Rick,
"Thanks! I hadn’t seen the PDF link (where was it?)
So paper cone can equal metal?"
I guess that depends on what "equal" means and who you ask. Personally I have not yet heard a paper or polycone that can match the midrange naturalness of a magnesium or ceramic cone.
Possibly I haven´t tried enough paper drivers. The various Scan´s are the one I´m most familiar with and I always prefer Excel or Accuton drivers.
/Peter
"Thanks! I hadn’t seen the PDF link (where was it?)
So paper cone can equal metal?"
I guess that depends on what "equal" means and who you ask. Personally I have not yet heard a paper or polycone that can match the midrange naturalness of a magnesium or ceramic cone.
Possibly I haven´t tried enough paper drivers. The various Scan´s are the one I´m most familiar with and I always prefer Excel or Accuton drivers.
/Peter
dave
I too was a little surprised by your remark
"A good paper cone is usually better than a good metal cone"
I thought 'a good paper cone generally has a smoother break up, while a good metal cone generally has more detail'.
Eg the detail in the Seas Excel mag cones (while not being quite ideal in eg size for my partikular project) is in a different league to any paper cone I’ve heard.
Could you give some examples of paper cones that match or exceed that?
Thanks
I too was a little surprised by your remark
"A good paper cone is usually better than a good metal cone"
I thought 'a good paper cone generally has a smoother break up, while a good metal cone generally has more detail'.
Eg the detail in the Seas Excel mag cones (while not being quite ideal in eg size for my partikular project) is in a different league to any paper cone I’ve heard.
Could you give some examples of paper cones that match or exceed that?
Thanks
Intelligibility
I recommend reading the CNRC website, Canadian national research institute.
Many article talk more about architectural acoustic in work offices, but there is still interresting info.
http://irc.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/fulltext/nrcc44286/nrcc44286.pdf
"...frequency range between 500 and 5000 is most important for speech intelligibility"
F
I recommend reading the CNRC website, Canadian national research institute.
Many article talk more about architectural acoustic in work offices, but there is still interresting info.
http://irc.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/fulltext/nrcc44286/nrcc44286.pdf
"...frequency range between 500 and 5000 is most important for speech intelligibility"
F
rick57 said:
Keep in mind that i have left behind the class of speaker exemplified by Seas/Scan/DynaAudio (lets call it the Scandinavian class)... too congested, too inefficient. Too much in need of crossovers that suck the life out of the speaker. The best metal cone drivers i've heard are the Jordans, and they suffer from inefficiency.
You want paper & detail, try something like a lowther. For reaonable amount of money i like the Fostex FE108ES.
The WR125 is appealling, despite its low sensitivity, because it is very good. Te condundrum with it is that it is designed by someone thinking in the Scandinavian class, yet has attributes that -- if it were more efficient -- would make it a killer to go up agianst Fostex, and other more efficient, extended range speakers.
Often the detail in metal cones, is not real detail but the ringing that is VERY hard to supress. The same can be said of a lot of power amps -- usually solid state.
dave
Dave,
"Often the detail in metal cones, is not real detail but the ringing that is VERY hard to supress. The same can be said of a lot of power amps -- usually solid state."
The reason stiff cones have better "detail" is simply becasue it is more stable under operation which greatly reduces distortion. For an example, go to Seas and check their drivers with same motors but different cones. Their lowest distortion drivers are the magnesium Excels.
"... too congested, too inefficient. Too much in need of crossovers that suck the life out of the speaker. The best metal cone drivers i've heard are the Jordans, and they suffer from inefficiency.
You want paper & detail, try something like a lowther."
I was curious at these type of drivers a long time ago. Went to a guy that sold Audio Note tube kits and he used a Lowther in his rig. I dragged along a two way with 8545 and Esotar, if one speaker was lifeless ans tired it was his back loaded Lowther. Even when we used a PSE at 16W my 85dB two ways was clerly superior and he was mighty impressed as well.
Nest stop was a shop in town that is hardcore on tubes, vinyl and high sensitive speakers. Listened to three different amps. one SE300B, ont pushpull 300B and one "self canceling SE" 300B. The SCSE was best and even though it had problems driving my speakers at high volumes (of course) they were clearly superior to the Audio Note speaekrs in the shop.
Since then I´ve moved on to new, better drivers and have not looked back to the ancient techologies.
Give me low distortion drivers and I´m happy
/Peter
"Often the detail in metal cones, is not real detail but the ringing that is VERY hard to supress. The same can be said of a lot of power amps -- usually solid state."
The reason stiff cones have better "detail" is simply becasue it is more stable under operation which greatly reduces distortion. For an example, go to Seas and check their drivers with same motors but different cones. Their lowest distortion drivers are the magnesium Excels.
"... too congested, too inefficient. Too much in need of crossovers that suck the life out of the speaker. The best metal cone drivers i've heard are the Jordans, and they suffer from inefficiency.
You want paper & detail, try something like a lowther."
I was curious at these type of drivers a long time ago. Went to a guy that sold Audio Note tube kits and he used a Lowther in his rig. I dragged along a two way with 8545 and Esotar, if one speaker was lifeless ans tired it was his back loaded Lowther. Even when we used a PSE at 16W my 85dB two ways was clerly superior and he was mighty impressed as well.
Nest stop was a shop in town that is hardcore on tubes, vinyl and high sensitive speakers. Listened to three different amps. one SE300B, ont pushpull 300B and one "self canceling SE" 300B. The SCSE was best and even though it had problems driving my speakers at high volumes (of course) they were clearly superior to the Audio Note speaekrs in the shop.
Since then I´ve moved on to new, better drivers and have not looked back to the ancient techologies.
Give me low distortion drivers and I´m happy
/Peter
I found the Seas Magnesium cone detailed - yet somewhat unnatural, and sometimes even clinical. I want to support Dave's assertion about ringing. In my experience with these drivers it is not good enough to suppress the resonant peak electrically. At high output these cones will exhibit sympathetic resonance - stimulated by the tweeter output. It is interesting to note that Audio Physic damps the Seas magnesium cones mechanically.
"At high output these cones will exhibit sympathetic resonance - stimulated by the tweeter output. It is interesting to note that Audio Physic damps the Seas magnesium cones mechanically."
Is this something you have studied? This is something that will happen, but the question is at what magnitude and if it´s audible. This should be easy to measure but playing back the tweeter at sufficient high amplitude and compare the decay with mid covered up and mid excited by tweeter.
Remember that the typical break up for a 6.5" is 5k or so where the tweeter start to beam. If a 5" is used the break up may be at 8k or so and I find it very hard to believe that the tweeter output would affect the 8k resonance at a level anywhere close to audible.
/Peter
Is this something you have studied? This is something that will happen, but the question is at what magnitude and if it´s audible. This should be easy to measure but playing back the tweeter at sufficient high amplitude and compare the decay with mid covered up and mid excited by tweeter.
Remember that the typical break up for a 6.5" is 5k or so where the tweeter start to beam. If a 5" is used the break up may be at 8k or so and I find it very hard to believe that the tweeter output would affect the 8k resonance at a level anywhere close to audible.
/Peter
Pan said:
Well, at least one part of the problem here is that 'distortion' is not a scalar quantity. *What* distortion is as important as how much. This is why Zaph's 4.5" driver measurements are an interesting starting point IMHO. All 3 drivers are relatively low distortion, but each has quirks. I think it would be pretty interesting to spend some time evaluating these three for both 'detail' and 'intelligibility' to see whether anything can come of it. Of course, even just designing a good test for this is tough to say nothing of implementing it, but it would be interesting to say the least.
I suspect that the waterfall/CSD will relate better to intelligibility than distortion will. As far as detail goes, it's tough to say. It wouldn't surprise me if the L12 did best on the 'detail' score, despite not having the lowest distortion in the midband, although maybe this is because I give credence (to a degree) to the idea that breakup is enhancing the perception of detail.
dwk123 said:
Very much... and as Dr Geddes has shown fairly convincingly is that distortion, as we currently measure it, has no correlation to how well a speaker sounds.
to each his own... everyone has their own preferences, what is important is that you enjoy the music... there are many totally different sounding speakers, each with their own faults & strengths that satisfy a particular listener...
dave
Hennie said:
At what magnitude?
Also I do not believe that a metallic driver sounds "metallic" like som describe. I believe the sound of break ups are almost exklusively determined by amplituded and Q, and I see bad stuff happening in paper and other drivers as well. Metallic "bell" ringing... don´t think so, tapping and scratching a magnesium or ceramic cone does not sugest anything like that... sounds like hard paper to me with a very damped characteristic.
/Peter
Gary
Thanks I’ve been looking for something like that on Speech Intelligibility.
I was in a working group a year ago planning some Open-plan Offices, trying to escalate the issue of acoustics etc, shame I didn’t know the CNRC website then. But would they have listened?
Dave
Interesting observations on drivers. If I’d known of those a year or two ago (before I bought . . ) too; Fostex appealed, but I knew none who had them.
I believe that if the WR125 had higher sensitivity, it would probably have to sacrifice bass. I'm not that concerned, but is it made by Adire, or just designed by DW?
Peter
You are the voice of reason. I’ve heard the Excel on two systems: in one ‘home designed’ it was too hard for me; in the SL Orion – it was faultless.
Dwk
You could well be right that the waterfall/CSD will relate better to intelligibility than distortion will. Maybe the CNRC site says something about this.
Thanks I’ve been looking for something like that on Speech Intelligibility.
I was in a working group a year ago planning some Open-plan Offices, trying to escalate the issue of acoustics etc, shame I didn’t know the CNRC website then. But would they have listened?
Dave
Interesting observations on drivers. If I’d known of those a year or two ago (before I bought . . ) too; Fostex appealed, but I knew none who had them.
I believe that if the WR125 had higher sensitivity, it would probably have to sacrifice bass. I'm not that concerned, but is it made by Adire, or just designed by DW?
Peter
You are the voice of reason. I’ve heard the Excel on two systems: in one ‘home designed’ it was too hard for me; in the SL Orion – it was faultless.
Dwk
You could well be right that the waterfall/CSD will relate better to intelligibility than distortion will. Maybe the CNRC site says something about this.
Yes I also believe that decay is very important. Delay and stored energy masks and mess up small details and nuances while harmonic distortion and IM may do that to some degree, but since they are not timedependent it´s another character I´d say.
If I understand the word intelligibilty right I think like this;
A flat or relatively flar Fr and low stored energy is important. Low distortion helps but dispersion and room contribution is of outmost importance to control.
To get the very best intell... ahrg! resolution I´d say pistonic operation, fast decay in drivers as well as room. Low HD and IM and high directivity and/or very well damped first reflections. Better use headphones
/Peter
If I understand the word intelligibilty right I think like this;
A flat or relatively flar Fr and low stored energy is important. Low distortion helps but dispersion and room contribution is of outmost importance to control.
To get the very best intell... ahrg! resolution I´d say pistonic operation, fast decay in drivers as well as room. Low HD and IM and high directivity and/or very well damped first reflections. Better use headphones
/Peter
One reason some homebrew stiff designs sound harsh can be the fact that the distortion peaks below the break up.
A 7" with a single break up peak at 6k will likely have increased 2nd harmonic at 3k and 3rd harmonic at 2k. If these drivers are lowpassed above this point and driven hard like in a typical two way (which always will have high distortion relatively spoken) this distortion will be audible and I believe it is this amplitude that is bad more than the ringing itself.
By lowpassing a driver below that point and also by highpassing it in order to avoid gross distortion you will get clean, dynamic state of the art sound, nothing more nothing less. If such a design is fed a quality signal it will shine in a way that a "lesser" design can never do.
So, if these modern driver sound bad in a design it is likely becasue of a faulty implementation as mentined above or crappy electronics that punish your por ears.
Happy pistonic listening!
/Peter
A 7" with a single break up peak at 6k will likely have increased 2nd harmonic at 3k and 3rd harmonic at 2k. If these drivers are lowpassed above this point and driven hard like in a typical two way (which always will have high distortion relatively spoken) this distortion will be audible and I believe it is this amplitude that is bad more than the ringing itself.
By lowpassing a driver below that point and also by highpassing it in order to avoid gross distortion you will get clean, dynamic state of the art sound, nothing more nothing less. If such a design is fed a quality signal it will shine in a way that a "lesser" design can never do.
So, if these modern driver sound bad in a design it is likely becasue of a faulty implementation as mentined above or crappy electronics that punish your por ears.
Happy pistonic listening!
/Peter
rick57 said:
Yes, hoffman's iron law... you would have to sacrifice bass -- or dollars (ie a nore expensive motor to bring up efficiency).... but given the seemingly inverse relationship between amplifier quality & amplifier power, it may well be worthwhile.
Dan Wiggins designed the driver under the auspices of Adire for Bob at Creative Sound. Then Bob had something like 5k drivers made.
Despite its efficiency it is a very versatile driver, going amazingly low with fairly low distortion, going high enuff that you can get away with no T or at most a helper T.
An ideal midrange... one that can be used by itself until you can score tweeters & woofers. Seems to work best with SS amps, in a modest DIY situation a gain clone is likely a good choice.
I'll have more to say when i get prototypes running in my own system. Certainly very good bang for the buck -- and in the end, all of us working with real world budgets, this is a big factor.
dave
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