my 2 cents (do they still have centimes and pfennigs ?) -- we DIY to push the state of the art forward.
initially I DIY'd to save money -- this was cabinetry -- then I realized that I did a much better job than anything I could purchase -- after all, who would use the "french polish" technique on cabinets in their kid's bedroom --
DIY -- in ham radio land we are finding that some of the modded receivers (Drake) from 30 years ago can be made to dramatically outperform the high end devices of today with only modest changes --
initially I DIY'd to save money -- this was cabinetry -- then I realized that I did a much better job than anything I could purchase -- after all, who would use the "french polish" technique on cabinets in their kid's bedroom --
DIY -- in ham radio land we are finding that some of the modded receivers (Drake) from 30 years ago can be made to dramatically outperform the high end devices of today with only modest changes --
ShinOBIWAN said:
If you eliminate the "pleasure of the hobby" and the quest for a "different sound" - and then compare a diy effort on a price v. quality basis (without labor costs). I think your right - it would be difficult to match this speaker.
On a materials basis alone this is a very good value. GOOD custom drivers - oxide coated aluminum - and several of them. The box(s) to a diyer would be at leat 100 US total - NOT including veneer. The veneer would likely cost another 100 US. Then there is the crossover - we don't really know the quality of the parts used here, but still - it won't be nominal.
On an engineering basis you have a reasonably flat freq. response in-room. Excellent off-axis performance. An astounding "linear" decay. ..and yes a break-up resonance outside most peoples ability to hear which is NOT at 17 kHz, but rather around 24-5 kHz. The response is tilted up very slightly, but chances are most will listen at a distance greater than 50 inches.
Again (to those who would say otherwise): REAL VALUE.
So it seems like it's a reason NOT to DIY... if the RS6 is EXACTLY what one is after.
Bass - All my friends and myself prefer sealed bass from 12" woofers over a ported 6". I am very skeptical that this will be great bass output and clarity. I expect high nonlinear distortion here, and perhaps also poor transient response though I admit not all ported designs have poor transient response. One may say this 6" bass unit is a "value" compromise but DIY designs can use sealed 12"s and still keep under $1000 for the completed speaker, whether active or passive.
Midrange - looks good actually, but no one here knows how it would compare to a SEAS Excel Magnesium. Also note that not everyone here like the sound of metal midranges in general.
I hate to argue with the more knowledgeable members here, but it seems like the cost of DIY is overestimated by many members here, who may use expensive tools and fancy veneers. To me the cost of DIY is only the drivers and crossovers. If going active, add the cost of the power supply which is pretty cheap. The rest is either very cheap or free. All I have is a dremel and the rest is carved by hand.
I would love to see the RS6 become popular and later have a DIY member beat this speaker for half the cost (according to listening tests).
Bass - All my friends and myself prefer sealed bass from 12" woofers over a ported 6". I am very skeptical that this will be great bass output and clarity. I expect high nonlinear distortion here, and perhaps also poor transient response though I admit not all ported designs have poor transient response. One may say this 6" bass unit is a "value" compromise but DIY designs can use sealed 12"s and still keep under $1000 for the completed speaker, whether active or passive.
Midrange - looks good actually, but no one here knows how it would compare to a SEAS Excel Magnesium. Also note that not everyone here like the sound of metal midranges in general.
I hate to argue with the more knowledgeable members here, but it seems like the cost of DIY is overestimated by many members here, who may use expensive tools and fancy veneers. To me the cost of DIY is only the drivers and crossovers. If going active, add the cost of the power supply which is pretty cheap. The rest is either very cheap or free. All I have is a dremel and the rest is carved by hand.
I would love to see the RS6 become popular and later have a DIY member beat this speaker for half the cost (according to listening tests).
cotdt said:
Your stuck between a rock and hard place with DIY... why? Well there's a 99.9% chance that the design your wanting to build won't actually be auditionable until you've already:
A) Shelled out on the drivers, crossover and other materials
B) Spent hours and hours of time building them
After this you may get extremely lucky and have EXACTLY what you looking for
Or you may need to go out and buy some more crossover bits or maybe swap out the drivers for something different or maybe rebuild the cabinets to something more suitable or maybe pick another design altogether etc. etc.Its very easy to see where this can all start to spiral in cost and time spent on just a single design. If your really picky you could still be working on the project a year later (like me).
Now the great thing about commercial stuff and especially speakers in the <$1000 bracket is that you can audition them. Its all very painless and can save you on unforseen expenses.
If you DIY for the love of DIY then great but there's also no denying that the RS6's are superb speaker and a tough design to beat with a DIY design of a similar budget. I know non of really do but if you start to factor in time and labour then it looks increasingly tough to beat.
Still not sure what you getting at regarding ported vs. sealed. I've heard both sound every bit as good as the other. There's a much greater chance to mess up a ported design so I expect you just haven't heard the right design yet and yes, I agree that many budget ported commercial speaker do sound 'rough' but ported does have a huge capacity to sound quite astounding when done correctly.
To really build sucessful and great sounding DIY designs you do have to invest in some tools however cheap or expensive they may be.
Then you need more than dremel to build cabinets that really do look like a professional made them rather than someone in a potting shed. So that means investing in some of the following: router and bits, table saw, mitre saw, drill, orbital sander. These all add up to a considerable sum of money for quality tools and that expense isn't easily recovered unless your really churning out designs. Most folks tend to slowly build up a collection of tools since the really good ones are so damned expensive and if your doing all this for a single project then it really does make the whole idea look rather daft. Of course you can build cabinets that look like filth but I very rarely see that happening on here.
Active electronics aren't cheap for something that will perform better than good passive components. Amplification for active speakers isn't cheap if you'd like to maintain a certain level of quality.
Andy Graddon said:
Andy,
Your forgetting that building anything other than a rectangular box requires a fair amount of skill and lots of planning. Many DIY'ers just don't have the skill or time to do that.
And for commercial designs to take a more intricate shape always means massive cost increases. So that's why you only see the really beautiful speakers in the high end arena with a price tag to match.
Sure curves are a bit harder, but sloped sides, and other flat surfaced shapes are not really that much more difficult than a rectangular. It's just a matter of taking the effort to sketch a few things first and see if you can come up with something that works.
It can just add that bit of elegance and certainly gives a much larger feeling of "I did that" than simply cloning a rectangle.
Odd that everyone seems to understand complicated software for x-o design, but can't do simple calculations of volume and angles ;-)
and btw its "YOU'RE" not "your" when shortened from "you are".
as a pommie you should know better
It can just add that bit of elegance and certainly gives a much larger feeling of "I did that" than simply cloning a rectangle.
Odd that everyone seems to understand complicated software for x-o design, but can't do simple calculations of volume and angles ;-)
and btw its "YOU'RE" not "your" when shortened from "you are".
as a pommie you should know better
Andy Graddon said:
Andy,
I couldn't find your website this morning (dumps me to the TPG error page).
But 'most' DIY efforts are actually rectangular cabinets (edit: ShinOBIWAN, you stole my thunder!). Seriously, if you haven't got something to compare your DIY efforts against, then you're just going to end up with something that you are familiar with, but may or may not sound any good.
I can think of examples - but one that struck home was when a friend (of a friend) brought some of his home-made wine over for us to try. He had been raving about it (flavour, etc), but when we tasted it, it was pretty much like vinegar (with raspberry cordial in it). And his palate had been so jaded that he couldn't enjoy any of the (quite) nice wines that we were drinking - they all tasted too sweet and over-powering.
The same thing happens in audio, where science and psuedo-science get confused. And then people end up buying SETs and silver power cables and blocks of wood for $99ea that are just supposed to sit around near your stereo making it sound naturally good (http://1388.com/html/body_c16_tmf.html).
The Monitor Audio range have been good value for the money, and I'm sure these are no exception (even with the peak at 20kHz). They'd be useful as a reference speaker - but I use Elac as mine (yes, another box).
A serious reason TO DIY
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Andy Graddon said:
You oversimplify matters.
Its easy to take your own abilities for granted and also to assume others can do the same straight off the bat. Even if you put in all the calculations, drawings and design work some folks still can't achieve anything other than a rectangular, heck some struggle with that.
I also disagree with you about the curved side speakers, I found that they are relatively simple to do but speakers with angled surfaces are much tougher and especially to do correctly. These were the first speakers I ever built:
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They were surprisingly easy to do but found much more of a challenge with angled speakers.
and btw its "YOU'RE" not "your" when shortened from "you are".
as a pommie you should know better
Just because we had a large hand in inventing the english language doesn't mean that every Englishman speaks perfect English. Perhaps some of us over here are illiterate.
Or maybe I type quickly and don't pay a great deal of attention to something as casual as typing a reply to message on a internet forum. If I realised I was getting marked on this I really would have put more effort in
You're right, curved stuff isn't that hard really either, but you have to attempt it before you realise that !!.
It's your right to have a slight difference in opinion about construction difficulty ;-))
Sorry about the "YOU'RE" correction, it's just something I see everywhere that really bugs me.
Like seeing people type "shure" when they mean "sure".
It's your right to have a slight difference in opinion about construction difficulty ;-))
Sorry about the "YOU'RE" correction, it's just something I see everywhere that really bugs me.
Like seeing people type "shure" when they mean "sure".
Well now, let's see. Nice looking drivers. Pistonic behavior. Excellent. So far, so good. Put one, two, three of them, flat on the face of a speaker box with some ports. Hmm, I wonder what it sounds like? Rub eyes. Yawn. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz........
Cheers,
AJ
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz........
Cheers,
AJ
I'm not sure if the price/quality equation should always be the litmus test for deciding whether or not to DIY - people DIY because they ENJOY it - it's fun, challenging, and emotionally rewarding - things that are difficult to assign a dollar value to - and now and then it gives a superior return on the price/quality investment.
Many people might decide to get a great sounding $1,000 pair of speakers solely because they can't beat it going DIY, but perhaps those people would simply prefer not to build in the first place; others of us want to build, regardless.
Let us not forget that this is a HOBBY, and one that isn't always persued purely on the basis of economics.
Many people might decide to get a great sounding $1,000 pair of speakers solely because they can't beat it going DIY, but perhaps those people would simply prefer not to build in the first place; others of us want to build, regardless.
Let us not forget that this is a HOBBY, and one that isn't always persued purely on the basis of economics.
AJinFLA said:Well now, let's see. Nice looking drivers. Pistonic behavior. Excellent. So far, so good. Put one, two, three of them, flat on the face of a speaker box with some ports. Hmm, I wonder what it sounds like? Rub eyes. Yawn. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz........
Cheers,
AJ
Its true.. it doesn't exactly have the "wow" factor of other designs - but most that I can think of cost a LOT more (commercially). ..and I can't think of any that measure anywhere near as well.
Of course "wow" factor typically has little to do with sound quality, but if it's an impediment to even hear the design - then it does have to "factor-in" to a degree. (..and so does esthetics generally - the speaker's gold/silver/black may be a little to much "pimp-my-ride" for some.)
I don't care how rich I ever get, I'll always like DIY. My dream prebuilt speakers would be the B&W Nautilus 800 for ~$30k/pr.
Even if I could go down and buy a pair tomorrow, I'd still build different DIY designs and compare them to the 800 with the goal of eventually building something that sounds better.
Square boxes are never boring if they make the music sound so good that your forget they're even involved. When I seriously listen to music, I do it with my eyes closed most of the time.
Even if I could go down and buy a pair tomorrow, I'd still build different DIY designs and compare them to the 800 with the goal of eventually building something that sounds better.
Square boxes are never boring if they make the music sound so good that your forget they're even involved. When I seriously listen to music, I do it with my eyes closed most of the time.
Cool looking plotsSarchi said:
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