Anyone in Vegas listen to the Gilmore speakers???

-it took me a while to figure it out. Mark Gilmore had told me several times on the phone that the speakers need 50 hours of breakin to sound right, and this was proven at the show. When the speakers arrived, they had 10 hours on them. Shipping damage of the Fed Ex variety prevented the speakers from getting any more time before the show, and it was a miracle that they had even the ten hours on them.

So the first day of the show, using our MA-1s, the speakers did OK in the mids and highs, being as revealing as anything I had heard, but the bass did not make it. We also had a room problem- too much volume and the room came apart. It was easy to get too much volume, as close to the speaker you could not tell how loud you were playing the system, since there were none of the usual loudness cues to clue you in. Further back it was obvious.

The second day the speaker was a little better, but still not doing it right until the end of the day. After hours, I played a musical project I had been working on for the last year at a serious but not mind-breaking volume. My Korg Mono/Poly can do some deep bass that easily rivals Moog Tauras pedals and I was interested to see how the Gilmores could shake the place up. I let the whole CD play. By the end of the CD, I had 6 companions that showed up and listened through the whole thing without complaint. It was also nice because it was helpful in getting reactions out of people with regards to the CD. It will be ready for release in a couple of months. The Gilmores played the bass line easily, BTW.

On the third day we used the MA-2s. Also Abraham graced us with his appearance. What a wonderful person to meet. He is very gracious, and quite learned. At this point the speakers finally were really playing the bass, but it was also apparent that there was a standing wave in the room that we were not going to be able to solve. So as a result there was no real bass in the center of the first two rows of chairs. The room continues to be a major influence in the system; no technology I have seen solves that.

Abraham was delighted with the way the speakers presented the sound. As a bass player myself, I can tell you that your location with respect to the speaker is a huge deal on how it sounds to you and how the amp interacts with the instrument. With a planar speaker, this no longer matters. All of a sudden Abraham was able to play the bass without worrying about where the bass amp was as the sound was the same anywhere he stood. This made it more about the music and less about the gear. What was a big deal as far as the speaker was concerned is that it was impossible to damage the speaker with the MA-2s while a very active and talented bass player provided the input. No chance of fried mid or treble drivers due to overdriving the amps- the ribbons handle more power then the MA-2 can generate.

On the fourth and fifth days of THE Show, the speaker was finally blending the bass with the same speed and agility that hallmarked the ribbon unit from the beginning. Despite the MSB CD player's phenomenal playback, it proved no match for the SOTA/Triplanar/Helicon combo. It was nice to play LPs that I have heard for years and note things in them I have not heard before. The highs (as long as we did not set the room off) were easy, relaxed, focused and coherent: a pleasing combination of speed and laid back character all at once. Nice for music.

Of course, shows are terrible places to audition gear. If it sounds good, that's OK, if it does not that really doesn't mean a thing. However I've been doing these shows for 15 years now, with a variety of speakers. Based on that experience the Gilmore proved an impressive debut.

I know what my amps and preamps sound like, and its not by chance that I use recordings that can shut most systems down in a heartbeat. I like to see what a system can do with demanding material. Although I am a two channel geek with all the tube recording and playback gear anyone could hope for, this does not mean that I am above using some serious rockin' stuff as reference. Better that then having to saw my leg off if forced to listen to Diana Krull once more. Frankly, I'm a bit of a snob (like most audiogeekphiles) about the music I listen to- some of which I have the advantage of having recorded myself.

I can't tell you how often people with duck in, look at things and leave. There's lots of tire kickers out there, which is fine. I've seen a lot of controversy about this speaker, lots of it aimed at Mark Gilmore, who has had a lot of things said about him by people on this and other forums who have had no communication with Mark at all. I call him on the phone, or email him if I have questions. Seems like the sporting thing to do. Anyway, my point is that at any room at a show, if you want to find out what a system does you'll have to do more then duck in. You'd better bring a recording you know very well, and if you only play 2 or 3 cuts I seriously doubt that you are going to learn much about any system. I find that seperate recordings should be used to determine things like depth, width, and imaging in the soundstage, still others for bass extension, more for bass impact, highs and so on. Oh yes (sigh) let's not forget the female vocals with light jazz. Whatever. King Crimson is more my style, but this, for the time being, is still America :)

What I am trying to say is that I have experience with the show conditions, the gear and the recordings that allowed me to satisfy my curiosity about the Gilmores. I really do feel that I am not going out on a limb in saying that time will demonstrate that the Gilmore raises the bar for all planar speakers. In addition to being musical and full range, it is also very easy to drive. During the entire show we never clipped the amps at any time. On the 3rd day, we had a guy come in after hours and play the system at 115 db! Despite our dismay, the amplifiers lounged through without a hint of stress. A planar speaker that is finally easy on tubes, *full range* yet capable of serious dynamic range. Not something you see everyday. In fact, its the only speaker like it.

Sorry to disappoint you folks. First off, we were in the back room when that dude showed up and played the system at such a volume. However, For the record, temporary exposure to 115 db does not damage hearing unless your ears have some previous damage. I hope that you will re-read my previous post and see that 115 sound pressures were NOT used during my consideration of the speaker.

For your money, you could get a cooktop but I don't see how you would be able to play music with that :)

Some people don't think of the speaker as a planar speaker, but it most definately is. The way you can tell is that it really makes no difference how close to the speaker you are- the volume you get from it seems the same at any distance in the room. The only speakers I have seen do that are planars.

As for 'standing to profit': for the record, although I have known Mark for close to ten years, and found him to be one of the nicer, straight-shooting guys you could hope to meet in this hobby, I have no interests in the speaker whatsoever. Ya know, all you have to do is ask either me or Mark by email rather then have to drag this stuff out ad nauseum just to find out something that a simple question on the email would answer. I have to say (again) I have seen all sorts of stuff said about Mark on this and other forums, and from talking to him, I know that not one of those individuals *ever* called or emailed Mark to ask him *anything*. Sorry to say this, but if you want to be a troll, go ahead and repeat the same behaviour. If not, call him or email him and bring this stuff up with him. You will find him to be a fine gentleman.

Over the years, a lot of people have told me that they 'don't care what it looks like as long as it sounds good'. I have found that generally that is not actually the case, but I have also found that, at least in the case of the gear I make, that when the form follows the function it is easier to build a higher performing product.

Its been about a week and a half since CES ended and we had to pack up. In the meantime, it occurred to me that a lot of people have asked me what I thought about the speaker and how it sounded. It seemed appropriate to put my thoughts down on paper, so to speak, as most people have no idea what the Gilmore is like. I have to say I was very curious as well. Although disappointing on the first two days as I mentioned previously, this was the result if inadequate break-in. Afterwords the speaker did the job right.Anyway, since I had been thinking about all the people that asked my opinion I thought I would offer it. I hope that I have not offended anyone by making these points.

What Mark tells me is that there are dozens of colors to choose from. They way I understand it, the infamous ad that has been so effective and controversial is a photo of a prototype, hence the blue color. If you look at some of the photos that Albert Porter took, you will see one photo of the equipment stand in the Glacier room. In front of the stand are 5 Golden Ear Awards, which are sitting on square blocks of Corian, which are some of the color samples Mark brought to the show. I figured they would make handy bases...

I'm getting mine in black.

Mark of course tried wood and wood products, but none of them would control resonace properly. The Corian allowed for resonace control to 8Hz (an octave below the passband of the speaker) and one of the country's largest Corian machining plants is very close by so it seemed a simple choice. He explored other options but from what I understand the costs went out of sight. Ask any one who's remodeled a kitchen recently how much machined Corian costs and you have a good idea of the cost of this speaker. There's enough Corian in them to easily build a complete counter array in a modern kitchen (the speaker is two slabs laminated together in a vacuum pressure press and then machined- none of which is cheap, its not like you can use SealAll to hold this stuff together...). All this information was easily obtained by asking Mark himself (as you can imagine I have been very curious as I have been hearing about this speaker for a long time).

I find the stovetop comments amusing as obviously no stovetop is made with Corian as it would be damaged by the operation of the burners :) So I think we can regard the stovetop comments as a wee bit of the troll influence...

I was also very curious about the woofers, which initially look very pedestrian. A closeup look at the actual diaphram reveals, especially after questioning Mark, that the diaphrams are composed of an metallic honeycomb structure- at once very rigid, lightweight and sturdy. Mark studied several different diaphram structures but all the others failed either due to the materials being inadequate or else costing more for one woofer array then the total cost of the speaker. As Mark obviously took great inspiration from the Carver (and knows the man personally), he knew that the Q of the woofer was important for getting an open baffle design to work (IOW, building an operational planar speaker). The comments of the speaker being a Carver ripoff are thus no less amusing, as the actual woofers, baffle, crossover and ribbon ribbon designs (IOW: the entire speaker) are quite unique. The ribbon and woofers are both made in house. The baffle material, size and shape were modeled by computor to insure the proper bandwidth (17Hz cutoff) and the actual real-world speaker conforms to the design.

Mark sent me a plot of the impedance curve. Other then a bump at the 200Hz crossover point, the plot is ruler flat- 8.1 ohms at any point other then the crossover point. The resonance plots are equally impressive: essentially the speaker exhibits resonaces an order of magnitude less then any other speaker measured.

That is quite a statement, and frankly I believe that some 'audiophiles' were disappointed *because* the speaker lacked the typical resonant signatures that they have become so used to. I have always maintained that electronic reproducers are just that - and *not* musical intruments (which should have resonaces). Colored speakers and amplification built with intentional coloration (don't get me started...) fall into the latter category.

Hi Albert, What, is Kenny G the Antichrist??

Yes, I'm alright with them. It helps that the speaker handled my recording of Salubrious Invertebrae without bottoming out. Of course, like everything else in this sport, the final test will be how they do here at home.

I was talking to a friend of mine who is an interior decorator, and she was pleased, even after seeing photos of the speaker, that there is finally a speaker like the Gilmore, because in her business, it is now finally possible to hide the speaker in the decor, as Corian is available in so many colors. She says that way it does not have to be the central focus of the room. Something *I'd* not thought of before... (she says its nearly impossible to hide most speakers in the room decor as the wood and black grills attract the eye so easily) so now I might be doing the speaker in the same tones as my room is done in now.

The way these things go, I expect it'll be May before I can get my hands on a set.

Dude, I have no idea what that guy was thinking, playing the stereo so loud. However its nice to know that with a reasonably powered amp that one cannot clip it.

>Assuming an anechoic environment, the sound from a point >source decays at a rate of 6 dB for every doubling of >distance...

Of course, as we all know, no-one lives in an anechic chamber :) As a result, my previous statement stands, unless one has a very large room. At any rate, were it a point source, there would be a sizable increase in volume as one approached the drivers (square of the distance, blah blah) and this obviously does not happen.

With regards to the stovetop comments, there is indeed a consistancy of troll reactions. My girlfriend, on seeing the photo of the speaker, commented that it was nice to see a speaker that had some curves and was not the same-old same-old. Mark reports that the marketing studies show that women accept the speaker easier then men. Obviously there will be exceptions. Mark also points out that the shape of the speaker is such that it prevents comb-filter effects that it would have if it were rectangular.

Mark also explored grill cloth materials and tried every type that is in use on other planars. They all had a sonic artifact. As a result there is no grill. The ribbon is available in several colors so there are choices to allow for the lack of ye old black.

Well, I suppose the Gilmore is already halfway there, as it has always been available in black.

Mark's not mentioned anything about you calling him like I mentioned to you last we spoke. It sounded to me like you had a good idea regarding the grill cloth.

However I spoke to Mark and he revealed some interesting information about grillcloths. He was not able to find a material as I mentioned earlier that was actually acoustically transparent over the ribbon. Additionally, even when the cloth was positioned a couple of inches from the woofer, he had problems with the cloth flapping back and forth. But you might have an approach he's not thought of. Give him a call. I'm sure he would be glad to hear from you.