What's good is that the OP saved himself a big headache and still found satisfaction, and now he can "really" start working on what he originally wanted, i.e., better bass and imaging.
It is also quite likely that the OP gains sufficient knowledge in the process, so as to carry out any future improvements / modifications / redesign, according to the personal preferences of the time.
It is also quite likely that the OP gains sufficient knowledge in the process, so as to carry out any future improvements / modifications / redesign, according to the personal preferences of the time.
Great post, Geoff. Excellent suggestions and those just begin to scratch the surface of the hundreds of DIY kits available from a variety of sources throughout the world. And all of them tremendous value for the money.
If someone has the time and patience to build their cabinets, or can find someone else to do it for them, there is no reason to buy commercially manufactured speakers. And a lot of reasons not to.
If someone has the time and patience to build their cabinets, or can find someone else to do it for them, there is no reason to buy commercially manufactured speakers. And a lot of reasons not to.
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I'm not really sure what 'big headache' you think the OP saved himself from. Perhaps you can elaborate on it.
Yes, had the OP gone with the Visaton kit and not liked it, his later attempts at trying to sell the whole contraption for a decent price would indeed have been some struggle.
Hope that also answers classicalfan's concern in #84.
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The point I tried to make was only about having to choose between those two options: the Visaton kit is far too expensive for someone, especially a first time builder, just to 'take a punt on'.
I would have suggested the kits summarised in my post above above to N3rd, but don't have the experience or expertise to suggest which design would work best with those low ceilings.
I wouldn't choose either option, to be blunt.
Something like the Classix 2.5 TMM would cost a tenth of the Tannoys or Visaton and sound very good indeed. And even if I didn't like the sound - and everyone who's built them loves them - and I couldn't sell them, I would have learned something, had fun and only spent $400 or so. Plus a friend would get a very good pair of speakers for a present.
Geoff
Yes, what you meant is clear from the quote itself (below):
Nevertheless, it did remind me of the possible difficulties in getting DIY stuff sold for good prices.
GeoffMillar said:
Nevertheless, it did remind me of the possible difficulties in getting DIY stuff sold for good prices.
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Well, if they're popular ones, then someone here would have built / would know about them, how much they cost, how they sound etc. The OP has to wait until such people join in and give their opinions. I believe the Tannoy is still expensive to many, but it's entirely up to the OP to go for it or not.
I listed the cost of each kit or design in my post. As for sound, the web sites cited either have customer/magazine reviews or designers' comments - I have always found the latter to be honest and accurate.
Almost all those designs come with FR and impedance graphs and you can't say that about many commercial speakers. One famous maker, and I won't mention the name, has apparently even taken legal action to stop reviewers publishing that information.
Of those listed projects, a large number of people have built and reviewed the Solstice, Tritrix, Classix 2.5, Slapshot and Amiga speakers. A few Google searches and reading the web sites provided will pay dividends.
I also noted the designs which I've built and like.
Describing sound is difficult, and it's very hard to try and guess how a speaker will sound in anyone else's room, hence my reservations in suggesting a design for the OP. However, a great thing about DIY is that the community is almost always helpful; I find that designers are very happy to help me with working out what would best suit our needs.
Geoff
Almost all those designs come with FR and impedance graphs and you can't say that about many commercial speakers. One famous maker, and I won't mention the name, has apparently even taken legal action to stop reviewers publishing that information.
Of those listed projects, a large number of people have built and reviewed the Solstice, Tritrix, Classix 2.5, Slapshot and Amiga speakers. A few Google searches and reading the web sites provided will pay dividends.
I also noted the designs which I've built and like.
Describing sound is difficult, and it's very hard to try and guess how a speaker will sound in anyone else's room, hence my reservations in suggesting a design for the OP. However, a great thing about DIY is that the community is almost always helpful; I find that designers are very happy to help me with working out what would best suit our needs.
Geoff
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It's okay to be against the Visaton Monitor 890 mk3 because there certainly is bits within with a price tag blown out of proportion.
It is though not fair to not recognize that all the bits contained in the kit can be sourced for a total price that is about 900 hundred euro less than the kit price! Do you understand? In the same store!
Well, what are the overpriced pieces? It is the midrange unit (269€/piece) and the horn for it (399€/piece) and the adapter (27.5€/piece) on top of it. Then there is the "issue" of a super tweeter. Even though it is a very good quality product, it might be unnecessary if the midrange unit were a tweeter. And that tweeter could have been a part of a conventional constant directivity waveguide/horn. Of course, this is just a fantasy suggestion, an out loud thinking of mine, and Visaton company will not concern itself with it, probably not.
So, in essence we would like to keep the woofer drivers, add a nice 1" compression tweeter unit, and a good waveguide, change the complicated woofer cabinet to a simpler one, simpler for the execution, not needing to oursource this job, and a modified x/o filter to account for a new design. A loudspeaker like that with awesome bass capabilities would indeed fulfill OP's desires.
But, as usually, propaganda wins. 😉
It is though not fair to not recognize that all the bits contained in the kit can be sourced for a total price that is about 900 hundred euro less than the kit price! Do you understand? In the same store!
Well, what are the overpriced pieces? It is the midrange unit (269€/piece) and the horn for it (399€/piece) and the adapter (27.5€/piece) on top of it. Then there is the "issue" of a super tweeter. Even though it is a very good quality product, it might be unnecessary if the midrange unit were a tweeter. And that tweeter could have been a part of a conventional constant directivity waveguide/horn. Of course, this is just a fantasy suggestion, an out loud thinking of mine, and Visaton company will not concern itself with it, probably not.
So, in essence we would like to keep the woofer drivers, add a nice 1" compression tweeter unit, and a good waveguide, change the complicated woofer cabinet to a simpler one, simpler for the execution, not needing to oursource this job, and a modified x/o filter to account for a new design. A loudspeaker like that with awesome bass capabilities would indeed fulfill OP's desires.
But, as usually, propaganda wins. 😉
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GeoffMillar said:
Yes, Sir, but N3rd has not specified where he is from. However, from his negotiations in pounds, he may very well be across the pond in several cases. International shipping is often not the same as domestic, and the numbers change rather quickly.
Lojzek said:
Yes, 2x12" crossed at 1.2kHz (or so) with a good 1" + horn would possibly do well. However, the OP would have to get ready for some DIY trouble, as it would no longer be just an assembly job.
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I need to apologize for miscalculating the total price of the bits compared to a kit price. Calculus included one woofer a cabinet, instead of two, so the total price is about 3,240 € for the bits, and not 2,644 €.
As N3D has pulled the trigger for a concentric Tannoy, it will be good one explains to him two things about second hand loudspeakers and crossovers refurbishing if the second hand is old enough and maybe a way to improve the impulse response with a better delay between the long embedded horn in the center of the woofer with it , I think about a passive delay bandpass filter maybe if its budget has money left 🙂... Tannoy have often terrible measurements.
Well, I’m glad that N3rd has found an answer to his needs and hope that he enjoys his new speakers. Building the Visaton Monitor 890 cabinet is very complex and difficult and was probably not a good idea for a first time builder anyhow.
And hopefully some of the other people who have posted in this thread and who apparently did not understand the true nature of DIY speaker building before have learned now what it is really all about.
Particularly with regard to the entire industry that designs, creates, and distributes kits thereby bringing great value to this DIY community.
And hopefully some of the other people who have posted in this thread and who apparently did not understand the true nature of DIY speaker building before have learned now what it is really all about.
Particularly with regard to the entire industry that designs, creates, and distributes kits thereby bringing great value to this DIY community.
Geoff, thanks for listing those specific kits. All good suggestions. I would add to your list the Piccolo by Jeff Bagby. I'm building my second set now after letting my son try the first one and not being able to take it back from him.
As I have posted before on this forum, I got involved in DIY speakers after first auditioning many commercial products costing up to $2,000 per pair in stores and finding that none of them sounded very good. A $5,000 per pair Monitor Audio set sound even worse than its $2,000 per pair sibling.
Very affordable $400 kits will greatly outperform those commercial products. And that's really why we are all here,
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Neumanns, as best I can tell, are all ProAudio studio monitors.
Entirely unsuitable for highly refined audiophile type listening in a home environment.
So, no thank you. We already have hundreds of great sounding DIY options for very affordable prices that will bring much more pleasurable listening than the those.
Entirely unsuitable for highly refined audiophile type listening in a home environment.
So, no thank you. We already have hundreds of great sounding DIY options for very affordable prices that will bring much more pleasurable listening than the those.
Not only you are in the lie but you are in the myth... and I didn't say diy sounds bad, but all what you say are white or black without nuance, one see more a religion here than advices that makes sense. Some diy can be more expensive, some others not, all is about the situation.
I don't care about Neumanns, etc : but they are very affordable for what they are, many works fine not only on desk as the one I linked, and all have active solution for room integration and hit 115 db without stress ! I'm not stystematic like your advices... you are clearly biased and dishonest till the point I haver changed my mind because I talked about diy in my post above. How ridiculous it is at the end. You need nuance, not for me as I don't care, but for your soul imho. DIy is larger than just building a kit; in hifi as soon as you buy two device you integrate at home you are already in the diy !
looks like a crusade for you, me I only think about saying a guy : sort out all the advices and try byyourself to hear first : in shops, why not at home members - GB is not that big and very active in the hifi hobby and club, etc !
I don't care about Neumanns, etc : but they are very affordable for what they are, many works fine not only on desk as the one I linked, and all have active solution for room integration and hit 115 db without stress ! I'm not stystematic like your advices... you are clearly biased and dishonest till the point I haver changed my mind because I talked about diy in my post above. How ridiculous it is at the end. You need nuance, not for me as I don't care, but for your soul imho. DIy is larger than just building a kit; in hifi as soon as you buy two device you integrate at home you are already in the diy !
looks like a crusade for you, me I only think about saying a guy : sort out all the advices and try byyourself to hear first : in shops, why not at home members - GB is not that big and very active in the hifi hobby and club, etc !
The source
For the sake of clarity regarding how cheap and crappy sounding loudspeaker Behringer B2031A is, in classicalfan's opinion of course, he quoted an unidentified review and took one sentence out of context, presenting it as a confirmation of his opinion:
"It's a shame that the tweeter is not as good as the one on the JBL's, and will probably bother you at some point while listening to them."
In original review, just before the quoted line, it says "In stock form the Truth Monitors provide some of the best mid bass clarity that I've heard from a 2 way speaker."
And somewhere before that:
"While listening through a few other tracks the treble starts to bother me. Not just the quality, but the quantity. Turning again to the literature on the back of the speaker it suggests for a live room, which I definitely have, to knock down the treble 4dB. I give that a shot, but it sounds too muffled. I flip the switch to -2dB, and the clicks and pops of Kraftwerk are now mostly enjoyable instead of anoying. The slight harshness is still there in the in the highest highs, but it's not too bad."
The review starts by:" Cheap German knockoff..." and a little later "The Truth 2031A's are a design stolen from Genelec, the 1031A,"
And another quote:
"Prepare for more insanity. MDF quality is very nice dense stuff, not the usual chinesium crap. The front baffle is a complicated heavily machined piece which is 1/2 inch behind the tweeter, and 1 1/8" behind the woofer which is precision flush mounted to the surface. The center brace is a solid 3/4 inch piece and all of the cabinet walls are covered in a thick carpet padding type material. This is a better box than the Infinity Primus, which was over built massively for the price point. I would say that only the B&W 686S2 beats the Behringer Truth's in cabinet construction quality of reviewed speakers."
Let the rookie audiophiles judge for themselves, what B2031A may sound like.
For the sake of clarity regarding how cheap and crappy sounding loudspeaker Behringer B2031A is, in classicalfan's opinion of course, he quoted an unidentified review and took one sentence out of context, presenting it as a confirmation of his opinion:
"It's a shame that the tweeter is not as good as the one on the JBL's, and will probably bother you at some point while listening to them."
In original review, just before the quoted line, it says "In stock form the Truth Monitors provide some of the best mid bass clarity that I've heard from a 2 way speaker."
And somewhere before that:
"While listening through a few other tracks the treble starts to bother me. Not just the quality, but the quantity. Turning again to the literature on the back of the speaker it suggests for a live room, which I definitely have, to knock down the treble 4dB. I give that a shot, but it sounds too muffled. I flip the switch to -2dB, and the clicks and pops of Kraftwerk are now mostly enjoyable instead of anoying. The slight harshness is still there in the in the highest highs, but it's not too bad."
The review starts by:" Cheap German knockoff..." and a little later "The Truth 2031A's are a design stolen from Genelec, the 1031A,"
And another quote:
"Prepare for more insanity. MDF quality is very nice dense stuff, not the usual chinesium crap. The front baffle is a complicated heavily machined piece which is 1/2 inch behind the tweeter, and 1 1/8" behind the woofer which is precision flush mounted to the surface. The center brace is a solid 3/4 inch piece and all of the cabinet walls are covered in a thick carpet padding type material. This is a better box than the Infinity Primus, which was over built massively for the price point. I would say that only the B&W 686S2 beats the Behringer Truth's in cabinet construction quality of reviewed speakers."
Let the rookie audiophiles judge for themselves, what B2031A may sound like.
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... and one has to make it in the context : The Behringer is way under any cheap kit price with 200 euros. When considering then the much more better Neumann 3 ways I linked near trhe limit price (3700 euros a pair), it can for a beginner the way to go to a music shop and listened to them to try to have an idea of a more or less neutral and good enough sound then try to compare with clasic hifi and diy (alas cv-19 makes the thing not easy, not talking of the people that think that vaccine sounds bad and is a crappy medecine plot sided !)
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