Напольная акустика — Paradigm Electronics Persona 7F

The Persona 7F is a passive floorstander in the Persona Series made by Paradigm of Mississauga, Ontario, positioned directly below the hybrid 9H. The seven-model line also contains the 5F and 3F floorstanders, the B standmount, the C centre and the Persona Sub, and every model uses drivers with Truextent pure beryllium diaphragms in the treble dome and the mid cone. The 7F was priced at USD 25,000 per pair in 2017. Production takes place in the company's own plant near Toronto.

Key specs that matter

The 3-way bass reflex layout uses four drivers. A 1 inch Truextent beryllium dome tweeter is ferro-fluid damped and cooled, a 7 inch beryllium midrange is driven by a neodymium motor of the Inverse Differential Drive type, and two 8.5 inch ultra-high-excursion X-PAL woofers handle the low range. Third-order electro-acoustic filters cross over at 2.4 kHz and 450 Hz. Response is 24 Hz to 45 kHz within 2 dB on axis and 24 Hz to 20 kHz at 30 degrees off axis, with an 18 Hz low-frequency extension figure. Sensitivity is 92 dB in room and 89 dB anechoic, and the speaker is rated as compatible with 8 ohm amplifiers. The cabinet measures 132 cm high, 30 cm wide and 52 cm deep, and each unit weighs 65 kg.

Engineering and use context

Paradigm uses 99.9 percent pure beryllium foil because it is much stiffer and lighter than other diaphragm materials, which pushes cone breakup far out of the working band. Both beryllium drivers sit behind Perforated Phase-Aligning lenses, and the woofers use Active Ridge Technology surrounds. The enclosure is built from seven layers of wood composite bonded with viscoelastic adhesive and cured with radio-frequency energy, with 25 mm internal braces, 25 mm top and bottom plates and a 32 mm front baffle. Its curved rear and parabolic footprint came from mechanical and acoustic finite element analysis. A large flared port fires down through a tilted bottom plate. The crossover uses heavy-gauge copper inductors wound in-house and metalized polypropylene capacitors, and a single pair of carbon-fibre finished five-way terminals takes the cable. Buyers choose from Vanta Black, Harmony White, Aria Blue and Sonic Silver paint, the first two in high gloss and the others metallic, and the warranty covers five years.

Pairing

The amplifier range runs from 15 to 500 W with a 350 W maximum input, so both low-power valve designs and large solid-state amplifiers are within specification. For multichannel use the Persona C centre and Persona Sub belong to the same range.

Alternatives

The Persona 5F is the smaller passive tower of the same series, listed at USD 17,000 per pair.