What speakers work well for low watt amps?

rollo · « **Reply #100 on:** 12 Dec 2017, 04:41 pm »

Rethm, Omega, Volti, Devore all depends on your budget.

charles

doggie · « **Reply #101 on:** 30 Jan 2018, 04:10 am »

Quote from: rollo on 12 Dec 2017, 04:41 pm

Rethm, Omega, Volti, Devore all depends on your budget.

charles

+1 for Omega Audio. I use their 97db High Output Alnicos with my Linear Tube Audio Ultralinear amp (20 watts PP Compactron tubes from a David Berning design).

Mazeppa · « **Reply #102 on:** 18 Sep 2018, 07:01 am »

Only have just begun to explore the low watt amp/high efficiency speakers path, and struck gold right away.
Like Dad always said, "I'd rather be lucky than good."

The Caintuck Audio Betsy Baffle.

A 92.4db/5.9ohm, single driver, open baffle speaker.
When fed well recorded, acoustic music from a cd player through a Schiit Gumby to a home brew 25W/channel chipamp I experienced the ethereal "equipment disappears and the music becomes part of the air"
sound for the first time.
Get them in their sweet spot and special things happen. Just music, not reproduced music.

Consider me thoroughly impressed, even amazed.

So, off I go.
Ordered a pair of Omega Super 3 XRS's, can't wait to get my Amp Camp Amp Kit mono blocks built, looking for just the right preamp...

This is going to be fun.

roscoe65 · « **Reply #103 on:** 18 Sep 2018, 11:48 am »

Quote from: rollo on 12 Dec 2017, 04:41 pm

Rethm, Omega, Volti, Devore all depends on your budget.
charles

I will second Charles' recommendations. I own several Omega speakers, and all of them work with as little as two watts. They may not all be room-filling at that power, but can provide satisfying dynamics even at low power. Other wide-range drivers I have heard with low power SET (my own including a direct-coupled 45 SET) include Diatone PM-610B, Fostex Fe127n, Triangle FL17TLV, Lowther (unkown model).

Wide range drivers without crossovers tend to be very easy to drive. On the other hand, more complicated speakers, even those of greater efficiency such as Altecs or Tannoys seem to like a bit more power to get up and go.

I am of the opinion that very light moving mass is key to being able to use fleawatt power. If we look at a speaker like the Omega Super 3, which has a single 4" driver mounted in a bass reflex box, it should not work with 2wpc as well as it does.. But the driver has a strong magnet and very low cone mass of 1.6g. The result is an honest 94.5dB (such precision!). Louis generally gets good bass from his alignments, but at the end of the day you are limited by the laws of physics. I like this driver with additional bass support.

roscoe65 · « **Reply #104 on:** 18 Sep 2018, 11:53 am »

Quote from: Mazeppa on 18 Sep 2018, 07:01 am

Only have just begun to explore the low watt amp/high efficiency speakers path, and struck gold right away.
Like Dad always said, "I'd rather be lucky than good."

The Caintuck Audio Betsy Baffle.

A 92.4db/5.9ohm, single driver, open baffle speaker.
When fed well recorded, acoustic music from a cd player through a Schiit Gumby to a home brew 25W/channel chipamp I experienced the ethereal "equipment disappears and the music becomes part of the air"
sound for the first time.
Get them in their sweet spot and special things happen. Just music, not reproduced music.

Consider me thoroughly impressed, even amazed.

So, off I go.
Ordered a pair of Omega Super 3 XRS's, can't wait to get my Amp Camp Amp Kit mono blocks built, looking for just the right preamp...

This is going to be fun.

The Super 3XRS is a great speaker, and one what you can keep with you as your system grows. I own RS5-based speakers in both single driver and dual driver configurations. The dual driver model does offer better midbass, but to my ear loses some of the midrange magic of the single driver model. I think that with the larger XRS cabinet you will like the bass on the single driver model.

OzarkTom · « **Reply #105 on:** 18 Sep 2018, 09:13 pm »

Check out the new up and coming Decware DNA2's. Steve is saying these are the best that he that has ever built. Decware also sells a pair of the Omegas.

Mazeppa · « **Reply #106 on:** 19 Sep 2018, 12:45 am »

Quote from: roscoe65 on 18 Sep 2018, 11:53 am

The Super 3XRS is a great speaker, and one what you can keep with you as your system grows. I own RS5-based speakers in both single driver and dual driver configurations. The dual driver model does offer better midbass, but to my ear loses some of the midrange magic of the single driver model. I think that with the larger XRS cabinet you will like the bass on the single driver model.

Magic, that's what I'm looking for.
My Omegas should be in the house around the 1rst of Oct, really looking forward to seeing/hearing them.

Decware site is where I was introduced to the Betsy Baffle.
Already had some Omega's in my sights, research on which led me to the Decware site.
The Betsy's didn't fill any need that I had, but I was intrigued by the open baffle concept.
They were consistent with the direction I was turning to and I had no experience with open baffle speakers, so I popped for them, and was (continue to be) pleasantly surprised.

Mazeppa · « **Reply #107 on:** 19 Sep 2018, 12:47 am »

Quote from: OzarkTom on 18 Sep 2018, 09:13 pm

Check out the new up and coming Decware DNA2's. Steve is saying these are the best that he that has ever built. Decware also sells a pair of the Omegas.

I live in Harrison, AR.
Where are you at, OzarkTom?

Shogun · « **Reply #108 on:** 23 Sep 2018, 02:05 pm »

Coherent Audio from Ontario, Canada. They have three models : a 10'', 12'', 15'' and maybe still have a 8'' version. His website is not up to date. I don't think Frank, as a one man operation, has the time or/and he's a web geek, marketing type. But, he's easy to reach and prefer a personal approach.

Audiowise, as a dealer, is a better place to view Frank's loudspeakers.

On most audio shows, Coherent is mated to Triode Labs 2A3 with stunning results.

http://www.coherentaudio.ca/

https://audiowise-canada.myshopify.com/collections/coherent

Tyson · « **Reply #109 on:** 23 Sep 2018, 02:52 pm »

GR Research Super 7 speakers are becoming available again. 97db efficient with a very flat 8ohm impedance and a self-powered bass section. Bass is from 16hz to 200hz, so your tube amp only has to power from 200hz on up:

https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=159096.0

-Richard- · « **Reply #110 on:** 22 Nov 2018, 05:51 am »

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone ~

I am using a Yamamoto A-08S, 2 Watt 45 Tube SET to drive a pair of 8" Lowther PM5A's with Ticonal Magnets, in an Open Baffle configuration, with bass duties handled by the Eminence 15A 15" driver, driven by the 7 Watt TBI Millenia Class BD.

To get everything to sound quite lovely took a few years. The leap from very good to incredibly special took a definitive turn when my nephew gave me an older used Apple Mac Mini to play with about a year ago. I purchased a monthly subscription to Tidal and then purchased the Audirvana Application which is synergistic with Tidal and promised to have better algorythms than some of the best and most expensive DAC's currently available. Then I purchased the small cigar-shaped Meridian Explorer 2 DAC so I could hear what the MQA hype was all about.

Audirvana was truly a revelation, bass suddenly appeared from some unknown dimension, room filling sea-deep highly textured bass that I have never heard before. Getting bass to work with Open Baffle speakers is usually a challenge. The treble region integrated better, allowing instruments like the violin, always difficult to reproduce with that silvery translucent texture that the Lowther's did not always get quite right before, resolve beautifully now. Shimmering instruments like bells, chimes, top hats of drums, triangles and the like now sound like I am using a highly resolving electrostatic tweeter.

So working with Open Baffle, Lowther wide-range drivers, and a 2 watt 45 SET amplifier is not a plug-and-play system. It takes quite a bit of luck to bring everything together so the music can 'sing' beautifully. It takes patience and experimentation and sometimes throwing caution to the winds if one has a strong hunch and a passion to find out.

Now almost every piece of music that is moderately well-recorded sounds very musical and gives off sparks of delightfully textured and harmonic colors. Audirvana also has an option to control volume which easily allows the 2 Watt/Lowther combination to fill my 20 foot by 30 foot listening room with powerfully pulsating music if I desire to listen at those extravagant levels of volume.

Amplifier/speaker combinations are influenced by many factors, made even more challenging if one is looking for speakers to use with Low Watt amplifiers. I chose the Lowther Ticonal 8" drivers because they were rated, at least by the then US distributor, at 98db sensitive. I had previously owned or heard several 45 tube amplifiers and missed the purity and transparency of that special sound and knew that if I wanted to listen to music played by a 45 tube amplifier the speakers had to be appropriately sensitive. I took a risk in bringing them together and was amazed that the Yamamoto A-08S was configured to have a very strong output signal making a workable synergy with the Lowthers.

I also use the rather expensive Emmision Labs 45 Mesh Plate larger-than-life tubes which also contributes to a deeper, richer, wider frequency spectrum sound than the NOS 45 tubes I have tried. I feel confident that better cables will improve what I am hearing, perhaps with better separation of instruments. I am open to discovering an inexpensive higher-resolving cable that is still 'musical' but what I am hearing now is really special and I am in no hurry to experiment with that.

With Warmest Friendship ~ Richard

witchdoctor · « **Reply #111 on:** 22 Nov 2018, 03:41 pm »

Richard - Tekton makes a speaker specially designed for tube amplifiers:

https://www.tektondesign.com/the-perfect-set.html

The other suggestion would be Klipsch. Maybe a Heritage model like the Forte:

https://www.klipsch.com/heritage-speakers

As for cables try inquiring over in the Zen Wave Circle. I think isolation is important too and maybe post in Herbies Circle. Have fun.

Tyson · « **Reply #112 on:** 22 Nov 2018, 05:13 pm »

I really like OB speakers, so I'd recommend either the Super 7 kits that Danny's offering here:

https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=159096.0

Or the Pure Audio Project speakers available here:

http://www.pureaudioproject.com/

It's hard for me to find OB speakers that I like, because I like big, slamming bass. Which is a notorious weak point on OB speakers. But not on the PAP or Super 7s. These both rock!

jbtrio · « **Reply #113 on:** 22 Nov 2018, 05:41 pm »

I don't know if anybody mentioned Horning Hybrid speakers. I have the Eufrodite Ellipse using Frankenstein 300b and First Watt SIT-3 amps and the pairings are excellent.

rollo · « **Reply #114 on:** 30 Nov 2018, 07:44 pm »

Quote from: jbtrio on 22 Nov 2018, 05:41 pm

I don't know if anybody mentioned Horning Hybrid speakers. I have the Eufrodite Ellipse using Frankenstein 300b and First Watt SIT-3 amps and the pairings are excellent.

Not bad either, hey Joe.

charles

Shogun · « **Reply #115 on:** 4 Dec 2018, 01:43 am »

Ok, this website is more complete, has all the infos on Coherent speakers.

https://coherentguy7.wixsite.com/coherentaudio/current-line

JLM · « **Reply #116 on:** 12 Dec 2018, 11:46 am »

For years, liking the sound/principles, tried to enter the low power field but could never find reasonably priced speakers I liked. A good analogy in the transportation world is that low wattage amps are bicycle tires (perhaps the world's best) and you're looking for a decent/good ride to match them up to. Would be OK if you like pedaling everywhere you go, limited by the weather you can travel in, forgo carrying much cargo or any passengers, and do it at low speeds. But bicycle tires make no sense for a motorcycle, car, etc.

Refused to limit myself to little girl and a guitar genres or late night sound pressure levels. Most low power friendly speakers are single driver designs that lack full bass (and many low power aficionados don't even realize it!!) and have emphasized midrange response or other colorations. More expensive multi-driver designs use energy robbing crossovers that may measure as reasonably efficient but rob low power amps of dynamics and ultimate output and can also have colorations. Again the dynamics/ultimate output issue can relate back to transportation, the corollary being a tiny engine in a big car. Sure it will move, but acceleration would be pitiful and top speed wouldn't allow for freeway use.

My guideline has been that true audiophile performance begins with handling peaks of at least 30-20,000 Hz response at 105 dB (live symphonic music), fidelity attributes (tone, detail, imaging, etc.) being debatable. Note that I'm not a headbanger, just want full musical response. Anything less IMO can't begin to be defined as high fidelity, it can only be a niche system, suited for reproduction of small unamplified ensembles. Additional watts (and damping) provide a commanding grip of the drivers that add detail (and prevents clipping to save the amp/drivers).

Watts versus dB is a logarithmic relationship. By definition 1 watt = 0 dB of gain. 2 watts = 3 dB of gain. 5 watts = 7 dB of gain. 10 watts = 10 dB of gain, etc. Adding the dB of gain from the amp to the speaker efficiency (huge assumption that the stated specification is accurate) would give you the output (per channel at 1 meter away). So a 94 dB/w/m speaker fed by a 5 watt amp could produce 101 dB 1 meter away. Adding a second channel and increasing the distance to say 6ft would be a wash (still 101 dB).

-Richard- · « **Reply #117 on:** 23 Dec 2018, 05:24 pm »

I find it strange that someone would enter the Low Wattage Systems circle, which incidentally I love, just to de-construct the very idea of the validity of the low-watt approach to home music reproduction. Obviously, the magic of using a combination of a high-sensitivity speaker with a well-designed low-watt amplifier has never touched him.

Right now I am listening to my present low-watt system: self-designed open-baffle speakers using Lowther PM5Alnico/Ticonal drivers for the mid-to high-frequencies driven by the Shigeki Yamamoto designed A-08S 2 watt 45 tube amplifier, combined with the Eminence Alpha 15A 15" drivers for mid-range to bass duties, driven by a 7 watt class D amplifier. The music produced by this combination, using Audirvana to stream Tidal through its sophisticated algorythms, then passing it through the small cigar-shaped Meridian Explorer 2 DAC, is nothing less than electrifying. Deborah and I are stunned every time we listen to the vast range of music that we love.

However, I admit that I do not listen to symphonic music. Neither Deborah nor I respond to music that is heavily laden with large-scale instrumental density. This is not a criticism of music written for large-scale symphonies, which admittedly a good part of the world of music lovers cherish, but just our particular musical aesthetic. We prefer smaller-scale music; classical small ensembles, jazz, occasional rock and roll, 'popular' musical genres, a great deal of native music from around the world, and a huge amount of music written for the voice, including ancient to modern musical forms. We also love Baroque music which traditionally use smaller-scale orchestras compared to our modern much larger orchestras.

My listening room is biased to being 'live', compared to overly damped, 20 feet by 32 feet with an 8 foot ceiling. What the 2 watt Yamamoto brings to the music is a transparent and holographic presentation, helping the Lowthers to sound very refined in the upper frequency range. Voices sound incredibly 'present', instruments have an 'alive' textural and tonal depth, the overall sound field is extremely rich. Open baffle penetrates and saturates the entire room, treating the space as if you were ‘inside' a baffle.

To equate listening to music through particular equipment with metaphors of transportation vehicles and their parts belies the concerns of at least some 'audiophiles' who think in terms of mechanical power and scale, rather than instrumental tonal color, pulsating rhythms, textural detail, and a spatial being-there 'presence'. Also to use the term 'little girl' as a metaphor for small-scale suggests a drift into sexist thinking. I hope the poster is not implying that little girls are in any way weaker compared to a little boys.

However, there are many factors that need to be addressed if someone wants to experiment with low-watt systems. I had to push my budget for a pair of high sensitivity drivers; the Lowthers cost $2600, several magnitudes higher than I have ever spent on a speaker before. That is one of the reasons I stayed with the DIY approach and redesigned my own simple open baffle speakers. Interestingly, after listening to open baffle for a while, Deborah developed an aversion for boxed speakers. For her the 'box' colors the sound too much and limits the illusion of a rich 3-dimensional highly saturated musical presentation. Here the example of ‘coloration’ is not the amplifier circuitry but the ‘box’.

Deborah and I have a great deal of experience listening to live un-amplified voice and instruments in many kinds of rooms. For example, we attend live performances for a few weeks each year at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, a highly esteemed music school. There, several rooms of different dimensions are used for the performing students and world-class teachers. One result is that Deborah developed a very acute sense of the role played by the room in what one hears. She has become convinced that what one hears from their audio system is room dependent. When your partner is also an acute listener, Deborah loves our audio system even more than I do, there is less room for self-delusion in what one actually hears.

Opinions about audio equipment and what they can do to get us closer to musical bliss are wonderful. I enjoy reading the opinion of members of this forum, dedicated to sharing ideas around the low-watt system approach. If low-watt systems are not your thing, it is quite understandable, since there are many ways to achieve musical bliss using different audio technologies. However, if you knock this approach, used by thousands of highly knowledgable and experienced music lovers the world over, by attempting to advance the idea that you 'know' what good audio is all about, you are merely exposing your lack of knowledge and experience.

Wishing Everyone Joy and Happiness for the New Year. ~ Richard

Folsom · « **Reply #118 on:** 23 Dec 2018, 09:24 pm »

Here's a more complicated thing that would be nice to list speakers on...

Efficiency. For example many single driver units are very efficient. They can be rated at 85db and still get loud on 15w, where as an inefficient speaker at 87db on 15w can be stuck in the mud and never achieve much volume.

FullRangeMan · « **Reply #119 on:** 24 Dec 2018, 05:09 am »

Hi Richard,
Good to see you posting here again

I agree with you, a few years ago I contacted Eminence about the 15A electric efficiency, the next day a friendly email from Mr.Anthony informed me it was a huge η0=4.00% so this driver is fully suited to a small tube amp.

I would like to inform small tube amps fans that the ideal speaker for a flea amp is a 16 ohms FR driver as used in the hey days of audio when small tube amps ruling the audio shops, this modern habit of using 8 ohms speakers with flea amps is an awful idea, it does not allow the amp to offer the best dynamics and the SQ it can render.

As 16 ohms FR are rare today one can use two drivers in serial, both to front or in a front and side position to more dispersion.
Hope this help.