I got some new speakers a couple days ago, from Black Sands Audio. Another great deal and great service from John Cook. Thank you John.
They have ceramic drivers made by Accuton. They are extremely detailed and revealing. Probably even more than the Ushers from 100Hz on up. Simply amazing midrange. Accutons really give you the texture. Below 100Hz the transmission line tuned bass comes into play. Instead of just a tapered horn, they put a port orifice at the end of the TL to lower the bass extension even more. There are two sets of tweeter posts, each with different filter, so you can have flat response X-Ray vision, or a little more rolled off with rosey glasses, which I prefer, so far. Even the dumb tweeter is still extremely resolving, just not as extended, I think.
The speaker uses 1st order filters, so transient response is perfect above the tuned bass frequencies. A single copper Goertz flat ribbon coil to the bass driver, and a Mundorf Supreme cap to the tweeter. Not sure yet as to how they make two different tweeter profiles, but I will know soon.
The bass is surprisingly powerful and tuneful. Tone is not as detailed as the direct sound, but still very good. BISL sent me this cool jazz trio disk of Brian Bromberg (thanksBob) and it really shows off the acoustic bass on this speakers. It's a great CD for listening and for system demo, BTW. I am experimenting with the port tuning. There is a removable rubber ring in the middle which can be removed to enlarge the port orifice. In the picture I have it installed backwards. The adjustable port is capable of varying the bass volume to match the speaker to the room size. My room is very big, but the little speakers really do fill it up with deep penetrating bass. CooL!
They have a very flat impedance around 8 ohms, so they should be great with tube amps. I'm gonna try that today. I'm also gonna try sitting a little closer.
I bought these as interim speakers to enjoy and learn from them until I can build my own speakers this spring. I want to see if I can live with ceramic drivers long term. They are relatively small cabinets, and weigh about 90 pounds, so I can move them easily and try them in some of my smaller rooms.
They are covered in fingerprints and smears from shipping so please ignore that. The finish is beautiful, perfect glossy black lacquer. I gotta get some Zymol for these beauties.
One thing all the reviews said was how great they image, and that is no exaggeration. They totally disappear. Images are dense and clear straight ahead and spread out across the pan, right up to the speakers. They don't get sucked into the speaker when panned wide. Some of that is the amplifier, but the speakers have to resolve too.
I do have to say that the jumpers that come stock are not satisfactory. I used ecramers's diagonal hookup scheme and that made a huge difference, by making the jumpers less critical. Shane lent me some JPS jumpers which added even more bass control and clarity. Thanks Shane.
I'll check the calendar for a G2G date.
Here's some pics:
