Magico S5 vs Infinity IRS speakers

[CLEE]

Coming back to the Genesis II. I think the use of servo to measure the output at the bass drivers and feeding back to the servo amp for correction was great idea but it seemed to me that Infinity/Genesis was ahead of its time. I still recall detectable bass artifacts and it was quite frustrating trying to integrate well the bass column to the mid-range. On the other hand I applaud Infinity/Genesis of such pioneering work.I suppose these problems were solved. I haven’t followed later development since the Genesis II and II.5.

[Elberoth]

The idea was great but the amp was way too slow - chence the problems.

Originally Posted by CLEE

Coming back to the Genesis II. I think the use of servo to measure the output at the bass drivers and feeding back to the servo amp for correction was great idea but it seemed to me that Infinity/Genesis was ahead of its time. I still recall detectable bass artifacts and it was quite frustrating trying to integrate well the bass column to the mid-range. On the other hand I applaud Infinity/Genesis of such pioneering work.I suppose these problems were solved. I haven’t followed later development since the Genesis II and II.5.

Interesting

Originally Posted by CLEE

Yes. Your description of S5 vs Q3 is quite accurate. I had an itch for the Q3 but when I arrived home to listen to my S5 making beautiful music, that itch subsided quite a bit.

Yeah I feel the same way Clee. The S5's just seem to flaw me and bring a smile to my face. They are so easy to listen to and give me that sense of awe and excitement I loved about the Infinity IRS speakers

[Charles]

The solution to the problem of too much low bass and too little upper bass causing a problem with male voices is solved by lowering the crossover point of the midrange panels so that the subs don't get into the lower midrange. With my Gen II's as I recall I needed at least 84 Hz crossover to get enough upper bass. This on some recordings caused heaviness in the male voice that was unatural.

In general I find that speakers suffer from two tonal flaws. The one just described. The other is on loud passages that notes pop out from the midrange fabric and hit the ears too hard. It's a sign of a rough midrange/lower treble. The Gen II also had some of this going on when pushed. But overall for a 30,000 speaker it was wonderful. I kept it for 10 years, till it literally wore out. Even then I seriouly considered getting the midrange panels replaced (not the ribbons but the whole panels with the newer tweeters also) but the cost was going to be 25,000 and I did not want to spend this much on 10 year old speakers. They were truly great speakers.

[jazzman]

Originally Posted by CLEE

Yes. Your description of S5 vs Q3 is quite accurate. I had an itch for the Q3 but when I arrived home to listen to my S5 making beautiful music, that itch subsided quite a bit.

As I said, you cannot go wrong with both of them!
let's meet one of these days, I am based in Taipei. Will be happy to welcome you when the Magico Ultimate have arrived! (see my ("stereo") thread on WBF)

[CLEE]

Originally Posted by Charles

The solution to the problem of too much low bass and too little upper bass causing a problem with male voices is solved by lowering the crossover point of the midrange panels so that the subs don't get into the lower midrange. With my Gen II's as I recall I needed at least 84 Hz crossover to get enough upper bass. This on some recordings caused heaviness in the male voice that was unatural.

In general I find that speakers suffer from two tonal flaws. The one just described. The other is on loud passages that notes pop out from the midrange fabric and hit the ears too hard. It's a sign of a rough midrange/lower treble. The Gen II also had some of this going on when pushed. But overall for a 30,000 speaker it was wonderful. I kept it for 10 years, till it literally wore out. Even then I seriouly considered getting the midrange panels replaced (not the ribbons but the whole panels with the newer tweeters also) but the cost was going to be 25,000 and I did not want to spend this much on 10 year old speakers. They were truly great speakers.

Charles, you had more skill and luck with the Genesis II. I agree that they were great speakers. I got mine from an audiophile friend. He even went as far as bypassing the servo with his own active-crossover and bass amp. Come of think of it, we audiophiles can be sensitive to negative feedbacks when applied in some quantities. It took a Soulution (or Boulder) to design ultra fast (wide bandwidth) electronics to alleviate their effects. But Infinity/Genesis was trying to do it with a mechanical process in between (monitoring and controlling the bass drivers), and that was 15, 20 years ago. Hence my appreciation of their efforts.

[CLEE]

Originally Posted by jazzman

As I said, you cannot go wrong with both of them!
let's meet one of these days, I am based in Taipei. Will be happy to welcome you when the Magico Ultimate have arrived! (see my ("stereo") thread on WBF)

That will be great! I read your thread in WBF. What a wonderful listening environment! I hope to visit your place sometime. I have never seen the Ultimate but it seemed that the previous Magico dealer sold at least one in HK. The boys who delivered my S5 were telling horror stories of delivering Ultimate/Q7's. Some flats in our crowded city are not that easy to move heavy bulky stuff in and out.

Originally Posted by Charles

The solution to the problem of too much low bass and too little upper bass causing a problem with male voices is solved by lowering the crossover point of the midrange panels so that the subs don't get into the lower midrange. With my Gen II's as I recall I needed at least 84 Hz crossover to get enough upper bass. This on some recordings caused heaviness in the male voice that was unatural.

In general I find that speakers suffer from two tonal flaws. The one just described. The other is on loud passages that notes pop out from the midrange fabric and hit the ears too hard. It's a sign of a rough midrange/lower treble. The Gen II also had some of this going on when pushed. But overall for a 30,000 speaker it was wonderful. I kept it for 10 years, till it literally wore out. Even then I seriouly considered getting the midrange panels replaced (not the ribbons but the whole panels with the newer tweeters also) but the cost was going to be 25,000 and I did not want to spend this much on 10 year old speakers. They were truly great speakers.

That's a very good observation of common speaker design ills. I recall my wonderful Infinity Renaissance 90's midbass coupler never quite blended seamlessly with the high energy Emim and Emit (tough call), but I suspect the midbass coupler had two issues; firstly it's relatively high crossover point of 200Hz and it was fast, but not as fast as the planar magnetic mid & tweet. Crossover points were 200, 600Hz and 3kHz. The L-Emim employed in the later IRS-Epsilon reportedly solved that issue and had a lower crossover point of 150Hz (similar to the S5's). Of course the S5's use a bass/midrange driver instead of separate mid bass/midrange drivers, but the S5 has the benefit of 17 years of speaker development.

[GaryProtein]

Gary Koh showed the Genesis 2.2jr at the New York Audio Show this spring. It was very impressive. I had a good conversation with him too.