, Morel and heard many more quite expensive designs with either horn or conventional dome tweeters (from soft to ceramic,or diamond).
However, today I enjoy my own speakers with Aurum Cantus G1 ribbons after living with a commercial bookshelf with G2 for a few years.
I prefer myself the clarity, speed and resolution of ribbons where the strings vibrate with pure overtones and resonances are sparkling clear; there are great advantages in a transducer that is an order of magnitude lighter than a dome tweeter and reacts and stops in an instant.
Viawave, Raven, Raal are some of the best transducers available nowadays, that when properly implemented are well beyond any existing conventional tweeter potential regardless of the cost of "entry" imho.
But I can be wrong and my own bias got the best of me.
Ribbon tweeters are tools. Like any other drivers they are there for a designer to achieve his/her goal. Even a small format ribbon tweeter, crossed high in a 3-way monitor can work very well.
It's really up to a designer to use them properly. Most ribbons are fine. The video should be named "why most speaker designers are so bad then it comes to ribbon tweeters".
That is basically also what I said.
Got that right... There are 6,000 people designing speakers for sale....perhaps a dozen are actually good at the task.
First hi-fi channel I've actually subbed.
i heard people talking about planar tweeters like Bohlender Graebener Neo3 being something that actually a better option than dome tweeters. they play lower, handles more power, move faster, more durable and open back options.
ribbons sounds like it won't change much in the hifi world, but also depends how you define ribbon, i think of ribbon as the ones that has the aluminium foil suspended in a magnet gap(with the durability issue you mentioned). or perhaps the yellow folded ribbons with magnet at the sides and acting like an accordion.
My 30 year old Apogees ribbon speakers with help of a Infinity EMIT super tweeter are still playing nicely. But hell, what I know ?
Thanks, it's the journey that fun and interesting.
ribbon tweeters work well, or can, in a treated environment like a studio. in our B room at the studio i work at we have Adam's. a pair of A5x's for tracking and as reference and a pair of A77X's as our main monitors. they're expensive, and do sound great. i can't imagine using these types of ribbon/planar based monitors anywhere else though.
like most things, context of your environment matters. domes are better for most situations, regardless of their lack of detail. just my opinion, great video!
Linaeum tweeters are the best in my opinion.
I have ribbon tweeters in my car-audio setup. Amazingly, the delicate ribbons have been going strong for over 5 years. One advantage of rectangular shaped ribbons is controlled dispersion. In my case, I mount the left tweeter horizontally to minimize reflections from the adjacent A pillar.
The downside is that I high-pass my ribbons at 6.5khz, which only works because I'm running 2" mids in pods on my dash. Yes, I just mount speaker pods on my dash and it sounds better than door speakers. BION, I get 3D imaging in my car that most home audio enthusiasts can only dream of.
Actually about to do the same I think. I’m going to use a 4 way setup plus sub just got to have enough time for the fabrication.
I prefer soft dome tweeters over ribbon tweeters. They are more durable, smoother sounding, and have a wider dispersion.
Me too. But, maybe less than 1% of the ribbon tweeters with the best crossover and constructions in the world are also really really good.
My main point was just the normal build quality with cheaper speakers has many times got sound issues.
What about planar tweeters?
One shoe fits all? There are different technologies of ribbon. Not all sound the same.
I have AMTs on my Adams AV7 active speakers., they sound absolutely amazing.
Essentially its about the quality of the components, regardless of the technology.
This is why you use two normal tweeters dome etc, with one ribbon… Works great for me. Cross them over to hit different notes
I think ribbons are good when they are isolated to very high frequency, usually in a 3 way design along side a strong dedicated midrange performer, in which case they can shine in the top end.
jup
Agree 💯
Planar or ribbon tweeters usually kick as. The problem is they need to be crossed fairly high. So it's the midrange that has to cope up. And Ribbons don't need to cost 3000$ to be excellent. After 300$ per item you can get excellent sound from them. After 500$ there is hardly a dome tweeter in the market that can cope. Either made by beryllium, titanium or cloth from Jesus robe.
You know what I mean. That the tweeter and the entire speaker needs to be made in a very expensive way usually in order to support that amount of detail so it is stable/versatile/normal.
And to do that, it many times requires a non shelf tweeter than is made in house like Verity. Or like the Raven tweeter.
Raal can in theory do the job. But that just means that the entire speaker has to be extremely good to support that sound.
Again, it will sound good, but nowhere near the best compared to an inhouse custom made tweeter by some of the best companies.
Too many sound metalic/weak.
Beryllium tweeter do a lot of good and sound cool, but are a lot like the old B&W kevlar units; putting too much of it's own sound on the music.
That is the problem with most units in the world not just tweeters, they interfere too much with their own sound.
And still, that does not mean that they cannot sound very good. It just means, that it is far from the ideal solution.
With low price there are always compromises that get made. And to then make that an acceptable or even a good sound, one has to partner it with equally bad components.
@@RealHIFIHelp And you are wrong.
Custom tweeters are usually ordered by manufacturers for a very specific designs. For example, transformers may be wound for particular impedance. Raal BTW solves this problem on 20XR by providing multiple transformer taps.
For majority of the custom tweeters however, customization is limited to engraving speaker brand name on the face plate. ProAc uses silk dome tweeters on some of their models which is nothing but Vifa DX-25.
The second reason many manufacturers claim to have custom tweeters is marketing. We are special! We have custom model! It's hype for gullible audiophiles. Tweeter manufacturers will support this by having OEM only models which mere mortal DIYs or small timers cannot buy. Your are conflating good design, personal preferences, marketing and the cost of components. They are all different animals.
Most of what you wrote here are nothing but generalizations that have little to do with reality.
This for example.
"Raal can in theory do the job. But that just means that the entire speaker has to be extremely good to support that sound.
Again, it will sound good, but nowhere near the best compared to an inhouse custom made tweeter by some of the best companies."
Raal does the job not in theory but in reality. There are excellent DIY designs, using Raal as well as terrible commercial offerings, using the same exact tweeter. Raal also has various models some of which are good and others, not so much. I am not even sure what in house made tweeters are you comparing to and based on what standards? Distortions, polar response? May be linear response?
@@snowblow1984 I am comparing to the best in the world, not the normal stuff. That is why what I wrote can seem like a generalization, but in fact it is much deeper than that. I never make a black and white statement saying it is 100% like this.
@@RealHIFIHelp there's no such thing as "the best in the world". There are great sounding systems that some people will rave about and other, dismiss for one or another reason.
@@snowblow1984 Yes that is the common group mindset, that likes to preach that.
You can still enjoy bad gear on several levels, getting close to the good stuff.
You aren't seeing a lot of Ribbon tweeters, but a lot of AMTs (Air Motion Transducers). AMTs are fine alternatives to domes, if you take into consideration, they cost a little more, and can't typically be crossed over as low as modern dome tweeters. Your complaints aren't regarding the tweeter or its usage, but overall target curves speaker designers use today. In the 90s, everyone blamed metal dome tweeters for the brighter sound of the latest loudspeakers. The reality was speaker designers had wider bandwidth drivers than before and could make speakers with a flatter target curve. Flat frequency response to 20k hz was the theoretical ideal, but listening experiments showed listeners found it bright sounding. Today, many speaker designers have taken a step back and are using target curves where the output tapers toward the treble, but the majority are still producing speakers with flat target curves, which sound bright. If AMTs didn't come back into fashion, you would still complain about the overall trend in how speakers sound today.
I have had Decca type ribbon tweeters for 35 years. Me and my friends have enjoyed music during several hours long sessions. The rest of the equipment need to be very good though. For classical music ribbons are a must. Ribbons are much more detailed and life like. Visit a live string concert and you will see what I mean. I just don't like domes, they are too muffled especially soft domes.
I love the sound of my Monsoons with planar mids and ribbon "tweets".
anyone got any views on the goldenear brx? ive had many adams and i hate the ribbon or amt so far
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Fountek, are they a good brand?
I don't know.
Have you tried tweeters by Morel?
Maybe, I have heard hundreds I don't know the name of.
Morel is the best I've heard. Not their woofers just the tweeters. Have heard most of the popular domes except Scanspeak. Not perfect mind you - in fact I'm watching this video precisely because I'm looking for a better solution.
Baffled here, so what makes most ribbon tweeters bad? Harmonic distortion? Bad crossover design in commercial speakers? I need more information than they must be expensive and paired with expensive caps and coils. Sure high quality parts help, but implementation matters more. I’ve heard lots of high end speakers that I would not buy, but every once in a while a engineer really hits it out of the park and the speaker just sounds correct. A lot of multi driver speakers never have the coherent realistic sound of a full range speaker.
When a company crams a cheap ribbon or AMT into a two way design I can see there being definite compromises, but in a well designed three-way speaker they are superior to any dome I've experienced, and that seems to be where they shine best!
Maybe, depends on specific 2 way vs 3 way we compare and then the room and gear and many other factors. Yes there are a lot of good tweeters in a lot of 3 way speakers, I cover the best ones in my books and most other things if you want them. But it is material that currently is about 2500 pages.
so you think the raal 70-20xr sucks???
No. I just think that cheap drivers need a lot better insides in a speaker to support them mostly. And when you have a cheap driver, you usually don´t have those things.
It has to do with proper "implementation"! Proper crossovers, cabinets etc,. I was told for YEARS that AMTs were all terrible, till I purchased GoldenEar speakers (Sandy Gross designed) and I fell in love with them! I had previously owned many speakers with ribbon tweeters, and was never that happy with them (well I loved Magnepans if properly set up). Also cost doesn't always mean that much if the designer knows what they are doing!
Yep, totally agree. Most of the issues come from them having to be crossed over so high to reduce distortion. With that come plenty of problems.
I don't like ribbons. They have to much distortion. That is what people call detail. They are ok from about 7khz up but then, why bother at that point. Burylium (sp) tweeters are 100 times better.
Maybe, depends on so many things. Best tweeters I have heard and in the Marten Design Bird 1, Sarastro Verity, Audio Note AN-e speakers.
And many I know say that it it the Marten Mingus together with the Wilson XVX chronosonic speakers that are the best. There are so many top end models with good tweeters nowadays.
Ribbon tweeters especially demonstrate the audiophiles lack of ability to adjust gear/room to the revealing unit. I like Berilium many times, but don´t consider it as natural as many of the highest models of the AN-E. AN-e spe/he + sec signatue + Sogon models are just a lot more integrated in sound where Berilium has a tendency to separate things more artificially.
@@RealHIFIHelp well, I have been a musican for 45 years. I have been a recording engineer for 40 years and a mastering engineer for 35 years. Not to brag but when you want to hear things through speakers that sound like the real thing, it is pretty hard to do.
Ribbons don't do it.
@@analogkid4557 I have owned Quad S2 (ribbons) for nearly 5 years, and as far as voice is concerned, I don't believe there is a speaker under £1,000 (or a good deal more) which beats them. I have heard dozens and none betters them on this criteria. For bass, dynamics, scale etc.....sure, this isn't their forte. But realism as you stated, c'mon ?
@@karlhinchliffe4920 yeah, cymbals don't sound real at all. Only metal domes can do that.
Come on , Couple million dollars Tweeter , that doesnt even Exist . Yes there are company's selling snake oil , so god knows maybe someone put a million dollar tweeter .
But whatever it is you can make it DIY for fraction of that , i dont care what is it .
Some of the most expensive speakers , best speakers use Tweeters made by hand in Serbia where im from , best in the world in its class . And its not even a 1000$ per pair , its around 200$ bulk sail for best possible materials realistically handmade .
Jup like I explained it's all about context. You can of course chose to misunderstand it, if you want to. And no all ribbon tweeters are not the same, there is a huge difference. And the really good ones are not the ones that they sell in the stores. Have a nice day.
@@RealHIFIHelp You are the one who can make the tweeter to be really good one or a crappy one as a speaker designer. There are plenty of superb components on the market that can be used to create a world class speaker. No need for the ones that are not sold in the stores. It's your speaker design skills baby!
@@snowblow1984 Not really most DIY is really low quality and your are talking about the biggest potential DIY sound, not the most likely common ones that most people use.
If you bothered to do your research you would realise I have tried all levels. Yes standard components can do an okay sound. But custom made stuff is 9/10 times better. So there is no reason for settling for something that most people find okay.
On top of that, custom made sound can also become cheaper.
You are comparing the normal DIY gear with the normal trashy expensive sound.
I also say in many videos that it is very relative.
Meaning that, when incorporating cheap stuff, you have to do it in a certain way, that could in theory make it sound good.
By the way, I worked with some of the best in the business, a
@@RealHIFIHelp some the DIY use $5000 Tad tweeters. Some build humongous horns. I have line arrays that weight 2 tons. Other Diy will use $19 tweeters an cardboard. It's all over the place. Just like it is in commercial design. I am still puzzled as to how you quantify that 9/10 times difference in betternes. Don't care who you worked for. Based on your sweeping generalizations you have little technical knowledge as far as use of the drivers and ribbon tweeters in particular.
@@snowblow1984 DIY can sound good, but will in most cases be beat by the best stuff in the same value category new. Simply because the manufactors can get the stuff at a much cheaper price and they can tune it better and get better matched units. (we normal people have to buy single layer not properly matched units with all kinds of cheap kits)
So it is generally better to just buy the new stuff in the stores, going after the special few good things.
I have heard good DIY projects, but then we aren't talking about a normal Proac or Avalon clone, then we are usually up in the 10-30k USD class trying to making a good Wilson Audio speaker copy or a proper Avalon speaker copy or even trying to copy a Verity speaker.
Kit's aren't usually that good compared to the best, they are just good low level value most times. The good stuff, some few people keep to themselves.
But yeah you can still get good value stuff on Troelsgravesens homepage or other places like that.
There is no harsh nor metallic sound. Thats audiocracy BS. there is distorsion and distorsion less (below hearing threshold) sound. There also is NO warm or cold sound.
All you hear are frequenties with their proportional values in excited energy, in other words, its all in the amount of energy the filter passes through to the individual speaker elements.
Further, the acoustics of the listening environment(room), has even a greater impact on the sound.
Dont tell people all this nonsense but stick to the facts.
And certainly dont ask this guy for advice lol jeeeez.
You are talking about the main culprit of what creates what I call harsh or metalic sound. So you just wasted both of our time by just stating what I stated in ASR terms so you can feel good about yourself. Have a nice day.
@@RealHIFIHelp People spreading all kinds of audio BS everywhere, sometimes it makes me just spend the time to neutralise this.
Bi wiring, cables and so on and so on, its all marketing BS. Anyone that can hear the difference is hypnotised by the money they spent on the particular item. wasted money!
The only money you should spend is to improve your acoustics in the listening room.
A bad speaker = a bad speaker, it doesnt matter what type of speaker it is.
Just stop telling porkies. (i could copy this and post it at almost every "review" about audio gear etc....) To much money greed in this business, overpriced gear with low quality components. Also over engineered to make it bling and cost a lot for the snobs to make them happy for a minute.
You have a nice day to.
ps make a video which tells the truth about all this :)
Thanks for pointing out the trouble with ribbons. Looks like Ribbon fans came here expecting to hear good news thus the thumbs down .