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You Cant Buy It but you Can Build It

One of the things, well the primary audio thing that fascinates and pleases me to no end is superlative hand built systems. Not from boutique vendors but from audiophiles who want something they can't find on a shelf or buy.

  I am a minimalist and figure the fewer devices needed to get to great fidelity the better. I am in the camp that feels if you have to have a lot of devices or fancy exotic things in your audio stream then you began with the wrong speakers.

 My system consists of a Dell Workstation PC with the hi def Realtek driver installed. 1/8" jack out to XLR to either a Xilica XP3060 if the speakers need DSP and bi-amping or straight to the amp. From the Crown XLI800 amps to the speakers and that is it. 12gage zip cord from amps to speakers and crimp fork end connectors.

  The speakers are two way and consist of the following. A Klipsch K-402 horn with Klipsch 1132 drivers with the latest version phase plugs is the HF side of things. crossover point is 650 and 12db Linkwitz Riley with four PEQ's and gain set in the Xilica. Driver is full output to just over 18khz which is past where most of us can hear anyway.

 The LF bass bin is a horn derived from the Klipsch MCM 1900 MWM single fold bass bin. This bin was altered to have a 60" depth and 60" mouth (minus 17" in the middle for the woofer plenum)  and 18" chamber ht ID and to have a true 108" throat depth. Constructed out of 25mm Baltic Birch. Has a single K-43-K Klipsch woofer in there and goes down to 27hz before serious drop off starts. I have not figured out the exact DB efficiency of this system but figure it is somewhere north of 105db. There are four PEQ's and gain setting from the xilica for this bass bin also.

 

  What started this whole thing was I wanted to hear Bach Pipe Organ music like I was right there and the same for Cello chamber music. Or Japanese Fireworks or any thing else I could find of high fidelity that interested me. I have grown to like most things recorded well that I can find. Key here was life like reproduction as close as I could get using things I have heard in person as reference points. If the fireworks would impact me in person with a felt boom along with sound I wanted that. If the 32' pipe made things move around on table tops I wanted that. Now I rarely play at those volumes but if I want to I can. But I also wanted the true to life definition that would have accompanied this just like real life. I did not want someones idea of signature sound I wanted realism. Once the PEQ's are set I do not fiddle with PC EQ and leave it flat all the time.

 

  As a pure all horn system sound reproduction is effortless and the headroom creates superb sound at 75db as well as 105db and up if you care to go there. The Crown XLI800's are solid state and 200 watts per channel. I leave them up half way and adjust the rest with the PC sound card control which rarely goes above 50%. 

Total cost to build using todays prices and all new components would be about $7400. Frugal shopping for electronics will save you off that. My actual cost after hunting for a year of so was under $4000.

 Now a word about tube amps and DACs and all that stuff. The Xilica has the ability to basically tailor sound for almost any effect, if you take the time to learn to do so. Along the way you end up having to get Room Equalizer Wizard, or REW, which is free software for analyzing sound using your laptop and a calibrated UMike. These active DSP systems are NOT plug and play.

  Not all PC's will give you great fidelity. My Dell happens to be one of those fortunately. If you go this route make sure you download the latest Hi-Def driver for your sound card. If I was not happy with the sound card, or suspected it to not be good, I would get an aftermarket one.

 Peer validation is always nice and the stream of repeat visitors I have lets me know the pieces to this puzzle worked out well. I quit my search for better when I got these dialed in.

 

mahlman
mahlman OP
433 posts
 

"I have never believed computers can or should ever be considered in the same league as dedicated audio equipment. At best, it is a hybrid compromise that never truly makes the grade."

  Until I stumbled across the Realtek Hi Def driver download I might have agreed with you. The PC now can go as high as 24 bit 192KHZ. I never use 192KHZ anymore and stay with 96KHZ on my files after running music files through Audacity. I have had loss of fidelity when going past 96KHZ. The problem now is finding good enough music files

fatdaddy2
368 posts
 

This thread cracks me up; so much effort on the back end, but relying on an old laptop's sound module?  Give me a break!

mahlman OP
433 posts
 

Of course not all laptops or PC's are created equal and as mentioned the laptop did not sound as good. Laptops do have their place though when dialing in a system with REW and a UMike. You can sit right in your preferred spot and dial things in on the fly and no up and down across the room nonsense. So what has been your experience that caused your bias?

apogeum
34 posts
 

What Ohm value did you choose and why?

I use a 100K ladder type attenuator because I wanted the input impedance (100k) of my amp not below 50k after adding the attenuator. Input impedance should be in the range of 10 times or more the output impedance of what you use for driving the amp etc.

The other odd thing was a corded laser mouse. When I moved it around you could hear it also.

My feeling is that a USB interface with galvanic isolation and getting rid of some unnecessary background processes would already be a big leap forward while still using the Dell laptop. No more noise when using the mouse and less noise in general. The Xilica XP 4080 offers Ethernet and USB input. Don’t know about the XP-3060.

If the Xilica is only for DSP  you could also do it with software only like HQPlayer, writing the filters for the convolution engine  in REW, thus making it even more simple.

phusis's avatar
phusis
1,135 posts
 

Interesting (and to me rather familiar) rundown on your audio setup, mahlman. All-horn, -active, DIY, inclusion of pro audio products, letting size have its say, PC-based source - hear you loud and clear. One senses the vitriol from some of the comments, because this - all of it, actually - rubs audiophilia quite the wrong way. And that’s how it should be, apparently.

It’s great that you’re able to maintain a 2-way speaker system running from ~25Hz to ~18kHz and a sensitivity across the board no lower than 105dB’s, it seems. Something tells though the bass horn is at its limits in the upper range crossing over to the K-402? The K-1132 apparently isn’t all too different compared to the EV DH1A (used in my main speakers).

My own speaker system is 3-way - that is, 2-way pro cinema Electro-Voice TS9040D LX speakers, run actively through a Xilica XP-3060 (same as yours) with a Belles SA-30 for the HP9040 horn + DH1A compression driver and a Lab.gruppen FP6400 for the ported dual 15" drivers. A Crown K2 runs a pair of DIY MicroWrecker 20 cf. tapped horns fitted with a 15" B&C unit in each, augmenting the EV’s from just below 85Hz down to 20-25Hz. Total output power sits at ~2.5kW per channel (the EV bass section sums into 4 ohm). Slopes across the range are 36dB/octave Linkwitz-Riley, though the high-pass on the MW subs at 20Hz uses a Butterworth slope style. I'm implementing 5 PEQ’s on the EV horn section (4 subtle notches and 1 peak suppression). The rest of the bandwidth is run sans PEQ.

What really makes a difference here, and where I find 3-way to be worthwhile, is high-passing the EV bass section at ~85Hz crossing over to the TH subs, which "sets them free" with a cleaner and more agile/expressive imprinting - it adds a bucket of headroom in this vital region. The DH1A is a monster, a sledgehammer in velvet gloves, and is crossed with the HP9040 at just over 600Hz. The TH subs are wholly effortless, smooth and quite visceral, and integrates tremendously well with the EV’s.

I use a PC source as well in the shape of a DIY music/HT server with a Marian Seraph D4 AES/EBU digital output interface to feed my DAC/preamp via a balanced Mundorf silver/gold digital cable.

I find it’s great that you’re using the system you do, actively and all and with the priorities you’ve made. I may end up with all-horn again (been there), but for now I’m very pleased with where I’m at. An important trait with the EV’s is their physical height of just over 6’ with the acoustic center sitting between the lower horn edge and upper edge of the EV bass cab. It’s an unrestricted sphere-like presentation that fills the room effortlessly, not unlike a large panel speaker (but with much better macro dynamics). A future upgrade may present itself with a pair of DIY high-order bandpass subs fitted with 21" pro neodymium woofers. They extend higher and cleaner in the upper band compared to my TH’s, and thus may further clean up the upper bass/lower midrange (the MW’s are run at their max upper ceiling). Fun stuff.

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