What are the best options this year for dome midranges?

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#31
camplo said:
Whats the theory behind this? Whats so special about 500hz I should say.
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As I understand it, the pioneer's original goal was to provide the highest speech intelligibility at highest gain over the widest range of [background] noise and based on Bell Lab's already extensive research WRT human hearing acuity it was determined that getting the 250-2500 Hz [analog telephone] BW as 'clear'/perfectly reproduced as technically possible was the key since 'we' perceived any deviation as 'muddiness', particularly in the ~300-500 Hz BW, and over time found they could shift it higher to 500-3000 Hz as an acceptable compromise, though with the development of digital phones they chose to use 300-3000 Hz for whatever reason.
 
#32
It's also worth mentioning that due to the mechanical attributes 3" dome is a sweet spot driver for midrange. 3" diameter is just right to deliver right Spl levels without need for bigger xmax (1mm excursion gives around 110dB@500Hz if coil can handle that) and (depend on diaphragm used) this size of the dome pushes all the breakups above usable freq. spectrum (which is not the case for cone drivers) leaving it's band clan as a water. So good on bottom, good on top and perfect in between.
 
#33
Hmm, FWIW, the pioneer's way was the mean of the BW = ~ [500-3000] = ~1225 Hz = ~ 13543/pi/1225 = ~3.52"/89.41mm effective diameter, so with its 8.4 mm dia. VC, a little short of piston area, but overall close enough for me! 😉
 
#39
profiguy said:
As a massive fan of dome mids, I'd give the following advice to spare you from wasting money and time.

The Dayton RS52AN - although not a bad deal for what you get, it has production tolerance issues to start with, but a deal breaker for me is elevated odd order HD in the critical 2-5 k area that is higher than the 2nd order HD. It looks good on paper FR wise, but it sounds antiseptic and non-musical to my ears. The ringing peak up top has to be suppressed if you want to run it higher than 4 k LR2.

The Morel MDM55 or CAM558 (round faceplate) - this is a warm sounding driver with good power handling, but can't be crossed lower than 800 LR4 or 1000 LR2 to get the best from it. You can cross lower for limited SPL situations but odd order HD starts killing the magic. Otherwise it has a nice controlled top end rolloff with very little to complain about in the CSD plot. Mates well with 90 dB sensitivity drivers but may need attenuating if using BSC on the LF driver or with shallower crossover slopes due to bandpass overlap gain.

The Vifa D75MX-41 (SS D7608-9200) - this one is a temperamental driver that can sound amazing with the right filtering and supporting drivers. Its achilles heel is the limited xmax, so you can't cross lower then 900-1000 LR2 to get the most performance and musicality, plus it must be used with a carefully dampened rear chamber of about 1.5 liters to get its Qts down to under .9 (medium density sheeps wool is best or loosely rolled grille cloth right up against the magnet). In most cases you will need to attenuate it using LF drivers with less than 90 dB sensitivity after applying BSC and especially with shallow filter slopes.

The HIVI DMB-A - nice dome considering the $30 price point. Don't even think of crossing lower than 1000 LR2 as it has little output due to high Fs. If this is ok, it sounds really detailed and somewhat warm to boot. Needs an efficient LF driver that can play clean past 1.5k, which rules out anything larger than an 8 inch woofer. Top end rolloff of the dome is not as clean as the other 2 inch domes.

The Satori MD60N - this one was rather disappointing after having high hopes. The price tag is a deal breaker considering the excess THD if you expect a transparent and open presentation. It works great with rock and pop with its colored sound, if that's your thing. I've honestly heard better cone mid drivers for the price, discounting the limited dispersion on top of course. It is however a very efficient mid and has its place in the market, but the price/performance ratio isn't there IMO.
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Thanks for the run down. I keep wanting to find as dome mid, but have been disappointed. Heck even a decent cone. Give me a driver for 500 to 5K!
Then the bottom end is easy and even an XT-25 is great on top. Best I have seen is a few newer slightly larger tweeters. 1 1/8 inch that can cross happier @ 1800 or so which even many cross 1's that low, too much distortion for me. Got me thinking the old idea of tweeter and supertweeter designs. Efficiency of so many mids are so low, it makes passive crossovers difficult.

FWIW, I have hated every Morel I have ever heard. Can't put my finger on it, just don't like them. Others disagree.
 
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