Andrew Jones out at ELAC!

[thewas]

More fresh interviews of him at the beloved Steve Guttenberg Audiophiliac channel:

 

[restorer-john]

I know I won't make friends in this thread but find people like him overhyped and don't like such a person cult. There are dozens of loudspeaker engineers in the world which have contributed much more to the evolution and understanding of loudspeaker design but you won't find their names and YouTube interviews all over, like you write 'he is an exceptional communicator and guy". But it seems that such strategy works well, let's see how long he will stay at Mofi before he jumps to the next one and his fans following and cheering him.

Exactly.

He's just another guy screwing a woofer and a tweeter into a box and hopefully selling them for a profit.

 

[mhardy6647]

Paul W. Klipsch was a pretty skilled communicator
<stylized> language alert:

Spoiler

... and... love, like, or loathe him... he did manage to have a pretty significant impact on the field.

 

[ta240]

It seems like he is a guy that gets paid to do what he loves and he seems to like new challenges. Good on him.

 

[Descartes]

Exactly.

He's just another guy screwing a woofer and a tweeter into a box and hopefully selling them for a profit.

Hey maybe we will all be pleasantly surprised!

 

[Zvu]

When i look at engineering done in Pioneer TAD i see what AJ is capable of. His work in Kef i had no contact with (i'm to young for that) and his work for Elac i don't like at all, performance or price wise.

I gather that engineering potential is there. Will he use it to a larger degree depends on budget and his contract with Mofi. You don't need high end or oem drivers to make a statement product, Kii3 and D&D are fine examples of how good engineering can prevail using average and even subpar drivers.

 

[thewas]

You don't need high end or oem drivers to make a statement product, Kii3 and D&D are fine examples of how good engineering can prevail using average and even subpar drivers.

I agree, according to the first interview in this case though he is tooling his own concentric design and as we know this is very tough if you want to reach the level of the very good ones (Genelec & KEF) and not having the support of large R&D companies like TAD/Pioneer. I have the feeling that from measurement point of view it won't be on par, as in the second video he gives the typical audiophile talk that "measurements are important BUT...."
Hope I will be wrong though, we will see...

 

[Zvu]

Sorry, i haven't watched videos from above.

If he makes his tooling for drivers, that can be a good foundation for independence.

 

[restorer-john]

When i look at engineering done in Pioneer TAD i see what AJ is capable of.

What exactly did Andrew Jones bring to the TAD table that wasn't already in the pipeline? I'm serious what did he actually design and produce from the ground-up that did not exist prior? He went from KEF to TAD exactly when? Pioneer (TAD) had been doing concentric drivers and high end loudspeakers since the early 1970s. Not exactly ground-breaking stuff- ask Tannoy. Their (Pioneer) 1980s output of trickle-down high-ish end speakers were amazing (I sold a bunch of them).

Like Sony. They built some of the finest loudspeakers ever to see the light of day. The built their own plant in 1976 (Acoustic Research* Inc in Kokubu Industrial Park out of Kofu) made their own pulp, baskets, drivers, cabinets, everything. You name it, they did it. And they had one of the largest and well equipped research and development labs (and a huge anechoic chamber).

*Not the Acoustic Research brand you are thinking of...

 

[Zvu]

@restorer-john He brought dual concentrics used today, designed all the drivers in their Reference series still in production.

Dual concentrics used in TAD before AJ look more like cheap car audio loudspeakers compared with what is in Reference series today.

 

[Jake Cushing]

Speaking of AR, it'd be nice if he made a sealed-box monitor. That type of design needs re-popularising.

 

[chris719]

When i look at engineering done in Pioneer TAD i see what AJ is capable of. His work in Kef i had no contact with (i'm to young for that) and his work for Elac i don't like at all, performance or price wise.

I gather that engineering potential is there. Will he use it to a larger degree depends on budget and his contract with Mofi. You don't need high end or oem drivers to make a statement product, Kii3 and D&D are fine examples of how good engineering can prevail using average and even subpar drivers.

Uh, isn’t Kii using Purifi drivers? Those are anything but average.

 

[jhaider]

What exactly did Andrew Jones bring to the TAD table that wasn't already in the pipeline? I'm serious what did he actually design and produce from the ground-up that did not exist prior? He went from KEF to TAD exactly when

Andrew Jones went to Pioneer (from Infinity, I think, not KEF) to develop the TAD home audio speakers. So basically everything in the home TAD line has his stamp in some way. Actually, he went to Pioneer maybe even a little before the TAD home line came out. The first Jones design for Pioneer known to me was sold as Pioneer Elite. This series had a unique take on the dual concentric: plastic ring radiator midrange surrounding a soft dome tweeter in a short horn. Here's the patent. They marketed it as "IRIS."

His TAD and Pioneer EX coaxes were notably wider in dispersion than competitor coaxes. The materials (vapor deposited beryllium for mid and tweet on the top one, magnesium cone mid and Be tweet for the mid one, magnesium cone mid and ceramic-graphite tweet for the base model) stole the marketing, and maybe enabled the dispersion to some degree, but I think the most interesting thing about them is just how wide their dispersion is. Here's I think a useful comparison, though Stereophile's normalized off-axis plights distort the apparent treble performance of these drivers (big spikes because of the on axis cancelation notch nicely filling in off axis):

Pioneer S-1EX

Source: https://www.stereophile.com/content/pioneer-s-1ex-loudspeaker-measurements

is about halfway between this:

Revel Salon2:

Source: https://www.stereophile.com/content/pioneer-s-1ex-loudspeaker-measurements

and this:
KEF Reference 201/2

Source: https://www.stereophile.com/content/kef-reference-2012-loudspeaker-measurements

and a good bit wider than this:
KEF LS50 Meta

Source:

KEF LS50 Meta loudspeaker Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements I used DRA Labs' MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the KEF LS50's frequency response in the farfield, and an Earthworks QTC-40 for the nearfield and spatially averaged room responses. My estimate of the LS50 Meta's voltage sensitivity was...

www.stereophile.com

or this:
Trenner & Friedl Sun (Seas coax):

Source: https://www.stereophile.com/content/trenner-friedl-sun-loudspeaker-measurements

Full disclosure - my first "good" speakers (KEF RDM Two) were Jones designs and for a long time I used speakers based on his ill-fated flagship in-walls (Pioneer had the bad luck to launch $2000 each in wall speakers just before the global finance system nearly collapsed) as our reference speakers. Our current immersive system uses in-ceiling speakers from that line for front and rear height speakers. So I'm generally favorably disposed to his work, and wish him and MoFi well.

 

[Zvu]

Uh, isn’t Kii using Purifi drivers? Those are anything but average.

PuriFi was founded much later than Kii3. Drivers used in KiiThree are Seas DXT, Peerless SBS-160F35AL01-04 and Peerless fsl-0512r01-08 .

​

 

[chris719]

PuriFi was founded much later than Kii3. Drivers used in KiiThree are Seas DXT, Peerless SBS-160F35AL01-04 and Peerless fsl-0512r01-08 .

​

Thanks for the correction, I guess I just assumed the Kii was first to get them.

 

[anmpr1]

Andrew Jones went to Pioneer (from Infinity, I think, not KEF) to develop the TAD home audio speakers. So basically everything in the home TAD line has his stamp in some way. Actually, he went to Pioneer maybe even a little before the TAD home line came out. The first Jones design for Pioneer known to me was sold as Pioneer Elite.

AFAIK, the first TAD produced loudspeakers were sold under the Exclusive moniker. Pioneer's higher end offerings in Japan. The info I found indicates TAD group was formed around 1975. In the mid '80s they had that 'furniture' style studio monitor look. Similar in appearance to the Westlake product from California. I wish I could say I've heard any, but I haven't.

 

[Hugo9000]

AFAIK, the first TAD produced loudspeakers were sold under the Exclusive moniker. Pioneer's higher end offerings in Japan. The info I found indicates TAD group was formed around 1975. In the mid '80s they had that 'furniture' style studio monitor look. Similar in appearance to the Westlake product from California. I wish I could say I've heard any, but I haven't.

View attachment 202641View attachment 202642

Those look really nice! And I'm not a fan of horns haha!

 

[mhardy6647]

Those look really nice! And I'm not a fan of horns haha!

I suspect they beat, say, the HPM-100 all to heck, Bart Locanthi notwithstanding.

I've never heard 'em, either... but I suspect that I'd like them.
I have heard some of the TAD compression drivers -- those I quite like (and cannot afford).

Speaking of the HPM loudspeakers -- I happen to have a pair of Pioneer HPM-1100s. The 15 inch woofers used in them, besides being ahem rather JBL-esque, also appear to be awfully similar in design & construction to some of the early TAD woofers (or perhaps vice versa).

TAD/Pioneer TL-1601aの仕様 パイオニア

audio-heritage.jp

Pioneer/Exclusive/TAD スピーカーシステム(80年代)一覧 パイオニア/エクスクルーシブ

audio-heritage.jp

 

[kenimaru]

He did finally come out with the Reference 6.2 which is reasonably nice.

 

[Music1969]

Somebody at Audiophile Forum said @amirm banned Andrew Jones from this forum?

I don't recall such?

Why you can't trust measurements

audiophilestyle.com