Listening Get Together

re: Listening Get Together

mark anderson said:
Big E Loudspeakers . com is the related site, remove the spaces.
At least they don't sell fancy wire or magic rocks.
This video BIg E Loudspeakers - MA Deuce-4 Bass/Keyboard Loudspeaker - YouTube
at :46 seconds states
"The compression horn is in the driver chamber firing rearward into the Vortex Waveguide."
No smear there, nope...
Click to expand...

I checked out their website and was surprised to see they are located in Piper City, IL...about 5 miles from my daughter's house. There is also a company in Piper City called ATS Acoustics (which has been in business several years and from whom I have bought several cartons of Owens-Corning 703). It's a really small town in the "middle of nowhere" where you wouldn't expect to find two audio-related enterprises. I wonder if the two companies have any relationship? Didn't see any evidence of audio tinkering the last time I visited ATS about 4 years ago. Big E apparently is looking for small volume contract speaker builders to construct their products...I don't know that I'd like that as a business plan, how do you QC/QA everything that gets sold under your name if multiple small time builders are doing it for you? Well, if there's anyting to it, I might drop in for a visit next time I'm down that way.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Leland Crooks said:
.

I will post curve I trust. It's a nice little 2x5 studio monitor or home system that will evolve into a small line array cab with different drivers.
View attachment 5961
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What I like to see in a measurement is a lot smaller vertical scale. Something on the order of 100,000 times smaller or 50dB less. Everything looks smoother if you expand the scale.

Also a bit less smoothing-and also show the percentage of smoothing used.

It is also VERY helpful to have a calibrated level associated with the graph-along with a known drive voltage and distance of measurement.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Ivan Beaver said:
What I like to see in a measurement is a lot smaller vertical scale. Something on the order of 100,000 times smaller or 50dB less. Everything looks smoother if you expand the scale.

Also a bit less smoothing-and also show the percentage of smoothing used.

It is also VERY helpful to have a calibrated level associated with the graph-along with a known drive voltage and distance of measurement.
Click to expand...

More than willing to display my ignorance here. I thought 1/3 octave smoothing was pretty much standard. I'll rerun it and capture at higher resolutions. I think I saved the raw response, but if not I'll do it again, check the voltage. This was at 1meter I do know that. I was just so happy with the sound I just stuck the cab in my test area and fired away.
 
Re: Listening GTG/Slight Change

We need to move the location of the listening party due to a scheduling conflict.
No biggie... we are moving to the Elementary School gym, appx 1/4 mile North of the High School on "C" Street.
Gym is behind the Elementary school.
This may be a good thing. Although the gym is slightly smaller, there is a stage there.
Everything else is as planned.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Artifact of the main driver. It echoes the main driver curve almost to a t. If I chose a better driver that would flatten. BigE cabs all exhibit the same thing, they just make whatever the driver's curve is louder, moving it down, adding energy at the bottom. Here's the raw driver curve. The tweeter crosses in at 8k on a single order crossover. 8)~8-)~:cool:
830945-freq.png


This particular model is being built to a price point, namely free. They're for some family. Subjective, they're utterly transparent. The sound floats in front of the cab, huge sound field with imaging even from a single cab. Could they be flatter, sure.

More numbers to come, probably first of the week. Distracted from doing fun stuff like this by making a living shipping stuff and building cabs for customers.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Leland Crooks said:
Artifact of the main driver. It echoes the main driver curve almost to a t. If I chose a better driver that would flatten. BigE cabs all exhibit the same thing, they just make whatever the driver's curve is louder, moving it down, adding energy at the bottom.

This particular model is being built to a price point, namely free. They're for some family. Subjective, they're utterly transparent. The sound floats in front of the cab, huge sound field with imaging even from a single cab. Could they be flatter, sure.

More numbers to come, probably first of the week. Distracted from doing fun stuff like this by making a living shipping stuff and building cabs for customers.
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Leland,

It is very difficult to design an accurate system without good measurements, and very easy to believe that a speaker is subjectively good before you measure them accurately.

It appears the Big E team is all about subjectivity, while lacking any objectivity.

That is fine for selling to the bass guitar cabinet, home theater, and DJ markets, but professionals prefer measured results demonstrating good frequency, phase and polar response.

As far as more numbers, I won't hold my breath:

On 9/13/12 you wrote:
"Do I think the instrument cabs are for everyone? No. But here's a big statement, I think the PA cabs are going to change the industry.
You will see data in about 6 weeks.

10/25/12 And less than 3db drop at 200ft. No doubt bounce from the building and the train affected it. But they do exhibit line array characteristics in a single cab. True line array performance when you stack a pair, throughout most of the frequency range, not just to the length of the line frequency cutoff.
Then, 1/22/13: I have a bunch of measurements done, none of which I'm going to publish yet. They're done with HolmImpulse, a piece of free software. They're fine for me to reference to each other as I tweak xovers and things, but they certainly are not accurate enough for public consumption.
Then, 2/4/13 There are some really unusual things that they do that we have no idea how to quantify in a meaningful way via graphs. The dispersion characteristics are different to say the least."

If you would become familiar with testing, you would understand that all sorts of "really unusual things" can be quantified in a meaningful way via graphs, but don't expect any of that quantification to show attributes that would be desirable to anyone wanting accurate reproduction.

Good luck with your endeavors.

Art
 
re: Listening Get Together

True, Art. This has taken far longer than I anticipated. Part of the reason has been evolution of the designs, and my need to make a living while trying to start something new. Most of those posts on TB were made with 1st gen cabinets. We're now into the third generation. Slow going, it's all done empirically, the modeling software for cabs won't work. There will be some numbers for this little 2x5 cab, but nothing for the big pa stuff until I know it's right. Either by me with much better gear or I will hire it done.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Leland Crooks said:
True, Art. This has taken far longer than I anticipated. Part of the reason has been evolution of the designs, and my need to make a living while trying to start something new. Most of those posts on TB were made with 1st gen cabinets. We're now into the third generation. Slow going, it's all done empirically, the modeling software for cabs won't work. There will be some numbers for this little 2x5 cab, but nothing for the big pa stuff until I know it's right. Either by me with much better gear or I will hire it done.
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There are 2 3rd party companies 9in the US) that I know of that you can get a good set of numbers. Pat Brown from Synaudcon and Ron Saro)
 
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re: Listening Get Together

Leland Crooks said:
True, Art. This has taken far longer than I anticipated. Part of the reason has been evolution of the designs, and my need to make a living while trying to start something new. Most of those posts on TB were made with 1st gen cabinets. We're now into the third generation. Slow going, it's all done empirically, the modeling software for cabs won't work. There will be some numbers for this little 2x5 cab, but nothing for the big pa stuff until I know it's right. Either by me with much better gear or I will hire it done.
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Leland,

The old adage "take time out to sharpen the saw" applies to what you are attempting to do.
Your time is valuable, yet much of it is wasted when your empirical work is not properly analyzed due to lacking a dual FFT program like Smaart that can show you FR and phase response in far more detail than the software you are using.

Same applies to modeling software, you evidently are not using Akabak, (or Hornresp) which can create simulations very close to the actual cabinet response even with very complicated designs. They won't be perfect, but after a few design /build /test cycles you will see where the imperfections lie, each iteration can become closer to the prediction.

In the phase of development you are at presently, using a third party for testing could be useful, but I'd suggest that learning how to test your cabinets would serve you better, as you will be able to correct, or scrap designs without having to pay additional costs in time and shipping for each iteration.

I know for fact I would easily have saved hundreds of hours of design/build/test time if I would have started using Smaart and Hornresp years before I did.
At any rate, doing what you are attempting without the right tools is a slow process- I have built entire PA's with a just circular saw, drill and jig saw, but it is a lot easier and faster when you also have a table saw and routers.

Art
 
re: Listening Get Together

Art Welter said:
Leland,

The old adage "take time out to sharpen the saw" applies to what you are attempting to do.
Your time is valuable, yet much of it is wasted when your empirical work is not properly analyzed due to lacking a dual FFT program like Smaart that can show you FR and phase response in far more detail than the software you are using.

Same applies to modeling software, you evidently are not using Akabak, (or Hornresp) which can create simulations very close to the actual cabinet response even with very complicated designs. They won't be perfect, but after a few design /build /test cycles you will see where the imperfections lie, each iteration can become closer to the prediction.

In the phase of development you are at presently, using a third party for testing could be useful, but I'd suggest that learning how to test your cabinets would serve you better, as you will be able to correct, or scrap designs without having to pay additional costs in time and shipping for each iteration.

I know for fact I would easily have saved hundreds of hours of design/build/test time if I would have started using Smaart and Hornresp years before I did.
At any rate, doing what you are attempting without the right tools is a slow process- I have built entire PA's with a just circular saw, drill and jig saw, but it is a lot easier and faster when you also have a table saw and routers.

Art
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One thing that you can do with Rons setup is to simply hire him (and his setup) for a day(s)-not cheap though.

Since he can do full spherical measurements very fast-you can get a polar-make whatever crossover changes you need-measure again and so forth.

Of course it is best if the basic "alignment" is done ahead of time. At least you have a better starting point.

I assume you can have either of them do a "basic measurement" on axis. It takes less time and work on their part-so would be less expensive.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Ivan Beaver said:
One thing that you can do with Rons setup is to simply hire him (and his setup) for a day(s)-not cheap though.

Since he can do full spherical measurements very fast-you can get a polar-make whatever crossover changes you need-measure again and so forth.

Of course it is best if the basic "alignment" is done ahead of time. At least you have a better starting point.

I assume you can have either of them do a "basic measurement" on axis. It takes less time and work on their part-so would be less expensive.
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Ivan,

Leland chose to post a response curve of a "studio monitor" with a response 15 dB down at 1kHz compared to 10kHz, using a crossover design lacking even the most basic "alignment".

Rather than spending thousands of dollars having a third party measuring something that order of magnitude off, my point in post #52 is that paying for some decent measuring tools and instruction on how to use them would serve him better at this point in the game.

Big E speakers will require a big jump from creating euphonic speakers for bass players and home stereo to something with a linear enough response to be a decent choice for professional live sound reinforcement.

Of course, we are in "Junior Varsity" :^) ....


Art
 
re: Listening Get Together

Art Welter said:
Ivan,

Leland chose to post a response curve of a "studio monitor" with a response 15 dB down at 1kHz compared to 10kHz, using a crossover design lacking even the most basic "alignment".

Rather than spending thousands of dollars having a third party measuring something that order of magnitude off, my point in post #52 is that paying for some decent measuring tools and instruction on how to use them would serve him better at this point in the game.




Art
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Yeah I fully understood that-but I was just throwing out the suggestion that he could use the facility to fine tune some aspects quickly-if desired. Hence the suggestion for getting it close ahead of time.

Without a basic measuring system (and the skill and knowledge of how to use it to make proper measurements), it is hard to say what sort of "specs" would be arrived at and how they would be arrived at.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Ivan Beaver said:
Yeah I fully understood that-but I was just throwing out the suggestion that he could use the facility to fine tune some aspects quickly-if desired. Hence the suggestion for getting it close ahead of time.

Without a basic measuring system (and the skill and knowledge of how to use it to make proper measurements), it is hard to say what sort of "specs" would be arrived at and how they would be arrived at.
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Just so you don't think I'm ducking this thread. Flattened it yesterday using my digmoda which has an excellent dsp. Graphs and observations to come. I also have new drivers coming for this box, so I'll wait for those. Have a bunch of stuff to build that let's me eat, so it will be a bit. Couple of days at most.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Leland Crooks said:
Just so you don't think I'm ducking this thread. Flattened it yesterday using my digmoda which has an excellent dsp. Graphs and observations to come. I also have new drivers coming for this box, so I'll wait for those. Have a bunch of stuff to build that let's me eat, so it will be a bit. Couple of days at most.
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Any loudspeaker can be "flattened" with processing. At least on one axis.

To me it is raw response (with calibrated SPL) that is of most use/most telling. Seeing just the "processed" response means next to nothing-UNLESS you can also see the response of the processing or the raw response. I like how EAW does it on some of their cabinets. They provide the raw response-the processed response and the processor response it took to get there. Now you have something to see what is going on.

But you HAVE to have 2 of those-or else you don't have a clue what the cabinet is actually doing.

If there is a big hole in the response-there are 2 ways to go about fixing it (not counting using different drivers or cabinet design). Either you can put a nice big boost (you can run out of amp headroom real quick on that one and I don't like the sound of big "boosts") or you can pull down everything else to the level of the "hole". But then the sensitivity of the "system" suffers-or possible clipping somewhere "up stream" occurs from having to drive it so hard.

All I am saying is that you just can't "throw a DSP on it" and fix all the issues-even though many people think it is that "simple".
 
re: Listening Get Together

Doug Hart said:
Wow, it always baffles me how people are so judgmental and are always experts on things they know nothing about.
I'm trying to have a friendly conversation and tell you what I observed and... well... I see no need to be rude about things.
Of course I had test equipment there and used it in other tests, I just did not feel like dragging everything out 300' for that particular one.
Just stating what I observed at 300'. It sounded great and the drop in volume was not what was expected.

Of course the inventors have taken extensive measurements, but I was just speaking from my point of view.
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And it's remarkable how often designers reinvent the wheel. Utilization of the back wave from loudspeaker drivers is not a new concept with many pros and cons.

The use of hyperbole in describing technology is usually inversely related to content.

I remain too skeptical to look closer but perhaps somebody who lives nearby (Tim?) with experienced ears can check this out to help separate the wheat from chaff.

It's hard to BS driving high SPL into a large open area, so either it does well, or not. An untreated gymnasium does not seem like an ideal venue for gauging sound integrity due to the highly reverberant space.

but what would I know....?

JR
 
John Roberts said:
The use of hyperbole in describing technology is usually inversely related to content.

I remain too skeptical to look closer but perhaps somebody who lives nearby (Tim?) with experienced ears can check this out to help separate the wheat from chaff.



JR
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A website that devotes more text to how the chief engineer came up with the logo for the company then to his technical background doesn't exactly inspire confidence either.

The cross fired speakers doesn't exactly make sense to me either. There is very different interactions going on depending on wavelength so the claim that somehow all wavelengths are positively affected needs serious measurement before I am going to believe. The time differences per wavelength off of the back of the speaker is just another problem.
 
re: Listening Get Together

Ivan Beaver said:
All I am saying is that you just can't "throw a DSP on it" and fix all the issues-even though many people think it is that "simple".
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Great point Ivan. I remember my early days in audio when measurement systems were just beginning to catch on....I came to this realization while trying to push the limits of a mediocre DIY system. I thought I would just measure (RTA)the response of a much better system, and EQ my system the same way. The light went on when the 2 nearly identical responses from the 2 systems sounded nothing like one another. And that was just ON AXIS.......

:lol:

I'm not suggesting that Leland doesn't already realize this. Leland has told me a bit about these new cabs in the past, and I am interested to see more detailed information become available. Many great ideas started out as crazy ideas. I prefer "cautious optimism" as a modus operandi as opposed to outright skepticism.
 
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