So basically there's a series of things happening in the Yamaha's midrange that might be impairing things:
1) possibly a steep xover, which is also complicated by it's use of FIR filters
2) diffraction off that sharp cabinet edge
3) my walls are 100% untreated, and according to cask05's wiki, I need to address that
4) the Yamaha fits very tightly into a corner, so reflections off the walls are likely more audible. Or are they less?
Hi,
I don't think#1) on your list is a problem....
The crossover is at 2.1kHz and whatever order xover is being used, it appears phase has been taken care of via FIR.
BTW, what are you using for a sub, and it's crossover to the dxr12?
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Patrick: thank you for the usually entertaining posts! By a coincidence, I had The The's "Mind Bomb" and played it for first time on my Yorkville U15 Unity -- wow! Great studio effects, perhaps to compete with Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon or the Wall, even. Disclaimer: I have been using a famous smoked herb (or vaped) that is on prescription in FL but is over the counter in CA. It has notable improvement to the imaging of the system.
I was a huge fan of the Smiths in the 80s, so when the band blew up, I basically bought up everything the former band members did.
So when Johnny Marr wound up playing for The The, it was a no brainer. The album is really nicely recorded.
About ten years later, Morrissey lamented that The Smiths albums were so poorly recorded.
I wish I had the chance to meet Marr! He lived about eight blocks from one of my friends in Portland, and I often hoped I'd bump into him at Starbucks or something lol.
Johnny Marr On Quitting School, Moving To Portland And Wearing Capes : NPR
" I'll jump on a plane and go off to Portland and stay there for five years. If that's where the good stuff is or if that's where I need to be — wherever the idea is for music, my life follows that."
So when Johnny Marr wound up playing for The The, it was a no brainer. The album is really nicely recorded.
About ten years later, Morrissey lamented that The Smiths albums were so poorly recorded.
I wish I had the chance to meet Marr! He lived about eight blocks from one of my friends in Portland, and I often hoped I'd bump into him at Starbucks or something lol.
Johnny Marr On Quitting School, Moving To Portland And Wearing Capes : NPR
" I'll jump on a plane and go off to Portland and stay there for five years. If that's where the good stuff is or if that's where I need to be — wherever the idea is for music, my life follows that."
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As distasteful as some hipsterism can be, let's not forget that they are the future generation of speaker folks. The people buying vinyl are actually likely to sit their butts down and listen to a record actively, and develop an interest in true hifi. DIY has some cred in that scene, too, so let's not let manbuns and coffee snobbery dissuade us from accepting the next generation of dorks who like good sound.
Badman, Hah! I really like that view!
You're saying that hipsters are geeks weirdly centered on a peak of fashion. Makes it easier to accept for sure.
PB, yeah I get the dispersion is what it is, the Yamaha's where intended for outdoor or wide pattern coverage. They brag about it extensively in the sales paper. Part reason of why I like my 15-300TC's so much. How are they with foam plugs?
You're saying that hipsters are geeks weirdly centered on a peak of fashion. Makes it easier to accept for sure.
PB, yeah I get the dispersion is what it is, the Yamaha's where intended for outdoor or wide pattern coverage. They brag about it extensively in the sales paper. Part reason of why I like my 15-300TC's so much. How are they with foam plugs?
Patrick, aren't you using any toe-in on the Cosynes? In my rooms they didn't do as well arranged straight ahead like that. The SmallSyns seem to do better facing directly forward, at least in our little living room, don't know why that might be. The bigger 3D printed waveguides seem to work better with toe-in (basement system), but I think part of that might be because toe-in better works into the diffusors at side/rear of the room.
I also wonder about trying the Yammie with the smaller woofer. I was listening to a guy's system lastnight, a 10" "fullrange" and a dome tweeter. Sounded very good on some stuff (old Belafonte and some modern club singers), but after a while it seemed the midrange all sounded kinda the same and that got annoying. Maybe cone breakup is the devil there, dunno.
I also wonder about trying the Yammie with the smaller woofer. I was listening to a guy's system lastnight, a 10" "fullrange" and a dome tweeter. Sounded very good on some stuff (old Belafonte and some modern club singers), but after a while it seemed the midrange all sounded kinda the same and that got annoying. Maybe cone breakup is the devil there, dunno.
The interesting thing about the Cosynes is that there doesn't seem to be a limit for how apart you can place them. With most speakers, when I move them apart, a 'hole' appears in the soundstage. But with the Cosynes, not so much. So I have them as far apart as they'll go.
The interesting thing about the Cosynes is that there doesn't seem to be a limit for how apart you can place them. With most speakers, when I move them apart, a 'hole' appears in the soundstage. But with the Cosynes, not so much. So I have them as far apart as they'll go.
I noticed the same thing with my old Tannoy 12DMTII’s. They didn’t image wider than the speaker placement, but they could be on the sidewalks (appropriately toed) without causing a hole in the center of the stage.
I've noticed that the 90degree synergies (CoSyne, SmallSyn, 3DP) all did that center image thing. What always amazes me is that I can sit there looking at each speaker and can't make myself perceive that the sound comes from the speaker itself. Unlike other speakers I've had, even the tall BG ribbons with their impressive imaging I could switch to hearing the sound as being from the sources without too much effort. Narrower horns (though they weren't Synergy) didn't seem to do it either, nor did the 90 degree Econowaves I played with. The common elements seem to be coaxials and directivity (and me being the listener, of course). Maybe those Tannoys fall in the same category.
Not sure if the wide directivity is involved, but I've tended toward wider horns because they seem less likely to sound like horns to me. I still have cringing memories of the KHorns I used to have (SpeakerLab clones of the Klipsch, not original) and their narrow midrange horns, those I'm pretty sure I could have been blindfolded and able to aim a laser pointer at each driver!
Not sure if the wide directivity is involved, but I've tended toward wider horns because they seem less likely to sound like horns to me. I still have cringing memories of the KHorns I used to have (SpeakerLab clones of the Klipsch, not original) and their narrow midrange horns, those I'm pretty sure I could have been blindfolded and able to aim a laser pointer at each driver!
The interesting thing about the Cosynes is that there doesn't seem to be a limit for how apart you can place them. With most speakers, when I move them apart, a 'hole' appears in the soundstage. But with the Cosynes, not so much. So I have them as far apart as they'll go.
Is your room specifically setup for music videos? I didn't notice a center channel for movies. Have you thought about using a 3rd Cosynes for center channel duty?
K-402 do this imaging across the middle as their trademark sound, including the K-402-MEH configuration, and the two-way Jubilee configuration crossed at about 400-550 Hz (based on order of the filters used with slightly higher xo frequencies used for lower order filters). The entire front wall becomes the apparent source of sound.
I find that the only limitation is speech intelligibility and locking in the center image if you're listening off-axis using stereo only. A three-across (L, C, R) configuration when dialed in properly is seamless and doesn't care where you sit or stand anywhere in the room, like at good commercial cinemas...
Chris
Chris' description is spot-on : it's like the entire wall is the source of sound.
Sometimes I'll close my eyes and I can pinpoint sounds coming from points in between the center and the speakers. I haven't heard many speakers that can do that. Sure, lots of speakers can do a 'phantom center', but they cosynes are ridiculously pinpoint.
I can see why William Cowan just put them IN his walls, because that probably takes the illusion a little further. (Because you don't SEE the speakers.)
My 2 cents on the illusion of imaging...
Simply said, I believe it comes from good time domain response.
The closer acoustic centers are located, and the more precise the time and phase alignment, the greater the pinpoint illusion, and sense of reality, IME.
Similar to Patrick, I find two really good speakers running mono can make a super solid center image, with very little presence to be heard of their own.
And this image stays solid between the speakers as I move from side to side; the image just moves side to side too, based on relative distances to speakers.
This mono test is the best test I've found for imaging, and what to expect with stereo. How do others gauge imaging, apart from stereo listening?
I think when acoustic centers are not close, no matter how precise the time and phase alignment, we get small audible location clues from each speaker that muck up the illusion, anytime even slightly off center axis between speakers.
I rationalize that it's comb filtering from a speaker on one side that that can't be matched identically by the speaker on the other side other. (picturing mono again, with listener off center).
I think this is why synergies/cosynes image so well..with their acoustic center co-location...less chance for combing..
Simply said, I believe it comes from good time domain response.
The closer acoustic centers are located, and the more precise the time and phase alignment, the greater the pinpoint illusion, and sense of reality, IME.
Similar to Patrick, I find two really good speakers running mono can make a super solid center image, with very little presence to be heard of their own.
And this image stays solid between the speakers as I move from side to side; the image just moves side to side too, based on relative distances to speakers.
This mono test is the best test I've found for imaging, and what to expect with stereo. How do others gauge imaging, apart from stereo listening?
I think when acoustic centers are not close, no matter how precise the time and phase alignment, we get small audible location clues from each speaker that muck up the illusion, anytime even slightly off center axis between speakers.
I rationalize that it's comb filtering from a speaker on one side that that can't be matched identically by the speaker on the other side other. (picturing mono again, with listener off center).
I think this is why synergies/cosynes image so well..with their acoustic center co-location...less chance for combing..
I started building Unity horns about fourteen years ago, and I heard my first "real" one about ten years ago. About four years back I rented a Danley SH50. Shortly thereafter, I met Bill Waslo in Portland, and I've heard a few of his speakers.
I think the Danley SH50 sounds better than the Lambda Unity Horn. The difference isn't huge, but it's noticeable.
I think Bill's designs are neck-and-neck with the Danley designs. I believe the primary advantage of a Synergy Horn over a Lambda Unity Horn is that the Synergy xover includes some little-discussed features that aren't in the Unity horn. (It's in the patent, hint hint.) Also, if I'm correct about the Lambda Unity Horn, then there's real potential to turn it into a world-beater by revising the crossover while using the same drivers that it came with. The Unity horn concept came a long way between the premier of the Lambda Unity horn in Y2K and nowadays.
I think the treble of the Waslo designs is superior to the Danley designs, but the Danley's image a little bit better. I think the reason the treble on the Danleys is a little rough is because the midrange taps are significantly larger than the Waslo designs, and I think that's impacting the treble. Danley doesn't really have a choice here; he's selling a high-output design and if the midrange taps were smaller it would limit the output.
BUT -
I think it may be possible to take the Waslo designs a little bit further.
Here's what I would do:
Possibly the weirdest thing about the SH50 is that it's really difficult to perceive where the soundstage begins and ends. I've never heard a speaker like that. I've told this story a million times, but when our twelve year old daughter was sitting THREE FEET away from a Danley SH50, she asked "is it on?"
Like, how crazy is that? She's sitting mere inches from a giant loudspeaker cranking out something like 100dB in SPL, and she can't tell if it's on or not.
Danley has related similar stories, about how you can stick your entire head in an SH50 and it's difficult to perceive where the sound is coming from. Crazy stuff.
I think this effect is caused by two things. First, the crossover. Second, the midrange taps in the Danley products are *much* further down the horn than in the Cosyne. In the Cosyne, it's two inches, in the SH50, it's 3.5". In the Small Syns, it appears to be about 1.75"
So you have this situation where the wavefront that's produced is in-phase, but the *sources* of that sound are radiating from three points in space separated by almost a FOOT in depth.
When you place the loudspeakers in the room corners, you use the front-of-room boundaries as the completion of the loudspeaker aperture (horn), including and most importantly the midbass and lower midrange (which is usually ignored by most and allowed to bounce off of everything uncontrollably. So you see a lot of hybrid loudspeaker designs, i.e., horn loaded HF driver(s) over a DR woofer set out away from the room's walls. This is the source of the differences in imaging.
This is a typical situation within the engineering profession: many people want to set the "system boundaries" too small, not encompassing the true system and the full range of its operation. When you do this, you start to see individuals having trouble identifying the true source of issues. In this case, the system boundaries encompass the room boundaries, loudspeakers, listeners, and in-room furnishings. Since the Cosynes are presently placed in room corners, their midbass and lower midrange polars follow the room corner boundaries in terms of directivity (controlled all the up and down the audible spectrum).
Also, when you start to look at 1/2 wavelength cancellations in-room, you'll see that the best place (for imaging, etc.) is the room corners--unlike almost all of the sage advice given on audio websites that tell owners to place the loudspeakers out into the room-away from the boundaries. Then you deal separately with the extreme nearfield midrange reflections using a small amount of absorption on the adjacent walls next to the midrange horn mouths.
This is the reason why I put together the first corner horn imaging FAQ (also here) a number of years ago to present another viewpoint from the standpoint of the increased system boundaries that include the room itself.
Chris
After extensive testing, listening and reflecting on the Danley SH-50 performance in-room, my view is that the loudspeaker has been designed for low group delay/flat phase in order to facilitate lobeless stacking of boxes to form very high SPL capability arrays that cover multiples of 50 degrees (or 60 degrees in the case of the later SH-60). This achieves the audience coverage requirement--that's so important to PA and cinema loudspeaker applications.
The SH-50's point source capability adds to their imaging performance (and help to achieve the flat phase/GD requirement), but it turns out that any well-behaving horn-loaded loudspeakers placed in the corners will image in like fashion, as John is finding with the hybrid Cosyne design (single aperture horn on top of a DR ported woofer box). Full-range point source horns with minimal vertical separation and nearly constant polar coverage will perform even better.
Many seem to think that no acoustic treatments are required when placing loudspeaker in room corners--as well as re-EQing the bass response flat again. These notions are not true in my experience.
Chris
The SH-50's point source capability adds to their imaging performance (and help to achieve the flat phase/GD requirement), but it turns out that any well-behaving horn-loaded loudspeakers placed in the corners will image in like fashion, as John is finding with the hybrid Cosyne design (single aperture horn on top of a DR ported woofer box). Full-range point source horns with minimal vertical separation and nearly constant polar coverage will perform even better.
Many seem to think that no acoustic treatments are required when placing loudspeaker in room corners--as well as re-EQing the bass response flat again. These notions are not true in my experience.
Chris
Very cool, the amount of experience you have with the synergy/unity designs.
I've heard Ivan talk about the "can't tell how far the speaker is / where it comes from" phenom you mention...I can't believe I still haven't managed to hear any of the true synergies.
But no matter how well they sound, just from specs and components, I also think they could be taken a little further.
As good as the passive crossovers are in the Danley boxes, I really think the crossovers and tuning could be improved.
I have the Danley SC-48 processor and have laughingly suggested to their DSP/amp expert, that they should throw the passives in the trash LoL
It's all just part of taking advantage of the co-located acoustic centers... to the max, with linear phase. I'm happy to see the last batch of Danley presets loaded into the SC-48 use linear phase crossovers for some of the bi-amped synergies.
I wish I had any of your experiences re the ports...
Working with Bill's spreadsheet and Hornresp is going slower than hoped...
..but I'm pretty dense, so nothing below expectation so far
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