German Physiks' Loreley Mk II does 360-degree sound

Speakers capable of 360-degree sound projection seem to be all the rage these days, with German Physiks the latest to get in on the omni-directional action. The Loreley Mk IIs go in for the whole alien style look too, with several extremely funky drivers arranged in a vertical formation. Backing up the drivers are 10" passive radiators and two 12" inverted dome subwoofers kicking out the lower frequency sounds. Audiophiles will likely jump all over these high end speakers: the rest of us will just balk at the $165,995 price tag, going up to $200,000 if you want a carbon finish. Cheapskates can look, but not listen.

[humpty @ Sep 16th 2007 12:26AM]

Useless.. bass frequencies are omni-directional to begin with.

[james Prumm @ Sep 16th 2007 1:35AM]

wow your dense! can you not see the key feature of these speakers is the high frequency drivers in an interesting arrangement that is designed fill the 360° range? have you never herd of speakers having flat spots? the idea is to eliminate the flat spot! the bass design is not the point of buying these speakers! thats not to say it won't be an awesome bass experience anyway..... point is you are a dickhead and think next time you speak

[nih @ Sep 16th 2007 2:54AM]

That was a very calm response. Have you looked into therapy?

[Andrew @ Sep 16th 2007 12:47AM]

I hope that I am not the only person that finds it ironic that the design is a corner unit.

[Primax @ Sep 16th 2007 1:00AM]

haha good point Andrew

[Zander @ Sep 16th 2007 1:14AM]

I wish those money amounts were in yen so it would only cost $1440.00-$1740.00.

[Paris @ Sep 16th 2007 6:53AM]

And I wish they were in Ugandan shillings so that it would cost US$115

[R. C. @ Sep 16th 2007 3:20PM]

I wish it wqas in old turkish lira so it would cost 13 cents.

[Carbonize @ Sep 16th 2007 1:42AM]

I'd say these are not 360 but possibly 280 or less because it looks to me that the bas speakers would block some of the sound from the vertical speakers from being heard behind the speaker.

[slimfox @ Sep 16th 2007 1:55AM]

well from my experience, the MK series always sounds great, listening to it is like being live in a concert but as always the price is so high you could buy a villa in some countries.

[paccoast2010 @ Sep 16th 2007 3:05AM]

How did you get to hear them, then? Have a very, very rich friend?

[slimfox @ Sep 16th 2007 3:58AM]

you don need a rich friend to have a listen at them. All you need is to go to those audiophile trade shows and have a good listen to bout any audiophile equipment you want

[WhyFi @ Sep 16th 2007 8:26AM]

"Mk" in audio is shorthand for "Mark." So "MkII" indicates a revision to the previous (original) design just as MkIII indicates a third iteration. "Mk" is not a series in and of itself.

[BigMike @ Sep 16th 2007 2:08AM]

You think the point of it being 360 sound mean you only need this one device or mutiple towers specially placed?????? and if so with you have to deal with the same as when hdtvs cameout and have to pay some one 2000 dollars to be sure its been "centered" corectly.

[nih @ Sep 16th 2007 2:56AM]

Maybe they'll release track mixes with one instrument per channel. Then you could buy half a dozen of them and have a whole band.

Fuck that. It would be cheaper to buy the band.

[nih @ Sep 16th 2007 2:55AM]

Would it honestly be that hard to copy their design and build your own? Make some new, acute-angled cones to attach to existing drivers and stack'em.

[nih @ Sep 16th 2007 2:59AM]

Also, in case anyone didn't notice, those subs are 12" cones. Those speakers are enormous and according to the article, weigh 900+ pounds.

[chengdude @ Sep 16th 2007 5:48AM]

I don't know if I'm willing to accept all the science and engineering behind these speakers considering they can't spell "physics".

[hello kitty @ Sep 16th 2007 6:11AM]

Well, in germany we use more advanced physics called physik. See?

[JonesH @ Sep 16th 2007 7:46AM]

Well, I have a hard time understanding why suddenly omnidirectional speakers are all so hot again? They were all the rage during the 70's, along with 4ch stereo, but since they give a rather diffuse sense of direction, sound stage and a very muddled stereo image they died soon enough. So why is it so revolutionary this time? It still renders a bad stereo image, but sure enough covers wide areas. The comb-filtering and phase-cancellation comes for free :)

[Zach @ Sep 16th 2007 10:21AM]

It looks cool, but it's not even close to economical.

[Darkest Daze @ Sep 16th 2007 12:58PM]

Even if it was economical, is it really feasible to have a 925lbs speaker in your house. Not even worrying about the floors holding it, how would you carry it in?

[Sauerkraut @ Sep 16th 2007 1:48PM]

for that money you can get a better speaker system i'm sure, a whole movie theater

do they expect to get 1 sale? i guess if they get 1 sale it's still 200k lol

[Chir @ Sep 16th 2007 10:15PM]

What they fail to explain is why 360deg sound is desirable in the first place. Speakers are meant to be used in stereo and surround arrangements, and directionality is very important for creating a soundstage. For surround sound effects there are dipolar and bipolar speakers which probably creates a better sense of diffusion than these. So what is the purpose of one of these things anyway?

But then again, these speakers are named Loreley. So I guess they are meant to lure in unsuspecting audiophiles with their Siren's song and take all their money, leaving them shipwrecked in the land of bankruptcy.

[Paul @ Sep 16th 2007 11:02PM]

there's a sucker born every minute.

[fuma @ Sep 17th 2007 4:31AM]

free way of 360 degree sound...

1. place speaker facing up in middle of room
2. play music.
3. run around it like a choad!

[Churrasco9 @ Sep 17th 2007 11:51AM]

First off, the speakers use DDD driver, which hae been around for a while, read here:
http://www.german-physiks.com/ddd-bendingwave-converter/ddd-driver.html

The point isnt to get "360-degree surroundamasound" out of them, but to get a cleaner sound overall. "Normal" speakers with front-mounted cone drivers also have a 180 degree dispersion, but once you deviate even a few degrees off the front vertical axis, you get distortion, volume drop offs, etc. That's why in most audiophile speakers (or even crappy speakers....and ESPECIALLY in electrostats) you have to toe-in the speakers so the drivers are firing at you in a direct line, 0 degrees off axis to get the best sound. The point of these types of speakers is that you now have a perfect response 360 degrees (or 180 in some of them) off the front axis, and there is no distorted sound bouncing around the room and reaching your ears. All you get is perfect reproduction, no matter where you sit in the room. Think horn tweeters, only better. And dont even THINK about telling me about Bose acoustimass systems and how they're fantastic for listening to music with their direc/reflecting technology...because you're just wrong. and as far as the omni-drectional attempts back in the 70's, that's totally true. But speakers now are VERY different creatures than they were back in the day. No, I dont work for these guys, and no, I have no intention of ever being able to afford them. But it's just like anything else, they're built for balls-out performance and if you dont have the scrilla then you should go back to listening to your ipod. I'm just tired of uninformed people making fun of things because they're out of their price range. I'm sure your $10 digital casio watch keeps better time than a rolex, but c'mon...it's a freakin rolex.