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The Nautilus tweeters are enough of a magnet for guests to touch that I couldn't imaging leaving the grilles off when they, or their kids/pets, are around.
An argument could be made that most speakers are designed to sound best with their grilles intact, while others might reason that anything in front of a tweeter has got to be bad. Reader Gerald Neily wants to know if you prefer to listen with your speaker grilles on or off.
Very few speaker manufacturers design their systems to be heard with their grilles on. If their desired sound comes from the grilles being left off, than that is how I would prefer to listen to them. A spectrum analyzer running both with the grilles on and off would yield different results. But now that I've said that, my children are old enough to not poke at the drivers. Besides, I bought these speakers because of the funky driver arrangement, so I'd kind of like to see them.
I use a pair of Alon IVs in one of my listening rooms in my home. These are really wonderful speakers for the price. However, with the grilles on, one can discern an audible "honk" in the midrange drivers. For their application (home theater), the honking is really not an issue. However, on rare occasions when I listen critically to "real music" through the Alons, the honk becomes bothersome, but when I remove the grilles, the honk disappears like a flock of geese.
I have Vandersteens. Their grilles can't be removed (well they could but the speakers would be too ugly otherwise). Interesting you brought it up. Speaker designers should design speakers to sound their best with the grilles on, and some companies such as Paradigm, make the grilles an intgral part of the speaker, aligning flush with the drivers to reduce diffraction. Is it just me, or do others think that Wilson needs to re-design their grilles? Everytime I see a pair of Wilsons with the grilles off I shudder. They look so tacky with that velcro looking stuff to attach the grills. Come on! If someone is paying over 10Gs for a pair of speakers, they better look good, and sound good with the grilles on.
We live with big, curious, slobbering Rottweilers. The Wilson Benesch Act One's look better and sound great with the grille cloth in place. Mack and Jake leave them alone but do go see what's up when Shamus or Teddy howl in their living room. Better to be covered.