Carfrae Little Big Horn - Audio Evidence

Carfrae Little Big Horn
Few speakers look more
extraordinary than Carfrae’s Little
Big Horn, and hardly any are more
beautiful, in my opinion and those
of several visitors, who admired
the faintly bizarre but beautifully
sculptured shape, the delicious
solid wood
finishing, and
were
fascinated
by the
large
‘climbthrough’
hole in the
middle. The
photographs
are much more
eloquent than mere
words in describing a speaker
which looks unlike any other on
the planet, which makes perfect
sense in form-follows-function
terms, yet manages to do so
with considerable panache and
a wickedly gastropodic wit.
As the name suggests, this is a
horn-loaded design, a factor which
accounts for both the shape and
the bulk. And it is a bulky beast to
be sure, my own quite generously
dimensioned room (4.3x2.6x5.5m)
is probably just about the practical
minimum. In truth the Little Big
Horn would fit more happily into
rooms at least half as big again
- and could happily fill a small
church, should the opportunity
present itself. But it doesn’t loom
the way large speakers usually
do, the curved profile, deep blue
crackle finish around the horn
profile and the hole through the
middle all help minimise the
perception of a bulk which is
only really a handicap when you’re
unpacking and struggling to
manoeuvre them into place.
By Paul Messenger
Let’s put the LBH into
context.
Like Carfrae’s swan-neck Big Horn,
it’s based around a single Lowther
DX3 drive unit, but where big
brother’s horn is 3.3m long and
fires into a comer, the LBH loads
the rear of the Lowther by a
forward-firing 2m tractrix
profile horn. It’s much
more compact than the
Big Horn, uses MDF
rather than plywood,
and less real wood
veneer, so the whole
affair is much less costly
at £7,950 (against some
eighteen grand for the
Big Horn).
Eight grand is still expensive
for any pair of loudspeakers, and
significantly (though not
dramatically) more than the two
other Lowther-driven speakers
which have passed through my
hands recently (the £5,000
Beauhorn Virtuoso in Hi-Fi+ issue
7, and the £6,000 Veritas H3 in Hi-Fi
Choice issue 191).
The Little Big Horn can easily
justify its premium, however, not
just on grounds of aesthetic
elegance (where it’s in a class
of its own), but also because it
cunningly incorporates an active
subwoofer as an integral part
of the design. This is built into
the separate teardrop shaped box
which supports and orients the
horn proper. (And you can christen
it Custer’s Last Stand if you want
to.)
What we have in toto
therefore is a single full-range
horn-loaded driver, which, in the
Lowther tradition, has an
extraordinarily high sensitivity
(around 105dB/W on my estimate),
at the inevitable expense of
limited bass extension. Jim
Carfrae’s literature implies that the
horn works down to 50Hz, but my
measurements indicate a practical
in-room lower limit of around 80Hz
for the horn section, leaving the
subwoofer to take responsibility
for the bottom two octaves.
The Little Big Horn differs from
the other Lowther-driven speakers
I’ve tried in making no attempt to
horn-load the front of the drive
unit. I suspect the lack of a short
horn on the front is the reason why
the LBH’s output is just a little weak
through the broad midband, but
such a horn will tend to add its
own coloration which Jim prefers
to avoid.
One less happy consequence
of the slightly weak output
400z-1.5kHz is that it leaves the
characteristic Lowther presence
band resonance (about an octave
wide centred on 2kHz) just that
bit more exposed and obvious.
The treble proper is also stronger
than average, with evidence of
another peak around 8-12kHz, but
it remains a notable achievement
to create a high efficiency mostly
horn-loaded speaker capable of
delivering a full bandwidth
in-room balance which (once I’d
fiddled around a bit with the
subwoofer controls for best
integration) held within +/-4dB

on a far-field in-room averaged
measurement from 20Hz to 18kHz.
This is a total contrast to the
Beauhom Virtuoso’s
behaviour, which is
deliberately tuned to give
a smooth and flat
midband, while
gently rolling off
the top and
bottom ends.
The more
time I spent
looking at the
Little Big Horn, the more
I became impressed
by the sheer cleverness, not only
of the overall concept but also
the fine detail of the design. The
driver is carefully arranged to be at
seated ear height, and the boss on
which it’s mounted is a seriously
chunky hardwood fabrication,
cleverly put together to create
patterns in the grain orientation.
Subtle hardwood curves frame the
horn mouth, and the profile of the
subwoofer is curved too (creating
an irregular shape which will help
avoid standing waves).
Sonically I’m a bit of a
sucker for Lowther-driven speakers
and indeed for high sensitivity
speakers in general, so the Little
Big Horns immediately ensnared
me in their enchantment. The
sheer immediacy and vividness of
the sound catches the attention
straight away, much of which
comes down to the effortless
and natural way they reproduce
dynamic contrasts and
shading.
Most of
the listening
took place
immediately
after I’d
carried out a
group test on
12 ‘normal’
loudspeakers
(averaging
around £1,000/pair
and 89dB/W sensitivity), and these
Carfraes instantly sounded like
‘real’ speakers, where
the others had
been mere
pipsqueak
pretenders,
lacking
genuine scale
and limiting
expression and
communication.
First off I didn’t
connect up the
subwoofers, and just listened to
the horns alone. This was very
beguiling, and honestly didn’t
seem as lacking in bass
extension as the
measurements had
indicated. On speech it
was particularly
magical, with great
expression and a
marvellous freedom
from timesmear and
chestiness. Individuals
somehow managed to
sound more distinctly
individual, and regional
accents were clearer and
more easily identifiable.
On simple material with
little bass content, such
as string quartets, the
horn alone was lovely.
I half expected to
find the subwoofer a let
down, as all my previous
experiences of trying to
use active subwoofers
alongside high efficiency ‘satellites’
have been tinged with
disappointment. While the Little
Big Horn’s integral
subwoofers did
compromise
the time
coherence very
slightly the effect
was indeed very
small, and I happily
left the subs connected
up for the duration, enjoying the
worthwhile extra weight and
gravitas they brought to anything
with serious bass content. The
other slight weakness is that their
dynamic tracking didn’t always
match the horns, so the balance
seem to shift very slightly with
level, but the overall integration
was unexpectedly superb, and I
was only conscious of their
existence on odd occasions.
The one fly in the ointment -
more of a dragonfly in fact - is
that presence peak, which just
happens to be in the region of
the spectrum where the ear is
most sensitive. This proved difficult
to ignore, at least when using
my regular Naim (NAC52/
NAP500) amplification,
which itself has a rather
shiny and forward
character, and made
me reluctant to listen
at realistically high
levels. I could
probably live with it,
just as I can live with
the slightly higher
frequency peak of
my Rehdeko
RK175s, but I’m
rather more
tolerant than
most in this
regard, and tend
to find most
conventional
speakers (which usually
show a presence dip) a
little shut in.
As I’d expected from
show demonstrations, the
Little Big Horn is rather in-yer-face,
and not exactly polite or smooth
by conventional standards. But
that’s partly because it’s
exceptionally revealing of either
the sources or amplification. The
trick is to find the right
components to create a
sympathetic whole. High efficiency
Lowther horns originally stem
from the era of low powered
valve amplification, and make
natural partners for the revival
of interest in single-ended triode

amps, especially as the impedance
stays above a comfortable 9 ohms
throughout. Jim Carfrae had
brought along a pair of
monoblocks from Glass Audio
Tube Engineering, the GATE SE300
(from £3,335/pair,
depending upon
the source of the
300Bs), which he
felt were a good
match for the
LBHs.
I’ve always
had a soft spot
for this type of
amp, based on the
magnificence of its
midrange
reproduction but
tempered by major
reservations about
bass softness.
However, Little Big
Horn’s active sub
means it does its own
thing in the bass region,
and the system amp doesn’t
need to supply any serious
current below 80Hz. Major
reservation dismissed.
Measurements taken with the
valve monoblocks showed the
same presence peak as before,
but above that region the treble
output proper was some 2-3dB
less, and this is probably a major
reason for the altogether ‘kinder’
and less aggressive sound which
they produced.
In fact the combination was an
absolute delight. Background hiss
was reduced while hum increased
slightly - but those seem to be the
inevitable consequence of going
from transistor to valve operation
when using a super-sensitive
speaker. Best of all was the way
the SE300’s classic thermionic
sweetness took the ‘fierceness’ and
aggression out of the system. It
remains a moot point whether
one should choose an amplifier
or the speakers first. Given the
Naim amps I probably wouldn’t
have chosen the Little Big Horns;
given the Carfraes, I probably
would have chosen the GATEs (or
something similar).
There are many reviewers who
try to describe the sound of
their favourite recordings, an
approach I avoid, because
it’s highly unlikely that
these happen to be your
favourite recordings, or
even that you’ll enjoy
them in the same way
that I do. I could ramble
on about the brilliantly
layered production of
the Beastie Boys’
Hello Nasty, the Iyrical
lucidity of Eminem’s
Marshall Mathers LP,
or the delicate and
subtle interplay on
the Grateful Dead’s
Reckoning
acoustic set.
But I’d rather
report on the
effect a speaker
system has upon my
actual behaviour, as this
seems much more meaningful.
A major strength of the Little
Big Horn is that it makes even
‘difficult’ material that much more
accessible than regular speakers.
I found myself listening to a
lot more Radio 3 than usual,
and getting sucked into the
wonderful textures of orchestral
instruments and instrumentation.
I’ve now been listening to the Little
Big Horns continuously for about
three weeks, across a broad range
of programming which includes a
mixture of vinyl, CD and radio,
plus an (un)healthy dose of dayto-day
television watching. Jim’s
coming back to pick them up
tomorrow, and I’m not looking
forward to his arrival one little bit!
With a speaker this coherent,
temporally and dynamically, choice
of source and amplification
components becomes extra
critical, and I’d certainly suggest
valve amplification is likely to
be preferable to the solid state
variety. Indeed, the enormously
high sensitivity of the Little Big
Horns is a powerful incentive
to go straight down the singleended
triode road, as the modest
power outputs will be no
handicap, and their sonic marriage
might have been made in heaven.
As I sat ruminating while Radio
3 was playing some Mozart, the
thought came over me that if I ever
get to retire from this loudspeaker
reviewing game, this could well be
the speaker system to retire with.
It’s not perfect - no speaker is - but
it’s such a fine combination of the
various qualities I personally rate
most highly that I reckon it would
fill the bill very nicety indeed.
Others might prefer the smoother,
more mid-oriented sound of the
Beauhorns I reviewed a few
months back. But I strongly urge
any reader interested in getting
closer to the ‘real thing’ to take
the time to audition a Lowtherbased
speaker system, as the
combination of single-driver
coherence and massive sensitivity
brings its own unique magic to the
proceedings.
TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
Type: Single driver horn with
active sub-woofer.
Main Driver: Lowther DX3
Sensitivity: 105dB
Impedance: