.. and I really don't know how you come to that conclusion
I was merely providing some factual data on the issue of "musical taste bla bla" affecting the speakers people like. The data says, in DBLTs, listeners of ALL musical tastes prefer the same speakers.
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In our nearly 2 decades of DBLTs, only 2 single unit full range systems did well. Both date back to the early 70s. Most were awful.
There are good reasons for prefering these old designs. One was 94dB/2.83V/1m and the other 96dB. And they were nominal 15R speakers. If you had less than 10W, these might outperform LS50. (We used a 1000W/channel amp for our DBLTs and the choice is another long story)
I have this naive belief that if you design, made & sold speakers that sound better, you might make more profits. We were very successful in this for a long time. But this is a seriously wonky stand today as it is almost impossible to hear speakers properly in a shop .. let alone borrow them for a weekend as the better shops used to do.
Today, people buy based on 'reviews' ... and this would be good if reviewers were more perceptive than the man-in-the-street. Alas, most are significantly worse.
Actually the type of speaker that has improved the most in the last 4 decades is little 6ltr thin MDF boxes with 4-5" bass & dome treble.
Indeed, the speaker with by far the best performance in nearly 2 decades of DBLTs is one of these ... usually against MUCH larger and more $$$ systems.
I had a small hand in advancing the technology of these animals. You could consider LS50 a slightly larger version
There's been loadsa opinions expressed in this thread. All I can say is that if you get the chance to test these opinions in a DBLT, grab it.
I have heard that the XLS Encore by Danny Ritchie is close in sound to the LS50. I have the non Encore version and would agree that might be true. It’s worth checking out some of the blind tests with these. The value is huge though.
SmallSpeakerShootout2007Part1
X-LS Encore kit
SmallSpeakerShootout2007Part1
X-LS Encore kit
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That's interesting to see you the epos M12 in the final. My dad has them and they're the best bookshelf speakers I've heard to date. Maybe I should try the xls.
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Not too many speakers will publish detailed measurements.
Here are the vertical polars - very rare to see in a bookshelf 2 way. These look excellent by the way:
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Horizontal polars:
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Here is the usual single frequency response that you may not even get from most speakers manufacturers:
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And measured impedance curve - presents an easynload for most amps:
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And finally spectral decay:
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The bass extension depends on the cabinet you make, but following plans and supplied port gets about 40Hz bass extension. As discussed above, a well designed speaker that measures well plays all genres well.
That’s a lot of components for $249 (includes Teflon insulated silver hookup wire and silver solder even).
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I am only pointing out this speaker because I think they sound great and more people should try them. Danny Ritchie, the designer and company owner is also great to work with from customer service standpoint. He is responsive and customer satisfaction oriented. Very helpful and knowledgeable.
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.. and I really don't know how you come to that conclusion
I was merely providing some factual data on the issue of "musical taste bla bla" affecting the speakers people like. The data says, in DBLTs, listeners of ALL musical tastes prefer the same speakers.
right, that clarifies your point, thanks.
And it's a very interesting point you raise, that sensitive speakers tend to sound better.
Obviously, this is the best-selling category, so the first to profit from any gains in materials and advances in design techniques. But, all things being equal, the same gains in materials and methodology are carried over through in the 4-5" full range market. If you compare the offerings from say, Tang Band, it's obvious that inverted surrounds, hot materials and fancy magnets are all shared cross range.
to view the LS 50 as the somewhat state of the art of the 5+1 combo is not an exaggeration IMHO - especially if you consider the active streaming versions. All the bells and whistles of the past 40 years of audio design.
IMHO, this discussion has become a bit pointless. The FR itself is not something one should loose the sleep. OK some well behaved FR but nothing seriously rigorous. Time domain is more important.
Anyway there is no question about the quality of the LS50 beyond subjective preferences. They are great monitors. Period. They only need at least 25W good tube watts (or 50W solid state) to sound loud because have a real average efficiency of 83 dB/1W/1m and they are effectively 5R speakers on average (but rather easy to drive except the lower module respect to specified nominal 8R). F-3db is around 55Hz.
The real spirit of DIY should not be I spend less money and get something better than the LS50. It's a wrong attitude, IMHO. For me it's the best I can do with my resources without (hypothetical) comparisons that also do not take into account the rest of the HiFi chain. Including the room and the listener!
Anyway there is no question about the quality of the LS50 beyond subjective preferences. They are great monitors. Period. They only need at least 25W good tube watts (or 50W solid state) to sound loud because have a real average efficiency of 83 dB/1W/1m and they are effectively 5R speakers on average (but rather easy to drive except the lower module respect to specified nominal 8R). F-3db is around 55Hz.
The real spirit of DIY should not be I spend less money and get something better than the LS50. It's a wrong attitude, IMHO. For me it's the best I can do with my resources without (hypothetical) comparisons that also do not take into account the rest of the HiFi chain. Including the room and the listener!
I didn't say that. What I 'said' was that it is possible to design a very LOUDspeaker, 94+dB/2.83V/1m that still sounds good on eg chamber music ... and indeed ALL types of music.
But most speakers of that sensitivity sound terrible
There's no need to damn LS50 with faint praise.
The best KEF speaker I've heard at any size, price, vintage is the 2nd generation KEF KHT2001-2 Egg. They were certainly designed for Home Theatre but do very well as main stereo speakers in much more fancy systems ... if you give them the power they need. You wouldn't use them at parties, discos and for PA cos the power they need to sound good would also destroy them instantly if misused.
LS50 is probably in the same category but I haven't heard them so can't pontificate further. The same people were involved in both.
Certainly making a speaker active can get you significant gains. eg you can safely extend LF to 'big speaker' standards and often get nearly 6dB extra spl before overload in the mid & treble. You can protect the speaker without compromising the sound and ensure overload sounds benign. My patented Powered Integrated Super Stuff was a large part of this, incorporating both analogue & digital technology.
I'm surprised so few makers use even the crudest aspects of this.
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An AES membership is $125/year and you get all the access you want. Shouldn't be the end of the world for someone who's running an audio business (or is generally curious).
They usually don't actually. Once submitted to the journal, the manuscript generally becomes the intellectual property of the journal, not the author.
I agree that paywalls are annoying, but AES is actually one of the lower walls. I see many papers behind $35/paper walls and $k/year journals. Thankfully, I have academic access for a little while longer.
Tom
I have not heard Markaudio, but have the KEF LS50. An interesting whitepaper on the LS50 tech here: https://www.kefdirect.com/pub/media/wysiwyg/documents/ls50/ls50_white_paper.pdf Quite the cabinet design and construction. I can't imagine how it would be possible to diy this.
I wrote an article comparing the size and sensitivity the LS50's to large JBL high sensitivity loudspeakers: KEF LS50 (David) Versus JBL 4722 Cinema (Goliath) Speaker Comparison with Binaural Recordings - Reviews - Audiophile Style
The article includes binaural recordings of both speakers. I certainly had my biases before making the recordings and was surprised by the outcome... Lot's of fun!
I wrote an article comparing the size and sensitivity the LS50's to large JBL high sensitivity loudspeakers: KEF LS50 (David) Versus JBL 4722 Cinema (Goliath) Speaker Comparison with Binaural Recordings - Reviews - Audiophile Style
The article includes binaural recordings of both speakers. I certainly had my biases before making the recordings and was surprised by the outcome... Lot's of fun!
I don't recall anyone saying they wanted to.
If you had to buy the software to model them and do the FEA etc., it would obviously be much cheaper just to buy them.
jeff
I agree. $125/year = ~$10/month. That's two Starbucks Frappi-Dappi-Whatever fancy "coffee" per month. Or if you're a caffeine addict (as I am) and insist on going to Starbucks (which I don't), you could just forego the fancy "coffee" three days a month and get their drip coffee instead.
Tom
Or invest in a cheap espresso machine and Illy ground from London Drugs and make your own. Worst cuppa I had recently was at an otherwise delightful restaurant on Victoria Inner Harbour - the Steamship Pub- when I looked at the bill it said "Starbucks" . The dark roast at Timmies, or even McD's is to me a better quaff.
Back to your regularly scheduled programming.
Back to your regularly scheduled programming.
Cool comparison. Thanks! I had a similar experience with the KEF Q100s. Once EQed to a similar target, they sounded similar to an all-horn system. In fact, the soundstage with the Q100s was so huge, it was difficult to tell which system was playing.
See post 7 (pictures and measurements in the first post): DIY with KEF Q100 drivers
A11MS as LS50
Hi there,
This is my contribution to this discussion. Two months ago I've received A11MS and after some serious thinking process (well, it happens sometimes) and testing drivers in some inadequate Voigt pipes (just to give them some time to settle down) I decided to put them in a BR box sharing some principles as KEF LS50 does. I'm little bit tired of tall narrow boxes (Voigt, TLs, MLTLs, BLHs and alike) so stand-mount it is. I haven't herd LS50 but they intrigued me with their design, especially their front panel. It is basically segment of a ball and it has big influence in diffraction distortion and so on. As i don't have all needed tools to shape a ball segment (and some lack of skill, of course) I decided to shape front panel as segment of cylinder. Close enough. Box is 19 liters tuned to 42 Hz, bit larger than KEFs. Yesterday morning (well, more like noon) finished and playing since. Sound? GREAT! I am not afraid of direct comparison to KEFs in any kind, DBLT or so (I made them so they must be the best in the world, naturally!). Precise, defined sound, I recommend this this drivers in proper box, by all means.
And some pics:
Hi there,
This is my contribution to this discussion. Two months ago I've received A11MS and after some serious thinking process (well, it happens sometimes) and testing drivers in some inadequate Voigt pipes (just to give them some time to settle down) I decided to put them in a BR box sharing some principles as KEF LS50 does. I'm little bit tired of tall narrow boxes (Voigt, TLs, MLTLs, BLHs and alike) so stand-mount it is. I haven't herd LS50 but they intrigued me with their design, especially their front panel. It is basically segment of a ball and it has big influence in diffraction distortion and so on. As i don't have all needed tools to shape a ball segment (and some lack of skill, of course) I decided to shape front panel as segment of cylinder. Close enough. Box is 19 liters tuned to 42 Hz, bit larger than KEFs. Yesterday morning (well, more like noon) finished and playing since. Sound? GREAT! I am not afraid of direct comparison to KEFs in any kind, DBLT or so (I made them so they must be the best in the world, naturally!). Precise, defined sound, I recommend this this drivers in proper box, by all means.
And some pics:
Attachments
Markaudio Alpair-11MS Gold Cone 6.5" Full Range
Markaudio Alpair-11MS Gold Cone 6.5" Full Range
Markaudio Alpair-11MS Gold Cone 6.5" Full Range
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