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Old December 24th 07, 11:05 AM posted to uk.rec.audio
Jim Lesurf
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Default The damping factor and the sound of real music

In article , Eeyore
wrote:



Electrostatics may indeed have less colouration than most speakers but
that has nothing to do with the bass.


The absence of any meaningful baffle means the electrostatics will
always have poor bass repsponse. It's inherent to the design (the rear
radiation cancels the front radiation more at low frequencies determined
by its physical size).


On the ESL63 the resulting LF roll-off is -6dB at about 35 Hz, roughly
second order IIRC. This, of course, is the nominal 'free space' value. In
the room I use for the main hifi system the last time I measured it was
only about -3dB at 30-35Hz. The result does not sound 'bass light' to me.
But this will of course depend on the room, etc, and the absence of a box
boom may make other speakers seem to have 'more bass'... :-)

It may be more significant that the sound pressure level you can get at low
frequencies is perhaps more restricted than a good conventional speaker of
similar price. But that is a question of sound power, not frequency
response.

Slainte,

Jim

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