W26FX002 VS CA26RFX Troel Jenzen

[ambisingh123]

hi i just wanted inputs on which one i should use between W26FX002 VS CA26RFX in troels jenzen build as i already have the T29CF002 and W18NX001 and just wanted to know if its worth the extra cost getting the W26 over the CA26 as iam looking at nearly 150$ difference between the 2 woofers in the United Kingdom ... would i be getting a lot of extra performance for my extra $300 (pair)

Thanks for any input

[5th element]

I don't like this design period.

Using a 6.5" mid/bass driver all the way up to 3kHz? With a 2nd order acoustic filter and a huge amount of driver C2C distance? This is like a collective bunch of no's all strung together.

The Crescendo tweeter is ridiculously capable and could handle a 2nd order acoustic at 2kHz, if not a little lower. If you're going to use a tweeter that costs an arm and a leg at least use what you are paying that huge amount of money for. SEAS $30 tweeters can do 2nd order @3kHz without breaking a sweat.

Contrary to what Troels' says crossover order (at least so far as comparing a 2nd or 4th order linkwitz riley goes), does exceptionally little in influencing the way a loudspeaker sounds. I've done extensive testing of this myself using a DSP, with the ability to swap between one and the other instantly. There were ever so slight tonal balance changes that were caused solely by the poorer off axis response of the 2nd order design. Both the 2nd order and 4th order had an on axis response that were virtually indistinguishable from one another. I could clearly hear a difference between the two and had to move over to the room averaged power response to find out why. The 2nd order had ever so slightly less energy present around the crossover region when measured in this way, accounting for it's slightly laid back presentation. Why? The vertical off axis had bigger holes in it due to the greater areas of driver overlap and therefore cancellation.

There is nothing superior about this design, in terms of performance, because of the individual design elements that Troels' has chosen to implement.

The stepped baffle will compromise the tweeters frequency response smoothness, both on and off axis, vs having everything nicely flush mounted on a flat baffle.

The stepped baffle is required for phase integration of the 2nd order crossover. 2nd order networks are more sensitive to driver C2C issues and the stepped baffle necessitates increasing the C2C distance, quite significantly, to accommodate it.

You can help to overcome a lot of these short comings by using the lowest crossover point that the tweeter can handle, Troels' chooses to make things even worse for this design by going with 3kHz, compounding the problems caused by the above design choices.

It's a catalogue of errors that make each other worse.

Sometimes trade offs are worthwhile. For example if you go with a waveguide on the tweeter, for a directivity match, the size of the waveguide will necessitate increasing the C2C distance. In this case that trade off is made up for by giving you something else, that being exceptional horizontal off axis behaviour, constant directivity, greater freedom from room interaction and less cabinet edge diffraction issues. Troels' has introduced the C2C distance, stepped baffle and chosen a 3kHz (why I don't know) all for the sake of going with a 2nd order filter? Something you can't actually hear?

I don't get it.

Then again I don't like any of his designs really, they are all compromised technically. And I'm not meaning this in a snide way. The issues are usually so easy to solve - get your midrange and tweeter closer together - use a lower xover point, your tweeter can easily handle it. Stop using 6.5" drivers for the midrange if you want to use high xover points etc. Sometimes he gets things closer to right though.

I don't mean to come across as overly critical but when people are paying for his designs, paying for very expensive drivers and spending a lot of time building his cabinets, you should be overly critical. These designs are supposed to represent the state of the art and appear to come across as that to the less knowledgeable, but they are filled with issues that shouldn't really be there.

Yes the designs probably do sound quite nice and I'm not saying that they'll sound bad. What I'm saying is that they could easily be better.

As to the answer of your question though...Yeah the Excel drivers are quite expensive, but they do have excellent performance to back it up, especially vs the standard prestige line. As far as I see it, if I'm going to spend all that time and effort building the cabinets, paying for the design, paying for the xover components and the other drivers...I would definitely want to pay for the better bass units.

[dar47]

Wow, 5th no beating around the bush on this one!

I thought his earlier work seemed thought out and I built his super mini's as I wanted a small monitor with that OW1, it was nice. I wondered if most of the newer stuff was just driven to sale kits, and he has a lot of very similar small multi driver designs. The large ones I was disappointed with a lot of the cabinet design and suggested materials in them. Hearing you are disappointed with xover design and driver layout would really worry me as they are not small count and use expensive parts.

[Evil Twin]

I don't like this design period.

Using a 6.5" mid/bass driver all the way up to 3kHz? With a 2nd order acoustic filter and a huge amount of driver C2C distance? This is like a collective bunch of no's all strung together.

The Crescendo tweeter is ridiculously capable and could handle a 2nd order acoustic at 2kHz, if not a little lower. If you're going to use a tweeter that costs an arm and a leg at least use what you are paying that huge amount of money for. SEAS $30 tweeters can do 2nd order @3kHz without breaking a sweat.

Contrary to what Troels' says crossover order (at least so far as comparing a 2nd or 4th order linkwitz riley goes), does exceptionally little in influencing the way a loudspeaker sounds. I've done extensive testing of this myself using a DSP, with the ability to swap between one and the other instantly. There were ever so slight tonal balance changes that were caused solely by the poorer off axis response of the 2nd order design. Both the 2nd order and 4th order had an on axis response that were virtually indistinguishable from one another. I could clearly hear a difference between the two and had to move over to the room averaged power response to find out why. The 2nd order had ever so slightly less energy present around the crossover region when measured in this way, accounting for it's slightly laid back presentation. Why? The vertical off axis had bigger holes in it due to the greater areas of driver overlap and therefore cancellation.

There is nothing superior about this design, in terms of performance, because of the individual design elements that Troels' has chosen to implement.

The stepped baffle will compromise the tweeters frequency response smoothness, both on and off axis, vs having everything nicely flush mounted on a flat baffle.

The stepped baffle is required for phase integration of the 2nd order crossover. 2nd order networks are more sensitive to driver C2C issues and the stepped baffle necessitates increasing the C2C distance, quite significantly, to accommodate it.

You can help to overcome a lot of these short comings by using the lowest crossover point that the tweeter can handle, Troels' chooses to make things even worse for this design by going with 3kHz, compounding the problems caused by the above design choices.

It's a catalogue of errors that make each other worse.

Sometimes trade offs are worthwhile. For example if you go with a waveguide on the tweeter, for a directivity match, the size of the waveguide will necessitate increasing the C2C distance. In this case that trade off is made up for by giving you something else, that being exceptional horizontal off axis behaviour, constant directivity, greater freedom from room interaction and less cabinet edge diffraction issues. Troels' has introduced the C2C distance, stepped baffle and chosen a 3kHz (why I don't know) all for the sake of going with a 2nd order filter? Something you can't actually hear?

I don't get it.

Then again I don't like any of his designs really, they are all compromised technically. And I'm not meaning this in a snide way. The issues are usually so easy to solve - get your midrange and tweeter closer together - use a lower xover point, your tweeter can easily handle it. Stop using 6.5" drivers for the midrange if you want to use high xover points etc. Sometimes he gets things closer to right though.

I don't mean to come across as overly critical but when people are paying for his designs, paying for very expensive drivers and spending a lot of time building his cabinets, you should be overly critical. These designs are supposed to represent the state of the art and appear to come across as that to the less knowledgeable, but they are filled with issues that shouldn't really be there.

Yes the designs probably do sound quite nice and I'm not saying that they'll sound bad. What I'm saying is that they could easily be better.

As to the answer of your question though...Yeah the Excel drivers are quite expensive, but they do have excellent performance to back it up, especially vs the standard prestige line. As far as I see it, if I'm going to spend all that time and effort building the cabinets, paying for the design, paying for the xover components and the other drivers...I would definitely want to pay for the better bass units.

Plain speaking based on clear and accurate technical issues- this is an attitude I can highly commend, as there are times the Emperor has no clothes on, or at best, poorly fitting ones of mediocre quality...

The Excel drivers are all about improved motor behavior, with generally much lower nonlinear distortion. Copper in the gap in the right places is the key to that, but better generally motor designs plays it's role also. However, I generally take issue with the efficacy of the Nextel coated paper cones. Look at the bobbles in the impedance curve below 1kHz- this is the give away for mechanical resonance. I would personally prefer the W26FX001.

And while we are critiquing the Emperor, let us not forget the shortcomings and inaccuracies in his measurement setup... why he persists in providing data above 20kHz when it clearly seems he is not accurate even to that frequency is a very puzzling matter... he should invest in a real measurement microphone and system, given the way he is managing to monetize his DIY efforts. .

[ambisingh]

Thanks for the info.. do you guys suggest that i should be looking at other designs then, the equipment i have so far was basically given to me cheaply so i dont mind having to buy new speakers if i will get better results i have also been looking at the karios 3 way by jeff, would you say that is a better design?

Thanks

[scottvalentin]

Haven't heard any of either Troels' or Jeff's designs, but another option to consider is using the drivers you have and designing a pair. Measurement gear and software will be far less pricey than a set of Kairos! As you can see above, lots of help here to get you going with that.

[dar47]

Well I wouldn't call the monitor section 2nd order perfectionist but more importantly that sloped monitor baffle on top of that tall bass bin look like you need to be standing to enjoy this. This design exercise was to do your best to add a base bin to that monitor.:roll:

If you can't entice a designers here to jump in I am sure Rick Craig at Salah Audio has some experience with your existing drivers and could use those Nextel drivers appropriately.

[5th element]

I know I didn't exactly beat about the bush concerning Troels' design but I feel that the obvious technical flaws in such a design should be pointed out for clarity to those who might not be quite as knowledgeable on the finer points of loudspeaker design.

From a technical point of view the Kairos three way makes a very strong argument for itself. The SB Acoustics Satori 6" driver is one of the best soft (read not metal or ceramic etc) cone drivers out there that money can buy. It has one of the best motors on the planet. The Satori tweeter is similarly impressive for a ring dome, or wide surround tweeter. Jeff ends up going with a low 1800Hz xover point which makes the most of what both drivers can do, and ends up producing one of the best 6" + ~1" typical dome designs that money can buy.

High passing the 6" Satori driver, and adding in the extra bass driver, improves upon things but the improvement would only be incremental. The addition of the 10" bass driver gives the design much more bass extension and considerably more power handling but that's about it. This might sound a bit disregarding towards the design in general but that's what you're getting. You will also get improved midrange clarity at higher listening levels.

Another option would be to build the Kairos and add in subwoofers. A high-pass (either active or passive or a passive line level xover) would be needed on the Kairos, but you'd end up with the same overall benefits. Reduced excursion and demands placed upon the Kairos 6" driver, additional bass extension, courtesy of the subwoofers, and a higher maximum SPL providing you have enough amplifier power.

With a standard cone/dome three way you'd ideally replace the 6" Satori with the 5" one and optimise the bass to midrange crossover around where baffle step occurs. That way you'd get slightly better overall sensitivity. As you can see in the Kairos three way pdf the Kairos with the SB bass driver is a little too bass heavy, this is because you've got a degree of floor loading on the 10" driver + the Kairos already having a lot of BSC built into their crossover as standard. If you redesigned the Kairos three way xover you could optimise the crossover and end up with a more sensitive loudspeaker.

I am nitpicking here, but it's worth keeping in mind that properly designed 6" + 1" two ways have low sensitivity. If you want these to play very loud then you'll need a very powerful amplifier. With a properly designed, reasonably large three way (with proper driver selection and crossover) you end up with higher sensitivity and better bass extension.

I should point out that using the 6" Satori in the Kairos as a three way is not really a compromise vs the 5" Satori. The 1800Hz xover makes sure of that, keeping the overall off axis performance excellent. If in a complete three way redesign, then the 5" would allow you to raise the xover point up a little, giving the tweeter an easier job, whilst maintaining the same off axis performance. But both would make for excellent midrange drivers in appropriately designed three ways.

Maybe it would help if we ask what your listening requirements are. If you don't need loud then that makes things a lot easier.

[ambisingh]

The new system would be my main system so it will be in my living room connected to my tv and media pc so it will always be on most of the day so it will need to be able to play music, watch movies on it and also to watch normal tv like sky TV and play video games the size of the room is around 9 meters long by aprox 4 meters wide its basically a rectangle. I do like to turn up the volume here and there but not regularly ... (Music type is manily hip hop and Indian music, but do listen to vast range of music)

Hope that helps

[---k---]

Jeff Bagby knows what he is doing. His work is very well respected. I've heard a couple of his designs and enjoyed them. The Karios may or may not be the right speaker for you. But you can trust that Jeffs designs are based on solid engineering principles and rational decisions. He's also probably the most charitable to the community having given his free software used by many and spending countless hours answering questions on the forums.

[TEK]

The new system would be my main system so it will be in my living room connected to my tv and media pc so it will always be on most of the day so it will need to be able to play music, watch movies on it and also to watch normal tv like sky TV and play video games the size of the room is around 9 meters long by aprox 4 meters wide its basically a rectangle. I do like to turn up the volume here and there but not regularly ... (Music type is manily hip hop and Indian music, but do listen to vast range of music)

Hope that helps

Do you at regular basic turn down the light and watch movies at near cinema loudness level to really "get into" the story?

[ambisingh]

No not on a regular basic maybe one or two times a month i manily only really turn up the volume when listening to music

[5th element]

From where I come from that is pretty big room you have there and I think you'd certainly benefit from a nice three way of decent sensitivity. Of course I am sure that you are aware of this given your original choice of speakers.

The kairos three way would certainly fill the room with sound but they are not very sensitive. For all of Jeff's claims of a 85.5dB loudspeaker this seems a little optimistic considering the drivers inherent base sensitivity of 87.5dB re 2.83VRMS. That said the data sheet measurement that Jeff displays in his white paper aren't even representative of the current MW16P-8 as SB have updated their measurements on the website.

Whatever the case Jeff shows around 5dB of BSC in his design. With an 87.5dB nominal woofer you're looking at a final system sensitivity of ~82.5dB depending on inductor losses.

What amplifier is it that you are using?

Normally I'd say that you'd want a solid (and real) figure of 85dB re 2.83VRMS for a room that size.

[ambisingh]

I am using the honey badger diy amplifier which is over at diyaudio fourms

[5th element]

Well then you've got yourself a decent amount of power and an amplifier that's capable of driving 4 ohm loads without too much trouble.

A lower sensitivity design might work just fine but you also have the ability to drive most MTM or TMWW designs without issue. Double bass driver loudspeakers, by their very nature, tend to be 4 ohm loads as a result of the parallel bass drivers. This is done for gains in voltage sensitivity. Some go a different route, such as Jon's Ardent, sacrificing sensitivity for a very easy load. These are speakers that thrive on the end of amplifiers with a lot of voltage swing, rather than the ability to deliver tons of current.

There are pros and cons to both routes. 8 ohm loads make amplifiers happy, but a 4 ohm load eases loudspeaker design. Everyone wants small and lots of bass, but this comes at the expense of sensitivity. Paralleling up two bass drivers helps to boost sensitivity back up again but makes the speakers harder to drive.

Given your amplifier, and the size of your space, I'd be thinking along the lines of the Revel Performa3 F208. A dual 8" bass driver speaker (or similar) 5" (or so) midrange driver + tweeter. My preference would be for a design with a wave-guide, like the Revel's, but that would be quite hard to find.

In terms of recommendations...this is a hard one...if I wanted to build a loudspeaker around soft cone drivers then I would definitely want to use SB Acoustics Satori drivers for the midrange. These simply outperform everything else out there, especially in terms of motor linearity and this does make it harder to find suitable designs.

After having blasted Troels' earlier on I am actually going to go back to him for my recommendations.

In an ideal world Jeff Babgy would have used the TW29RN-B, the neodymium version of the Satori tweeter, for his Kairos, but unfortunately he did not.

I was going to recommend you build the 2 way Kairos to start with and see how you like that. This being by no means an end point, but more of a starting point, after which you'd have options.

1) Add subs and a Kairos high pass, for more bass and a bit more max SPL potential, but still limited by its low sensitivity.

2) Buy another MW16P-8 and build Troels' SBA-16-MTM. This would reuse what you already have, but unfortunately doesn't work out that way because the tweeter is different. This design is a 4 ohm load, harder to drive, but you gain 6dB of additional voltage sensitivity to boot. This would still need subs for real bass mind you. Troels' has done fine with this design, using a low xover, so no problems from me on this one.

3) Build Troels' SBAcoustics 10 design. This is a real three way, and ironically uses one of the bass drivers that Jeff chose to augment his Kairos with. It is, in fact, very similar to Jeffs Kairos + SBAcoustics bass driver, but with one difference, it has been optimised as a three way and has more sensitivity to boot. Once again this has a low, very low, xover point between the tweeter and the MW16P making the most use of said tweeter and keeping the off axis smooth. It is also more of a 6 ohm design, given the bass drivers impedance, so fits in between an 8 and 4 ohm load. Now this is a proper three way with a large bass driver, lots of bass and SPL potential but it's also expensive. All of Troels' designs are as you have to purchase them.

An ideal three way idea would be something like a pair of RS225s, the M16P/M13P + the TW29RN-B. Troels' might even release a three way using these. Then there are the designs based around the RS225s that Jim Holtz has worked on and Zaph's rather large http://www.zaphaudio.com/SB12.3/

[cochinada]

And what about these? Thy use SB drives as well.
In fact these were mys speakers before the current ones and all I can say is that for the money they were more than competent.:T

EDIT: now I see you mentioned it right at the end. Although I don't consider these to be that large. At least they are midgets comparing to my current speakers

[JonMarsh]

EDIT: now I see you mentioned it right at the end. Although I don't consider these to be that large. At least they are midgets comparing to my current speakers

But nearly EVERYTHING is midgets compared to your current speakers! :W :B

Even those ones ET is working on...

[cochinada]

But nearly EVERYTHING is midgets compared to your current speakers! :W :B

Even those ones ET is working on...

Guilty as charged. ops:

Recently I blew the tweeters because of some unfortunate loud white noise caused by a DAC that I didn't disconnect in the proper sequence and so I had to order a replacement pair from USA.
I'm waiting for almost a month now. Our customs here are like a giant black hole that suck our money in and even worse takes ages to do that. :rant:
I'm puzzled how importing from UK is so fast for you guys.

Anyway, back on topic, I'm sure the SB12.3 even small as they are would fill his room with ease.

[Navy Guy]

I don't like this design period.

Using a 6.5" mid/bass driver all the way up to 3kHz? With a 2nd order acoustic filter and a huge amount of driver C2C distance? This is like a collective bunch of no's all strung together.

The Crescendo tweeter is ridiculously capable and could handle a 2nd order acoustic at 2kHz, if not a little lower. If you're going to use a tweeter that costs an arm and a leg at least use what you are paying that huge amount of money for. SEAS $30 tweeters can do 2nd order @3kHz without breaking a sweat.

Contrary to what Troels' says crossover order (at least so far as comparing a 2nd or 4th order linkwitz riley goes), does exceptionally little in influencing the way a loudspeaker sounds. I've done extensive testing of this myself using a DSP, with the ability to swap between one and the other instantly. There were ever so slight tonal balance changes that were caused solely by the poorer off axis response of the 2nd order design. Both the 2nd order and 4th order had an on axis response that were virtually indistinguishable from one another. I could clearly hear a difference between the two and had to move over to the room averaged power response to find out why. The 2nd order had ever so slightly less energy present around the crossover region when measured in this way, accounting for it's slightly laid back presentation. Why? The vertical off axis had bigger holes in it due to the greater areas of driver overlap and therefore cancellation.

There is nothing superior about this design, in terms of performance, because of the individual design elements that Troels' has chosen to implement.

The stepped baffle will compromise the tweeters frequency response smoothness, both on and off axis, vs having everything nicely flush mounted on a flat baffle.

The stepped baffle is required for phase integration of the 2nd order crossover. 2nd order networks are more sensitive to driver C2C issues and the stepped baffle necessitates increasing the C2C distance, quite significantly, to accommodate it.

You can help to overcome a lot of these short comings by using the lowest crossover point that the tweeter can handle, Troels' chooses to make things even worse for this design by going with 3kHz, compounding the problems caused by the above design choices.

It's a catalogue of errors that make each other worse.

Sometimes trade offs are worthwhile. For example if you go with a waveguide on the tweeter, for a directivity match, the size of the waveguide will necessitate increasing the C2C distance. In this case that trade off is made up for by giving you something else, that being exceptional horizontal off axis behaviour, constant directivity, greater freedom from room interaction and less cabinet edge diffraction issues. Troels' has introduced the C2C distance, stepped baffle and chosen a 3kHz (why I don't know) all for the sake of going with a 2nd order filter? Something you can't actually hear?

I don't get it.

Then again I don't like any of his designs really, they are all compromised technically. And I'm not meaning this in a snide way. The issues are usually so easy to solve - get your midrange and tweeter closer together - use a lower xover point, your tweeter can easily handle it. Stop using 6.5" drivers for the midrange if you want to use high xover points etc. Sometimes he gets things closer to right though.

I don't mean to come across as overly critical but when people are paying for his designs, paying for very expensive drivers and spending a lot of time building his cabinets, you should be overly critical. These designs are supposed to represent the state of the art and appear to come across as that to the less knowledgeable, but they are filled with issues that shouldn't really be there.

Yes the designs probably do sound quite nice and I'm not saying that they'll sound bad. What I'm saying is that they could easily be better.

As to the answer of your question though...Yeah the Excel drivers are quite expensive, but they do have excellent performance to back it up, especially vs the standard prestige line. As far as I see it, if I'm going to spend all that time and effort building the cabinets, paying for the design, paying for the xover components and the other drivers...I would definitely want to pay for the better bass units.

Glad I'm not the only one who thinks this. He definitely has a lot of devoted followers but a lot of his designs seem to fall short technically IMHO.