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Norh 4.0

 

Many mini speakers use a single "full-range" driver. This is much less expensive because you don't need a crossover and it is easy to make a case with a single hole. The most popular size woofer is 3 inches. This is the same size as you are likely to find in many small radios or TVs. Because the bass rolls off quickly, a bass unit is required.

On testing, we found how a very expensive mini system can perform. The system cost about $1,400. It has a ragged response from 1 khz up. It drops off quickly before the subwoofer kicks in. It has no high frequency performance above 13,000 Hz.

A true subwoofer would produce frequency only below 100 Hz. Most subwoofers would also produce bass down below 30 Hz. The units shipped with most mini speakers produce from 50 Hz to 200 Hz.

Most mini speakers are made using very low-cost components and plastic cases. I contacted the company that makes the plastic case for most of these speaker companies. They are located in Taiwan. You can have plastic cases made for these speakers for less than $2.00. The drivers cost about $1.50. That means the total production cost (excluding labor) might be about $20 for five speakers!!!

We started looking at the Vifa TC 3 inch woofer. This is not a full range woofer so we were looking at adding a crossover. No matter what we did, the unit sounded thin. There simply was no bass. We moved up to a four inch woofer. This woofer would have been ideal as the cabinet only needed to be 1 liter. Unfortunately, this woofer also sounded thin as we couldn't get it to go lower than about 125 Hz.

We tried a five inch woofer (the same size used in most mini speaker bass units). The five inch woofer was exactly the sound we wanted. It was simply fantastic. There were two problems. First, the five inch woofer was more expensive. Secondly, we needed a larger cabinet. The woofer wanted a 13 liter cabinet. With careful tuning we were able to get the woofer to work well in a 6 liter cabinet. We then got the bad news that it would take an 11 inch log to build a 6 liter cabinet.

We were not going to be able to save much money in either materials or labor. Originally, I wanted to cheapen the cosmetics up (as long as it didn't impact the sound). I wanted to paint the speakers instead of hand finishing them. I wanted to use a standard plastic grill instead of custom making our own.

As the project progressed, we continued to add cost to our product. Originally, we had decided on a tweeter that is quite popular. It is the same tweeter used in the Rogers LS/1A. Our engineers preferred a different tweeter that was more expensive. They wanted to buy this tweeter because it produced very little magnetic flux and we could make a shielded version. After seeing this tweeter, we decided we could redesign the system and mount the tweeter on top the speaker. Printout of nOrh 4.0 response above 200 Hz is shown here. Note that the response is very linear.

Our cabinet maker had to design a wood device that would look attractive and hold the tweeter. We had decided that we could time align the speaker and eliminate any problems from the baffle by mounting the speaker on top of the cabinet. Of course, all of this added to our costs. Finally, we built some prototypes and we started testing them. Allan Issakson designed two crossovers. One was a simple and inexpensive crossover that would give us performance that was impressive for a loudspeaker in the price we were targeting. The second printout was exceptional. It was virtually ruler flat from 100 Hz to 20,000 Hz. The speaker gradually rolled off at 75 Hz. The problem, the crossover would be expensive. There was only one way we could get our prices down. We had to buy in bulk. We had to order lots of everything. That is what we had done. We ordered enough components to build 1000 nOrh 4.0s. We were confident that this loudspeaker will be a big hit. We were right.

The nOrh 4.0 does not require a subwoofer for many applications. While it doesn't deliver deep bass, its performance characteristics compare with mini-monitors selling for $700 to $1200 per pair. A subwoofer will add impact and will make the entire system sound richer. For applications where deeper bass is desired, the nOrh 5.1 will provide bass down to 45 Hz -3 dB.

Celedon

We have recently introduced a celedon glazed loudspeaker. Celedon originated during the period of the Five Dynasties (907-960) in China. It features jade like glaze. The original Chinese word for Celedon is qinqci, which means "greenish porcelain". In Japan, Celedon porcelain is known as "Seiji-ware". By 1200, the Koreans had developed their own celedon, Goryeo celedon. The French gave the porcelain the name Celedon because its color compared to a character in a popular book of fiction and the color of a green suit at the time.

Celadon has a long history in Thailand. It was first produced in the city of Sisatchainalai as early as the 10th century AD. The ancient city of Sukhothai also became famous for its beautiful Celadon wares, which have recently been recovered from excavated shipwrecks of Chinese vessels dating to the 15th and 16th centuries.

nOrh Loudspeakers now merges this ancient art with technology to produce the Celedon nOrh 4.0. The Celedon nOrh 4.0 is designed not only to be a great sounding loudspeaker. It is a loudspeaker that is designed to last for years (perhaps centuries) and one that is designed to be a beautiful piece of art. The Celedon nOrh 4.0 is slightly more expensive to produce, however, we hava managed to keep the price at $450.00 per pair.

The photos don't do justice to the Celedon 4.0. You can almost see the crackling pattern in the photos.

 

Celedon 4.0 (Enlarge)

All American Ceramic 4.0 (Enlarge)

All American

Three years ago, we did a wood version of the 4.0s that we called the All American. We posted photos of it on the website. When we started doing ceramic, we asked if they could do a ceramic version of the same design. Initially we tried painting over white ceramic. The problem is that if we used a ceramic glaze, we have to do additional firings. I wanted to do a ceramic version of the All American because I wanted to have a loudspeaker with colors that would not fade.

The All American 4.0 was designed by a Thai. I didn't ask him to design the speaker. He brought it to me and asked me if I liked it. I liked it but I could not understand why a non-American would artistically render an American flag. I asked him why he did this. He told me that he did it because the American flag represented his own personal dreams.

I was quite touched by this. I think it is a message that many Americans don't hear often enough. When we read or watch the news, we are often left with the impression that Americans are not liked anywhere and that much of the world is anti-American. Being a world traveler, I have found this not to generally be the case. I believe that most of the people in the world admire America. Many of the world's people would like to be an American. To me, being an American has more to do with what you believe than where you happen to be.

I would like to invite you to buy a loudspeaker designed and built in Thailand by Thais who are inspired by the American dream. The speaker costs $450 per pair.

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