Need Help Downloading "Passive Crossover" FRD!!

[kelticwizard]

Computer: 200 MHz, 32MB RAM, 20 gig HD Win 98 SE
ZIP program-ZipItFast, an excellent unzipper
MS Office 95

I realize this is a computer question, but it is about a program to aid in loudspeaker building, so here goes.

I keep on trying to download Passive Crossover FRD. I know that RAM is a little low, but it ususally gets me around the net.

I download the program and put it in it's own folder in a folder named Speaker Test Equipment, which is located in Program Files. It unzips. Every time I try to run the program I get the message illustrated below.

Should I use WinZip, (which I hate?). The program mentions that as an unzipper. Other wise, what am I doing wrong?

Oh yeah, I cleaned out Temporary Internet Files in the Windows folder, which sometimes helps. No help this time, though.

Computer mavens from around the globe: HELP!!

[Wombat]

To be more exactly - it is an UPX packed self extracting RAR packed file

Its size should be 915.968kb (The Excel file)

To me it looks more like your Excel version is too old - you need Excel 97 at least.

Wombat

[kelticwizard]

Yikes! Any more suggestions? I hope Wombat is not right.

Thank you for your input, though Wombat. If it doesn't work, at least I'll know why. I'm still hoping for something that will make it work, though, (without having to get Excel 97).

[f4ier]

Yep, you'll need Excel 97 at least, preferably Excel 2k.

Why not Speaker Workshop or Crossover Simulator?

[kelticwizard]

As it turns out, I do have Excel 97, but it is with Ofice 95, or something.

Speaker Workshop I have tried to set up, but just cannot get the "hang" of it yet. A screen appears that I have no idea what I am supposed to do with or where I am supposed to go forward from.

I think it looks like a program that you might need a college course to learn.

Crossover Simulator I have been meaning to talk to you about. It requires FRD files. Well, where do I get them? I went to that FRD consortium and to an FTP site which is supposed to be their library, and the instructions said that they do NOT allow downloading of FRD files.

Would be most grateful for a step-by-step illustration of how Crossover Simulator works. How about the Peerless 10" 850146 CSX woofer crossing over to the Peerless 811827 tweeter @ 2,000 Hz for example?

That would be really, really great. In fact, the only reason I got into looking at all these programs was that I could not make hide nor tail of Crossover Simulator.

PS: For purist's sake, you might substitute the 6 1/2" Peerless CSX 850122 crossing over @ 2K to 2.5K. People might quail at a 10" crossing over that high.

[Westrock2000]

Yup that error means that your excell version is not up to par, either the current version is corrupted and needs to be reinstalled or the XO spreadsheet will not work with the version you got.

Hehe, that is low memory, my win2k usually idles using about 100 megs.

I actually downloaded this thing the other day, and its a very good "program", it has alot of XO's and filters and is very easy to use.

[f4ier]

I wonder myself why Speaker Workshop hasn't been updated to address user interface issues

The FRD Group's FRD ftp site is still under consruction, I think, which is why files aren't still available for download. I'm sure this will be fixed asap.

As for xoversim, have you seen the FAQ page, Quick Startup Guide, parallel 2-way sample and series 2-way sample pages? Also, please visit the Notes page.

In short, load your driver files, fill out the filter component tables, then simulate away Electrically, xoversim is "almost" limitless. Acoustically, only six drivers may be accounted for in the resultant curves... at least for now.

Sorry if the above are not too helpful or are confusing. The 2nd semester of school had already started when I finished the test version of xoversim's internal calculator. And so very little time was available to make a more detailed startup guide.

School just ended last week, so I should have more time for updates. I promise to make a better startup guide for the (very) beta xoversim. I won't make a full manual though; since I will be working on the final version 1 anyway.

As always, the user interface will take a while to build; particularly the graphical schematics editor since I really haven't touched it yet. I only have ideas at the moment. I'll also re-write the circuit calculator to support opamp modeling. Alongside those, I will be working on the next iteration of subsim. So I'll just update my pages as I go along.

Let me know of any specific problems with xoversim and I'll do my best to help


Isaac

[swirv]

With your low PC horsepower this may not help you but it could help others who have simular issues.

Go download OpenOffice.org. Its free, powerful, and opens/edits/saves almost all documents (ie. Exel, Word, Lotus, ect, ect.) Oh yeah...did I mention its FREE.

There is no catch ... Ive used several spredsheets from differant sites to calculate crossovers, Box/port volumes, air-speed velocity of unladen swallows....

OpenOffice.org

[f4ier]

swirv, does OpenOffice fully support vba? I don't know if Jeff coded PCDC with lots of vba, but I'm willing to bet OpenOffice will have trouble running Paul's BDS.

[kelticwizard]

Swirv:

Thanks for the advice. I will give Open Office a shot. The worst that can happen is it won't work on my machine, and if it doesn't, so what? It's free.

I wonder if getting more memory will change things as regards these programs. It's cheap enough-maybe I ought to just get around and do it. It's like ordering the Panasonic WM-60 microphone element-I keep saying I'll do it, but then it it never happens.