AXPONA 2018 Show Report: The Renaissance of High-Quality Sounds

Originally published in audioXpress July 2018, we are now making available online the complete Audio Expo North America (AXPONA) 2018 Show Report, with all the details about the best sounding rooms and ultimate high-end gear from the Chicago, IL, show. AXPONA is one of the largest high-end audio shows in North America - and with the full potential to become the largest, thank to excellent facilities provided by the new Schaumburg Convention Center and Renaissance hotel.

Once again, audioXpress focuses on loudspeaker building, design, and testing in its September edition. We have three great speaker DIY projects that are certain to inspire our readers, Geoff Hill explains how speaker measurements are evolving under the latest Audio Engineering Society (AES) efforts, and Richard Honeycutt writes about modulation distortion in loudspeakers. We interviewed Crispin Herrod-Taylor, the designer of the amazing SoundBuckets portable speakers, we explain all you need to know about the latest HDMI Enhanced Audio Return Channel (eARC) specification, and Ward Maas tells the story of Infineon's new energy-efficient multi-level amplifiers.

Following the first test on the new Scan-Speak Ellipticor series, with the D3404/552000 tweeter, this edition of Test Bench focuses on the Scan-Speak Ellipticor 18WE/4542T00 midbass woofer. Like the D3404, the 18WE/4542T00 is a seriously feature rich transducer, which has a magnetically attached aluminum trim ring that can obviously be anodized a variety of colors besides black. For the cone assembly, Scan-Speak chose a rather stiff curvilinear profile back coated paper cone with an elliptical 45 mm × 35 mm convex paper dustcap. This article was originally published in Voice Coil, April 2018.

This edition of Test Bench focuses on the Scan-Speak Ellipticor D3404/552000 dome neodymium motor tweeter. Overall, the D3404/552000 is like a big elongated 28 mm diameter tweeter. For a motor system, Scan-Speak basically scaled up their currently successful Air-Circ tweeter motor with 10 neodymium slugs and copper shorting rings and a titanium former. The big news is that this motor and diaphragm yield a 2.83 V/1 m sensitivity of 97 dB! This article was originally published in Voice Coil, April 2018.

Voice Coil April 2018 highlights new drivers from Dayton Audio, and BlieSMa, a new OEM brand from Germany. There's an updated directory of Microspeaker vendors, and David Mathew and Joe Begin from Audio Precision explain all you need to know about the basics of testing headphones and earbuds. Vance Dickason characterizes two of the new Ellipticor drivers from Scan-Speak, and we pay tribute to loudspeaker pioneer Ejvind Skaaning (1929 - 2018). Get your copy now!

In this Test Bench, I examined the 28W/4878T00, a new 10” (28 cm) subwoofer from high-end OEM Danish driver manufacturer Scan- Speak. Scan-Speak’s 28W/4878T00 has a well-chosen feature set that includes a proprietary cast seven-spoke cast-aluminum frame that has minimal reflection surfaces and is completely open below the spider mounting shelf. Other features include a stiff, lightweight paper sandwich cone—further stiffened by a 3.25” convex coated woven fiber dust cap. This article was originally published in Voice Coil, September 2017.

This year we thought our readers would like to know which of the topics and stories published online in 2017 were the most popular for our community. We looked at the most-read articles of 2017 in audioXpress.com (which also includes selected articles from Voice Coil magazine), and we created this Top 10 list of news stories and online articles. Here are the results!

In the September 2017 edition of Voice Coil, read about the new Klippel Analyzer 3 (KA3), launched to coincide with the year the German company celebrates its 20th anniversary. Also, read about a surprising speaker design recently patented by Harman and learn about "Acoustic Methods of Microphone Calibration" from the experts at PCB Piezotronics. In Test Bench, there's a 3” midrange dome driver from Volt Loudspeakers and a new 10” subwoofer from Scan-Speak. Now available.

This edition focuses on Adhesive Joints and Cone Treatments and includes a special report on the latest new material options available and an updated directory of Adhesives, Coatings, and Sealant Providers. In our Spotlight article, Dan Knighten discusses the “Practical Measurement of Bluetooth and Lightning Headphones,” and in Test Bench, Vance Dickason discusses the new B&C Speakers DE990TN compression driver and Wavecor’s new SW168WA01 6.5” woofer. That and much more now available.

Previewed at an exclusive event in Munich, in May 2017, Scan-Speak has now launched the first two drivers in its Ellipticor line, combining a series of design innovations such as elliptical voice coils, resulting in lower distortion, combined with higher SPL. The first two Ellipticor drivers released by the Danish brand include the D3404/552000 tweeter and the 18WE/4542T00, a 6.5” midwoofer.