It sounds dubious to me too I only added that line in to appease those that would start saying stuff that I didn't specifically mention myself.
Well there's more to it than that, driver sensitivity, required amplifier power, increased linearity of said amplifier at lower power levels due to the 10Fs greater sensitivity. Higher linearity of the output inductors of the class D amplifier used at lower power levels too. A different distortion profile for the 10F vs the TG9, resonances inherent to the cone/suspension/pole piece-dustcap cavities/pole vents and then how open the basket is/how small the motor structure is.
Considered by who? And the only reason why those are considered 'high end' is because of their ridiculous price tags. Certainly the drivers mentioned are used only in very niche products that have a very small following. This is usually an indication that the niche is niche for a reason, products that do a lot wrong by traditional standards that happen to appeal to a small number of people.
I am referring to loudspeakers that measure well objectively and also review positively across the board subjectively.
Most band limited drive units do require large amounts of filtering to sound nice, this is why we use crossovers. You cannot audition drive units outside of their intended application in an attempt to determine which ones will be the best for said application without actually putting them into application that they were intended for.
For example SEAS W15CY001 driver sounds wonderful once in a loudspeaker, but if you try and listen to it without a crossover it sounds terrible.
The article is simply one persons view on the objective measurements of said device. Goran isn't being particularly fair either as he is quite biased in a lot of his reviews. Most of the drivers Goran talks about he has purchased himself for use in loudspeakers he wants to build.
The point is that the RAAL starts to lose linearity very high up, far higher than the manufacturers advised lower xover point. This is not a good thing, especially in a driver costing such ridiculous amounts. One does not usually pay this amount of money for something that performs so poorly in this regard.
If you want to use the RAAL then you do need to use it from 3kHz and up to ensure adequate performance under dynamic conditions. Many people have used the RAAL and many people also say exactly the same thing. They've tried using it down below 2kHz but it's never sounded good down that low, looking at the measurements it's easy to see why.
Indeed.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To kind of sum up though, XRKs subjective thread worked and was highly relevant because the way in which he used the drivers was how they were supposed to be used - full range drivers being used as full range drivers. There is a large demand for this kind of thing and I am sure many people were appreciative of the experiment. I was appreciative because it backed up what scientific study has been saying all along and helped to disprove nay sayers points of view towards the obvious.
What you are attempting to do though is completely pointless. For a start you can't simply whack tons of EQ onto raw drivers as a way of comparing their performance. Some drivers do not take well to this kind of thing and certainly applying gross amounts of EQ to linearise otherwise very non-linear drivers is poor from a system design point of view. It's also bad from the point of view that it's not going to be practical in any real world application.
XRK could have used EQ in his comparisons to completely linearise the wonky FR of some of the drivers so that all of the drivers had a FR that was +- 0.1dB across their bandwidth. Given the type of test this would have made everything sound almost identical and would not have been useful to anyone. The usefulness of this test was to show that people preferred more linear drivers and to also show which those drivers were - without any EQ - so that people would know which ones to buy for their full range systems.
In your test, if you apply lots of EQ you will iron out lots of the problems that certain drivers have and render them a moot point. This is not useful in any which way as it will not be indicative of how the vast majority of people will use said drivers. You will also be using many drivers way outside of their actual useful bandwidth. For some drivers this is far less of a concern as they remain quite linear (like the Satori driver for example) whereas for others completely fall to bits (like the W15CY). Do this test without any EQ and it would be pointless as the true full rangers would win vs true midrange drivers for obvious reasons. Do this test with EQ and again it would be pointless because you'd be trying to push true midrange drivers into a mould that they do not fit.
To evaluate drivers all one needs to do is make objective measurements. How one interprets said measurements is another thing entirely, but a correctly performed set of measurements are really all you need. You cannot evaluate drivers like this without using them in their intended application and once they are in their intended application you cannot evaluate said drivers properly either as you are now evaluating the entire system (which should be properly designed), rather than individual drivers.
The test you are trying to carry out could have some relevance if you were comparing apples with apples and were trying to compare one soft coned 6" midbass with another, say comparing SEAS ER18 with SEAS U18. But to try and compare two drivers that are so vastly different, say the Scan speak 10F and the Visaton B200...there is virtually no point as they require completely different end system design to get the best out of them.
Sreten's contribution was constructive by pointing people in the right direction.
He used them in a FAST configuration, which is highly relevant. The bass capabilities of most small full range drivers is severely limited, they are inherently not really suited to being called 'full range' either because they cannot cover the lower end of the spectrum with any authority, but are still called FR.
Besides the only areas that really matter in small full range drivers is how accurately they reproduce the midrange, how well they go through breakup and therefore how well they extend into the treble region.
How much bass they can produce is important depending on the application, but the mid and treble are of primary importance with the bass coming in second.
Agreed (mostly), but not what you said. With his XO ~300 Hz the lowest midrange octave is missing and the bass driver is going to contribute to at least the 2nd lowest midrange octave.
dave
dave
S'fine with me, below 300Hz all the drivers there would be operating over their pistonic range with their low end capabilities easily modelled by using their T/S parameters. I don't need a subjective thread like that to tell me how they are going to sound in the bass.
Ignoring the elephant in the room? Nowif i said i'd prefer the amplifier with 90 dB signal to noise over the one with 50 would you call that crap? (they both have perfectly flat FR)
dave
Looking into history that subject agree Sreten.
Lack of planet10 being constructive other than his subjective opinion on personal handful of drivers that outperform all others in low level detail seem endless and we got it long ago what he prefer, would be nice take a long break post about that subject unless interesting data support the subject.
Agree and prefer linear phase, that said please be reasonable all the drivers at X's test sat in same condition and we respect what drivers you preferred from the test then please the other way respect what driver others prefer.
The only thing i did was point out all the things convolved with the driver in the test, and in another thread, how little i liked the TC9, my opinion being that it did not deserve the high ranking it has been given..
dave
dave
This can't be a driver competition. The result should be useful at least for you, better for others too. And to be useful, it should help in choosing the right driver for specific application.
You have mentioned somewhere your preference of 4-way loudspeaker. 0-100Hz, 100-700Hz, and so on if I'm not mistaken. This blind test can be used to support that. So we are looking for the third driver that will go from 700Hz to somewhere where a tweeter can take over.
Most tweeters can work comfortably down to 3kHz (including ribbons), so this frequency should be the "reference" point. You might not want to cross the third driver at too high frequency (7kHz).
I believe you have a point regarding the 4-way ideal, and the problem is indeed to find the (third) driver suitable for 700Hz-3kHz. This is a bandwidth commonly used in the classical 3-way speakers, including Troels' modern designs (700Hz-3kHz Seas MCA12RC, 600Hz-3k5Hz MCA12RC, 800Hz-3kHz ScanSpeak 10F).
700Hz-3kHz is the shortest band where the midrange acts like a "filler" (ala Duelund or B&O), with response relatively lower than those for woofer and tweeter. 500Hz-5kHz is the wider band option, that I believe is suitable for your test. And may be an LR2 and/or LR4 slope.
From reading your post I think you want a wide enough bandwidth so the clip will be "musical" enough. But the real need is to find a driver that can produce a narrow band without issues. Enjoyable and non-fatiguing sound in this band is very RARE, that's why this is interesting and useful. We can also see how 10F midrange compares to those exotic fullrangers, and see whether you are correct that FR has better mirange quality than a dedicated midrange.
That's a very important and useful information, especially for those like me who have never heard of it live, only from the test clip where it did sound beautiful for such a very low price.
If I had an intention to purchase such driver (but I already have enough of small drivers!) I would gather more information from you regarding why it is not so special in your opinion.
It's quite nice, Zaph has measured it, although I'd prefer to use the 18Sound 6ND430 unless the extra sensitivity was critical.
thank you very much - those are good comments on the B&C - here's something - only 1mm excursion, no distortion data http://prvaudio.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/8MR500-PhP-4.pdf
No offense but that's a pretty interesting opinion from someone heavily involved with speakers that have average to poor CSD and non-linear distortion.
The TC9 looks godly in that respect compared to an FF85WK. I have to wonder if what you consider 'lack of detail' is really 'lack of distortion'.
I have the Nd magnet version of this and it is a superb sounding driver for mids. Very sensitive and low distortion.
B&C 6MDN44 6-1/2" Neodymium Midrange Speaker