A few days ago in the thread “Who Builds Horns”:
 
http://www.goodsoundclub.com/TreeItem.aspx?postID=3226#3226
 
there were mentioned the Cessaro Horn Acoustics Company from Germany.  The company has an interesting model Gamma:
 
http://www.cessaro-horn-acoustics.com/index.php?id=23

I was looking at them, looking, thinking and released that Cessaro GAMMA have potential to be very good speaker.

With the Bush’s dollars of nowadays the 114K EUR makes near $150K. Well, certainly it is expansive but let look at the subject further. What is out there for 100K?  Let forget about the Kharma Grand Enigma, the biggest Genesis, the largest Wilsons with their numerous limitations, the German Physik’s Gaudi with the low sensitively 4Ohm, 3 ways monster of 1/4 million dollars or the Alon’s Exotica.  I wonder would be that if a person does pay that obscene amount of money then what he will be getting?  Well, in case of the Cessaro Gamma I think the person “might” get the most.

4-way, horn-loaded, time-aligned, high sensitivity, vertically arrayed, with dedicated pairs of LF sections – I feel it is the very much the direction for an ultimate result available for home sound reproduction. Also, those types of speakers allowed to use not the hundreds watts SS-crap and not the elephant-sounding, on-capacitance-floating high-voltage-wattage transmission tubes but the most advanced-sounding conventional low power triodes.

I never heard the Cessaro Gamma but frankly speaking it was the one of the few speakers over $100K looking at which I did not laugh. Looking at the Magico Ultimate, at the top pf the line Calix Phoenix Signature or partially at the Acapellas Spharon or TLG Accoustics it is difficult stay away from giggling. Sure, the Cessaro Gamma has a lot opportunities do not sound well. Using not-good drivers, use the driver wrongly, many aspects of loading and implementation, even in bass – all of it if it was not done correctly will affect sound negatively. Still, if everything is done properly and sensibly in the Cessaro Gamma then I feel those speakers HAVE A POTENTIAL to be the MOST INTERESTING “ the best” commercial home speakers out there.

I wonder if anyone recognizes the drivers of the Cessaro Horn Acoustics? I thought that I know all of them but looking at Cessaro’s compression driver I have no idea what it is and I feel that my ego severally hurts. The pictures on the Cessaro site do not allow seeing who made the drivers. Most likely Cessaro glue their own labels on the drivers but whose drivers they use? Evan their bass driver looks very nice, probably with sloth or papers suspension…

The Cessaro said that their 2” compression driver cost over €4000, cobalt magnet and beryllium diaphragm. The 4000 EUR is quite noble price and I wonder who was up to the task to make those drivers. It is pretty much how those drivers Sound it will be described the 50% of the Cessaro’s system sound…

Well, it was not trick question; I thought initially that they were TADs. However, TAD uses Alnico7, Alnico 5 and Neodymium magnets not the cobalt magnet. The TADs drivers do not cost €4K but rather €1.5K.  I never heard TAD use Samarium-Cobalt magnets for 2". The Samarium-Cobalt is more expensive then Neodymium-lron-Boron, perhaps it explains why Cessaro claims €4K. There’re few options that I see:

1) They made TAD to do for them custom drivers. It would be surprising because TAD usually is very hesitant to sell out custom drivers, particularly for the volumes that Cessaro might be interested.
2) They buy out custom drivers with custom magnets from the same supplier where TAD buys. I am sure it is some kind of shop in china and therefore they looks like TADs
3) They juts lie and use TAD driver, wish is not good, as the default TAD driver do not sound interesting…

Perhaps I do not know it and TAD does make the Samarium magnets for MF. I never heard them though….

It is interesting… complaining about the fact that the “promising to be claver” Cessaro Horn using the TAD drivers (still it is not completely known as they said that that MD driver cost €4000) I asked myself: what else they might use?  Really, horns are incredibly simple topology. The horn section of any 4 ways inhalation does not cost expensive and the very best set of horn would cost not a lot at all. The complexity in the horns coming form setting the things up, arrangement and trashing out of the person head those idiotic cartoons that the person have managed to sponge from the world of the box speakers. Then the drivers came …

The drivers are real bitch in horns. The Morons listen horns installations that perform more or less acceptable and run to imitate what they have seen,  buying the similar to the given system cable elevators and feeling that they might get the similar sound. However, behind all tribulations of horns inflations there is something that the Morons do not see – the drivers.

I is ironic that in the world of compression drivers everything is so freaky (not to mention that I generally do not use the phrase compression drivers). No one make good or even at least interestingly sounding compression drivers. Some people fell that they “smart” and use some vintage drivers but the vintage driver are crap as well. Each compression driver and particularly “vintage” has own cook-coo and it is necessary to deal individually with each driver. Not a lot of people have skills to handle the tasks not to mention an ability to discriminate and navigate result. The compression drivers “as is” perform “as is” and it is how most of the horn sounds out there. Bruce Edgar, who feeds America bottom eaters with his “Volkswagen horns” was complaining that people do not understand where his quality come from. He said that people see the wooden horns and feel that it’s it but in realty the 50% of his sound come from his driver person retune and reassemble each driver. I would not comment on the Bruce’s driver but the point is very well illustrated: no drivers - no needs to peruse any horns.

Well, Bruce staffs his horn with “obtainable for production” JBL2441. I did not use this driver, I used 2440, but even 2441 should be fine. Still, it is kind of “vintage” driver and another 5 years and the hoodlum will seal even them on eBay for obscene amount of money, not to mention that you need 2-3 paid to make one well-sounding pair… So, if the Germans at Cessaro Horn decided to make horns commercially then what options they have for drivers of the need a reliable and stable flow of “not trouble-type” of the drivers. The army of the crappy ferrite-magnet drivers? TAD? TOA? BMS?  Today’s Altec/JBL? 2-3 more? I mean there are not a lot of out there…

It is certainly that Cessaro Horn did not make this 4–5-way $150K horn as “popular” model and they will generate the cash flow by pushing the 2-3-ways smaller and cheaper installations. People who will buy the 2-3-ways horns are deaf anywhere and for them it is irrelevant what kind drivers will be used there. The Cessaro Gamma will remind as the company virtual flagman, good for pictures and good for marketing but with “irrelevant sound”.  There are not reasons for Cessaro to go in their Gamma for better drivers. The sales peoples will be show off the smaller Cessaro speaker and say that the company $150K flagman used the same drivers. The fact that those people, if they have ears, could get the very same sound as the TADed flagman has for fewer than 5K would be irrelevant….

Yes, I am disappointed the Cessaro Gamma uses TADs but I do not think that it is completely the Cessaro fault. If you are in a business to do mass cooking then you start from precooked pasts and end up with handing the burgers out there the drive by window… Dispute a large price tag the TADed Cessaro Gamma most likely is not a product of tailored authored sound. Everything will be completely understandable about Gamma if I know how the upper bass horn was done… Still, even among the McDolands speakers the Gamma, well along with thir €4000 TADSlooks deistically objectionable (means has objectives :-)
I juts wish it would be more available drivers out there and Cessaro, AG, Bruces and dozen others would have chance to use them….

coops wrote:

Romy are there any good commercially available horns that sre any good? What about AvantGarde I heard their Trio's recently, how far away are there from being good/ thanks Keith.

coops wrote:

Yes primarily i viseted Thomas to compare tonearms, he has a couple of Schroeders, the new graham Phantom ( mark III ) a vintage Ortofon amongst others. and he has a fine collection of cartridges, as I mentioned he is a very nice guy, The real surprise was the Cessaro Alpha's whic he has had for about three months, they were astounding, I had only heard the Avantgardes, and some vintage Vitavox's ( and some diy lowthers ) up to that point, the Cessaro's were jaw droppingly good, more like real music than anything else I have heard, can't tell you much about them, TAD drivers obviously, I know that each horn is spcifically designed for each driver, I believe Ralph prefers a simple passive crossover , at Thomas's they were being driver by a KR amp, ( huge valves ) I think they can be configured pretty much to your taste, beautifully made, the website photos give no sense of the size or beauty of the speakers, horns are solid wood, I think Thomas said that the horn alone weighs 35kg, and as mentioned they will be at the Munich show, Thomas is a very hospitable host visitors are most welcome and he has no axes to grind, he lives in herne relatively near Dusseldorf, for me it was a revelation.

I still insist that Cessaro Alpha is quite challenged loudspeakers. It is essentially a near 300Hz MF horn with a driver that goes down no more then let say 600Hz. This of the bass enclosure that Cessaro uses is pretty much none-effective above 100Hz-150Hz and they just fill the hole between 150Hz and 600Hz worth “sonic mad”, similar to what Avantgardes does in this Duo.  It is 98dB sensitive and it should sound as poor as Avantgardes Duo. Do not take me wrong. I do not deny that you were experienced a revelation. But a revelation is juts a realization of something that you did not realized before, so it was a next step for you up but I doubt that it was a good sound.  Any new realization are good things, I would juts propose you to capitalize on this new revelation and try to audition the Cessaro’s Betas and Gammas. The Betas and Gammas should have way more sophisticates sound as Betas has an upper bass horn and a separate LF section. A present of a dedicated upper bass channel will set all bets off, would allow using way more interesting bass drivers and should take the sound of the Cessaro setup way further then what Alpha could do.  

I’m very pleased to se what the Cessaro folks (using a view from 50.000 feet) do and if you an insider and could bring up some of the advanced Cessaro users then it would be very interesting to head form them. Do you know who is behind this Cessaro Company and if they sold any Gammas at US’s East Coast. I would drive to listen the inhalation; I think it should worth….

Keith,

you see, in Alphas the MF driver does down to let say even 500Hz then it mans that they need to bring those bass W-bins unto 500Hz but it is imposable even theoretically. Let me to expanse, it I very simple. When a “reflected” horn fires up and if it operates in more or less wide bandwidth then HF harmonics gets consumed by the reflection in the horn much more aggressively then LF. This has tow very bead effects. First, we have to increase voltage on the bass horn because a LOT of it’s HF output is got eaten in the W-turns, this way we loose sensitively and gains distortions (exertions). Seconds no mater what we do we have an upperbass that sounds absolutely unnatural because harmonically the HF of this upperbass are more “dry” then LF. It sounds like overly dry fur if you know what I mean….A normal range of any W-bin solution is 1-1.5 octave, let say form 30 to 80… all the rest is juts  does not work… In fact I very much feel that in order to make that Alpha’s bass to run all the way up to 500Hz they had to EQ down the bottom of the bass range (here is what the sensitivity got eaten). In the Betas and Gammas the did not have this probelms and they have 109dB sensitively…

Anyhow, the Ralph has the Gammas at his home… Well,  I will put him in my list of “Interesting Germans” and if I go once again in my trip to “discover Germany” then I most likely will ask him to exercise his hospitality. Those Gammas, if Cessaros were able to get any noble tone out of the TADs drivers (a big question mark!!!) I feel are that most lucid speakers what that I have ever seen made commercially. Ask Ralph to bring you in his home and to listen those Gammas. It should be a very educational experience for you.

Keith,

Thanks, I do not see any needs to discuss anything with Ralph – I am not a prospective buyer and what I had interest personally about Gammas I have already understood.  It does look like those Cessaros people took horns eventually seriously and looking at some details that they trying to do indicate that they are not fools (like adjustment of upper horn exertion depending of the angle if it’s axis) . I hope they did not screw everything up with crossovers but so far I do not see any indication that they did.

Me, being me I would question the use of TAD drivers but for a manufactures who need a study flow if reliable supply – what kinds opinions they have? To run around the world and to trace the lasting stock of the JBL 2440 and then spending days to fix/tune them up? I really do not see any production-type of manufacturer would do. Also, I feel that TAD-type sonic-signature should be very favorable to German character. Sure it is a very sweeping generalization but any commercial manufacture should consider pleasing the generalizations of the prospective consumers. So, the TAD should be acceptable in Cessaros since they are primary homeland oriented.

BTW, let me to expand a littlie on my last comment. I always personally with some suspicion and difficulty “get” what German high-end audio does. They frequently target some very “bicepsy” sound but they kid of very liberal, sometimes to a point of complete disrespect to some tonal load. Ironically the “late” German music kind looks at the same direction. German are so damn spoiled with great traditions and legacy of superb tonal music that nowadays they find some “kinkiness” in doing black/white. I kind of understand it and perhaps appreciate it but me being me I looking for something different. I remember once I was lost my driving directions and was wondering across the hilly roads in country side of South Bavaria. I ended up driving up some mountain and found an extremely sexy, almost ruined castle at the top of the hill. There were no people there and I dropped my car and decided to walk around. This led me to a deep forest but it was deferent forest then I knew. It was very clean but at the same time it was “deep” with some natural dramatization. I had no idea where this drama came from but it was physically presented in the very moisture air and forest had own sound. It is hard to explain, but it was very distinct sound of a cold, full with morning mountain dew air and listening of this Sound I suddenly understood how I would like Beethoven’s sound. Since then, listening German music, I always look of that “wet” and “deep”, with mind smell of spruce and pine tone… I know that TAD would not do it for me as they are more on “synthetic” side of the wagon. But for Germans, who might not necessary in search for “my version of the Beethoven tone”, the “bicepsy” and "showy" TAD character might do… It would be similar to that fact that  many Westerners adore Shostakovich and his jumpy and vulgar phraseology but many Russians of my generations, listening in our childhood very many of Shostakovich’s shity compositions (and many equally shity imitations) that were presented to us in context of Communist Propaganda - we really can not stand much of what Shostakovich composed…

Romy the Cat wrote:

BTW, let me to expand a littlie on my last comment. I always personally with some suspicion and difficulty “get” what German high-end audio does. They frequently target some very “bicepsy” sound but they kid of very liberal, sometimes to a point of complete disrespect to some tonal load. Ironically the “late” German music kind looks at the same direction. German are so damn spoiled with great traditions and legacy of superb tonal music that nowadays they find some “kinkiness” in doing black/white. I kind of understand it and perhaps appreciate it but me being me I looking for something different. I remember once I was lost my driving directions and was wondering across the hilly roads in country side of South Bavaria. I ended up driving up some mountain and found an extremely sexy, almost ruined castle at the top of the hill. There were no people there and I dropped my car and decided to walk around. This led me to a deep forest but it was deferent forest then I knew. It was very clean but at the same time it was “deep” with some natural dramatization. I had no idea where this drama came from but it was physically presented in the very moisture air and forest had own sound. It is hard to explain, but it was very distinct sound of a cold, full with morning mountain dew air and listening of this Sound I suddenly understood how I would like Beethoven’s sound. Since then, listening German music, I always look of that “wet” and “deep”, with mind smell of spruce and pine tone… I know that TAD would not do it for me as they are more on “synthetic” side of the wagon. But for Germans, who might not necessary in search for “my version of the Beethoven tone”, the “bicepsy” and "showy" TAD character might do… It would be similar to that fact that  many Westerners adore Shostakovich and his jumpy and vulgar phraseology but many Russians of my generations, listening in our childhood very many of Shostakovich’s shity compositions (and many equally shity imitations) that were presented to us in context of Communist Propaganda - we really can not stand much of what Shostakovich composed…