@thespeakerdude @mijostyn
I have two amps (one 50w and one 125w) for 175 watts total per speaker. In essence each DRIVER has its own monoblock.
Times 13 active speakers = 2,275 watts. There is no way it would have been practical to fit the individual amps (even if I didn’t use a monoblock for each speaker) in my room. Another benefit of active.
Now, Anthem is Paradigms partner. Their 5 channel amp costs $3799. I would have needed 3 of them if I used one channel per speaker. I would have to use two channels per speaker to biamp, that means 26 channels or roughly FIVE of those amps X $3799 comes to around $19K. I am not even going to figure out what the speaker wire would cost, but it would be a lot.
Another benefit of active.👍
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@donavabdear , yes, I did see you lowered the Genelec CC from above the monitor and its now in line, nice. Even if it takes 2 more months to get things calibrated just right, that is still half the time it took for tech support. It will be amazing to mix your movies on one system and then play it back on your HT. I guess you can test your principles of how film mix transfers to a HT and have a watch party when you are done. Do you know the guys at the Dubstage studio? Sounds like you will be ready for some new projects by February.
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@donavabdear , what did tech support do? After 4 months it must have been a jackpot when everything worked as (or better) than expected.
There will never be another time when I can have such a good voice reference and a unique experience to evaluate the end product of a recording.
Great, Christmas came early, happy times!
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I am looking at the Ones and can only imagine what that 134 pound sub must be like 😎 Obviously overkill for a HT but like how they couple it with the monitors for a full range solution.
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@mijostyn , if your forecast is true about the Genalec sub great job, license your designs to them and get a royalty. I have never seen a sub in what appears to be a tower, I like the idea of getting the driver off the ground.
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@rick2000 , many people could list their speakers, cables, dac. and amps for sale, take the cash, buy a set of Dynaudio Focus speakers, get an upgrade, and have money left over. I think they won't because it is too hard to let go of the OCD that often comes with this hobby. Fortunately their is a new generation getting into this hobby that will benefit greatly from a plug and play, value priced ACTIVE system like this.
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@donavabdear , I was thinking about getting the new Jim Fosgate designed tube headphone amp The Aries from Black Ice audio which was demoed at this past CEDIA. They don’t have a price yet or a firm release date. I really like my Sony SACD/CD/Blueray player and wanted to try out their reference Signature line. I will likely get the matching headphones after I try it out as a DAC and a preamp. The DAC is a custom field programmable gate array and should be quite interesting vs the ESS and AKM DAC’s out there. This is why it has some of the features you don’t see on most DAC’s like the DSD remastering and higher bit rates on PCM:
DSD native (up to 22.4 MHz) DSD DoP (up to 11.2 MHz) PCM (up to 768 kHz/32 bit)
The fact that it has headphones designed to match the amp was a plus.
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@thespeakerdude
Much of the hobby survives on the satisfaction people get from spending money.
Too late, I just spent more money🎧. I wanted to try a nice headphone rig and have been thinking about getting a 2 CH preamp for my home theater. My active speakers have both RCA and XLR inputs with a toggle switch to connect two preamps. So, I pulled the trigger on the Sony Signature headphone amp/dac/preamp, the TA-Z1HES.
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@mijostyn re: sub setup I set mine up per Earl Geddes. He actually recommends at least 3 and to have one above the midline level of the room if possible, see pg. 236. I only have two and use the opposing corner setup:
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@mijostyn , thanks. I EQ them with Audyssey in my processor. I have a question for you. I run two subs because my processor has two sub outs. I would still like to add a third one as Earl describes. I am thinking of getting a DSPeaker or miniDSP to EQ them. Should I skip it and just stay with two? I don't need more volume and the bass is satisfying. I am just wondering if it would be OTT good if I add another one. Thanks
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@thespeakerdude , you can see how my subs measure without room correction in the graph below (blue frame is before), thoughts? The numbers in the scale are cut off when I uploaded it from PDF.
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@mijostyn
You do not want to add another processor.
That sounds right, I am going to shelve any tinkering with more processors, etc. I think I’ll go in the opposite direction and try 2.0 with no subs and no dsp when I get the new Sony preamp delivered and will post how it goes. The Paradigm passive 40's go down to 45 hz or so. The active version I use go down to 32 hz which should be fine for music.
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You are overthinking it, many people have 2.0 systems and enjoy them without subs.
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@phusis , let me change that to I’m overthinking. I have a well treated room that is nicely EQ’ed in my main system which does everything from 2 CH to 9.2.7 Atmos. I just got a new preamp/dac/headphone amp in the Sony Signature line. I can connect it via RCA to my HT processor and use the subs, the EQ, etc. I can also connect it via balanced directly to my active speakers. Too systems, totally different, in one room. Before I start messing with subs and EQ with the new 2 CH pre I want to let it go and see what happens. Paul McGowan disavows EQ in a 2 CH system (but still likes subs).
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I got the new Sony Signature TA-Z1HES installed tonight and so far have only used it as a dac connected to my main system (subs, EQ, etc). I connected it to a laptop and streamed some ripped files as well as streamed tidal. I must have a bias to Japanese tuned products because my processor is a Marantz, this new unit is a Sony and my DAP is an Onkyo DP-X1. The dac in the Sony is crystal clear straight out of the box, I look forward to breaking it in. Of the upsampling features I like DSD remastering the best. You can only engage it with files of CD resolution or lower (44hz). The real surprise was when I let my Onkyo DP-X1 DAP upsample and output the files as native DSD. I have the song Angela by Bob James on an SACD and heard it many times. I never thought upsampling could approach native DSD and if I didn’t know it I couldn’t tell the difference. When streaming Tidal I have to let the DAC do the DSD remastering. The DSD choices available are limited, inconvenient, and expensive. What a pleasant surprise and I would say just as a dac this unit justifies the price. I’ll try it as a two channel preamp tomorrow and post. The engineers at Sony know digital.
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@mijostyn
I use 8 of them which equals 4 15" drivers or two 18" drivers.
Does the law of diminishing returns kick in after the first 2 or 3 subs?
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@lonemountain
Good info, 4 subs summed to mono, very doable for my room.
What do you use to EQ them? Minidsp? dspeaker?
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I found a solution to use my subs with both systems, need to get the DSPeaker Anti-Mode 8033 II, thanks @mijostyn, @phusis and @thespeakerdude
I’ll try 2.2 instead of 2.0 with the new Sony preamp:
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So I got to run my new Sony TA-ZH1ES dac/pre/headphone amp as a pure 2 ch preamp today, sans subs, just in 2.0. I haven’t listened to a system without dsp in this room in a long time (ever?) and although the Sony’s sound is more pure to the original recording it loses a step in sound staging and overall smoothness compared to my Marantz processor in Pure Direct mode which includes the benefit of the subs and room EQ. I might tinker with setting up the subs and dsp with the Sony after the holidays but for now am just going to enjoy it as a dac feeding my Marantz processor.
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I realize most subs are active speakers but this topic belongs in a new thread, (Bassaholics Anonymous?) Can we get back to the thread topic of active speakers and the confusion surrounding them?
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@kingharold , the pics look stunning in your virtual system, beautiful wood finishes.
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@donavabdear , if it is both subs I doubt they are both defective. Here is a trouble shooting sequence that might help:
1) Take one sub to a different room, on a different breaker. Turn the volume down to 0, then plug it in WITHOUT any interconnects plugged in. Turn it up from 0 to max and notice if hum engages. If it does then do same with other sub. If they both hum without any components plugged in it might be an issue on the powerline and I would try the DC Blocker from Audiolab. Amazon has a 30 day return.
2) If you don’t get a hum take it back to your room and try a different cable (XLR/RCA). Repeat as before and if it hums switch cables. If it still hums it might be the connection with your preamp. Try different ports, look at your settings. It might be the sub gain is set too high in your preamp.
3) If all of that fails to find the issue call JL Audio Tech support or maybe another member has some other suggestions.
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The audiophile world is a fake world that is searching for something that is unscientific but using the language of science to find their way.
and the more "scientific" they get, the more they obfuscate (or fake) their ability to find their way.
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@mijostyn , do you really want to go there? This thread is about powered speakers, if you want to focus your post on a members system, fine. To drag this thread into a battle of "I am smarter than you" is boring. Or, why not start a thread on basic acoustics? The TACT you use is not exactly the latest technology you know? BTW, have you ever looked up the word TACT? I don't see any in your last post. FWIW I think this is a good video on acoustics:
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@mijostyn , the bottle neck in your system is two fold. The TACT is like from the prior century and why not take advantage of Moores Law? (Look it up). The other problem is your subs are too big for your system, they bounce around (unacceptable) and can integrate better with your speakers. This is a good resource:
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@thespeakerdude
As well I (and apparently @donavabdear) have worked with other physicists, acoustic experts
Please, you are an interesting member, I like your posts but you have to put up some kind of proof if you want to start boasting about your creds. @donavabdear posted his creds, I never claimed to have any creds so at least posted my system to show I can walk the talk of what I am claiming as experience. You have done neither and that is just not going to fly if you want to claim your brilliance here. So, you either gotta post some creds and post your system so we know you just aren't making it up as you go. Please, don't start dragging other members into your personal diatribe with @mijostyn , the mud splatters OK?
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@phusis , come to think of it I may have one credential, maybe. The member not working in the industry with the most active speakers in a home theater-🎖
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@phusis , I can only speak for myself, the reason I don’t use an outboard amp configuration and active crossovers is space consideration. For a two channel system NP, but when you have a HT with 5,7, or more channels it would be a monster to have to store all of the additional gear. Internal amps is the opposite, takes away the racks I need and gives me biamped speakers for less money than I could build myself. No doubt, it could be better and I know you can use the Storm Audio/Bryston SP4 HT processor DSP capability to run active crossovers for each channel but you still need to house all the amps somewhere.
Theortically you could do this if you got the Bryston SP4 processor and then 5+ of the Bryston active speakers but it would be complex and you still need to house all the amps.
https://bryston.com/preamps/sp4/
https://bryston.com/active-loudspeakers/
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Thanks to the members who suggested I use a sub in with my new Sony TZ-HA1ES dac/pre. So, I have a Paradigm PW Link streamer here that has a digital out. I connect the digital out (with an iFi SPDIF Purifier in the chain) to the DAC and the RCA out to my sub. Run ARC Genesis room correction, open the Playfi streaming app and bingo. This is a soundstage from two channel that wraps you in a cocoon of sound. Best two channel ever in my room. I still plan to get the DSPeaker 8033ii for the subs but this is another level from running it without the sub and DSP. The Link is on sale on the Paradigm website for $199. Audyssey charges $199 just for their software upgrade and DIRAC charges $499. This is like getting SOA room correction DSP and they throw in the hardware and the streamer for free. For the members wanting a room correction solution or just a refresh it is worth it. I have before and after graph of the results I'll post later, thanks.
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@mijostyn , I had an issue with the window too. I hung a pair of Acoustic Lens diffusors and it worked perfect, I’ll try and upload a pic but as you see they let the light right through:
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@mijostyn
I put a window too close to the right hand loudspeaker and somehow it was skewing the treble on that side. I had the window removed and the hole sided over, big improvement. I never would have known had I not measured it. I thought as long as the wall was reasonably flat it would be OK. I put blinds over the window and that did little to nothing.
I had a similar problem, rather than remove the window I did some creative room treating. This also was in line with Anthony Grimani’s "acoustic recipe" in the video I posted earlier. This is a 3D diffusor that has an absorber mirroring it on the opposite wall. As you see it doesn’t block the light either, win/win. I’ll post the measurements I just took after installing my new preamp later:
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@mijostyn
In order to run Anthems ARC Genesis room correction I connected the digital out of the Paradigm PW Link into my Sony dac/pre. Look at these results (the green line is the after). Anthem has all types of products with ARC, recommend you replace the TACT. With your 4 subs and PJ the Anthem AV90 is worth checking out. To get the results you want you can’t rely either on DSP or room treatments, you need to do both (remember to treat the ceiling too). I know you have a PJ, look how I worked around mine using a similar solution. The result is more than worth the effort:
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@mijostyn
The components of your system are like a Ferrari, but you are using a team of horses (the TACT) to power it. Yes, you have a lot invested in horses, you have used them a long time. It is time to let them go and get an engine suitable for your components. You have several members here who have already praised their own DSP (trinnov, room perfect, ARC, Audyssey Pro, DSPeaker, etc) and NOBODY is using TACT. It is a horse in the era of cars, time to get an "engine" more in line with your components. That system is from 2008 and if it was an amp or a pair of speakers, fine. For a digital component? No. A $100 DAC from today will blow a $5000 DAC from 2008 out of the water. "Digital Signal Processing" software that old is not even a consideration. If you need advice start a new thread and I am sure you can accelerate the transition, NP.
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@ricevs , that is an excellent post, I had 0 clue about those solutions, thanks!
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@mijostyn , you have done a nice job on your media room. I think black out curtains that are absorptive would also work. Given the power tools you have I am sure lopping off a window was easier.
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@ricevs , could you use a 3d printer to make smallish cabinets like a spherical type for speaker builds?
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@mijostyn , I get the level of detail you need because you need of the crossover capability of the DEQX. It must be fun to build the house, build the room, build the speakers, and crack a cold one. Not necessarily in that order. I would never have the patience to go tweeter hunting. If it ain't on Ebay I would just change strategies, good luck.
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Floyd Toole uses the exact same layout in his home (when in doubt copy Floyd I always say) @mijostyn read the article, Floyd uses curtains as absorbers:
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When pursuing multi channel the limiting factor tends to be space, space for speakers and space for amps. ACTIVE speakers that house the amps inside resolved that dilemma for me. For anyone wishing to experience unleashed dynamics and realism try this setup with either a processor that does Atmos with wides or DTS-X Pro:
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adults typically can’t hear 16khz.
The pursuit of higher and higher resolution files is like chasing rainbows. This is why the law of diminishing returns kicks in hard for two channel purists. Do you know WHY audio shows are full of $50K amps and $100K speakers. That is what it takes to squeeze out the last "bits" of two channel resolution. I am firmly in the camp with Tomlinson Holman who states multi channel offers very great value. I use his Audyssey DSX codec which is channel based, incredible, especially with live recordings. In essence, add WIDE channels to your system BEFORE height channels. Object based Atmos is great but less than 10% of the available music out there is mixed in Atmos. Audyssey DSX is an upmixer:
As Mr Holman is quick to point out, any audio engineer confronted with the question, “what do you want to do with a higher bitrate?”; will always ask for more frequency range and more dynamic range because they don’t know what to do with more channels. "It’s a new paradigm." "Just to go to 192 KHz sampling rate to satisfy passing bats instead of human beings is pretty crazy, but adding channels is of very great value." (For those readers not terribly familiar with flying rodents, bats have an ability to hear ultrasonic frequencies, the kind you can reproduce with a 192 KHz sampling rate). In answer to the question what is 10.2? Mr Holman replies "It is as far as we can push the market without people thinking we are crazy."
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An Atmos version of the same layout (as you see in my virtual system) The angles are key, I moved the top middle ceiling speakers a little more in toward the center of the room to separate them from the surround speakers and between the first and second rows. They also can double as VOG channels for Auro 3D that way. Front and rear height channels are mounted above the front L-R and rear L-R channels and center height above the center for a total of 7 height channels in my layout. I didn’t use active speakers for top middle and center height, too big for my ceiling, but I did use the smaller Paradigm speakers that most closely matched my actives (same tweeters):
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@donavabdear , I like DSP for time alignment as the last step. In the Dolby diagram they have the MLP toward the rear. I scotched that and moved my MLP equidistant between the front and rear channels, using a tape measure to dial it into the inch and a laser pointer to get the angles of the height channels aligned. It didn't take that long. I'll post a diagram of Floyd Toole's home layout and he has the exact same layout. So I use the time alignment feature of DSP after using a tape measure and a laser pointer to get the distances and angles as close as possible. For example my room isn't wide enough to have my side surrounds equidistant so DSP in that case is a big help. As for speakers overhead I think for the top middle, it works. For front and rear height, it isn't ideal. No sense having the sweet spot pointed at the floor right? For front and rear height (which are equidistant from MLP) I find facing them toward the MLP and angled about 30 degrees like in this diagram:
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I think this is one place where artificial intelligence will enter our market.
One of the reasons I like Sony is their DSEE upscaling. My Sony SACD player and my Sony TA-ZH1ES DAC offers it and you can turn it on or off. If you are playing a high rez file it won’t do anything. If you are playing CD quality or lower it upsamples it to highrez. Whether or not you like it is a matter of personal preference. I like it as it is better then the other upsamplers I have tried in my processor or in various DAC’s. Now they have an AI version just as @thespeakerdude mentioned. It is available in their new Signature Series Walkmans. See the link below:
https://www.sony.com/en/SonyInfo/sony_ai/headphone.html
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@thespeakerdude
For all the bluster in the audiophile community for playback, I do not think we have a good handle on what drives people to prefer X over Y.
You will NEVER find what drives "people" by looking for signs in the audiophile community. "People" do not spend $2K+ on speakers like audiophiles. Steve Jobs said people don't know what they want. They would have said faster horses if you asked them before they saw a car. I do not envy your challenge but sincerely look forward to your next invention. The puck is moving toward bundled ACTIVE speakers as far as I can tell.
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@donavabdear
This is a simple observation by Floyd but it has been a MASSIVE benefit in my room.
An in-ceiling loudspeaker is used as the Voice of God. Others could have replaced some or all of the elevation speakers. But, knowing that the direct sound has a dominant effect on timbre/sound quality I decided not to compromise, and used high quality bookshelf loudspeakers in custom mounts, aiming them at the prime listening location as shown in the following floor plan.
Placing the matching bookshelf speakers at front and rear heights directly above their bed channel counter parts matches timber as Floyd states, they also better time align with the bed channels and in my experience are incredible at pressurizing a room. A perfect way to demo this is get a copy of Kraftwerks The Catalogue concert bluray which has an Atmos mix and can be played in 3D or 2D (3D is AMAZING if you can wangle it but the main thing is the atmos mix). Talk about pressurizing a room at reference volume levels, it will blow your mind. The bookshelfs as height channels have no trouble keeping up, the smaller in ceiling speakers I just don’t see having enough muscle. My heights are active and so the muscle they add to a concert or action movie are OTT. You can achieve the same thing with passive bookshelfs like Floyd did too:
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@donavabdear , I never used Room Perfect so maybe DSP is good enough.
On the other hand, after making the investment in equipment might as well take the time to experiment a little to get it just the way you want.
Happy New Year!
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This is a nice video and from 19:00 to 25:00 they talk about mixing in Atmos. Studio C was converted and now they are using it mostly for Atmos music:
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If anyone wants to try upmixing their 2 channel music here are some things to try:
1) For straight upmixing most people agree Auro-3D works great for music.
2) For upmixing 2 channel or 5.1 channel mixes into Atmos or DTS-X an X-Box series S or X has an app you can get that will render ANY content (music or movies) into an Atmos or DTS-X bitstream for your processor. This works better than the upmixers in your processor 99% of the time.
3) If using the Dolby Surround upmixer in your receiver go into settings and turn center spread to ON.
4) If you already have a 5.1 channel system and want to add speakers add wide or height channels before adding surround back.
My personal preference is to add wide channels first but not all receivers offer wide connections.
I have threads here on setting up your system for Atmos and another on Atmos music for more info.
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