Ribbon midrange pros and cons


Ribbon tweeters are fairly common on some high end speakers. ...they sound great.....can anyone tell me why ribbon midranges are hardly ever used by some of the best speaker companies. ..what are the pros and cons? 
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Showing 1 response by rgs

A slight correction to Raul's comments.  The  Classé DR 3-VHC is not a 25 watts/ch amp, it is spec'd at 45 watts/ch in pure class A.  The smaller DR 2 and DR 3 were rated at 25 watts/ch.  They could all be bridged and basically quadruple their power while remaining in pure class A.  All 3 amps would be able to drive the Scintillas (and they would deliver full power in class A).

Regarding ribbon midranges, the top model Genesis speakers designed by the late Arnie Nudell used B-G ribbons that shared many similarities to the the ribbon used by Bob Carver in the Amazing Platinum Speakers (I think Carver used Kapton, and B-G used Mylar).  Those ribbons are extremely easy to drive (they are basically a 6 ohm resistive load), and excellent sounding; however, there are no longer produced so they are no longer a feasible option for speaker manufacturers to consider.