dmason said:That brings up another point: women seem to LOVE the sonic signature of the B200. Little Miss Sensitive Ears tends to be attractedand therefore aroused by the sound of her music played thru these things, on an open baffle, so the business end of the "DarkStar" brings many good things to the beholder. It is true: The B200 on open baffle will supercharge one's sex life, assuming one has one, of course. This alone is a very good reason to choose this "load."
Regarding Louis of Omega I might be the reason why no B200 baffle is produced. I brought in the simple 1 mH + 8 ohm LR-circuit to trim the B200 response. Louis evidently never use electrical components in his speakers. I think he had to admit that the single B200 on the winged baffle sounded better with the LR-circuit than without it, hence no B200 baffle.
/Erling
/Erling
Congratulations
--- Sounds like a dream to me, finally being able to evaluate different amps without having to worry about the speakers. It's becoming more and more striking how many people have found their 'definite' speakers in B200 open baffle. What puzzles me is how the strongly rising upper response of these drivers doesn't seem to cause any/much problems in OB (based on the FR alone I would predict ear-shredding performance). I can only think of two reason that would explain the good performance in open baffle, both attenuating the lifted high-range:
-- the backside of the membrane rolls of earlier (that side doesn't benefit from the hyperbolic cone shape)
-- HF are more directional then LF so less of them reach the listener at the other side; thereby providing 'natural' equalisation?
Any comments?
Simon
My musical taste is broad..
I have tested the B200's with Loreena McKennitt, Nora Jones, all kinds of JAZZ old & new, to the complete oposite end as in TOOL, which is a good test for systems IMO, very complex stuff for what it is. Chris Cornell is excellent also. Only in the 1st 1/2 hr if that was I worried about having to use a notch filter, that went away completelly. Also very high volume has been done to for extended period, No fatigue.. Another really cool thing is kinda, is I planned to run these with eaither the Fountek CD3's or Cantus G2 ribbons I have & can't bring my self to install them..I feel no need. & so definatelly in no hurry, I will try them xo'ed way out there, for that little extra, but really it might be some time before that ever happens. for the price of B200's I consider them a bargain from how they perform here at my house. I have only ran tube amps thru them. & very short signal path, as in PEC pot's & TVC's from highly modded NOS DAC's with there output stages by-passed direct from I/V stage thru top flight caps & straight to amps. Nothing seems out of balance , vocals are at the level they need to be, on any CD I have tried. The dynamics are impressive. which I feel is because of no filters & fairlly high effeciancy of the driver. They are smooth.. nothing like any Fostex I have tried, which is not many , fe167e, 103, etc....The bass is the only thing I needed to play with, but I have bass augmentation, with active plates into Vifa m26wr0908's, don't ask me why the low qts Vifa work well, cause I don't know, they just do. Was listening To John Lee Hooker last night & it was the best I have heard that entire recording,, this weekend will be the start of me building my 1st non kit tube amp. a JE simple 45 & then the Darling after that..both should be good starters for me..I think I will just use James OT's & hammond PT. I don't think the published FR graph says the story in OB for this driver at all. It is a revieling driver for sure, so if your source is crap, it will show it. lytics, bad sounding op-amps, etc...The driver has major jump factor if that helps..
I have tested the B200's with Loreena McKennitt, Nora Jones, all kinds of JAZZ old & new, to the complete oposite end as in TOOL, which is a good test for systems IMO, very complex stuff for what it is. Chris Cornell is excellent also. Only in the 1st 1/2 hr if that was I worried about having to use a notch filter, that went away completelly. Also very high volume has been done to for extended period, No fatigue.. Another really cool thing is kinda, is I planned to run these with eaither the Fountek CD3's or Cantus G2 ribbons I have & can't bring my self to install them..I feel no need. & so definatelly in no hurry, I will try them xo'ed way out there, for that little extra, but really it might be some time before that ever happens. for the price of B200's I consider them a bargain from how they perform here at my house. I have only ran tube amps thru them. & very short signal path, as in PEC pot's & TVC's from highly modded NOS DAC's with there output stages by-passed direct from I/V stage thru top flight caps & straight to amps. Nothing seems out of balance , vocals are at the level they need to be, on any CD I have tried. The dynamics are impressive. which I feel is because of no filters & fairlly high effeciancy of the driver. They are smooth.. nothing like any Fostex I have tried, which is not many , fe167e, 103, etc....The bass is the only thing I needed to play with, but I have bass augmentation, with active plates into Vifa m26wr0908's, don't ask me why the low qts Vifa work well, cause I don't know, they just do. Was listening To John Lee Hooker last night & it was the best I have heard that entire recording,, this weekend will be the start of me building my 1st non kit tube amp. a JE simple 45 & then the Darling after that..both should be good starters for me..I think I will just use James OT's & hammond PT. I don't think the published FR graph says the story in OB for this driver at all. It is a revieling driver for sure, so if your source is crap, it will show it. lytics, bad sounding op-amps, etc...The driver has major jump factor if that helps..
Anyone who hears the driver on an open baffle realizes the disconnect between what they hear, and what they see on that graph; I found as they wear in, higher frequencies' extension became apparent, also. Planet10 was the first to point this out and advocate for the sound, and screw the pictures. Dave was right, as usual. The rest was simply follow-on history.
If you are using NON OS DAC's with nice little pentodes with these things, you ought to be enjoying the proceedings. They are astounding with non oversampling sources in my opinion, I keep the Monica2 around JUST for the B200's, and I have yet to hear an EL84/6v6/6AQ5 type amplifier that did NOT sound wonderful. I have a Sun Audio SE 6V6 amp on its way from Japan, to build this winter, for just such purposes. ..You sir, have hit on a very sweet synergy right there; no surprise you are having an epiphany right there and now.
If you go to the audiocircle open baffle circle, there are some new baffle inventions with pictures. I especially like Costa Rica John's concentric baffle. Personally, that one does it for me. John will have much more on it, and he really knows his OB stuff.
If you are using NON OS DAC's with nice little pentodes with these things, you ought to be enjoying the proceedings. They are astounding with non oversampling sources in my opinion, I keep the Monica2 around JUST for the B200's, and I have yet to hear an EL84/6v6/6AQ5 type amplifier that did NOT sound wonderful. I have a Sun Audio SE 6V6 amp on its way from Japan, to build this winter, for just such purposes. ..You sir, have hit on a very sweet synergy right there; no surprise you are having an epiphany right there and now.
If you go to the audiocircle open baffle circle, there are some new baffle inventions with pictures. I especially like Costa Rica John's concentric baffle. Personally, that one does it for me. John will have much more on it, and he really knows his OB stuff.
I don't think you can draw any conclusion about the B200 sound from TOOL. But with jazz there is a very simple test and that's where you hear the cymbals in the soundpicture. They might be close in front or in the back where they belong. With the LR-circuit they will be in the back. Vinnie R of Red Wine Audio taught me this simple lesson about balanced loudspeaker sound and dead right he was.
Dmason is right in that B200 actually improves in the high end with more hours on them. Even the Germans now regard B200 as possibly the best Fullranger around for the moment. See Hi-Fi Selbstbau.
/Erling
Dmason is right in that B200 actually improves in the high end with more hours on them. Even the Germans now regard B200 as possibly the best Fullranger around for the moment. See Hi-Fi Selbstbau.
/Erling
I too listen to TOOL with great pleasure with my B200 OBs. But
I would not be able to judge how 'natural' or 'balanced' they sound from the synth sound only.
In the Audio-Circle thread we agreed to that people are very different with regard to the sensitivity of the B200 treble rise.
Some, like myself, cant stand it, others just love the B200. I find it most annoying on Symphony Orchestra violins which are just too much.
I should add that some might construct OBs that emphazise the lower midrange in a way that balances the treble rise, it is not impossible. But I, myself, think the B200 sounds as it measures if not even worse in normal listening rooms.
That said, it's a speaker in a class of its own, price taken into consideration.
/Erling
I would not be able to judge how 'natural' or 'balanced' they sound from the synth sound only.
In the Audio-Circle thread we agreed to that people are very different with regard to the sensitivity of the B200 treble rise.
Some, like myself, cant stand it, others just love the B200. I find it most annoying on Symphony Orchestra violins which are just too much.
I should add that some might construct OBs that emphazise the lower midrange in a way that balances the treble rise, it is not impossible. But I, myself, think the B200 sounds as it measures if not even worse in normal listening rooms.
That said, it's a speaker in a class of its own, price taken into consideration.
/Erling
I think the next step up for me .
would be top line Supravox Alnico's or something similar, so that will be wa down the road..I ain't even going to try & beat it @ this price range. Does everything I want it to. Listening to Amani A.W. Murray & Ener-JAZZ " Continuum" last night shows balace to me..my room & everything else could help this I suppose. I do know if someones front end has a crap op-amp in the way or Lytic or over loading the amp with a hot pre-amp & such , they would be NOT happy with B200's, I consider them revieling as a mofo. which for many would be bad....I wish my vinyl rig was up to par, so I can get a real grip on how good these are for the $. I am building another NOS DAC that has Lundahl input Trannies & direct tap from I/V conversion to Lundahl output trannies. will see if it beats my NOS by-passed output stage DAC, via cap coupled.Should be fun...Wish I had 2500.00 lying around as I would try the Supravox, some day I will. they look like ME........
would be top line Supravox Alnico's or something similar, so that will be wa down the road..I ain't even going to try & beat it @ this price range. Does everything I want it to. Listening to Amani A.W. Murray & Ener-JAZZ " Continuum" last night shows balace to me..my room & everything else could help this I suppose. I do know if someones front end has a crap op-amp in the way or Lytic or over loading the amp with a hot pre-amp & such , they would be NOT happy with B200's, I consider them revieling as a mofo. which for many would be bad....I wish my vinyl rig was up to par, so I can get a real grip on how good these are for the $. I am building another NOS DAC that has Lundahl input Trannies & direct tap from I/V conversion to Lundahl output trannies. will see if it beats my NOS by-passed output stage DAC, via cap coupled.Should be fun...Wish I had 2500.00 lying around as I would try the Supravox, some day I will. they look like ME........
JandG
You bring up a point: for some time I have been thinking that the occasional polarized opinion of the overall B200 vibe has ALOT more to do with what is talking to it; impedance matching is a much bigger deal, with wideband, actively amplified situations.
When you minimize/optimize upstream circuits, exactly like battery driven NOS DAC's, clean amplification, like simple DHT triode circuits with these things,they likely will leave the Supravox behind. Several people in Germany have opined that a properly fed B200 will KILL the Supravox field coil units, in their opinion; I would still love to hear them, I bet they are great, and I want to try some field coil speakers. The US distributor lives up the road from me.
I also bet on 1,000 active musical hours making the best and biggest difference in the beholder's beauty; this is being discussed right now over at that DarkStar circle, on audiocircle. Like I previously said, with NOS DAC's and really nice SET/T amps, in my experience, and that of maaaany others, the B200 becomes a sonic holograph projector. Scary good, in the dark, and on the pipe.
You bring up a point: for some time I have been thinking that the occasional polarized opinion of the overall B200 vibe has ALOT more to do with what is talking to it; impedance matching is a much bigger deal, with wideband, actively amplified situations.
When you minimize/optimize upstream circuits, exactly like battery driven NOS DAC's, clean amplification, like simple DHT triode circuits with these things,they likely will leave the Supravox behind. Several people in Germany have opined that a properly fed B200 will KILL the Supravox field coil units, in their opinion; I would still love to hear them, I bet they are great, and I want to try some field coil speakers. The US distributor lives up the road from me.
I also bet on 1,000 active musical hours making the best and biggest difference in the beholder's beauty; this is being discussed right now over at that DarkStar circle, on audiocircle. Like I previously said, with NOS DAC's and really nice SET/T amps, in my experience, and that of maaaany others, the B200 becomes a sonic holograph projector. Scary good, in the dark, and on the pipe.
How about 1- 6sn7 output..
I tried my lil 6sl7/6sn7 se amp with the b200's this mourning & still going strong with Linda Perry "In Flight" great vocalist she is..just great..This lil flea amp gets you that scary good, & is definaley a holographic projector. just cool....I installed a 80hz high pass on the lil critter cuz it is outstanding till bass comes around then it distorts,, we;ll see how the high pass does. sad if this doesn't work, because it is something to hear..I have heard enough to build a proper one for sure, this one is a sloppy build..& still you would NOT believe..
I tried my lil 6sl7/6sn7 se amp with the b200's this mourning & still going strong with Linda Perry "In Flight" great vocalist she is..just great..This lil flea amp gets you that scary good, & is definaley a holographic projector. just cool....I installed a 80hz high pass on the lil critter cuz it is outstanding till bass comes around then it distorts,, we;ll see how the high pass does. sad if this doesn't work, because it is something to hear..I have heard enough to build a proper one for sure, this one is a sloppy build..& still you would NOT believe..
skorpion said:
Apparently I belong to those who are sensitive to B200 treble rise. It is quite annoying sometimes (with violins of course), or I get the feeling that the singer is shouting right at my ear, while the rest of the band is placed a couple of feets back. (This is with RL filter, without it the sound is cleaner but more shouty as well).
However, there are two things that could change this 1. Work hours 2. OB
The driver is brand new with no more than 20 Hrs on it. Second, OB should ameliorate the complete sound experience, making the shout less noticeable. (B200's are still in a sealed box, which muffle the sound a bit I guess)
So far, I've decided to go for the baffles similar to these:
http://www.sixmoons.com/audioreview.../roadtour5.html
Regards,
Vix
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