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In Reply to: RE: Suggestions to replace Dunlavy posted by hebaton on October 18, 2014 at 05:33:55
and phase coherent speakers. Vandersteen, Green Mountain Audio ...It is quite possible that really is what you like about the ones you have.
If your listening diet is mostly acoustic / classical then it may be even more worth staying with that feature.
I met and got to know John when he was here in Canberra before moving to Adelaide.
He liked my Audiosphere 3s and the baby 2s.
Warmest
Tim Bailey
Skeptical Measurer & Audio Scrounger
Edits: 10/18/14Follow Ups:
and your general suggestion of brands. However my experience with Thiels over the past 15 years or so is they are brighter than Dunlavy's designs or Vandersteens, meaning a harsh or metallic edge to any I've auditioned. Among those suggestions I'd begin by auditioning a Vandersteen model, although I'd still choose my Janszens over anything under $10K.I also agree with hebaton regarding the Halo JC-1s. I went through many amps with my Princesses over the years until I heard the Parasounds. They offered a sense of power and musicality that seemed a magic match with the Duntechs.
"You can’t know what the “best” is unless you have heard everything, and keep in mind that given individual tastes, there really isn’t any such thing." HP
Edits: 10/18/14
despite having simple/'easy?' pass-band slopes. And I wonder if its the bigger PSU that helps most of the time
This power-hungry issue is likely due to the compensation/Eq components to keep the band-pass output of each driver clean and flat, and nail each pass-band down so that the slope really is 1st order, and to join dispersions up smoothly as as as as far as is possible.
A friend here had the biggest (2 x 12" bass) Dunlavy's made and sold here and in the USA. He drove them in quite a big room for a while with a restored LEAK Stereo 20 which gave 16wpc 20-20 kHz on test. Being a valve amp its storage in joules would have been close to a 100WPC SS amp.
My 2-way spheres - are instead quite sensitive being 91db/w and an easy true 8 ohm load. There's no Low Pass but a complex 3rd order HP with an Fs trap and Eq on the big soft-dome tweeters.
They were set up to be semi-actively bi-amped by my own two St20s but with way bigger PSUs. 4 SS SR diodes in a full-wave bridge and snubbed.
The triode mode amp (~6? wpc) drove from 3.5khz on up into the OEM passive crossover, and had 3 x 470uf Nichicon 400V audio-grade PSU caps, the last two bypassed with film caps.
The mid and bass duty amp, in pentode mode, drove the unfiltered 8" drivers which have just R&C inductive Z-rise Eq and a ni-chrome wire damping R.
The difference with these high joule PSUs against the 'OEM restored' stage was a big move up. Bass was a lot better, more nuanced, still tubey, and yet real slam.
But, the system is being rebuilt. A vertical array of bass sphere, WR sphere and a second Bass sphere, like an MwTMw array but at a much lower crossover point of 170 Hz. I've owned a second pair of the '8" 2-way' spheres for a while now.
Warmest
Tim Bailey
Skeptical Measurer & Audio Scrounger
Timbo,
Dunlavy rated the Princesses at 90 dB, yet the manual suggested at least 200 wpc for "greatest musical satisfaction"!
I don't know that much about electronics or speaker design but in this case I attributed two factors. One, as you suggest, was the complexity of the crossover to maintain the time/phase coherency with first order as the design goal demanded.
Second was the amplifier load. They were rated at 4 ohms but the impedance curve shown in the manual (obviously quite detailed) dropped to nearly 2 ohms at two separate points across the 20-20K spectrum.
One time a friend brought over a 40 watt tube amp he'd just built, thinking it might work with a 90 dB speaker, and he knew the Duntechs were revealing. It fell flat on it's face, totally underpowered.
Through my years of ownership I tried several different amps before settling with the JC-1s. One example was the AtmaSphere MA-1, 100 wpc OTL mono blocs. They sounded wonderful with simple, un-complex music. But play anything symphonic, big band jazz, or complex rock and they simply wimped out.
Talking with John Dunlavy one year at a CES he described a powered speaker he was working on to be tri-amped with 200 watt modules. I never read of those being released although they might have been demoed in Oz?
"You can’t know what the “best” is unless you have heard everything, and keep in mind that given individual tastes, there really isn’t any such thing." HP
This speaker was to be powered by Spectron amplification and also incorporated SigTech DSP. As you suspected, it never went anywhere.
Under hard drive a complex power-sucker low-impedance dynamic driver speaker can have its impedance drop!
I have become a big fan of large PSU's for power amps. It is possible with PP valve amps a truly large PSU increases the cleanness of their 3db peak power.
Warmest
Tim Bailey
Skeptical Measurer & Audio Scrounger
It has been said the power supply is the amp. What we think of as the amp is a complex electronic 'valve' to control the release of the energy stored in the power supply. If the power supply wimps out(especially on massive peaks) it doesn't matter how good the 'valve' is. Standard measurements don't really stress the power supply the way some sounds do. It's interesting that the British call a tube a valve, a much more descriptive term.
Is there any such thing as the perfect speaker?
You are dead on Tim. I listen mainly to classical, jazz and acoustic instruments. Not much interest for pop or rock, except maybe for afew marginal bands from the 60s 70s prog rock...
I to believe I like those speakers becaus they are time and phase coherent. I also find myself atracted to very low or zero feedback electroniscs. I listen to music, not sound. Altough I have enjoyed what some of the hifi toys can do at times. i like having funwith those once in awhile but I am always drown back to musicality in the end...
I used Dunlave SC IVs for many years with Marsh Sound Design A400amp. A great combination. The Marsh is as good as there is regardless of price. I juat wanted a change and got Reference 3A Grand Veenas. They have a more detailed, sophisticated sound but not quite as much bass though it is as tight. I'm now using Quicksilver 88 monos and am satisfied(blew a channel on the Marsh). Dunlavy taught me to prefer time aligned and phase correct speakers hence the Grand Veenas.
Edits: 10/18/14 10/19/14
side and rear walls ala Allison's ideas.
A To the floor:B:C should be about 1:1.5:2.5 and up to 1:1.6:2.6.
And A doesn't -have- to be the woofer to floor distance. It can be the woofer center to the rear wall.
You basically want unequal path lengths.
This could give you a little more extension.
In my room I have treated the first reflection points with pegboard panels treated with old wool-carpet and stood-off using soft door stoppers and covered with printed fabric selected by SWMBO.
Click below.
Warmest
Tim Bailey
Skeptical Measurer & Audio Scrounger
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