DaveRedRef-III
500+ Head-Fier
I have been listening to a good many speakers lately and also attended the the Hifi Show in Windsor last week. I was reminded how bad the sound at shows can be. Strangely a good 70% of material used to demo equipment was digital and not analogue. Perhaps digital is being more widely accepted now as the equal of analogue. The only thing is, they were playing far inferior front ends than BluDave. There were setups where very good speakers were matched to poor amps and chairs placed so close to the speakers that the image wasn’t properly formed. I am sure some manufacturers would cry if they heard it.
Anyway, it’s been an interesting process, acclimatising to the latest offerings of leading speaker designs. The first thing I noticed was that some of the new materials used in tweeter design were a great improvement. Materials like Diamond and Beryllium produce a much more natural and smooth sound. There is more detail and yet they are ‘less’ harsh. This may all seem off topic but I believe BluDave tests the limits of conventional mainstream tweeters like soft dome and aluminium dome varieties beyond their limits. Soft domes remain soft but are rather dead and slow so they hide detail and hide frequency breakup which occurs around 10khz. It’s a pleasing sound but hides much of what BluDave has to offer. Aluminium is claimed by some manufacturers with their own proprietary designs to delay breakup to 30 or even 40khz but I have tested what is widely considered to be one of the best of these designs and with BluDave Aluminium is less detailed than say a ribbon and far less natural or smooth. Aluminium sounds grainy and rough by comparison to ribbon.
Some manufacturers have superb designs I think but are just using materials which introduce limiting capabilities. I am sure they will seek out improved materials in due course and no doubt raise their prices!
Though I have yet to find a speaker worthy of upgrade, I have already concluded so far that Beryllium, Diamond, Ribbon and (I am assuming) Electrostatic also have the speed, resolution and overall smoothness to do justice to the natural smooth and detailed sound of the BluDave combination.
Anyway, it’s been an interesting process, acclimatising to the latest offerings of leading speaker designs. The first thing I noticed was that some of the new materials used in tweeter design were a great improvement. Materials like Diamond and Beryllium produce a much more natural and smooth sound. There is more detail and yet they are ‘less’ harsh. This may all seem off topic but I believe BluDave tests the limits of conventional mainstream tweeters like soft dome and aluminium dome varieties beyond their limits. Soft domes remain soft but are rather dead and slow so they hide detail and hide frequency breakup which occurs around 10khz. It’s a pleasing sound but hides much of what BluDave has to offer. Aluminium is claimed by some manufacturers with their own proprietary designs to delay breakup to 30 or even 40khz but I have tested what is widely considered to be one of the best of these designs and with BluDave Aluminium is less detailed than say a ribbon and far less natural or smooth. Aluminium sounds grainy and rough by comparison to ribbon.
Some manufacturers have superb designs I think but are just using materials which introduce limiting capabilities. I am sure they will seek out improved materials in due course and no doubt raise their prices!
Though I have yet to find a speaker worthy of upgrade, I have already concluded so far that Beryllium, Diamond, Ribbon and (I am assuming) Electrostatic also have the speed, resolution and overall smoothness to do justice to the natural smooth and detailed sound of the BluDave combination.
