Sonics Allegra Speaker

The new Sonics Allegra speaker, shown here with Immedia's Allen Perkins (left) and designer Joachim Gerhardt (right in JA's pic), differs from the one I reviewed in January 2009, primarily in how the cabinets are attached. In the first series, the top, midrange and tweeter cabinet was solidly affixed to the top of the woofer box. Joachim Gerhardt decided to mechanically isolate the two cabinets to give the midrange and tweeter a cleaner environment in which to work, so they're now attached with an absorbent elastomer layer. To maintain the mass loading and resulting stability, however, there is now an approximately ½"-thick, stainless-steel plate attached to the bottom of the mid/tweeter cabinet. Simple, clever, and effective.

The system sounded great, as I mentioned, with the wide-open soundstage and effortless dynamics that characterize Perkins/Gerhardt setups, but was particularly noteworthy in its low—very low—and articulate bass. Even in substandard show conditions, the system's bottom end had a natural feel and character that one rarely hears outside of a concert hall. Whether it was the new table, arm, preamp, amp, cables, or speakers is a bit hard to say, of course, but I look forward to hearing the gear in more familiar surroundings.

By an accident of good fortune, I overheard a brief exchange between Joachim Gerhardt and legendary designer John Curl. Joachim had pulled out a small, sheet metal box, of the sort that Altoids come in but about twice as big, pulled off the top, and was showing it to John. In about 30 seconds, the two had discussed, analyzed, compared notes on, and come up with potential improvements to the circuit. The two credited each other for the critical ideas and agreed that it should work quite well, indeed. Joachim noted that it could be built for "less than 20 euros" and set it aside. True genius is an amazing thing to see because it usually looks like anything but.

COMMENTS
nunh's picture

Brian Damkroger - love this kind of reporting/ stories - love it! These kind of stories give us a neat insiders view to interesting people in the industry. Thanks!

struts's picture

I don't think I know anyone who hasn't scored in Vegas but dressed like that Joachim may well be the first. "I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK..."

Joachim Gerhard's picture

The decoupling was Allens idea and it works marvelous. I told many people to put a hand on the bass bin and then on the midrange-treble modue. It is pretty effective and simple. I love Allens mechnial work.

norbert's picture

the guy on the right has this Larry David sartorial thing going on

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