Driver quality

[Phil Olson]

Any thoughts on who makes the best sounding drivers, (widest/flatest freq response, lowest distortion for a given output, etc.), or is it just personal preference?

I'm on my third attempt at doing a 3way and will hopefully have the time to finish this time!

I'd like to go 40-20k+ if possible in a sealed enclosure.

I have the dough to do it right but would like to stick to the standard names, (Seas, Scanspeak, etc.).

My last attempt was to use Adire drivers just for grins. Then a work load hit and before I could get back to them, Adire folded.

Not looking for a flame war, just some ideas to get me started up again!

Thanks!

[Dave Bullet]

You probably want both flat FR AND low distortion in the pass band.

Have you checked out Zaph's driver test pages?

http://www.zaphaudio.com

Seas and Scanspeak drivers like you have mentioned seem to fare well.

Dave.

[Phil Olson]

Thanks, I'll check it out.

[454Casull]

As far as bass drivers go, you should definitely check out pro audio manufacturers.

[Phil Olson]

I'm not too concerned about bass as there are plenty of good drivers out there for that. It's the rest that seems more of an art.

I guess I could grab almost any set of drivers and they would sound OK if implemented properly but if that's all I wanted I'd just buy a set of speakers.

I'd like to do something really sweet if possible.

[Brett]

Originally posted by Phil Olson
I'm not too concerned about bass as there are plenty of good drivers out there for that. It's the rest that seems more of an art.

I guess I could grab almost any set of drivers and they would sound OK if implemented properly but if that's all I wanted I'd just buy a set of speakers.

I'd like to do something really sweet if possible.

I'm going through a protracted 'paper' design phase for a very large sealed monitor grade speaker (funds are slowly becoming available). Most 'phile drivers are toys compared to well engineered pro stuff. Efficiency and low distortion and power compression are a must, and these are the only drivers that can do it. Many are also very sensibly priced.

A variation on this design is under consideration, but with an IB sub <50Hz.
http://www.audioheritage.org/vbullet...ad.php?t=12126

My inital thinking on it is here.
Large high efficiency WMTMW speaker project

[Phil Olson]

Yeow, that's serious sound going on there!

Thankfully, my needs are far more modest. I am looking for more HT type specs, 105dB for mains 115dB for LFE.

Going from 115dB to 130 is a whole different ball game! (Let alone 105dB!)

Moreover, like most people, I tend to listen at about 10dB below reference so even if I'm a little shy it wouldn't hurt.

I have a sonosub using two 15" tempests that makes me physically ill if I turn it up too loud, (starts seriously pumping my stomach!). Thanks to room gain and a Behringer FBD it will play flat down to 10Hz, (perhaps 5, I can't remember off hand).

I forget if it will go to 115 but since it goes beyond where I am physically comfortable, it's good enough for me!

I've been using Snell LCR's for my system and they were good enough that occasionally we thought noise in a movie was actually outside. I'd like to improve on that and make the new system as transparent as possible. With advances in driver technology I would think that it is doable, (the Snells are ancient!).

Since I have a brand new house with a 17-6x9-2x24-11 HT room to play with. My goals are to make a theater with real wow factor both in sound and picture.

So far the walls are 2x6 with R-21 covered in two layers of 5/8"drywall with near optimum coverage Green Glue between.

The doors will be solid oak paneled with weather stripping.

I intend to install all the equipment/furnishings, then tune the room with absorption/diffusion, then integrate the speakers into that environment for final tuning.

Anyhoo, that's the background that I am working from.

[terry j]

Originally posted by Phil Olson


I have the dough to do it right

Thanks!

Well consider active. The amps aren't as big a hurdle as you might first think, heck you at least already have one!

Not much power required at all for the tweeter amp, and not so much for the mid.

The dcx has a lot of parametric ability and so you can make sure that each driver is flat within it's passband, and select what slopes and where and then correct the in room response (but you already have a bfd).

It's very good value for the money, but the lack of volume control IS a pain.

Other options too, but price goes up when you go a bit exotic.

Food for thought.

[Phil Olson]

My plan is indeed to go active using the DCX, (I just ordered one to play with), and either some kind of GainClone design or the Hypex 180 modules.

Perhaps Hypex for the woof and mid and GainClone for the tweet?

At any rate, plan is to build the triamp into the base/stand of the speaker itself while having all the DCX's in the back rack along with my Lexicon MC-12BHD and the players, etc.

The Hypex modules seem really great and all the building blocks are available, (power supply, soft start, ect.), but it would start getting a little pricy. I may just bite the bullet and just use them throughout anyway but first things first, (e.g. SPEAKERS! )

Since I'm retired but still doing the finishing on my new house, (I built myself by the way ), I've decided to give myself one day a week to work on them so this Monday I'll start throwing a few drivers up for discussion.

[Phil Olson]

OK! I visited the Zaph Audio site and that was way impressive! He really knows his ****. If fact, after reading through his entire site, I couldn't find one thing to disagree with, including his rant section.

Anyways, he had what looked like a really great design that I will use as a starting point, the ZD5.

The tweeter is a Vifa XT25TG30-04 and the mid is a Scan Speak 15W8530K00. Since I would like to go at least another octave lower and have more output I'll be adding a woofer and perhaps going to a WMTMW or MTMWW.

Of course at that point, the only thing I'm taking from the design are the drivers! However, if the drivers themselves are capable of that kind of performance, it assures me that my design will only be limited by my level of engineering, not by the driver designers'.

Now the question is, what woofer? Staying in the family the two choices would be the 8" 22W/8857T00 and the 10" 26W/8867T00.

The 8" is rather smooth and I can just eek out 40Hz at 3dB down from 105, (but just), if my modeling is correct.

On the other hand, the 10" gives me plenty of room but gets nasty at around 2KHz. Since that is way beyond the crossover it shouldn't be an issue, though.

Anyone used either of these woofers? Any thoughts otherwise?

I'll still check around for other drivers to see if I can lower the budget so any other ideas would be appreciated.

TIA,
Phil