Through DIY can you build a very low power handling speaker (<20W) that will well outperform the typical budget 50-100W commercial hifi speakers, e.g missions, wharfedale, for around the same price?
So far I couldnt find many options... there is the ScanSpeak 10W 4'' full range driver, over £110 for a pair of drivers alone is more expensive than some of the budget 50-100W speaker sets, paired with a good cabinet could you expect some exceptional sound within its power limits?
There is limited info on the ScanSpeaks but this video kind of sold of them, even listening to a recording through headphones the sound is very inviting and pleasant: YouTube
I like the idea of full range, because of coming from headphones and not having to worry about a crossover, so I havent looked into diy 2 way ... maybe they offer better price : performance? the budget commercial speakers are all 2 way for example.
So far I couldnt find many options... there is the ScanSpeak 10W 4'' full range driver, over £110 for a pair of drivers alone is more expensive than some of the budget 50-100W speaker sets, paired with a good cabinet could you expect some exceptional sound within its power limits?
There is limited info on the ScanSpeaks but this video kind of sold of them, even listening to a recording through headphones the sound is very inviting and pleasant: YouTube
I like the idea of full range, because of coming from headphones and not having to worry about a crossover, so I havent looked into diy 2 way ... maybe they offer better price : performance? the budget commercial speakers are all 2 way for example.
Because it's simpler to get acceptable bass. Though I prefer the concept of marrying a wideband (what a "full range driver really is) driver with a woofer
1st off, power handling is a useless number when it vcomes to comparing speakers.
Not sure what exactly you want but some stellar boxes can be built with FR drivers. The best ones bring a coherent magic to the music that almost all multiways do not have.
It is down to the crossover, and thephysical differences in driver position. If one can move the XO down in frequency such that the driver spacing is less than a quarter wavelength at the XO frequency many of the issues with XOs go away. This is why the WAW that Scott mentions work so well.
dave
Not sure what exactly you want but some stellar boxes can be built with FR drivers. The best ones bring a coherent magic to the music that almost all multiways do not have.
It is down to the crossover, and thephysical differences in driver position. If one can move the XO down in frequency such that the driver spacing is less than a quarter wavelength at the XO frequency many of the issues with XOs go away. This is why the WAW that Scott mentions work so well.
dave
ah funny ive read that signature so many times over past weeks and its suddenly very relevant.
thats a great concept, bass was a concern with the FR but this is a great solution and the FR can still work alone before, or if , a bass driver is paired.
Yes, there is that option, if you use a woofer though it is best to use a crossover, now, if this is done passively (after the amplifier) it requires large and expensive components because the crossover frequency ideally wants to be as low as possible. This makes an active crossover a worthwhile alternative which comes with additional benefits
You could do a lot worse than try to get a pair of Fostex FX120 units and put them in 30L sealed boxes. I reckon these are the finest drivers Fostex ever made. They are almost discontinued now ( but see EBay ) . This little project will deliver music in a way many speakers can't achieve.
See -
Speakers for my son. - audio-talk
See -
Speakers for my son. - audio-talk
it would need to be local and less expensive. Google did a great job of hiding the Markaudio UK distrubutor kjfaudio.com when searching for full range drivers earlier.
7.3 and 7p look like good choices but the 7p doesnt have a page on the official website.
they are discontinued?
7.3 and 7p look like good choices but the 7p doesnt have a page on the official website.
they are discontinued?
Does it matter? It's on sale in the UK and way cheaper than in the USA: Alpair 7P Generation 1 (pair) | KJF Audio
GM
GM
well it begs the question why, and why the sale also. high volume of returns? It might just be that the paper versions werent as popular, theyve been described as harsher and needing longer burn-in so the metal cone would be a safer choice.
its the same price as 7.3 but I havent read anything that suggests the paper versions are better, and that its really down to personal sound preference for paper vs metal. If I had a preference it would make the choice simpler but I dont
its the same price as 7.3 but I havent read anything that suggests the paper versions are better, and that its really down to personal sound preference for paper vs metal. If I had a preference it would make the choice simpler but I dont
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This post from Mark himself sheds a bit more light on it:
https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/ful...tive-sound-characteristics-2.html#post1862295
he describes paper as dryer and metal as brighter.
https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/ful...tive-sound-characteristics-2.html#post1862295
he describes paper as dryer and metal as brighter.
I assumed it's a closeout, especially since it's not even archived on their site, but when driver selection includes cheap, budget, etc., and high quality [normally an oxymoron], then the price rules, making this a huge bargain, paper or not, which BTW is easier for the novice to tweak than a metal one, i.e. much more forgiving.
That said, its fiberglass reinforcement could very well make it 'sharp', but there's ways to deal with it by shortening burn in time via temporary compression loading in a 4th order BP if you find it too harsh to live with.
I've only auditioned/owned some of MA's early 'FR' drivers under the CSS banner, which were paper, so no clue about the metal ones other than considering its specs and other brands/models of wide band mid range drivers that for the most part has me firmly in the paper 'camp' except for [super] tweeters and wide BW mids-HF compression horns.
GM
That said, its fiberglass reinforcement could very well make it 'sharp', but there's ways to deal with it by shortening burn in time via temporary compression loading in a 4th order BP if you find it too harsh to live with.
I've only auditioned/owned some of MA's early 'FR' drivers under the CSS banner, which were paper, so no clue about the metal ones other than considering its specs and other brands/models of wide band mid range drivers that for the most part has me firmly in the paper 'camp' except for [super] tweeters and wide BW mids-HF compression horns.
GM
Do note that the A6.2. A7.3/p, A10.3/p are the drivers with metal cone and paper cone drivers. The A6 and A10 have very much the same relative characters. The A7p sounds like a stereotypical metal cone driver and the metal cone much like paper.
dave
dave
Beats my long winded way of saying the same thing, except when reinforced with fiberglass, the paper's not so 'dry' until well broken in. 😉
GM
do you mean it sounds like a paper cone with metal cone qualities or is it really not distinquishable as a paper cone? in other words there are no concrete rules for how paper and metal should sound
Do you mind me asking what search terms you were using? I do a pretty good job of SEO for the most part and come top of the search listings in the UK for all of the search terms I can think of that are Mark Audio related.
7p is still current, will be for a while yet, they are just on sale because I've got loads of them!
it was something like ''full range speaker driver'' not markaudio specific.
some US driver shops and german shop showed up at the top, lots of drivers from general retailers after that.
if UK is added to the search your site shows up on first page, I guess its my fault for expecting google to use my location data appropiately.
That will just be because other sites carry more brands and hence in a full range driver search will appear more relevant to Google. Obviously I'm the best though 😉
Mark's site is in need of an overhaul, hence a few missing drivers. That is something I'll be helping them with in the spring when I've got the first run of my new amplifiers out of the door.
Mark's site is in need of an overhaul, hence a few missing drivers. That is something I'll be helping them with in the spring when I've got the first run of my new amplifiers out of the door.
The thing to remember is this: all designs are compromise. Even the ones that are "no compromise designs".
To take a couple of examples with roughly equal cabinet size:
6"/1" 2-way bookshelf speaker
- Advantages are reasonable dispersion throughout the range, and reasonable LF response.
- Disadvantage is mostly that the crossover is in a region where our hearing is very acute, so getting a seamless blend is difficult.
4" full-range driver on its own
- Advantage: no crossover to mess up the midrange
- Disadvantage: limited dispersion at the top end, limited LF output.
A 6"/3" design will mandate a slightly bigger cabinet than using a tweeter, but...
- Advantages: reasonable bass response, crossover is away from the critical band
- Disadvantage: limited HF dispersion
Recently, more manufacturers have been using that third route, often with BMR drivers and the like. It's easy to see why, though - the Average Joe wants a stereo with a bit of grunt, and the 6"/1" design beats a 4" when it comes to that.
Once you get to larger speakers, you get different sets of compromises. For instance, an 8"/1" box is pretty difficult to pull off - not many 8"s go high enough to meet a tweeter, so now you might start looking at a 3-way design, with all the extra work that entails. Remember - as you add more crossover points, the difficulty of getting them all working correctly increases exponentially.
Don't put much thought into power handling, unless you plan on trying to get every last bit of SPL out of your system. Working as a live sound engineer, that's something I do for a living. The power handling spec tells you how much power you have to put in to make the speaker eventually fail, although it might take a few hours to do so.
Chris
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