Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site

Horn-Loaded Speakers
Topic: Depends...

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Posted by Romy the Cat on 04-27-2025

Posted by Paul S on 04-27-2025
Thanks, guys, for the very targeted, coherent conversation about Bill's set-up, and the very relative observations about his stereo. Since Bill copped that he is 78, I will tell that I am 76, and I understand and appreciate his measured approach to all this. I also really appreciate that Bill is in it for the Music, because otherwise, who cares? Not to mention any names, but the "well-known audio bloggers" just got smoked!

Best regards,
Paul S

Posted by anthony on 04-28-2025
Now that is an interview.  

Posted by anthony on 05-02-2025
Was looking on line to see how Trinnov changed the adc/dacs inside the altitude and found this rather interesting video.  Bill, Romy, does any of this ring true?

http://tempuri.org/tempuri.html




Posted by Romy the Cat on 05-02-2025

Anthony, I have really nothing to say on this as I do not have this unit. The gentleman who made this video sound quite reasonable, and it is highly possible that everything that he says is accurate. Methodologically however, I feel that direct a/b comparing between two or more devices is very demonstrable but not necessary a very objective way to observe the differences. Again, no criticism what he is saying. 


Another interesting point. As much as I hate digital processing. I need to admit that when Bill's system sounded in his best. I did not detect issues that I would attribute to bad digital sound. Could it be better with different DACs? Only God knows as it will be completely different system. I do not know what version you have but since you going to be running only your surround channels from Ternov I do not think that you need to lose your sleep.


Posted by Bill on 05-03-2025
I bought the new converters last fall. Definite improvement. I believe all new altitude units have them. Price was reasonable for the16 I had installed. If you are getting an older unit you have to upgrade all 16 or 32 channels. 

Posted by anthony on 05-03-2025
Yes, my Trinnov is brand new with the all the current bits.

My thoughts with that video were towards the conundrum of what has clicked to get your system to its current level of performance.  When I was watching the video I thought there were several parallels between what the guy described as the differences with the new dac boards and those relatively recent improvements to your system as discussed by yourself and Romy.  Part of the puzzle for sure, but it would be nice to figure out the catalyst for things falling into place with your system.

Posted by Bill on 05-04-2025
There have been too many changes in my system over the past three months to say what was significant. The new dacs were from the fall before Romy noticed the significant improvement so they may have helped but not the main cause. I think it’s the combination of everything that coalesced in an unknown manner. I do know that without his guidance I never would have achieved it. Just wish I had started listening to him when I was in my 50's and not close to 80. I do know that the. Trinnov made a significant difference, but so did Romy’s guidance to the Vitavox drivers and his ampx amplifiers.

Posted by anthony on 05-10-2025
Bill, in my experience I am finding it harder and harder to understate what the Vitavox S2 and K15/40 bring to the sound of a capable playback system.  

Posted by Romy the Cat on 05-12-2025
Anthony, they are very very good drivers. Perhaps cuz they are one of the best in their class. Still I would like not to make cult out of anything. The relative quality of components is very important things if they used properly. However, when we paid attention at the absolute implementations of any given playback installations, then we can discover that there is much much more to it.

For instance, a few months ago I visited a very elaborate playback installation with old largest Altec was used as a primary mid-range channel, sitting behind 18 cell horn. I know those drivers they are okay but kind of no cigars. However, in context of that installation that mid-range driver sound spectacularly. Is there a lot of complicated problems with that playback but the sound of that mid-range driver was completely out of this world. I asked the guy what the hell he did to it And he said that many years ago he bought on eBay a custom made paper diagram for this driver from some unknown guy from Russia. Pay attention, not aluminum but purely paper. I can only testify that it was absolutely wonderful result. 

The same with the base driver. As you know I absolutely adore 15-in white box drivers but for my corner horns I do not use them, as I fill other drivers do better job. So, it is not about what is best. If you blindly look in the subject of what is best then you will end it up with a community of retards who clustered around their famous audio forum. They are collect what they sell to themselves as the best but they are in many cases our idiots who do not understand or feel what they do behind buffing themselves up at internet. If you have nothing to do book for yourself a trip and visit them, preferably those who create more noise. You will discover very soon that they indeed accumulated a lot of best equipment but that does not manifest interesting or even simulating results in their listening rooms.

So, having a capable playback components does not give advantages of assurance of stimulating result of a complete installation. I can give countless examples from my practice when I visited people with exceptional selection of equipment, you cannot even imagine how exceptional it was, but in the same time they did not particularly have good sound in their listening rooms. What was more appalling that they thinking about application of those excellent components was kind of strange, at least in my view.

The reason why I am writing all of it is to express my point of view that those wonderful Vitavox drivers are indeed wonderful but they themselves are not an assurance of some kind of quality or other success. For instance, me personally, as a person who dealing with those drivers for 25 years, I would more feel curious if I read not about the facts that they are good or bad but rather to learn about specific application of a given driver. In your case, I pretty much know what to do with S2, but I do not think I know very used 15-in driver.

Posted by Bill on 05-12-2025
Anthony:      If you can, make sure you have the trinnov salesman set up your unit the first time and don't let him leave until he shows you all of the intricacies. I didn't and it has taken me almost three years to get the best from it. Since you have self built speakers with hopefully a separate amp channel for each driver, set up multiple programs , one for your analog crossover, and several using the trinnov channels as the crossover with multiple different crossover points. After doing a program, always check the various parameters, especially the settings page, to see what has been accomplished before listening. On YouTube, trinnov has several setup instructions, and If you speak  German, there is an even better set at https://youtu.be/VfJKOUKvVK0?si=wGR97-womQjJWkY3 .     Romy was over last night, and in less than an hour we made adjustments to the crossovers, volumes and frequency curves of different drivers that would have taken days to accomplish with analog crossovers.     I agree with you the the Vitavox drivers are great. Heard what they can do at Romy's. Just wish I had known about the woofer cones when I was building my horns.Bill

Posted by Romy the Cat on 05-12-2025

With all honesty yesterday I did not detect in Bill's sound any deficiencies that I would feel a " better" Vitavox 15-in drivers would address. This whole concept of battle driver is complicated. Russians have saying: if two people do the same things. Jane, they are not the same things. The very same tru in yhe most audio applications. We made his base horn run down to 45 cycles and it was very beneficial to listen his playback without any lower frequency channels. His horns did beautifully and I do not think that if we have " better" driver in horns if it would make any difference. From what I feel vitavox 15 in driver not necessarily like to be squeezed in a horn. I personally very much like it as a direct radiator or in very lightly loaded horn. I would not use it for any hyperbolic or any other slow opening horns. 


Whatever was very remarkable yesterday is that Ternov become very substantially screw up sound when we changed main volume control. It happens that we listening his play back at 0db and it provided fight fine result. Then Bill to demonstrate me somthing and flipped The volume at -1 DB. I swear to God that sound instantaneously got collapsed. It's immediately got compressed and it was very editable. So if you plan to use this type of the processor for anything more than surround channels then I would run anything as much as possible at unity gain.


Posted by anthony on 05-12-2025
Romy, the Vitavox quip was a cheap remark following some visits to some expensive audio installations.  The two major areas where I felt these installations were lacking was right where the S2's and 15" in my system are implemented...the Vitavox drivers.  Especially what the S2/YO186 in conjunction with the RAAL tweeter is giving me...so nice.  Implementation is everything which is the major reason I have leveraged your experience with Macondo/Melquiades.  

Posted by Romy the Cat on 05-12-2025

I know exactly how people feel after visits to "someexpensive audio installations". However, the reason because I become so verbal on the subject because I would like you to estimate yourself the accuracy of your fillings. You are running home a playback system which is significantly more advanced topologically than most of "visits to some expensive audio installations".


Now, he is a homework to everybody. How methodologically accurate somebody like Anthony could make a judgment about presumable advance his system over other, if Anthony willing to single point vitavox products. I have no doubt that his system has a lot of advancements over others but how he, or anybody else can make a judgment that it is vitavox but not the significant number of other topological investment that his playback has?


It is not so simple question as you think. I personally feel that the Vitavox probably the reason number four or five. In addition to the homework above, feel free to propose what might be considered reason one, two and three...


Posted by anthony on 05-13-2025
Thanks for the tips Bill.  No Trinnov guy to do the setup at this stage but apparently there is access to Trinnov in France.  I may end up getting the salesman here...not sure...he is a long way away.  The unit is sitting in a box downstairs patiently waiting for me to get the stereo subs integrated and then Macondo time-aligned.  One thing at a time.  I want the stereo system to be completely finished before transitioning to the multi-channel.

Romy, I have only ever heard one digital volume control that was not destructive to stereo so your observation is no surprise.  The flawless one was entirely in software and used no digital chip or other hardware to enact, but I have heard other software based volume control that for sure is not ideal.  Not sure how the Trinnov does volume control but it it could be either I suppose.

Regarding the loose Vitavox quip, it's not so much what you've got but how you use it.  I realise that putting Vitavox in other speakers will almost automatically "not work" as it has to match not only topology but character of the surrounding drivers and amplification.  But I do think that if someone has the time or inclination to work a system around those drivers they can get some wonderful results, just like they can with other drivers.  I've been listening to commercial speakers and amplifiers and no doubt they are "well thought out" too but each are missing the colour and richness I hear every day.  A factor of that is that I have integrated Macondo/Melquiades into my room over several years whereas the "plug and play" brigade often only superficially integrate their system into the room being limited by knowledge, time or ambition...or poor choices and bad advice...as are we all.

Posted by Bill on 05-26-2025
As you can read above, Romy came over to help me get the best from my system. With his guidance, and the use of his ampX amplifiers, we used my Trinnov prepro to adjust the crossovers, frequency curves, phasing of drivers and driver volumes of the Edgar horns , work that would have taken weeks without the Trinnov and Romy's ears to obtain, if at all. All i can say is that in 48 years of my high end audio experience and 20 years of living with and adjusting my Edgars, I had never obtained the sound I am getting now.

It is the best reproduction I have ever heard of orchestral classical music in a home, audio salon or the 10 audio shows attended. Thank you Romy for your guidance. You really should start getting paid for the service, (but not retroactively of course except or another prime rib dinner i definately owe you.)

Posted by Paul S on 05-26-2025
When the student is ready, the Teacher appears.
Now is the time to enjoy some Music!

Best regards,
Paul S

Posted by IronManIV on 06-03-2025
The seller on EBay is voice_of_steppe. Current paper diaphragm production is very nice with three different voice coil wire options and any impedance. But, I also saw the paper die stamps for sale. I am afraid these may not be available for long. I bought 808 and 288 versions. They are beautifully made and inexpensive and seller is very responsive. I don’t have an opinion on sound worth anything to anyone else. I hope to live and learn with these for awhile. I just love them and I want to understand them. Jamie.

Posted by Romy the Cat on 06-14-2025

I visited Bill 2 days ago and was listening to his playback after another 37563 changes he made. After small tuning an adjustment I cut myself with interesting perspective. 


We frequently, included me, looking for various playbacks over internet, are trying to make predictions how's this playback might perform, using some reasons, topologist, etc. usually it's allowed to filter out explicitly stupid installations, which is majority of them, but it is not always permits us to be accurate.  Look at the Bills installation. Digital crossovers of the fourth order across the whole system. The overall curve equalization at digital level, for people like me it sounds laughable. Still, his playback demonstrate unexpectedly good result. 


Yes, if to dig deeper, and go for my nude not known publicly properties then tons might be dug out, which would be true for any installation. However, overall, in my view, his playback present extremely potent and capable presentation which doesn't create any immediate each for any further improvement. He's play back at the level where enough is enough snd ride is very enjoyable and thoughts provoking.


Another interesting aspect is that he did something with his electricity recently, which made quite good improvement in term of calming down his entire playbacks with so many electronics in play. He has half of the room of amplifiers everywhere and he has some minor looping problems and right now it is absolutely quiet. When I came to his room I was kind of upset that he did not warm up system before me coming. I kind of complained, to which Bill responded the system is up. I was impressed.


The main question remind if Bill would be able to get substantially better result using strictly analog crossovering, and no digital equalization. The answer is certainly  it will be substantially better but... But how we project the amplitude of that "substantially better" to the amount efforts which need to be spent to achieve it? Probably if I wear in my 30s I would tackle this challenge if I were in bills shoes. And frankly speaking person do it once in a lifetime. Still, considering where Bill is and I am I do not think that either of us will have motivation to do it. It is not necessary because we are so lazy, but rather the result that he is getting is good enough to be content. It' has some problems but it does not scream about them, in fact, the overall presentation is very convincing, balanced, and integrated. 


Which brings to another interesting point. He doesn't play CD or analog and he does explicitly streaming. My observation that all streaming services are not really serious high-end audio sources but rather a very basic mediocracy. So I wonder, if people out there use streaming as a sources then do people need anything better than digital crossovers and simple solutions for playback?


Perhaps $1,000 streaming device with integrated crossovers and amplification is all that you need? Let's agree we do not have a lot of sensible men who use little digital fart machines to drive very serious vintage acoustic systems, properly made. I just never seen it. From a certain perspective, Bills playback is unique. He has very serious acoustic system in exceptionally serious listening group and he drives all of it from something that might be considered compromised front end. Pay attention, as a result he has good sound. From another side we have zillions of the people out there who drive exceptionally sophisticated front ends into less capable acoustic systems and we know the results. So, would it send some kind of message to us?


Posted by IronManIV on 06-15-2025
Can we imagine what Hilliard, Lansing, Olson, Thuras and Wente would have done if we had offered them a technology that could time align the amplified signals for the Shearer horn? What transducer and horn topology might they have built or kept in production if they had that. Would they care that it was digital?

It would seam that digital signal processing and horns were made for each other. Time alignment in the analog domain for horns is not for the faint of heart or real estate constrained. Just trying out a large horn in one's living room could be a daunting task.

I am quite amazed at what can be done with a $600 3 channel Hypex D-Class amp and DSP processor. Add a Hypex plate amp for subs and bass, and now 4 channels with full DSP control all the way through FIR filters of modest size. And, the revelation that all the relationships between Xover slopes and phase slippage and group delay are 1 to 1 the same as what passive filters are doing. The Laplace and Fourier transforms are inviolate. So, a design can be ported, even piece by piece back into analog topology. Except the interaction between the amplifier and filter to the reactive component of the voice coil impedance. There is still plenty of fun to be had for analog enthusiasts to do complex impedance optimization for ideal driver behavior and the work of people like Harvey Fletcher on long distance telephone lines can still inspire us. If only we could do the math like these Phd's who laid the groundwork for our methods.

Tools like Aura and Trinnov etc. which can bring raw processing power to do statistical averaging of polar responses, delays and comb filtering to trim delays and slopes to a least error total room or total power response reverberant field are quite amazing feats of technology. It is not surprising the results might be truly emergent or unexpected. 
Jean Michel Le Cleach suggested in 2004 at ETF2004 that the off axis, reflected or ambient sound was important in crossover design and suggested 3rd order slopes in phase quadrature with additional delay of the woofer channel could improve sound. And as far back as 1986 Vanderkooy and Lipshitz recognized that better power response and sound quality could be achieved by some sacrifice of on axis response flatness. These folks had to propose these methods with rigorous mathematical models since without them there would be no way to implement the methods in the early dsp solutions. A phd in math or physics was almost necessary to propose these solution academically.

Today we have machines that can iteratively design slopes for a given room and drivers without any restriction to symmetrical models and analytical solutions like Butterworth, LW or Bessel. The Aura or Trinnov machines can move the slopes around to infinite shapes including assymetrical arrangements and hunt for the best overall solution for the reverberant field and if necessary run the whole kit through an all pass FIR to flatten phase. (analog fanatics have had coronaries at this point thinking of all the signal manipulationSmile

None of this would be very interesting for the horn enthusiast or hobbyist, except that smart guys in Europe and Scandinavia (contributions from Amerika are few as we've decided that higher education is a conspiracy) are writing incredibly good software that incorporates cutting edge signal processing and acoustics research into easy to use tools that are often FREE. Tools like REW, VituixCAD, Rephase, etc. The hobbyist can do a poor man's Aura with these tools and several Hypex amps.

Of course we would not know these tools might yield such pleasant results without the open minded observations from good sound fanatics like Romy and Bill who can compare these results to the most sophisticated analog systems. What a pleasure it is to get these reports from the frontier for without it, we'd be lost in an exponentially growing field of practical options.

Jamie

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