My GR Research Super V system

poseidonsvoice · « **Reply #20 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 01:21 am »

Well put some measurements up now of just your LF response and let’s compare and contrast. I can’t tell if you originally had a hole between 100-300 Hz from where the coaxial transitions to the subs on one speaker but less of one on the other. The crossovers are not brick wall filters so a hole is possible which will affect the lower midrange.

And FWIW, I think Jonathan Janusz’s previous post is well worth reading.

Best,
Anand.

SoCalWJS · « **Reply #21 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 01:25 am »

Quote from: danvprod on 27 Apr 2018, 12:55 am

Well d*mn it if that didn't do it. @Jonathon Janusz, @Shakeydeal @gregfisk. Unbelievably frustrating. Set the A370s to what Danny had at RMAF and image is centered. Bass is less smooth for sure. Listening to Veedon Fleece right now and Van is floating in the center between my speakers.

Not sure where that leaves me? Either way is going to be a compromise.

Definitely take measurements again and see if there is a better compromise - Image still centered and Bass as Flat as you can get it.

Also, OOC - what are the speaker distances? (center of driver to center of driver vs distance to MLP - your photo makes it look close to near field listening.

Jonathon Janusz · « **Reply #22 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 03:14 am »

Quote from: danvprod on 27 Apr 2018, 12:55 am

Well d*mn it if that didn't do it. @Jonathon Janusz, @Shakeydeal @gregfisk. Unbelievably frustrating. Set the A370s to what Danny had at RMAF and image is centered. Bass is less smooth for sure. Listening to Veedon Fleece right now and Van is floating in the center between my speakers.

Not sure where that leaves me? Either way is going to be a compromise.

Where this leaves you is with a great set of full-range main speakers in need of a couple of subs to even out the bass response.

For what it is worth, Danny generally ran (with the settings you note using now) a pair of sealed servo subs in the back of his demo rooms, firing 180 degrees out of phase with the mains, at a noticeably lower volume level, to even out the show room's bass response and add just a little more "weight" to the whole presentation. It is definitely a noticeable improvement over running the same setups with the back subs turned off. Anand's suggestion of getting some new measurements up will help you when you go to dial in your soon-to-be new additional (and in this case true) subwoofers.

Slightly aside, regarding a little of the amp talk earlier in the thread, I've grown to accept that for my tastes and preferences, I really am of the camp that there is no replacement for displacement when it comes to amplifier power. As long as we're talking comparable quality in the amp department, I would absolutely put some big amps behind those coaxials. They may be able to play on a few watts of power, but there is just something magical to me about having a system that can do clean, clear, effortless, uncompressed dynamics, and for that one needs some power to make it happen. Even better in your case, you are playing with a pro coaxial driver that is designed to make the most of that kind of power that just happens to have been built like a really big audiophile driver.

Danny Richie · « **Reply #23 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 02:23 pm »

The phase control should have no effect on the output of the woofers. It is just a time delay control. It allows you to blend them (In time) to the co-axial drivers.

Once that is set then you have to use the other tools to control the amplitude within the range of the woofers.

danvprod · « **Reply #24 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 02:35 pm »

So this is the early part of the ETC for the L/R co-axial drivers and L/R subs (old sub settings). What I see is that the arrival time of the sound from the co-axial drivers are at 15.5ms or so whereas the subs arrive later, tough to see the direct sound peak but maybe 20.5ms? So if I am reading this right, I need to move the sub arrival signal ahead in time by about 5ms to arrive blended with the co-axials.

When you turn the delay/phase from 0 to 180, are you increasing the delay? How much delay range are you adding going from 0 to 180? Period of 80 Hz is 12.5ms so would the range be 6.25ms of delay @ 80 Hz? Am I thinking about this right?

Shakeydeal · « **Reply #25 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 04:04 pm »

It seems to me that you are overthinking this thing with measurements and spreadsheets. That's all well and good, but you should be able to dial those in by ear w/o sweating the technicalities. Who cares what a graph looks like if you aren't happy with the end result?

JMHO

Shakey

gregfisk · « **Reply #26 on:** 27 Apr 2018, 09:38 pm »

Dan, Really glad I could help in some way. Bring your speakers out into the room as far as you can, that made a big difference in my room. Also you can really change the presentation with the toe in.
Also like I and others have mentioned, try a big amp with those coax drivers, they will really come alive for you.

HAL · « **Reply #27 on:** 28 Apr 2018, 01:12 am »

Dan,
Since the speed of sound is about 1130ft/sec, 5mS of time offset equates to 5.65' of travel distance difference. If you expand the first impulse you will probably find all four peaks overlapped,tweeter, mid, sub 1 and sub 2.

Those other peaks are room reflections

danvprod · « **Reply #28 on:** 29 Apr 2018, 06:31 pm »

Thanks @Hal. You are still using those Parasound A23s in your line arrays, correct? That might be another amp to consider for powering the coaxial drivers. There is likely some reason that you picked that A23. I think you have about 10 now, right?

Anyways I received the little 22 watt AudioEngine amp to try out yesterday. For the price, it's pretty nice. Stereo line out, smooth volume control and digital in (S/PDIF, optical and USB), plus a stereo line in and headphone out. Pretty slick. Anyways, its safe to say that the Vs like a bit more power for sure.

Also for whatever reason this amp lets the 12" dig down a little bit deeper, so I am getting a much better blend with the subwoofers.

Should also be getting a chance to try out a Mivera in my system in the next few weeks, so we will see how that does. I have been looking at Dacs the weekend and now am considering the PS Audio Steller Gain Cell Dac. Assuming I can output both the RCAs and balanced XLRs at the same time, that might be great for my system. I could run balanced to either a A23 or AS1200 and then run the RCAs to the A370 sub amps.

BTW, I ended up toeing the speakers to 15 degrees again, as I like the soundstage better, plus I think the toe lets the rear wave be absorbed a bit into the corner bass traps, which ends up sounds a little bit better in the space.

So on the plan would be to get a DAC, figure out what amp I want, and get some floorstanding bass traps to go behind my listening chair at least. Eventually, I'll also want to add some first reflection panels and another soffit bass trap behind me. Thanks everyone for the thoughts and help.

Plus look, I am finally getting a proper cross over between the subs and the co-axial drivers. Nicely summed through the XO region.

HAL · « **Reply #29 on:** 29 Apr 2018, 08:53 pm »

Dan,
Yes, I am using 10 Parasound Halo A23 Class AB amps in the line array for mids and tweeters. They are balanced input DC coupled with DC servo controlled outputs for no DC offset and very low output impedance. I love the amps in the setup.

danvprod · « **Reply #30 on:** 30 Apr 2018, 01:31 pm »

Quote from: HAL on 29 Apr 2018, 08:53 pm

Dan,
Yes, I am using 10 Parasound Halo A23 Class AB amps in the line array for mids and tweeters. They are balanced input DC coupled with DC servo controlled outputs for no DC offset and very low output impedance. I love the amps in the setup.

Very cool. Thanks for the info. How low do your mids reach? I'd assume pretty close to what the 12" co-axials do, since we are running the same subwoofers (albeit you have 6 a side!). Do you think a A23 would be a good match for the Super V tops?

HAL · « **Reply #31 on:** 30 Apr 2018, 01:59 pm »

Dan,
I ran Pass Labs Aleph 2 monoblocks with the Super-V's and they sounded very good.

Never tried the Parasound A23's with the Super-V's so hard to tell without trying them. Their bigger brothers the JC-1 monoblocks are very good in two other systems locally.

danvprod · « **Reply #32 on:** 1 May 2018, 01:35 pm »

Updated system pictures. Here is that chip amp I am using:

Also I forgot about that little Folsom Amp (https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=156151.0) that Danny built a few weeks back. The one in the nice Dodd case. Another option for good pairing with the system.

And these guys are interesting too: http://templeaudio.net/. Their Bantam Gold 25w guy.

HAL · « **Reply #33 on:** 1 May 2018, 02:32 pm »

Quote from: danvprod on 30 Apr 2018, 01:31 pm

Very cool. Thanks for the info. How low do your mids reach? I'd assume pretty close to what the 12" co-axials do, since we are running the same subwoofers (albeit you have 6 a side!). Do you think a A23 would be a good match for the Super V tops?

In the line arrays, the Neo10's go down to ~150Hz to meet the 6x12" servo subs.

danvprod · « **Reply #34 on:** 8 May 2018, 12:09 am »

@sledwards came over this weekend and we had a lot of fun. He brought over his Nord ICE1200AS2-based amp as well as his Mod-86. We used my Mogami XLR cables to hook up my Cambridge DacMagic Plus as well as @poseidonsvoice's D3 Zenwave XLRs (which were a solid step up from the Mogamis). It was incredible how sensitive the Nord and the Mod-86 were to the change in cables. The Mogamis are not bad XLRs, either. But the Zenwaves were something else.

Both the Nord and the Mod-86 sounded really nice in my system and we listened to a number of excellent tracks. Hopefully he will post some listening impressions as well. Before we had our listening session I built a 6" tall amp shelf to house my DAC and the amp while keeping the rack as low as possible to avoid having a tall rack between the speakers. I came up with something like this that was built from 3/4" ply, braced with MDF underneath and painted with Duratex:

Having a bit more power going to the P-Audio co-axial speakers really allowed the midrange to match the quickness of the servo subs (and to deal with the rising impedance towards the Fs of that driver). Both the Mod-86 and Nord had similar gain and allowed the A370 amps to be turned up to about 75% gain level. Another thing that was nice was just how quiet the system was. Only the faintest hiss could be heard with your ear up to the P-Audio driver in both cases. That is pretty awesome. Also no isolation transformer was need between the Cambridge DAC and the A370 amps. Another improvement and simplification to the system there.

Nord Stack:

Listening room now:

The Cambridge Audio is currently acting as my preamplifier with a 16' USB cable being run from my MacPro on the adjacent wall. I need to find a DAC with a remote so I can adjust the volume from my chair. Looking at the RME ADI-2 DAC as well as some of the Benchmark options.

These are some nice cables!

danvprod · « **Reply #35 on:** 18 May 2018, 02:03 am »

Big updates today. I received my PS Audio Gain Cell Dac and currently am working on burning it in.

I am still using the Zenwave D3 XLRs to connect the PS Audio Dac to the Mod-86. I also added 5x GIK 244 bass traps. A pair at the first reflection points, a pair behind my speakers (hidden behind my curtains), and a single one behind my listening chair above the soffit bass trap.

I currently have Dave from P.I. Audio Group making me a cable for the Dac. I am auditioning several ICs. I really like how these Z3s are sounding in the system.

Captainhemo · « **Reply #36 on:** 19 May 2018, 06:30 pm »

If you don't already have one, consider talking to dave about an Uber/Mini Buss, well worth the expense .
Congrats on the Mod86 purchase

jay

danvprod · « **Reply #37 on:** 19 May 2018, 10:49 pm »

Thanks, Jay!

I have one of Dave's MiniBusses with a P.I. Audio powercon cord that goes to the outlet. I love it! As much as I like my TWL powercords, I really do like Dave's cords and busses. My Brother has an Uber and he loves it. I'd like to upgrade the mini to an Uber in the future and move the Mini to my computer system to the right of the main system.

Captainhemo · « **Reply #38 on:** 20 May 2018, 08:18 pm »

or, get dave to build youa hardwired Uber, no receptacles. One cord to wall, one with IEC to mini buss.
Just a thought

jay

danvprod · « **Reply #39 on:** 23 May 2018, 10:48 am »

Not a bad idea at all. I could do a PowerCon in and out and then using my existing PC from PI to go from the outlet to the Uber and then have Dave make me a little PowerCon to PowerCon jumper to go from the Uber to the Mini.

I updated the intro post to reflect the current state of the system. Ended up adding the Zenwave D3 XLRs to the system. Really happy with their performance.

Current FR after adding the PS Audio, additional bass traps and XLRs.