Plasma Speakers?

Plasma Tweeters?

A colleague just sent me this url:-

http://www.plasmatweeter.de

Has anyone heard of these?

 

Dev,

I visited the home of Martin Brewster a couple of weeks ago. He is the proprietor of Audio Reference who import and distribute various high end brands (Halcro, Clearaudio, Acapella, Graham etc.).

I was intrigued by the speakers in his lounge - Acapella High Violons from Germany. They are expensive (£26K!!) but fairly unique in that they use a plasma (ion) tweeter.

I sat and had a listen. Source was a Clearaudio Master Reference turntable and tangental tracking arm, Clearaudio Insider reference cartridge, Halcro pre and power amplification and the Acapellas sat on the end!

The small puple flame that is visible at the back of the tweeters horn is mesmerising and they threw an absolutely vast soundstage across the room.

I have never heard midrange and treble produced so delicately with transparency, air and realism! Arguably, there could have been more going on at the bottom end but what the hell, you can always add a sub!

Admittedly this was a mega-expensive system at around £100K but it is good to listen to kit like this from time to time to remind oneself of the state of the art!

Here is a link to a review:-

http://www.ultraaudio.com/equipment/acapella_high_violon.htm

Steve

 

there was a review of a speaker with a plasma tweeter on (i think...) the ultra audio website about a year ago. it seemed to think they sounded fantastic, though highlighted a few safety concerns over ozone and fire risks... plus they were very expsensive, over 20k as i recall.

 

ah... i see snoopdog was giving a much more full response as i typed...

 

I was intrigued by the plasma tweeter. It seems a bit dangerous though. I especially like the following notice by Ulrich Haumann on his website :-

Notice
This device work with high Voltage and high power RF in the area of 27 MHz. This can be dangerous to your health. It is recommended to use metal chassis for shielding because this is a strong transmitter and be careful with the plasma flame. The flame is very hot. This publication is for private use only. Building and using of the plasmatweeter is at your own risk. I am not responsible for doing something stupid after reading this pages.

 

Steve, you lucky dog

 

There was also Ionofane many years ago, and I believe something in the States that needed a gas cylinder to operate (Richard Hill - I think, but the brand's defunct and the designer left the audio business). Both gained some notoriety, but the snag was that they added ozone to your listening atmosphere.

 

My father-in-law (in Germany) has a pair of plasma tweeters. The designer has been working on them for about 20 years but they don't look the same as the ones in Dev's link.

I thought they sounded very good, were not THAT expensive and, apparently, the ozone problem has been licked.

I can try to find out more if anyone's interested.

 

Bit like the JMLabs Berylium tweeters !

Seriously, those sound very interesting and I would imagine they'd be quite hypnotic :JOEL: .