You could make Carmody's Spitfire but as a small tower with these flat pack cabinets:
Denovo Audio Knock-Down MDF 1.16 cu. ft. Tower Speaker Cabinet
Spitfire, Full Kit (Pair) SB Acoustics | Audax | Audyn | Accuton | Airborne | Aurum Cantus | Beston | Bohlenbder Graebener | CSS } Clarity | Cebo | Dayton | Eton | Eclipse | Fountek | Hi-Vi | Hiquphon |LPG | Lynk | Scan Speak | SEAS | Solen | Satori | Silver Flute | Tang Band | Transducer Labes | Tymphany | Vifa | Wavcor Meniscus Audio
Denovo Audio Knock-Down MDF 1.16 cu. ft. Tower Speaker Cabinet
Spitfire, Full Kit (Pair) SB Acoustics | Audax | Audyn | Accuton | Airborne | Aurum Cantus | Beston | Bohlenbder Graebener | CSS } Clarity | Cebo | Dayton | Eton | Eclipse | Fountek | Hi-Vi | Hiquphon |LPG | Lynk | Scan Speak | SEAS | Solen | Satori | Silver Flute | Tang Band | Transducer Labes | Tymphany | Vifa | Wavcor Meniscus Audio
Attachments
Almost anybody can afford drapes to stop sound waves bouncing off the rear walls and heavy curtains on the windows to moderate traffic noise if buying at Goodwill and that is what I meant, the same space but modified to work somewhat better, bookshelves filled with books worked well for me in one space, in our current room just changing the curtains for much heavier ones did a similar job as did adding in a rug on the floor. Sometimes you can't do much about speaker placement but that also is worth experimenting with. The biggest change in our listening space came when I hung a big and heavy carpet on the wall behind our seating but it had very poor WAF and when it was removed to repaint I wasn't "allowed" to replace it although SWMBO is generally pretty tolerant of big black boxes against the wall. IF you have a spare amplifier you best bang for buck in improving fidelity might be Bi-Amping with a cheap XO
Cheap woofers but a great top end sound better to me sometimes.
I am sure the shortcoming is mine, but I don't see a single word addressing any of the questions. Perhaps you could be a bit forthcoming with the answers:
what instrument do you play and who genre of music do you listen to?
what are you sources - old vinyl or newer CDs, or... ?
how big is your room* and do you sit in one location and need only good quality only in one spot?
ambience matters?
handy with a table saw? Handy with a soldering iron?
how's your treble hearing?
B.
* granted, chirsjmartini did say "small" which I am sure we all understand to be definitely between 500 and 5500 cu feet.
In the intro he linked to in the 1st post.
An iPhone with AIFF files.
800 ft2
No space even if he could.
'some electronics engineering knowledge”
dave
I am an ex vocalist. I listen to Rock, Metal, Jazz, Classical, Pop mainly.
No physical media. Sold the vinyl collection over 20 years ago. Still have the CDs but honestly never use them anymore. Listen to lossless hd audio files mainly.
The room is an 11' x 17' rectangle. I have half the space for listening, so a square shape space. In that space is a 60" tv, stand, large coffee table and a large sofa. Where the right speaker would be placed is almost up against a wall (maybe 6' from back wall and side wall). So yeah, a problematic space. I would definitely need some type of sound absorbing material on the sofa wall as that wall is shared with a neighbor.
Yes, though not sure how much I can do about that in such a small space.
No space or tools for woodworking. Will need to buy pre-built or flat pack cabinets. Soldering is no problem.
Probably not perfect given my musical past (loud PA systems & rehearsals in my 20s). However, I can still tell the difference between compressed and lossless music through a pair of good headphones, so my hearing can't be that bad...
It's not that i'm poor. I meant that i'm in a small apartment in a very expensive city. So for now, until I find something bigger, i'm staying here. That could mean 8 months or 2 years until I find the right neighborhood and the right property.
So as far as drapes and other sound absorbing materials. I can afford those. I just had not really thought of that before you mentioned it.
There are already 2 layers of drapes on the large front windows, and it does absorb some road noise, but the road outside is so busy that it's nearly impossible to absorb it all.
The challenge here will be adequately insulating the wall behind the sofa where I listen, as that is the wall I share with a neighbor.
What street?
My Uncle is an arcitect in The City. Now lives in Oakland and commutes. I think his offices are still in Giradelli Square.
I know SF better than i know Vancouver which is just across the straight.
dave
My Uncle is an arcitect in The City. Now lives in Oakland and commutes. I think his offices are still in Giradelli Square.
I know SF better than i know Vancouver which is just across the straight.
dave
Oh cool. I'm actually in a suburb slightly south of SF (Burlingame). I live on a road right beside the 101 freeway. So both the road outside my place and the freeway are super busy. So double trouble on the noise front...
I didn't mean to infer poverty but I wouldn't spend big money on and in a temporary space either. BTDT and it was; in hind sight; a dumb idea. But cheap room treatments are very cost effective
There's a big difference between sound isolation and room treatments.
Well-designed remediation to your party wall to reduce noise from a neighbour can be obviated by ignoring structure-borne transmission or sound that travels around the wall through the space between the ceilings and floors above and below.
And as good as the design may be, the efficacy ultimately depends on close attention to every detail by the trades... the guys with the hammers and DeWalts and caulking guns.
Well-designed remediation to your party wall to reduce noise from a neighbour can be obviated by ignoring structure-borne transmission or sound that travels around the wall through the space between the ceilings and floors above and below.
And as good as the design may be, the efficacy ultimately depends on close attention to every detail by the trades... the guys with the hammers and DeWalts and caulking guns.
Interesting solution. Though I have no space/tools for woodworking so cannot cut the holes to mount drivers. I would need to either find somewhere to have them cut locally or find a ready built or flat pack cabinet somehow.
I do really like the HiVi kevlar woofers. I haven't heard them but all reviews i've seen on builds with these have been positive.
I am leaning toward the The Swan/HiVi 3.1 (for ease of assembly and high quality drivers) or the TriTrix MTM Transmission Line Kit (as the tranmission line design is intriguing on top of a MTM configuration). I know, I know, both kits use MDF. Not an ideal cabinet material but both designs have excellent bracing, which should cancel out the negatives to a large degree.
Of course i'm open to reviewing other kit solutions that might be here or elsewhere!
Where are the box plans? The tower is not well-braced, as they run in the wrong direction. And the tower will be an ML-TL not a BR so the horizontal braces constrict the line.
Bracing Guideline 1: Braces should create subpanels with higher aspect ratio than the panel they are bracing
Guideline 2: Subpanels should have differeing aspect ratios.
Contact Bob Berner, i am pretty sure he would be interested in looking at doing a proper plywood flat-pak.
dave
Maybe you could join another local member 'ThermalAcademy' who's building some of the GR X-Statik?
X-Statik is this a good buy @ $399. Pair kit ?
X-Statik is this a good buy @ $399. Pair kit ?
Iphone isn't just a reasonable source, its the gold standard.
Take it from the guy who measured the thing.
iPhone 5S Audio Quality & Measurements
I know its an old phone, but i doubt they have made it much worse in the last 5 years.
I thought the problem with iPhones was that Apple removed the 3.5mm stereo jack so it couldn't be used as an output device for real gear. We can't use my wifes in her car with a cable so we have to use my OPPO instead
That problem is easily fixed with a Lightning to headphone jack adapter.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
