How Does 'PASCALITE' Diaphragm Sound ?

[417 - Alnico]

Symbiotik; What is it & how did it perform?
Symbiotik?

[thevott]

Bob,
I do agree that there are a number of high quality tour-sound companies with very talented professionals within. My assessment is based primarily on my concert attendance experiences in general. Your comments about many tour-sound personnel fully support my observations as most of the errors I see (or hear) are technical oversights with otherwise good equipment which result in phase, equalization and coverage disasters.

My comments about multicells are primarily in regard to the defined coverage issues that are often diregarded in many systems I encounter. Multicells, of course, are not the only option but they are clearly excellent sounding horns in my opinion. I cited them as an early and well tested design to illustrate the abandonment of old school thinking in many current systems---'throwing the baby out with the bath water' so to speak---and how even the oldest technology can dramatically simplify and improve some of these systems.

PS: I am a second generation trombone player. Horns are in my blood.

[joyspring]

Hi VOTT,

Good equipment in inexperienced or ignorant hands will have a low probability of producing good sound. The suggestion that given an unlimited amount of time, even a monkey with a typewriter can produce the works of Shakespeare is applicable here.

And I will mention three points, two that I made previously:

1. Modern loudspeakers have very ideal coverage -- it's just that the sound techs often have no clue.

Please remember that Pro Sound - live sound in particular - has suffered from an exponentially-increasing rate of B.S., pure mythology and utter lack of quantitative reasoning in the past twenty years.

Some of the stuff I hear from these folks makes the Vinyl tubes SET capacitors silver-wire audiophile non-technical nonsense seem relatively mild. What's more these people often influence large budgets and make decisions that affect the sound quality thousands of attendees, who each often paid in excess of US$40 to enter the venue, will experience and so have a much greater level responsibility than the incompetant `tweek' audiophile whose fretting over the proper braid in his oxygen-free headshell leads or the gauge of the point-to-point wiring in his Single-Ended Tube amp only affects himself and those immediately about him.

2. If multicells truly did have unquestionably excellent sound, then they would be ubiquitous in recording and particularly mastering control rooms. They are not. Mastering in particular is perhaps the most demanding arena for loudspeakers and I've not ever seen a multicell-equipped monitor in a mastering or cutting control room.

Multicells are not encumbered by any licensing or patents so any high-end transducer manufacturer (i.e. - TAD, Fostex) could produce multicells at a monstrous profit if they had an appreciable advantage over radials or CD horns that were (note past tense) commonly used in control room and mastering monitors. Fact is, none do.

As I mentioned in my reply to Mirrophonic above, the only common control room or studio playback monitors that employed multicells were the Lansing Iconic and the early Altec 604s up to the 604B.

Multicells solved coverage issues in the pre-CD horn era, and had a relatively good sound for P.A. / sound reinforcement. However, the employment (or lack thereof) of the multicell in truly critical listening applications is the ultimate indicator of its sound quality.

3. Waveguides have largely replaced most horns in BOTH sound reinforcement and studio monitoring applications. They have the very significant advantage of much lower distortion compared to our beloved horns which is why they are becoming ubiquitous.

Higher electrical input capacity drivers (better adhesives, geometry, technology in general) have offset the need for horn loading and high compression loading, mitigating two common sources of distortion. Again, waveguides merely `guide the wavefront' and define coverage pattern; they do NOT need to provide any loading to the driver.

To sum, the very top mastering facilities, recording studios and top touring sound companies have deep pockets and may employ any loudspeaker technology - new or old - that they wish to use. Much of the older technology that we cherish is not amongst those choices.

Finally, an `abandonment of old school thinking' is not how engineers think. We consider the `old school'. We consider modern technology. We weigh the advantages of both against the disadvantages. And most often the new technology wins because it often is a result of directed research to address the deficiencies of the `old school'.

If Altec were still in business, their engineers would be doing exactly the same thing - that is, if they wanted Altec to remain a leader in professional sound, they would be developing new technology and doing what you coined `abandoning the old school'. Their management's resistance to change and the fact that VOTT was a then `Academy' standard probably had a lot to do with Altec's demise.

JBL is does exactly that whilst acknowledging their heritage quite well and their latest systems - in the proper hands of course - sound brilliant compared to their older systems. That is, great sound, lower distortion, better coverage, higher headroom, far better reliability (which you simply cannot expect out of 1950s-technology two-way theatre systems in a live performance setting)... all the things that plagued their older systems that their engineers sought to fix, and they're still continually improving.

BobR

PS - I'm a woodwinds player, which is probably why we have a difference of opinion ;-)

[scott fitlin]

Sorry Bob, I totally disagree with you. JBL today does not, IMHO, sound the best. In fact JBL today leaves much to be desired sonically speaking.

[joyspring]

Scotty J,

Re-read my post a bit more carefully... nowhere did I ever state that `JBL sound [sic] the best'.

I did mention that newer JBL kit does sound better (as well as have many superior attributes) compared to older JBL kit, alluding to my main point that technology progresses and stuff does get better. Engineers don't conspire to produce worse-sounding product.

I will partially agree with you on one point: every loudspeaker system (and most any electro-acoustic transducer) leaves a lot to be desired sonically speaking... that's what Research and Development in addition to the study of psychoacoustics are for.

BobR

[scott fitlin]

Ok, I see what your saying. Its just that I see alot of JBL talk, and when I go to events and other places that use top pro and tour gear, I see much EAW, Meyer, as well as JBL these days, and I seem to prewfer EAW over JBL today. And I love vintage JBL and Altec, even with the inherent limitations of many older designs; i.e. power handling, distortion, limited Xmax, etc!

Just had to stick my .02 cents in!

[Mirrophonic Sound System]

Guess what Meyer have inside them ? JBL for better or worse.

[scott fitlin]

But JBL manufactures drivers for Meyer to Meyer specification! JBL makes the 2441 driver for Meyer, but I cant buy brand new 2441,s from JBL. You gotta consider this. JBL also makes the 076 cats eye tweeter for Westlake, but WE cant buy em!

JBL WILL make things for you IF you order 100 pieces of the item, so IF I had them make me 2220A,s to use 12 of them what would I do with the other 88 woofers?

Yeah, Meyer sound uses JBl drivers, but they aint what you get from JBL, Im sure of that!

[Jim D]

I must weigh in in this discussion. When ALTEC built the first experimental Mantarays they were much larger than the production models. The designers had made then within spec to 500 Hz. Due to the conical expansion rate used in them, it takes more length to develop the LF loading than it does in a comparitive exponential (Multicell, Radial/Sectoral)horn, especially in the vertical. When they were shown to the movie tech people they said that they would not use anything bigger than a multicell, so, back they went and downsized the Mantarays to be be coherant to 800 Hz instead. The JBl BiRadials and the later EVs are bigger, mostly taller, and probably a third octave more coherant in the low end, about 630Hz. We had Jerry Hubbard design use some "full size" Manatarays we used mostly outdoors. They were the best of all, good LF loading and the same sharp pattern. In a horn of this type, size means everything. JIM