Epos ES 14 N - best passive Speaker in SpiNorama.org so far? (7.4/10 with equalisation without subwoofer)

[Purité Audio]

BTW, if you design a studio monitor, it's a different story. Now your speaker is a tool in your setup and that's another story.

KHF why and how?
Keith

 

[Sokel]

.....now I'm almost speechless. What is your problem with the components? You are talking about what? The main inductor for the woofer is an air core. The higher resistance of the coil compared with an Iron or whatever core version is compensated by a higher BL of the woofer. Air cores do not generate any distortion ....so it's the best solution. The only laminated steel core on the right side is more than 4mH and cannot be made as air core, because it would be too large or the wire too thin. But as there is a 15 Ohm resistor in series, the current is low. The two blue electrolytic ones have a dissipation factor of 3% - the lowest you can get. Making them in film was a NG....the crossover would be far too big to be mounted in the speaker. One of them is in the impedance compensation filter in the input for making the speaker more tube friendly. The resistors are low inductance ones wherever it is needed (marked BiFi for Bifilar). Tweeter capacitors are PP in 250V and 400V and the rest of the inductors are also air cores. The coils are all carefully placed to have the lowest possible interaction and we used the maximum size, so the crossover can be removed through the woofer hole and the internal braces.

Are you sure you know what you are talking about?

Dear Karl you talk with matty,you're new here and you don't know.

 

[Karl-Heinz Fink]

Is there a problem in measurements that these components gives?
I dont see a point for these very cool crossover speakers with low performance measurements, there is a lot of speaker with fancy crossover with lots of distortion

No, of course not. You don't see in the measurements whether you use an MKT with DF or 1% or a PP with DF0.1%....not even with electrolytic caps having DF10%.
But you can hear the different materials at different positions. And no, I have no real idea why some are sounding different and no, it's not imagination.
The thing is that we are designing the crossover with the parts that work best AND fit the speaker box size-wise.
You can measure distortion on inductors with different cores. Laminated steel core are almost impossible to drive into saturation, but they always have a level of distortion even at very low levels. Ferrite cores have low distortion at low levels, but they go from good to very bad at a certain level. Air cores are the best solution, but for a given size, they have higher resistance. But I know how to deal with that and make the driver with the right parameters.
I think the poster of the comment is a DIY guy. They love to pay a fortune for Mundorf pars. I like to design my parts, so they work right and sound right.

 

[sigbergaudio]

@Karl-Heinz Fink Congratulations on what (based on the measurements) appears to be a well behaved speaker with good tonality.

 

[computer-audiophile]

No, of course not. You don't see in the measurements whether you use an MKT with DF or 1% or a PP with DF0.1%....not even with electrolytic caps having DF10%.
But you can hear the different materials at different positions. And no, I have no real idea why some are sounding different and no, it's not imagination.
The thing is that we are designing the crossover with the parts that work best AND fit the speaker box size-wise.
You can measure distortion on inductors with different cores. Laminated steel core are almost impossible to drive into saturation, but they always have a level of distortion even at very low levels. Ferrite cores have low distortion at low levels, but they go from good to very bad at a certain level. Air cores are the best solution, but for a given size, they have higher resistance. But I know how to deal with that and make the driver with the right parameters.
I think the poster of the comment is a DIY guy. They love to pay a fortune for Mundorf pars. I like to design my parts, so they work right and sound right.

In fact, many consumers today are mostly concerned with looks. They expect the inside view of devices and all the components to be instagrammable as well.

 

[maty]

Buchardt S400 MKII

S400 MKII

S400 Passive Loudspeakers

buchardtaudio.com

€ 2,100 << € 4,000

[ 2. Tweeter
Although it's the same tweeter as its predecessor, it sounds way different with the new crossover in place. We find it to be very well-balanced between detailed and relaxed. In fact, with the MKII, the tweeter is one part that you will more or less forget about, in a good way. This is partially because of a new crossover design with the use of high-end components within the crossover. We did use a great amount of time reviewing different combinations of capacitors and resistors. In the end we settled with using an ultra high-end CU/paper/oil capacitor from Miflex mixed with amazing parts from Jantzen Audio Denmark namely their Cross-caps, baked air core inductors and Superres resistors. The results are an amazingly balanced and neutral presentation. ]

BTW, I love my MiFlex bypass cap in my modded KEF Q100 coaxial (old photo).

 

[Karl-Heinz Fink]

KHF why and how?
Keith

......because you create the sound that people listen to later. First of all, you need to listen to many details, so taking the upper mid-band slightly down, will not help. I would even use a waveguide to make the dispersion uniform. You need to know the position (on the desk, on the wall and so on), so I would go active with EQ-Possibilities.
Every sound engineer will fine-tune the setup and listen to the mix later on different systems.

 

[thewas]

Buchardt S400 MKII

S400 MKII

S400 Passive Loudspeakers

buchardtaudio.com

€ 2,100 << € 4,000

View attachment 318055

I see also electrolytics and iron cores there.
Like KHF correctly wrote above in the end the application and implementation is what matters, not black'n'white audiophool hypes and misunderstandings.

 

[maty]

I see also electrolytics and iron cores there.
Like KHF correctly wrote above in the end the application and implementation is what matters, not black'n'white audiophool hypes and misunderstandings.

Sometimes electrolytic speakers cannot be avoided (very large capacitance values). It also depends on what part of the filter they are incorporated into. To avoid in the signal path, especially in the tweeter.

-> The component quality is very noticeable in the tweeter.

 

[Sokel]

Buchardt S400 MKII

S400 MKII

S400 Passive Loudspeakers

buchardtaudio.com

€ 2,100 << € 4,000

View attachment 318055

[ 2. Tweeter
Although it's the same tweeter as its predecessor, it sounds way different with the new crossover in place. We find it to be very well-balanced between detailed and relaxed. In fact, with the MKII, the tweeter is one part that you will more or less forget about, in a good way. This is partially because of a new crossover design with the use of high-end components within the crossover. We did use a great amount of time reviewing different combinations of capacitors and resistors. In the end we settled with using an ultra high-end CU/paper/oil capacitor from Miflex mixed with amazing parts from Jantzen Audio Denmark namely their Cross-caps, baked air core inductors and Superres resistors. The results are an amazingly balanced and neutral presentation. ]

BTW, I love my MiFlex bypass cap in my modded KEF Q100 coaxial (old photo).

Maty no speaker without Duelunds passes my doorstep

 

[Karl-Heinz Fink]

Buchardt S400 MKII

S400 MKII

S400 Passive Loudspeakers

buchardtaudio.com

€ 2,100 << € 4,000

View attachment 318055

[ 2. Tweeter
Although it's the same tweeter as its predecessor, it sounds way different with the new crossover in place. We find it to be very well-balanced between detailed and relaxed. In fact, with the MKII, the tweeter is one part that you will more or less forget about, in a good way. This is partially because of a new crossover design with the use of high-end components within the crossover. We did use a great amount of time reviewing different combinations of capacitors and resistors. In the end we settled with using an ultra high-end CU/paper/oil capacitor from Miflex mixed with amazing parts from Jantzen Audio Denmark namely their Cross-caps, baked air core inductors and Superres resistors. The results are an amazingly balanced and neutral presentation. ]

BTW, I love my MiFlex bypass cap in my modded KEF Q100 coaxial (old photo).

so what is the point? I see electrolytic and Chinese-made PP caps. Only the 0.1uF is special - the rest are standard parts. Jantzen is based in Poland, but caps are made in Asia. Yeah, it says Denmark, but they make no capacitors themselves and buy them in. Next time, I print EPOS Germany in golden letters on my caps.


Just one comment: There is nothing wrong with the Burchardt crossover, The crosscaps are nice-sounding ones and he uses air cores as well, I myself use Crosscaps in my Finkteam speakers, together with Mundorfs and custom-made ones. I'm not totally convinced about the bypass cap.

 

[Karl-Heinz Fink]

Sometimes electrolytic speakers cannot be avoided (very large capacitance values). It also depends on what part of the filter they are incorporated into. To avoid in the signal path, especially in the tweeter.

-> The component quality is very noticeable in the tweeter.

Can I ask you how many speakers you designed yourself in your life? Just to give me an idea what your experience is? Thanks!

 

[Mnyb]

.....now I'm almost speechless. What is your problem with the components? You are talking about what? The main inductor for the woofer is an air core. The higher resistance of the coil compared with an Iron or whatever core version is compensated by a higher BL of the woofer. Air cores do not generate any distortion ....so it's the best solution. The only laminated steel core on the right side is more than 4mH and cannot be made as air core, because it would be too large or the wire too thin. But as there is a 15 Ohm resistor in series, the current is low. The two blue electrolytic ones have a dissipation factor of 3% - the lowest you can get. Making them in film was a NG....the crossover would be far too big to be mounted in the speaker. One of them is in the impedance compensation filter in the input for making the speaker more tube friendly. The resistors are low inductance ones wherever it is needed (marked BiFi for Bifilar). Tweeter capacitors are PP in 250V and 400V and the rest of the inductors are also air cores. The coils are all carefully placed to have the lowest possible interaction and we used the maximum size, so the crossover can be removed through the woofer hole and the internal braces.

Are you sure you know what you are talking about?

Use the ignore function for mr maty (he's been here a long time but stubbornly refuses to learn or listen to reason , it's a mystery ) thanks for your contribution to the forum . It's very nice to have competent actual audio professionals writing on the forum , amateurs like me can learn something every day

 

[maty]

It is not worth prolonging the discussion. Each one has stated his position. Mine boils down to the fact that you expect quality components in an expensive product, be it loudspeakers or vehicles, whether visible or not.

I have not designed any but I have improved a few speakers over a few decades. I was also reluctant with the components but I decided to do the test and I was able to verify the great improvement.

- The End -

 

[Grotti]

It is not worth prolonging the discussion. Each one has stated his position. Mine boils down to the fact that you expect quality components in an expensive product, be it speakers or vehicles, whether visible or not.

I have not designed any but I have improved a few speakers over a few decades. I was also reluctant with the components but I decided to do the test and I was able to verify the great improvement.

- The End -

And this is exactly what you get in the Epos speaker: high quality where it counts soundwise. If you are into shiny snakeoil components, you have to look elsewhere...

 

[AudioJester]

so what is the point? I see electrolytic and Chinese-made PP caps. Only the 0.1uF is special - the rest are standard parts. Jantzen is based in Poland, but caps are made in Asia. Yeah, it says Denmark, but they make no capacitors themselves and buy them in. Next time, I print EPOS Germany in golden letters on my caps.

Iam also glad to see you posting here, thanks for sharing your expertise.
Please ignore the fake experts, you will soon recognise those with real knowledge.

 

[DSJR]

Hi,

The old EPOS ES14 was designed before CD was hitting the market....with LP 12 and NAIM electronic. Honestly, the bottom end of this box was a disaster....compete underdamped and the best thing you could do was close the port with an old sock. The early metal dome tweeters had this strange whispering sound that I never liked a lot and the whole speaker produced a lot of distortion and IM.
It's a bit like old cars. Take the original Beetle......you may like it and have a nostalgic feeling, but would you use it as your daily driver? On a modern motorway, with no proper heating in winter, noisy like hell and with a horrible suspension? Maybe not.

BTW, if you design a studio monitor, it's a different story. Now your speaker is a tool in your setup and that's another story.

Regads

KHF

The old ES14 went through around three 'versions' before the final and best known 1990's article as reviewed in Stereophile, which came from the factory in Chesham (and I believe from Mordaunt-Short too) with a sponge bung in the port to make for a 'Controlled Leak' in Robin Marshall's words (I knew him well back then since his mid 70's Audiomaster days). All the ignorant dealers pulled the bungs out (making a mess to start with as they were glued in at first) and this made for an 80Hz BOOM which the dealers and users seemed to like. Robin knew this but all but gave up trying to educate the dealers and end-users here and let them get on with it. I used mine with port bung in sideways which added a little warmth without the bloat! Robin had it in mind to re-design the tweeter, as the bass unit re-design with 'phase plug' lost midrange output over previous versions, so rather than pad the tweeter down, Robin changed the cap value to bring it in later, giving a 'sssssparkle' which vinyl lovers liked but which screwed up an otherwise acceptable for the times metal dome tweeter performance. Mordaunt Short absorbed Epos and Robin, who was removed from the brand he told me and price of the ES14 all but doubled in a very few years, basically killing it off.






Sorry for the diversion of now ancient history. The response of the original Es14 was a dogs dinner, but with 'port' suitably plugged lightly (or used as I did), the 'sound' was very nice and communicated the music well. The only 'truly flat?' speakers I've heard recently are upper-end Dynaudio Confidence models which use very fancy drivers and got to say these leave me as cold as the sound appears - actually not as smooth as I'd thought bearing in mind the tech and their measurement system - Confidence 30 from Stereophile -

 

[DSJR]

@Karl-Heinz Fink Congratulations on what (based on the measurements) appears to be a well behaved speaker with good tonality.

AND - I now have two fairly local sources where I can get to hear a pair

 

[DanielT]

Hi,

I published the measurements of ES-14N and I made them with the Klippel NFS.
So I think I did everything to be as transparent as possible. I can't see what would be different with a different Klippel NFS. The other measurement I saw above looks a bit strange, so I cannot comment, as I don't know how it was made. I trust my NFS .....and my ears.
Even so, I like Audiosciencereview and Erins Channel, it does not mean I always agree with what both conclude from the measurements. With a lot I'm OK, but a small valley in the 2-3kHz area for example is very easy to straighten out with a crossover, but sometimes you add it to avoid the speaker sounding aggressive and too forward. Designing a waveguide for a tweeter is not very complicated, but I like the way it sounds in the room without it and with an exposed dome. The speaker is a compromise in most cases, so my speakers are the result of my idea of a compromise.
I can accept if somebody thinks a speaker only has to be so and so......as long as I have the freedom to do it the way I like.
We have a lot of equipment around and we use it a lot......but in the end, we have to listen to it and so, final adjustments are done by ear.
So far, we have not established a distribution for EPOS in the US. it's a difficult market, as it is so large and the time is not very good for a new brand, even so, it's old. So we have to wait for better times and the right distributor.

Best regards

KHF

Great job on the speakers!

Now I added another manufacturer, you, to this thread:

Good German Hifi ?!

I might go to Germany instead of England. Come on Germans, I know there is very good Hifi. Contemporary Hifi or something vintage, technical invention that influenced the sound history and so on. You get free hands to write what you want.:) If I go with my rather rickety Volvo to Germany, I...

audiosciencereview.com

 

[Karl-Heinz Fink]

The old ES14 went through around three 'versions' before the final and best known 1990's article as reviewed in Stereophile, which came from the factory in Chesham (and I believe from Mordaunt-Short too) with a sponge bung in the port to make for a 'Controlled Leak' in Robin Marshall's words (I knew him well back then since his mid 70's Audiomaster days). All the ignorant dealers pulled the bungs out (making a mess to start with as they were glued in at first) and this made for an 80Hz BOOM which the dealers and users seemed to like. Robin knew this but all but gave up trying to educate the dealers and end-users here and let them get on with it. I used mine with port bung in sideways which added a little warmth without the bloat! Robin had it in mind to re-design the tweeter, as the bass unit re-design with 'phase plug' lost midrange output over previous versions, so rather than pad the tweeter down, Robin changed the cap value to bring it in later, giving a 'sssssparkle' which vinyl lovers liked but which screwed up an otherwise acceptable for the times metal dome tweeter performance. Mordaunt Short absorbed Epos and Robin, who was removed from the brand he told me and price of the ES14 all but doubled in a very few years, basically killing it off.

I think Robin did a great job with it. I worked with him during his time with Mission and Harman. So if you see the speaker in the context of the time it was developed, it was really great. But he was never as stubborn as some of the hardcore fans, who want a copy of the old design....ignoring 40 years of speaker development.