[gdahl]

In a typical voice-coil driver, the magnet itself is a disc. In order to provide a circular slot (gap) for the voice coil, two concentric cylinders are placed against the magnet. The gap is the space caused by the difference between the outside diameter of the inner (solid) cylinder and the inside diameter of the outer (ring) cylinder, usually just enough room for the voice coil plus a bit of air space.

These parts (inner cylinder and outer ring) are the pole pieces. They are made from a magnetically permeable material which brings the magnetic field out to the gap, surrounding the voice coil.

Most high-quality magnets are made from materials that are very difficult to machine into precise shapes. Samarium cobalt (typical headphone magnet material) is rather brittle and crumbly. It is not practical to machine it so as to directly form the gap.

 

[mercid]

drool W1000 drool

I am damn near sure that these will be in my hands christmas morn

-mercid

 

[ServinginEcuador]

Quote:

Originally posted by mercid drool W1000 drool I am near sure that these will be in my hands christmas morn -mercid

It sounds like you're going to have a nice Christmas after opening THAT present!! Hope you get 'em and enjoy 'em for years to come!!!

 

[gdahl]

Halcyon,

The W1000/W2002 cable issue seems to have a few factors worth considering. After your previous post I went back for a closer look at the AT site.

The W2002 uses a 4-conductor cable, with separate grounds for each channel. The cable itself is hybrid, combining high-purity copper and silver. Details of the exact configuration aren't given. The grounds are of course tied together at the 1/4" plug.

The W1000 uses a 3-conductor cable, with a shared ground. This cable is also described as a hybrid, because it combines high-purity copper with less exotic copper. Again, the details aren't given.

I am actually more concerned with the issue of how each cable sounds than I am about the ground configuration. Depending upon the cable geometry, the crosstalk may very well be essentially nonexistent. But there is no doubt that these cables will each have their own sound. With revealing transducers such as these, there is no place to hide!

Sonically speaking, silver is a tricky material to work with. Though it is the best conductor available, sometimes the use of silver leads to a threadbare, top-end emphasized sound. But it can also be done very well. My Aurora amps are wired liberally with pure silver. The worst results usually result from combining silver with copper, either by using silver-plated copper or running dissimilar conductor materials in the same cable. Because of this, I am quite suspicious of the W2002 cable. Check out http://www.silveraudio.com for a detailed discussion of some of the issues around the use of silver wire in audio.

Copper cables can have sonic problems too, but this is more common where there are either poor-quality materials or weird cable geometries. Where multi-stranded conductors are used, better results are obtained with a fairly small number of strands, in my experience. These headphone cables don't seem to be all that heavy, so we're probably safe there.

Dielectric absorption contributes significantly to the sound of headphone cables, too. Different materials, such as PVC (yuck!), polypropylene and teflon (yum!) can impart significant sonic signatures. AT doesn't give us much information on that part of their designs.

So...I'm actually pretty comfortable with the cable design of the W1000's. But the proof will be in the listening.

Can hardly wait!

 

[wallijonn]

if silver is so good (i think WWII bombers had silver wiring throughout), then why isn't it used in voice coil winding? i would think that that would give the ultimate sound.

why does AT use ccaw, copper clad aluminum wiring, in some model and ofc, oxygen free copper in others? for that matter, why do they use aluminum as the voice coil core? aren't there more inert composite materials, or elements, that can be used?

 

[gdahl]

In my opinion, sometimes special materials are used for marketing reasons, and other times they are used for engineering reasons.

As an example, consider voice coil material. Aluminum is frequently used where heat dissipation is of paramount importance, such as pro sound speaker drivers. Other cooling techniques include the use of ferrofluid in tweeters, and vented pole pieces (a hole in the center of the central pole piece). Aluminum is less conductive than copper, and generally a cheaper material. For very high power applications, aluminum might not be so great after all, because the increased resistance will generate more heat for a given amount of signal current.

Copper makes a very practical voice coil material. It has lower resistance than aluminum, along with still good heat conduction. It is easily coated with enamel to make magnet wire, the raw material of most voice coils.

Silver has been used to make voice coils on rare occasions. It presents special problems because it can't be enameled the same way as copper. I'm not sure of the reason, but I believe it has to do with the way the coating reacts with the metal. The only processes/materials for coating silver wire that make a thin enough layer for fine gauge coils are hideously expensive. Worse, the resulting product is difficult to fabricate, because the coating tends to be at least as strong as the wire. Pure soft-annealed silver is pretty delicate. I rewired a tonearm with some 30-gauge wire coated with teflon film. It was nearly impossible to work with! Voice coil wire in headphones is even finer.

Lowther, a British manufacturer of exotic full-range high efficiency speaker drivers, has produced silver-v/c versions of some of their models. It didn't seem to make a huge sonic improvement...as a matter of fact it probably tipped things in the wrong direction, as the Lowthers are already HF-emphasized.

Altec-Lansing has used a very interesting voice coil configuration in their compression drivers. The wire is thin copper strip, wound edge-wise. This allowed a large number of turns in the gap, yet keeping a relatively large cross-sectional area of copper, for low resistance.

Silver-clad copper is an undesirable material for audio signals, in my opinion. The molecular structure that results from the plating process is random, instead of the long crystals that result from drawing wire, or better yet, casting. Silver coating does make sense from a corrosion-resistance point of view however. Silver oxide conducts about as well as pure silver, while copper oxide is a semiconductor! Believe me, you don't want a bunch of molecule-sized diodes on the surfaces of your conductors.

I am not by any means an expert on the relationship between metallurgy and audio, but I do know enough to cast a suspicious eye on the reasons some materials are chosen for use in audio products. I would rather see either pure copper or pure silver with either separately insulated strands or a modest number of strands. Furthermore, I would rather have copper wire in a high-quality dielectric and cable geometry than silver wire in a low-quality dielectric. The geometry affects the inductance and capacitance of the cable. This will definitely make an audible difference.

 

[nanahachi]

Greg and gdahl,
thanks for the responses!!

i agree, i WILL own both the Etys and the W1000s

the etys no longer seem so exciting with the arrival of the W1000s. but i will make no purchase before our fellows have spoken their thoughts about the ATs. plus, i think i need to make sure both types of phones will suit my listening preferences and circumstances (mostly at work....altho the Etys will be GREAT for commuting)

i think i might lean towards the W1000s for now, since i think i would prefer to have full 'cans at work. plus, theyre gorgeous. but i dont need to really say that do i? Etys are a must though, dont get me wrong.

if anyone else has an opinion, do share it.

thanks for the info on the metal coiling and such, gdahl!!

 

[Mallow005]

which etys do you mean? In my opinion the ER6 is more suitable for portable than the ER4s. The ER6s have less isolation, so if someone screams or talks in a pretty loud voice you can hear them. With the ER4s however... Also the cord is a lot easier to work with. If anything, the ER4s should be used for home listening. Neither should be used when you are actually moving, although I have tried that, it's a very unsettling experience and potentially dangerous.

There was also that one time where I was listening to my ER6s at the bookstore and reading a magazine. An old woman came over to my table and asked if I was using the other chair. I'm not sure how many times or how loud she asked me, but I noticed that the people in front of me were looking at me weird. So I looked around and saw the woman looking at me and mouthing something. So I take off my ER6s and say, "what?" Then she asks her question in a very annoyed voice, then walks off with the chair. Then the people at the other table shake their heads. So you see, you can be misunderstood if you choose to use etys in public.

 

[NotoriousBIG_PJ]

Holy over-hyped batman!

Seriously though, I hope they turn out to be nice.

Not that I'm interested, cause the rs-1's treat me right, but I like to hear about new cans...

Biggie.

 

[nanahachi]

big pappa,

indeed, the hype the W1000s are getting may seem/be exhorbidant. but they look great, the 2002 were well received, for users like me, they seem to fill a great niche: beautiful, CLOSED phones.

i need to do some more research, but other than Beyers, im not really sure what options I have other than AT.

altho, im not sure i want other options

 

[JML]

The cable in the W100 is made from Ohno Process Continuous Casting copper, which is very pure copper made via a special casting and drawing process that creates far fewer crystal boundaries. Whether that's marketing mumbo-jumbo or not, that stuff has worked well for other cabling, such as the Outlaw PCA and other far more expensive stuff.

Frankly, the one thing I don't like about the W100 is the silk outer covering on the cable. It makes it hard to "dress" the cable and it can be a real pain to coil.

If you're curious about figuring out the possible audible effects of that common return, you owe it to yourself to listen to the HeadRoom Blockhead and the customized Senn HD-600 that goes with it. The Blockhead is the only amp set up for dual returns, one per channel. You ain't heard the HD-600 until you hear that version. The two best things I heard on the Headroom Tour were that combo and the Orpheus. The next was the Cary, driving my ATH-W100.

Talk about stripping away veils -- with the Blockhead setup, the music was totally nude and beckoning.

 

[pigmode]

Hmmm, I tend to believe that the silver content in the W2002 cable is partly responsible for the almost hyper-detail in it's sound signature. I have a feeling the W1000 will have a slightly more balanced sound.

 

[scrypt]

Keep in mind that Kelly, Nick and others might very well dislike these phones (though I'm not suggesting they will; ideally, taste is based on fresh impressions, not repetitive histories).

I'm *expecting* to like them because I loved the W100, quirks and all. But really, who knows? I recommended the W100s knowing their sound was an acquired taste and that they wouldn't be my first choice for reference listening. But listening to Jacqueline DuPre through them and a tube amp was an unrivaled experience in its way, an aesthetic moment I'd like to repeat (history notwithstanding).

My sense is that certain of the W100's less desirable quirks (such as a restricted lower frequency range) were taken out of the W1000. If so, I love the idea of owning a pair. But do let the example of the EM7 and people's initial/long-term reactions to it serve as a cautionary tale. Buy what sounds good to you. Buy only that.

Unless you have other concerns. I bought a used pair of EM7 because they were cheap enough to mitigate the what-if factor and for cosmetic reasons Magicthyse can well appreciate (though his ears get short shrift on this board).

I'm not responding to the silver-aluminum-copper debate because that is the province of what an Aussie engineer-friend of mine calls witchcraft. I'm not presuming you're wrong. I'm only saying I'm not initiated into the ways of silver appreciation (unless we're talking about a watch).

BTW: The only reason I *know* I find the W100's sound addictive is because Piano Black was kind enough to lend her pair to several Head-fi members consecutively. The lady is in my will. Props to PB.

 

[Calanctus]

On Audioasylum the consensus seems to be that the brightest of all cables is silver-plated copper, silver next, then copper. Obviously individual cables will vary depending on how they are made.

Silver-plated copper DH Labs Q10 biwire was just the right thing for my previous set of speakers...enlivening the treble tremendously without crossing the line into hyper-brightness. I'm currently using another set of silver cables--Analysis Plus Silver Oval--with my new speakers, and again they don't seem overly bright.

So: I guess everything is system- and listener-dependent.

 

[NotoriousBIG_PJ]

Quote:

Originally posted by nanahachi big pappa, indeed, the hype the W1000s are getting may seem/be exhorbidant. but they look great, the 2002 were well received, for users like me, they seem to fill a great niche: beautiful, CLOSED phones.

Well it seems like everyone is expecting these to be on par with the 2002 when they are priced closer to the w100's which are a pretty contraversial headphone... and I wonder how they compare to the w11's... I guess we all gotta play the waiting game.

Biggie.