Not So Sure

[Bob Boyer]

I think the build my own crossover is on hold for a while. I took the little single driver floorstanders out of the system and switched back to my bi-amped LSA's using the passive internal crossovers. Those DavidLouis/LouisDavid chinesium drivers were fun, but harsh. I just couldn't get around it. Acoustic stuff (Johnny Cash's American albums, Kathy Mattea's Coal, etc.) sounded very good and I was drawn in by the specificity of the instrument placement in the soundstage but something like Santana's Abraxas or Who's Next would just wear my ears out. Didn't matter how I aimed the speakers, there was just too much sibilance. Which is a shame, because the mid-range really was pretty special.

Back to deciding if I want to try some of these MarkAudio drivers from Madisound in the boxes Louis gave me: https://www.madisoundspeakerstore.c...rkaudio-alpair-11ms-gold-cone-6.5-full-range/ as they do fit but the frequency response curves look to be even more sibilant. That, or build some Fostex boxes to sit on top of the LSAs and go back to using them as woofers only. I liked the bass, mid-bass, and mid-range of the single driver plus LSA setup through the Ashly crossover.

Thoughts?

This the the curve for the MarkAudio drivers:



Here's what they published for the Chinese drivers:

 

[George S.]

JBL studio monitors perhaps, for the smaller room. Just a thought.

 

[mlucitt]

Personally, I would not trust those curves for Chinese audio components.

 

[laatsch55]

And that's why we play the game fellas!!! Folks can talk shit till; they're blue in the face, until you sit your ass in that chair and run through enough of your catalog that you know the difference you are hearing or in many cases that there was a DIFFERENCE TO HEAR!!!!! I have learned that high wattage through even 1800.00/pair crossovers eventually breaks something down and they get harsh. Happened with my universals, happened with the extreme slopes. THAT HAS NOT happened with going active with the Ashly. Amps are sooooo much happier dealing with a limited frequency range. And what are we doing now?? Fixin to opamp roll the Ashly...... just never satisfied.....and I love every fuckin minute of it!!!

 

[laatsch55]

On another note.....those 3000 watt 15" woofers that Randy put in his K's ROASTED.....they were rated for 900 RMS continuous....so Randy was clipping the 700 enough to take out the voice coil by not having enough power.... yep, the clipping phenomenon of the flat line being essentially DC is a real thing......

 

[Bob Boyer]

So... had some time last night after dinner with the fam to switch speakers in and out. Went back to the LSA as sub/David Louis combo and played a few reference lps and then ran high-res files through the system. Acoustic stuff great with excellent instrument placement. Digitized vinyl fine. Digitized mixes from my 15 ips tapes all fine. Digital mixes and downloads exhibit harshness. Maybe that's why I wasn't catching anything but a gut feeling for the past month.

Anyway, put on Elton John's Where To Now St. Peter, which has some very subtle percussion buried in the right side of the mix. First file was my 24/192 copy from a pristine album, second file from a Gus Dudgeon remastered CD released as part of a huge EJ remastered CD package back in 1995 (can't believe those words just came out of my fingers...). Sure enough, the vinyl hi-res file was smooth as silk with the percussion about where I expected it. The remastered CD version highlighted the percussion in a not so flattering way - there's a real bump in the mid-range on these drivers.

Which leads me to ask this question as I'm looking at the response curves on a lot of different single drivers and they all show a mid-range peak between 3 and 7k, with the biggest peak at about 5k. The question is how will any of these speakers respond in a box that isn't quite right in terms of volume? I've found a couple of drivers that will match closely, but nothing is perfect. Just add more wool?

Looks like I'm about to spend $225 on those Mark Audio Alpair 11MS drivers at Madisound to find out sometime in the next month or two.

 

[J!m]

I think you are discovering why so many speakers have multiple drivers.

These want to be run where that peak is, and throttled above and below. Suppliment with lower peaking (bass) drivers and higher peaking (high-mid/tweeters) drivers.

Then design a first-order crossover...

This is why I like Thiel so much. He did all the hard work; I just need to treat the room properly and feed them lots of power.

 

[Mohawk]

I have spent many hours on many occasions "zeroing" my system for crossover piont, slope and "EQ" ing .....
House curve , Yada Yada Yada....
Once I finish and start listening to a couple of "GO TO" tracks then is starts to unravel...
A tweak hear and there because it just doesn't sound quite right ?
The curve and levels that are "Textbook" don't necessarily translate to sounding good in your room.

 

[J!m]

You have to understand the very real and distinct difference between "good" and "correct".

Correct may not sound good and good may not sound correct.

Since I listen to such varied music, I go for correct. Or perhaps better said "accurate to the source recording".

If an acoustic recording sounds as if the musicians are playing in the room, that's the standard I strive for. Anything multitracked in a studio? That might sound "bad" only because the source material is "bad". The "room acoustics" of each instrument recorded differ, because often they are close miced and any "room" sound (reverb etc.) is artificially added, and their location on the "soundstage" created via a pan pot. And each track/instrument has their own flavor of "room". Final result after it all goes onto tape is rather muddied and unfocused. So, we EQ or use other means to homogenize the sound. Use this homogenized sound with a "good" recording and now that sounds like crap.

Newer digital multitrack creations actually creates the musician placement on the "soundstage" graphically, so their relative volume and pan position (to control depth and width) are run by the computer. This is better than the old fashioned way, but generally comes with the digital over-compression and other garbage that sounds so unpleasant.

 

[Bob Boyer]

...If an acoustic recording sounds as if the musicians are playing in the room, that's the standard I strive for. Anything multitracked in a studio? That might sound "bad" only because the source material is "bad". The "room acoustics" of each instrument recorded differ, because often they are close miced and any "room" sound (reverb etc.) is artificially added, and their location on the "soundstage" created via a pan pot. And each track/instrument has their own flavor of "room". Final result after it all goes onto tape is rather muddied and unfocused. So, we EQ or use other means to homogenize the sound. Use this homogenized sound with a "good" recording and now that sounds like crap...

And that's where the single driver shines - acoustic recordings made in real rooms. I may be closer to the "correct" sound than I realized once I got the bass dialed in (at least to my taste) for this room.

Johnny Cash's four American recordings, Kathy Mattea (on Coal), Jorma Kaukonen/Quah, Waylon Jenning's last album, Miles Davis' Kind of Blue, Cannonball Adderly's Quintet In San Francisco, etc. all have that in-the-room immediacy that the rock recordings in my collection, in general, don't have. Though Welcome To The Canteen seriously surprised me on the single drivers as several of the instruments (notably Reebop's congas and bongos on Gimme Some Lovin') are mixed really well and stand out from the mayhem. The live recordings on the Eagles' Hell Freezes Over LP/CD are outliers as well, especially Hotel California, but Elilot Scheiner always works hard on his live mixes.

I'm also able to more accurately hear the "house" sound of various recording studios where I have multiple albums from several artists, all from the same studio. Muscle Shoals Sound is my most obvious reference, as Charlie Watt's drum track on Wild Horses and Roger Hawkins' drum tracks on Bob Seger's Roll Me Away and Elvin Bishop's Loan Me A Dime have the same snap to them in spite of the different drummers. It's the house. And single driver speakers somehow pick up on that much better than my LSAs.

There is much to like about these single drivers. But then I put on Santana's Singing Winds, Crying Beasts and cringe at the distortion on the chimes before we get to Black Magic Woman.

 

[Mohawk]

This is a very deep and jaged rabbit hole indeed..

Some dislike Paul McGowan ( PS ) audio but I have his book and set up cd and it's full of good stuff... Discussion on theory, set up/ speaker placement and tests to prove the adjustments...



Read the instructions in the book and run the corresponding audio tracks....
Works very well.....

https://www.psaudio.com/products/the-audiophiles-guide-the-stereo?_pos=8&_sid=f8f9cbca0&_ss=r

 

[J!m]

"Get Better Sound" is the book I use...

 

[mr_rye89]

Rig up a speaker switch and use the single drivers with acoustic music and the 2 ways with the more "produced" music

If I get bored I still have those tang band w4 2142s I can throw in bass reflex boxes and an SET Amp still sitting on the rack. Patch it in with the MiniDSP and gooooo!

 

[mlucitt]

Just wait a few years for your hearing to become "adjusted" and then all of your set ups and room modifications will sound just about the same.

 

[Bob Boyer]

Have gone back to straight bi-amped LSAs, no active crossover. Just the straight bi-amp setup out of the Exposure manual. Moved the LSA's out in front of the bookshelves and toed them in some to try to get something closer to the soundstage the single drivers wer creating without their harshness.

After we listened to Stratdoc's dual AHB setup, we came back over here and I let him hear both of my setups and he came to same conclusion I was coming to - there's a source-dependent harshness in the drivers that can't be tamed. So I'm opting for just a bit more smoothness while playing with speaker position. I may see if he'll help me try the REW app on my computer with his microphone to see what happens if we adjust the system through JRiver. It won't help vinyl, tape, or SACD playback but it will show me what's possible while I'm waiting to try those MarkAudio Alpair drivers.

 

[nakdoc]

Buy some wool felt at a fabric store and cut out little rings slightly larger than the dome diameter. Tack them on with rubber cement and play the harsh stuff. Diffraction effects often sound harsh.