If you've every heard a Unity horn, it does something very unique in the midrange. There's a sensation of "cohesiveness" in the midrange which is startling. I believe this is because the entire midrange emanates from a point that's about the size of your fist (because the mids and the compression driver are located within two inches of each other.)
If there's one thing I miss about my unitys, that's it. It's really freaky when you listen to someone speaking over a unity and it sounds like you could almost touch them. I've never heard another speaker that can pull this off as convincingly. The closest comparison would be the Anthony Gallo speakers. But the Gallo speakers have tons and TONS of distortion. It's all rather euphonic, so it's not offensive. But listening to someone speak over a Unity, with that incredible clarity and lack of distortion gives me goosebumps.
I'm afraid your dipole proposal would go the opposite direction; you would have sound emanating from something like six different points in space, all separated by significant time delays.
If there's one thing I miss about my unitys, that's it. It's really freaky when you listen to someone speaking over a unity and it sounds like you could almost touch them. I've never heard another speaker that can pull this off as convincingly. The closest comparison would be the Anthony Gallo speakers. But the Gallo speakers have tons and TONS of distortion. It's all rather euphonic, so it's not offensive. But listening to someone speak over a Unity, with that incredible clarity and lack of distortion gives me goosebumps.
I'm afraid your dipole proposal would go the opposite direction; you would have sound emanating from something like six different points in space, all separated by significant time delays.
That design does suffer from a few drawbacks (some of which are shared by the Summa).
1. Relatively high vertical distance between waveguide and mid, resulting in vertical lobing
2. Physically wide
3. The 24" woofer can be hard to find. An 18" or 21" could do in a pinch, but in order to get the same max SPL, you need more power and xmax
4. Needs EQ
Those are the worst I could think of right off the bat.
I don't see why sound production from "six different points in space" is such a bad thing. A sealed one-driver full-range will still bounce sound off all over its baffle, not to mention the terrible effects that the room has on the reflected waves (a near-infinite number of reflections, mind you). Besides, all dipoles shoot to the back, and you said yourself that dipoles can sound very good.
1. Relatively high vertical distance between waveguide and mid, resulting in vertical lobing
2. Physically wide
3. The 24" woofer can be hard to find. An 18" or 21" could do in a pinch, but in order to get the same max SPL, you need more power and xmax
4. Needs EQ
Those are the worst I could think of right off the bat.
I don't see why sound production from "six different points in space" is such a bad thing. A sealed one-driver full-range will still bounce sound off all over its baffle, not to mention the terrible effects that the room has on the reflected waves (a near-infinite number of reflections, mind you). Besides, all dipoles shoot to the back, and you said yourself that dipoles can sound very good.
If anyone has the space, you could make a killer dipole out of two SH50s. Just stack them front to back. The SH50 uses a conical horn which is twice as wide as the Summa. So you'd get pattern control down to an octave lower.
There's three days left on this sale here:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/vbclassified.php?do=ad&id=7711
Who has $10,000 and lots of room?
Besides that, you could probably turn around and sell it on Ebay in a year for $9K. That works out to $80 per month which is less than what I spend on CDs.
The owner is only 27years old, when are you old guys going to start buying the good stuff
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=42181151
There's three days left on this sale here:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/vbclassified.php?do=ad&id=7711
Who has $10,000 and lots of room?
Besides that, you could probably turn around and sell it on Ebay in a year for $9K. That works out to $80 per month which is less than what I spend on CDs.
The owner is only 27years old, when are you old guys going to start buying the good stuff
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=42181151
454Casull said:
It's mostly a subjective observation. In a previous post I mentioned the amazing dynamics that I observed when listening to the Summas play a classical track.
The most impressive thing I ever heard from my Unities was a Johnny Cash song. It was incredible how you could almost imagine Cash mouthing the words. The articulation of the Unity is just mind boggling. You're able to hear people speaking in the background on songs, and weird little glitches on the recordings also.
The Unities also shine on heavily processed electronic recordings, where the engineers are using psychoacoustic tricks to mess with the soundstage. For example, on a Fischerspooner track it sounds like there are things happening about six feet BELOW the speakers! Now this is obviously a "trick", but it's quite startling. The unities are the only speakers I've ever heard that can pull this off. I assume this has to do with the coherency of the mids and the CD.
I just emailed the dude with the SH50s by the way. Maybe I'll buy them
Just to be fair to the Summas, I just listened to the two tracks referenced in the previous post, which I used to test the Unities I built. Quick observations:
Johnny Cash - "Hurt"
The unities excel at making sounds in the mix intelligible. I believe this is due to the proximity between the mids and the compression driver. Over the Summas, you can certainly hear the details of Johnny's delivery. For instance, you can practically hear him swallow between verses. But on the Unity it's more apparent. One thing I should keep in mind is that the Summas are in an exceptionally reflective room, and little details like Cash swallowing could be swamped by the room's reflections. I am listening to the Summas from a distance of twelve feet, whereas I listened to unities from five feet away.
Fischerspooner - "A Kick in The Teeth"
Listening to this track over the unities, it's more than obvious that the track is heavily tweaked. There's a part of the song where the soundstage appears to be coming from about six feet BELOW the speakers. I've never heard this before! It's surreal.
The first thing I notice on the Summas is the bass is in an entirely different league. No overhang whatsoever, and there's a seamless transition from subs to woofers. After about a minute I have goosebumps, this track just sounds AH-MAZ-ING over the Summas. The soundstage is absurdly huge, it sounds like it stretches from about five feet above to five below the speakers, and about ten feet on either side of the Summas. Obviously this is a totally cooked recording, but it's also FUN
Someone really needs to get the Summas into a nite club somewhere, because these speakers have bass that is TO DIE FOR.
Johnny Cash - "Hurt"
The unities excel at making sounds in the mix intelligible. I believe this is due to the proximity between the mids and the compression driver. Over the Summas, you can certainly hear the details of Johnny's delivery. For instance, you can practically hear him swallow between verses. But on the Unity it's more apparent. One thing I should keep in mind is that the Summas are in an exceptionally reflective room, and little details like Cash swallowing could be swamped by the room's reflections. I am listening to the Summas from a distance of twelve feet, whereas I listened to unities from five feet away.
Fischerspooner - "A Kick in The Teeth"
Listening to this track over the unities, it's more than obvious that the track is heavily tweaked. There's a part of the song where the soundstage appears to be coming from about six feet BELOW the speakers. I've never heard this before! It's surreal.
The first thing I notice on the Summas is the bass is in an entirely different league. No overhang whatsoever, and there's a seamless transition from subs to woofers. After about a minute I have goosebumps, this track just sounds AH-MAZ-ING over the Summas. The soundstage is absurdly huge, it sounds like it stretches from about five feet above to five below the speakers, and about ten feet on either side of the Summas. Obviously this is a totally cooked recording, but it's also FUN
Someone really needs to get the Summas into a nite club somewhere, because these speakers have bass that is TO DIE FOR.
Patrick Bateman said:
Hey John (Patrick)
This is a big difference. Have you ever listened to your Summas very close, like right where the axis cross? The effect is sureal. Some people fall in love with it, to me its interesting but rather wierd, not realistic. The sound stage seems to go way out to unreal dimensions. Its not to my liking, but one thing that I did notice was how clear little background sounds became.
There were several nightclubs in Bangkok that used them, but the DJ's just pushed the SPL up until it sounded distorted like they were used to and the level was annoying to say the least. What I would like to see is a nightclub where the sound guy took advantage of the clarity to deliver a pleasing sound to the inhabitants instead of just blasting them until they distorted - all speakers distort at some point - and just forcing people to live with it. But on the other hand nowhere did I hear as bad sound as in Thailand. They had the worst concerts and clubs and everything else that I ever heard.
After a bit of thinking I believe the Unity is doing some interesting things in the midrange, but the effort required to get the effect is rather daunting.
Even if the SH50S were $10 each, I would still have to come up with a way to deal with the edge diffraction on the waveguide, and I'm not certain if the high frequency extension is as good as the Summas. As I understand it, the Summa's crossover pads down the compression driver to extend the response at the top end, basically trading midrange efficiency for high frequency extension.
I believe the SH50 uses the BMS coaxial compression driver as well, and many have reported that it's very difficult to get good results with the unit, due to it's complexity.
IIRC, the SH50 is a four-way design; the Summa is a two-way.
Even if the SH50S were $10 each, I would still have to come up with a way to deal with the edge diffraction on the waveguide, and I'm not certain if the high frequency extension is as good as the Summas. As I understand it, the Summa's crossover pads down the compression driver to extend the response at the top end, basically trading midrange efficiency for high frequency extension.
I believe the SH50 uses the BMS coaxial compression driver as well, and many have reported that it's very difficult to get good results with the unit, due to it's complexity.
IIRC, the SH50 is a four-way design; the Summa is a two-way.
Patrick Bateman said:
The waveguide has an almost ideal -6 dB / oct fall after the drivers resonance. So yes its padded down in the midrange by some 20 dB relative to the high end. But I'm not sure that I would say that "trading midrange efficiency for high frequency extension" as much as this is just the natural response of a constant directivity / sound power source.
Patrick
True. I always chuckle when I see people show "waveguides" claimed to be CD and yet are flat on axis.
My only comment on some of your discussion is that I have always considered imaging to go higher than 2 kHz. I would say that imaging is dominated by the three octaves from 500 Hz to 4 kHz in a sort of bell curve. Its not exactly bell since I would suggest that its skewed upward in frequency with "tails" to maybe 8 kHz. But really anything above 8 kHz is completely out of the picture and 4 - 8 kHz is marginal. In all cases the critical octave is 1 kHz - 2 kHz where everything has to be right. Thats a tough octave to get right.
At any rate, I see that we have driven everyone else away and maybe we should post these discussions somewhere else as they arn't about Orions.
True. I always chuckle when I see people show "waveguides" claimed to be CD and yet are flat on axis.
My only comment on some of your discussion is that I have always considered imaging to go higher than 2 kHz. I would say that imaging is dominated by the three octaves from 500 Hz to 4 kHz in a sort of bell curve. Its not exactly bell since I would suggest that its skewed upward in frequency with "tails" to maybe 8 kHz. But really anything above 8 kHz is completely out of the picture and 4 - 8 kHz is marginal. In all cases the critical octave is 1 kHz - 2 kHz where everything has to be right. Thats a tough octave to get right.
At any rate, I see that we have driven everyone else away and maybe we should post these discussions somewhere else as they arn't about Orions.
Bratislav said:
I keep thinking about this experiment and it just doesn't sit right with me. I don't disagree that you'll hear it; I just think it is irrelevant.
The experiment makes sense at high frequencies where the sound emanating back through the cone may be delayed relative to the original by at least a half cycle or so. This could significantly effect the waveform coming out of the speaker. I'm not saying it does given a real speaker... just that it is concievable.
At low frequencies however, say below the lowest (non-DC) mode inside the box, the pressure of the air inside the box is basically uniform throughout and the delay in any sound coming back through the cone is small relative to a wavelength... this would not significantly effect the waveform coming out of the speaker.
The lowest mode in the box of a Summa-sized speaker would be somewhere around 200 Hz, meaning the thought experiment is relevant from 200-900 Hz at best. In that range, how transparent is the cone? If you stuff the enclosure with fiberglass, how much is this secondary sound attenuated by the fiberglass and cone loss relative to the original?
If there is significant reradiation, wouldn't this be seen in the measurements? I've never seen any dipole vs. box speaker measurements that show this. Certainly you can see resonances in the box both in the frequency response and impedance measurements, but I've never seen the effect you're talking about with a stuffed enclosure.
I had this concern - sound coming back through the cone, so I tested for it as best that I could (on several occasions actually). Looking above 200 Hz, for the reasons that you describe, I looked at the polar response in three situation. Normal box with stuffing, but a lot directly behind the woofer cone, no absorption behind the cone, basically a worst case, and an open back where there won't be any sound coming through the cone (or very very little). I could not detect any differences in these three that I could equate to sound coming through the cone. At off axis locations, the no back was different, which was to be expected. But there was no measurable difference with and without the back absorption directly behind the speaker. IF this is a significant effect then I would expect some difference in the measurements near the axis or slightly away from the axis, but there weren't any.
So where does the sound go within the enclosure? It can not be all converted into heat or cabinet vibration and not escaping through the cone.
I did some measurements a couple of days ago on my new U-frame speakers (under development). I could clearly see the first dipole peak between 150Hz to 250Hz and first dipole dip at around 400Hz of up to 6dB. Adding and removing wool damping materials (up to 15cm thick) at the U-frame clearly showed changes of the response of the peak and dip of about a dB or 2. So even wool material could not be too effective between 150Hz to 500Hz.
I would imagine that if it is sealed then the backwaves, which obviously cause a severe peak and dip in the U-frame, would either have to ring inside the enclosure, gradually absorbed by the damping material and converted into heat, and/or vibrate the speaker panels, and/or escape through the cone.
The questions is whether there is sufficient amount of sound energy escape through the cone to be measurable? and if unmeasurable, why?
I did some measurements a couple of days ago on my new U-frame speakers (under development). I could clearly see the first dipole peak between 150Hz to 250Hz and first dipole dip at around 400Hz of up to 6dB. Adding and removing wool damping materials (up to 15cm thick) at the U-frame clearly showed changes of the response of the peak and dip of about a dB or 2. So even wool material could not be too effective between 150Hz to 500Hz.
I would imagine that if it is sealed then the backwaves, which obviously cause a severe peak and dip in the U-frame, would either have to ring inside the enclosure, gradually absorbed by the damping material and converted into heat, and/or vibrate the speaker panels, and/or escape through the cone.
The questions is whether there is sufficient amount of sound energy escape through the cone to be measurable? and if unmeasurable, why?
I would guess that virtually all of the rear energy is converted into heat. Why is this inplausible? The sound just bounces off of the cabinet walls at frequency greater than the very lowest frequencies and bounces around until it is absorbed. If the wavelengths are longer than the cabinet then this is basically a static presure to the box and depending on how rigid it is it won;t move much. The effect of this static pressure on the cone is simply the boxes compliance and is obviuos in the measurements as an added stiffness. But sure SOME comes through the cone, but that's not the point. The amount is so low that it can't be measured and that data point leads me to surmiss than it also can't be heard. No test that I have ever done has convinced me that box vibrations or cone leakage is significant At least not in any of my boxes, but then I don;t build weak boxes. I also don;t go overboard either. Good solid design and assembly is all that is required.
Hi all
and oh
all the Guys out here in DIY music nirvana,
overkill mania right there from going to DIY heaven
yes,
I did hear the unity horn, there was one guy on the www. building it.
There was one guy selling it before it was gone to ultra sub nirvana.
I guess you do knew where it did go to, a shame for the DIY community.
For huge orchestra, rock, jazz and so on with a bit of mathematics and
some woodworking mated to a decent sub, still my definitive dream
on the wish list for as real as possible sound pressure.
Why not make a free plan open to DIY heaven ?
Or is there one in the www. space to follow?
drivers could be affordable or even cheapish.
flame m,e as a petite blonde, stupid .... but
as i do live music and know
that point source and pressure is a key
for live ambiance, don't talk about single ended please
talk about the unity horn,
It can fly with a tiny or big tube to heaven
with a mosfet even further LOL
we have to have a gainclone unity horn plan,
easy to buld with non exotic drivers.
Regine
typos sorry, take my shower now
and oh
all the Guys out here in DIY music nirvana,
overkill mania right there from going to DIY heaven
yes,
I did hear the unity horn, there was one guy on the www. building it.
There was one guy selling it before it was gone to ultra sub nirvana.
I guess you do knew where it did go to, a shame for the DIY community.
For huge orchestra, rock, jazz and so on with a bit of mathematics and
some woodworking mated to a decent sub, still my definitive dream
on the wish list for as real as possible sound pressure.
Why not make a free plan open to DIY heaven ?
Or is there one in the www. space to follow?
drivers could be affordable or even cheapish.
flame m,e as a petite blonde, stupid .... but
as i do live music and know
that point source and pressure is a key
for live ambiance, don't talk about single ended please
talk about the unity horn,
It can fly with a tiny or big tube to heaven
with a mosfet even further LOL
we have to have a gainclone unity horn plan,
easy to buld with non exotic drivers.
Regine
typos sorry, take my shower now
Ok
Linkwitz is one of the gurus of HIFI nirvana wiht a high WAF factor.
An airy somewhat dull sound as all Quad and ES,L so nice
golden sounding, pleasant but never close to my MAY piano.
They call it Berlin manufactured, build in China.
Affordable and a great sound, anyway
Why go for so $$$ Summa ?
point source as possible,
but no Manger please,
velocity and sound attack the first micro second maybe,
all down do 1800 cycles could do the trick.
a Unity horn could do this,
somewhat compromised, but dammed real
an ESL three panel backward damped,
a huge cylinder can do this,
a dream of ribbon can do this,
an $$$ overkill speaker can do this
but frankly why car audio
sounds so dammed good,
why esoteric dreams are so common?
What is wrong with unity horns ??
Linkwitz is one of the gurus of HIFI nirvana wiht a high WAF factor.
An airy somewhat dull sound as all Quad and ES,L so nice
golden sounding, pleasant but never close to my MAY piano.
They call it Berlin manufactured, build in China.
Affordable and a great sound, anyway
Why go for so $$$ Summa ?
point source as possible,
but no Manger please,
velocity and sound attack the first micro second maybe,
all down do 1800 cycles could do the trick.
a Unity horn could do this,
somewhat compromised, but dammed real
an ESL three panel backward damped,
a huge cylinder can do this,
a dream of ribbon can do this,
an $$$ overkill speaker can do this
but frankly why car audio
sounds so dammed good,
why esoteric dreams are so common?
What is wrong with unity horns ??
OT part three
Orions and all this Dipols are great speakers, somehow masking
all faults a normal living has to have sound wise.
Yes a normal living, it it's no sound stage nor a recording studio,
sound gaps and all this stuff has no high WAF factor. OK
Orions and all ESL can sound somewhat accurate and somehow real
with a amp doing slew rate and rise time correct.
With the DIY bass forum long time ago
there has been a speaker, a clone, but not a clone
of the famous KEF 105-2.The bass bin ok but the
cube was a front firing Manger and on the sides two Jordans.
No baffle step and with a huge fast amp somne magic.
Danila Manger does the trick with 3 Mangers on the top, mated to
a weak bass direct bi amped.
All this stuff a bit loud sounds fairly stressed.
A French ESL ATL coupled direct to a huge OTL,
attention the plan is in the www. with some glitches
was sounding quite perfect in a huge living..
I did not build the OTL and sold all the stuff,
not easy usable at all ,
sound-wise magic, no stress at all.
A curved ESL array once in the speaker builder
can do the trick,
like any near-field Monitor, as Genelec ,
but in a living ?
ESL headphones, great, like Jecklin's,
but not WAF friendly.
Fly in a curved array three or four Bose 301,
go crazy flame me, maybe no HIFI , hm
dammed real on jazz and big sound no WAF at all
single as I'm with friends who cares.....
If no ESL, no Orion, no tine single ended stuff,
Why not a Unity horn on a bass bin ?
Not very huge at all, looking somehow cool
and can sound dammed real..
The first sound attack, aka Manger and sound pressure
is the key to a realistic sound pattern.
Good night
from Regine
recording and doing live music since twenty years
Orions and all this Dipols are great speakers, somehow masking
all faults a normal living has to have sound wise.
Yes a normal living, it it's no sound stage nor a recording studio,
sound gaps and all this stuff has no high WAF factor. OK
Orions and all ESL can sound somewhat accurate and somehow real
with a amp doing slew rate and rise time correct.
With the DIY bass forum long time ago
there has been a speaker, a clone, but not a clone
of the famous KEF 105-2.The bass bin ok but the
cube was a front firing Manger and on the sides two Jordans.
No baffle step and with a huge fast amp somne magic.
Danila Manger does the trick with 3 Mangers on the top, mated to
a weak bass direct bi amped.
All this stuff a bit loud sounds fairly stressed.
A French ESL ATL coupled direct to a huge OTL,
attention the plan is in the www. with some glitches
was sounding quite perfect in a huge living..
I did not build the OTL and sold all the stuff,
not easy usable at all ,
sound-wise magic, no stress at all.
A curved ESL array once in the speaker builder
can do the trick,
like any near-field Monitor, as Genelec ,
but in a living ?
ESL headphones, great, like Jecklin's,
but not WAF friendly.
Fly in a curved array three or four Bose 301,
go crazy flame me, maybe no HIFI , hm
dammed real on jazz and big sound no WAF at all
single as I'm with friends who cares.....
If no ESL, no Orion, no tine single ended stuff,
Why not a Unity horn on a bass bin ?
Not very huge at all, looking somehow cool
and can sound dammed real..
The first sound attack, aka Manger and sound pressure
is the key to a realistic sound pattern.
Good night
from Regine
recording and doing live music since twenty years
Rybaudio said:
Well, let me turn the table a bit. Have you seen measurements of HOMs ? Any paper (apart from honorable Dr Geddes), say from Harman, JBL or other heavyweights ? Yet we can hear it. Annoyingly so.
'Box coloration' is something that perhaps isn't so impossible to measure, but hust like HOMs, it is mainly in time domain which makes it hard to pin down. I think we just don't yet know how (or sometimes don't WANT, as in already documented case of horn diffraction/interference glossed over by people who definitely can do something about it). As Earl has shown it already, we only begin to understand what really rates in home reproduction, and how to really push the envelope. Unfortunately golden days of HiFi are now gone and big boys aren't interested at all in pursuing it anymore.
Hi again
have a look there
not $$$$
I do know how they sound, graet
sure no single ended golden nirvana
maybe the first PA for home use...
http://tinyurl.com/594qb4
or read here and enjoy
http://tinyurl.com/57ncln
the gay there came
from the famous Oris Lowther paradise.......
if the so called mega $$$ Hifi league
gone since more a decade
does not provide anymore decent tools
I do look elsewhere
have a look there
not $$$$
I do know how they sound, graet
sure no single ended golden nirvana
maybe the first PA for home use...
http://tinyurl.com/594qb4
or read here and enjoy
http://tinyurl.com/57ncln
the gay there came
from the famous Oris Lowther paradise.......
if the so called mega $$$ Hifi league
gone since more a decade
does not provide anymore decent tools
I do look elsewhere
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