pros and cons: beryllium vs ribbon tweeters in sound and emotions terms

I suspect each has unique properties and unless listening to a tweeter alone which is better depends almost totally on the smarts of the guy building the complete speaker and utilizing each to best effect.

Folded ribbon tweeters I’ve heard in recent years delivered a very relaxed and non fatiguing sound, almost to a fault if one expects recordings to have a bit of an edge to it from time to time.

Metal tweets in general historically seem to lean the other way in terms of their faults when mentioned but most I have heard in recent years in quality products have not struck me that way. Some like Focal may have been Beryllium. These were nicely etched in the highs but also very easy on the ears.

Low noise and distortion upstream to start with is always a good thing to help keep any good tweeter on your good side. For example I have Dynaudios with Esotar soft dome tweeter that delivers a lot of detail and energy to the top end but might drive one out of the room if noise and distortion upstream are not under control.

Also of course the dispersion patterns of a ribbon versus dome tweeter of any kind tend to be much different. That might be the most significant difference I would guess.

Just my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that I think ribbon and folded ribbon tweeters in general tend to be more "forgiving" of problems upstream than most any metal tweeter or the best soft dome tweeters, like the Esotar.

I’ve heard some cases where other soft dome tweeter designs may be more forgiving as well.

The soft dome tweeters in my OHM speakers for example are definitely somewhat more forgiving then the Esotars in my Dynaudios.   Again part of that is the overall design and target sound I think perhaps as much as the tweeter alone.

I believe my Triangle Titus XS speakers use a Titanium dome tweeter. These normally are somewhere between the Esotar and OHM soft dome tweets in terms of overall attack, but with a quality signal tend to be somewhat laid back and smooth as well.

At least to my 56 year old ears.

When I was younger I could hear clearly to 20khz. Only to 12khz or so these days like most people my age. An up side is that as you get older, your ears become less sensitive to anything nasty that might be happening at high frequencies, often a result of noise and distortion rather than music, which is mostly just "air" above 12Khz or so.

I had Heil AMT speakers in my late teens and midfi electronics. A decent first try but not one that stuck with me.

ccolby most recently I’ve listened carefully to affordable Goldenear Aon 3 speakers with folded ribbon tweeter and liked those a lot. Have heard various others over the years including ribbon tweeters in Magnepan which is a totally different beast..

I've never heard any of those old full range ribbon Apogees that owners (with proper amplification) tend to cherish and never give up.   Would like to.   I feel the same way about Walsh drivers.  Once you've been there and like it nothing else is quite the same.