Напольная акустика — ESD Acoustic Super Dragon

The Super Dragon is an active horn loudspeaker system from ESD Acoustic of Hangzhou, China, founded by David Dai, Sam Saye, Bruce Edgar and Jacky Dai, and the maker calls it its flagship horn system. Visitors saw it at High End Munich in 2023 and 2024 and at High End Vienna in 2026. A standard Dragon package costs about USD 1.05 million and the full Dragon System about USD 1.53 million, while the Super Dragon shown in Vienna with custom lacquer was priced above USD 3.6 million.

Key specs that matter

The system is a 5+1-way active design with an analogue active crossover at 100 Hz, 500 Hz, 2 kHz and 8 kHz, using ten field-coil driver units. The S20 sub-bass unit has a 10 inch titanium diaphragm, 150 W and 110 dB at 16 ohm, the S100 bass unit an 8 inch titanium diaphragm, 80 W and 114 dB at 16 ohm and the S500 midrange a 4 inch beryllium diaphragm, 30 W and 120 dB at 16 ohm. The S2000 high-frequency unit has a 1.75 inch beryllium diaphragm, 20 W and 112 dB at 8 ohm, and the S8000 tweeter a 1 inch beryllium diaphragm, 5 W and 110 dB at 8 ohm. System response is 18 Hz to 52 kHz within 3 dB, and sensitivity is 112 dB. The main cabinet measures 1730 x 740 x 1400 mm and weighs 1190 kg, the subwoofer 1335 x 1685 x 2540 mm and 442 kg, and the sub-bass unit 600 x 700 x 1535 mm and 990 kg.

Engineering and use context

All drivers use field coils, electromagnets fed by their own power supplies instead of permanent magnets, and the compression drivers reach a magnetic density of 2.4 T. ESD applies what it calls AI negative feedback technology to the field-coil supplies against eddy currents. The beryllium diaphragms come from Truextent, and the bass sections use titanium sandwich diaphragms. Every horn is made of carbon fibre, including a very large sub-bass horn. Amplification is included in the price, with one D100W-1B single-ended pure Class A monoblock per horn section, rated at 10 W nominal and 20 W peak into 8 ohm. The high sensitivity of the horns is what lets these low-powered amplifiers drive the system, and the active crossover means each amplifier feeds only one driver section.

Pairing

The system comes with its amplifiers, so it needs only a source and a preamplifier with enough outputs to feed the active crossover. Its size calls for a very large dedicated room.

Alternatives

The ESD Acoustic Phoenix is the five-way horn system with ten units per channel and a 2050 mm tall main cabinet.