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New Loudspeaker Eliminates Distortive Influence
fejrskov writes "The Danish audio/video company 'Bang & Olufsen' announced a new loudspeaker which promises to eliminate the bad influence from walls, floors and ceilings on the sound. This is achieved by using two technologies: ALT (Acoustic Lens Technology) uses sound dispersing lenses to make sound travel equally in all directions. ABC (Adaptive Bass Control) involves sliding a tiny microphone out at the base of the speaker, playing a series of test sounds, and adapting the bass according to the measured acoustic response. Each active loudspeaker contains amplifiers for a total of 2500W (!) output using B&O's patented ICEPower concept. The price? Approximately 55.000 Danish kroner (8.000 Euro) each."
I'm having a hard time swallowing this.
Acoustic lensing has been used for quite some time. I'm also not convinced that equal distribution is a good thing. With the traditional sound cone, most of the sound is directed at the listener. With equal dispersion, a lot the sound is being reflected. This means it's being muddied on reflection, and you have delay issues.
Regarding ABC: One of the biggest problems in bass is the standing wave. A standing wave is inaudible at one part of the room, but overpowering in another. One aspect of a standing wave is that it has no effect at the speaker.
Now, using a mic for calibration is a good thing. The Pioneer Elite VSX-45TX reciever, for example, can be hooked up to a mic that is placed at the listening position. It can then calibrate itself for delay, levels, and per-channel eq. That accommodates most room dynamic problems as well as they can be, at least by preprocessing. But if your subwoofer seems to have a screwy response curve, then no preprocessing is going to make it right-- you have to actually stand up and move it.
Ever notice how the large majority of speaker companies have speakers that look like a box?
Ever wonder why after decades of research they're still a box?
Ever notice that B&O likes to make non-conventional looking stuff and then charges an arm and a leg?
They're selling you functional art at really high prices folks.
If you want speakers that actually sound good, then try an electrostatic or planar speaker. Magnepans aren't a kajillion dollars and are a damned good place to start looking for planars.
Exactly. However, it doesn't mean they aren't good speakers. It just means that marketing departments don't aim at techies. The "ALT" buzzword rubs me the wrong way because "accoustic lens" actually means something - an array of parallel plates mounted in front of an exponential horn to diffuse sound. They lost relevance in the mid-70's when the constant-directivity horn was developed. There are still audiophiles using, and swearing by, accoustic lenses. Since I can't view the website, I don't know if B&O has resurrected this antique technology, but I doubt it. More likely their marketers didn't bother asking an audio engineer if the term was already taken.
In all fairness, there's a legitimate marketing reason for assigning names to "technologies", however trivial those technologies might appear to an engineer. Let's say this speaker takes off, and the manufacturer wants to make a smaller, cheaper one with some of the same ideas. They can say "the model 5000 has ALT and ABC". This helps them rub off some magic from the flagship product to something more affordable. I still don't like it, though.