Well, I can confirm that there was a distinct, if not large, improvement in detail resolution and imaging precision with the Chartwell LS3/5A's that I recapped with polypropylene capacitors. At the same time, the image they projected seemed a bit more 'liquid' with good source material.
I should also mention that, for the most part, the capacitors I installed were very comparable size wise with the mylar ones replaced - presumably due to advances in manufacturing technology in the 12 or so years I had the Chartwells before I did the recap. For instance, I was pretty much able to match the original capacitor pcb lead spacings in every instance. I was also careful to match the values between speakers for each capacitor within 1% which is a tolerance that I believe polypropylene holds better than mylar over time and temperature.
Fortunately, I had no 'lytics to worry about with these speakers.
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Perhaps I'm different then, even if I had Warren Buffet's money I'd still be in my garage on the weekends sawing and soldering and I'd still have a basement full of parts and knick knacks that I've been collecting for 20 years
I do this kinda stuff because I love it, not because I'm too poor to have someone else do it for me.
As far as active xovers, having used it, I consider MultEQ (which is really system EQ) to be an essential part of my 8.0 (- soon to be 8.1 if my DC subwoofer prototype works out satisfactorily, but that is another story) HT 'listening' experience. At the same time, I wouldn't have it in my dedicated stereo system due to processing/conversion 'artifacts' and generally nondescript analog chain.
I think to make digital xovers really effective in most systems, some sort of automated calibration option would be very helpful.
I think to make digital xovers really effective in most systems, some sort of automated calibration option would be very helpful.
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This is a real aspect of the problem, and something that makes it more difficult, most audiophiles don't have measurement equipment, which is pretty much absolutely required if you're going to try and mate a standalone active crossover system with random speakers and then try to mate them to your listening area.
Maybe if it was widespread and standardized, speaker manufacturers could include a configuration file or something that could be used and offer their speakers "with a crossover" or "crossoverless+config file".
*shrug*
Edit: it would be nice if this was offered as a stand alone product:
http://www.audyssey.com/audio-technology/multeq/how-to
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Perhaps I'm different then, even if I had Warren Buffet's money I'd still be in my garage on the weekends sawing and soldering and I'd still have a basement full of parts and knick knacks that I've been collecting for 20 years
I do this kinda stuff because I love it, not because I'm too poor to have someone else do it for me.
you're a tinkerer.
the rich I'm talking about, are too busy living rich people's lives. This tinkering might figure in on what? 1% of the 16K speaker buying crowd?
Kef isn't building speakers for diyaudio board members.
They build them for people who go to a dealer and drop 16K in their dealer's hand and walk out, get in their super luxo automobile, go home and wait for the custom delivery crew that comes and does the install, because it's included in the sticker price.
That's probably why they don't charge 16.7K, and put in a bunch of esoteric parts in the crossover that will not be seen by anyone who owns them.
Nor will they be asked "why you guys skimped on the crossover parts? You know there's better stuff out there that you could have used" by their "audiophile" customers.
And active crossovers?
When you see a salesman with a big fish on the line taking a Kef REF start to confuse the deal with some newfangled way of making his amplifiers obsolete, well...
that's a salesman that's not going to win that month's commission prize..
Btw, I've corresponded with Chris Kyriakakis, one of Audyssey's founders, and he has been extremely helpful wrt some questions I had regarding center channel speaker setup, even describing some experiments he himself had been involved with regarding them.
One of the equalization functions that MultEq accomplishes is in the time domain so it can actually compensate for some of the early room reflections from speakers. This is somewhat beyond what is normally considered a conventional 'active eq' function, but it can be nice to have, if you are using digital active EQ for other reasons. For my HT, it is particularly useful when I have my HT speakers near an untreated wall, or actually facing the wall (as for the surround channels) to spread their apparent acoustical width & make them less apparent as sound sources. The MultEq time and frequency EQ largely cleans up the resulting coloration in both the frequency and time domains.
It seems probable MultEQ also may help out with floor bounce issues (at least for certain listening positions), but I haven't seen any specific claims advanced by Audyssey regarding this.
One of the equalization functions that MultEq accomplishes is in the time domain so it can actually compensate for some of the early room reflections from speakers. This is somewhat beyond what is normally considered a conventional 'active eq' function, but it can be nice to have, if you are using digital active EQ for other reasons. For my HT, it is particularly useful when I have my HT speakers near an untreated wall, or actually facing the wall (as for the surround channels) to spread their apparent acoustical width & make them less apparent as sound sources. The MultEq time and frequency EQ largely cleans up the resulting coloration in both the frequency and time domains.
It seems probable MultEQ also may help out with floor bounce issues (at least for certain listening positions), but I haven't seen any specific claims advanced by Audyssey regarding this.
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Rather he would need to sell more amplifiers then less if people went active. Maybe not more of a specific model, but more nonetheless.
And to the crowd with more money then sense, they wouldn't give a fig if it was active or passive. It'd come with in home installation so any issues relating to the initial setting up would be largely irrelevant. Only on set up the active system could been tuned/tailored to match their room and even ignoring that, have the potential to sound better. I think it's also worth mentioning that the more money then sense crowd would probably have it 'tri amped' or whatever already so the number of amplifiers might not necessarily be any less or any more then if the loudspeaker were active or passive.
I mean where do you people see most of these expensive hifi systems going? To the people who like to continually faff about with them, or to those who will buy what's 'best', have it set up and then just listen to it? And on that thought, would you think that more systems would end up with actual 'audiophiles' who have the idea that digital/opamps and long signal paths are bad, or to people who really, do not care. This isn't meant to sound condescending but I'd expect the snake oil crowd to be in a huge minority when it comes to where most of the profit in this business comes from. Having said that I don't know. Who do companies like Magico and YG Acoustics sell most of their loudspeakers to?
Ask Waveform or Paradigm in the analog era how well that worked.
Or, more recently and digitized, ask NHT what a wild commercial success their xD system was.
Bang & Olufsen and Meridian have managed to carve a niche for their active speakers, but in the consumer arena (i.e. ignoring Genelec, ATC, etc.) I can't think of anyone else who has done so long term.
People just don't want the complexity. Perhaps that will change, if the cost of circuitry goes down. (I think if someone manages to get the price of a complact plate with 2-3 channels of amplification at 50-100W/ch, a DSP, and a wireless receiver for $40-50 in quantity, active speakers will take off. Until then, not really.)
I think that is astute. After all, a naked box with drive units in it (especially if they're off-the-peg units) has little value added. It's something any cabinet maker could product. A crossover is where a speaker maker adds value to the product.
Change that to "have the illusion of control" and I think you've nailed it.
Because bespoke drivers give the maker an extra degree of freedom. They can "do signal processing" in either (passive or active) circuitry, or acoustically.
That would double the number of stupid audio boxes in my room. Well, not really, as two of the three subs are powered by rack amps, but presumably one would still need that separate power for the multisubs. Especially if one is running room-decor friendly small closed box subs. Anyone who isn't doing multisubs isn't doing high-fidelity, after all!
And even if the speakers have plate amps built in, that limits placement flexibility by requiring one to string power leads to each speaker. Even if signal transmission is wireless. (Why we're still running RCA and XLR cables in 2011 is beyond me. All that stuff should really be wireless by now.)
Sure there is: their plugins run on OSX.
Yep.
Typical HT's sound bad for a number of reasons entirely unrelated to DSP/multichannel.
-Craptastic toppled-MTM center channels. A good test of whether or not someone cares about sound is to see if all three front speakers are the same design, mounted at the same height, and in the same orientation.
-"Bass management" that takes bass out of the mains (depriving the room of at least three pressure sources in the modal region) and shuttles it to a single subwoofer.
-Diffraction (large things between the loudspeakers, or between the listener and the loudspeakers, such as equipment racks, large televisions, coffee tables, etc.)
Done properly (with identical front speakers, multisubs, and care to minimize diffraction), modern multichannel setups only improve of stereo.
Um, it is: Audyssey MultEQ Pro Sound Equalizer Review — Reviews and News from Audioholics
The guy that wants new speakers and has a ton of disposable cash to offload on 16K worth of speakers in a floorstander, probably already has an idea that he wants something "expensive" driving them.
He probably already has the amplifier, in a separates format already.
see, when you look at successful implementations of the audio gear, you see a lot of integrated amps at the lower end levels, but having your preamp as a separate component, well, that's when you know it's serious.
Somebody that is looking at these Kef Reference is probably not entertaining any thoughts of ditching their high dollar amp/preamp in favor of a DSP solution that has the potential for problems and a learning curve involved, that's just the way the people with a lot of money (normally, we're talking percentages here) were brought up, most of them are 50 and up, and if they want to splurge on a pair of 16K speakers, I really don't think they want to ante up for an altogether different topological design basis, they want some super-duper passive speaker systems that sound great because they were designed by professionals who have been at the game a long time and has a recognizable name that is consistent with quality.
The other stuff, Kef puts in their online advertising like the videos and the techno-babble, is pretty much for the ones that need a shove, or something to look at after they've been to the store and had a salesperson give 'em a spiel.
It's like selling anything expensive, it's a game and Kef is delivering on all counts except for the small contingency of diy fold that will take their component selection to task over a sticker shock reaction.
The proof is in the eating, again, Kef isn't going under and their product is plenty capable.
correct.
but, a statement that strong suggests that you come from a position of experience, which if true must be nice.
I remember back in the day bad reviews didn't get printed, but who knows. Your best reviewers are glued to the sides of your head
I think you've sort of missed my point again. I was of the thinking that the guy with the tons of disposable cash doesn't care if he needs to change part of his system to make the new speakers 'sing'. If he needs to buy 2 more stereo power amps, that's just more high cost bling he can feel good about/flaunt.
The guy above could already have a tri-amped system, so he'd probably have almost all of the power amps necessary for an active system anyway.
I was also coming at this from the point of - very rich person with disposable income has a new room in a new house that they want to put 'the best' hifi system into. They don't currently own any hifi for that room/system so what it requires doesn't matter and doesn't affect what they already might own.
Having a fully active system would add a degree of exclusiveness to the system, something you'd figure the rich person would be pretty pleased about. Knowing that their extra wealth has managed to buy them something 'altogether different and most possibly better for it' that the vast majority of people cannot either afford, or even know to afford. The rich owner probably wouldn't even care what this different thing was, except that it was different and touted to be the best.
There should be zero problems and zero learning curve. The hifi with the DSP box should behave exactly like a hifi system without an active DSP based xover. You simply turn it on, press play and then listen. Why does it have to be difficult to use and come with specific system limitations? It doesn't, unless poorly designed. The only issue with a DSP based active xover is if the user in question has a degree of prejudice towards digital.
Why not? This is usually invited because it makes the item they own different and therefore 'better' because of it. All manufactures do this, try and exploit their own unique features through successful advertising to convince you that their way is better. Magico do it through cone material and insane cabinets etc. KEF do it through their UNI-Q driver, B&W do it with diamonds and kevlar-FST. I really don't think that a UNI-Q driver + active digital crossover will harm a sales pitch, if anything is should strengthen it.
You make it sound like the DSP active crossover is going to be designed by an amateur. It would be designed and provided/built by KEF. Or it could be designed and manufactured for KEF by Lyngdorf/TacT for example, with KEF setting the final crossover DSP parameters.
Why does using a DSP automatically mean you lose the professional name consistent with high quality?
Linn have been producing active versions of their loudspeakers for decades and they are obviously successful otherwise they wouldn't keep at it.
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