Usher SD-500 Speaker

A Bookshelf Speaker That Defies Its Size

A Bookshelf Speaker That Defies Its Size The USHER DMD tweeter, with its amorphous diamond coating, has been recognized by audiophiles and reviewers worldwide as one of the highest performance tweeters of today, and until now has been featured only on USHER’s premium range speakers. Over the years, however, we’ve received numerous requests for putting the DMD tweeter in an ultra-compact speaker system for smaller listening environments. The engineering team at USHER have been hard at work in developing an ultra-compact woofer, crossover and cabinet worthy of the DMD tweeter, and the SD-500 is the result.

The DMD Tweeter

At the heart of the SD-500 is, of course, the USHER DMD tweeter. Diamond, due to its superlative stiffness and heat-conductivity, has all the favorable traits of a perfect diaphragm but one: weight/density. To overcome this, USHER invented the diamond-metal-diamond sandwiched structure by coating a special metal dome with amorphous diamond on both sides. The resulted diaphragm has the best compromise in terms of stiffness, mass and inner loss, which, mated with the superb electro-magnetic motor design USHER has been famous for decades, established the DMD tweeter as one of the most accurate and musically satisfying tweeters.

The Woofer

In order to match the nearly impeccable performance of the DMD tweeter, USHER has designed a 5.5” mid-woofer from scratch. Weighing 2.1 kg and featuring a hybrid composite fiber cone, the new 0538 mid-woofer is capable of lightning fast response that is essential for mating with the DMD tweeter, with excellent low-bass extension and dynamics.

Cabinet Design And Crossover Network

To achieve the lowest possible bass extension and optimized response in such an ultra-compact design, the SD-500 employs a heavy 1” baffle on an extensively braced bass-reflex cabinet. The crossover point is set at a lowish 2.1 kHz to maximize the DMD advantage and place the mid-woofer in its most linear operating range. The crossover is built with low-loss air-core inductors, value-matched premium capacitors and OFC wires. The SD-500 is also bi-wire/bi-amp ready.

A Beautiful Form That Follows Function

The SD-500 features a slightly angled front baffle that’s time-aligned for the tweeter and woofer. It’s available in four finishes: Walnut, Pearl Red, Jet Black and Pearl White. All four are finished with high-gloss piano lacquer and have a removable grille that’s discreetly yet securely attached to the baffle by magnet insets. The SD-500 is a treat both for the ear and for the eye.

The SD-500 is the smallest model with the DMD tweeter, but is nonetheless the culmination of decades of engineering excellence at USHER. Its performance defies its ultra-compact size and one will be hard-pressed to find another speaker of this size, regardless of price, with the same level of technology and musical satisfaction.

Product specifications
System: Bookshelf type two-tone bass reflex design
Tweeter: 1.25-inch DMD diaphragm monomer
Bass: 5.5-inch paper fiber composite sound cone monomer
Efficiency: 86dB/w/m
Impedance: 8 ohm
Frequency response: 45Hz~40KHz
Withstand power: 60W (continuous)
Crossover point: 2.1kHz
Speaker size: width 190 × height 360 × depth 285 (mm)
Weight: 8.5 kg (single)