I have not used RAAL so far so no experience.
As for the 4" bass-mids, there are indeed many to choose from. I personally know SEAS CA12RCY (used in ProAc Tablette clone) and I liked it, but that's me.
Few members here, as I recall off the top of my head, were using SEAS CA12RCY-P (alu version): IIRC it was Zvu, and he praised it. Other, SEAS Excell 12CY, used by Pida. I think Lojzek mentiones Peerless often, etc - am sure many others have recommendations and perhaps first-hand experience and may chime in.
SB NAC and CAC series are highly regarded, with excellent measurements (on my shortlist too).
So let's see what the "committee" comes up with.
As for the 4" bass-mids, there are indeed many to choose from. I personally know SEAS CA12RCY (used in ProAc Tablette clone) and I liked it, but that's me.
Few members here, as I recall off the top of my head, were using SEAS CA12RCY-P (alu version): IIRC it was Zvu, and he praised it. Other, SEAS Excell 12CY, used by Pida. I think Lojzek mentiones Peerless often, etc - am sure many others have recommendations and perhaps first-hand experience and may chime in.
SB NAC and CAC series are highly regarded, with excellent measurements (on my shortlist too).
So let's see what the "committee" comes up with.
Well, i did a fast rough sim for this setup of the OP (more out of curiosity) and get this rahter ok response, as long as you add a woofer for below 200Hz. I included the zip file with the xsim project i made for this. This can be a starting point for a crossover, but it's definitly not finetuned, and you can use it at your own risk.
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Thank you very much for the input. Would like to stick with parallel setup as for starters series crossover will make it more complicated.
Also consider Faital Pro has some mid-woofers in the 4-5" range with remarkable power handling and great response in the top end.
Well, no problem, while i was on the train home after work i had some entertainment messing arround with it...
Again, this is a rough sketch, not a fine tuned crossover, and use at your own risk...
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Thank you very much.
The result of your value:
Tweeter + Woofer(Perfect)
But as I plan to pair two woofers in series it is bit off.
If tweaked a bit it can be done.
But I would like to know the reason to cross it at 3000Hz and not at 2000Hz. Wouldn't it be better to cross it at 2000Hz specially for that ScanSpeak woofer and even RAAL tweeter is also known to do fine with that low crossover range unlike some lower end ribbons. Is there a reason for that which I need to understand.
The result of your value:
Tweeter + Woofer(Perfect)
But as I plan to pair two woofers in series it is bit off.
If tweaked a bit it can be done.
But I would like to know the reason to cross it at 3000Hz and not at 2000Hz. Wouldn't it be better to cross it at 2000Hz specially for that ScanSpeak woofer and even RAAL tweeter is also known to do fine with that low crossover range unlike some lower end ribbons. Is there a reason for that which I need to understand.
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I was going through their site and the ones I came across were 4FE32 and 4FE35. Have you used them or have you personally experienced them. How transparent can they be. I am looking for cleanest audio output irrelevant of harshness of source. When compared to ScanSpeak 12MUs I listed will be better for clarity.
I've not heard the Faitals I'm afraid, but they are very attractive as listed above, and also, not very expensive at all. Lots of FaitalPro fans here though.
I personally love the ScanSpeak Revelator line, but on pure specs, at 4" those FaitalPros are hard to beat, especially for dynamic range.
I personally love the ScanSpeak Revelator line, but on pure specs, at 4" those FaitalPros are hard to beat, especially for dynamic range.
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Thank you very much.
The result of your value:
Tweeter + Woofer(Perfect)
But as I plan to pair two woofers in series it is bit off.
If tweaked a bit it can be done.
But I would like to know the reason to cross it at 3000Hz and not at 2000Hz. Wouldn't it be better to cross it at 2000Hz specially for that ScanSpeak woofer and even RAAL tweeter is also known to do fine with that low crossover range unlike some lower end ribbons. Is there a reason for that which I need to understand.
Because i don’t like to push ribbons to low. They sound better if you don’t...
And i did model with one driver, i can redo that for 2 also if you want to make an MTM.
I will only be using MTM setup for center channel which will be horizontal MTM while other side and surround will be TMM vertical config.
As long as they can give me pure experience instead of smoothing it out for better experience, I am fine with having any driver to be paired with. It is just that I have heard that ScanSpeak Illuminator series sound extremely natural and pure, so as long as FaitalPro can beat it I have no concerns. At this point cap on budget blew out of the window so no worries there. I mean I am not planning to build another set to replace it for at-least a decade or even more.
True, though many consider the Revelator mid-woofers among the best sounding in the world. Gamut, Wilson and others have not always gone up to the Illuminators.
The Illuminators definitely have a lot going for them technically, but at a price that is hard to always justify.
Yes Perfectly Done
Thank you very much.
I will be taking this as my base point and working it up to perfection with drivers after finalizing and purchasing them.
I think Illuminator is a notch above Revelator(correct me if I am wrong). As long as they are up a notch I wouldn't mind spending as I said will be using them over extremely long period of time and would like have best possible setup.
I went, just for the fun, a bit further with your id and added a subwoofer. The driver is the 12″ SB34NRX75-6 and i would put it in a 75L sealed box for this. That should give you an F3 of 36Hz and a F10 of 23Hz. And the crossover would be like this.
Just throwing arround with ID's. And again, this is a rough sketch, use it at own risk.
Just throwing arround with ID's. And again, this is a rough sketch, use it at own risk.
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You can do better than either for less.
Frankly though, using a mid. doubled-up and pushing it much below 200 Hz is asking for problems. The Illuminator mid. has higher odd-order distortion below 300 Hz. IF however you do use a sufficient high-pass (presumably active from MiniDSP), then it should be OK as long as you don't have really high output levels. The driver sounds really good above 400 Hz.
If I were going by this design: MTM sort, 2-way only with ribbon it would be:
crossover around 2.5 kHz, with 2 Zaph Audio ZA14W08's (in *parallel*) with a Viawave SRT-7:
Zaph Audio ZA14W08 | HiFiCompass
Viawave SRT-7 | HiFiCompass
Despite the lower linear xmax those Zaph drivers are tailor-made to that sort of *MTM 2-way design, the only real limitation (beyond ultimate spl) is getting the crossover right as far as dispersion (..and of course notching the bell mode resonance near 9 kHz).
Pocket the saved difference or plow it into your passive crossover components. 🙂 ..and enjoy a better loudspeaker.
*see ZA5.3 MTM
Zaph|Audio - ZA5 Speaker Designs with ZA14W08 woofer and Vifa DQ25SC16-04 tweeter
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The reason for picking up that specific combo specially the RAAL tweeter is because of its vertical off-axis response which is considered to be the best of any ribbon tweeter. The center channel will be vertically off by 9-13°.
I plan to pair the speakers with a dedicated Sub woofer which will be limited around 200hz. Should I clip the woofer to 200hz or let it roll off without clipping.
I read your reasoning originally.
Go back and look at the verticals for the Viawave and make correct comparisons. 😉
(..the SRT-7 has a +/- 15 degree (30 degree window) vertical that only has a -2db variation at that +/-15 degree limit as high up as 12 kHz, and a -6 db difference at 20 kHz.)
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