General Speaker Advice and Recommendations

Discussion in 'Speakers' started by shotgunshane, Mar 7, 2017.

  1. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    The reason I am harping on this is personal experience. Over a decade ago, all I built where tall speakers with relatively small drivers. Sure maybe a 8" here or there. But mostly 5.5" MTMs, because that was all the rage (and still the rage). I didn't know any better. My prior system was a Aktiv Linn (6" MTM) setup with a REL sub. And I thought it sounded great and had awesome bass. What little did I know!

    When I decided to build a JBL horn / compression driver speaker, I naturally mated the horns with a 12" woofers. That was my first insight into ... Oh shit, why have I been wasting my time on these super expensive 5.5" drivers (the TOTL Seas and Scanspeak)?

    Now I don't have a problem with small driver designs. I have a bunch of "elite" Fostex 4" drivers and the uber Scanspeak 5.5" driver on the shelf. I also have the 6" Fostex BLH in my living room. But I'm also not a fool to think they are going to give me the same bass quality as merely "decent" 12" or 15" woofers.
     
    Last edited: Aug 10, 2017
  2. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Keep them coming! Those will look beautiful once they are finished! Please post photos when done!
     
  3. SineDave

    SineDave Friend

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    Within reason to me is within the bounds of your room/space. I have no problem with 15 or even 18" drivers in your mains. Two of the best designs I've ever heard use massive woofers, it's just hard to make work in most rooms:

    http://legacyaudio.com/products/view/whisper-xd/
     
  4. Armaegis

    Armaegis Friend

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    What about multiple smaller woofers with roughly equivalent surface area? (Speaking in generalities, assuming ideal operating conditions, yadda yadda) is there anything that 4x8" can do better than a single 15"?
     
  5. murphythecat

    murphythecat GRU-powered uniformed trumpkin

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    not sure if you understand what you mean, but my experience is that the bigger the woofer, the easier it is to have flat FR measurements at the listening position.

    im thinking long and hard about those Maximus 12 lxe
     
  6. dmckean44

    dmckean44 In a Sherwood S6040CP relationship

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    Big 2-ways (or 2.5-ways) do great in small rooms. For a large 3-way you need a couple more feet between the speakers and a couple more feet between the speakers and the listening position to get the best imaging.
     
  7. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Not necessarily ideal, but sometimes if the big speakers will work in a small room, it's better to go for the big speakers. I cite this as the @Shaizada Principle. Better is just better even if not ideal.

    As far as big speakers needing big rooms, it's not necessarily true. I've totally been guity of saying this myself; but really, it's a matter of the design. Manufacturers build in a certain amount of baffle step. They make an assumption of how far the speakers will be placed from the walls (walls will reinforce lower mids and below). If they feel that their big speakers will probably be placed in a big room at least 3 to 4' from a room boundary, then placing those speakers in a 8 x 8 might not work. You'll get bass galore.

    @shaizada's Marten Bird speakers worked fantastically in that tiny room of his. The downside to such a small room and short distances to the speaker were that the polar response changes were totally screwy. You had to be in his comfy seat. If you stood up next to the seat, it was not good. A bigger room with more distance between the listening position and speakers would have alleviated this issue.
     
    Last edited: Aug 10, 2017
  8. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    1. The 4x8" will cost more
    2. The 8" driver will have higher Fs, resonant frequency (not extend as low as the 15", all other things being equal)
    3. The 4x8" drivers will be less efficient* (not be as efficient as the 15", all other things being equal)
    4. The 15" will inherently have a wider baffle, requiring less baffle step correction, if the speaker is designed to be used far from a wall.
    * unless you stack a bunch of 8" to make a line array and listen within the nearfield range of the line array, or cheat by paralleling the drivers, but then you present a harder load (more current demands) to the amp.
     
    Last edited: Aug 10, 2017
  9. spwath

    spwath Hijinks master cum laudle

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    So I put the speaker together. That little horn is great. The woofer is broken. Sounds like an elephant farting. Probably my recone job... Looks cool though.
    [​IMG]
     
  10. SineDave

    SineDave Friend

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    I'm strictly referring to space, and that's mostly because I am a home theater guy. I can't have massive speakers getting in the way of my 120" screen, so I have no choice. At this time I don't have a dedicated room for 2 channel separate from my HT. I'm in complete agreement with you guys that a larger speaker is a good thing, especially for mid-bass and bass reproduction, but it can be a problem if you aren't only using that space/room for audio and have to accommodate a screen or wife acceptance.
     
  11. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    Absolutely. I have had a couple of speaker setups where piles of books acted as stands. I suspect they might actually be good technical reasons to use them, but I did it just because... I wanted higher speakers :D
     
  12. spwath

    spwath Hijinks master cum laudle

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    If I press on the left side of the cone, the bass quantity increases to a normal amount, and sounds good. Any ideas why this is happening/how to remedy it?

    My thoughts would be voice coil might not be aligned right. Thoughts?
     
  13. Hrodulf

    Hrodulf Prohibited from acting as an MOT until year 2050

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    I think it would be useful to state that we're talking about bass, not sub bass. Subs were never meant for bass in the first place. Subs are okay if one needs dat 20-40..60Hz rumble. I'd say that most systems are fine if they can do good 50Hz. The problem is that if they can, the marketing guys will push the designer to rather make them play crappy 30Hz so it looks better on the paper.

    In my case 2x12" were 100$ cheaper than a single 15" for the same specs. So sometimes it pays to look around.

    P.S. This is some of the best stuff you've been posting in some time, Marv.
     
  14. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Perforated screens? Sell the wife? Hehe. I've just been totally spoiled seeing some of these screening rooms at the studios lately.
     
  15. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    Go big woofers or go home.

    Coming from car audio, I've never once been satisfied with small woofers for music reproduction.
     
  16. GTABeancounter

    GTABeancounter Friend

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    My experience with perforated screens is not that different from audio with respect to "expectation bias". Which is to say that perforated screens may give up little in terms of picture quality relative to similarly priced non acoustic transparent screens, but I know they are sub optimal for video nonetheless which isn't good for my OCD :). I suspect that the average AV enthusiast will have an easier time distinguishing between great and good video quality VS distinguishing between "mid-fi" and "hifi sound".

    Ultimately, it's all about compromises and enjoying your system... in my case its tower speakers with itty bitty 5.5" woofers and a PB-1000 sub. I've wrapped all my speaker cabinets in protostar flocking so they disappear (literally :)) when we watch movies (this was my way around having a non acoustically transparent screen). I've sure I'm giving quite a bit up with respect to 2 channel audio impact, but I'm still really happy. I'll have time to build some kick ass 15" monsters once the kids grow up but in the interim I'll read this thread and live vicariously.
     
  17. Serious

    Serious Inquisitive Frequency Response Plot

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    @spwath Yep, sounds like voice coil needs recentering or maybe even reforming. Or maybe there's something in the magnet gap.

    That is until you realize the Lowthers aren't endgame :p

    I know some people say big woofers sound "slower". I still think it's mostly implementation or a matter of differences that have nothing to do with size. Also sometimes it's comparing 2 ways against 3 ways. The two ways do have some advantages.
    I guess the real question we should ask is if the smaller woofers at a 6db lower level sound as good as or better than the big driver (in the case of 4 vs 1 driver). Yeah, I guess not.

    Why would the efficiency be different? Of course this is if the smaller drivers had 1/4th the Mms, while also having the same Fs and Qes, Qms, etc. Of course the lighter, smaller driver would need a much higher compliance to reach the same Fs. And actually a lot of the time the smaller drivers will be heavier in respect to their size.
    Simulating this in Basta! tells me they should be pretty much the same efficiency (smaller driver is 6db less efficient so that 4 of the small drivers are the same efficiency as one large driver). I've read somewhere that multiple smaller drivers couple to the air less efficiently, because the drive surface is broken up into pieces, but I've also heard that at low frequencies when the drivers effectively become one radiator, that they boost their efficiency a bit.
     
    Last edited: Aug 10, 2017
  18. Priidik

    Priidik MOT: Estelon

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    First thing that comes to mind is cone breakup. Smaller drivers have that going on higher up.
    That should allow these to be used to higher crossover point.
    Another thing is more coil area for membrane, the buzz used to market ring domes.
    More often than not can get away with lower combined moving mass, thus perhaps better high bass, low midrange clarity.
    Usually (and historically) small midwoofer drivers have better tech in motors (symmetric drive, less inductance, vented) and better cooling.

    I have been doing extensive search for my own project, I will add what I have found:

    There is plethora to choose from the 8'' size starting from good range of very low Fs (20..30) danish designs (ScanSpeak, Vifa, SBacoustics).
    In hifi side, not as much to choose in 15'' range that actually have Fs below 30 Hz. I haven't found more than 4-5 that has modern tech put into it.
    Pro stuff is where there is lot to choose, but almost everything is around 30...40 Hz Fs.
    Then the HT stuff, while Fs is like 18 Hz, cone is the weight of a sledgehammer, thus low eff, probably sounds as rhino's fart for music.

    8'' have much less linear travel, perhaps this is the most limiting factor.

    Cost wise, disregarding obviously overpriced things like Accuton etc:
    4x top shelf 8-9'' = 700..1000$
    1x top shelf 15''= 500..1000$
    2x top shelf 12..13''= 400..900$


    I too don't think 4x8 would be less efficient. In 2x2 conf voltage sensitivity is also quite the same in general. That is comparing hifi 15'' to hifi 4x8'' with similar Fs and similar combined Mms.

    edit: all in theory, in RL I have not heard 8''x4 speaker. I know that 2x 8'' is better than 1x 8'', that's probably only because of eff. It would be fun to build apples-to-apples 15'' vs 8''x4 woofer boxes to put this argument to rest. I suppose nobody cares that much. I won't be saying that either is gonna win, it's just that 1x15'' makes more sense and is easier to build.
     
    Last edited: Aug 30, 2017
  19. Sylafari

    Sylafari Acquaintance

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    Eagle has landed...

    [​IMG]

    First Impression: If I must be honest, I'm not blown away like I was with the JBL LSR 30X. They certainly sound better than the LSR 30X but certainly do not sound 1800 dollars better (darn diminishing returns). Though to be honest, I have never been blown away by the acquisition of more expensive audio gear. When I got the HD 800 (upgrading from the AKG K702s) the only thing that really struck me at first was the soundstage, the rest of the improvements took me a few weeks to understand the many other differences that I was hearing. As for these, we shall see...

    I was wondering if using them as nearfield monitors (as well as the terrible spot they are in with tons of random things around them) so close to me diminishes the sound (am I wasting a lot of the potential of the speakers by having them so close?). Luckily when I move out towards the later of the month they will be placed much farther away from each other and not on top of a folding plastic table (and possibly put on some speaker stands).
     
  20. SineDave

    SineDave Friend

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    It's funny, but as an audio guy (and a video guy), I really notice the effect of AT screens on higher frequencies. No amount of EQ seems to make it sound natural to me again, so i'm sort of stuck in between. Most likely i'll just convince my wife I need a 2nd room for the stereo listening :)
     

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