I'm not surprised you've not heard many commercial dipoles, simply because there aren't many around. Martin-Logan have stopped making the CLS, and their hybrid speakers seem to me to be almost hybrid the wrong way, in that the lower down you go the bigger the advantages of dipole operation.
The disadvantages of dipoles are that you need space behind the speaker, so they need to be pulled well into the room, and because of dipole roll-off you need big drivers and quite a few of them, plus of course active EQ. None of these are high on the list of desires for most speaker buyers, and hence sellers.
Maggies are the only popular full range dipoles I can think of as Quads are too bass limited and Gradients are somewhat rare, and Maggies come with their own set of compromises.
The best thing is that dipoles are so easy to build, especially subs. Just grab some drivers, whack them in an H-baffle and have a listen.
Steve
The disadvantages of dipoles are that you need space behind the speaker, so they need to be pulled well into the room, and because of dipole roll-off you need big drivers and quite a few of them, plus of course active EQ. None of these are high on the list of desires for most speaker buyers, and hence sellers.
Maggies are the only popular full range dipoles I can think of as Quads are too bass limited and Gradients are somewhat rare, and Maggies come with their own set of compromises.
The best thing is that dipoles are so easy to build, especially subs. Just grab some drivers, whack them in an H-baffle and have a listen.
Steve
@ pete fleming
I wouldn´t bother too much about room sensitivity. I have tried my dipoles in different rooms and found them always enjoyable. What they really didn´t like was standing in front of a big window (2.5 m tall, 5 m across). Nasty echoes there ...
My usual setup has one loudspeaker near a sidewall and the other one just in the middle of the room. As long as you can keep them 1 m (or more) from the backwall, you should give it a try.
My experience: Keep the space between the loudspeakers free from furniture. Any obstacles there can really hurt the precision of imaging.
Rudolf
I wouldn´t bother too much about room sensitivity. I have tried my dipoles in different rooms and found them always enjoyable. What they really didn´t like was standing in front of a big window (2.5 m tall, 5 m across). Nasty echoes there ...
My usual setup has one loudspeaker near a sidewall and the other one just in the middle of the room. As long as you can keep them 1 m (or more) from the backwall, you should give it a try.
My experience: Keep the space between the loudspeakers free from furniture. Any obstacles there can really hurt the precision of imaging.
Rudolf
Thanks Steve,
As you mentioned, there is little effort involved in trying this configuration, particularly if I use the W18 instead of the W22 since I can then use them in the Thor if I’m not satisfied. Upon re-reading the Linkwitz site I see the US$300 he’s charging is actually for more than the plans so going down that path isn’t as absurd as I first thought.
A passive line-level crossover has always appealed to me, handling low level signals is always so much simpler. However my present speakers are about 1 metre from the drivers to the wall and I’m not prepared to come out any further than this. Quite apart from my girlfriend attempting to dangle me by my goolies (you just don’t want to mess with an angry Finn), it’s not practical in that room. I get the impression that to get a reasonable in-room response the equalisation can sometimes be quite severe … hopefully it can be implemented a little more successfully than the Bose 901!
Unlike many, I’m not at all interested in heavy or extended bottom end, and find the “wow” factor of electrostatics a bit tiring after a while. It would be nice to capture just a little of what I heard in the MBLs.
As a matter of interest Steve, did you buy the drivers locally?
Cheers,
Pete
As you mentioned, there is little effort involved in trying this configuration, particularly if I use the W18 instead of the W22 since I can then use them in the Thor if I’m not satisfied. Upon re-reading the Linkwitz site I see the US$300 he’s charging is actually for more than the plans so going down that path isn’t as absurd as I first thought.
A passive line-level crossover has always appealed to me, handling low level signals is always so much simpler. However my present speakers are about 1 metre from the drivers to the wall and I’m not prepared to come out any further than this. Quite apart from my girlfriend attempting to dangle me by my goolies (you just don’t want to mess with an angry Finn), it’s not practical in that room. I get the impression that to get a reasonable in-room response the equalisation can sometimes be quite severe … hopefully it can be implemented a little more successfully than the Bose 901!
Unlike many, I’m not at all interested in heavy or extended bottom end, and find the “wow” factor of electrostatics a bit tiring after a while. It would be nice to capture just a little of what I heard in the MBLs.
As a matter of interest Steve, did you buy the drivers locally?
Cheers,
Pete
Phear said:Hey nice work!
Once you tried open baffles you don´t go back to boxes. -One of the ten DIY-commandments. I to am a bit "Linkwitzified". I'm currently going för the Phoenix approach with separate subs & high/mid. I'm still in the prototype stage...
I'm using Scan-speak 9300 tweters, Vifa XT18WH09 6,5"mids (gonna buy 2 more tho) & MDS Fanatic 12" carwoofers.
cheers
/Per
Hi Per,
I sent you an email yesterday on an off-topic question (the XT18 driver).
By the way, what is the fuzzy stuff on your mid/hi baffle?
Regards,
Eric
i got abuot 2 hours at the show in Neu Isenberg (Frankfurt). 7V was there longer. i saw quite a few dipoles that too by accident. one was a room that also demoed a 300kg power amp. the speakers were small in comparision. 2 x 12" with a 6" and 1" for the top. The other was a dipole using a 6" or 8" midbass and a B&G tweeter.
both however claimed to control the rear radiation pattern to form some sort of cardoid. any ideas about this? it seems to be a new trend.
so far i find that the impression about dipoles is (like horns) they have to huge to produce decent bass (compared a sealed box or TL or bass reflex) levels. anyone has had contarary experiences?
both however claimed to control the rear radiation pattern to form some sort of cardoid. any ideas about this? it seems to be a new trend.
so far i find that the impression about dipoles is (like horns) they have to huge to produce decent bass (compared a sealed box or TL or bass reflex) levels. anyone has had contarary experiences?
sorry i meant all in german?
anyway I was in germany visiting friends in Dreieich-Buchschlag. i arrived on the 29th morning and on the 30th i decided to go to Zeil to shop. It was raining so i headed back early. i noticed a hi fi show poster in the S bahn station so the next morn (1st June) I managed to escape from my friends place and come to the show. the found me 2 hours later and dragged home me for lunch.
anyway I was in germany visiting friends in Dreieich-Buchschlag. i arrived on the 29th morning and on the 30th i decided to go to Zeil to shop. It was raining so i headed back early. i noticed a hi fi show poster in the S bahn station so the next morn (1st June) I managed to escape from my friends place and come to the show. the found me 2 hours later and dragged home me for lunch.
*lol*
Konnichiwa,
Of course you CAN change the radiation pattern. It was even done in the old radio receivers with a "flowresistance" (aka back panel with loads of holes) on the rear.
Musik Elektronik Gaithain (still my favourite company to make monitors - I know them since the days when the great wall of Berlin still enclosed the Isalnd in the red sea) has recently introduced a whole range of Speakers having cardiod Low Frequency response.
http://www.me-geithain.de/niere.html
Sadly the text is in German only, but it is a simple solution. Some detail is in a report from production Parter (german Pro-Audio Mag) which is available in English:
http://www.me-geithain.de/presse/sondere.htm
Another way to create a cardiod woofer is to combine a dipole and a monopole (selaed box) in one system, as it is done by W-Vier in their "Unipole" subwoofer. A study at wvier.de claims advantages for the unipole over the dipole, though in practical tems their measurements show not all that much difference. I think for DIY using Dipoles is an excellent solution, also because of the simplicity in building.
It has already been mentioned, but the Behringer DCX2496 digital crossover makes a pretty good controller for such systems, as does the dbx Driverack.
And you could build multichannel, suitable gain for Pro-Audio compatible (clipping at +20dbu) "gainclones" with balanced input to drive the various speaker drivers.
You could even use a variable impedance Chipamp (aka gainclone) to control the drivers Qt, so you could use a low Fs driver like the Peerless 12" XLS but electronically raise it's Qt to > 1 (without linkwitz poles/zero filter) for the woofer section.
And how about a Seas 6.5" Coax (XP cone) as "fullrange"? This has a Qm so low that you can drive the cone on an open baffle with pure current drive (Qt = Qm), killing loads of distortion and compression in one go.
Sayonara
sfdoddsy said:
Of course you CAN change the radiation pattern. It was even done in the old radio receivers with a "flowresistance" (aka back panel with loads of holes) on the rear.
Musik Elektronik Gaithain (still my favourite company to make monitors - I know them since the days when the great wall of Berlin still enclosed the Isalnd in the red sea) has recently introduced a whole range of Speakers having cardiod Low Frequency response.
http://www.me-geithain.de/niere.html
Sadly the text is in German only, but it is a simple solution. Some detail is in a report from production Parter (german Pro-Audio Mag) which is available in English:
http://www.me-geithain.de/presse/sondere.htm
Another way to create a cardiod woofer is to combine a dipole and a monopole (selaed box) in one system, as it is done by W-Vier in their "Unipole" subwoofer. A study at wvier.de claims advantages for the unipole over the dipole, though in practical tems their measurements show not all that much difference. I think for DIY using Dipoles is an excellent solution, also because of the simplicity in building.
It has already been mentioned, but the Behringer DCX2496 digital crossover makes a pretty good controller for such systems, as does the dbx Driverack.
And you could build multichannel, suitable gain for Pro-Audio compatible (clipping at +20dbu) "gainclones" with balanced input to drive the various speaker drivers.
You could even use a variable impedance Chipamp (aka gainclone) to control the drivers Qt, so you could use a low Fs driver like the Peerless 12" XLS but electronically raise it's Qt to > 1 (without linkwitz poles/zero filter) for the woofer section.
And how about a Seas 6.5" Coax (XP cone) as "fullrange"? This has a Qm so low that you can drive the cone on an open baffle with pure current drive (Qt = Qm), killing loads of distortion and compression in one go.
Sayonara
I haven't heard the cardioid Geithains so far but some older models.
At one hifi-show they had one of the best presentations IMO. There were just two of their monitors and a CD player with output pot (don't remember the make and model) and they simply blew a way (in terms of quality) some systems costing much much more. I have to admit however that they were looking quite ugly.
Meyersound is using cardioid woofers for P.A. purposes:
http://www.meyersound.com/products/mseries/m3d-sub/index.htm
I also have a JAES article somewhere, where the necessary signal-processing is described to generate a cardioid soundfiled with closed-box woofers. If anyone is really interested I'll try to find it.
Regards
Charles
At one hifi-show they had one of the best presentations IMO. There were just two of their monitors and a CD player with output pot (don't remember the make and model) and they simply blew a way (in terms of quality) some systems costing much much more. I have to admit however that they were looking quite ugly.
Meyersound is using cardioid woofers for P.A. purposes:
http://www.meyersound.com/products/mseries/m3d-sub/index.htm
I also have a JAES article somewhere, where the necessary signal-processing is described to generate a cardioid soundfiled with closed-box woofers. If anyone is really interested I'll try to find it.
Regards
Charles
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