Created 20-Aug-12
Modified 3-Jun-20
Raidho (pronounced "Ride-o") Acoustics is one of Denmark's foremost high-end loudspeaker-makers. In its facility at Pandrup near the west coast of the Jutland peninsula, it fabricates and assembles all of its own drivers. The only items not made on-site are the beautifully finished lacquered cabinets.
Michael Borresen, Raidho's brilliant chief engineer, has designed several unique parts that are built at the Raidho facility: a quasi-ribbon tweeter with incredibly low distortion, high resolution, and broad bandwidth and power-handling; several sizes of plasma-deposited-aluminum-ceramic-oxide/aluminum/aluminum-ceramic-oxide sandwich-cone drivers (used as midranges, mid/basses, and woofers in various Raidho speakers); and a brilliantly engineered neodymium magnetic drive system, called Ceramix, in which super-powerful neo-magnets are arranged vertically in a push-pull configuration around an ingenious dual voice-coil.
Raidho's C 1.1 mini-moniotr is universally considered one of the world's greatest compact speakers, and its new, large (nearly seven-feet tall), 363-pound flagship, the $140k C 4.1 three-way, seven-driver floorstander, is likely to vie for the heavyweight title of "World's Best Transducer."
Also new is Raidho's X-Monitor LE, a $5k ribbon/ceramic stand-mount/desktop monitor that sounds exactly like a smaller C 1.1.
All photos taken handheld with Sony NEX-7 and Zeiss Biogon C 35mm f2.8 lens, and processed in Lightroom 4.1.
© Jonathan Valin