I have been communicating with Raymond for quite some time as he is the lucky owner of a pair of EA12 from my friend and fellow speaker designer Alain Wacquet. Raymond has also been helpful in providing information for my article on Confluence. He has just posted a comprehensive review of these fabulous speakers on the forum Audio Vintage and has kindly given permission to rewrite and translate his prose in English here. For those of you who read French and want to read the original post, here is the link: http://www.audiovintage.fr/leforum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=56039 My notes are in italics in the text below EA12 presentation by Raymond Lerat - The English version Raymond Lerat had the pleasure to meet with Alain Wacquet in Nancy chez Audio Video Son in the mid 80s. He found him affable and full of humour with a smile on his face, and passionate about music with a penchant for jazz, and a composer himself, up to this day where he indulges in more esoteric compositions with prepared instruments and noises. He was born near Lille in the Northern part of France, close to the Belgium border. (This is where I met Alain...) Raymond first interest in presenting these panels to the Forum was to gauge the level of knowledge, interest and exposure that the members of the forum might have with this confidential range of vintage speakers from the early 80s. Raymond notes that all people he knows who have been exposed to AW speakers were all enthusiastic about them, specially when reproducing jazz ensembles and small classical formations where they excel. Their main characteristic been described as "energetic", with a real sense of "beeing in the room" and with perfect imaging and spatialisation. All reports written over the 10 years of research by Raymond have all returned an "enthusiastic" response. The way Raymond describes his first encounter with AW Audio fells short of a "love at first sight" declaration, but like often, the object of ditto love seems unreachable financially and is left confined to the realm of dreaming...until such a time where it suddenly becomes accessible. Raymond goes on to describing various experiences with other panels, like Magnepan, Stax, Audiostatic and Quad, products which were not lacking in anything, but which would actually add undesirable things, in his opinion. With Magnepan for instance at the time, the image of a piano might have been stretched to 15m or so, within an orchestra which would feel like 20m wide, so the proportions of the sonic image was distorted. Inadequate dynamic range, lack of the bottom octaves, short circuit between front and back fields made it near impossible to position the panels for the best results in a given space. Lansing Trimline, DCM Time Frame, Carver in the US, Phonophone, Triangle in France have tried to use electrodynamic drivers to design such a type of speaker with various degrees of acoustic success, but no commercial one. Alain Wacquet managed to stay in business for over 10 years, while producing a "haute couture" type of product, made by hand, with love and exceptional craftsmanship, hence expensive. The objectives and typical qualities of an electrodynamic panel are a credible horizontal and vertical image, with a cylindrical polar response, providing a stable, accurate and homogenous response and image. The impulse response - slew rate - will have to be exceptional, vastly superior to any other system, with a very good reproduction of timbres, the hallmarks of an acoustic doublet system. The use of a linear array of mostly identical small full range drivers will provide such result if they are correctly implemented. If not, the result will be like a "sonic porridge" as Raymond nicely puts it. NOTE: I have found this measurement from a LEEDH Perspective designed by Gilles Millot, using the same driver as a midrange. This shows the exceptional impulse response of the main driver used by AW Audio, a WFR12 from Audax. It is to be noted that 6 12cm drivers have an equivalent surface to a 300m woofer with half the mass...But the resonant frequency would be about double, hence why the lower octave can't be reproduced at the same level as a 300m woofer which fs would be around 30Hz. Obviously, it will be expected that the lower octaves of the audio spectrum will be somehow reduced in level, but still extremely clean because of the speed provided by the light membranes of the drivers, but also by the acoustical short circuit between the front and rear waves. Trying to add a subwoofer often results in a bad marriage, which Raymond describes as trying to mate a carp and a rabbit! Raymond has experimented with electrostatic and isodynamic panels over time but found them lacking inefficiency, and dynamic range, qualities required to give life and freedom to the music, a treat that a boxed system cannot achieve. For these reasons Raymond had abandoned his quest, even though he owned a pair of QUAD ESL 63 in the 80s. The various advantages of a panel speaker compared to a box speaker A bit of history - You might want to read my own articles on the timeline of AW Audio The AW Audio adventure started in 1985 after two years of research prior, resulting in the introduction of the EA12 first panel, then the less expensive EA11 and finally the outstanding EA16 which only 10 pairs have been sold. Later the EA12 would be replaced by the PA12 and there are a few units of the ultimate Transparence (in Alain's basement...) all this over a 10 year period and through a handful of dealers around the country. Raymond didn't get a chance to listen to this second generation of panels, which seem to carry the same drivers, although they are no longer locked behind the fabric. (neither did I...) Obviously, the difficutiles of marketing and selling such a boutique range of products of such high quality, superb finish, designed by a passionate and uncompromising man such as Alain was not a piece of cake, having to abide by the rules of greedy esoteric and high end dealers, (being used to extravagant margins to push such a product and others..) Raymond goes onto explaining some of the reasons behind Alain's decision to abandon the project although all public demos were all spectacular and well received in comparison with similarly priced products at the time. Essentially, it was extremely difficult to transform all these marketing efforts into sales. (I have witnessed a number of these demos and they are amongst the best I have ever heard at any price... It took me decades to find something better, and you probably know that I am referring to my friends at Kyron Audio here!) Raymond goes on to compare the experience of listening to an AW Audio panel to the degustation of a Grand Cru wine, as it stays with you for the rest of your life either on the palate or in your ears. (Obviously, you can rejoice time and time again to the pleasure of listening to a pair of good speakers, difficult and somehow far more expensive to keep drinking bottles of Ducru-Beaucaillou 1982, my all time favourite wine, if you can find some, that is...). The relation between cost of manufacturing and sale price is quite similar in both cases... To calibrate the topic, a pair of EA11 cost 15500 francs, EA12 25000 Francs. EA16 50000 francs. (The dealer was probably buying them for less than half that price, and a pair of EA12 was equivalent to my generous monthly salary at Hewlett-Packard..., so Alain would have to sell at least two pairs a month to barely survive!). A pair of EA12 was sold at the same price as a pair of Confluence "Pastorale" designed by another atypical engineer, musician, music lover and passionate. Alain Wacquet had some serious criteria and objectives to design his panels: linear phase, homogeneous polar response, slew rate and extended dynamic range, timbres accuracy and enough bass in such a dipole setup, maybe not as deep as a traditional box speaker, but certainly cleaner in many aspects. The AW Audio panels had very few rivals at the time with these parameters in mind.
Alain has never unveiled anything much about the crossover schematic, nor the treatment of the midrange drivers, but one can see that 8 drivers (WFR12 from Audax) were used in line, the two top ones have some treatment applied and are dedicated to the midrange, the six at the bottom are the bass drivers. A Focal tweeter takes care of the higher frequencies. It is a 2-way electrically but three way acoustically. The coherence and balance of the system are outstanding (The quality of the voices, male or female and accuracy of the timbres particularly on percussions were astonishing and Alain was a perfectionist when it came to choose the music that would put the best out of his speakers... At some hifi shows where we were both exhibiting, I would sometime abandon my own stand to delight myself in Alain's demos...). The AW Audio panels are quite easy to set up, specially compared to other types of panels, when it comes to spread and tilt as well as distance from the walls. A reasonable power amplifier is enough as the efficiency of these speakers is around 91db/1w/1m. Even a valve amplifier will be a good match, bringing out all the qualities of the panels on vocals and small musical ensembles. Listening test In a few words, the general impression left by listening to the EA12 is one of balance, with an image as wide as it is high and deep with a great sense of precision, without halo around the instruments, with no listening fatigue. The differences between live or studio recordings are well articulated as there is no fuzzyness attached, giving the impression of space between the various instruments, what can be expected of a panel speaker versus a traditional cabinet of the same quality. Percussions are very realistic, the brass are physical, and the strings are very quick, all timbres rendered with accuracy, speed and finesse, the vocals are superb, palpable... The bass is as speedy as the upper spectrum, there, with a sense of freedom, it breezes... All listeners agree that, even though the very bottom part of the spectrum is not present, the quality of the bass is second to none, not withstanding much larger box speakers. Having bought the Confluence "Pastorale" two weeks after getting the EA12, Raymond had extensive comparative listening sessions over the last two years. The EA12 excel at jazz and classical small ensembles with their imaging, finesse and precision, still providing a big sound even at low volume On the other hand, the Pastorales are more polyvalent, specially if one listens to pop, rock or soul music.. (I am tempted to disagree with Raymond on this, being a great lover of small speakers, where imaging, precision and finesse are more important than a lot of bass. In many ways, AW Audio and Microphase were very similar in their objectives and were both very accurate and quick, with a great imaging, hence why we became friends quite naturally). Each speaker brings its own character to the party and that is why so many people design speakers as it is still the realm of some "black magic", definitely an art form. Raymond goes onto stating that his "graal" for listening at home still favours high efficiency and dynamic range over other criteria, implicitly giving the preference to AW Audio. It is worth noting that the EA12 and the Pastorales are in the same price range, hence there is a valid point in comparing the two systems. Raymond concludes by saying he was very lucky to find a pair of EA12 to buy, almost 30 years after having first seduced by Alain's demos and contraptions, as most owners of AW Audio panels tend to keep them for themselves. And I would agree with that statement 100%! ![]() Roquemaure is a picturesque village on the west bank of the Rhone river, drinking distance from Chateauneuf-du-Pape, Lirac, Tavel and many more famous wineries - including my favourite Cotes-du-Rhone: Vidal-Fleury! Christophe Bedel, the enthusiastic and knowledgeable owner of related website www.hifi-vintage-audiophile.fr has just been in contact with me asking if I could promote this event on my blog. I couldn't refuse! In fact, I am trying to convince Greg Borrowman from AHM, who will be in France at that time visiting Focal and hopefully Waterfall Audio to stop by and report on the only fair of this type I know of in the South of France! This is good timing too as a number of Festivals are happening in the region over the summer period, with usually a fantastic array of live concerts to choose from - Avignon being the most famous of them, but Uzes, Carpentras, Bagnols sur Ceze, La Roque d'Antheron ( a must!), Aix en Provence, Orange and Nimes all competing for your time (and good money..) So, if you are one of 43 out of 100 Australians out of the country at any given time, or one of my readers in any of the 70 countries or so where I have an audience, and if you happen to be in Provence for the European Summer, just drop by and have a look at the fantastic collection of vintage Hifi that will be on display and for sale! I will update this post with an exact address as soon as I get it, but if your French is good enough, then visit Christphe's website: www.hifi-vintage-audiophile.fr ![]() In 1987, Alain Wacquet introduced the third and unfortunately last installment of his EA series of electrodynamic panels. He would later introduce a "Transparence" upgrade, but this product never became a proper commercial reality. I understand Alain still have a few pairs of these magic panels. If anybody is interested, let me know via our "Contact Us" page and we will put you in touch with Alain. But back to the EA 16 now! Alain sent me a copy of a review of these products in HIFI Video, June 1987 issue, and I will try to extract the useful information out of it for you in English. I will also give you access to the original text. So, it is confirmed, as I have suspected from day one, that EA 16, stands for 16 drivers, which implies that the EA 11 and EA 12 had, guess how many, 11 and 12 drivers respectively... We also get confirmation that all the drivers are in a single vertical line, and in the EA 16 at least, the midrange and tweeter are further back from the woofers. From the impedance curve, we can derive that the panel has its main resonance around 70Hz, which correlates well with the lack of rock-bottom bass. However, because of the small diameter of the drivers, the 94dB/1W/1m efficiency, and the proper time alignement, the impulse response and the dynamic range are second to none. I have found recently that the AUDAX WTF12 is the main driver. Its efficiency is 90dB/1w/1m and its free air resonance 87Hz, which confirms the above, and which shows up in the impedance curve below. Even the best electrostatic panels have difficulty to compete with the EA16s, not a mince feast. The closest I have found are actually the Magnepan panels. Alain is a jazz music guru, and these panels are certainly very well equipped to properly render the small jazz ensembles and the intimate venues that are usually associated with them. I don't think I have ever heard percussions, and primarily skins rendered with such accuracy and realism. The EA 16 compare in size with the Martin Logan CLX and the KS-10 from KingSound (out of Honk Kong) at 90cm wide by 140cm high (vs 178.6cm × 65.4cm for the ML and 196cm x 76cm for the KS) To emphasize that the balance, dynamic range and impulse response are more important to the auditive result than a perfectly flat and extended measured response, it is interesting to note that this is the case for the EA16s. A slight emphasis in the 200 to 300Hz region improves the subjective impression of enough bass, specially when teamed up with a dip in the midrange and a controlled cut-off in the treble (the curve below may not be accurate in the treble due to the large size of the panel and the positioning of the measuring microphone, however it correlates well with the listening experience...) These were expensive speakers at the time and also because of their size would sound best in a large room where you could have them well away from all walls, but then you would be rewarded by one, an extraordinary wide, stable and accurate image and two, a dynamic range and timbral accuracy second to none.
The reviewer at HIFI Video concludes: "The system has the efficiency and energy of a compression speaker, the tonal balance of the best electrodynamic system and the "finesse" of an electrostatic panel." The best of all worlds then? Maybe not, but certainly one of most rewarding listening experience in my book! see original review below. ![]() In April 89, the French magazine, La Revue du Son, published this review of the newest incarnation of the EA12 panel by AW Audio. Called the PA12.2, it was a significant improvement on the original model. What this review reveals though for the first time, is some technical information about the construction of this outstanding speaker. And I had guessed successfully some of them...(see previous posts on AW Audio) First, all the full range speakers are in line, 2 on top of the tweeter, and six underneath. The tweeter is described as an inverted dome tweeter: at that period, only Focal was using that arrangement, so we can assume Alain Wacquet was using one... The full range speakers are mentioned as being 12cm in diameter, and one can assume that these would be of Audax origin. Although not exactly a D'Appolito arrangement, it certainly have a lot in common with it in terms of imaging and transient response. The tweeter is working only over 5KHz, and may or may not been time aligned mechanicaly, but certainly in the complex filter, as one main quality of these panels is their transient response. It seems also that an external filter is used to compensate for the acoustic short circuit in the bass region, inevitable consequence of a dipole speaker. My recollection of these speakers is that the bass spectrum, although not extended very low, was still believeable and extremely clean. Alain is a jazz enthusiast, and his demos always included fantastic percussions, which always came out of these panels as extraordinarily accurate. If I can quote Patrick Vercher and Jean Hiraga in their assessment of their performance, they compare these panels to electrostatic panels, the transcription of the music being "luminous", full of micro details, very respectful of instruments timbres. Again, my own recollection of these speakers is that voices were very realistic, specially female (Sade, very popular at the time, come to mind...) and the lower medium and upper bass region being perfectly reproduced due to the absence of box coloration. On small jazz formations and live recordings, you could hear the ambience of the venue, and one could easily feel being there - what any speaker designer is trying to achieve with various degrees of success! A few years later, Alain introduced the short lived "Transparence", probably the best way to describe his creations in one word. I am hopefully meeting Alain at the Paris Hifi Show next week-end and expect to get more first hand info on these unique speakers. ![]() AW Audio - EA-12S AW Audio, started by Alain Wacquet in the northern tip of France in 1983, had a range of extra-ordinary speakers which evolved and grew until 1995. Alain and I struck a friendship over many joint exhibitions, not least because I was very impressed by his products and his extremely well run demos. Alain is first and foremost a music lover and a musician himself, involved in Electronica and all sorts of up to the minute electro-acoustic experiments. As a speaker designer, he is a pure autodidact and, as such, his designs are certainly coming from left field, and outside the square. Over the last few months, I managed to track him down and convince him to tell his story on this website. Here is the first instalment: The EA-12 panel speaker I first heard this product at a small show organised by a famous (although eccentric...) dealer in Lille, not far away from Alain's patch. Being a small show, there were lots of free time to go and listen to each other's contraptions and have a chance of a proper listen. Alain was always very secretive about what was IN the speakers and I have been guessing ever since... One trail I pursued as he conjugated his range into EA-11 and EA-16 later, was that 12, 11 and 16 represented the number of drivers in the panel. One could imagine that EA-12 was equipped with two midrange drivers and a tweeter in a D'Appolito arrangement and another 9 speakers were handling the bass. I have actually started designing such a panel, but have not built it just yet... Then I thought the EA-11 would drop one of the midrange driver to make it more affordable, then the EA-16 would go back to a more complex D'Appollito and more bass drivers: That would have been far too obvious in Alain's mind... Alain has since sent me a copy of the reviews published on the EA-12 in 1985 and then the EA-11 in 1986, both in the now defunct magazine HiFi Stereo and I just found out researching this article a defunct reviewer as well (for those of you reading French, here is a link http://www.homecinema-fr.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=173595141). Ghislain Prugnard was a good journalist and his reviews quite thorough and fair. We are very sorry to hear of his passing away (over a year ago in March 2010). Back to the EA-!2, as you can see on the photo, this is a large panel measuring 1560x540x70mm, with a faceted front baffle. It is very thin at 70mm, just enough to support the small drivers all in line in the centre of the panel - I believe 5", 12cm drivers and my guess, from Audax who were the manufacturer of choice for us young designers at the time. The tweeter would have been a Scandinavian 25mm fabric dome, but again this is a guess (Maybe Alain will finally unveiled more details on his designs over time...). One thing we know is that it is essentially a two-way design with a crossover at 5kHz These speakers have the most beautiful image I have heard until the later release of the Martin Logan. They also have an extremely good transient response and timbre accuracy, all coming from using the same drivers from bass to midrange and small light membranes - my guess again here in paper, as kevlar was still to come to prominence... They were not trying to go very low (my guess is that they would roll off gently with a 6dB/octave slope from 100 Hz), but to get the most accurate rendition of the different instruments and their location in space. Obviously, they would work better with the simplest (and best...) recordings, and were particularly brilliant at reproducing percussions (Alain has a passion for jazz...) and could withstand quite a wide dynamic range as they were very efficient at about 90dB/1w/1m. They were also beautifully finished, should I say handcrafted to the highest standard. Alain does not have a pair anymore, and this is the only missing piece in his collection. If you own a pair and wish to sell them, get in touch via our contact page, and we will work out a very interesting deal for you - it is such a good deal I wish I own a pair... Anyway, stay tuned, as we will soon talk about the EA-11, EA-16 and more |
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