Fried Loudspeakers are Back

Fried Loudspeakers " Speakers of Truth "

Bud Irving Fried founder of Fried speakers popularized in the 80's established a loyal fan base of audiophiles who sought accurate high performance loudspeakers a cut above the status quo.

Fried speakers are back under new management, but the same design philosophies cherished over a quarter century ago are practiced today such as:

• Series Crossovers
• Transmission Line Enclosures
• Phase coherent designs
• Benign impedance for easy amplifier load

We sat down for a break from the cold rainy day at Alexis Park to hear a demo of these speakers from a brand name that garnered much respect back in the day. What we heard was a pleasantly warm and natural musical representation from jazz classics such as Acoustic Alchemy. I found the integration of the phase plug tweeter from Vifa quite good, in fact perhaps better than others I have heard.

It was nice to hear a demo that we weren't blown away with blasting and shrilling music to give a "WOW" effect in hopes of catching the ear of a passing consumer. However, I found myself craving a bit more dynamic range and bass impact wondering what was missing. I later found out that the electronics used in this demo (namely the tube amplifier), the Stingray from Manley had an output impedance in the audio range of greater than 2 ohms with a distortion spec of greater than 1%! The nominal impedance of Fried speakers is 4 ohms so as you can gather, damping factor was greatly compromised reaching its peak value of 2, over 10 times less than what is usually consider adequate in a high performance audio system. I couldn't help but wonder how these speakers would have sounded with some well engineered solid state electronics.

Overall the demo was good, the speakers easy to listen to, and the atmosphere a bit sterile but a nice alternative to the typical CES/Alexis Park demo. It was certainly nice to take a brief break from the nasty Vegas weather and enjoy a few moments of musical solitude.

The top half of the transmission line surrounded with dampening materials. The new slendor look sported by Fried speakers certainly makes them more eye appealing and surely gains higher spousal acceptance.