What good are hi-tech amps with antique speakers?

[Biddlin]

Conventional loudspeakers have been around since the invention of the telephone in the late 1800's. We've been driving them with tube amps thirty some years longer than Keith Richards has roamed the land. Some of the oldest of this breed are still the best. While amplifier design has expanded the capability and application of the beast, speakers have not evolved to meet those capacitys. We are somehow stuck at the "great ideas how do I get the bass? point of speaker development and have been since the late 1950s. Several promising technologies have appeared. Oscar Heil's Air Motion Transformer,a product I was intimately involved in, was a brilliant piece of home audio, but several attempts to adapt them to guitar amp applications failed.

Hybrids, like the Blue Ox, have achieved some success. They were expensive and quality control was less than optimal. I bought a pair of rejects from the factory(Yeah, i paid for 'em)and reworked them, they are still in use 39 years later as PA speaker for an old Shure 4 channel.

Martin Logan uses a similar design for the AMT at $8500 a pair.

Another concept is the Distributed Mode Loudspeaker, a flat panel technology in which sound is produced by inducing uniformly distributed vibration modes in the panel through a special electro-acoustic exciter. Distributed mode loudspeakers function differently from most others, which typically produce sound by inducing piston-like motion in the diaphragm.Both moving coil and piezoelectric devices are placed to correspond to the natural resonant model of the panel.
Biggest problem, still the bass. So why don't we see hybrid cabs? I don't know much about the electrical hardware side of amplifiers and speakers, so I wonder if some of you could point me to speakers that are hybrids or totally alternate technology that are available.
I'm thinking about building a hybrid AMT/conventional woofer cab for a 50 watt Solid State Tube application.

All thoughts considered..
;>)/

 

[soundboy57]

As far as hybrids are concerned, they have been used for years in home audio, but adding a high frequency driver to a woofer
for guitar would sound like ass, for one. Plug in to any of the cabs you are showing off, and see what I mean.

People have added woofer cabs to guitar setups, but since low E on the guitar is 82hz, it seems a moot point, as well.

That is what the bass guitar is for, otherwise, it would all be mud.

A single 12" speaker seems the perfect transducer for a guitar...and that was perfected in about 1967
by a company called Celestion, using cones from Pulsonic.

I am sure a FFT analysis, or a waterfall plot from a '67 Celestion wouldn't look real great...
but add a tube amp and a Les Paul, and there is no need to improve or modernize it, IMHO.

Nice gear though!

 

[Ken]

Speakers are like tubes when it comes to guitar: they are a cheap technology that gets the job done. There's been HUGE evolution in the technology of amps and sound reinforcement....see Bose. But for what we do, most of it is too expensive and frankly not as good as the old technology.

I predict SS modeling amps will eventually replace tube amps, but we'll still be playing them through 12" speakers.

Ken

 

[mott555]

Guitar speakers aren't supposed to create a clean reproduction of the signal, just like a guitar amp they heavily modify the tone by reproducing some parts of the spectrum and attenuating others. If you were to play an electric guitar plugged into a hi-fi amp and hi-fi speaker set with tweeters and subs, it would not sound very good.

 

[jimmyjames]

Unless it's a THR10 into a hifi amp/sound processor, then a 30-40 y.o. 12'' hifi cab...

 

[Biddlin]

Guitar speakers aren't supposed to create a clean reproduction of the signal, just like a guitar amp they heavily modify the tone by reproducing some parts of the spectrum and attenuating others. If you were to play an electric guitar plugged into a hi-fi amp and hi-fi speaker set with tweeters and subs, it would not sound very good.

Unless it's a THR10 into a hifi amp/sound processor, then a 30-40 y.o. 12'' hifi cab...

I actually used a Kenwood amp and Wharfedale, tuned speakers for a house gig with a blues organist. It was too clean for Metallica, but great for Wes Montgomery. I keep hearing the"It'll never get better than it is now. " refrain and "Guitar speakers aren't supposed to be clean." I don't accept it. I'm also not a "Marshall guy", so I expect "clean" reproduction, once in awhile.
Thanks for the responses
;>)/

 

[CaptainZero]

Speakers are like tubes when it comes to guitar: they are a cheap technology that gets the job done. There's been HUGE evolution in the technology of amps and sound reinforcement....see Bose. But for what we do, most of it is too expensive and frankly not as good as the old technology.

I predict SS modeling amps will eventually replace tube amps, but we'll still be playing them through 12" speakers.

Ken

I'm actually a little surprised that BOSE hasn't put out a really good sounding cab. Of course it would probably be a $1000 1x8.

 

[Ghostman]

I'm actually a little surprised that BOSE hasn't put out a really good sounding cab. Of course it would probably be a $1000 1x8.

that's all Bose is, is the cabinet. Well that, and a **** load of processing. Their raw speakers are absolute ****.

 

[jimmyjames]

Buy Other Stereo Equipment ?

 

[bulldozer1984]

I actually used a Kenwood amp and Wharfedale, tuned speakers for a house gig with a blues organist. It was too clean for Metallica, but great for Wes Montgomery. I keep hearing the"It'll never get better than it is now. " refrain and "Guitar speakers aren't supposed to be clean." I don't accept it. I'm also not a "Marshall guy", so I expect "clean" reproduction, once in awhile.
Thanks for the responses
;>)/

Clean lifeless guitar ? No thanks.. Buy an acoustic..

 

[soundboy57]

Ironically, the two most famous guitar recordings....where NO speaker was used, and the guitar was plugged direct to the board, are both distorted..
Revolution by John Lennon, and Black Dog by Jimmy Page.

 

[ampmadscientist]

Buy Other Stereo Equipment ?

There have been several major developments,
But rock guitar players don't want or need hi fi reproduction.

At the start, emphasis was on big loud guitar amps because the PA systems were woefully inadequate.

Later, The majority of progress has been made in PA systems.
So now the trend is for smaller guitar amps, and bigger systems to reproduce the entire band, specially accurate vocal reproduction.

Looking at Hi Fi, (which is not pro sound at all)
The speakers are inefficient, and they sound really good. The emphasis is not on loudness.
The vast majority of high end Hi Fi speakers won't play loud at all. The Hi Fi speakers were not designed for Live PA use. (live sound would destroy ribbon tweeters, etc...)

In guitar amps, the research goes into getting a good sound at a very low volume.
As time goes on, the venues demand less stage volume. They strive for good quality at lower loudness levels.

Venues discover that lower volume and higher quality = more $$$ money and more customers.
Bands that play at controlled loudness also make more money, and have more demand to play at more venues.

Driving paying customers out of the room, with loud amplifiers is becoming a thing of the past. It's non- profitable.

So I don't understand how you mix Hi Fi with live sound, because the two are different worlds.
Hi End Hi Fi is completely non- suitable for live sound reproduction.

 

[blues_n_cues]

the definition of High fidelity-
"Ideally, high-fidelity equipment has minimal amounts of noise and distortion and an accurate frequency response."

this is not what some want in a guitar speaker.they want the added breakup & frequency attenuation.

some want the opposite since the tone is derived from the amplifier/fx and the speaker just needs to produce an accurate representation of that.

either way,speaker companies have come a long way & doa lot of R&D to see what works best with different components,not to mention weight & durability.

speakers are just another piece of the chain.the sum of all parts=the desired end result.

 

[jimmyjames]

Erm, Mr Madscientist, my quoted comment was merely a little dig at an overpriced and overrated brand....

 

[SG~GUY]

where the hell is this going?

 

[Metroman]

I like Hemp Coned JBL E120's and HC'd E130's with my Metropoulos GMP45.The more the Merrier.

Im in the 0 Speaker distortion category.

An original Hiwatt DR103 had 600-800 watts worth of speakers for a 100 Watt amp.


I also do like the Old Pulsonic Coned Celestions but I wouldn't use anything less than a 4 x 12 with a 38 Watt amp with Old Expensive collectable speakers.

Ive got a Mather 4 x 12 Oversized 1982TVB Cabinet and some Pulsonic Coned 1972 Celestion G12Ms with 25 Watt 75hz cones and they give that Marshall sound with my Metro but I like the Clean Headroom of the JBL's and they take pedals great with the HC's.

2 of them are good for 300 watts and are louder than my 4 x 12 Celestions.

SRV used 4 x 10 EV 10's or JBL E110's and/or EV 15L and E130 JBLs through 45-85 watt amps. HEewasn't into speaker distortion either.

Pete Townsend uses 3 x 10 JBL E110's x 2 x 12 JBL E120's in his 60 watt VibroKing. That's also 525 watts of speakers for a 60 watt amp.

I think few Modern Speakers have come close to JBLs, Altec Lansing, Original Pulsonic Coned Fane Cresendos. 80-100 Watt. Electrovoice 10M x EV 15L's. Gauss.

Great Plains Audio Still makes the Original Altec Lansing 417H. They bought all of the old manufacturing equipment and the rights to the name. They make many Altec Products.

For me Speaker Manufacture has gone Backwards.

For CP speakers I like.. Altec, Fane, Hi Tone Speakers made by Eminence, Tone Tubby and Celestion Gold x Blue in the right applications.

In general I like 3 times the Speaker capacity as compared to RMS. Minimum.

 

[Quasar-Kid]

Comparing home Hi-Fi
To stage volume rock performance gear
is like comparing Ferrari to farm equipment
Both awesome but used for completely different things

 

[dreyn77]

I got plenty of bass out of my G12 100K speakers

I've also got the horned speaker and speaker cab. it's great! I really like that sound.

those colored items in the last pic look real interesting. something with those in it would look great.

just have a listen to joe pertruchi, his sound seems to blend with the bass player too much.

you could get a high Fi speaker for your amp. I fear it's too clean.
it would sound like wobble strings sound.
I have conducted my research into this area and I've perceived the totally clean sound and I don't think it would be useable for songs. maybe for atmosphere music and such.

John from the who, used some awesome looking speakers from the live 1977 show. very futureistic. all that stuff got thrown out the window with the bath water and the baby. it's sad!

 

[Salsg]

I don't see guitar speakers for sound reproduction. They are for sound production, they are part of the sound. The electric guitar is a complex instrument and the guitar itself is only half the instrument. The amplifier is the other half which includes the speaker.

Now, micing an acoustic guitar to make louder is sound reproduction