Super 3 XRS vs. Max Hemp

tuga · « **on:** 4 Sep 2007, 07:41 am »

Hi everyone,

I fear the 4.5'' driver is going to be too small, so I started wondering what would be the sonic differences between them...

Has anyone has listened to both?

Cheers,
Ricardo

tuga · « **Reply #1 on:** 4 Sep 2007, 12:09 pm »

One more thing: is any of the 8'' driver speakers suited for corner placement?

Vinnie R. · « **Reply #2 on:** 4 Sep 2007, 01:37 pm »

Quote from: tuga on 4 Sep 2007, 12:09 pm

One more thing: is any of the 8'' driver speakers suited for corner placement?

Hi Ricardo,

Louis had a version of the Max Hemp that featured the Visaton B200 driver in a sealed-box.. called the Revolution. George (Zybar) owns a pair in a custom finish:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=44525.0

That's the way to go for corner placement or placement near the wall behind the speaker, IMO!

-Vinnie

PS: Louis is working on a hemp version of such a sealed-box 8" driver, with ALNICO magnets! aa aa aa

tuga · « **Reply #3 on:** 4 Sep 2007, 02:05 pm »

Thank you Vinnie. Buying "blind" is a terrible experience, its nice to get some help.

rajacat · « **Reply #4 on:** 4 Sep 2007, 07:44 pm »

I only have experience with my Omega Bi/dipoles. It would be very interesting to hear them, in the same room using the same electronics, with all the other offerings of Omega in particular the 8" hemps. I can use my Bipoles in monopole configuration to approximate the the XRS's.

...Raj

jrokke · « **Reply #5 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 12:40 am »

For the super 3 xrs what do you guys who have them think the minimum distance is to have them to your back wall or corners. Do they need quite a bit of room to breathe? Or can you push them back against the wall a bit ?

SuperXRSSeattle · « **Reply #6 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 03:41 am »

Quote from: jrokke on 10 Sep 2007, 12:40 am

For the super 3 xrs what do you guys who have them think the minimum distance is to have them to your back wall or corners. Do they need quite a bit of room to breathe? Or can you push them back against the wall a bit ?

I just got pair and they're at the 20hr mark - 150 hours to go! With the rear port maybe? maybe the decoupling from the walls is advise due to corner bass buildup? I have no idea but possibly a bass trap\acoustic treatment would allow near wall placement. I'm guessing. At any rate, the Super XRS are Very nice even at early appraisal butted up against the wall, in traingular listening position. The amplifier would be more influential? Regardless, we all want airspace, more the better...so get room if at all cost

Vinnie R. · « **Reply #7 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 01:50 pm »

Quote from: jrokke on 10 Sep 2007, 12:40 am

For the super 3 xrs what do you guys who have them think the minimum distance is to have them to your back wall or corners. Do they need quite a bit of room to breathe? Or can you push them back against the wall a bit ?

Hi jrokke,

The Super 3 XRS speakers are rear-ported, but even placed close to the wall behind them (6" or 12") I never found them to get boomy when testing them out like this. I'm not sure if this has to do with the little 4.5" driver being so fast, the tuning of the port, etc.

I'm sure the room has a lot to do with it as well and YMMV...

However, for best quality bass and to achieve a wide and deep soundstage, pulling them out into the room is highly recommended if possible!

Best regards,

Vinnie

opnly bafld · « **Reply #8 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 10:30 pm »

Quote from: Alwayswantmore on 10 Sep 2007, 04:19 pm

Not to hijack this thread, but related to "close to wall placement, with no corners"...

I've been pondering a way to get good sounding "in-wall" speakers for a 50" plasma TV. I was wondering if I could embed Super 3's into the walls with a sub, with the speakers placed at TV height. How would they do for imaging, soundstage and frequency response? At 7.5" deep, the Super 3 s would stick out approximately flush with with front of the TV. Also, with no magnetic shield, how far would they need to be paced from TV? Anyone have any thoughts?

P.S. Sorry to hear about Louis' parents. And thank you Vinnie for keeping this Circle going in his absence.

Super 3s size = 15” H x 12”W x 7.5”D -- front ported.

As far imaging/soundstage see Vinnie's post above.
With regard to bass if you are going to use a subwoofer you can use any of Omega's speakers.
You can plug the ports on the rear ported speakers, this will raise the tuning frequency (the speakers will produce less bass-maybe a good thing against a wall) and may even make it easier to integrate a sub.

Lin

schotter · « **Reply #9 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 10:54 pm »

I played a bit with plugging the ports on my XRS and minuets (later sort-of-narrow baffle Super 3's) in combo with a sub. Whenever I did this it felt like the soundstage 'collapsed' and things got very flat. Whatever it was technically, adding the sub did not bring back what was lost. I preferred the sub/speaker overlap for better integration.

zybar · « **Reply #10 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 10:57 pm »

Quote from: opnly bafld on 10 Sep 2007, 10:30 pm

Quote from: Alwayswantmore on 10 Sep 2007, 04:19 pm
Not to hijack this thread, but related to "close to wall placement, with no corners"...

I've been pondering a way to get good sounding "in-wall" speakers for a 50" plasma TV. I was wondering if I could embed Super 3's into the walls with a sub, with the speakers placed at TV height. How would they do for imaging, soundstage and frequency response? At 7.5" deep, the Super 3 s would stick out approximately flush with with front of the TV. Also, with no magnetic shield, how far would they need to be paced from TV? Anyone have any thoughts?

P.S. Sorry to hear about Louis' parents. And thank you Vinnie for keeping this Circle going in his absence.

Super 3s size = 15” H x 12”W x 7.5”D -- front ported.

As far imaging/soundstage see Vinnie's post above.
With regard to bass if you are going to use a subwoofer you can use any of Omega's speakers.
You can plug the ports on the rear ported speakers, this will raise the tuning frequency (the speakers will produce less bass-maybe a good thing against a wall) and may even make it easier to integrate a sub.

Lin

The Revolutions work quite well with the McAlister PP-150.

Personally, I would want more bass than the Revolutions could deliver, but I can see many people being ok with the bass and not needing to add a sub (especially in a mid or small sized room).

George

Alwayswantmore · « **Reply #11 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 11:11 pm »

Quote from: tuga on 10 Sep 2007, 09:54 pm

Man, that's a total hijack!!!

Sorry. Moved to new thread.

schotter · « **Reply #12 on:** 10 Sep 2007, 11:20 pm »

Quote from: schotter on 10 Sep 2007, 10:54 pm

I preferred the sub/speaker overlap for better integration.

But I agree with Vinnie, they never sounded 'boomy', even close to the wall. You should not have a problem with placement in a small room: My observation is that they are very nice when you are sitting very close to them and with some room to breathe behind them (plusminus 2ft min.). But still, I would wait and ask Louis what he thinks about XRS vs Revolution, max Hemps and compacts. If any of the others are bigger in the lower mid region, I would have paired my Shigaraki with one of those.

DaveC113 · « **Reply #13 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 12:54 am »

I just moved into a smaller space, and the room needs some help, but I did not find having the XRS in a corner made it boomy. I also plugged the port and they sounded much worse. Right now they are close to the side walls, but 2' from the front wall, and luckily my listening position isn't against the back wall. I just need some bass traps and absorption on the side walls near the speakers and I'll probably be able to live with it until I get a bigger place. I am using a 10" downfiring Adire sub.

I just got an opportunity to hear the MaxHemps, and they are awesome. They aren't quite as fast or detailed as the XRS, but have a fuller, richer, warmer sound... otherwise they share a lot of similarities to the smaller XRS. They are among the best speakers I've heard at any price.

Dave

jsaliga · « **Reply #14 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 02:12 am »

Quote from: Vinnie R. on 4 Sep 2007, 01:37 pm

Quote from: tuga on 4 Sep 2007, 12:09 pm
One more thing: is any of the 8'' driver speakers suited for corner placement?

Hi Ricardo,

Louis had a version of the Max Hemp that featured the Visaton B200 driver in a sealed-box.. called the Revolution. George (Zybar) owns a pair in a custom finish:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=44525.0

That's the way to go for corner placement or placement near the wall behind the speaker, IMO!

-Vinnie

PS: Louis is working on a hemp version of such a sealed-box 8" driver, with ALNICO magnets! aa aa aa

This is very good to know since I am in that very situation: the speakers in my listening room need sit near the wall.

Thanks!

--Jerome

smccull · « **Reply #15 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 02:54 am »

The MaxHemps that DaveC listened to were mine. He came over Sunday and we had a great time trying all kinds of different combinations with the remarkable Trends TA 10.1 amp. We played with two different power supplies and then an Optima Yellow Top battery, which was clearly the winner for me. Gotta get one of those! We also tried some of his DIY cables, which were very, very nice.

But I have to agree, the MaxHemps are really, really good. We played my RWA modded Squeezebox through an Altmann Attraction DAC through my Promitheus TVC with the battery powered Trends and it was spooky how good the all DC/passive setup sounded. I'm going to have a tough time finding something a lot better when I go to RMAF in the coming weeks. I think it'll take at least $20-30K to beat this budget combo, and I really don't think that's a stretch.

The MaxHemps have all the resolution you'll ever want, and the coherency and presence you'll only get with a single driver. But they never sound shouty or small, like Lowthers and Fostex, nor do they break down in challenging dynamic pieces. Don't get me wrong, they don't have the full on macrodynamics of three or four ways at 95+ decibels, but they're so good at lower and medium listening levels you'll rarely feel the need to crank them like that. With no passive crossover in the mix there's no need to turn them to ear bleeding levels to get them to sing. They can however play quite loud (it's a good thing the wife wasn't home) when you want and like I said there was no hint of compression, cone breakup or soundstage collapse, quite a trick for one eight inch driver. That hemp is some tough stuff!

A couple weeks before I went over to Dave's to listen to his XRS's with his Adire subs and his setup sounded really, really good too. Maybe a little bit thinner, because of the smaller drivers, but also maybe a bit more open and transparent. Again, the coherency and emotional connection to the music was what grabs you and keeps you engaged. These would be really nice in a small room, but I do think they need a sub for the bottom octave and a half maybe.

Either speaker would be really good. I haven't tried moving mine against the wall so I can't comment on that, but I do have to say that finding the Omega's will keep me off the speaker merry go round for a long, long time.

Good luck, whichever way you go.

Steve

DaveC113 · « **Reply #16 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 03:32 am »

The sub is something to consider... I'd prefer the Maxhemp without a sub to the XRS with a sub. The extension isn't ultra-low, but the bass dynamics and impact are good. The XRS needs a sub to add some impact to the low end, and it needs to be a very fast, low distortion sub to work well...

smccull · « **Reply #17 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 03:51 am »

Dave,

I got the Adire subs in today. I won't be able to hook them up till this weekend but I'll let you know how they sound, and if they can keep up with the MaxHemps.

rajacat · « **Reply #18 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 04:09 am »

I have the Hemp Bi/Dipoles V.1 and I am impressed with the synergy with the Trends 10.1. The Trends certainly has a very favorable sound quality to price ratio.

I'm biamping which is giving really great resolution and separation. The Mapletree tube pre seems to add body without sacrificing detail...too. I'm still fooling with speaker wires, etc try to find the best combination. The Hemps are so detailed that upstream changes are very apparent. Real speed merchants.

I'm using a sub and I think that some room treatment and more tweaking are in order now.
'

DaveC113 · « **Reply #19 on:** 11 Sep 2007, 05:27 am »

Steve, good luck with the subs, I look forward to hearing how you like them

Raja, I just bought a tube pre to replace the Adcom. I hope it will work well with the XRS and Trends. I like the Anti-Cable speaker cable the best so far. I tried a couple cat5 wires and 20g magnet wire too, so no extensive testing, but fwiw the AC is cheap, and easily sold if you don't like it. My Anti-Cable IC clones sound VERY close to the actual Anti-ICs at Steve's... of course, I think they're slightly better

The biggest difference is silver vs copper, so you'd probably like whichever conductor you happen to prefer. I tested a Cu 8-stranded helical IC which is better than the Anti-ICs with the XRS but not with the Maxhemps. They have great bass and a smooth, rich sound without losing any detail... the Maxhemps prefered the more open, analytical sound of the Anti-ICs and sounded a little plump with the other IC. The differences were quite large and very obvious, you're right that little things make big differences.

Dave