BoomboxLover48 said:
My friend, let us check if this high end got a horn tweeter.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Linn-Audio-home ... 2307ccecb6
I see Ira with those speakers.
No they don't have horns & it doesn't prove my points about horns as invalid. As I said, very high-end HOME speakers go for a more omni-directional dispersal approaching 180 degreess where horns have a more directional & controlled dispersal pattern dictated by the design & angle of the horn aperture, itself. Look up Klipsch corner horns & learn. These are not just opinions but scientific LAWS that are supported by decades of research by acoustic engineers. This isn't an arbitrary cherry picking of web-sites to support my assertions but just the first couple of results from google out of literally 100's of supporting web documents.
Here ya go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klipsch_Audio_Technologies
OR here:
http://www.sonist.com/SONIST_WHITEPAPER.html & I quote:
"Special qualities of horns
What special qualities do horns have that endear them to enthusiasts besides having very high efficiencies? The horn may be viewed as an acoustic impedance transformer. When a diaphragm vibrates, pressure waves are created in front of it. This is the sound we hear. Coupling the motion of the diaphragm to the air is not an easy thing to do due to the very different densities of the vibrating diaphragm and air. This can be viewed as an impedance mismatch. We all know that sound travels better in high density materials than in low density materials, and in a speaker system, the diaphragm is the high density (high impedance) medium and air is the low density (low impedance) medium. The horn assists the solid-air impedance transformation by acting as an intermediate transition medium. In other words, it creates a higher acoustic impedance for the transducer to work into, thus allowing more power to be transferred to the air.
A horn is a tube whose cross-section increases exponentially. The narrow end is called the throat and the wide end is called the mouth. The transducer is placed at the throat. When the diaphragm moves near the throat, we have a high pressure with a small amplitude in a small area. As the pressure wave moves towards the mouth, the pressure decreases and the amplitude increases. Excellent natural efficient amplification.
As mentioned earlier, horns have very special properties, including lower distortion than conventional drivers, faster transient response than conventional drivers, and are easier to drive at high SPL's than conventional drivers.
Lower distortion at a given SPL: For an equivalent SPL, horns require a smaller diaphragm, and since distortion is directly proportional to the size of the diaphragm, a large diaphragm electromechanical transducer (conventional driver) has to move much more than a horned diaphragm in order to create the same SPL (sound pressure level). The larger the excursion, the worse the distortion. So, for a given SPL, a horn loaded system will generate much lower distortion than an electromechanical transducer.
Faster transient response: Since the diaphragm is smaller, it is lighter and thus it accelerates and decelerates faster. This, in the real world means superb, fast snappy transients. As the excursion of the diaphragm is very small as compared to an electromechanical transducer, the voice coil is much smaller and again, this translates to a lower moving mass and again, results in fast transients.
Higher SPL's with a given input wattage: Small voice coils also take full advantage of the flux in the pole piece gap. This increases the efficiency of the transducer allowing the amplifier to work with greater ease. Since the amplifier has more headroom and the driver handles peaks and high outputs more efficiently, horns are able to produce much higher SPL's before they distort.
Thus, in the normal operating range, horn designs are faster, more dynamic, have a better transient response, have less distortion, and are easier for an amplifier to drive than conventional driver designs.
Horns have impact!
You feel the music, you become part of the music, and the music becomes part of you. The full-range phase coherent wave front of horns produces a lifelike presentation with tremendous dynamic range, as opposed to "polite", compressed presentation of low efficiency conventional driver designs. Horns will never sound veiled or compressed.
Due to their inherent benefits of low distortion, high efficiency, fast and accurate transient response, and wide dynamic range, horn loudspeakers provide a pure, unadulterated musical presentation, a more organic and natural recreation of the acoustic event.
Waveguides are Specialized Horns
Technically speaking, all waveguides are horns, with a few specialized features which differentiate them from the generalized definition of a horn. Waveguides are used to shape the wavefront of tweeters, narrowing the spread of the wavefront and providing a constant SPL level and frequency response within the included angle of the waveguide. A waveguide can also be used on midrange and low frequency drivers, although at frequencies below 200Hz the wavefronts are omnidirectional. The benefits of the directivity of a waveguide are improved frequency response and SPL levels within the included angle of the waveguide within the operating frequency band of the waveguide. In addition, sidewall and floor bounce reflections are reduced by the controlled directivity. These benefits are achieved in the Sonist Concerto 2 standmount and Concerto 3 floorstander through the use of integral waveguides formed in the 2" thick solid poplar baffle for both the ribbon tweeter and 8" woofer. Here is a picture of the Sonist Concerto 2 standmount, showing the tweeter and woofer waveguides:"....
Now, if you look at the picture of the 2-way speaker in the article the waveguide of the tweeter is similiar in shape to the waveguides or shallow horns on the M70 cabinet. Hopefully, now, the light-bulb has lit over your head & you realize my point here about horn loaded tweeters in ghetto-blasters, which are few but they do exist like the M70 & GF-777Z, etc.
