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RE: IIIa Foil Project Sucess!

Ideally, I think you want the woofer panels approximately parallel to the front wall. This will reduce room modes. Also keep in mind that the Tympani woofers like to have a bit of a fold in them, as in the manual. I've been given to understand that this is necessary for optimum power response. I'm not sure if this applies to the against-the-wall scenario, though -- what you're getting with that acoustically is actually four panels, with the center at the physical wall.

I'd be very interested to know how the foil mids compare to the Neos. I'm guessing they're pretty similar in sound, but that the Neos have lower mass and a better waterfall, which will translate into better detail because of superior air damping. Frequency response will of course be idiosyncratic to the drivers. You can measure it, but it's just one aspect of the sound. Even if you take a waterfall it only tells you so much, particularly since the waterfalls we have for the Neos aren't of a line array. So you're comparing apples to oranges since a waterfall of a line array will be messier than that of a single driver.

Bottom line is that for me anyway the best reason to add the Neo's is that you can get rid of the IIIa woofer. It's a matter of proximity, if you're crossing over at 300 Hz you want the midrange to be as close as possible to the aooustical center of the woofer to avoid lobing. But the system you have will work just fine, we're talking subtleties here and I can see that you might hesitate to spend another $1000 and put in all that work.

For measurements, I'd recommend a calibrated Behringer. They're pretty cheap. The Rat Shack meter is useful for checking overall levels and mabe dialing in a woofer, but it isn't accurate enough for meaningful midrange measurements. These guys sell them:

http://www.cross-spectrum.com/measurement/calibrated_behringer.html

You also need a boom stand, maybe $20 online. I'd wait on the mic preamp until I knew what DAC solution I was getting, if it has a built-in mic preamp with phantom power you can use that. Measurement software is Room EQ Wizard, which is free.

I think you'll really want this stuff, tuning a three- or four-way system without it will be difficult indeed. This will let you adjust levels, play with crossovers, etc., quite rapidly. Your ear of course is always the ultimate arbiter but the measurements help you get them quickly to the point at which they sound good.

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