Planar Speaker Asylum

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Planar Speaker Asylum

Follow up question

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In Reply to: RE: One great sub, or 2 good ones? posted by Dawnrazor on October 20, 2009 at 22:18:36

Ok thanks for all that responded, but only one poster really read what I wrote and I didnt spell it out that good. Sorry.

Lets start over. I have to have a small sub with a 13x16in footprint at the max. So 15 inch subs and 4 subs around the room arent going to fly in this case....the wife has reclaimed her living room and the sofabed couch I sleep on due to my snoring (not because I am a bad husband :)) needs to join the audio room. That leaves little space.

So I need SMALL subs that fit in the 13x16 in space so the closet door will still open. Given this the sub will be on the back wall by the bed and about 21" away from the sidewall.

Will this be an OK place for the new subs? The room mode page I was directed to shows some issues in the 160 and 140hz regions. Will having the driver 16" into the room and 26" (21"+5" if I get a 10 Inch sub) from the sidewall be a bad position?

Another option puts the driver the same 26" from the sidewall but 23" OFF THE FLOOR. Which would be best?

What subs would you recommend given the size requirements?

About Rel. I understand the post not to buy the velodyne. But as much as i like Rels sound and their high level hookup instructions I can't get past the long wire I would need to connect my amps to the sub. How can you get the correct timing they talk about when the sub amp gets the signal 34ft later?

Finally, Dr. K's post made sense about the dsp correction. With a limited space for placement wouldnt that be a big benefit over subs that dont have that option?

Thanks!!

Follow Ups:

RE: Follow up question - emsquare 17:56:23 10/23/09 (0)
Take it for what it is worth... On a recent outing to a local dealer, I remember a noteworthy comment that is a hear-say kind of thing. The owner had not long back had met with Mr. Thiel being a dealer of his speakers. Of course they talked about whatever it is that manufacturers talk about with dealers but the Thiel subs were discussed. Even though he was pleased with his sub-woofer designs he felt that the cutting edge product was REL. Saying that one of his prime goals was to better REL's speakers.
Now I have not listened to any of REL's sub-woofers and just can't say anything about their quality. But when Jim Thiel made a statement like that I tend to think that it would be a worthy consideration. I mean seriously, how many speaker designers can one name?
Again this is all FWIIW.

In search of musical bliss...

Edits: 10/23/09
RE: Follow up question - leon 14:53:10 10/23/09 (0)
HSU VTF 1

Small, will fit in your space and easily work into a 1500 cubic foot space.

Inexpensive, too! Budget permitting, a pair would be killer and not overdone.
long cables and acoustic timing - wazoo 16:14:33 10/22/09 (10)
There's a huge difference between the speed of light and the speed of sound. Electricity essentially travels at the speed of light, so a few (or even 30) extra feet isn't going to monkey with timing in any significant way (in other words, that just isn't a problem). When you went with a capless XO, did you worry about the treble-mid/bass timing difference that would result from the signal that had to pass through that long stretch of copper (the inductor)?

"Jazz is not dead - it just smells funny" FZ
- What about the main question? nt - Dawnrazor 10:11:33 10/23/09 (1)
  d
  - I don’t think I’m qualified - wazoo 07:06:37 10/24/09 (0)
    If my choice is between a single or a pair of subs (all else being equal), then I think the answer is simple – two. Two grand should buy a pair of really good subs – my little RELs were just over that for the pair (not sure what the price structure is for the current line). As far as which subs are your best bet – I have no idea. The 10” RELs produce adequate bass for my tastes, though they aren’t floor shakers like the 15” Klipsch I used for HT.
    
    Like you, I have my own bedroom because of my snoring (a condition I inherited from my mother who has been diagnosed with sleep apnea – went to a center for observation) - nice to know that I'm not alone in this regard. Fortunately, the MMGs still have their place in the living room. I have my AR91s and the Stax earspeakers (each driven by its own Parasound amp - older and not as nice as yours, but I think both are fantastic, so I hereby give the raspberry to you know who) in my bedroom – work very well in the relatively small space.
    
    I’ve never met a sofa bed that I could stand for more than a night or two (or even that long). I hope yours is far superior to any of those on which I’ve tossed and turned. Before my son moved out, I spent about a year sleeping on an air mattress in the living room. A few of them (they didn’t last for more than a few months of nightly use) were very comfortable. Using something like that instead of the sleeper sofa (you were talking about one of those fold out things, right?) might open up more possibilities for locating the subs. I must say, however, that it’s very nice to be sleeping on an actual bed again – bought one of those Tempurpedic mattresses and they are awesome .
    
    Honestly, I’m not qualified to be giving advice about locating your subs – or to judge whether or not they will work well in the location you have available. Remember, I just stuck mine under my MMGs, but my MMGs are pointing (more or less) at me. Maybe I should give the sideways setup another go – this time with my CrowleyPans.
    
    "Jazz is not dead - it just smells funny" FZ
- RE: long cables and acoustic timing - Dawnrazor 16:31:09 10/22/09 (7)
  Hey Waz,
  
  Yeah I know all that. SOme smarty pants will come out with some math to show it doesn't make a difference. But I am skeptical. hey, its my nature. The Mags are closer than the subs and they get the signal before the subs so how their sounds can arrive at the same time is a mystery to me. Now if you are saying that I cant hear the difference then that is one thing I suppose.
  
  I could make some Crowley pans and put the subs there I suppose and that would be right by my amp. But I am not sure that is the best place for some subs.
  
  YOur point is taken about the capless crossover. I am an idiot with crossovers I think but in that application, do the highs really move through the inductor?
  - well, no - wazoo 16:53:04 10/22/09 (6)
    I was just being a smartass, and wasn't really thinking about the design of that XO - the coil is acting as a shunt, eh? In a standard parallel XO, however, there certainly is a signal passing through a rather long coil of copper (which is what I started to type, then thought about what you had tried). Now I'm confused though - you're a skeptic (I thought I was the skeptical nutcase here)? The point I was trying to make is that the differences in length in your situation would result in a timing shift measured in nanoseconds - well below the threshold of audibility.
    
    "Jazz is not dead - it just smells funny" FZ
    - RE: well, no - Dawnrazor 16:59:10 10/22/09 (5)
      Well I thought in the ASYLUM there would be room for at least 2 skeptical nutcases...
      
      Probably why i like you so much.
      
      Yeah, you are probably right I am going a bit overboard.
      
      On those rels, can you shorten the cable?
      - skeptic (to be an official member of the club) - wazoo 04:50:58 10/23/09 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: well, no posted by Dawnrazor on October 22, 2009 at 16:59:10
        
        I think any proper skeptic should have Michael Shermer's 'Why People Believe Weird Things' in his book collection. Of course, a couple of older books also belong - Thomas Paine's 'The Age of Reason' (1794, 1796) and Charles Mackay's 'Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds' (1841). Carl Sagan's last book 'The Demon Haunted World' ought to be in there too. Crap, here I go again. I was going to mention one book as a requirement and then I just got carried away with the idea - sorry. Oh well, all of those and more are very good books on how rational thought gets derailed. (Did I mention Michael Zimmerman's 'Science, Non Science and Nonsense'? How about... (Even one of Bill Gates' former cohorts, Richard Brodie wrote a great little book on the spread of memes, 'Virus of the Mind'))
        
        "Jazz is not dead - it just smells funny" FZ
      - shorten what cable? - wazoo 17:23:28 10/22/09 (3)
        
        In Reply to: RE: well, no posted by Dawnrazor on October 22, 2009 at 16:59:10
        
        Did my RELs come with cables? I guess they did, but I'm not using them. I made my own. Wait a tic - yep, I have some wires that look suspicious in the closet. Sure, you can cut them down to whatever length you need. One end is terminated with the Neutrik connector, but the other end is just three wire ends.
        
        "Jazz is not dead - it just smells funny" FZ
        
        RE: shorten what cable? - Dawnrazor 20:06:03 10/22/09 (2)
        
        In Reply to: RE: shorten what cable? posted by wazoo on October 22, 2009 at 17:23:28
        
        Ok,
        
        That helps. I still dont know how to hook it up. The manual talked about differential amps and I think I have one but dont know.
        
        I suppose I can figure that one out though.
        
        ;- ) lotsa ways - wazoo 20:48:53 10/22/09 (1)
        
        In Reply to: RE: shorten what cable? posted by Dawnrazor on October 22, 2009 at 20:06:03
        
        I recently changed to the second pair of RCA outs on my preamp, then added a dbx120 I picked up for $50 off eBay (has a problem with the main outputs (pop goes the capacitor), but I'm only using the sub outs - so, no problem (these frequencies really aren't going to be negatively impacted (audibly) by a little tweaking). Actually, it's a nice solution - allows me to correct for shortcomings in many mixes (some material doesn't need any help, so I just dial it out of the sonic landscape).
        
        I've pretty much decided that this is how I want to keep my subs connected, but I still want to do something about the MMG XO (will stay in the line level realm henceforth) - want to rolloff the bass above the resonance peak (would like to have the -3dB point around 60Hz). I also want to spread the XO region a bit - not as much as 2nd gen stock.
        
        I formerly had each sub connected to each channel of my amp - the two signal wires for each sub connected to the positive of its respective channel (in parallel with each MMG) and the common wire to the negative. It worked great that way, but the added enhancement (judiciously applied) makes my current setup far superior.
        
        Before the purists sharpen their claws and tear into me good over using such a device (of artificiality), I should remind them about what may well have existed in real life but only made it into the recording as harmonics. This thing just recreates the lost fundamentals - yes, I know it can be abused, but so can many other things. I'll tell you this: It makes many recordings of '70s progressive music sound far better (only way I can listen to Yes). It's one thing to turn a sub's gain up; it's quite another to feed it a fundamental an octave down (from what would normally be fed).
        
        "Jazz is not dead - it just smells funny" FZ
        
        RE: I do the same. - Travis 06:40:19 10/23/09 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: ;- ) lotsa ways posted by wazoo on October 22, 2009 at 20:48:53
        
        My 70s jazz fusion ceedees and elpees benefit from that extra low bass.
        
        "If people don't want to come, nothing will stop them" - Sol Hurok

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