That's easy, the 300's had Carver ribbons, not BG, so neither are origional. I've replaced both RD48's on my 350's and the ones I bought it with were grey/white. Some confusion on whether they were origional or not. The 350's first came with Carver's but 350SE's used BG RD48's along with the full array of tweeters.
Fact is, 10 KHz is way above the crossover for those. Not even all the tweeters go all the way up, only one goes over 8K if they followed the II.5
http://www.stereophile.com/floorloudspeakers/genesis_ii5_loudspeaker_system/index.html
Good news is that the tweeters are a lot less $ but you have to get them off GAT. |
I have a pair of 350s and replaced the old ribbons with the newer BGs but still have the original drivers. The original drivers have a different design than the BGs. The front plane of the original is flat whereas the BGs are contoured. It is a distinct difference. |
It's also possible that one of the drivers got rewired in the wrong phase. |
Thanks for all the responses. I've determined the speaker with output that is lower has the original Carver driver in it. The other speaker has a newer BG driver. I will probably get around to "upgrading" the carver driver at sometime.
I think I will get more bang for my buck by doing some room tweaks to improve reflections and such.
Mmcghee, did you notice an improvement when you replace your ribbons with BG ribbons? |
http://cpskal.gr/equip10.htm
Noticeably different.
The crossover upgrade is no longer available. |
Thanks Ng for the link. Based on the pictures it looks like I have the newer crossovers and I think I have a newer base amp, it is the round one not rectangular. I'm still perplexed about what mid range drivers I have. They have been changed but the different color wires b/w the right and left channel makes me wonder what they are.
The thing that disappoints me about these speakers is their lack of imaging. I just bought a bunch of bass traps and diffusers for myself for Christmas, so hopefully that will help. |
They can have amazingly focused imaging if well setup. Should be well out into the room and no "soft" traps directly behind. As large line sources, they can make things seem larger than life but, opposite to logic, they can appear smaller the closer you sit, within reason. Personally, I prefer no toe-in to give a deeper stage.
I'm still thinking one of the tweeters got polarity reversed. Compare the wiring from one side to the other. You can remove the rear tweeter chamber and the panel behind the tweeters. PITA to stuff in all back in though.
I think the different colors just indicate that the ribbons were changed at different times. |
Bingo! The louder speakers RR tweeter is wired backwards. Black is going to positive. |
RR = Right Rear?
Caution, those are dipole not bipole. Since the crossover board has specific terminals for the rear tweeter, it should be easy to tell which is which. |
It was the right rear. The black wire was soldered to the + terminal of the tweeter. However all other tweeters have the black wire soldered to the negative terminal. |
Scvan did that fix the problem?
If so, how do the speakers sound now? |
It helped quite a bit. The imaging is much better. The only problems now are a bit of boom around 30 Hz and a slight lack of high frequency clarity. I think some room tweaks will improve these problems. |
Svcan, I did find that the BG ribbons enhance the speaker's performance. Although most of the midrange attributes were very similar to the older ribbons, the dynamics and mid bass were improved considerably. For me, this was most notable on something like a firmly plucked bass string or a solo acoustic guitar. |
Scvan, I would talk to Christos P. Skaloumbakas about the Genesis 300 speakers. He runs the Greek audiophile society in Greece. He's has the Genesis 300 speakers for like 15 years and knows everything about them. He's also had his Genesis 300 modified. I would talk to him. Here's his website where he talks about the Genesis 300. His system is also on Youtube. I put the links to both below http://cpskal.gr/pop_skal.htm http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJ81nYeY_NM |
From what I gather, my Genesis 2's have the Carver ribbon on them. Anyone certain of this ? Also, does anyone have any information or copies of reviews, or manuals on the Genesis 2 system. Your help is appreciated.
Mark |
