OK I feel like maybe there might be someone else out there who might benefit from seeing dirty crap projects, instead of the immaculate magnificence we have all become accustomed to on this forum, so I am posting pictures of my dirty crap if I can figure out how. I am also not going to clean up said dirty crap, even where it has 1/4" of drywall dust and cat hair on it, because I am a lazy...er...because I am trying to make the point that dust need not diminish sound quality. Before you see my dirty crap, though, I would like to point out that it sounds remarkably better than it looks, and also describe it a bit.
The TV is a 52" Sharp Aquos. We bought it 2 years ago and still love it, but it is over the counter and not DIY so who cares.
My mains are merely BR-1s kits, but they have Dennis Murphy's updated crossover - available at http://murphyblaster.com/content.php?f=pe_br1.html . I also added small braces between the left side and the right side of each. My improved crossovers look like a pig's arse, but they are now hidden inside the cabinets and I couldn't care less what they looked like when they were visible. They do sound better. I am eager to upgrade my mains, but my wife simply does not see the need. Nor is she likely to any time soon, unless we run into enough money to make it a non-issue. I am very passionate about music; I listen mostly to jazz, in two channel sound, which I rip into Windows Media Lossless format and feed digitally to my receiver, which is set to "direct", because even though the receiver's brain could compensate for some nasty room acoustics with equalization, it adds distortion in the process, and I find my own brain is more able to ignore ugly room acoustics than minor electronic distortion (to a point). I have bottomed my BR-1 woofers numerous times, and I have juggled with the crossover point to that end, and arrived at a strained and unusual temporary solution, described further down below. I want better sound for this application than the BR-1s can possibly deliver. I have been reading the forums for years, dying to try dozens of different designs, but hindered from doing so by economics. I have at various times had different speaker builds all planned and loaded into my PE shopping cart, but I haven't pulled the trigger because I am afraid of the consequences. Despite my wife's inability to get my audiphile/musician/DIY hobbyist fetish, I do love her, and of course I want peace in the home. Can't listen to any music when you are having a domestic dispute...
For movies, my centre channel is a triune, which I built from scratch with Curt's plan available here http://speakerdesignworks.com/TriuneTL_07.html . My crossover for this speaker also looks like a pig's arse, but again, it is hidden. I don't demand a whole hell of a lot from a centre channel, just nice clean clear vocals, and the triune certainly delivers this. To a degree beyond what movies require. In my opinion, overall power handling and subwoofer bass extension and power are more vital to movies than supreme sonic perfection, and the triune is everything I could want in a centre. I would have to upgrade my mains a few times before I would ever see a need to upgrade my centre. "Mismatched timbre"? Yeah whatever, I don't care. One thing I will do to improve it is a) clean the dust off of it and b) give it a nicer finish. Black melamine applied by roller on an imperfect surface looks awful. I get away with it because our movie/listening room is dark.
My surround speakers are "Precision Acoustics" 2 way bass reflex speakers that I bought for $50 a pair at www bestbuy.ca when they were on sale for 75% off (regular $200/pr). They can get louder without bottoming than the BR-1s can, but they are definitely not as clear and clean sounding, and have nowhere near the bass extension or imaging. But frankly I don't care because I ask even less of a surround speaker than I do from a centre. They are more than adequate. I can hear that the motorcycle or helicopter zoomed onto the screen from over my left shoulder; that's good enough for me.
I have a Logitech Harmony remote. It makes it easier to go from "music in 2 channels direct with no sound effects or equalization and no TV" to "movie mode with all the bells and whistles" in one click. The problem is it makes you forget how to operate your components. My receiver is a 5.1 Pioneer VSX-816 which I got on sale. It has too many functions. It is designed to make it easier for inbred yeti to figure out, which makes it almost impossible to navigate the menus logically and achieve the desired result. I have it set up the way I like it, and then set up in my remote. It took a hundred years. My greatest fear is that we will have a housesitter/catsitter one day come in and push a million buttons and screw it all up. I would have no choice but to take my own life at that point.
The receiver does not provide power amp functionality for my main speakers, only for the other three. The digital output from my receiver goes to an Adcom GFA-545 power amp, to power my mains. I don't know a lot about power amps, but I know this sounds significantly cleaner than it sounded when my mains were powered by the receiver. My neighbour handed the Adcom over the fence saying "try this", and I skeptically tried it. I'll pay him for it (remind me to do that tomorrow), but I ain't giving it back.
OK now here's where it gets interesting. I have numerous subwoofers. I have my subwoofer crossover on my receiver set to 100 Hz. I could cross it higher and I would love to do so in order to give my mains more room to breathe, but a higher crossover makes it sound too much like "Oh here's the music and the instruments and all the important stuff, and over there is where all the booming crap is". When I cross at 100 Hz, my mains are more likely to bottom, but it just sounds better as long as I am careful with the volume. The bass is integrated and not audibly localizable.
Sooo... everything from 100 Hz down goes out the cable and is then split into two.
One cable goes to my single 8" Dayton DVC sub in a closed box [URL=http://www.parts-express.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&Partnumber=295-480[/URL], driven by this amp [URL=http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=300-784[/URL],, to give me tight clean bass a little lower in frequency than the BR-1s like. It's lower range is simply attenuated by the closed box. Again, jusdt like the BR-1s
big amp http://www.parts-express.com/pe/show...TOKEN=59012341
big woofers http://www.parts-express.com/pe/psho...number=295-470
small amp
small woofer
The TV is a 52" Sharp Aquos. We bought it 2 years ago and still love it, but it is over the counter and not DIY so who cares.
My mains are merely BR-1s kits, but they have Dennis Murphy's updated crossover - available at http://murphyblaster.com/content.php?f=pe_br1.html . I also added small braces between the left side and the right side of each. My improved crossovers look like a pig's arse, but they are now hidden inside the cabinets and I couldn't care less what they looked like when they were visible. They do sound better. I am eager to upgrade my mains, but my wife simply does not see the need. Nor is she likely to any time soon, unless we run into enough money to make it a non-issue. I am very passionate about music; I listen mostly to jazz, in two channel sound, which I rip into Windows Media Lossless format and feed digitally to my receiver, which is set to "direct", because even though the receiver's brain could compensate for some nasty room acoustics with equalization, it adds distortion in the process, and I find my own brain is more able to ignore ugly room acoustics than minor electronic distortion (to a point). I have bottomed my BR-1 woofers numerous times, and I have juggled with the crossover point to that end, and arrived at a strained and unusual temporary solution, described further down below. I want better sound for this application than the BR-1s can possibly deliver. I have been reading the forums for years, dying to try dozens of different designs, but hindered from doing so by economics. I have at various times had different speaker builds all planned and loaded into my PE shopping cart, but I haven't pulled the trigger because I am afraid of the consequences. Despite my wife's inability to get my audiphile/musician/DIY hobbyist fetish, I do love her, and of course I want peace in the home. Can't listen to any music when you are having a domestic dispute...
For movies, my centre channel is a triune, which I built from scratch with Curt's plan available here http://speakerdesignworks.com/TriuneTL_07.html . My crossover for this speaker also looks like a pig's arse, but again, it is hidden. I don't demand a whole hell of a lot from a centre channel, just nice clean clear vocals, and the triune certainly delivers this. To a degree beyond what movies require. In my opinion, overall power handling and subwoofer bass extension and power are more vital to movies than supreme sonic perfection, and the triune is everything I could want in a centre. I would have to upgrade my mains a few times before I would ever see a need to upgrade my centre. "Mismatched timbre"? Yeah whatever, I don't care. One thing I will do to improve it is a) clean the dust off of it and b) give it a nicer finish. Black melamine applied by roller on an imperfect surface looks awful. I get away with it because our movie/listening room is dark.
My surround speakers are "Precision Acoustics" 2 way bass reflex speakers that I bought for $50 a pair at www bestbuy.ca when they were on sale for 75% off (regular $200/pr). They can get louder without bottoming than the BR-1s can, but they are definitely not as clear and clean sounding, and have nowhere near the bass extension or imaging. But frankly I don't care because I ask even less of a surround speaker than I do from a centre. They are more than adequate. I can hear that the motorcycle or helicopter zoomed onto the screen from over my left shoulder; that's good enough for me.
I have a Logitech Harmony remote. It makes it easier to go from "music in 2 channels direct with no sound effects or equalization and no TV" to "movie mode with all the bells and whistles" in one click. The problem is it makes you forget how to operate your components. My receiver is a 5.1 Pioneer VSX-816 which I got on sale. It has too many functions. It is designed to make it easier for inbred yeti to figure out, which makes it almost impossible to navigate the menus logically and achieve the desired result. I have it set up the way I like it, and then set up in my remote. It took a hundred years. My greatest fear is that we will have a housesitter/catsitter one day come in and push a million buttons and screw it all up. I would have no choice but to take my own life at that point.
The receiver does not provide power amp functionality for my main speakers, only for the other three. The digital output from my receiver goes to an Adcom GFA-545 power amp, to power my mains. I don't know a lot about power amps, but I know this sounds significantly cleaner than it sounded when my mains were powered by the receiver. My neighbour handed the Adcom over the fence saying "try this", and I skeptically tried it. I'll pay him for it (remind me to do that tomorrow), but I ain't giving it back.
OK now here's where it gets interesting. I have numerous subwoofers. I have my subwoofer crossover on my receiver set to 100 Hz. I could cross it higher and I would love to do so in order to give my mains more room to breathe, but a higher crossover makes it sound too much like "Oh here's the music and the instruments and all the important stuff, and over there is where all the booming crap is". When I cross at 100 Hz, my mains are more likely to bottom, but it just sounds better as long as I am careful with the volume. The bass is integrated and not audibly localizable.
Sooo... everything from 100 Hz down goes out the cable and is then split into two.
One cable goes to my single 8" Dayton DVC sub in a closed box [URL=http://www.parts-express.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&Partnumber=295-480[/URL], driven by this amp [URL=http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=300-784[/URL],, to give me tight clean bass a little lower in frequency than the BR-1s like. It's lower range is simply attenuated by the closed box. Again, jusdt like the BR-1s
big amp http://www.parts-express.com/pe/show...TOKEN=59012341
big woofers http://www.parts-express.com/pe/psho...number=295-470
small amp
small woofer
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