Upgrades to the Salk HT3...

brj · « **Reply #80 on:** 18 Jul 2005, 05:01 am »

Don't forget external passive crossovers.

jsalk · « **Reply #81 on:** 18 Jul 2005, 12:48 pm »

Quote from: brj

Don't forget external passive crossovers.

Good point. Thanks. I will add them as well.

- Jim

Robert C. Schult · « **Reply #82 on:** 18 Jul 2005, 03:14 pm »

Hi Jim and ACer's.

Great Idea about the Upgrade/Options Link Jim.

With that, I'm guessing a bit of info might be useful as to why the Poiema!! wire harness works so well with not only the Veracity HT3s but any speaker we've used it in. This includes our own Sason Ltd, Ref 3A MM DeCapo i, and a few other personal and client custom projects.

In short, the harness's are custom made for the loudspeaker they are going to be used with. This is different than almost all other speakers where off the shelf (name brand) hook-up wire or speaker cabling is used.

So what's the big deal about a custom harness? Ideally, the cross over and the driver it's designated to should have the same characteristic impedance in order for the transfer function to work optimally without wasting useful power. An incorrectly terminated wire harness will inhibit that. The only real option left is to choose an internal cable that is euphorically pleasing to the designer or what the designer thinks the market will except.

When the wire harness is not optimized electrically, small reflections and power loss will occur. Picture spraying water through a hose at a screen window. Much of the water gets through but some of it gets "sprayed" back. Not the most efficient transfer. Remove the screen (impedance) and nothing gets wasted. Another illustration: Driving a high performance car down a winding highway and suddenly you encounter a long tunnel. You go through without any headlights on and ram the side wall at 130 mph. This has nothing to do with audio but I was just thinking about it and I thought I would mention it.

Virtually all internal wiring in loudspeakers starts at maybe fifteen ohms AC impedance and simply gets worse (most cases) from there. How many loudspeaker systems do you see rated at fifteen Ohms nominal impedance? Me either.

As far as I know, and I think I know, there is not a large production cable manufacturing process that can accomplish suitable impedance characteristics for a loudspeaker system. Even Wilson, if you've seen some of their recent ads, shows their internal wiring being hand tweaked to get what they want. Couple that with some of the proprietary materials we use and the build technique we developed (which has just been refined and improved again) and perhaps it becomes even more evident why the harness's we offer are custom and hand built.

Will the Poiema!! harness make or break a speaker system. I don't think so. What it will do is fully allow all the other effort, design choices and/or options that have gone into the speaker design to be fully realized and that is not inconsequential by any stretch.

Exclusive to our cable harness also, if the manufacturer is willing to implement it as Jim at Salk Sound did for Marbles, is our own method of using the Cardas (patented) binding posts. This is our innovation and is part of the Direct Connect system first introduced on the Sason Ltd loudspeaker system we offer. Simply the best interface for the amp/speaker partnering... period-bar none!

Cheers to all!

Robert

Marbles · « **Reply #83 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 12:24 am »

Robert,

I'm not sure what you were trying to say above...I'm sure the meds will kick in soon..

I do remember you taking lots of time and asking a lot of questions regarding the drivers and talking about the proper gauge and length for each run, as well as the terminations, especially with regards to the TC Sounds woofer.

I want to mention that I fully expect these to be my last speakers..or at least I never intend to sell them. If at some point you see them for sale you will know I have fallen on some very hard times. Anyway, I chose Ridge Street internal cabling for my last set of speakers, since I've never heard better cable in my system.

That should say plenty.....

Kishore · « **Reply #84 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 04:17 am »

WoW- they look amazin! Congrats Jim and Marbles!

Jim-regarding center channel-maybe you could make also provide for HTC sitting on top of TC woofer sound box - would be good match for left and right. (kinda like Dali CS4 sitting on top of its sub)

Quote from: Marbles

Robert,

I want to mention that I fully expect these to be my last speakers..or at least I never intend to sell them.

Cheers,
Kishore

aggielaw · « **Reply #85 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 04:26 am »

Hmmm..so Rob, are the HT3's going to lead you to part with your nOrh 9.0's anytime soon?

ekovalsky · « **Reply #86 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 04:32 am »

Robert,

I've been trying to digest your post. What exactly do you mean when you say

Quote

Virtually all internal wiring in loudspeakers starts at maybe fifteen ohms AC impedance and simply gets worse (most cases) from there

Surely the wire itself doesn't have 15 ohms impedance, unless you are talking about a 1000' spool of 28 gauge wire.

Ohm's law applies to AC and DC circuits, does it not ?

Of course if you include all the wire in the voice coil of a big woofer in series with the hookup wire, resistance will go up significantly... i.e. to the 4 or 8 ohms range.

Robert C. Schult · « **Reply #87 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 01:13 pm »

Good morning Ek.

I think I assumed more than I should have. I try to explain things in terms I think everyone will understand since that's one of the ways that I learn and understand stuff. I never would have made it in an EE class room. Even back in '74 I barely made it through high school because of my learning style. I gotta have a reason that interests me to learn, I need things boiled down in pretty simple terms to grasp the meat of it and my learning needs to heavily include a process of application. I'm one of those Abstract/Random personality types. Ha! My wife is Concrete/Sequential. What a (scary) pair we make sometimes! Anyway, probably TMI but...

AC and DC resistance are not the same. DC resistance can simply be measured across a given trace or wire with any DMM set for "resistance". Not so with AC. It's mainly a product of inductance, capacitance and resistance. Take a Digital Cable for example. Measure it's DC resistance either open or closed loop and it's resistance will be somewhere around a 0.0? Ohm value. But measure how it responds to AC, which requires some pretty expensive equipment, and if it was designed right, it will have a value of 75 Ohms.

This all is certainly more involved than just the above but suffice it to say, all impedance includes resistance but not all resistance includes impedance and it's not correct to understand or use the terms "resistance" and "impedance" synonymously.

Cheers!

Robert

Marbles · « **Reply #88 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 01:24 pm »

Quote from: aggielaw

Hmmm..so Rob, are the HT3's going to lead you to part with your nOrh 9.0's anytime soon?

I never intend to part with my column 9.0's either.

JoshK · « **Reply #89 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 02:43 pm »

A useful link that explains a bit of the theory behind AC & DC measuring: Info

FWIW (I don't know anything about measuring AC resistance), it looks as though you need to know the reactance of the circuit so that you can obtain PHI (the phase angle between voltage and current) in order to calculate AC resistance. Or so that is what that link implies.

JoshK · « **Reply #90 on:** 19 Jul 2005, 02:56 pm »

Even better! More succinctly explained here....I find this reading fascinating in my sick mind. Doug's Tech Notes

ekovalsky · « **Reply #91 on:** 20 Jul 2005, 05:27 am »

Thanks for the clarification, Josh & Robert.

So if the internal hookwire has 15 ohms AC impedance, how much impedance is in the many feet of wire wound around a drivers' voice coil

Tech lessons aside, it is refreshing to see how much thought and planning went into building these custom speakers, down to the internal wiring and binding posts. I'm a big fan of the 'patented' Cardas posts.