MSRP   US$3950.00 pair
*All prices F.O.B. our plant Watertown, NY. All shipping, duties, taxes or any other Landed Costs are not reflected.

VR-4 Generation 2

    Von Schweikert Research’s flagship loudspeaker, the VR-4, winner of 1997’s CES Design and Engineering Showcase Award, became a landmark product almost over night. A benchmark in deep bass response, the VR-4 also set records for breathtaking transparency and imaging. Sweden’s HiFi & Musik magazine recently lauded the VR-4’s as "The Best We’ve Heard!"

    So why tamper with a speaker this good?

    Engineering advances made for the new VR-6 and VR-8 models earned "Best Sound Of The Show" at Stereophile’s Hi-Fi ’97 Show behind the $75,000 Wilson X-1’s. In developing new technology for the VR-6/8 speakers, we concentrated on a number of commonly overlooked problems and their effect on what we’ve dubbed the Masking Threshold. Ultimate clarity and transparency are highly dependent on low level detail. However, this detail is typically "masked" by the cumulative effect of crossover component dissipation, lossy cabinet interaction, and driver non-linearity. Each isolated problem is not necessarily severe, but the sum total of these effects destroys realism. By eliminating these problems we’re able to greatly enhance transparency, dynamic range, and image focus. Coupling our Masking Threshold technology with numerous model-specific advancements, we’ve been able to develop an upgrade worthy of succeeding the classic VR-4.

Generation II improvements include:

Enclosure Design. Each enclosure has been further optimized in shape and proportion to improve both internal and external air flow--minimizing or eliminating unwanted reflections, diffraction, and internal standing waves. Five different sound control materials are employed in the midrange/treble (MT) enclosures alone, meticulously selected and arranged based on their individual acoustic properties. Though the midrange cavity is actually larger with thicker walls, the external dimensions of the MT cabinet are much smaller. The reduced externals allow for significantly broader dispersion.

Cabinet Construction. While the Gen. II occupies 24% less volume than its predecessor, it’s mass has remarkably increased! Wall thickness has been increased by 33%, and the cabinets sport 150% more internal bracing. The braces are carefully placed to avoid mutual panel resonances. The sturdier construction plays a hand in more efficient bass, improved transients, improved imaging, and substantially lower overall distortion!

Rear Ambiance. A Ferrofluid damped aluminum driver is now employed for rear ambiance--matching the front tweeter and offering superior clarity to the original driver. Additionally, an advanced circuit better integrates the rear signal with the main signal for a seamless power response.

Crossover Circuit. Exhaustive circuit optimization involved computer-aided testing as well as extended listening tests and A-B comparisons in a variety of environments and with a variety of front-end equipment. The new VR-4 saw more iterations and fine-tuning than perhaps any other model! The result is an exceptionally smooth and neutral frequency response, superb driver integration, and improved impedance characteristics. Unique, electrically damped shunt conjugate circuits improve signal transients. The midrange and tweeter circuits are now physically isolated from each other, reducing the risk of component "bleed-through". The same high-quality electronics are employed (low-loss polypropylene capacitors and custom heavy-duty inductors) as in the original VR-4.

Bass Alignment. A modified Theile/Small vent alignment utilizes carefully damped internal airflow and flared ports. Wind noise generated from turbulence has been eliminated, while transients have been improved. Despite the reduced size, the output in the lowest octave (20Hz to 40Hz) is identical to that of the original VR-4. However, the entire bass range has faster transient response, with improved pitch differentiation and "tightness" compared to the original model. When placement is optimized for bass response, we’ve repeatedly measured a 13 Hz -3dB point! In most environments you can expect useable output down to 20Hz, +/- 5Hz.

...And The Look! All of these upgrades are packed into a loudspeaker 24% smaller than the original VR-4! More importantly, the sleeker proportions and angled rear of the VR-4 II give the impression of a 40% smaller cabinet!

    The VR-4 II is a two-piece per channel stacking speaker system with full range response (20-25kHz), wide dynamic range, and life-like imaging. Although many speaker designs on the market are quite good in many respects, the VR-4 was acknowledged by many reviewers the world over to be the first design to fully balance all of the design parameters necessary to achieve realism. The VR-4 has been favorably compared to $15,000 systems by two magazines....

    Five carefully matched drivers are utilized per side to reproduce the full frequency spectrum. However, choice of crossover frequencies, physical time-alignment, and finical electrical integration render the individuality of the drivers inaudible. The VR-4 II uses a full range (57Hz to 11kHz raw) woven carbon fiber driver to reproduce a very wide frequency range, such that only the extreme low and high frequencies need be augmented.

    Two high-speed, custom-built 8" woofers are used to reproduce frequencies below 150Hz. These woofers have laminated cones of fiberglass resin and polypropylene, and are extremely rigid for their weight. The woofers are loaded into a modified reflex enclosure with aperiodic damping similar to transmission line loading, and offer extremely powerful and fast low-end response. The separate woofer enclosures are 100% stuffed with our Gradient Density packing, eliminating cavity resonance and "boom". Tuning and pressure release is managed by low-noise flared ducts with absorptive linings, which dampen the vent system and further improve bass transients. Imagine upgrading from a bass response so powerful and accurate as to be equated to a servo-controlled system! (See HiFi & Musik magazine’s review of the original VR-4.)

    The upper "MT" module is docked on synthetic feet, minimizing the possibility of resonance transmission, which could mar the all-important midland. The midrange and tweeter’s minimum baffle design contributes to the wide dispersion and is one of several methods employed to eliminate the sonic cues that signal the presence of the cabinet itself. The VR-4 II adds rounded baffles, thereby purging any frequency response irregularities created from abrupt cabinet edges. The custom-built midrange features a diaphragm of woven carbon fiber (which exhibits the highest Young’s Modulus, or rigidity-to-weight ratio) to ensure the highest degree of clarity possible. To fill out the treble response we employ a Ferrofluid-cooled, rubber-clamped aluminum dome tweeter. The tweeter’s atypically low natural resonance frequency and our rather high MT crossover frequency yield a treble response free from the harshness associated with tweeters operating near their natural resonance.

    To create a life-like sonic image, we have developed the Acoustic Inverse Replication™ dispersion characteristic, which simulates a microphone pickup pattern in reverse. After all, it is the microphone’s response that encodes the musical event. To decode the recorded signal, we generate a quasi-omnidirectional response, employing a rear-firing driver and our unique Global Axis Integration Network ™ crossover system.

    In all respects, VR-4 Gen. II may be regarded as a reference grade speaker system!

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