INDUSTRY & PRODUCT NEWS

Register for Acoustic Engineering & Simulation Seminars to Optimize Product Performance
Engineers who design devices such as microphones, speakers, handheld devices, and headphones are always being challenged by consumers to create better-sounding products. While the challenges among acoustic engineers may vary according to industry, all share a common trait: gaining an understanding of their products' acoustic behavior before an expensive prototype is built, and before that product goes to market, is business-critical.
To help engineers understand their product's acoustic behavior, MSC is hosting a series of free seminars throughout the US. Each will be presented by Dr. Jean-Louis Migeot, a world-renowned acoustician who serves as Chairman of the Belgian Royal Academy of Science, Professor of Acoustics at the University of Brussels, and CEO of Free Field Technologies. Register for a seminar near you!


Chester Group to Defer it's Montr�al Salon Son & Image Audio Show
In a surprise announcement, The Chester Group, the promoters of the Montr�al Salon Son & Image - the same company who promotes the New York Audio Show and several other shows across Canada and the United Kingdom - announced its decision to postpone the 2016 edition of this high-end and consumer audio event, due to take place 18-20 March 2016.  Read More


NTi Audio Provides Professional Verification of Voice Evacuation Systems
Voice evacuation systems can save lives in an emergency. The correct installation and periodic functional testing of such systems are therefore essential. The NTi Audio TalkBox and XL2 Sound Level Meter with the new extended background noise correction are instruments designed for this purpose.  Read More



Audio Precision Showcases Key Audio Test Applications at Prolight+Sound 2016 
Audio Precision is once again exhibiting at Prolight+Sound, which runs from April 5-8 in Frankfurt, Germany. Planned application demonstrations during the show include enhanced electro-acoustic and production testing setups, testing Dante-enabled systems, and measuring high-performance amplifiers, ADCs and DACs. Read More
 

Fluid Audio Announces FPX7 Reference Monitor with Coaxial Ribbon Tweeter
Fluid Audio's much anticipated FPX7 coaxial ribbon monitors are now shipping. Building on the brand's popular Fader Series monitors, Kevin Zuccaro has upped the ante by creating an affordable coaxial ribbon tweeter monitor, which, as he says, "is poised to blow the socks off other monitors in its class in sound reproduction, imaging, and affordability."  Read More


Audiofile Releases Myriad Next-Generation Audio Batch Processing
Audiofile, a leading music technology company from Minneapolis, MN, and maker of the popular Sample Manager App for OS X, released Myriad, a next generation batch processor. Developed with feedback from professional users, Myriad includes modern features, a new workflow for a better user experience, and improved performance for today's demanding audio processing needs.  Read More
 

Interested in Binaural Audio? Don't Miss the 140th International Audio Engineering Society Convention
Experiencing Binaural Listening - recreating a 3D soundspace through headphones, which is an ever-expanding aspect of present-day audio - will be an integral component of the 140th AES Convention, coming to the Palais des Congr�s in Paris June 4 to 7. If it's about Binaural, it's at AES!  Read More


Kanex Announces Digital Audio Adapter for 4th Generation Apple TV
Kanex announced an optical audio solution for the new Apple TV, allowing users to keep using existing hardware and have high quality audio support. The Digital Audio Adapter provides an optical audio port to connect a surround sound system to the 4th generation Apple TV via HDMI. The adapter supports 5.1 surround sound via standard optical audio, or 2.0 surround sound via 3.5mm audio port.  Read More

Jo�o
Martins
Editor-in-Chief


Editor's Desk


The Danish Loudspeaker 100 Year Anniversary

A young Peter L. Jensen,
in 1910, setting up Poulsen
arc transmitters for the
Poulsen Wireless Company.
Over the years, audioXpress and Voice Coil magazines have published several company profiles on speaker manufacturers. More recently Mike Klasco was responsible for a series of articles on Nordic companies, compiled with the valuable support of Danish loudspeaker engineer Claus Futtrup. Futtrup is currently SEAS' Chief Technical Officer, but he previously held R&D positions at Dynaudio A/S and Tymphany Denmark. Thanks to Futtrup, we learned about a very interesting initiative of a book recently published to celebrate 100 years of the loudspeaker and, in particular, the remarkable contributions of the Danish loudspeaker industry (audio and electronics industry in general is the fourth largest exporting industry in Denmark).
 
This week I thought I should highlight this publication. It is freely available to download in digital and for purchase as a "coffee table book" and which we would like to recommend it to all our readers. With kind permission of DELTA and the Danish Sound Innovation Network, producers of the book, we will highlight some of its content, written by Jan Larsen, Director of the Danish Sound Innovation Network and Claus Futtrup.
 
Thursday, December 10 2015 was the exact day of the 100th year anniversary of the electrodynamic loudspeaker. 100 years earlier, on December 10, 1915, the Dane Peter Laurits Jensen and his partner Edwin Pridham presented their groundbreaking invention to the public in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco. The next day The San Francisco Bulletin published an enthusiastic article about the event: "Great invention made of Californians solves many problems. The slender tone of a single violin heard about a mile away. The sound operatic Luisa Tetrazzini's voice reverberating throughout the stadium, and a piano solo resembling the chimes of Westminster Abbey played by Colossus of Rhodes". The loudspeaker was born.
 
More than 1 million Dynaco A-25 units were sold from 1968-1980 and the A-25 design went through several evolutions during that time.
In the book's foreword, Jan Larsen writes: Home of the loudspeaker, Denmark is notorious for being a loudspeaker country. In the sixties and seventies, Danish companies manufactured more loudspeakers per capita than any other country in the world. The technologies invented in Denmark are numerous and many of these have since become industry standard.
The invention of the loudspeaker by the Dane Peter Laurits Jensen and Edwin S. Pridham in 1915 was groundbreaking. This enabled humans to communicate and experience sound from a distance, and further sparked the development of the 20th century's most important technology products such as radios, telephones, and public address systems. 100 years later, the loudspeaker is still a ubiquitous element of sound reproduction systems and used in almost all sound technology products.
Denmark was an early adapter of this new technology with the start-up of many companies as well as the introduction of university programs to support the technological development and constant flow of talented people. The present book covers important inventions, contributions, and amusing anecdotes from the 100 years of loudspeaker history, and not least, the flourishing of the Danish loudspeaker industry.
 
The SR3 Avantgarde Arret� Jubilee 100 speaker,
 made by Audiovector,
celebrates the 100th birthday
of the loudspeaker.
In the chapter "The History of the Loudspeaker from 1915", Claus Futtrup writes, "In mid-1920s, many companies emerged in Denmark focusing on manufacturing radios. One of these, Bang & Olufsen (B&O), still exists today, founded in 1925 by Peter Bang and Svend Olufsen. In other words, applications for loudspeakers were rapidly developing. In the beginning, all speaker units in Denmark were either manufactured in-house (kitchen table style) or imported."
"The practical (modern style) dynamic speaker began with the Rice and Kellogg AIEE paper (1925) and the Radiola loudspeaker based on that paper (1926). This was a game changer, because what Kellogg and Rice discovered was a useful frequency range above the first mechanical resonance frequency of the speaker, where the frequency response flattens. Therefore the speaker was suitable for applications without horn-loading - a concept called direct-radiator loudspeaker. The origins of the loudspeaker company Peerless date back to 1926 when Einar Skjold Petersen (a carpenter who was interested in radio) and his cousin, T.M. Larsen, formed the sales company Skjold Petersen & Co. Among others, the company represented an American loudspeaker brand named Peerless. The world crisis, following the Great Depression in 1929, put an end to these imports and the Danish company turned to repairing loudspeakers. It soon began to produce its own speakers and, as Peerless in the USA had closed down, Skjold Petersen & Co. took over the Peerless brand name. The company started on Amager (a Danish island near Copenhagen)."
 
In this valuable chapter, Futtrup revisits the birth of the loudspeaker and its technological evolution, from Denmark, Norway, and around the world, providing a chronological description of the birth and evolution of many loudspeaker companies and brands, such as Ortofon, SEAS, Vifa, Scan-Speak, Dynaudio, AudioTechnology, Dantax, DALI, Peerless, JAMO, TC electronic, etc. Providing important insight into the role of many of the personalities behind those companies over the years, the chapter is also invaluable to understand the importance of product design and the many Danish loudspeaker engineers involved, including their close collaborations with many historical US companies at crucial moments in their history.

One such story details one of the most successful hi-fi loudspeakers of all time, the Dynaco A-25. As Futtrup recalls, Audio Dyne, a company that imported Dynaco products from America and sold them in Europe, became Scandyna, in 1967. Partially funded by American audio engineer, David Hafler, (founder of Dynaco), together with SEAS engineers, Scandyna developed speakers, including the H87 textile dome tweeter, as well as rubber surround woofers for the Dynaco A-25.
 
This fascinating 118-page book also includes several chapters with contributions from the following companies, all of which provide historical details and valuable chronologies of loudspeaker innovationsand designs:
Scandyna/EET Group A/S is currently better known for the popular Podspeakers.
System Audio A/S
Scan-Speak A/S
Quali-Fi
PointSource Acoustics (the production lab for loudspeakers)
Scandyna/EET Group A/S (better know currently for the Podspeakers)
Libratone
GN Netcom, brand name: Jabra
Dynaudio
DALI (Danish Audiophile Loudspeaker Industries)
Cornered Audio ApS
Clint Digital ApS
Bang & Olufsen A/S
Audiovector
Audio Technology ApS
Artcoustic Loudspeakers
 
The book can be viewed online and/or downloaded in PDF format from the Danish Sound website. Danish Sound is also selling hard copies of the book in packs of a minimum 10 books at the cost of 30 DKK per book, excluding VAT and delivery.
You Can DIY!
Build an External Phono Preamplifier
By Bill Christie
 
Many of today's receivers and preamplifier processors do not have phonograph inputs, so anyone with a vinyl collection will need an external phono preamplifier. A friend of the author found himself in this predicament and asked if he could build him one. Texas Instruments (TI) has a series of high-performance op-amps specifically designed for high-fidelity applications. The datasheets include the schematic for a phono preamplifier, the LME49740, which looked like a good candidate. The LME49740 is a 14-pin integrated circuit (IC) containing four op-amps, which is just the right number for the preamplifier. Since the author had excellent experience with this series he decided to use it. This article was originally published in audioXpress, July 2013. Read the Full Article Available Here
Voice Coil Test-Bench
Faital Pro's HF108/HF108R compression drivers coupled with LTH102 60� � 50� horn 
By Vance Dickason
 
In this Test Bench, Vance Dickason looks in depth at Faital Pro's HF108/HF108R compression drivers coupled with Faital Pro's LTH102 60� � 50� horn. The HF108/HF108R are the latest in Faital Pro's series of Keytone Polymer diaphragm 1" compression drivers, which includes the HF100, the HF102, the HF103, the HF104, the HF105 (reviewed in Voice Coil December 2012), the HF106 (reviewed in Voice Coil July 2013), and the HF107 (reviewed in Voice Coil July 2013). Features include a Keytone polymer annular-shaped diaphragm and an annular-shaped phase plug. The throat diameter is 25.4 mm (1") and is coupled to a 44-mm (1.73") diameter voice coil wound on a Kapton former with aluminum wire. Other features include a cast-aluminum body,  a neodymium ring magnet motor, and solderable terminals. Offered as a variant, the HF108R has a higher resonance and slightly diminished SPL above 8 kHz. The horn is Faital Pro's cast-aluminum 1" throat 60�H � 50�V elliptical tractrix flare LTH102. This article was originally published in Voice Coil, April 2015.  Read The Full Article Online
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