Bootsn pants, bootsnpants , no seriously these are the real deal for a very nice two way bookshelf. I hooked up another two way which use the ribbon tweeter and jr's picked up other things the other design didnt.
I generally dislike writing subjective reviews - particularly when it is to cover my own work. So I will keep my own subjective impressions of this design to a minimum.
I agree with Nick's impressions, especially as regards the bass output. These little woofers are something special in that regards, and objectively I can help explain why (to an extent). The basket is very open, allowing a lot of air flow around the back side. Additionally, cast aluminum baskets (and I am digging deep into something I read years ago) affect the magnetic field differently than do steel baskets, and saturation is more focused (some semantic deviation in that statement maybe?). This allows the motor to be effectively stronger, and is why not a single high-end driver uses anything but cast aluminum. The strength is a secondary benefit.
The suspension is also a key contributor. The surround is the effective excursion limiter - meaning it will arrest cone motion before it hammers the voice coil into the back plate. Looking at the Dayton Ultimax 8", the stopping point on that driver is actually the edge of the cone, which will strike the basket - ugh. Most drivers, when pressing hard on the cone, you will find you are able to bottom it out against the backplate. While doing so, look at how the surround behaves - a lot of drivers will exhibit deformation of the surround when doing this, so you are introducing progressively worse non-linear distortion as you approach Xmax - this is what Klippel is all about, exposing those non-linearities based on excursion. This driver, or at least all of the samples I have tested (14 to date) exhibit high linearity up to the point of the surround acting as a progressive shock absorber. Every sample I tested, the surround stayed linear through the entire mechanical movement of the cone. I recently tested a similarly priced HiVi F5 that has, at best, 1mm of throw before the surround begins to deform. Witnesses to the now legendary "Barbie Girl" demo will attest to the civilized manner in which this driver hits its limits. This is largely thanks to the high-end behavior of the soft parts. To my knowledge, the entire Dayton RS line, for example, is capable of jumping the gap and damaging the cone. It is my opinion that you will fry the voice coil on these long before you can mechanically damage them - but again, excellent driver design intervenes and the (relatively) high sensitivity of this driver allows it to play very loud on a (relatively) low input voltage. A full BSC bookshelf such as Pinan still has over 82db of actual sensitivity. While that may not seem like a lot, a typical hi-fi 5" bookshelf that will play to 50Hz or lower will average maybe 77 when implementing full BSC. That is the difference between a Lepai and an APA150 for similar drive levels. That cannot be dismissed lightly; this is a high output 5" 2-way that offers real, quality bass into the 50Hz and below region.
Thanks to the well-designed moving parts, extremely strong motor, and (getting to this next) the nearly perfectly designed cone - this driver never exhibits the "uglies" as it approaches excursion limits. Period. It does not go into fart mode, it does not slap the backplate, it simply compresses in a progressive manner and recovers remarkably fast. The extensive cooling around the voice coil (the former is vented, extensive venting under the spider, a massive motor, and even a cute little back plate vent) means thermal compression and noise related to cone excursion is simply a non-issue. It plays loud, and compression occurs of course, but it is graceful as compared to the DSA175, for example. That driver plays loud for awhile, but due to the lack of adequate venting, it gets hot and goes into shit mode until you cool it down. It will also hammer the backplate quite alarmingly. When Nick and I were torture testing my DSA design one afternoon, we got the cones pretty hot.
The cone on the MCM is nearly perfect. Curvilinear in shape, and very stiff. Most importantly - a treated fabric dustcap. Is the cone to everyone's liking? No - although I think the pearlescent nature of the anodizing is quite beautiful, even I think the fabric dustcap is kind of... cheap and moderately ugly. However, it does a tremendous job of damping the cone breakup and I suspect it transfers heat really well. Back in the day, before driver manufactures figured out this whole "under spider and out the back plate" thing, a breathable dustcap was a very common cooling feature. I doubt this is fully functional in that regards, but it would not surprise me if, under compression, it becomes breathable.
Essentially, what we have is a sub-$20 driver that behaves like a $100 driver in most aspects. It is not the cleanest in the upper mids, but otherwise it is an unbelievable performer. Here is where things are going to get real - MCM has had a slight redesign on this bad boy and the next generation will have a black anodized cone, and a copper cap on the pole piece. The black will address some of the common aesthetic complaints, and the copper will help drive the distortion in the upper mids into that -50db territory, or better. The prelimary data sheet I have seen indicate it is otherwise going to be a drop in for existing designs. This is an exciting development, to say the least.
I said I would keep my subjective opinions on this design to a minimum, but I really think this design is one of a handful of under-$200 bookshelves that sets a standard. It plays louder and louder and handles it all with excellent transients, clarity and - dare I say? Excitement. Yes, I said it - this is a design that will have the end user reaching for the volume knob just to see how it will do on a variety of genres. When the revised drivers hit the shelves, I am going to buy them right away and do some testing on their suitability as drop-in replacements.
So anyways, the MCM 55-2669 is a world-class midbass and with the next iteration sporting a shorting ring, I suspect it will also be very competitive as a dedicated midrange. Who doesn't like the thought of a 89db, 8 ohm 5" midrange with build quality like this?
I generally dislike writing subjective reviews - particularly when it is to cover my own work. So I will keep my own subjective impressions of this design to a minimum.
I agree with Nick's impressions, especially as regards the bass output. These little woofers are something special in that regards, and objectively I can help explain why (to an extent). The basket is very open, allowing a lot of air flow around the back side. Additionally, cast aluminum baskets (and I am digging deep into something I read years ago) affect the magnetic field differently than do steel baskets, and saturation is more focused (some semantic deviation in that statement maybe?). This allows the motor to be effectively stronger, and is why not a single high-end driver uses anything but cast aluminum. The strength is a secondary benefit.
The suspension is also a key contributor. The surround is the effective excursion limiter - meaning it will arrest cone motion before it hammers the voice coil into the back plate. Looking at the Dayton Ultimax 8", the stopping point on that driver is actually the edge of the cone, which will strike the basket - ugh. Most drivers, when pressing hard on the cone, you will find you are able to bottom it out against the backplate. While doing so, look at how the surround behaves - a lot of drivers will exhibit deformation of the surround when doing this, so you are introducing progressively worse non-linear distortion as you approach Xmax - this is what Klippel is all about, exposing those non-linearities based on excursion. This driver, or at least all of the samples I have tested (14 to date) exhibit high linearity up to the point of the surround acting as a progressive shock absorber. Every sample I tested, the surround stayed linear through the entire mechanical movement of the cone. I recently tested a similarly priced HiVi F5 that has, at best, 1mm of throw before the surround begins to deform. Witnesses to the now legendary "Barbie Girl" demo will attest to the civilized manner in which this driver hits its limits. This is largely thanks to the high-end behavior of the soft parts. To my knowledge, the entire Dayton RS line, for example, is capable of jumping the gap and damaging the cone. It is my opinion that you will fry the voice coil on these long before you can mechanically damage them - but again, excellent driver design intervenes and the (relatively) high sensitivity of this driver allows it to play very loud on a (relatively) low input voltage. A full BSC bookshelf such as Pinan still has over 82db of actual sensitivity. While that may not seem like a lot, a typical hi-fi 5" bookshelf that will play to 50Hz or lower will average maybe 77 when implementing full BSC. That is the difference between a Lepai and an APA150 for similar drive levels. That cannot be dismissed lightly; this is a high output 5" 2-way that offers real, quality bass into the 50Hz and below region.
Thanks to the well-designed moving parts, extremely strong motor, and (getting to this next) the nearly perfectly designed cone - this driver never exhibits the "uglies" as it approaches excursion limits. Period. It does not go into fart mode, it does not slap the backplate, it simply compresses in a progressive manner and recovers remarkably fast. The extensive cooling around the voice coil (the former is vented, extensive venting under the spider, a massive motor, and even a cute little back plate vent) means thermal compression and noise related to cone excursion is simply a non-issue. It plays loud, and compression occurs of course, but it is graceful as compared to the DSA175, for example. That driver plays loud for awhile, but due to the lack of adequate venting, it gets hot and goes into shit mode until you cool it down. It will also hammer the backplate quite alarmingly. When Nick and I were torture testing my DSA design one afternoon, we got the cones pretty hot.
The cone on the MCM is nearly perfect. Curvilinear in shape, and very stiff. Most importantly - a treated fabric dustcap. Is the cone to everyone's liking? No - although I think the pearlescent nature of the anodizing is quite beautiful, even I think the fabric dustcap is kind of... cheap and moderately ugly. However, it does a tremendous job of damping the cone breakup and I suspect it transfers heat really well. Back in the day, before driver manufactures figured out this whole "under spider and out the back plate" thing, a breathable dustcap was a very common cooling feature. I doubt this is fully functional in that regards, but it would not surprise me if, under compression, it becomes breathable.
Essentially, what we have is a sub-$20 driver that behaves like a $100 driver in most aspects. It is not the cleanest in the upper mids, but otherwise it is an unbelievable performer. Here is where things are going to get real - MCM has had a slight redesign on this bad boy and the next generation will have a black anodized cone, and a copper cap on the pole piece. The black will address some of the common aesthetic complaints, and the copper will help drive the distortion in the upper mids into that -50db territory, or better. The prelimary data sheet I have seen indicate it is otherwise going to be a drop in for existing designs. This is an exciting development, to say the least.
I said I would keep my subjective opinions on this design to a minimum, but I really think this design is one of a handful of under-$200 bookshelves that sets a standard. It plays louder and louder and handles it all with excellent transients, clarity and - dare I say? Excitement. Yes, I said it - this is a design that will have the end user reaching for the volume knob just to see how it will do on a variety of genres. When the revised drivers hit the shelves, I am going to buy them right away and do some testing on their suitability as drop-in replacements.
So anyways, the MCM 55-2669 is a world-class midbass and with the next iteration sporting a shorting ring, I suspect it will also be very competitive as a dedicated midrange. Who doesn't like the thought of a 89db, 8 ohm 5" midrange with build quality like this?
Johnny, This isnt the other place. Subjective reviews based on observations that make sense, and are real key contributors to a drivers performance are greatly appriciated.
I found that woven fiber MCM 6.5" I fell in love with to exhibit the same type of cone behavior being surround-limited. The basket was stamped, but thick, and the pole had a hole.
I fell out of love with the Dayton RS after seeing multiple units bend the cone and seperate from the coil in a bloody mess. I have also seen them burn up easily. They simply do not shead heat.
They appeal to the "world is flat" group and measure good enough, but they will not handle programme.
The RS subs are good if you can get a couple that have passed QC.
Many of the very reasons you have stated is why I turn to Scan or Seas in my higher end woofer applications. Even some high end mfgs (some I will never understand the populus affinity for) cannot seem to understand these fundementals at times.
Thanks for the details. I have something with the old round-frame 2669 in process. Ill get details when done....Been a long time coming. Started it about 4 years ago and shelved it out of distraction and frustration on the cabinet finish, they will make a nice gift though so I want to finish them up.
Nice explanation JR. Without some of the insight oyu have mentioned, price, exclusivity and fandom are the only reason that points to very expensive drivers, wich may not actually have the guts to command the premium.
Mike, would you elaborate on some of the other high end mfg and specific drivers models?. I understand, not all the drivers in a mfgs basket are bad, but some definitely are...
When I wrote that, it was not my intention to go to such lengths - but as I kept writing, I realized there may be some benefit. Glad I could be of some help.
Sadly, as often as it is proven otherwise, pricetag is still the number one most trusted criteria for the impression people have about any given product, followed closely by popularity. I see this across manufacturing - quite discouraging when you know there are better, more powerful PLC's at better prices but the industry defaults to Brand AB because of proliferation.
Wine, speakers, cars - you name it, there are confirmation biases abounding. American cars are no less reliable than their German/Japanese counterparts these days - but tell that to someone who paid a lot of money for a used Honda "because a used American car is going to let me down".
So hopefully, giving people some basic tools to help visually determine some of the features that can point you in the right direction for selecting the right driver will help deter some of the price tag emphasis.
Ive built the ONS , these are above and beyond those two ways in the bass regend . You really do get some honest bass from these guys and for the price , I would lean towards these for a decent two way bookshelf.
Comments
I agree with Nick's impressions, especially as regards the bass output. These little woofers are something special in that regards, and objectively I can help explain why (to an extent). The basket is very open, allowing a lot of air flow around the back side. Additionally, cast aluminum baskets (and I am digging deep into something I read years ago) affect the magnetic field differently than do steel baskets, and saturation is more focused (some semantic deviation in that statement maybe?). This allows the motor to be effectively stronger, and is why not a single high-end driver uses anything but cast aluminum. The strength is a secondary benefit.
The suspension is also a key contributor. The surround is the effective excursion limiter - meaning it will arrest cone motion before it hammers the voice coil into the back plate. Looking at the Dayton Ultimax 8", the stopping point on that driver is actually the edge of the cone, which will strike the basket - ugh. Most drivers, when pressing hard on the cone, you will find you are able to bottom it out against the backplate. While doing so, look at how the surround behaves - a lot of drivers will exhibit deformation of the surround when doing this, so you are introducing progressively worse non-linear distortion as you approach Xmax - this is what Klippel is all about, exposing those non-linearities based on excursion. This driver, or at least all of the samples I have tested (14 to date) exhibit high linearity up to the point of the surround acting as a progressive shock absorber. Every sample I tested, the surround stayed linear through the entire mechanical movement of the cone. I recently tested a similarly priced HiVi F5 that has, at best, 1mm of throw before the surround begins to deform. Witnesses to the now legendary "Barbie Girl" demo will attest to the civilized manner in which this driver hits its limits. This is largely thanks to the high-end behavior of the soft parts. To my knowledge, the entire Dayton RS line, for example, is capable of jumping the gap and damaging the cone. It is my opinion that you will fry the voice coil on these long before you can mechanically damage them - but again, excellent driver design intervenes and the (relatively) high sensitivity of this driver allows it to play very loud on a (relatively) low input voltage. A full BSC bookshelf such as Pinan still has over 82db of actual sensitivity. While that may not seem like a lot, a typical hi-fi 5" bookshelf that will play to 50Hz or lower will average maybe 77 when implementing full BSC. That is the difference between a Lepai and an APA150 for similar drive levels. That cannot be dismissed lightly; this is a high output 5" 2-way that offers real, quality bass into the 50Hz and below region.
Thanks to the well-designed moving parts, extremely strong motor, and (getting to this next) the nearly perfectly designed cone - this driver never exhibits the "uglies" as it approaches excursion limits. Period. It does not go into fart mode, it does not slap the backplate, it simply compresses in a progressive manner and recovers remarkably fast. The extensive cooling around the voice coil (the former is vented, extensive venting under the spider, a massive motor, and even a cute little back plate vent) means thermal compression and noise related to cone excursion is simply a non-issue. It plays loud, and compression occurs of course, but it is graceful as compared to the DSA175, for example. That driver plays loud for awhile, but due to the lack of adequate venting, it gets hot and goes into shit mode until you cool it down. It will also hammer the backplate quite alarmingly. When Nick and I were torture testing my DSA design one afternoon, we got the cones pretty hot.
The cone on the MCM is nearly perfect. Curvilinear in shape, and very stiff. Most importantly - a treated fabric dustcap. Is the cone to everyone's liking? No - although I think the pearlescent nature of the anodizing is quite beautiful, even I think the fabric dustcap is kind of... cheap and moderately ugly. However, it does a tremendous job of damping the cone breakup and I suspect it transfers heat really well. Back in the day, before driver manufactures figured out this whole "under spider and out the back plate" thing, a breathable dustcap was a very common cooling feature. I doubt this is fully functional in that regards, but it would not surprise me if, under compression, it becomes breathable.
Essentially, what we have is a sub-$20 driver that behaves like a $100 driver in most aspects. It is not the cleanest in the upper mids, but otherwise it is an unbelievable performer. Here is where things are going to get real - MCM has had a slight redesign on this bad boy and the next generation will have a black anodized cone, and a copper cap on the pole piece. The black will address some of the common aesthetic complaints, and the copper will help drive the distortion in the upper mids into that -50db territory, or better. The prelimary data sheet I have seen indicate it is otherwise going to be a drop in for existing designs. This is an exciting development, to say the least.
I said I would keep my subjective opinions on this design to a minimum, but I really think this design is one of a handful of under-$200 bookshelves that sets a standard. It plays louder and louder and handles it all with excellent transients, clarity and - dare I say? Excitement. Yes, I said it - this is a design that will have the end user reaching for the volume knob just to see how it will do on a variety of genres. When the revised drivers hit the shelves, I am going to buy them right away and do some testing on their suitability as drop-in replacements.
So anyways, the MCM 55-2669 is a world-class midbass and with the next iteration sporting a shorting ring, I suspect it will also be very competitive as a dedicated midrange. Who doesn't like the thought of a 89db, 8 ohm 5" midrange with build quality like this?
This isnt the other place. Subjective reviews based on observations that make sense, and are real key contributors to a drivers performance are greatly appriciated.
I found that woven fiber MCM 6.5" I fell in love with to exhibit the same type of cone behavior being surround-limited. The basket was stamped, but thick, and the pole had a hole.
I fell out of love with the Dayton RS after seeing multiple units bend the cone and seperate from the coil in a bloody mess. I have also seen them burn up easily. They simply do not shead heat.
They appeal to the "world is flat" group and measure good enough, but they will not handle programme.
The RS subs are good if you can get a couple that have passed QC.
Many of the very reasons you have stated is why I turn to Scan or Seas in my higher end woofer applications. Even some high end mfgs (some I will never understand the populus affinity for) cannot seem to understand these fundementals at times.
Thanks for the details. I have something with the old round-frame 2669 in process. Ill get details when done....Been a long time coming. Started it about 4 years ago and shelved it out of distraction and frustration on the cabinet finish, they will make a nice gift though so I want to finish them up.
Mike, would you elaborate on some of the other high end mfg and specific drivers models?. I understand, not all the drivers in a mfgs basket are bad, but some definitely are...
Sadly, as often as it is proven otherwise, pricetag is still the number one most trusted criteria for the impression people have about any given product, followed closely by popularity. I see this across manufacturing - quite discouraging when you know there are better, more powerful PLC's at better prices but the industry defaults to Brand AB because of proliferation.
Wine, speakers, cars - you name it, there are confirmation biases abounding. American cars are no less reliable than their German/Japanese counterparts these days - but tell that to someone who paid a lot of money for a used Honda "because a used American car is going to let me down".
So hopefully, giving people some basic tools to help visually determine some of the features that can point you in the right direction for selecting the right driver will help deter some of the price tag emphasis.