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Post by John on Mar 24, 2015 8:43:39 GMT
Yes I have similar thoughts
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Post by Deleted on Mar 24, 2015 9:22:19 GMT
SEAS drive units from Falcon Acoustics www.falconacoustics.co.uk/drive-units-1/seas-drive-units/seas-linkwitz-lx521-orion-driver-sets/linkwitz-lx521-speakers-kit.html £865.51 . Building your own woodwork from 19mm baltic birch ply is the cheapest way, 2 off 2440 x 1220, about £150 if you have the woodwork skills, plus finishing. If not, buy an LX521 woodwork kit made with NC machined parts from www.magiclx521.com/lx521-components.html for €821.10, but you still need to finish them (paint, veneer etc) . You need an electronic crossover; that used to be analogue, but the current approach is a DSP crossover with config files dowloadable from Linkwitz's site. Couple of hundred for the DSP. Plans are about £100, which is Linkwitz's beer money. And you need 8 channels of amplification (4 each for L and R). The ones that seems to be recommended that don't bust the bank are Emotiva XPA-5 emotiva.com/products/amplifiers/xpa-5 . Including shipping of the 32kg each beasts to the UK, and adding VAT comes to about £1,800 So the grand total without cables and connectors is in the region of £3.5-£4k. As I said it was a great act of faith to stump up that lot on a DIY build. I complicated things by building my own power amps based on Doug Self's "blameless" approach. That actually cost me more than buying a pair of XPA-5! An excellent site for building them step by step is here www.ohio.edu/people/schneidw/audio/lx521.htmlI wasn't expecting such an informative answer, but thanks, it puts me acurately in the picture. £3.5-£4K for reference speakers and amplification is not bad at all. Maybe a project for the future. There is quite a few reviews about the LX521 out there that compare them sonically to commercial speakers in the £40k to £60k range. The only speakers that I've heard that are substantially better than the LX521 are YG-Anat www.yg-acoustics.com/category/anat-iii but they are in the >£100k price range. Owned by an old mate who has made a shed load of money as part of a stupidly high end/price system that you could buy a house with.
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Post by danielquinn on Mar 24, 2015 9:58:51 GMT
What about wadding. Is it a myth that you need the stuff in the first place or is it a myth that you can actually do without it? A good point. From my own experience of building my own speakers and tweaking commercial products, the use of foam is an absolute cost saving manufacturers compromise and for good open sound, not the way to go. Depending on your speaker design, most tweeters need nothing because they are fully enclosed, but that is not the absolute rule because some are not. In a two way system, the mid bass will prefer a relatively open chamber, usually without any stuffing including long haired wool, but work well with natural fibre thick underlay carpet felt stuck to the cabinet sides and behind the driver on the back panel. How far you extend the area covered is a suck and see situation and if more damping is needed, a second layer can be added and further enhanced by folding the second layer in a ripple or concertina style. if you have a three way, the midrange driver is likely to be within a dedicated sealed chamber. In this case, and in general, line the chamber four internal sides (not the baffle) with one layer of underlay felt and tease out some long hair wool to fill the rest of the chamber. All of this is completely adjustable so you can add/remove to your preference. Also, if a three way, the treatment to the bass chamber remains as above and is also completely adjustable to taste. In a bass reflex, port tuning is a must and probably one of the most difficult factors to get right as they can readily give you a pump of overblown bass when the music sound coincides with port frequency. It's a difficult thing to tune out and takes lots of fiddling but is worth it in the end. Having said that, you'll never get it completely right because the controlling criteria is what the sound engineer originally laid down in the recording. I have no doubt there are many of us here who have great sounding systems, but find certain recordings simply fail to work or are spoilt through unwanted bass bloom which is not to do with our set up and very much to do with how the sound engineer laid the recording down. I am curious as to what stuffing does that lining the cabinets with carpet underlay or bitumen will not do . Imo the answer is nothing . both are forms of internal damping and is in my experience bad , as it acts as filter . It will do it unevenly accross the frequency spectrum , it thus ranges from a moderate adhoc tone control to killer of the music . Solution is to strengthen the cabinet with steel plate or use modern materials that will not resonate .
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 12:35:44 GMT
Daniel, Just because you, and some friends, on HFS have had success with removing damping, fitting steel plates and doping drivers, does not necessarily mean that EVERY speaker so modified will sound better.
I have a few friends who between them have engineered and built some really wonderful sounding speakers and judicious use of damping materials can help to get the final "voice" right.
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Post by ChrisB on Mar 24, 2015 12:41:39 GMT
That's kind of how hi-fi myths seem to happen - when individual (or even numerous) examples of something working well become 'universal truths'.
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 12:53:51 GMT
That's kind of how hi-fi myths seem to happen - when individual (or even numerous) examples of something working well become 'universal truths'. Yes indeed.
I have no reason to doubt that the "Doc (Dunn) mods" do work on a lot of older speakers, more so cheap mass produced models, but I don't think it's a panacea (or magic bullet) for every speaker ever built.
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Post by danielquinn on Mar 24, 2015 13:15:54 GMT
Daniel, Just because you, and some friends, on HFS have had success with removing damping, fitting steel plates and doping drivers, does not necessarily mean that EVERY speaker so modified will sound better.
I have a few friends who between them have engineered and built some really wonderful sounding speakers and judicious use of damping materials can help to get the final "voice" right. I never said it did and it can hardly be a myth when it is fighting against hifi orthodoxy . i never mentioned docs mods , and i seem to recall the bringing of disputes from elsewhere is against the rules , I do not however see any moderation and indeed an administrator endorsing your post which is against the rules . Go figure that if you can . my point was that padding the walls is no different than inserting wadding , so to say one is rubbish and recommend the other appears to be suspect . damping attenuates , simple as that , it is in effect a tone control , this may be favored by some that deosnt mean it does not . it helps if you address the point .
however , as you brought it up, many of the people who have tried doc mods have expensive speakers and a wealth of experience with a plethora of speakers so your comment on cheap speakers shows you up for the kind of person you are and is totally disrespectful to them .
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 13:25:29 GMT
Well Daniel, you are starting to make it personal now.
So what "sort of person" am I ?
I thought that no "ad hominem" was one of the golden rules on HFS ??
I would have thought that a man with legal experience would concentrate on what I actually said, not what you thought I might have said or implied.
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Post by ChrisB on Mar 24, 2015 13:34:49 GMT
DQ - The statement was perfectly valid and showed no evidence of a pre-existing dispute. No rule was broken. Just because you and he have 'previous' doesn't mean that everything he says in disagreement is an attack on you or anyone else. And vice versa.
However, your final paragraph does break a rule.
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Post by danielquinn on Mar 24, 2015 13:36:53 GMT
My post is clear is it also a logical , accurate and reasonable inference to what you have written. Your response is unreasonable , disproportionate and itself ad homien .
i further note you remain silent upon the attenuation issue , i assume this is agreed .
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Post by danielquinn on Mar 24, 2015 13:38:49 GMT
DQ - The statement was perfectly valid and showed no evidence of a pre-existing dispute. No rule was broken. Just because you and he have 'previous' doesn't mean that everything he says in disagreement is an attack on you or anyone else. And vice versa. However, your final paragraph does break a rule. Rubbish . he brought in a dispute from elsewhere which is specifically forbidden . re final paragraph - Do tell how ?
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 13:39:03 GMT
Not sure if it's a myth, but have metal dome tweeters got more refined over the years ?
I have , in the loft, a pair of Musical Fidelity MC-2 speakers (the first iteration) and the treble on them was uncouth. I also have a pair of
Linaeum ribbonish tweeters which some say are "sweet" so a future project might see them on the MC-2 and possibly some of the "Doc mods" as well.
I purchased the MC-2 brand new from The Audiphile in Bishop Stortford and I'm loath to sell them, even though the have been unused for yonks.
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Post by ChrisB on Mar 24, 2015 13:42:09 GMT
Your response is unreasonable , disproportionate and itself ad homien . Indeed it is, so please, the pair of you stop the attacks. Back to the topic: DQ, I think you have inferred more than was intended on the comment about cheap speakers - what I get from it is that cheap speakers need all the help they can get (especially modern ones) and so they benefit particularly well from this treatment.
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 13:43:18 GMT
My post is clear is it also a logical , accurate and reasonable inference to what you have written. Your response is unreasonable , disproportionate and itself ad homien . i further note you remain silent upon the attenuation issue , i assume this is agreed . I don't disagree with anything you say as I'm sure it may well apply to some, if not more, of the vast amount of loudspeakers laying around peoples homes. I take exception to you saying I disrespect the members of HFS, because if you read my post again I most certainly did say no such thing.
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Post by MartinT on Mar 24, 2015 13:47:45 GMT
i never mentioned docs mods , and i seem to recall the bringing of disputes from elsewhere is against the rules To be fair, RD's mods were mentioned in this thread a while ago by someone else and may have suffered from my clean-up operations.
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Post by AlanS on Mar 24, 2015 13:48:00 GMT
That's kind of how hi-fi myths seem to happen - when individual (or even numerous) examples of something working well become 'universal truths'. Yes indeed.
I have no reason to doubt that the so called "Doc (Dunn) mods" do work on a lot of older speakers, more so cheap mass produced models, but I don't think it's a panacea (or magic bullet) for every speaker ever built. Dear Friendly pre65 The only truth or panacea is speakers need to be fed with an amplified signal (and probably someone will dispute that) so all the surmising about myths are user preference and make the thread futile. Yes I was being sardonic - calling anyone "so called" is not friendly. As I am sure you know all too well. Imagine someone calling you that so call **** poster on TaS.
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Post by danielquinn on Mar 24, 2015 13:48:57 GMT
In that case pre [ re last post of yours on this thread] I accept you did not mean to infer what I took your words to mean .
I see no reason why massifying [ for want of a better word ] cabinets with steel would not work on expensive speakers , especially those designed on the principles of lossy cabinents or indeed made out of wood .
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 13:52:11 GMT
Yes indeed.
I have no reason to doubt that the so called "Doc (Dunn) mods" do work on a lot of older speakers, more so cheap mass produced models, but I don't think it's a panacea (or magic bullet) for every speaker ever built. Dear Friendly pre65 The only truth or panacea is speakers need to be fed with an amplified signal (and probably someone will dispute that) so all the surmising about myths are user preference and make the thread futile. Yes I was being sardonic - calling anyone "so called" is not friendly. As I am sure you know all too well. Imagine someone calling you that so call **** poster on TaS. Indeed, the reference in question has been removed. On reflection, the "so called" referred to the mod itself not the originator of the mod (ie RD). Does that help ?
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Post by ChrisB on Mar 24, 2015 13:55:32 GMT
Rubbish . he brought in a dispute from elsewhere which is specifically forbidden . He mentioned another forum and what you have been discussing there. Talking about HFS or anyone on it is not banned here (unlike some other fora) and, as I said before, it was not evident from what was written that it was a continuation of a pre-existing argument. I think you just interpreted it as such. I'm not sure how else this can be interpreted other than an attack: "....so your comment on cheap speakers shows you up for the kind of person you are "
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Post by pre65 on Mar 24, 2015 13:59:02 GMT
In that case pre [ re last post of yours on this thread] I accept you did not mean to infer what I took your words to mean . I see no reason why massifying [ for want of a better word ] cabinets with steel would not work on expensive speakers , especially those designed on the principles of lossy cabinents or indeed made out of wood . Thank you Daniel.
I've never said that steel plates don't make a difference. The thing is that the resonant frequency of a cabinet needs to be at a certain level, and how do you tell what that is ?
All I can say is, if it works for you then I'm pleased, but I still don't think it's a panacea.
EDIT. I'm reminded of a friend whose favourite saying is "you can't polish a turd". But I'm sure there are lots of speakers that CAN be improved, or at least their characteristics changed to suit the owners own tastes.
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