Live music creates large area soundwaves having characteristics that can't be duplicated by little box speakers. Soundwaves emanating from live music help us determine "is it 'live' or is it a speaker?" Reproducing large area soundwaves requires a speaker with a large surface area. The Magneplanar MMG with the equivalent surface area of 72, 1 -inch dome tweeters, and 9, 8-inch woofers does this better than speakers costing several times the MMG's modest $599/pair price tag.
Quasi Ribbon Models
Ribbon speakers have long been respected as pure and elegant transducers. Closely related to the ribbon speaker, the Magneplanar Quasi Ribbon has the appearance and sound quality similar to a true ribbon at a fraction of the cost. Sometimes called Ribbon speakers by other manufacturers, the Quasi Ribbon speaker brings high-end speaker performance to today's mid-priced loudspeakers. Despite the delicate appearance, all Quasi Ribbon models have very high power handling capability and are nearly impervious to abuse.
With your eyes closed the Magneplanar will allow you to "see" the original performance suspended in space. The full height, width and depth of the concert hall can be heard.
Theoretically, loudspeakers should use massless drivers suspended in space with no box, magnet structure, or framework around the drivers. Most conventional box speakers are far from this ideal. The mass of the driver is high and the rear wave is contained within the box or magnet structure. While the frequency response can be smoothed out in a box speaker, the character of the sound is inevitably affected. The music sounds like it is coming out of a box-constricted and unnatural. The Magneplanar diaphragm comes closer to the ideal driver. The mass is low and the diaphragm is not contained. The sound is permitted to radiate freely into space. With the box removed, Magneplanars sound more like you are there.
The power from an ampilifer causes the conventional cone speaker to react as if it had received a sharp blow at the voice coil. Since the outer portions of the cone cannot respond instantly, the cone will flex. The resulting cone breakup gives music a "fuzzy", "blurred" quality. The Magneplanar eliminates cone breakup by driving the Magneplanar diaphragm over its entire area. The force from the amplifer is distributed over the entire diaphragm so that it all moves at the same time. Cone or diaphragm breakup is dramatically reduced and the integrity of the music is preserved.
The effect of mass on a loudspeaker can be illustrated by the comparison of a balloon and a beach ball. In the case of the balloon a nominal force such as a puff of wind will cause the balloon to accelerate quickly. When the force ceases, the balloon decelerates quickly. The same force will move the beach ball, however, the ball is slower to start and slower to stop. High mass is one of the main causes of sonic degraduation in conventional speakers. Magneplanars use ultra low mass components. For example, the Magneplanar ribbon element is so thin, that on edge, it is invisible to the naked eye. It is so light that when a piece of it is dropped from a height of 6 feet it takes and average of 5 seconds for it to reach the floor. Conventional speaker designs prohibit such low mass-the force from the driving amplifier would crush conventional speakers made of such light materials. Only by driving the transducer over its entire area can you use materials of such low mass.
