Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors

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Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #20 on: 4 Feb 2011, 04:52 am »
The MKIII SE9's had the silk dome tweeter. I have the Monitor 9's with the titanium tweeter.
I just found something out that is interesting.

I decided to use the MILLS resistors on the OE speaker and bang! Highs were brighter, cleaner, where they were previously stressing, caps are O.E. The bypass caps did the job in warming them up just enough to make it listenable without any issues. I will know more over some more testing but it seems the MILLS resistors with the Sonicaps do not play well together.

Also I'm wondering if the "clean up" is more due to the resistors then the capacitors now. I may remove the MILLS and place the OE resistors with a sonicap to compare the mills resistors upgrade vs the sonicap upgrade. :)

Pez

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #21 on: 4 Feb 2011, 04:56 am »
Interesting, keep us posted.  :thumb:

Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #22 on: 4 Feb 2011, 03:26 pm »
Ha.... You guys should find this interesting.

MILLS resistor upgrade ONLY
Sound was brighter, more defined, but had that high pitch dog whistle sound that was fatiging to listen to over the long haul. I'm not sure but I believe they color the music in the high end. Using a bypass resistor just barely made it tolerable, a couple more notches down would have been perfect. Even other discernable listeners noticed the difference. Certain subtle sounds are more pronounced and cleaner.

SONICAP only with ceramic resistors
MELLOW sound, non fatiging, much easier to listen to then with mills resistors. The subtle issues with the tweeter reproducing certain sounds was also gone with the sonicap. I believe the sonicap tended to further sharpen the sound that was passed to it from the MILLS resistor causing it to be unbearable. With the electrolytic feeding the ceramic resistor and the sonicap everything was nice, tame and under control in the high end but more defined and cleaner. With the bypass, almost no difference.. then again I still have the first electrolytic in place which is probably taming the highs like I suspect it does for these titanium dome tweets.

Might try out the 2 sonicaps in the near future. This weekend I am out though so I won't have any news to report until monday or wednesday.

Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #23 on: 4 Feb 2011, 04:41 pm »
BTW I use the term "MELLOW" loosely. It's kind of like calling heavy metal soothing but it is in context to what I have been listening to previously. In thinking the next logical step is to remove all the mills stuff from both crossovers and compare again.

Sonicap vs OE... then I will have a definate answer to the superior sounding setup.

For sure on these speakers I cannot recommend the mills resistors. Too bright and harsh which the sonicaps tend to sharpen further.

corndog71

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Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #24 on: 4 Feb 2011, 05:36 pm »
Hey Faststang,
I recently did some cap comparisons with Clarity Cap ESA series.

I found them to throw a huge, detailed soundstage but with a very warm overall effect.  Too warm for my AV123 speakers.  I was thinking they would probably work better in a speaker with metal tweeters.  They might just be what you're looking for.  I have to warn you they're even bigger than sonicaps.  I also found Mills resistors seemed to work well with them in my speakers.



Might be worth checking out.

Steve

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #25 on: 4 Feb 2011, 07:15 pm »
Ha.... You guys should find this interesting.

MILLS resistor upgrade ONLY
Sound was brighter, more defined, but had that high pitch dog whistle sound that was fatiging to listen to over the long haul. I'm not sure but I believe they color the music in the high end. Using a bypass resistor just barely made it tolerable, a couple more notches down would have been perfect. Even other discernable listeners noticed the difference. Certain subtle sounds are more pronounced and cleaner.

SONICAP only with ceramic resistors
MELLOW sound, non fatiging, much easier to listen to then with mills resistors. The subtle issues with the tweeter reproducing certain sounds was also gone with the sonicap. I believe the sonicap tended to further sharpen the sound that was passed to it from the MILLS resistor causing it to be unbearable. With the electrolytic feeding the ceramic resistor and the sonicap everything was nice, tame and under control in the high end but more defined and cleaner. With the bypass, almost no difference.. then again I still have the first electrolytic in place which is probably taming the highs like I suspect it does for these titanium dome tweets.

Might try out the 2 sonicaps in the near future. This weekend I am out though so I won't have any news to report until monday or wednesday.

Hi Fast,

Thanks for your experiment. I think one of the challenges is if the excessive perceived highs is caused by the part(s), tweeter, electronics etc.

For instance the new parts could be accurate while the tweeter could be bright; the new parts revealing the tweeters real characteristics. If this is the case, the OEM parts could have been chosen to compensate for the bright tweeter (but be inferior in other ways such as inner detail etc).

A cool test would be to place a 470 ohm resistor directly across the tweeter and see if there is a noticeable sonic difference.

Cheers.
« Last Edit: 5 Feb 2011, 04:23 pm by Steve »

Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #26 on: 7 Feb 2011, 10:15 pm »
Hey Faststang,
I recently did some cap comparisons with Clarity Cap ESA series.

I found them to throw a huge, detailed soundstage but with a very warm overall effect.  Too warm for my AV123 speakers.  I was thinking they would probably work better in a speaker with metal tweeters.  They might just be what you're looking for.  I have to warn you they're even bigger than sonicaps.  I also found Mills resistors seemed to work well with them in my speakers.

Might be worth checking out.

Looking for a trade? :)
I need something to warm up the tweets a bit but it doesn't look like these are going to cut it.

Hi Fast,

Thanks for your experiment. I think one of the challenges is if the excessive perceived highs is caused by the part(s), tweeter, electronics etc.

For instance the new parts could be accurate while the tweeter could be bright; the new parts revealing the tweeters real characteristics. If this is the case, the OEM parts could have been chosen to compensate for the bright tweeter (but be inferior in other ways such as inner detail etc).

A cool test would be to place a 470 ohm resistor directly across the tweeter and see if there is a noticeable sonic difference.

Cheers.

I agree that the tweeter is naturally bright and that the components will have a tendancy to accentuate it's natural characteristics. This is partially why I'm curious as to how my Mirage FRX700's would sound with the same components. It's too bad the values I have aren't even close to the spec I need. After blowing $200 with sub par results I am somewhat hesitant to dive in again. I did look at the FRX crossovers and they use poly caps stock.

As for the 470ohm resistor, I'm curious what would be the result of that. Are you looking to reduce the impedance of the driver network or attenuate the signal to the tweeter?

Steve

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #27 on: 9 Feb 2011, 06:56 pm »
Looking for a trade? :)
I need something to warm up the tweets a bit but it doesn't look like these are going to cut it.

I agree that the tweeter is naturally bright and that the components will have a tendancy to accentuate it's natural characteristics. This is partially why I'm curious as to how my Mirage FRX700's would sound with the same components. It's too bad the values I have aren't even close to the spec I need. After blowing $200 with sub par results I am somewhat hesitant to dive in again. I did look at the FRX crossovers and they use poly caps stock.

As for the 470ohm resistor, I'm curious what would be the result of that. Are you looking to reduce the impedance of the driver network or attenuate the signal to the tweeter?

I would also be hesitant to spend more money on tweeks under these circumstances. The 470 ohm resistor should

1) take some power away from the tweeter, but more taken as the frequency increases. Not much but over a wide frequency range. It changes the tonal balance.

2) help reduce resonances tweeters always have.

It is amazing how little it takes to change the sound. I am using a 2.4k resistor across my midrange driver. Seems quite high to use with a "4" ohm midrange, but it does change the perceived sound.

470 ohms should make more difference, hopefully easier to identify. Connect it right across the tweeter, either the driver or at the crossover board, whichever is easier.

Cheers.

Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #28 on: 10 Feb 2011, 12:24 am »
I would also be hesitant to spend more money on tweeks under these circumstances. The 470 ohm resistor should

1) take some power away from the tweeter, but more taken as the frequency increases. Not much but over a wide frequency range. It changes the tonal balance.

2) help reduce resonances tweeters always have.

It is amazing how little it takes to change the sound. I am using a 2.4k resistor across my midrange driver. Seems quite high to use with a "4" ohm midrange, but it does change the perceived sound.

470 ohms should make more difference, hopefully easier to identify. Connect it right across the tweeter, either the driver or at the crossover board, whichever is easier.

Cheers.

This might actually be a good mod since the tweet at high volume levels tends to "overcome" the sound of the bass drivers and get bright.

Well, as for the rest of the testing... here are the results.
Removal of MILLS to the tweet. Sounded better, less bright but still not as smooth as the OE speaker.
Removed MILLS at the driver. Again the speakers sounded better but not as good as the OE. The sound just didn't hit as quick for whatever reason.
Removed 2nd MILLS on the tweeter section which looks like goes to a low pass inductor to get the speaker back to stock.
Added a single Sonicap to the bass driver section. Again the sound was not as quick, a little muddy and not as accurate as the OE speaker. Removed the cap.
Removed the electrolytic and added a single Sonicap to the tweeter output section again and compared. Ended up a bit brighter then the O.E. speaker, but the soundstage was more into the speaker then the O.E. Paradigm. The OE Paradigm had a wider soundstage and projected the sounds better. The sonicap seemed to have less distortion in certain areas but then had a problem displaying certain insruments like the O.E. Paradigm did which makes me think the "distortion" I was hearing is actually in the recording, not a fault of the speaker. The sonicap seemed to have better clarity and sharper notes but was brighter then the OE and sacraficed the projection of the soundstage in some areas.
Adding the vishay bypass cap made the sonicap sound better, warmed it up a bit. It became easier to listen to the speaker but again the soundstage was still suffering. Infact I would say the bypass made the sonicap listenable and not bright but killed the soundstage even more over a variety of sources. The OE Paradigm did better overall and was more neutral over the range.
Pretty much everything I own is tweeked for better performance yet I could not make any of these components work for the Paradigms which gives me this conclusion.
If you have a DIY project I agree with many of the statements made for the caps, however, I think that a company such as Paradigm tends to match components and drivers for the specific application. Thier signature series still uses ceramic resistors and electrolytic caps as well as polyfilm and non inductive resistors. I think there has to be a balance struck with all these crossover parts and the drivers themselves as a complete package not a standalone application.
For example, metal tweet with MILLS resistor = a big thumbs down in my application since they sharpen up an already bright tweeter based on characteristics. However I think that the mills would do really well based on my listening with a silk dome tweeter to increase the clarity and sharpen them up a bit since they are generally less intense then the metal domes.
In any case that is my experience for the time being. Take it for what it's worth. I may try the 470 ohm resistor since I have a couple kicking around.

face

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #29 on: 10 Feb 2011, 12:39 am »
If you find Mills resistors harsh, stay away from MOX and Duelund resistors.  I found Mills warm and coloured in comparison. 

Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #30 on: 10 Feb 2011, 06:04 pm »
Thanks for the heads up. As for Warm!? Not with a these Paradigm metal domes they aren't. They are brual. My mother dropped in during testing and looked at me funny when I said "This speaker is modified and should sound better." Way to bright, (screaching) for any type of extended listening.

Faststang

Re: Paradigm Monitor 9's with Sonicaps and Mills Resistors
« Reply #31 on: 11 Feb 2011, 03:53 am »
BTW finally got ahold of the guys at sonic craft today. Jeff really knows his stuff over there and verified all my results and that these caps would make the sound to bright even if broken in. All I can say is before you do ANY cap upgrades give this guy a call and get his input. I made the mistake of listening and reading reviews but you really need to use a specific cap for a specific application. He said exactly what my conclusions came to, these caps are voiced to the tweeters from the factory and that specific sounding caps would be needed with specific drivers and I couldn't agree more with him. He pointed me in a much different direction for the highs.

I will be calling him back once I find my tube amp for new caps, I can't recommend speaking with him enough before making a purchase.