My seas millenniums have a lot of audible artefacts and they are crossed at 1400 Hz (Linkwitz Orions)
It is an extreme choice and it comes (very often
) with its huge problems.
I'm trying to find some wave guides in order to replace them by two B&C DE250, i'm still searching
But in your usage scenario you will be dealing with a different kind of lobing - that between the main and the reflected sound.
Other than that, I will keep on reiterating that we have a lot more to worry about than just lobing, and audio pursuit is never perfection but always a juggling act.
Non linear distortion, the only compromise. That's why you measure the non-linear distortion of the woofer and tweeter at different listening levels, decide what listening level you want to optimise for and then pick the frequency to cross at where the tweeter is lower distortion above and the woofer lower below.
And yes woofers can have problems with non linear distortion too, mostly due to their cone breakup modes pushing up the magnitude of distortion components in the upper mid to lower treble range. So if you push up the crossover too high not only do you become more susceptible to lobing off-axis, but you might reveal some distortion from the woofer too!
Zaph audio published an article investigating different crossover points, slopes and the effects on system non-linear distortion here:
Zaph|Audio - Design Contest Results
That little SB29 neo held up with a crossover of 1.1kHz at 110dB SPL! It just required a 6th order slope.
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Coincidentally, silver speaker cables reputedly lend a brightness to the sound, while copper cables might add warmth instead. I wonder why this might be...
Coincidentally, silver speaker cables reputedly lend a brightness to the sound, while copper cables might add warmth instead. I wonder why this might be...
In general what you said is true, but there are silver cables that are pretty nice. I have a set of QED silver interconnects and speaker cables and although they do tend to be just a bit on the right side of neutral, they are very nice sounding with very expansive soundstage. Maybe the conductivity of silver is higher than copper but I am not sure.
I think they were taking the p*ss; silver vs copper cables don't make a difference.
I would never consider crossing a dome tweeter over as low as 1500Hz, dome tweeters just don't sound any good at low frequencies, regardless of what the specifications may claim on paper for the few domes that claim to be able to go this low. (But then, I'm not a fan of dome tweeters in general)
The only reason to cross it over so low is trying to match the directivity at the crossover point, but the sacrifice is not worth it. To deal with directivity matching you're better to use a smaller midrange driver that can be crossed over higher, or use a waveguide loaded tweeter that better matches the directivity of the midbass driver at a more reasonable higher crossover frequency.
My preference is for the latter. When chosen correctly a waveguide mounted tweeter can also equalise the acoustic centre offset of the two drivers, killing two birds with one stone. It can also significantly reduce the effects of baffle edge diffraction giving a smoother overall on axis response and smoother polar response.
The vast majority of low to mid price speakers on the market use dome tweeters, cross them over too low, and make no effort to align the acoustic centre of the drivers, (or deal with it in the crossover with a delay or an all pass filter) or deal with baffle diffraction. Rounding the edge of a flat baffle only pays lip service to diffraction and has very little effect compared to using a waveguide.
It's not for no reason that the majority of low to mid price speakers on the market don't sound very good when they all follow the same flawed design approaches like sheep.
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I feel compelled to post this link, because it gives all the details of the off-axis midrange/mid-woofer response I talked about initially.
Speaker Off Axis: "Correct" Driver Diameters for Great Off Axis Response - Acoustic Frontiers
Speaker Off Axis: "Correct" Driver Diameters for Great Off Axis Response - Acoustic Frontiers
If you cross at 500Hz or 2K there will still be non-negligible phase shift through the 500Hz to 2Khz region.
I believe it was proven that for phase shift to be audible it must be severe e.g. 360degrees over 1/3 of an octave or less. Normal speaker crossover filters are no where near that.
A thred after my own hart…
I cannot add much in the way of using domes at or below 1.5k. My experience here is just too limited. However I have been working for decades on development of smaller ribbon designs that can be crossed at or below 1 k with simple passive filters. The reason for this effort is simple, to my ears when the crossover is at or below this point it becomes easy for just about anyone with just about any cone, to get good sound.
As mentioned with domes the issues are distortion and diffraction. And of course in the case of a ribbon some tradeoff in vertical dispersion. A tradeoff that IMO is small ( if ribbon below about 4 inches long) compared to the benefit of a crossover low enough to avoid the multitude of other less forgiving issues.
All I can say is this, once the distortion issue is overcome and a cabinet geometry and or driver position is adopted that tames diffraction issues, magic is almost too easy to come by at these lower crossover points.
I cannot add much in the way of using domes at or below 1.5k. My experience here is just too limited. However I have been working for decades on development of smaller ribbon designs that can be crossed at or below 1 k with simple passive filters. The reason for this effort is simple, to my ears when the crossover is at or below this point it becomes easy for just about anyone with just about any cone, to get good sound.
As mentioned with domes the issues are distortion and diffraction. And of course in the case of a ribbon some tradeoff in vertical dispersion. A tradeoff that IMO is small ( if ribbon below about 4 inches long) compared to the benefit of a crossover low enough to avoid the multitude of other less forgiving issues.
All I can say is this, once the distortion issue is overcome and a cabinet geometry and or driver position is adopted that tames diffraction issues, magic is almost too easy to come by at these lower crossover points.
Hi gabdx
I'm afraid I have to disagree. Perhaps that dullness you mentioned is due to phase cancellations.
Silver conductivity is 5% more than copper. This should not matter at all . The resistivity of the cables will be a negligible factor usually when compared to the resistances in the circuits that are being connected !
If there is brighter sound with silver cables then it must be lifting the HF response which is what makes sound brighter. This appears to be impossible and it would be as flat at HF as with copper cables. Then there must be some other mechanism that causes the 'bright sound' . Quantum quirks ?
Then there must be some other mechanism that causes the 'bright sound' . Quantum quirks ?
Well if I knew, I guess I wouldn't be here. But it seems like the general consensus among the audiophile community is that silver cables tend to have a brighter sound vs. copper. Is it the conductivity? I don't know. I am sure there are bright sounding copper cables as well, but then where does the "silver is brighter vs. copper" come from? May be some guy started the rumor and everybody else just followed.
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