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Congrats to Dan and Kerry. The results were similar to the modified DIY 3.1 in many ways, which is impressive for a 7" two way without a waveguide.
Sehlin Sound Solutions
I feel like we are owed an "I survived ASR" T-shrit
Damn straight! ONLY MEASUREMENTS MATTER!!!!
A lot of the members obsess over the numbers only, but I don't blame Amir for that. Right now the spinorama (CTA-2034) tests are the best we have for measurements. They're far from perfect, but much better than a single on-axis measurement. And Amir does do a listening test:
"I was impressed by the dynamics of the speaker. That woofer has fair amount of excursion compared to what we typically see in speakers in this size. Yes, as noted, it tries to play too low of a frequency and can get distorted. Other than that though, this speaker can play loud, really loud! Despite only using one speaker, I was able to fill a very large space with very enjoyable sound.
Note that I was driving the speaker with 400+ watts of power so as noted, you need to give it fair amount of juice (if you want to listen loud).
Conclusions
The CSS Criton 1TD-X design has benefited from some good design choices such as a woofer with impressive power delivery with good on-axis and predicted-in-room frequency response. There are minor imperfections here and there but at higher level, it achieves very good fidelity. Subjective experience with a bit of filtering was very good. As a kit, it will give you the satisfaction of building something you can take pride in.
Let me also repeat the willingness of the company to have its speaker subjected to our rigorous testing where others run away fast. Or don't even respond. These things score big points in my book.
I am going to put the CSS Criton 1TD-X Kit speaker to my recommended list."
It's a very good speaker that I've heard on a few occasions, so props to Kerry and Dan, but I'm still not an ASR fanboy.
I hadn't seen that you had your version of the kit measured. Nice work!
I'd like to discuss your sentiments on that further. I both agree and disagree. As a scientist, I am a strong believer that everything that matters can be measured. At the same time, I believe that we don't know everything that can be known with respect to how to interpret and prioritize various attributes that have been measured. Sean Olive did his research and it has its place, but I'm not convinced it is so comprehensive that it can be assumed to be unquestioned truth.
Sehlin Sound Solutions
It's not the measurements that I object to, actually I like seeing them. I just don't find an absolute correlation between how a piece measures and how it sounds. I've heard plenty of ruler flat speakers that I didn't care for, hell I've built plenty of ruler flat speakers that I didn't care for, and some bumpy ones that were very enjoyable on both accounts. I won't even get into the aspect of tube gear.
Yup
I believe that you are correct Scott. We currently
are unaware of or cannot measure what we can "hear", but I also believe that audio guys need to take a less fanatical standpoint on everything. There are so many different paths to sound reproduction all with pros and cons, and to take a religious stand that one is entirely superior to another is just ridiculous. To me, saying I only like domes, ot ribbons or planars or whatever is just closed mindedness, or perhaps I'm the only asshole who can enjoy a bit of everything. I've tried several amplifiers in my system and everyone sounds different, even though the distortion is below the supposed audible threshold, and has no one else enjoyed a piece of tube gear. All good DACs should sound identical, but somehow they don't, just like speakers that have been DSPed too much, have fantastic measurements, but sound just a bit off or unnatural. Maybe over processed is a better description. I guess it would be nice is ASR would say it measured well, but the sound while good, just wasn't my cup of tea, instead of always getting giddy over good measurements no matter what. I apologize for the disjointed rambling of this post, I've been writing it in between work all day. In the end I just don't visit ASR much because it tends toward the extreme objectivism, and I find myself closer to the center of objective and subjective camps.
Actually, he has had moments where it measures within the arbitrary "Klippel says it is good" and he doesn't like it and vice versa.
That being said, there are still some things I believe we need to work out - distortion at X drive level can be inaudible on amplifiers but time after time it has been shown that frequency response is not always linear which contributes significantly to the overall tone. Certain Class D amps are impedance sensitive and sky-rocket in to clipping when the power supply is exhausted - can really color the sound on high dynamic range music. A lot of amps simply lack dynamic power - which is measurable - and in my opinion is a significant factor in perceived SQ.
That's why I like my arc welder. At Iowa (forget which year, 2015 maybe - Harry Potter Hall) the left channel was shorted by poorly connected banana plugs and it took long enough to blow the fuse on that channel that we all had time to wonder why it sounded so weird. Not going to happen with amps lacking reserve. Took 10 amps to blow the fuse. That is some serious overhead.
As far as DAC's go, I think there is close to a consensus on how they should be designed, but audiophiles being audiophiles it is my firmly held belief that manufacturers deliberately add coloration to what should be a completely transparent component. In the early days, of course, jitter was notorious. The same can be said about cables - fancy cables often add linear distortion just to have a signature sound. These things are measurable, but the right things have to be measured.
I stopped visiting ASR when they called Harman's methods in to question based on a review of the big Revel speaker. Random internet dude buying a Klippel nearfield measurement tool is not in the same league, sorry. I am still confused how accurate farfield simulations based on nearfield measurements are.
I feel too often people push their understanding as the only true understanding. In may ways this turns into the concept of every tool is a hammer. My understanding of one thing is unilaterally applied as understanding of all things.
As I get older I seem to care a little less and just try to have speakers I enjoy.
I think all of us who have been doing this for a while have had similar experiences. I'm currently sitting in our family room listening to a pair of speakers I brought to DIY Iowa a few years ago that have the SB12PFC coax flanked by two regular SB12PFC's. These...
The SB12 coax response has a nasty cancellation on axis due to the tweeter-woofer cone transition, so this is the response based on measured driver responses and the simulated crossover.
The funny thing that in our quite non-ideal room and placement, they sound very good (crossed to a sub at 80 Hz, which helps). The striking thing is how even the sound coverage is throughout the room, which is really what we need for that application.
If I do full polars, I might be able to document that the response isn't as bad as it seems from the simple plot above. I'd also guess that none of the drivers are straining much as they are being used. I'm enjoying them enough that I am thinking I should go ahead and do a write-up, but I do somehow feel the need to do enough measurements to be able to explain why they sound okay.
At the end of the day, there are a lot of factors that influence what we hear.
Over time, I'm at least trying to minimize the amount I am fixing something by changing something else, although in some cases (driver distortion in particular) you are stuck with what you have and just have to make the best of it.
Sehlin Sound Solutions
Hey Scotts, could you post the graph in place of the duplicate of the speaker pic, please?
I think I have it fixed.
Sehlin Sound Solutions
Sometimes a "flawed" speaker can bring a new perspective to your music. I've designed lots of those!
I stumbled on a new term today that sure fits in my case. The IKEA Effect - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IKEA_effect
Bad link - site unreachable but I agree concerning "flawed" speaker designs - each to his own ears and listening environment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IKEA_effect
I'm not sure I necessarily fall in to that category for DIY speakers - I kill too many projects that make me unhappy.
I am positive I fall in to that category in the kitchen, though.
Well people over at ASR looking at the your simple on axis graph might be think that the speaker is flawed.
But if you did full polars you'd probably see that the tweeter dip occurs on, or near on- axis (like most coaxials). And that the dip in tweeter around 2KHz looks worse than it sounds, because in fact, it gets peaky off axis compared to the on axis. So the power response and predicted in room response as defined by CTA20341/spinorama would look fairly good!
And, despite using drivers with basic technology, because they're paired, reduces the harmonic distortion and increases the dynamic range!
So it's a great speaker at a nice budget!
But you already knew that by listening to it! At an appropriate distance and in pairs.
So why bother with polars when it's such a PITA, and it sounds good already.
In the meantime a couple of the lead reviewers at ASR with the big machines (Klippel Analyser 2, or Klippel Near Field Scanner) don't even know how to interpret they're measuring. Or place them in their huge loft on a table, crank it up and play in mono, and the complain "where's the bass?" for a 4" mid-woofer? And the whole legion of consumers there just follow along. Or say "Oh its had good directivity" so you can EQ it to perfection. What? Have they heard of phase 101. You can't just insert a heap of parametric EQs without downsides like screwing the phase.
If it was really Audio Science Review, they'd do a teardown, and fix the crossover (or driver, or cabinet or whatever)
I mean look at this one:
28,000 views and counting.
The first graph is utter useless (the 2nd one shows the same, except with more data)
Graph three is a a near field measurement of every emitter. Including port, woofer, midrange, or tweeter, with taking into account differences in radiating area. What is the point? In science, NO GRAPH is often better than a misleading graphs)
And then commentary like "huge improvement in 15-20KHz) (of all things, what's happening about 15KHz is close to the least important)
It's like Google Search OR the new chatGPT.
Just because you have all the data at your fingertips doesn't mean you know how to interpret it, assess the strength or relative importance of the data, and thus the validity of it.
Was there supposed to be a link in there somewhere?
Coax with big on axis hole in the response may have good power response, but DI will be poor. The best sounding speakers will have good DI and power response. CTA-2034-A presents a great advancement in speaker performance evaluation and design capabilities, standardization in measurement and data representation methods is fantastic to see, but that is only the amplitude response piece of the puzzle. There's timing, group delay, resonant modes, harmonics, intermodulation, all plays a role in overall performance. Also of course user interpretation of data is often poor, so presenting data in a way that is simplest for layman to understand, like flat = good is best data to present, but not always reality. Biggest problem with ASR is the "score" is based on amplitude response alone. The review may present much other information mentioned, but overall score throws most of it away. Similar problem for amplifier reviews, overall score based on 5W 1kHz performance, which is basically the noise floor of competent amplifiers. It's like judging a Lamborghini by driving it through a grocery store parking lot.
I didn’t want to link it. Any publicity is good publicity
But is now at 30K views so the extra dozen from us won’t matter-
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/kef-r3-meta-measurements.42219/
Dumb and Dumber:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/the-real-problem-of-march-audios-sointuva-wg-review-measurements-and-reinforcements-with-klippel-device.35255/
LOL, nice! How long have you been waiting to use that analogy?
I usually say it's like a Top Fuel Dragster running 70 mph down the interstate. Just like wiping before you poop... it doesn't make sense!
Of course, if you mess with frequency response, phase is affected as long as you're employing IIR filters, in the sense that phase is a function of frequency response. It is applied to the speaker on the whole though, the crossover and it's effect, and power & DI pattern is not affected by EQ. That is to say, if a speaker has excellent power & DI, distortion, etc. but overall frequency response tuned too bright, then by all means "fix it with EQ" and enjoy. The speaker with crap power & DI however will still have crap power & DI even with EQ.
Why should a review fix a speaker? If the speaker needs fixing out of the box...bad review. 95% of the users at ASR are not DIYers, just your average audio consumer trying to decide what to buy.
The first graph...is impedance. What's the problem with it?
Delete the first graph. 2nd graph has all that info and more.
This is sounding like a debate of sorts; of which I have no interest in doing here.
Amir inserts about 5-10 parametric (IIR) EQs into a speakers with resonances or nulls caused by port/woofer interaction or poorly designed HP/LP filters and proclaims that they have fixed (or don’t) fix the speaker. Power and DI is not be all and end all.
Hear a review of Salk’s WOW I. I wouldn’t recommend reading THD whole review; because he cranks it up in mono and then complains there’s not enough bass.
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/salk-wow1-bookshelf-speaker-review.14842/
Clearly there is little understanding of fit for use.
PS. You judge a Lamborghini by how many people stare at you whilst you’re driving around in it.
If I recall correctly, the biggest issue with the WOW I was the noise/resonances coming through the front-firing slot port. I had some issues with that on the Helium, which didn't fare well with Amir's testing either. I threw one of those in the box when I sent the modified HiVi DIY 3.1 in for review, so I have a headless panther and a golfing panther...
I knew the Heliums wouldn't measure well, but PE's QC issues reared their ugly head and the two tweeters (Dayton ND-16's) wound up measuring quite differently. I wound up sending the "other" speaker than the one I did my design measurements on.
I don't really think that running a speaker that small full range at 86 dB and 96 dB test tones for one speaker correlates to any rational use case. I know the Heliums have been run with music at very high levels in multiple venues (some with my pair, some with other builds) and have held up surprisingly well.
I do appreciate VituixCAD and having the ability to simulate polar response during the design phase. I find I spend less time tweaking the more measurements I do up front.
Sehlin Sound Solutions
In terms of frequency response, one thing I've noticed over the years now is that lower distortion drivers can have a frequency response further from ideal before starting to sound offensive to me. Higher distortion usually needs a flatter curve and sometimes even a dip in certain areas to sound right whereas a small bump on a low distortion driver isn't going to sound as pronounced to me. This might just be a personal thing rather than universal but it does make sense given that a higher distortion driver is adding extra output at other frequencies.
You may be correct, but I don't think that 2nd order would be very noticeable, however 3rd order could very well be objectionable.