Loudspeakers

Perlisten is nothing if not an enigma – a new brand yet one betraying the extraordinary deep and secure foundation in loudspeaker design expected of a decades-old company. During an appropriately extended Zoom call, CEO and co-founder, Dan Roemer, got to the heart of the brand's thinking and direction.

'In most loudspeakers, the polar response is typically a by-product of the crossover design. For us the speaker's polar performance and predictable in-room behaviour is key, and so the crossover design is directed by these requirements, not the other way around. Matching notional filter responses to the specific bandwidths of individual drivers rarely guarantees any particular polar response.'

Dan elaborates on Perlisten's design goals. 'We first establish the desired family of curves to deliver the sensitivity, bandwidth, power response, on- and off-axis directivity, etc, that we want – we've spent many years creating and establishing these targets. Next, we design the drivers from the ground up, and set the waveguide and physical layout to meet these polar response targets. Only then is the crossover optimised to meet the family of target curves we established at the outset.'

Almost inevitably this results in some overlap in driver bandwidth and a more complex crossover topology to boot. 'Yes', admits Dan, 'but this gains us a more predictable and consistent in-room response, applicable across a range of "timbre-matched" loudspeakers. Different models are derived by adjustments in sensitivity and bandwidth.' PM