Full range and graphic equalizer
 

I was not sure where to post this question, but hope the full range fans might have some good input to share.

I want to build two little enclosures using the Audience A3 inch full range drivers and they will be dedicated to classical guitar recordings. I also want to build a graphic equalizer (6 or 8 bands) and want to know if having an equalizer contradicts what I want to accomplish by using a full range driver.

What are your thoughts?

Thank you,
Michael Speaker
(my last project was the Hedlund horn here:
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/full-...208esigma.html)

Before I go into a long explanation, are you willing to use a computer front end or are you comitted to vinyl?

Bob

Go look up the Bose 901. An active equalizer is part of the package.

G²

SACRILEGE!!!

...cool last name btw. May I offer to purchase it?:D


those Hedlund's look spectacular...

What? You think you should have no tone controls? Perhaps do without a volume control too?

No. The primary advantages of FR drivers are the sound staging, the simplicity and ease of driving and the efficiency.

A certain kind of purist might think you were doing something wrong.

I have a pair of FR speakers running from a Sonic Impact amp driven through the TV by a DVD/DTV receiver. They're used for music too, you can plug in a USB stick or play CDs. The TV has a graphic EQ in the onscreen menu, I have it set to knock back the higher frequencies progressively. It's a definite improvement to running the system flat, we don't fiddle with the settings.

TVs are quite useful like that, it has a subwoofer output that I've been meaning to try, I just need a cloak of invisibility to get this ugly black box past my wife.

w

the a3 has a rising response. Audience uses 4 in a vertical array with no eq.............

Eq certainly helps bass, but modulation distortion catchs up really fast. It is usefull for baffle step, but at the end of the day, you are limited by cone area / music / and distance from the speakers. Dual 4" 4mm xmax with eq doesn't cut the mustard for me listening to blues traveller 12' away. It sounded strained and distorted.

The a3's arn't cheap but have double the usable xmax. For me, big whup, I'd rather use a larger area driver (such as Alpair or Tang band, maybe fostex).

Oh yea, and eq isn't transparant. You give some, you lose some.

Norman

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, why not try a MiniDSP solution? I am using one to aid my enclosure research and it sounds great.
Yes, every additional 'stage' introduces its own issues and some of its own flavour. If you don't need it, don't use it. Active EQ does do away with the need for passive BSC, however.

I would be very surprised if you could buy or make a good quality, good sounding analogue EQ for anything like the price, and you still don't get the incredible versatility of all that DSP goodness.

Just the steep HPF to limit excursion, BSC (if needed) and broad response tailoring are easily implemented:- my experience is that the SQ improvements that result far outweigh the (for me) barely audible signal degradation of the device itself.

YMMV

Came here to offer minidsp advice as well, if you were to build an analog version of just the equalizers (parametric + variable slopes and other goodies) at the same quality it would cost a lot of time and money to get similar results.


Mindsp with full range + woofer is great as well :)

Bob, I will record myself playing classical guitar (will use microphones), then will burn CD's and play them in the CD player. I was thinking some equalization might help balance the guitar tones, just in case. Maybe no need to do any adjustments.

Will reply to the others a bit later.

Thanks,
Michael

One other alternative. It is not uncommon to use a contour/shaping network with full range drivers, then there is no need for equalization.