Morel CAW 938 vs. Peerless Exclusive 8'' for MDM 55 and OW I Project

[leifislive]

Hi,

I would like to seek your advice on which 8'' woofer you would prefer. It will have to be crossed at roughly 750Hz to the MDM 55. The cabinet should have preferable less than 50l. I would also prefer it to be closed.

The music will mainly be classical music, rarely exceeding 90dB/1m.

CAW 938:

(+)
- I somehow like Morel.... not really based on facts....
- Judging by the parameters, this should be a true CC woofer
- It may have some Dynaudio W24 DNA...

(-)
- Morel seems to use it only as a subwoofer in their Octave speakers, what does that mean?!?

Peerless HDS Exclusive

(+)
- The stiff membrane and the motor should give it - according to speculations on another forum - a better performance in the lower midrange compared to the CAW 938

(-)
- Judged by the Tymphany-homepage parameters, this is a typical BR woofer, although a recently published test suggests, according to the parameter derived from the test (Qt=0.4, fs=30), it may perform acceptable in a CC in terms of bass.


What is you opinion?
Thanks for help!

Leif

[peter_m]

Source: http://zaphaudio.com/tidbits/

Peerless HDS Exclusive 8"... ....Performance is excellent, and this is an 8" that is easily used in a 2-way. I intend to try it that way

Morel has a fine reputation but seams to be slightly over priced from what I gather. I vote Peerless HDS 8"

Peter

[peter_m]

Interesting thread: http://htguide.com/forum/showthread.php4?t=30035

[leifislive]

Thanks for the links. I had forgotten about the Exclusive on Zaphaudio. I am well aware, that Morel drivers often do not get the best reviews and often there are better solutions. However in my case, their is only one real alternative, and that is not really for the woofer....

I therefore decided to give the Morel a try. It is mainly due to the closed cabinet thing... Speakerbuilding is unfortunately a pretty complex thing to worry about. I hope and suppose, that this combination of speakers should be very easily crossed in a passive system using 12dB filters.

The speaker will be build for classical music. It will not have to perform very loud.
I think, the most important part for having a "naturally" sounding speaker is a good upper mid and high and I believe that harmonic distortion is overrated in this context. IMD and anomalities of the driver itself (if it is working outside its "ideal-piston-frequnecy-range") are probably rather much more important. I have never heard a naturally sounding 2-way system for orchestra recordings so far. Most of the time, the main source of these problems remains to be the overall design concept. That is, why I like the "old fashioned" 2'' 0.75'' combination crossed at 700 and 3500.

I got the MDM 55 so extremely cheap I didn't worry (although I might tend to the Dayton RS52 next time...).
The OWI isn't a real bargain, but well respected and ... well, why not... Having a matched pair for both mid and high was quite appealing to me as well.

The extended bass performance of the Morel and its specs making it look to be designed for a closed cabinet were for me a reason to trade off <10dB less distortion and probably a better motor design in the Peerless - I just suspect, I will not hear these advantage of the Peerless in the intended system at the intended SPL.
I will measure the Morel one day and compare it to my Eton 8-472 and let you know of the results.

So, lets see .....

Best,
Leif

[eccentric]

I have noticed that morel drivers generally don't have satisfactory xmax . Even if you are not going to listen to music at loud levels.you will need more xmax (hang on i think i may be wrong about this particular driver i havn't seen it before )but i would check this out because as you know after xmax is reached distortion blooms. I liked the look of the HDS drivers myself

[leifislive]

This is generally right, especially at lower frequencies noticeable.
However, more xmax is not automatically better (there is a summary at zaphaudio on this issue) and in my (limited experience), any excursion over 2mm in the bass results in quite significant distortion (>3%), which is not quite compatible with my understanding of "linear" excursion...

But anyway, with classical musical, I still think this driver should theoretically work fine (as long as you are not listening to organ music... )

Leif

P.s.: I have a pair of Dynaudio 30W 100, and I couldn't believe to find in my quick and dirty measurements the manufacturers distortion figures (found here http://www.gattiweb.com/dynaudio.html) to be not complete science-fiction...
If these are also true for the 24W and the CAW does indeed share some 24W DNA, then why not to give it at least a try.

[Salas]

Dynaudio broke some ground in hi-fi loudspeaker transducers in the past. Morel just copied that. No new research ground. Many better and more economic options can be found in today's market.

[leifislive]

I do not doubt that... BUT: I am curious, to know. That's the fun about it...

[Salas]

Originally posted by leifislive
I do not doubt that... BUT: I am curious, to know. That's the fun about it...

By all means. Its a hobby.

[leifislive]