The making of: The Two Towers (a 25 driver Full Range line array)
- Thread starter wesayso
- Start date
One more impedance control measurement:
Impedance as measured of all groups in left and right array. Close enough!
The wiggles at 50 and 150 Hz are from the laptop power feed.
Cleaned up the baffle and next weekend I'll mount the drivers and close it up again. Got to run now... other obligations
.
Impedance as measured of all groups in left and right array. Close enough!
The wiggles at 50 and 150 Hz are from the laptop power feed.
Cleaned up the baffle and next weekend I'll mount the drivers and close it up again. Got to run now... other obligations
.
Yesterday I wrote this post on another thread: https://www.diyaudio.com/community/...l-range-line-array.353658/page-4#post-7042144
This explains why an array is such a different animal once we use it in a room. It takes work, as all parallel planes need some help to get the best out of it.
It also lays bare the inherent flaws of Stereo above say 700 Hz. Yes, that cross talk. If we obscure the cross talk, using mid/side EQ and an ambience back-drop,
we get something wonderful. More clear than it should be (if we watch an array vs a single driver I think we'd all expect the opposite) and with that ambience
we can paint a more ideal picture of a space that we are in. Why? Because robbing that energy off of all parallel planes is the reason we notice the Stereo flaws.
Bringing back some late lateral energy hides that flaw, especially when using the mid/side EQ.
Maybe I should explain using the arrays well below their natural cut-off too. As that was another cause of confusion. "It's simply not good practice, right?"
Well, it wouldn't be if you didn't have the capacity available to do so. But due to the help of the room, the arrays can reach quite low and do so easily with a bit
of EQ (which is dropped by 9 dB from earlier renditions). Throwing away that capacity is a waste of energy that's almost free(*). As it (again) helps to share the load
with the subwoofers to fill in, or average out the room, just like the array does at higher frequencies. (distributed bass)
I think I'll have to get deeper into this subject somewhere soon. As I doubt the idea comes across that easy with words alone.
(*)= and everywhere there is a dip due to room dimensions, I place a PEQ to drop the amount of power going there, and the subwoofer will make up for that loss.
So in the end, nothing gets over stressed and we're only using the strengths and not the weaknesses. The end result is better and measurably cleaner.
(and a lot of work to do so)
This explains why an array is such a different animal once we use it in a room. It takes work, as all parallel planes need some help to get the best out of it.
It also lays bare the inherent flaws of Stereo above say 700 Hz. Yes, that cross talk. If we obscure the cross talk, using mid/side EQ and an ambience back-drop,
we get something wonderful. More clear than it should be (if we watch an array vs a single driver I think we'd all expect the opposite) and with that ambience
we can paint a more ideal picture of a space that we are in. Why? Because robbing that energy off of all parallel planes is the reason we notice the Stereo flaws.
Bringing back some late lateral energy hides that flaw, especially when using the mid/side EQ.
Maybe I should explain using the arrays well below their natural cut-off too. As that was another cause of confusion. "It's simply not good practice, right?"
Well, it wouldn't be if you didn't have the capacity available to do so. But due to the help of the room, the arrays can reach quite low and do so easily with a bit
of EQ (which is dropped by 9 dB from earlier renditions). Throwing away that capacity is a waste of energy that's almost free(*). As it (again) helps to share the load
with the subwoofers to fill in, or average out the room, just like the array does at higher frequencies. (distributed bass)
I think I'll have to get deeper into this subject somewhere soon. As I doubt the idea comes across that easy with words alone.
(*)= and everywhere there is a dip due to room dimensions, I place a PEQ to drop the amount of power going there, and the subwoofer will make up for that loss.
So in the end, nothing gets over stressed and we're only using the strengths and not the weaknesses. The end result is better and measurably cleaner.
(and a lot of work to do so
)
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In other news today. Last week I got my amplifier back. @koldby was successful in repairing it and luckily the damage was limited.
I wasn't feeling well at the time I got it back so I figured it would be saver to test on another day. But as some days had passed I was
feeling a bit more anxious to try it. I just connected it to the ambience channels and indeed it is running fine again (and more important:
I didn't do anything wrong).
A bit of background, not too long ago I ended up in the hospital again, not feeling well. Luckily my heart was ok, my confidence however
was shaken. Turned out to be a strange mix of stomach problems and muscle ache. But it threw me off and slowed things down around
here.
I wasn't feeling well at the time I got it back so I figured it would be saver to test on another day. But as some days had passed I was
feeling a bit more anxious to try it. I just connected it to the ambience channels and indeed it is running fine again (and more important:
I didn't do anything wrong).
A bit of background, not too long ago I ended up in the hospital again, not feeling well. Luckily my heart was ok, my confidence however
was shaken. Turned out to be a strange mix of stomach problems and muscle ache. But it threw me off and slowed things down around
here.
Of course I think there is, as I paid for them .
But seriously, they need their own processing first for me to judge anything.
As for now, they are loud and clear. Not bad at all considering I'm using processing for the other drivers.
There's still a group of 5 drivers that are playing full range without any filters at all. The filters do make
a difference, one that is pretty obvious if you've heard both renditions (with and without filters).
I'll need time, lots of it, on my own in our house to redo all DSP. That's pretty rare these days...
I'll take it slow though, I'm in no hurry.
.But seriously, they need their own processing first for me to judge anything.
As for now, they are loud and clear. Not bad at all considering I'm using processing for the other drivers.
There's still a group of 5 drivers that are playing full range without any filters at all. The filters do make
a difference, one that is pretty obvious if you've heard both renditions (with and without filters).
I'll need time, lots of it, on my own in our house to redo all DSP. That's pretty rare these days...
I'll take it slow though, I'm in no hurry.