Phantom Gold measurements: a stunning web first!

[ogs]

I too am interested to see if Phantoms are time aligned.  Different people have different sensitivities to time alignment so for some, it is important.

On line at Stereophile today is a review of the Dynaudio 200 XD. They have done it right re.: time alignment in DSP between the two drivers. If Phantom Golds have this kind of time response I'll be very happy
Also worth noting is that Dynaudio is using the amplifier technology used in Tact and Lyngdorf amps, originally Toccata, but now from TI.

I'm sorry, but human hearing is one subject that is not witchcraft, but it is a science that has been extensively studied in acoustics. There are many good authoritative textbooks, starting with the legendary book by the great German physicist Helmholtz. One the world's greatest acoustics experts is sound engineer Dr. Floyd Toole (employed at Harman International). Here is what he had to say about phase/time alignment: 

"It turns out that, within very generous tolerances, humans are insensitive to phase shifts. Under carefully contrived circumstances, special signals auditioned in anechoic conditions, or through headphones, people have heard slight differences. However, even these limited results have failed to provide clear evidence of a 'preference' for a lack of phase shift. When auditioned in real rooms, these differences disappear..". 

Whether the Phantom's are time aligned or not has little bearing on their perceived sound quality. A quick read through Stereophile would let you know most if not all class A loudspeakers are not time aligned. While my Quads are time aligned, even Peter Walker, their late designer admitted that it was not a critical aspect of their sound quality. The phase true nature is more or less an accident of their design. Similar planars, like the Magenplanar 3.6r, are not phase true. Thiel speakers are phase true, and so are Vandersteens. But this requires using first-order crossovers, which are very gentle. Many top loudspeaker designers will tell you that the game is not worth the candle. Forcing first order crossovers requires using drivers that can handle a lot of bandwidth outside their normal range, which can lead to problems. So, there's no magic bullet that makes time aligned speakers easier to design, or inherently better to the ear. I wish human hearing were that simple. It's an extraordinarily complex system with many quirks due to evolution (our ears were designed to listen to predators in the jungle and run away from them, not listen to high end audio!). 

I agree with MountanGuy here:  "Different people have different sensitivities to time alignment so for some, it is important"
I do not care much for statistics in this regard. I prefer time aligned speakers. If I took part in a listening session and identified  time aligned playback correct every time, but nine others did not, the result would be negative because of not being "statistically significant". I'd still be right, but a published result of the analysis would show something else.
And no, when using DSP for filter creation, first order filtering is no longer a necessity. Amplitude, phase and time can be manipulated independent of each other.