[-Richard-]

A weird accident has erupted from the music played on my Open Baffle speakers, the birth of a magical lit-up third-dimension. It is not the result of intention or design.

I have stepped-out of what was previously an extremely important part of my life. That seems to have created a resonance making it possible for me look at every area of my life freshly.

With that fresh energy, I finally took off the inductor and resistor I had on both of the Dayton Neo 8" wide-range drivers used on my OB's. It seemed as if the TBI class D amp I am using had a problem tracking both channels evenly, and I wanted to experiment using the process of elimination to make sure it was not something else in the signal path.

I originally placed the inductor and resistor on each Dayton based on Scorpio/Erling's recommendations to help to shelve down their steep-rise. This 'passive' EQ'ing worked nicely.

Recently, knowing I would be traveling in England, I purchased a Mac Mini to stay in touch with participants for a program I was running. I don't actually need it when I am home so I put it to the service of feeding my OB audio system through Pandora and a few internet radio stations. I am not using a DAC. A cable attaches the Apple iPad Mini to the TBI amplifier.

With just the TBI supplying the amplified signal I could hear the spotlighted upper frequencies. So I spliced in an older Maple Tree Audio Design preamplifier that I had lying around which I never liked. I originally purchased it to help add gain to the 2 watts of the Korneff 45 SET amplifier that I owned, based on a friends recommendation. It did not work. It bogged down the Korneff sonically. The gain of the Maple Tree preamp veiled the delicate transparency, magic and linearity of the 2 watts that the 45 tube generated.

I turned on the Maple Tree preamp, TBI and Mac Mini and was stunned. Something entirely magical is happening. This is something new for me, I have never experienced music reproduction like this before.

Everything sounds intensely alive… "lit from within" Sam Tellig, likes to say. Everything is lit up… the sound is so alive, so organic, so three-dimensional that Deborah and I are shocked... and addicted to listening to music again. Instruments and voices leap into life with all of their harmonic structure intact. There is a new tangible space around instruments and voices that merges with the space of the room. There seems to be another dimension to everything… holographic and highly saturated in tonal richness, in the extreme. All of the detail is there… but it never points to itself. Instead it seems inextricably bound to the textural presence of the instrument or voice that is playing. Separation is also uncanny… one needs only to listen for any instrument in any ensemble and it moves from its natural harmonic place in the whole to the 'front' of ones attention easily.

It is entirely intoxicating and has turned everything I ever thought possible about hi-fi on its ear.

Here are some suggestions of why it may sound as good as it does:

1. Pandora and the Internet Radio streams are not high resolution. If they were high resolution, the greater detail and extension of the streaming signal might push the magical three dimensional presentation out and replace it with an overly fatiguing 'more' of everything. I will experiment with that soon (for $4 you can get Pandora's high resolution stream for 1 month).

2. The Dayton Neo 8" driver must have broken in a little since it first arrived so it is less 'hot' on top.

3. The use of the inductor and resistor killed the 'magic' of this third-dimension, something Dan Mason always contended.

4. The signal processor (DAC) inside the Mac Mini may accidentally be sympathetic with 'normal' resolution streams.

However, it is not perfect (alas). Sometimes the highest frequencies do seem spotlighted… when that happens I adjust the preamplifier and/or the TBI and it goes away… usually requiring a slight lowering of volume. In fact being able to fine-tune the pre and amp allows me some 'personal' flavoring, modifying the recording engineers choices to better meet my own bias.

Also, after a few hours of listening some fatigue sets in. This much harmonic saturation and holographic 3-D lit-up presentation is not easy to take for very long periods. But it does point to possibilities I never dreamed of for a home hi-fi. Also there is not the ultimate transparency that say, electrostatics, or possibility well-designed horn speakers, or an omni-directional speaker can deliver. But the strange thing is that the usual concerns for this or that hi-fi consideration have disappeared for me in the face of this stunning presentation that brings music and voices to such intense life.

So this post is just to report that the OB paradigm has what for me was a hidden potential up until now. Something we can think about as we work with this highly malleable DIY approach to home audio.

With Warmest Regards ~ Richard 

[abernardi]

It sounds like you landed on a happy combination of source and components where the brain is getting the right balance of cues to create the illusion of reality, or the 3D quality you're talking about.  It's hard to believe you can get that with an internet radio stream, but I don't doubt it.  I'm experiencing something akin to this with my amp change.  I took my Dodd battery tube 15wpc amp out of the system temporarily and replaced it with a BEL 1000MkII solid state 50wpc to drive my high end on a biamped system.  The Dodd has excellent extension in the highs, very detailed and natural and sounds great.  The BEL is darker and creates almost a "box" around the sound stage.  It's a very large box, extending beyond the speakers, so it doesn't seem restricted.  It's much more 3D and has more weight.  At first it seems like there's less detail and the highs aren't all there.  But the more I listen, the more realistic it sounds to me.  Maybe it's my system adjusting to the new component, or me adjusting to the system, I don't know.  But my aural memory says the Dodd is "better", more open and extended, yet the overall effect with the BEL feels more real and engaging.

[PMAT]

Sounds like a Grateful Dead experience. 

[-Richard-]

Hi Abernardi ~

You have not made it clear if you are working with an Open Baffle speaker. However, thanks for sharing your insights regarding your recent change of amplifiers.

I suppose the point of my writing this post is that a simple wide-range 8" driver (or 6" or 7" driver) that is well designed could be all that is needed to achieve stellar musical bliss with the right ancillary equipment and digital stream. One can spend a great deal on this combination of products, especially if the speaker is a 'commercial' effort with a fancy furniture-grade finish. Nothing wrong with that. If I had unlimited funds for audio purchases, I would try a few commercially available speakers for the fun of it.

But for those of us, like myself and Deborah, who have limited funds for their audio system but who love music and the effect it can have on ones sense of being fully alive, with a little bit of experimentation and digging around for what is available, it is possible to enjoy musical magic without spending tens of thousands of dollars.

And following this line of thinking, if we can discover and identify which 8" drivers actually succeed in meeting this design goal, and it is not too expensive, it could revolutionize our efforts to build a simple working Open Baffle speaker.

Commercial audio would like to present itself as an elitist up-scale enterprise that reflects a person's economic arrival within the hierarchy of a well-healed class. If one does not have the budget for those kinds of purchases, they must save and sacrifice to get it. This is how it is presented to us by the advertising media. Money is supposed to buy audio magic.

The work this community is doing suggests that expensive equipment is entirely unnecessary in order to enjoy musical bliss at home with one's stereo. A little experimentation with the OB paradigm can bring the magic into ones life for a fraction of the cost of expensive 'finished' products. And it is quite a kick when it all comes together, either by accident or by design.

With Warmest Regards ~ Richard

[guest42212]

I have been on a roll in my speaker pursuits for some years.
Recently worked into using polycone coaxial speakers.
Grooving on all I heard.
Yesterday I happened to break out a RS 1265 (6"x9") w/whizzer
Another BIG Katharsis ........
So much clearer ............
How did I go wrong ?
Back to accordion surrounds and whizzers for me !
Until my next Breakthrough .......... 

edit> the operative is paper cones

[-Richard-]

I apologize for mis-naming my streaming device: it is the Apple iPad mini (not the Mac mini, which is a proven and reliable source for many users).

Warmest Regards ~ Richard

[Poultrygeist]

Should we not try FR drivers a'natural even when we know they have measurable issues? Instead of attempting to remove the warts, why not embrace them?

I tend to embrace the Tang Band's average reproduction of the tenor sax because it is so amazingly good with the alto sax. I'm not sure I'd want a better compromise if that's what an inductor/resistor would offer.

[-Richard-]

Hi Poultrygeist ~

Yes, I see your point and it seems very clear. However, when I first began to listen to the Dayton Neo's they appeared to be so hot on top that it was painful to listen to.

I spoke the other day to Jon Ven Halen from Lowther America, I am still very interested in their expensive PM5A 8" Alnico wide-range driver, and he pointed out that it takes a few hundred hours for the wood pulp on some parts of this driver to relax. It is a mechanical issue. Once 'broken-in', the unbearable top end of this Lowther driver smooths out, and apparently disappears into the 'whole'.

Perhaps I should have constructed some kind of sound-insulted-box and placed the Dayton's inside it facing each other to cancel out the front firing signal. At a high enough volume, it should let the parts that need to break-in relax much more quickly than my normally listened to modest volume and sporadic listening sessions.

I think that is why Dan Mason used to feel that using hemp as a 'paper' material for wide-range drivers was preferable, it probably does not need the long break-in period at high volumes that other forms of 'paper' must have. However, although hemp is known to deliver a lovely warmth to the tone, it is not clear that hemp will deliver the same 'speed' that say, Lowther's stiffer cone material produces once broken in, that contributes to the uncanny sense of 'presence' that micro-detail retrieval helps to create.

It could be asked, why don't driver manufacturers, like Lowther, sell their drivers already broken-in as part of a ready-to-be-used product? As a kind of value-added 'service' to their customers? They would be able to do this easily at their manufacturing plant compared to us having to do it in our homes over hundreds of hours.

So I took Erling's advice, which he was kind enough to share with me, in order to live with the Dayton's until apparently they were able to break-in. But this is not the whole story. It is also the preamp and amp working together with the Dayton's that is allowing sonic magic to happen. But I honestly don't think they are extracting the full possibility from the Dayton's. If I was a well-healed audio aficionado or a reviewer swimming in a variety of gear, I could try an assortment of different preamps and/or amps to find the best synergy possible. As things stand, with my limited audio budget, I can only get a 'taste' of what is possible using the gear that I have. Still, it points to new areas that I (we all) can explore.

Your Tang Band drivers are universally applauded for their effectiveness in an Open Baffle application. However, since the Tang Band is not ultra-sensitive, I would not be able to use a 45 SET amplifier with it... something I think I would like to do in the future.

My current thinking is that it would be nice to upgrade to a pair of ultra-sensitive drivers from here to something I would never need to upgrade to again... although this is probably unrealistic wishful thinking. If there was more or an interest in the DIY audio community to work with ultra-sensitive cone drivers for their OB's, perhaps a manufacture would address our needs (wide-range, ultra sensitive, easy to drive) by offering an 8" driver that was reasonably priced.

The least expensive Voxative 8" driver, the 1.5, is around $2700 (with shipping). It uses a ferrite magnet/motor and is 99db sensitive. The Lowther PM5A is $2500 and uses a large Alnico driver. Alnico is known for warmth and effective micro-retrieval, and it often said to offer a smoother presentation. Although the spec's suggest it is around 93db sensitive, apparently in OB use it is around 98db sensitive. The Voxative may not be suitable for mating with a bass driver, Ms. Adler feels it is 'too fast' to mate well. The Lowthers can be mated with an Altec reproduction (some use the Tone Tubby hemp driver) that should be able to go down to around 40Hz in OB application... especially if a 'hump' is introduced with some kind of EQ device. Jon feels that there are plate amps that have a built-in EQ (as well as cross-over control) that should make that possible.

With Warmest Regards ~ Richard

[guest42212]

When you use a resistor in series with a driver
(whether or not along with a choke), a small
capacitor shunt is needed to retain the 'life' of
the driver. Adjust to taste ~( 0.1 to 1.0 uf)
Not too large or you undo the effects of your
choke.

[Poultrygeist]

I was fortunate to win some affordable Lowthers on ebay and they arrived today. I am bi-amping in a flat baffle with pro woofers. Driving them straight off the amp is giving me the best sound I've ever had. I'll start a thread on them.

[-Richard-]

Hi Poultrygeist ~  Which Lowthers do you now own?

Warmest Regards ~ Richard

[Poultrygeist]

The DX3 and my love affair has begun.

I'm glad they have the light weight rare earth magnet vs the monster magnets of some Lowthers which could stress a simple open baffle without an exotic mounting method.