Renkus Heinz SR82 (Updated August 2010)

Renkus Heinz is Justifiably famous for their horns. Generally, the design of their wave guides yields a satisfying, smooth crisp high end without peakishness or beamy-ness. I use the SR82 for tracking monitors in conjunction with a sub crossed over at 125hz. They communicate dynamic range in a way that only horn can. I used them for PA once in a pinch and they sounded beautiful. They can put out enough to handle a little club - even a loud little club with ease - with a sub. The big surprise if how they sound for everyday stereo listening. Simply amazing. For hours at a time they are a little tough. These can be had for 700 dollars each - maybe less - (I bought mine used). I had one service question and their shop did a great job. As I was shopping for these the engineers at Renkus were happy to chat with me on the phone regarding the esoterica of horn design, and their competitive situation. These were designed after the EAW JF60 - also a brilliant speaker - I owned some of these and I wish I hadn't sold them. They sound as good as the JF, and for my money have a smoother low end.

Musicians and FOH engineers universally respect Renkus - I've never heard a bad word about the company or products - and my personal experience is you can't beat these for small (They are two 8's and a horn, adjustable! You can rotate the 60x90 horn to accommodate the placement and orientation of the speaker) full range speakers. They roll off at 60 hz (or maybe the f3 is 60 hz?, I can't remember) but if you are looking for full range they don't go low enough to cover below 70 hz. Above that they are quite flat. I measured them with several spectrum analyzers and the performance was impressive. However, frequency response is only a small part of the story. The realism of the horns is remarkable. I can hear the spit in Paul Desmond's sax in every "Take 5" track. Transient response is the basic reason and horns can do that better than any other type of speaker because of the impedance matching with the air which can be achieved by a well designed driver/throat/lens combination.

Horns have a nasty reputation as being tinny, or screechy, or honky, or whatever. This is history. A well-engineered horn has what it takes to sound more realistic than a tweeter.

Another advantage of horns for Hi fi is that the dispersion is very controllable. Control of dispersion is good because frequency response has more to do with room than the speaker unless you live in an anechoic chamber. Basically most of what you hear is reflected sound and no surface reflects "flat" - thus what you hear is a product of the character of the reflecting surfaces in your room. Normal tweeters disperse fairly wide (120 degree) to get room coverage in a lot of situations. Horns can be tuned to send sound to a place - particularly not to the walls - so you get more of what was intended by the engineer if you are inside the dispersion pattern of the horn.. and less reflections. The other big advantage of horn drivers is that they are powerful - and contrary to bar-room audio talk, high frequencies take a lot more power to reproduce, relative to wavelength, than low. This is because air resistance goes up as the square of speed - and high frequencies require that the diaphragm/coil move faster. Horn-reproduced high end can really hurt you - just like you would be hurt if you were standing next to the sound they are reproducing. My ears rang after my listening tests with the Renkus sr82 - even though my listening volumes were 95 db (loud - but not dangerous for a few minutes). I eventually realized that the transients from those horns were doing it and turned down.

Note: After two years of owning them: They are still holding up as advertised. The only issue I run into is that that are so inefficient. This is just the design spec – but basically its difficult to use them as tracking monitors if the power amp is in the room. Its hard to find a power amp big enough to drive them (they really need at least 600 per channel) that does not have a fan. They are available – but be prepared to pay. Also, the other day I was spectrum testing some other monitors – and for the heck of it re-tested the sr82’s – they were flat as hell. They are way flatter than my mixing monitors. They were within +- 2 db from 100 to 18,000 – in the room. Anyway, lovely and amazing. I’ve bought a bunch of other renkus stuff since the sr82’s (small format stuff) and its all sounded great.