I'm eager to test the Dayton woofer, but i doubt we'll have the threshold we thought we'd get... 😱
We'll see.
If it don't work, plan B (or is it plan C ?) would be to get away from the EQ/level-matching. I see no real other solutions, unless i try other drivers that are completely out of their zone and EQ them... which would be silly and useless.
So, where do we start ?
One driver 360hz/7.2khz against another 400hz/6.8khz ?
or
1 or 2db difference ?
or
One driver EQd flat and the other with some bumps or dips ?
We'll see.
If it don't work, plan B (or is it plan C ?) would be to get away from the EQ/level-matching. I see no real other solutions, unless i try other drivers that are completely out of their zone and EQ them... which would be silly and useless.
So, where do we start ?
One driver 360hz/7.2khz against another 400hz/6.8khz ?
or
1 or 2db difference ?
or
One driver EQd flat and the other with some bumps or dips ?
Considering these drivers will be integrated into a whole speaker, I think it's safe to say a speaker would show bigger differences, made with them. Also it might be valuable to use crossovers in the sense that how they respond to them is part of their character.
But in general I'm not sure the ABX is helpful at all.
Try assigning a symbol to the drivers that the participant can see. Then see if they can pick one they like. That's the point right, to pick one they like? The question will be if people repeatedly pick the same one. They don't actually have to be able to tell them apart blindly to make this "which is best" move forward.
But in general I'm not sure the ABX is helpful at all.
Try assigning a symbol to the drivers that the participant can see. Then see if they can pick one they like. That's the point right, to pick one they like? The question will be if people repeatedly pick the same one. They don't actually have to be able to tell them apart blindly to make this "which is best" move forward.
When I have conducted tests between electronics, I often needed to find a passage in the music material that distinguished the two. In a lot of the music the difference simply wasn't revealed. But at certain frequencies it did and that's passage I continued using.
Perhaps this will be the same for speaker drivers. If there really is a difference between them the way they are used here.
Either way, I think training is also important. Trained listeners distinguishes differences much faster that non trained ones.
You could try to raise the SPL some.
Perhaps this will be the same for speaker drivers. If there really is a difference between them the way they are used here.
Either way, I think training is also important. Trained listeners distinguishes differences much faster that non trained ones.
You could try to raise the SPL some.
@destroyer OS
So, basically, what you propose is to ask people:
''Which one do you PREFER''
then, after 100 or 200 participations, if it's not around 50% we get the answer we're looking ?
So, basically, what you propose is to ask people:
''Which one do you PREFER''
then, after 100 or 200 participations, if it's not around 50% we get the answer we're looking ?
miniDSP plateamps + iPad air 2 as a source.
I'm trying to find a way to feed the plateamps by their AES inputs, but it's not easy.
Will post pictures of the equipment and room.
There are several miniDSP amps. Some uses IcePower ASX series and some Pascal Audio amps.
ASX series has a clear and audible distortion in the highs (makes the sound warm and fuzzy), but it will be dependent on the drive. Most likely it's above the range we're talking about here. Besides from that it's a good amp, though lacking some transparency compared to best measurable amp (Hypex Ncore). I doubt it will be much of a bottleneck here if that's the one being used. Not too familiar with Pascal, nor the iPad air.
ASX series has a clear and audible distortion in the highs (makes the sound warm and fuzzy), but it will be dependent on the drive. Most likely it's above the range we're talking about here. Besides from that it's a good amp, though lacking some transparency compared to best measurable amp (Hypex Ncore). I doubt it will be much of a bottleneck here if that's the one being used. Not too familiar with Pascal, nor the iPad air.
Yes it's the 125ASX2.
Havent heard any problem with the ASX or any amplifier from ICEpower so far...
Bottleneck here is most probably the DAC. There is a double conversion here: iPad + miniDSP. We'll try to improve that.
I'm not sure if it will have any impact on the results though. I don't have much hope to be honest.
The room:
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An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Equipment:
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An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Although our room is not exactly the same as the ones listed above (ours is bigger with 147m³) it shouldnt be a problem. It's not very far from the University of Surrey's room dimensions & BBC R&D's ratio...
5.5 meters (width)
8.1 meters (lenght)
3.3 meters (height)
https://www.spsc.tugraz.at/sites/default/files/PA_Sereinig_A_Standardized_Listening_Room.pdf
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I have a (relatively) high noisefloor at this moment: 54db at listening position. Something that has to do with air circulation system that i'll have to manually close.
Will take care of that too.
Will take care of that too.
I do rather like the idea of throwing the RS225 into the mix, it is so far away from being suitable as a typical midrange driver that it will make for an interesting comparison.
We finally might have found the threshold with the Radian v.s. Dayton..
will be confirmed monday.
will be confirmed monday.
What really matters is the relation between frequencies that are far enough. So, woofer with midrange, or woofer with tweeter. That's why, in passive crossover, what matter most is the crossover design. (This could be a different case with DSP-based XO).
In "ultimate" speaker design, I found that my bottleneck is driver's non-linear distortion. This is against the opinions of many experts because they think that human cannot perceive distortion below certain threshold...
In a midrange comparison of this caliber, I would be looking for (or listening to) only 2 things: NLD and micro-detail. I may have a minimum threshold for micro-detail, but for NLD or distortion I don't.
Listening for distortion is different with listening for usual clues in an ABX...
Like I have explained, equalization will remove a lot of clues from the sound. But I think you may find out that there exist people who could still differentiate the drivers. This happens because they don't rely on listening to level differences.
1/2/3. First, this is not a job for "any men on the street". Those who will be able to do the job will know and will tell you what they need (regarding the musical excerpt etc.)
4. While top quality electronics might help, I don't think that better DAC will change the result. Yours is already too good imo.
5. I don't listen to music at high SPL so I believe that the SPL in your test is not too low for me. If others need the driver to work in concert level SPL, the test will not give the result they want 🙂
... i'm just brainstorming again... Something in the set-up and/or methodology might be wrong. Or maybe it's just us, humans, that limits everything.
I think, if you want to do an experiment, you need to have a clear objective. I'm not sure you have one or two exact question to answer or address in this experiment at the moment.