A fascinating Vienna debutante
By Roy Gregory
Every major show throws up a surprise or two, often in the shape of familiar technology reimagined. That’s exactly the case with Polish manufacturer Lirogon Instruments, who have produced an interesting and innovative electrostatic loudspeaker.
The Origin is a medium sized, slightly squat panel, with proportions that are more like a larger Quad ESL 63 than the taller, thinner Acoustat or Martin-Logan hybrid models. 131cm/51.5” tall by 80cm/31.5” wide, it delivers a claimed 35Hz-23kHz bandwidth and weighs a substantial 75kg/165lbs. There’s no quoted figure for sensitivity or indication of load characteristics. It is built into a substantial aluminium frame supported by a conventional rear foot that carries the input socketry, electronics for the electrostatic panels and a large adjuster for rake angle. But what makes the Lirogon speaker so interesting is that it’s a multi-driver but crossover-less design, with high-frequency and midrange panels teamed with five separate bass panels. All of the panels share the same membrane material but each panel is mechanically tuned to control its acoustic contribution, eliminating the need for additional, lossy electrical components in the signal path. In effect, the seven panels create a single, matrix driver with a mechanically combined output. The mechanical tuning extends to what the company call ZUKA Sound Correction, user adjustments that further tune the speaker’s output to taste, system and situation.
Panel speakers seem to be on the rise, with the likes of Clarisys and Diptyque already challenging the dominance of established box speaker designs. The proof will be in the listening but Lirogon are certainly aiming to join that trend.
The Origin speaker is priced at €120,000 and you can hear them in Room -2.77 at the main Austria Centre exhibition site.
www.lirogon.com
