Hello!
I'm considering building my own speakers to go in my living room. The living room has a suboptimal shape - it's rectangular, 3 14' walls and a large opening to the hallway/kitchen/rest of the house:
The speakers will go near the fireplace (labeled FP), so one in a corner (sucks but that's the layout of the room), and the other one about 8' from it. Listening distance would be ~12' from the front of the speakers. I mostly listen to electronic music and rock/metal. Sometimes I like to go loud (have measured close to 100dB in the listening spot. I don't do this often but I want to be able to do it). Adding a subwoofer (either purchased or DIY) is an option I am certainly okay with. No particular size/aesthetic requirement, I want it to be fun to listen to. My main system right now is a pair of Genelec 8330A and a 7350A sub, which I use on my desk. I absolutely love how that system sounds - the room correction is pure magic. And I like the analytical sound of studio monitors, but not attached to it.
In terms of amplification, I have not made up my mind yet - I will need to purchase an amp (or multiple). I have a MiniDSP 10x10HD available that I can utilize for this project if I wanted to. Budget wise, I am hoping I can get decent results with $2000-3000 - that goes towards wood, speaker elements and maybe a crossover if I go the passive route. Closer to the lower end of the budget is preferred. TBD about amplifier budget - I could always start with cheap amps and upgrade later. Most of my music comes from Spotify and Soundcloud, although I do occasionally listen to 24/96 FLAC recordings when I can get them. I am not yet sure which source I will be using for this living room. Would likely start with a Chromecast audio and some DAC via the toslink connection.
I have some woodworking experience, and have access to a professional, well-equipped wood workshop - so pre-cut kits are unnecessary. I also enjoy learning new things and playing at the shop.
I tried searching around for plans that fit my needs but there is an overwhelming amount of information, sometimes contradictory. I was wondering if anyone could stir me in the right direction. I am also open to purchasing speakers if that is the best use of my budget, but I am thinking that I might be able to get more bang for my buck by building my own, given that I don't put any value on my time as this is a hobby for me.
Thank you!
I'm considering building my own speakers to go in my living room. The living room has a suboptimal shape - it's rectangular, 3 14' walls and a large opening to the hallway/kitchen/rest of the house:
The speakers will go near the fireplace (labeled FP), so one in a corner (sucks but that's the layout of the room), and the other one about 8' from it. Listening distance would be ~12' from the front of the speakers. I mostly listen to electronic music and rock/metal. Sometimes I like to go loud (have measured close to 100dB in the listening spot. I don't do this often but I want to be able to do it). Adding a subwoofer (either purchased or DIY) is an option I am certainly okay with. No particular size/aesthetic requirement, I want it to be fun to listen to. My main system right now is a pair of Genelec 8330A and a 7350A sub, which I use on my desk. I absolutely love how that system sounds - the room correction is pure magic. And I like the analytical sound of studio monitors, but not attached to it.
In terms of amplification, I have not made up my mind yet - I will need to purchase an amp (or multiple). I have a MiniDSP 10x10HD available that I can utilize for this project if I wanted to. Budget wise, I am hoping I can get decent results with $2000-3000 - that goes towards wood, speaker elements and maybe a crossover if I go the passive route. Closer to the lower end of the budget is preferred. TBD about amplifier budget - I could always start with cheap amps and upgrade later. Most of my music comes from Spotify and Soundcloud, although I do occasionally listen to 24/96 FLAC recordings when I can get them. I am not yet sure which source I will be using for this living room. Would likely start with a Chromecast audio and some DAC via the toslink connection.
I have some woodworking experience, and have access to a professional, well-equipped wood workshop - so pre-cut kits are unnecessary. I also enjoy learning new things and playing at the shop.
I tried searching around for plans that fit my needs but there is an overwhelming amount of information, sometimes contradictory. I was wondering if anyone could stir me in the right direction. I am also open to purchasing speakers if that is the best use of my budget, but I am thinking that I might be able to get more bang for my buck by building my own, given that I don't put any value on my time as this is a hobby for me.
Thank you!
One channel in a corner and the other not is a very difficult thing to overcome. The best option is either:
1. a different placement in that room, OR
2. that same placement and DSP eq. for that position along with the ability to move them out for critical listening (and a different DSP eq. profile for that new position).
What sort of size (loudspeaker), freq. range/bandwidth, and max dynamic envelope/spl-capability (vs freq.) do you need?
Objectively a design with cardioid pattern down to 200 Hz can help out a lot with the "corner loading" (R) and non-corner loading (L). Problem is - I don't know of a kit that will do that (..and actually, there aren't many designs out there that will either).
Still, the MiniDSP can give you that option (and could even go lower in freq. with cardioid with enough drivers and amplification-power).
1. a different placement in that room, OR
2. that same placement and DSP eq. for that position along with the ability to move them out for critical listening (and a different DSP eq. profile for that new position).
What sort of size (loudspeaker), freq. range/bandwidth, and max dynamic envelope/spl-capability (vs freq.) do you need?
Objectively a design with cardioid pattern down to 200 Hz can help out a lot with the "corner loading" (R) and non-corner loading (L). Problem is - I don't know of a kit that will do that (..and actually, there aren't many designs out there that will either).
Still, the MiniDSP can give you that option (and could even go lower in freq. with cardioid with enough drivers and amplification-power).
Corner placement reinforces bass. Placement in front of window reinforces bass less. Fortunately, one only needs one channel of bass because quarter wavelengths are larger than your room. I'd mix bass below 100 hz from both channels of stereo sources into the right channel.
Shallow room favors wide dispersion speakers. I've owned some that were -3 db over 22.5 deg off axis 500 hz to 16 khz. -6 db over 43 deg off axis. On axis +-3db 50 hz to 17 khz. Max SP 125 db @ 300 Wrms pink noise, 101 db 1w1m. Since you're in California you may be able to pick up a pair used for $300 to $400. Peavey SP2-XT I can't hear 14 khz to 20 khz to the missing 17 to 20 is not important to me. Most US males have much more damaged ears than me, who always used earplugs in loud places.
I've measured mine 6' away from a hard plaster wall on axis white noise, with speaker backed into the wall & 28" off floor. I measured -8 db 40 hz -10 db 30 hz. The box is bass reflex tuned to 55 hz. So the room effect boosts bass enough I feel as If I don't need a sub. Drywall instead of plaster may lessen the bass boost. It's a heavily damped room so overall response had a 12 db peak at 400 hz and a 10 db notch at 100 hz. I don't equalize this out.
You may not like the styling. Made to project down at audience heads, so pole type speaker tripods are recommended. Mine were stolen. I'm building clones out of ugly unfinished MDF to prevent theft the next time. The drivers are still available. You may prefer some better looking wood instead of the SP2-XT wool felt finish. Huge rocket Peavey logo on the front, too.
Another 2 way with charted wide dispersion is pispeakers 4pi. It has a 1" CD instead of 1.4" so power handling and max SP are lower. Has a wood finish.
More modern SP2(2004) have dispersion 6 db down over +-45 deg off axis. Crossover of 1800 instead of 1200 boosts continuous pink noise response to 500 W. I picked a pair of these up for $400 +50 car expense. I listen at 1/8 watt average, with peaks of 50 w occasionally on classical music. More modern SP2 have 1000 W continuous power handling and no dispersion specification. SP2(2004) are hard to copy, the box is 8" narrower at the back than the front. SP2(2004) has harmonic distortion specified at 20 db down @ 5 w 50 hz to 12 khz. This shouldn't matter as much on electronic source tracks as on classical source tracks.
SP2 competes with JBL 4365 4367 and Eon615(powered). Possibly the M2. These are never for sale used within 1000 miles of here.
The clones I was building will use Eminence Deltapro-15a 15" woofers, and possibly Eminence N314X CD. I haven't found a 14" wide horn for the CD yet, it is bolt on instead of screw on like the Peavey RX22. I have one RX22 CD used and 2 screw on 14" wide horns. Project hung at the buying circular saw stage, the burglar took all my tools, too.
There on many on here that prefer 3 way & 4 way drivers. The expense of passive crossover components 200 w up should be a powerful inhibition of that. I find these 2 ways quite adequate for reproducing difficult sources tracks as acoustic piano, tinkly bells and cymbals. Lots of talk about beaming of drivers over 6" wide. Somehow Peavey & JBL have engineered in solutions to that, IMHO, with a 15" driver.
Happy shopping or building.
Shallow room favors wide dispersion speakers. I've owned some that were -3 db over 22.5 deg off axis 500 hz to 16 khz. -6 db over 43 deg off axis. On axis +-3db 50 hz to 17 khz. Max SP 125 db @ 300 Wrms pink noise, 101 db 1w1m. Since you're in California you may be able to pick up a pair used for $300 to $400. Peavey SP2-XT I can't hear 14 khz to 20 khz to the missing 17 to 20 is not important to me. Most US males have much more damaged ears than me, who always used earplugs in loud places.
I've measured mine 6' away from a hard plaster wall on axis white noise, with speaker backed into the wall & 28" off floor. I measured -8 db 40 hz -10 db 30 hz. The box is bass reflex tuned to 55 hz. So the room effect boosts bass enough I feel as If I don't need a sub. Drywall instead of plaster may lessen the bass boost. It's a heavily damped room so overall response had a 12 db peak at 400 hz and a 10 db notch at 100 hz. I don't equalize this out.
You may not like the styling. Made to project down at audience heads, so pole type speaker tripods are recommended. Mine were stolen. I'm building clones out of ugly unfinished MDF to prevent theft the next time. The drivers are still available. You may prefer some better looking wood instead of the SP2-XT wool felt finish. Huge rocket Peavey logo on the front, too.
Another 2 way with charted wide dispersion is pispeakers 4pi. It has a 1" CD instead of 1.4" so power handling and max SP are lower. Has a wood finish.
More modern SP2(2004) have dispersion 6 db down over +-45 deg off axis. Crossover of 1800 instead of 1200 boosts continuous pink noise response to 500 W. I picked a pair of these up for $400 +50 car expense. I listen at 1/8 watt average, with peaks of 50 w occasionally on classical music. More modern SP2 have 1000 W continuous power handling and no dispersion specification. SP2(2004) are hard to copy, the box is 8" narrower at the back than the front. SP2(2004) has harmonic distortion specified at 20 db down @ 5 w 50 hz to 12 khz. This shouldn't matter as much on electronic source tracks as on classical source tracks.
SP2 competes with JBL 4365 4367 and Eon615(powered). Possibly the M2. These are never for sale used within 1000 miles of here.
The clones I was building will use Eminence Deltapro-15a 15" woofers, and possibly Eminence N314X CD. I haven't found a 14" wide horn for the CD yet, it is bolt on instead of screw on like the Peavey RX22. I have one RX22 CD used and 2 screw on 14" wide horns. Project hung at the buying circular saw stage, the burglar took all my tools, too.
There on many on here that prefer 3 way & 4 way drivers. The expense of passive crossover components 200 w up should be a powerful inhibition of that. I find these 2 ways quite adequate for reproducing difficult sources tracks as acoustic piano, tinkly bells and cymbals. Lots of talk about beaming of drivers over 6" wide. Somehow Peavey & JBL have engineered in solutions to that, IMHO, with a 15" driver.
Happy shopping or building.
Last edited:
Thank you. Lots of information to go over, I appreciate the time you took to write it all down. PA speakers are an interesting choice, not what I expected to hear. I wonder if I can find someone to loan me some to try it out.
Regarding the question above by @ScottG - size of speaker is not a huge concern, some sort of floorstanding design would be preferred as I don't need them to be the attention center of the room design-wise. Freq range - similar to my Genelec system be ideal (I think it is speced at 22hz-23khz but that is a lot to ask from this living room setup). Not sure about exact SPL/dynamics requirements but I do know that as mentioned in the original post, using some random dB measurement app on my phone one time when listening at the loudest I ever play music at, I saw it peak at around 100dB.
Regarding the question above by @ScottG - size of speaker is not a huge concern, some sort of floorstanding design would be preferred as I don't need them to be the attention center of the room design-wise. Freq range - similar to my Genelec system be ideal (I think it is speced at 22hz-23khz but that is a lot to ask from this living room setup). Not sure about exact SPL/dynamics requirements but I do know that as mentioned in the original post, using some random dB measurement app on my phone one time when listening at the loudest I ever play music at, I saw it peak at around 100dB.
The SP2' highs go up 10 deg and down 30 deg from horizontal. You could turn them upside down & put them on the floor with the highs projecting up at your head instead of down across a big room. In a 15' deep room the highs won't go over your head. Main risk mice cats or dogs fooling with the unguarded horn or vents. I found a plastic cup stuffed in the vent in my SP2(2004) after I got it home. Vents could be serious mouse cave off the poles but could be screened. I have a wood house and yard mice chew their way in every winter
PA rental agencies should have these in your area. For about the same probably you can buy a pair on craigslist/ebay and sell them again if you don't like them. Their market is bars & party venues, but you don't have to feed them 300 W. They are very polite & refined at 1/8 to 50 W. They won't shake your innards at 30 hz but against a hard wall will reproduce the big pipes of a pipe organ accurately, IMHO.
Note used ones may have replacement drivers, especially the bass driver. 15-8KADT is still available but a lot of 15" drivers are cheaper. I tested mine with a piano CD to make sure the sound was accurate before I paid the man. I own a steinway piano for calibrating my ears.
Last edited:
I was thinking of stand-mount + subwoofer(s).
Standmount (or small "tower") because it's traditionally smaller, easier to move (preferably something with casters), and notably has less bass.
Subwoofer(s) because it/they do not need to be placed in the same position (as the loudspeakers) - you can permanently place them elsewhere in the room. (..I personally like sub's placed near my listening position with the appropriate phase/delay.) With a *"chaotically distributed array" (3 or more small sub.s) you can also achieve a very even bass response throughout the room if you routinely have more than one listener OR you frequently listen at different locations in-room.
*this is just subs that activate different room modes.
Basic proposal then: Using your MiniDSP (with amplification for each channel) + fairly small Tower speaker with casters, + subwoofer(s)
Subwoofer(s) below 150 Hz
Midbass 150 Hz up cardioid pattern, probably a line array for the midbass from the floor on a frame with casters.
Treble as low as you can get it with waveguide/horn (no less than 90 degrees horizontally), either tweeter dome/planar/HEIL or compression driver.
Cardioids to function properly cannot be deep (basically right up next to the driver's magnet), or wide (not much wider than the driver's frame) - so this would be a fairly "shallow panel" small tower (though for stability you would likely need a base for the speaker that was a bit more deep.
Hmm, perhaps a Great Heil (which basically has its own waveguide integrated into the design) down to 900 Hz with it's rear wave mostly absorbed, a vertical line below that of 4 (series/parallel connected) Anarchy 7's cardioid loaded. from 150 Hz to 900 Hz, and at least one well-placed subwoofer (or several smaller subwoofers).
https://essspeakers.store/collections/heil-amt/products/the-original-great-ess-heil-amt-air-motion-transformer™
https://www.diysoundgroup.com/speaker-parts/anarchy7-4ohm.html
Probably about 9.5" wide and 6" deep, with total height including about 5" of frame w/caster-height at the bottom = 42".
Subwoofer(s) - lots of different choices here and it depends on how many people are listening. I'd stick to Rythmik Audio for driver and accompanying "servo" plate-amp.
https://www.rythmikaudio.com/DS1200driver.html
(they have 8" drivers, 12" drivers like the one in the link, and 15" drivers.)
Last edited:
Thank you!
I don't know if I have the ability to effectively design my own cabinet. I was hoping that there are plans out there made by someone with more experience than me in the actual science behind the art that is speaker design 🙂
Of course I would be happy to pay for such plans. It seems that there are a lot of plans out there, both free and paid, but it is very hard to evaluate how well they would fit in this suboptimal arrangement.
I don't know if I have the ability to effectively design my own cabinet. I was hoping that there are plans out there made by someone with more experience than me in the actual science behind the art that is speaker design 🙂
Of course I would be happy to pay for such plans. It seems that there are a lot of plans out there, both free and paid, but it is very hard to evaluate how well they would fit in this suboptimal arrangement.
Well there isn't much to the cabinet that I outlined.
Basically the side of the speaker is "open" (which would likely be about 4") with but with a resistive vent.
Then "vent" is rather like a muffler with one panel of corrugated mesh metal on the outside and one on the inside and both sandwiching some thin fibrous material like cheap poly batting for quilts.
Here is MBK's muffler:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/adventures-in-cardioid.142691/#post-1808310
..and this is that ideal pattern with ONLY that muffler:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/adventures-in-cardioid.142691/#post-1808323
(..obviously the MiniDSP would be used to eq. it flat.)
Front baffle just needs to accommodate the 4 *drivers and the rear panel needs to "butt-up" against the magnets (with vent holes for the magnets).
*and you can see exactly the dimensions of the Anarchy woofers.
Base needs to be connected on bottom with caster's.
Top needs to connect to bottom of Great Heil with some absoprtive material just under the Heil (like 1.5" of ultratouch insulation, and this can also be good material for the fibrous fill for the resistive vents).
MiniDSP (+ software) & a mic. to measure the loudspeakers will provide most of the "engineering" you need. You can always post results here for help with crossover refinement. (..I'd probably also add-in a large capacitance value cap in series to the Great Heil to protect it from amp "thump" at turn-on.)
Basically the side of the speaker is "open" (which would likely be about 4") with but with a resistive vent.
Then "vent" is rather like a muffler with one panel of corrugated mesh metal on the outside and one on the inside and both sandwiching some thin fibrous material like cheap poly batting for quilts.
Here is MBK's muffler:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/adventures-in-cardioid.142691/#post-1808310
..and this is that ideal pattern with ONLY that muffler:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/adventures-in-cardioid.142691/#post-1808323
(..obviously the MiniDSP would be used to eq. it flat.)
Front baffle just needs to accommodate the 4 *drivers and the rear panel needs to "butt-up" against the magnets (with vent holes for the magnets).
*and you can see exactly the dimensions of the Anarchy woofers.
Base needs to be connected on bottom with caster's.
Top needs to connect to bottom of Great Heil with some absoprtive material just under the Heil (like 1.5" of ultratouch insulation, and this can also be good material for the fibrous fill for the resistive vents).
MiniDSP (+ software) & a mic. to measure the loudspeakers will provide most of the "engineering" you need. You can always post results here for help with crossover refinement. (..I'd probably also add-in a large capacitance value cap in series to the Great Heil to protect it from amp "thump" at turn-on.)
Last edited:
Member
Joined 2009
Paid Member
My solution to the ‘practical house’ was very simple indeed. I just made one large superb speaker with decent dispersion, designed to be effectively a point source. Yes, single channel, so it’s not stereo but I’m no longer fighting the room, dealing with sweet spots etc. You give up imaging but you were already on a losing battle there with the practicalities of a living room and the vagaries of your recordings. What you gain is a low compromise sound field, where the single channel can use the very best of everything because you only have to invest in one channel.
I have not yet experienced a better solution.
I have not yet experienced a better solution.
Last edited:
