I haven't really talked about it on the forums much, but a few months ago I went through a 'downsizing' phase with the company, selling off the older, larger equipment in exchange for higher performance, newer equipment.
Looking at all the options, I needed something extremely hi-fi but yet extremely small, and also very loud. There weren't a lot of options that fit my criteria, until I saw speakers from the new Fulcrum Acoustic at last year's LAB get-together.
Even though there wasn't a very formal speaker demo, I think most people at the event noticed that the Fulcrum stuff was very loud and sounded very good. This stuck with me, and I later called them up to see about getting a demo.
Rich and Dave were extremely accommodating with getting me demo equipment, namely a pair of DX1565 and a pair of DX1295 set up as 'portable' units with pole mounts and handles. Just a note: these are install speakers, and for a couple extra bucks they add handles and the pole socket. I'm told that dedicated portable speakers are coming soon.
I set up all the mains I had left at the shop, which included a Community IHP1294, Community RS880 custom biamped, and one each of the Fulcrum boxes. Playing music through each in turn and together made it immediately obvious that the Fulcrum stuff sounded really good, and went really loud. The Community IHP also sounded very good, almost as good as the Fulcrums, but nowhere close to as loud. The RS880 was louder than either Fulcrum, but didn't sound nearly as good, and had some funky horn resonances to it, which were especially obvious in comparison to such good sounding speakers.
My goal was to replace the four RS880s and the IHPs with one or two pairs of something new. Both the DX1295 and DX1565 got close to as loud as the RS880; in fact, against my conservative limiters, the RS880 was the same continuous SPL as the DX series. Once the limiters were opened up a bit on the 880, it won by about 5dB.
It was clear that the DX series would do exactly what I wanted, and could replace all the other speakers I had without a problem. The only remaining question was which of the two DX series speakers would work better, or should I get one of the other configurations?
To expand on the design of the DX series, they are a bit of a different design that most other speakers on the market today. There is a coaxial woofer/HF driver on top that uses a passive crossover, plus another woofer below without a crossover. This creates two passbands, making the entire box biamped. Both woofers go all the way down, while the lower woofer is rolled off quite a bit lower than the upper woofer.
The boxes use Dave Gunness's new Temporal EQ, which does fancy things with FIR filters and yields nearly perfectly flat phase and magnitude response above 500Hz, which also results in a nearly perfect impulse response. There are two sets of presets provided by Fulcrum: Level 1 presets are used in processors and amplifiers which have the necessary FIR capability, and Level 2 presets are used where that FIR capability is lacking. Since I own Crown I-Tech HDs, I use Level 1 presets.
Additionally, since the crossover is locked out in the Itechs, Fulcrum provides high-passed and full-range presets. They can make custom high-pass presets for you, as you need. Rich is pretty much the DSP magician, so he will take care of whatever you want.
Listening to just the DX series side-by-side with the high-passed preset (stock 100Hz), the two models sound nearly identical. There was something about the 1565 that Adrian and I didn't like as much as the 1295, but we couldn't put our finger on it. Both boxes needed a tiny cut in the 3k range to make them sound more pleasant to our ears, but they were flat when measured without the cut.
Only when the boxes were run in full-range mode did the difference become extremely obvious: the dual-15 had a LOT more low-frequency capability. They were more than good enough to not need subs probably a lot of situations, but since I nearly always run LAB subs, it didn't really matter to me. When used in high-pass mode with LABs, the 1295 got every bit as loud as the 1565, and was our winner.
In fact, I bought the demo pair. Dave Gunness hand-built one of them, since it's the first one ever made. He's going to sign it for me one of these days.
I have now used the pair of DX1295s at a bunch of shows, from small, intimate venues to medium-size theatres (700 people) and more. As a testament to the sheer SPL they can produce, I just used the pair to cover 2,000 people in a gym for an event with a DJ playing hip-hop music and a couple MCs. While right at the edge, they did great. In that particular case, I had them on Global ST132s up pretty high and angled down a bit, with PRX612s as front fills. I don't think I have pictures of this since my 20D died at that show.
It takes every bit of four LAB subs to keep up with the two DX1295.
Using the DX series, it's literally like using studio monitors for every show. I almost never need EQ on the mains unless the room is really bad, and there is no feedback, even when running them behind the vocalists. I even did a panel discussion for 100 attorneys (pressure!) with four lavs, and no issue with feedback! The pattern is great, rated at 90 degrees but is quite pleasant even beyond that. The two woofers help keep vertical pattern much better than just a single woofer.
Oh yeah, and the DX1295s are 63 pounds each! I can sling around two at once with no problem. Paired with a K&M variable-angle tilters and the ST132s, I don't foresee any shows that I'm going to have a problem covering in the near future.
Here are links if you'd like to check things out further:
Fulcrum Acoustic home
DX1295
DX1565
I was not biased going into this demo or purchase, but now I'm absolutely biased that these speakers are the best things since IIR. Feel free to contact me for more information or a demo: [email protected]
Looking at all the options, I needed something extremely hi-fi but yet extremely small, and also very loud. There weren't a lot of options that fit my criteria, until I saw speakers from the new Fulcrum Acoustic at last year's LAB get-together.
Even though there wasn't a very formal speaker demo, I think most people at the event noticed that the Fulcrum stuff was very loud and sounded very good. This stuck with me, and I later called them up to see about getting a demo.
Rich and Dave were extremely accommodating with getting me demo equipment, namely a pair of DX1565 and a pair of DX1295 set up as 'portable' units with pole mounts and handles. Just a note: these are install speakers, and for a couple extra bucks they add handles and the pole socket. I'm told that dedicated portable speakers are coming soon.
I set up all the mains I had left at the shop, which included a Community IHP1294, Community RS880 custom biamped, and one each of the Fulcrum boxes. Playing music through each in turn and together made it immediately obvious that the Fulcrum stuff sounded really good, and went really loud. The Community IHP also sounded very good, almost as good as the Fulcrums, but nowhere close to as loud. The RS880 was louder than either Fulcrum, but didn't sound nearly as good, and had some funky horn resonances to it, which were especially obvious in comparison to such good sounding speakers.
My goal was to replace the four RS880s and the IHPs with one or two pairs of something new. Both the DX1295 and DX1565 got close to as loud as the RS880; in fact, against my conservative limiters, the RS880 was the same continuous SPL as the DX series. Once the limiters were opened up a bit on the 880, it won by about 5dB.
It was clear that the DX series would do exactly what I wanted, and could replace all the other speakers I had without a problem. The only remaining question was which of the two DX series speakers would work better, or should I get one of the other configurations?
To expand on the design of the DX series, they are a bit of a different design that most other speakers on the market today. There is a coaxial woofer/HF driver on top that uses a passive crossover, plus another woofer below without a crossover. This creates two passbands, making the entire box biamped. Both woofers go all the way down, while the lower woofer is rolled off quite a bit lower than the upper woofer.
The boxes use Dave Gunness's new Temporal EQ, which does fancy things with FIR filters and yields nearly perfectly flat phase and magnitude response above 500Hz, which also results in a nearly perfect impulse response. There are two sets of presets provided by Fulcrum: Level 1 presets are used in processors and amplifiers which have the necessary FIR capability, and Level 2 presets are used where that FIR capability is lacking. Since I own Crown I-Tech HDs, I use Level 1 presets.
Additionally, since the crossover is locked out in the Itechs, Fulcrum provides high-passed and full-range presets. They can make custom high-pass presets for you, as you need. Rich is pretty much the DSP magician, so he will take care of whatever you want.
Listening to just the DX series side-by-side with the high-passed preset (stock 100Hz), the two models sound nearly identical. There was something about the 1565 that Adrian and I didn't like as much as the 1295, but we couldn't put our finger on it. Both boxes needed a tiny cut in the 3k range to make them sound more pleasant to our ears, but they were flat when measured without the cut.
Only when the boxes were run in full-range mode did the difference become extremely obvious: the dual-15 had a LOT more low-frequency capability. They were more than good enough to not need subs probably a lot of situations, but since I nearly always run LAB subs, it didn't really matter to me. When used in high-pass mode with LABs, the 1295 got every bit as loud as the 1565, and was our winner.
In fact, I bought the demo pair. Dave Gunness hand-built one of them, since it's the first one ever made. He's going to sign it for me one of these days.
I have now used the pair of DX1295s at a bunch of shows, from small, intimate venues to medium-size theatres (700 people) and more. As a testament to the sheer SPL they can produce, I just used the pair to cover 2,000 people in a gym for an event with a DJ playing hip-hop music and a couple MCs. While right at the edge, they did great. In that particular case, I had them on Global ST132s up pretty high and angled down a bit, with PRX612s as front fills. I don't think I have pictures of this since my 20D died at that show.
It takes every bit of four LAB subs to keep up with the two DX1295.
Using the DX series, it's literally like using studio monitors for every show. I almost never need EQ on the mains unless the room is really bad, and there is no feedback, even when running them behind the vocalists. I even did a panel discussion for 100 attorneys (pressure!) with four lavs, and no issue with feedback! The pattern is great, rated at 90 degrees but is quite pleasant even beyond that. The two woofers help keep vertical pattern much better than just a single woofer.
Oh yeah, and the DX1295s are 63 pounds each! I can sling around two at once with no problem. Paired with a K&M variable-angle tilters and the ST132s, I don't foresee any shows that I'm going to have a problem covering in the near future.
Here are links if you'd like to check things out further:
Fulcrum Acoustic home
DX1295
DX1565
I was not biased going into this demo or purchase, but now I'm absolutely biased that these speakers are the best things since IIR. Feel free to contact me for more information or a demo: [email protected]
