Legacy Audio Whisper HD Exotic Curly Maple

NOTE: PLEASE DONT BID IF YOUR FROM OUTSIDE THE USA I WILL NOT SHIP outside the the USA. Also DONT bid if you don't plan to pay and finalize the purchase. Thank You. !!

One look at the Legacy Audio Whisper with its grille off and it's easy to see that Legacy's Bill Dudleston is one of the more seriously experimental designers of loudspeakers. Thankfully, his philosophy is based in well-grounded scientific research and the goal of truly high-fidelity sound, rather than the use of novel methods for their own sake or repackaging good old-fashioned snake oil.

I had a chance to hear the Whispers at Legacy. I'd seen them at shows, and was intrigued by the design—all those drivers!—seemed to go against the conventional wisdom of "simpler is better." What I heard in Legacy's listening room shattered my preconceptions about complexity per se being an impediment to impressive sound.
I contacted Legacy's Bob Howard and 2 weeks later 2 large boxes and a small box containing the Step One bass processor arrived. I have added pictures of me unveiling the speaker from there shipping boxes. (I do have the boxes so I can ship as long as buyer picks up the cost of shipping. But rather have a local pick up).

A legacy of innovation
Bill Dudleston had five design criteria for the Whisper: 1) Minimize the room "noise" (early reflections) that normally masks ambient information and spatial cues, while maximizing channel separation; 2) Minimize the excitation of low-frequency room resonances, which blur transient detail and color the sound; 3) Provide the proper ratio of radiating surface to frequency, to control dispersion and minimize THD; 4) Provide broad dynamic range and high efficiency; and 5) Create a sweet spot large enough for multiple listeners. Everything that is different about the Whisper is geared toward the realization of those ends, and Dudleston's goal of "creat[ing] the most undistorted mirror of the microphone to date." Before sitting down at the computer to design the Whisper, he gathered data from 75 different listening rooms over a four-year period in order to arrive at the optimum dispersion pattern that would minimize room interaction and maximize the sweet spot.
Stripped of its front and rear grilles, the Whisper can be seen to comprise, like Caesar's Gaul, three distinct parts: top and bottom pairs of woofers, and the center section, which houses the mid-woofers and tweeters. The main portion of the speaker consists of two baffles, mounted 2¼" apart. The rear baffle holds the second set of open-air woofers, which are mounted back-to-front; the front baffle holds the front woofers, four mid-woofers, and two tweeters.
As noted, the Whisper doesn't look like most other top-echelon speakers. When the Whisper's grilles are off, the visual effect of all of Dudleston's computer-modeled dispersion control is somewhat that of a Mighty Wurlitzer, though I found it cool and retro. If there's such a thing as Edwardian high-tech, that's the Whisper's style. Conscientious objectors can leave the grilles on with no great sonic penalty.

To minimize room interactions, the Whisper's design was focused on projecting a highly controlled and predictable radiation pattern—the speaker is designed to have no more than 90° of horizontal dispersion at any frequency within its passband. Legacy describes the speaker as an "acoustic gun." This goal is no easy thing to accomplish with low frequencies. A large woofer in a box—any woofer in a box—will behave as an omnidirectional radiator. Dudleston therefore eliminated the woofer box entirely. The two pairs of closely-spaced back-to-front, in-phase 15" woofers behave like the twin diaphragms of some directional microphones; the result is a tight figure-8 directivity pattern with a null at the speaker's sides. (That there's a truly massive null at the speaker's sides can be confirmed easily by ear.)

The Step One bass processor, installed between preamp and power amp(s), serves to adjust the Q and level of the woofers to let them couple effectively with the room without compromising their controlled dispersion. The Whisper also has a 12" passive radiator on the back of the central section, said to absorb excess bass energy bounced off the wall behind the speakers.
The four midrange units, according to Dudleston, "appear" to the ear as a single 14" oval driver, which will be more directional than each on its own. Each is mounted in its own subchamber, which is stuffed with polyester fiberfill to absorb backwave energy. The dome tweeter and ribbon supertweeter are placed at the center of the oval in a waveguide of variable-density foam. The ribbon tweeter is rotated 90° to provide controlled horizontal and wide vertical dispersion.

The Whisper can be biwired or biamped via its two pairs of gold-plated binding posts, and all internal wiring is Legacy's own OFC copper. Fit'n'finish were excellent, and the lovely ribbon-mahogany premium finish had the kind of tiger-stripe effect one sees on the maple tops of fine old Gibson Les Paul Standards. I would like to see the binding posts mounted to an external metal plate, however; one post moved a bit when I cinched down my speaker cables.

The Whisper's relative lack of room interactivity (about which much more later) allows for a great deal of flexibility in setup and positioning. They can be pushed much farther back into corners than more conventional designs, and their bass output can be tailored with the Step One. However, like most speakers, especially large ones, the Whisper will perform best when given some room to breathe. In my room, the speakers initially settled at a spot 54" out from the front wall, quite close to the sidewalls, and toed in at a very acute angle, the tweeter axes crossing well in front of me. The extreme toe-in is recommended by Legacy to maximize the effects of the speaker's tightly controlled dispersion pattern and to minimize the effects of the room. The result was a sweet spot surprisingly large in lateral dimension with no sacrifice of center fill.

A legacy of power and subtlety
Despite its size and considerable weight, the Whisper's sound was not at first a typical "statement"-speaker sound, principally because of its bass. As the drivers are mounted in an open-air configuration, there are no box colorations to overcome. The amount of bass is left to the tender mercies of the owner, and the Step One must be adjusted with care. It was easy to make the sound too lean, and even easier to crank the processor up too far, for a sodden, muddy sound. It was easy to get the Whisper to sound good, but I found that patience and an attentive and musically attuned ear were necessary to attain the speaker's considerable best.

One could reasonably expect that four 15" woofers per side will move a lot of air, and the Whisper's are capable of doing so. But the system's design produces a very different sort of bass. When dialed in correctly, which in my room meant setting the Step One's single control somewhere between 12:00 and 1:30, depending on the type of music—a bit higher for big rock, lower for acoustic music—the Whisper produced bass that had the sheer speed and taut definition that characterize the best panel speakers. (I've had plenty of time to assess the nature of planar bass:

The superb transient response, plus the enormous amount of piston area the woofers present, added up to distinguished low-bass performance with apparent usable in-room response into the low end of the 20–30Hz range. The Whisper managed to uniquely and satisfyingly combine the best facets of planar and dynamic drivers. There was no overhang, sloppiness, or smearing whatsoever when the Whispers were properly placed and the Step One was adjusted with care. The Legacy's low bass was more of a wave rolling into the room very musically satisfying.
Playing "Deeper Well," from Emmylou Harris' Spyboy (CD, Eminent 25001-2), at a convincing level showed the Whisper's abilities down low. Daryl Johnson's rumbling bass pedals and five-string bass guitar had impressive physical presence. On Stanley Clarke's "I'm Home Africa," from East River Drive (CD, Epic EK 47489), the kick drum and James Earl's wall-rattling five-string bass, which I've heard smear into each other through some speakers, remained wholly distinct and clearly separate in space at all times. The punch and polyrhythmic drive of "Lady," from Hugh Masekela's Hope (CD, Triloka 85215-2), was a delight, with nary a detail of the complexity obscured
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The Whisper's midrange presentation consistently struck me as one of the most even and balanced I've heard. It presented voices with a genuine humanness stripped of any hint of electromechanical character. k.d. lang's impossibly gorgeous voice on "Constant Craving," from Ingènue (German LP, Sire 26840-1), has always raised the hair on the back of my neck—you can't learn how to sing like that, you're either born with the gift or you're not—and the Whisper did everything but transport her into my listening room. The sense of presence and reality of David Bowie's voice on "Putting Out Fires (Theme from Cat People)" (UK 12" single, Backstreet/MCA MCAT770) was quite extraordinary. Sia Furler and Sophie Barker's ravishingly sexy harmonies on Zero Seven's "Destiny," from Simple Things (CD, Quango/Palm QMG 5007-2), floated deliciously out into my room, silky and inviting. The Legacy did plush and smoochy notably well on "Wicked Game," from Chris Isaak's Heart Shaped World (LP, Reprise 25837-1), but performed with just as much panache on the spiky and angular "Ballet" from Yellow Magic Orchestra's BGM (LP, A&M SP-4853).
The big Legacy also excelled with the natural timbres of unamplified music. The legendarily luscious-sounding Clair de Lune, a collection of especially scrumptious bonbons performed by Raymond Agoult and the London Proms Orchestra (LP, RCA Living Stereo/Classic LSC-2326), fully lived up to expectations. The solo violin in Massenet's Meditation from Thaïs was presented elegantly and sweetly, and the woodwinds prominent in Elgar's Dream Children, from the same LP, were fully developed in their harmonics and timbral individuality. Massed strings had a gorgeous sheen together with an excellent balance of wood and rosin. This was particularly manifest on Rudolf Werthen and I Fiamminghi's recording of Alan Hovhaness' Symphony 6, Celestial Gate (CD, Telarc CD-80392), which is very much an exercise in musical beauty for its own sake. (It doesn't hurt that it was recorded by Jack Renner and Tony Faulkner.) Pizzicato strings had an uncommonly lifelike quality. The Whisper's midrange was about as good as it gets.
The Whisper's treble balance fell somewhere between those of the slightly mellow Wilson MAXX 2 and the flat-to-infinity extension of the Focal-JMlab Nova Utopia Be. It was fast and detailed, with air and extension in full measures, as one might expect from a ribbon. The top octave was slightly more forward than the mids and lower treble, but the effect was hardly excessive, especially when the speakers were toed in so that the axes of the ribbons crossed in front of the listening position. Even treble-heavy music, such as George Malcolm's performance on harpsichord of Bach's Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, had a fine balance and never sounded harsh or steely. Bad recordings were never made more unpleasant than necessary; the good and the great sounded as they should. The speaker's treble had one odd but pleasant trait: When optimally set up, the Whisper placed the background noise of LPs to the farthest lateral fringes of the soundstage.
While timbral realism is necessary in a statement-level speaker system, it does not, by itself, feed the bulldog. Once cost rises into the multiple tens of thousands, a speaker must be able to play large-scale music with authority and without strain. The Whisper did the job with distinction. "Stimela," from Hugh Masekela's Hope, is a classic demonstration piece at audio shows for a reason: it has whipcrack, extremely broad dynamic contrasts across the entire audible range. The Whisper was able to track these like a bloodhound, never sounding the least bit ruffled. Even the "annihilation mix" of Frankie Goes to Hollywood's "Two Tribes" (UK 12" single, ZTT 12 ZTAS 3), which is more dynamically extreme than the Masekela track, didn't faze the big Legacy (footnote 1).
Part of this is simple physics: With eight drive-units in each cabinet operating below 3kHz, no single unit is being asked to work very hard to move large amounts of air. This led to an enhanced and inviting sense of ease. When I'd perform the occasional random check of sound-pressure level with my trusty old RadioShack meter, I was always surprised by how loudly the speakers were actually playing. The Whisper coasted along easily at peaks of 94–100dB with no sense of coming anywhere near its limits. Whatever those limits are, they're well beyond my tolerance

Nor did the Whisper lose the little things that make music jump to life. Mark Knopfler's concluding guitar solo in "Sultans of Swing," from Dire Straits' eponymous debut album (Japanese LP, Vertigo RJ-7541), packs more dynamic shading, variety of attack, and tiny details into less space than exists in many entire songs. The Whisper made it all sing, catching every nuance. Minor variations in the way cymbals were struck were consistently audible, always snugly knit into the whole of the music. Whether bombastic or refined and restrained, the Legacy consistently brought the music home easily and smoothly

Resolution is also a part of the brief for a statement-level product. Hall sounds on the Massenet and Elgar pieces, and on Vernon Handley and the Royal Philharmonic's recording of Bantock's sublime Celtic Symphony (CD, Hyperion CDA66450), were present in the proper measure for a speaker of this stature. The Whisper consistently reached deeply and easily into recordings to expose and elucidate low-level details. In the gentle first section of King Crimson's mighty "Starless," from Red (CD, Editions EG EGKC 8), Bill Bruford's understated percussion punctuations were fully fleshed out and very clear. Art Zoyd's soundtrack for Nosferatu (German CD, Atonal ACD 3008) has endless layers of complexity and drama. It sounds like something cowritten by Edgard Varèse, J.S. Bach, and Frank Zappa while they were all zonked to the gills on enough psychoactives to levitate the late Hunter S. Thompson. The barely controlled
chaos of "L' uf du Serpent" and "L'Agent Renfield" was there in all its seriously screwed-up and frightening glory, and that is tough material to get right.

The Legacys had a slightly laid-back presentation, especially when contrasted with the ultrapresent sound of the MAXX 2s. The front edge of the Whispers' stage was at or slightly behind the plane of the speakers, while the Wilsons extended the recorded stage out into the room. This was noticeable on orchestral music, but especially conspicuous with one of the best-sounding rock recordings I know of: Streetnoise, by Julie Driscoll with Brian Auger and the Trinity (LP, Atco SD 2-701). Other than a touch of reverb, there is no audible processing on "Light My Fire" and "When I Was a Young Girl." The superb, live-in-the-studio sound is matched by Driscoll's magnificent, supremely soulful singing. Via the Wilson MAXX 2s, Driscoll was in the room with me; with the Whispers, she was on stage in a small club as I sat in the second row of tables. Neither presentation was right or wrong; it was a difference, nothing more. Some will prefer one, some the other.
Soundstaging may be an artifact of the recording process, but it is vital to a speaker's ability to convince. Seldom have I heard any loudspeaker reproduce the extraordinary sense of place and space the Whispers could provide. Grandly scaled material such as Pink Floyd's "Cluster One" and the desolate "Marooned," from The Division Bell (LP, Columbia C 64200), took on almost cosmic scope, but retained a centerfill so forcefully defined it was tempting to look for the phantom middle speaker. Yes, this is music in a created environment and not a natural one, but it didn't matter to the Whispers.
Ryuichi Sakamoto's Cinemage (CD, Sony Classical SK 60780) was recorded live with orchestra in a Japanese concert hall, and the breadth and depth of the stage were majestic. Even more impressive in this respect was Bantock's Celtic Symphony. Smaller-scaled music, such as the Driscoll-Auger tracks, were very intimate and precisely reflected the scale of the venue, but on the big stuff, the Whispers' soundstaging is not surpassed by that of any other speakers that have been in my room. It's clear that minimizing room effects and early reflections were the prerequisites for the Legacy's unsurpassed ability to re-create an illusion of space from recordings.