DIY Studio Monitors

[quamen]

Hello:

Can anyone direct me to ideas for DIY studio monitors?

I will be using anyone of the following amplifiers:

Leach 4.5
ESP P101
ESP P3A

I have considered several options:

ProAc 2.5 Clones
-Scan-Speak 18W 8535-00
-Scan-Speak D2010 8513


Bottlehead Straight 8
-16 ohm speakers for Single Ended Tube Amps-300B, 2A3, etc.
-8 MCM 55-1870 woofers-baskets are dampened and cones coated with varnish
-1 MCM 53-325 tweeter



Sessions Studio Monitor
-AudioXpress magazine November and Decmber 2001 issues
-2 Scan-Speak 15W8530K
-1 SEAS E-11
-1 unknown woofer

Thanks

K

[sreten]

Hi,

No way should you use a line array as studio monitors.

You don't say whether use is near field or far field.

/sreten.

[quamen]

I would be using them as main monitors (far field). I already have near field home stereo type monitors (NS10s).

The Straight 8 is a line array, but it has received major praise for its coherency and transparent sound. Bottlehead is no longer selling them but apparently they have already been used by several recording studios as their main monitors. I am interested in them primarily due to their price and ease of construction. Also the advantage to the Straight 8 and the ProAc 2.5 is that a sub-woofer is not required for full frequency representation.


Thanks

K

[DJ Sense]

Originally posted by sreten
Hi,

No way should you use a line array as studio monitors.



/sreten.

Why not ? are they not a flat response

(sorry i'm new to hi-fi)

[sreten]

Hi,

The NS10's as monitors for tonal balance are hopelessly inaccurate.

Any monitors used for tonal balance purposes should be as "standard"
as possible. In my book that rules out anything with an unusual on/off
axis performance, the results you get will not be typical.

/sreten.

[Jamesblond]

Sorry, Sreten. I must disagree with you there. I may be a novice in speaker DIY-ing, but I've worked in studios for a number of years (and still do).

NS-10 may not be the most linear speaker on the market, but they are quite suitable to make really good mixes - *IF* you know what you're listening to. You have to know them (and any other speaker, for that matter) inside and out if you want to be able to make a decent mix on them. The fact that they sound less then ideal makes them very useful as a "sub-standard" reference - they sound somewhat like a large tv set or cheap hifi. Which is useful, so you can make your mixes sound good on those systems too. They have been used for years as a standard for a reason.

NS-10 aren't always used by them selves. I've used them for a while next to active nearfields - Tannoy, Genelec, pmc... The NS-10's were able to reveal things I didn't immediately hear on the other speakers. Resonance in the mid-bass range, for example. The mix sounded okay on the tannoys, but really cluttered on the ns-10. I turned down mid bass a little, which made the mix sound well balanced on the ns-10. On the tannoys the mix now sounded just right - everything fell into place just a little better. If you can get your mix to sound good on NS-10's, you can be pretty sure it sounds good anywhere else.

[EDIT:] On top of that, off-axis response generally is not much of an issue in studio's, because most of the time, you'll be working in the sweet-spot.

[tktran303]

quamen,

I had the Rod Elliot P3A, with ProAc Response "2.95" clone.

Great amp and speakers, but too big for near field use!

I think an 8530K based speaker would be nice. Compact, killer bass, great mids. Low sensitivity but who cares- you're sitting close!

This would be nice first choice in a compact 2 way, in the price-no-concern class.

Troels has a design for it with the SS 9700 tweeter...

[DJ Sense]

Yes sorry, i see he said line array, in the pa world these are becoming "the thing" the trouble is they don't work! well let me clarify that . if you had an area outside with NO air movement, then they would sound fine, but as anyone who has listened to concerts knows, this happens very rarely. So you get air movement which upsets the clever physics which allows them to work in the first place which results in huge gaps in the frequency range, as the drivers lose the ability to couple correctly.

[sreten]

Originally posted by Jamesblond
Sorry, Sreten. I must disagree with you there................

[EDIT:] On top of that, off-axis response generally is not much of an issue in studio's, because most of the time, you'll be working in the sweet-spot.

Hi,

In terms of hi-fi you are totally agreeing with me, not disagreeing.
Used on their own for tonal balance without other references the
NS-10s are hopelessly inaccurate.

Regarding on top of that :

You said you wanted a far field monitor. Means to me a normal
position for a listener in a normal room. The off axis behaviour is
one of the critical factors in determining the percieved frequency
balance at the listening position.


/sreten.

[Jamesblond]

I see your point. However, I judge studio monitors not on soundquality, but on efficiency and ease of use as a tool. Sure - soundquality is an important aspect, but in the end the result is what matters. If you can deliver with a speaker like the NS-10, then the NS-10 is suited for the job. Even though there are better sounding alternatives.

For my own project I have completely different standards. Those speakers will be used for Hifi use, not for mixing. I want something that I like the sound of (and I am picky, unfortunately). Fact is that I have no experience in building and designing loudspeakers, so I appreciate any info and help on that subject. But I think that designing hifi and using studiomonitors are two different things. I can imagine that studio monitors are designed for a different purpose. I might be wrong though, since high end Hifi has pretty high standards aswell. Once again: I judge studiomonitors by efficiency as a tool, not by their "enjoyment-factor" in a home situation. I hope you get what I'm trying to say.