Pictures of your speaker system

@nlitworld - your picture links appear broken, fyi. The world needs to see that custom paint job!

 

Thanks for the heads up. I thing I might have fixed. Pops up on my phone at least. Oh the joys of modern technology

 

They are certainly pretty! I could go for a threesome with speakers like that.

 

they are beautiful, have wanted to hear these for a while. Have wanted to know how these sound, dam those are pretty
very nice
best,
Josh

 

@Thad E Ginathom @Josh Schor
Thank you for the kind words. Surprisingly they look half as good as they sound. I had a build thread over on AC that went through the whole build/paint process. First speakers I ever built and I think they turned out OK. Worth every penny of materials cost and swear jar contributions.

 

Five years after this picture (and almost 3 years since I got the kits), I have upgraded my living room setup:

I built a pair of Creative Sound Solutions Triton 1-TDXs and a 2-TDX MTM for my LCRs. There are a couple posts in the DIY speaker thread about my kit experience. The RC-10s are now my rear channel speakers (was using some DIY Overnight Sensations prior). Still running my Denon X3400H, though fed by an Apple TV4K now that my Shield died. I got a Rythmik L12 a while back to replace the Dayton sub (the first Wow upgrade). Still a problematic spot, but the Audyssey room correction seems to do its job and the speakers sound WAY better than my trusty Energy RC-10s regardless. The clarity, bass, and just size of the sound are so much bigger and better (almost too much bass - need to dial them down a little). When searching for options to build, I had questions about minimum driver size to get better "thwack." Well, likely nothing like Big Woofer Club folks get, I got the thwack I was looking for from these 7" woofers. Small ensemble, jazz, etc. stuff sounds amazing now.

And while I am super happy about the sound quality upgrade, I am also super excited for my upgraded non-audiophile "gimmick:"

I was able to convince the powers that be to let me install ceiling speakers for some Atmos height effects! I watch TV/movies and play video games 90% of the time in this space, so being able to create a mini theater that was Atmos capable was a dream come true. I may or may not have forced friends to sit through Atmos demos when they visited after these were installed. Now that I have my new main speakers in, the usage time might shift to 25% music, but until I move to a bigger house with a better 2-channel space (probably never since we will never leave the city), my audiophile listening will still be my headphone rig.

 

Nice Michell Gyro SE. What arm are you using with it?

 

Did you try optimizing your AUdyssey calibration with A1 Evo?

 

Hosted a music enthusiast group this weekend. Absolute blast and finally got my space organized enough such that I am comfortable sharing pics. No pics of the group in order to protect the innocent. Trust me, though. There were actual people here.

 

Interesting building. What's the back story?

 

Very nice looking space and kudos on the acoustic treatment too! The rug really ties the room together.

 

Very cool room and system.

Looks like what Chicago real estate folks call a "timber loft."

What drew you to the Vivid speakers?

 

I don't want to be doxed or cased for a robbery but I will share a bit. It's a typical early 1900 something brick commercial building in an American MidWest city area. The entire space is 1000 sq ft plus a huge 20x8' covered balcony in the back. There are several business on the first floor and I am on the second floor. It's a European feel out front with street cafe vibes and such (I'm a big fan of Paris). It's essentially a loft but you can see the middle drywalled area which is a large closet with washer/dryer. The kitchen is on the other side which opens up to another open space around 21x13'. The area is owned by a family who operates a few commercial things in the same space and are very attentive to keeping the place nice. I think over the last several decades they have been investing in this area and it has become a great staple in the community.

A buddy stumbled on this space when he noticed a "vacant" mark on the mailbox and inquired on my behalf. The owners were not advertising and were not really trying to rent it out. They have other stuff to keep them busy. I sweet talked my way into a pretty reasonably priced lease and moved from Metro Detroit. I need to buy a house, but this seemed like a badass place to keep my stereo so I had to take the opportunity.

My stereo room is a touch over 16x16' with 11' nominal ceilings. The stereo is in the "back" because I wanted to be away from street noise and noise from my neighbor. Our TV's are on opposite ends of our respective unit. There is nobody behind my TV wall and the wall behind my seating position is completely covered in (6) 2'x4' acoustical panels. I also work from home, so my office is in the front where I get more natural light throughout the day. I may move the stereo to the front 21x13' space because the physics of that room will no doubt be better, but I do like being in the daylight while I am working. The bass is affected pretty dramatically in the square room which is why I went so silly with corner treatments and diffusors. The floor also resonates at some frequencies that I have not determined, but you can feel it. It still sounds great.

The "bass traps" are just 4" and 2" GIK diffusor panes that I bought used locally. I stuffed some pillows behind to fill the corner a bit. The black arc diffusors also seem to really help. The speakers have side-firing woofers so I put the arc diffusor in-line with those side bass woofers. I feel like this has helped a lot but I still need to take some REW measurements. I made my own acoustical panel with some SRV artwork from years ago, as well as some Acoustimac prints of a few favorite albums and 2 travel photos I took in Ireland that I'm very proud of.

Vivid Audio was one of my first experiences with ultra HiFi 10+ years ago when I first discovered the hobby. The Vivid K1 blew me away when I first heard it and of course a Giya sometime after. They have a really nice clarity and fine level of detail without any fatigue. They also have an insane dispersion where seating offset from the sweet spot still sounds great. I came upon these Kaya 90s at a time when I was looking for a small upgrade but I had an opportunity to acquire them that I could not pass up. I like that they employ a pretty unorthodox approach with Soric cabinets and opposing drivers to enable them to remain light weight. This helps me to be able to manipulate them by myself. They are also properly exotic so I feel pretty cool that I own them. There's all sorts of MDF boxes out there with hand made drivers, but the Vivid just stand out in a way that gets me excited.

 

Vivid definitely has a distinct look. Very Snorks. I'm adding them to my to-hear list.

 

Here's an updated picture. I like this setup better. My wife handmade the quilt which is on display and hopefully has some acoustic benefit for the left speaker.

 

My classic/diy hifi set up in Manila - Altec 755Es in WE/Altec 618 boxes driven by a DIY Radiotron SE2A3 amp with Tango U808 OPTs, DIY 6SL7 + 6SN7 preamp fed by signal from an SME 3012 + DL103 + Shure MC step up or Audio-Technica ATP12T + cheap A-T conical cartridge mounted on a Thorens TD124 MkII turntable

 

I moved a few months ago into a house. I've made some status updates about getting placement of my speakers in a a pretty good spot, and then another about room treatment. I'm not gonna say everything is totally done, but people wanted to see what I had going on, and the room is sounding pretty excellent right now.




I got 6 24"x48"x4" acoustic panels from ATS, they really helped the room. The echo/reverb/etc in here was truly awful, and I just lived with it for 2-3 months. Putting those 6 panels in total transformed the sound. I would make a total guess that my RT60 dropped from like 1-1.5s to like .3-.5s. everything across the board improved. it went from being a kind of terrible smeary mess, to sounding better than my rig ever has. Today adding the diffusion panels at first reflection points and centered on the front wall wasn't as revelatory as the initial panels, but there were improvements to be had. Bass oddly enough improved the most I think, as well as sharper and clearer imaging. Also with the absorption at first reflection points, I could tell the highs were subdued more than they should be, this fixes that minor complaint as well. I am very pleased with the sound right now! New speakers are going to be on their way soon as well, that should also be fun.

Im ~12ft from the speakers, with them being ~11ft apart. ~6ft out from the front and side walls.

Yes, all the panels are on cinder blocks, I have a reputation to uphold lol Also they are cheap and a good height for temporary placement of the panels, I wanted to be able to move everything around and experiment

edit: this was also taken on the ultra wide camera to fit everything in, so it might look a little goofy

 

Mój nowy Altec 604 z otwartą przegrodą
https://photos.app.goo.gl/NWVt9y6jU4AmcLwK6

 

Perhaps my first picture post to this thread, porting over from my ramblings here: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...hannel-advice-thread.3191/page-64#post-435197





Top picture is when I was auditioning both the KEF LS60 and JBL 4329P in my home.

Bottom picture: the KEF won, and I bought some Costco acoustic wall tiles on sale

 

KEF buddies!



I guess this is almost more of a battlestation picture. Still playing round with toe-in angle and port blocking on account of proximity to the walls, but it's a moving target as the speakers break in, so just going to soak it in for a bit.