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A Matter Of Diffusion Sidebars

SIDEBAR 1
Recalibrating the Listening Room
Sonex and ASC Tube Traps are perhaps the best-known acoustical treatments. But the successful recalibration of most listening rooms will require more diffusion than broad-range absorption (Sonex) or low-frequency corner attenuation (Tube Traps). Before spending dime one, it's imperative that you understand just what you're trying to accomplish.

The goal of room makeovers is generally to remove the room's characteristic small acoustic "fingerprint" and replace it with the space, warmth, envelopment, and liveness of a very good concert hall…

Listening #37

There was once an Englishman named H.A. Hartley, who was a contemporary of H.G. Baerwald, P.G. Voigt, P.K. Turner, and other men whose first two names are lost to us. Hartley was a capable designer and audio theorist, not to mention a gifted lecturer and writer—his literary achievements include a book on astrology (footnote 1), of all things—and he's often credited with coining the expression high fidelity. Most important of all, in 1928 H.A. Hartley teamed up with the aforementioned P.K. Turner to create an audio manufacturing company known as Hartley Products, Ltd. The Hartley company made…

Listening #37 Page 2

"So I did some searching, and I found Richard Schmetterer in North Carolina, and I ordered a pair of brand-new 220 MSGs. And when I tried them, I found that they were even better than the old ones!"

Yoshi Segoshi was so impressed that he eventually decided to design and build a loudspeaker using the Hartley 220 MSG. The result of his work, which he calls the Hotei, is now a commercial reality—and I've been enjoying a pair of them in my home for a number of weeks.

The driver in question is a 9" full-range coaxial design in which the outer edge of the high-frequency "…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker

I've never heard a pair of the Italian Sonus Faber speakers I didn't like. What I've never liked was the US price: too high. And then you have to put them on costly stands. Plus, you're paying a premium for the magnificent woodworking and exquisite design—something I wasn't into, since I live with my stereo in a basement office/workshop/listening room some (who shall remain nameless) refer to as the "habitat for inhumanity."

So here's a pair of Sonus Fabers that stand on their own two feet, are graceful-looking but not "wooded out" to the max, and, at $3500/pair, would seem to be…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker Page 2

The Grand Piano, which stands a little over 3' tall by about 1' deep and almost 10" wide, sits on a triple-spiked adjustable metal support that allows you to tilt the speaker back to optimize driver elevation, depending on your seating position and listening distance. The baffle front is also gently sloped back to help time-align the drivers.

I did not open the box to inspect the crossover, but, judging from Martin Colloms' report on the less expensive Concerto, I assume the network in the Grand piano is equally well protected from vibration and constructed from components of a quality…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker Page 3

The speaker's only easily identifiable tonal flavor was a gradual and mild high-frequency rise (or did it just sound that way because of a dip in the midrange?) that gave the speaker a slightly forward presence—one that imparted detail without sounding etched or bright. I've heard tweeters that were more transparent and resolved greater amounts of detail, with more transient "snap." Still, the Grand Piano's upper octaves gave me enough of what I like to make them musically satisfying and convincing.

Imaging, staging, dynamics, & inner detailing
Properly set up, the Grand Piano…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker Specifications

Sidebar 1: Specifications

Description: Two-way, floorstanding loudspeaker: Drive-units: ¾" silk-dome tweeter, 7" acrylic-treated paper-cone woofer, 7" acrylate/"carbonium"-cone passive radiator. Crossover Frequency: 2.3kHz. Frequency response: 40Hz-20kHz, ±3dB. Impedance: 8 ohms nominal. Sensitivity: 87dB/1W/1m. Power requirements: 30-200W.
Dimensions: 39½" H by 9½" W by 11½" D. Weight: 60 lbs each.
Serial number of units reviewed: 752 (both).
Price: $3500/pair. Optional stone isolation bases: $500/pair. Approximate number of dealers: 35.
Manufacturer: Sonus Faber, 36057…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker Associated Equipment

Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment

LP playback: Lyra Parnassus D.C.T., Grado Reference, van den Hul MC-10 Special, and Goldring Excel XV cartridges, VPI TNT Mk.IV turntable, Simon Yorke Designs turntable and arm, Graham 2.0 tonearm, Triplanar IV Ultimate and Immedia RPM arms.
CD playback: Bow Technologies ZZ-8 HDCD CD player/transport, Enlightened Audio DSP 9000 III HDCD processor.
Preamplifiers: Ayre K-3 and Audible Illusions 3A preamplifiers.
Power amplifiers: Vacuum Tube Logic MB-450 monoblocks, Conrad-Johnson Premier 12 monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: Audio Physic Virgo…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements

The Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano appears to be of average sensitivity, my B-weighted figure of 87dB/2.83V/m agreeing with the manufacturer's specification. Its impedance plot (fig.1) implies that the speaker is a kind load for the partnering amplifier, dropping below 8 ohms only in the lower midrange and featuring a relatively low phase angle. The "saddle" at 40Hz in the magnitude trace indicates the tuning of the passive radiator (it behaves just like a reflex port, but with the added benefit that it is less transparent to internal-airspace resonant modes).…

Sonus Faber Concerto Grand Piano loudspeaker Measurements part 2

How these individual drive-unit outputs add on the tweeter axis is shown in fig.4. The response trend is basically flat between the upper bass and the upper treble, though the low- and mid-treble regions are broken up by the crossover behavior noted above. There is still an excess of energy above 8kHz, and MF did indeed find the speaker to have too much extreme HF in absolute terms. He also commented on the speaker's well-defined low frequencies, and the shape of the Sonus Faber's nearfield bass response in this curve does correlate with a rather overdamped alignment. As surmised, the…