My take is a speaker with highish sensitivity, easy load & large driver surface area should get you there be it by means of horn loading or dynamic drivers.
For listening at low volumes, I find it much better to use headphones, but that option aside, I find that an equalizer can work wonders to tailor that Fletcher Munson curve to your particular tastes. If you like your Dynaudios at higher SPLs, then they'll do a perfectly good job at lower SPLs once you boost the areas that your hearing is less sensitive toward.
Another option for low volumes is to set up a near-field listening environment. The closer you get to the speakers, the more natural they will sound at low volumes.
Another option for low volumes is to set up a near-field listening environment. The closer you get to the speakers, the more natural they will sound at low volumes.
Background noise is the enemy. I've found near field late night listening at low volume very enjoyable, my ears adjust and I can keep edging the volume down whilst seeming to hear more and more.
low volume speakers mostly have a low mms, so only a few watt (or even less than a watt in most cases) do the thing right. High mms drivers only work fully when enough power is send to it (mostly more than you will want for low listening).
Many fullrange drivers do it right. My recommandation is that a Mark Audio 10P or 10.3 in the pencil speaker designed for it would be very suited, just like the CHN110 (that i often use for this) in an MLTL.
But multiway drivers can also do that. Something like the part express C-Note or Tango MT is a good starting point if you are looking for a multiway kit. If you want to design it yourself, find drivers that are low mms to start with and build a kit that easely go way louder than you need (to have headroom for dynamics and transients). With low mms drivers you will less need an eq to make it sound balanced as the drivers will do more (but the Fletcher Munson curve still plays a bit).
Pro audio speakers often have a high mms to be able to handle a lot of power, and are less suited in my opinion. They are bigger and higher efficient, but they often don't work very well on very low power as the cone is to heavy for that.
Many fullrange drivers do it right. My recommandation is that a Mark Audio 10P or 10.3 in the pencil speaker designed for it would be very suited, just like the CHN110 (that i often use for this) in an MLTL.
But multiway drivers can also do that. Something like the part express C-Note or Tango MT is a good starting point if you are looking for a multiway kit. If you want to design it yourself, find drivers that are low mms to start with and build a kit that easely go way louder than you need (to have headroom for dynamics and transients). With low mms drivers you will less need an eq to make it sound balanced as the drivers will do more (but the Fletcher Munson curve still plays a bit).
Pro audio speakers often have a high mms to be able to handle a lot of power, and are less suited in my opinion. They are bigger and higher efficient, but they often don't work very well on very low power as the cone is to heavy for that.
Room treatments will only take you so far.
The complement of the "near-field listening" approach is soundproofing the room to prevent intrusive ambient sound getting into the listening space. This can be much more than you may want to tackle as the design is particular and the work has to be done fastidiously to make it worth while. But if I was setting up a facility to listen to de Visee lute music I'd start with sound proofing. Of course if I wanted to listen to AC DC at speed I'd be seriously considering sound proofing too.
As far as the loudspeakers go, the advice to go full range is sound. Dave (Planet 10) has some nice designs.
The complement of the "near-field listening" approach is soundproofing the room to prevent intrusive ambient sound getting into the listening space. This can be much more than you may want to tackle as the design is particular and the work has to be done fastidiously to make it worth while. But if I was setting up a facility to listen to de Visee lute music I'd start with sound proofing. Of course if I wanted to listen to AC DC at speed I'd be seriously considering sound proofing too.
As far as the loudspeakers go, the advice to go full range is sound. Dave (Planet 10) has some nice designs.
Of course, I also meant soundproofing when I mentioned treatment which is why the OP wouldn't be disturbed by / disturb the neighbours. Sorry that I missed the term "soundproofing" earlier.
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I lost you there. What, to you, is the relation between mms and the sound power level desired? A Scan Speak beryllium dome has a mms of 0,35g. But that wouldn't do, would it?
By the way, there will be a 60W solid state amp available IIRC. So...
My requirements are similar to OP, 50-70db, higher on occasion.
1) Extensive acoustic treatments - Drywall tear out soon. Maybe $4k total when complete. Well worth it to have a non-fatiguing and hearing preserving environment.
2) Speakers that are flat or critically damped, and non-resonant through the bass range. The quite, flat and noise free bass will unveil the actual bass that exists in the recordings while enhancing relaxed low level listening. Add, a well designed speaker that has a flat sloped response from bass to 3-6 db down at 15-20khz. You will have to design them or find existing diy offerings. IME no commercial design has come with described bass above - Always compensating with volume to try and hear a balanced bass response.
With 1 and 2, Fletcher Munson curves becomes mostly a non issue.
3) Good electronics. Lots of designs on this forum that will do the job and are as good or better as anything that's commercially available at a fraction the price - I put that savings towards room treatments. Consider, one pre-amp can be $4k+. $4k is a fraction of the price of commercial speakers. Amps, dacs, etc..🙂
1) Extensive acoustic treatments - Drywall tear out soon. Maybe $4k total when complete. Well worth it to have a non-fatiguing and hearing preserving environment.
2) Speakers that are flat or critically damped, and non-resonant through the bass range. The quite, flat and noise free bass will unveil the actual bass that exists in the recordings while enhancing relaxed low level listening. Add, a well designed speaker that has a flat sloped response from bass to 3-6 db down at 15-20khz. You will have to design them or find existing diy offerings. IME no commercial design has come with described bass above - Always compensating with volume to try and hear a balanced bass response.
With 1 and 2, Fletcher Munson curves becomes mostly a non issue.
3) Good electronics. Lots of designs on this forum that will do the job and are as good or better as anything that's commercially available at a fraction the price - I put that savings towards room treatments. Consider, one pre-amp can be $4k+. $4k is a fraction of the price of commercial speakers. Amps, dacs, etc..🙂
Acoustically treated from outside noise but not too much in the listening room itself I hope. lol
The room is in the basement, 15x17 with a 7'8" ceiling, lower where HVAC runs. First step is a complete removal of all drywall. Then move HVAC return, so flow and Return are at opposite walls so it's visually and acoustically balanced. Reframe walls for 2x4 centers. For the walls, I haven't decided on all absorption, all pressure panels or alternate between the two. Aesthetic goal is all absorption so no absorption panels would be inside the room, but necessary if the walls were hard surface pressure panels. The ceiling 12"oc trusses will be completely filled with absorption, strapping across to create a 24" grid pattern. Fabric stretched and stapled across all the absorption on walls and ceiling.. Also going to discuss it more at this site.Home | The-audio-expert
-The fabric is from Guilford of Maine - some samples in pic.
-The insulation will be 4" Rockboard 60 with a synthetic fiber fill material covering the rockboard before fabric install.
-The ducting will have a 1" rockboard covering - best I can do to save height.
-Floating subfloor with Carpet. Shag carpet if I can sneak that one past my Woman😀
-Home theatre/2channel combo on one end and 2 channel off of side wall..
-I'll play around with diffusion on home theatre listening end later.
-I'll measure and listen to final results of the bass response, then potentially look at a Bass Array for a flatter bass region, but my feeling is that it wont be necessary.
Side note - I'm working on a room in the GTA that holds a Grand Piano. Before Xmas, I finished 2 foot wide ceiling perimeter absorption with Guilford fabric installed. Inside the absorption perimeter the center of the Trusses will hold forty 2'x2' quadratic diffusers, targeting 1200hz to 8khz. The owners are deciding on the type of wood, then all will be made in home shop.. The walls will be treated after piano is reinstalled and I can measure reverberation.
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Thank you Joel, can sealed speaker be the right way to get what you described ? I think about 3-way modular speaker with sealed bass section.
What about combination of such bass section and FR speaker for mid/upper frequencies ? Such sealed (sub)woofer should be flat sloped and better to join with mid/high section ? And crossover can be 2-way. Or is it nonsense ?
Regarding;
1,2 - There's all kinds of designs that are closer to a normal speaker in appearance and operation, including sealed and bass reflex vented. Also the mass loaded, quarter wave designs, which are similar to BR but different.
3 - Generally I'd expect a common 70W amp to be class A/B. That would mean at low levels, it's operating mostly class A - different designs carry this mode to different lengths (Watts output) before transitioning to class B. So a high efficiency driver is going to keep your A/B amp in class A longer, if not fully, at low levels. Many class A enthusiasts say it sounds better in this mode of operation.
My Lii F15s are nicely efficient - and they reproduce the sound of a piano well. There is a piano in the house that gets played by our teenager often enough that I know what a real one sounds like - often enough simultaneously with my system 😡 (He tells me I play the stereo so loud, louder than his piano. To which I say no way - want me to measure it and compare?)
Given that I can still edit, I'll add that crossing a bass speaker section to a full range driver perfectly sensible and even desirable. This is because you can do the crossover at a much lower frequency than usual, say, "500" Hz, which has sonic advantages.
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There was an interesting discussion on this topic of quality at low volumes a few years ago: Considerations for good performance at low volume
Very briefly, many consider that a driver with low mechanical resistance, Rms, is an important factor for good low level listening.
Very briefly, many consider that a driver with low mechanical resistance, Rms, is an important factor for good low level listening.
So it looks like "safest" solution for DIY ?
Are there some proved DIY designs with very good sound, better than similar expensive commercial speakers ? (2 way with sealed bass & FR). Because i live in Europe, I would prefer construction with drivers that I can buy here in european e-shops.
Properly damped sealed is great, so clean. I just put together test boxes for the start of a 40L sealed set with an 8 inch woofer in each. But it doesn't quite match the low freq extension of my 20L ported, but has 2db more sensitivity. The blue and green curve reveals the response difference. Subjectively, the the sealed bass is close enough to the ported on many recordings but its early roll off shows up on some recordings. The sealed design was chosen for box size and for the earliest roll off I can accept in a sealed speaker.. lower sealed f3 requires bigger boxes or lower sensitivity - Hoffman's Iron Law-.
I'm not a big fan of really big boxes!
Equalized Sealed sub maybe.. I have 2 SB Acoustics 8" Subwoofers. The build quality is awesome, with 11.5mm of Xmax.. Planning to implement them into the sealed speakers mentioned above for lowest possible bass extension I can equalize them to at a low listening level. Maybe only one sub is required for this, I'll see. Solen Electronique Inc. | SB23MFCL45-8
If you can handle the cone breakup of a full range driver, I think Your idea is good. You preserve phase with the full range. Crossing over to tweeter can be a bitch. In my 3way, I crossed my bass to SB(not a true full range) mid at about 300hz and listened to it full range for months while tweeter sat on top unused. It was pretty okay and really nice off axis.
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I measured a few OTA TV shows and the vocal's widest range channels were from low 60s average [my norm] to mid 80s transient peaks on the two PBS channels!
The main channels were all compressed to ~10 dB transients with some obscure ones having basically mono AM radio quality.
I've read/been told that some OTA audio was superior to cable, etc., but surprised by how much.
That's been my experience when they are also high efficiency due to high Vas [mid]woofers, large horns in optimized [large] cab alignments tuned to a low Fs relative to desired low frequency roll off.
That and high Vas to get Fs low enough for decent bass and compliance for lower inertia. The box will be bigger but that'll get the tweeter to ear level.