Loudspeakers
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Bugatti is a name associated with very fast cars and multi-million-dollar price tags, not home audio. But now luxury automotive design and premium audio components combine for the launch of the Royale loudspeakers from Bugatti and Tidal Audio.
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A company spun off from the Fraunhofer Institute for Photonic Microsystems is looking commercialize a micro loudspeaker made from 100 percent silicon. After successful seed funding, Arioso Systems GmbH is now ready to take the technology to market.
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Not everyone has room for or wants their hi-fi system to have a commanding presence in the living room, which is where the Spinbase comes in – a powered speaker system that sits underneath your turntable.
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Billed as the world's first premium eco speakers, the modular Zero range makes use of recycled paper for its housing, with any waste returned to the paper mill for re-use.
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Sweden's Teenage Engineering is arguably best known for its mini synthesizers called Pocket Operators, but has been pushing design envelopes in other areas too. A collaboration with RISE researchers has yielded a loudspeaker encased in a kind of white wood that stays white as it ages.
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Late last year, high-end audio brand McIntosh revealed a new flagship loudspeaker, the XRT2.1.K, priced at US$130,000. Now the company has announced a slightly less powerful version that's also less than half the price.
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McIntosh says that it's tapped into over 45 years of loudspeaker manufacture know-how to create a pair of 7 ft high audiophile pleasers. The XRT2.1K full-range speakers feature a total of 81 drivers for the promise of "spacious sound reproduction with an unusually deep sound stage."
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Speaker cabinets are usually made from wood or, for penny pinching, plastic – though we have seen speakers made using other materials like glass and concrete. Michele Gastaldello and Giacomo Munari mix Italian design with good old-fashioned stone masonry for their Stones Speakers line.
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Many of the tech enhancements from B&W's top-of-the-line 800 Diamond Series have been handed down to a new, cheaper generation of speakers. But even the least expensive 700 series speaker will still set you back $1,200 a pair.
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Messages announced over train station loudspeakers are notorious for being unintelligible. Germany's Fraunhofer Institute is trying to do something about it, however. It's developed new audio-enhancement software, which might even find use in smartphones.
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A research team from Cornell University's Creative Machines Lab has managed to 3D print the cone, coil and magnet of a loudspeaker, and then use it to throw out sounds from a digital audio player.
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Bowers & Wilkins has revealed a weatherproof loudspeaker named the AM-1 Architectural Monitor.