passive set up v active set up

[lindsayt]

I wonder if any of the participants have heard the track "Why So Serious ?" From The Dark Knight soundtrack, and do they think it's a good test piece ? ...

Was that the vinyl or CD version?

 

[lpv]

can you tell what's source you're going to bring please?

to all participants: did you choose your 2 tracks?

edited...

A Denon C630 CD player (bought for £15 2nd hand). I don't mind if anyone else's source is plugged into my components and vice versa.

Would you or andrewjvt like to pick a track or 2 from the Steve Earle or Steve Winwood CD's I mentioned in this thread yesterday?

Preferably something up-tempo that can withstand repeated listening. And something that features vocals, bass guitar, full drumkit, guitars.

cheers Lindsay.. yeah, no problem

 

[JamesMellor]

can you tell what's source you're going to bring please?

to all participants: did you choose your 2 tracks?

edited...

A Denon C630 CD player (bought for £15 2nd hand). I don't mind if anyone else's source is plugged into my components and vice versa.

Would you or andrewjvt like to pick a track or 2 from the Steve Earle or Steve Winwood CD's I mentioned in this thread yesterday?

Preferably something up-tempo that can withstand repeated listening. And something that features vocals, bass guitar, full drumkit, guitars.

"A week of living dangerously" springs to mind , fits the bill and has a enough humour in it to stand afew plays.

 

[lindsayt]

...if LindsayT is using seventies EV, which was rendered obsolete by Kef and B & W in the late seventies early eighties, I can't see any point in comparing dated, Semi PA with modern high accuracy monitors because they won't be to his tastes. It'd be like a chap arguing that his elderly steam roller is better than his neighbour's Ford Focus.

I want to make some things abundantly clear here.

1 I am not emotionally attached to my EV Sentry III's. At home they are used exclusively on my A/V system. IE watching TV and Blu rays.

2 I paid £415 for them (plus about £80 in parts to repair them). The source that I'll be bringing cost me £15. The amps I'm bringing cost me £99 (in 1983), £150 and £1250. I'm not sure which amplifier will give the best sound on the day with the Sentries. It all depends...

3. If my system sounds the worst I'll probably laugh and say "Well it was the cheapest. What do you expect?"

4. In the past I've always been content to lose bake-offs as they have always led to me making improvements to my systems. I see no reason why this bake-off should be any different.

5. If we run out of time on the day, I really wouldn't mind if we never get round to listening to the EV Sentries. There's always another day...

6. At past bake-offs I have always reported the sonic differences that I've heard as honestly as possible. If ANY other system at this bake-off, for example, has a more focused midrange then I will say so.

7. I think it's personally insulting for Ashley James, or anyone else, to state that I (or anyone else that will be there) have already pre-determined the results. Or that we won't give other systems a fair listen. Or that we are biased so much that we will not be able to detect the relative sonic merits of each system. Or that our reporting will be anything less than 100% honest.

 

[Andrewjvt]

On cold plays ghost stories?

I could easy just playb 3tracks from that lp

 

[lpv]

On cold plays ghost stories?

I could easy just playb 3tracks from that lp

DR 6

 

[Ashley James]

That sounds entirely fair LindsayT and good on yer.

You have to admit though, that you have quite a few years invested in trashing poor old AVI.

in the circumstances it's good of you to man up.

Just got this from a customer watching a movie in Nova Scotia.

 

[shadders]

Hi,

Does anyone have the technical measurement data of the AVI DM10 which includes those figures as per Hifi News, who provide THD at 100Hz, 1kHz, and 10kHz?.

Do the DM10's have a class A/B amplifier or a class D amplifier?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

I did post them on Pink Fish some years ago. They were for an earlier model, but they do show a typical THD for speakers (they don't vary much) and also that it is lower than in passivespassives, particularly so around the crossover. Search and you'll find it.

TBH it's a meaningless measurement because speakers don't vary much in THD and the dominant harmonically related stuff is higher than and masks nasties. you have to add an awful lot of harmonic distortion to a signal before you hear it.

The stuff that makes drivers sound different is in the Time Domain. Typically resonances in structure, or in air gaps and of course cone break up. This time related stuff isn't as loud as harmonic distortion, but it is a lot more obtrusive, which is why had a special driver designed.

Ours sounds much cleaner because cone distortions and bucklings are postponed to an octave above the crossover point and so anything that is suspect is 48dB down.

Hi Ashley,

I searched for the pink fish media posts, and if they are the photobucket site graphs, they are of such low resolution that I could not determine what was being presented.

So, you are stating that the THD of the AVI systems are the same as passive speakers of a reasonable design, but the AVI speakers use of active crossovers provide an 8th order filter, which reduces the speaker time domain specific distortions significantly more than a passive filter. Are we to assume that the passive filter is 4th order?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

What I thought I said clearly was that THD measurements of speakers don't tell you anything useful because the drivers all have similar amounts of harmonic distortion to one and other and this will dominate the measurement.

What I don't understand is if everyone who's heard or owns them says they're incredibly good including Sinar Baja who also says that they sound like the best headphones and not like any other speaker, even they've heard, you don't just go and listen a pair for yourself.

Once you know they're as described you can ask me why they are so different. Otherwise it sounds as though you're looking for the magic bullet that proves everything so many people have been saying for ten years is wrong. It's not going to happen.

The distortion plots were large and clear and of active and passive versions.

Hi Ashley,

Ok, Thanks. So, you are indicating that the THD distortion will be similar for both AVI and passive speakers. This then infers that the extra control the AVI amplifiers have (300x), from recollection, reduces those distortion aspects which are significantly less than THD measurements (else AVI THD will be smaller).

What specifically are those distortion mechanisms which are so low as to when they are reduced (300x ???), that the THD is not affected?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

1. Any competent active speaker will be more clear and better overall than passive speakers generally.

2. THD in our active electronics is overall 0.002%, which is dictated by the output devices in the power Amps.

3. Passive crossovers introduce very large amounts of distortion, all unpleasant. A good description is that they boom and Tizz. Good actives don't, so are much nicer to live with.

4. If you were to measure typical speaker drive units for THD, they'd all be about the same and not hugely better than 1%. Harmonic distortion, as the name implies is harmonically related to the fundamental tone. If the test tone is 1kHz then a driver will also produce up to 1% (just hypothesising) at 2kHz and less still at 3kHz. If you listen to the driver you'll struggle to hear it because it is 'in tune' with the fundamental.

However if you measure our DM10's Total noise and Harmonic distortion and it's 0.1% rising at lower frequencies, that doesn't tell you that all the electronics, crossover included are very low at 0.002%.

When we measured THD of ADM9s years ago, they were 10-15dB better than passives, but that's not enough of the story. It's much more complicated.

There's a big difference so far better to go and hear it than assume you can tell from one of an awful lot of tests and measurements we had to do to produce DM10s

I do hope this is clear now.

Ash

PS. Doctor CS posted an analysis of a passive crossover on our forum in the Reference Section. It showed that because a passive crossover was disconnecting the driver from the amp, damping could be as low as 1. Martin calculated the damping factor of our amps connected to a DM10 driver at 300. You can hear that.

Hi Ashley,

Thanks. What I am intrigued about is that at the relevant frequency, the crossover should look like a low impedance, sufficiently so, such that the damping factor should still be triple digits in the crossover passband.

If the AVI's are 10dB to 15dB lower in distortion, then this for current speakers which have 0.1% THD in general (Hifi News figures), would place them with a THD of 0.01%. Hence the reason I asked for the THD figures.

Regards,

Shadders.

 

[jcbrum]

I think it's personally insulting . . .

Ha, you are not a very good judge of what's personally insulting, judging by your previous posting record on various forums

The only exception to this is your regular contributions to the NVA forum (HiFi Subjectivist, run by Richard Dunn), where you seem completely at home as part of that gang. Insulting Marco, and AoS, is essential to their ethos, and perfectly appropriate given his history.

Probably best a fresh start is made, LindsayT, - good luck.

JC

 

[Ashley James]

Hi,

Does anyone have the technical measurement data of the AVI DM10 which includes those figures as per Hifi News, who provide THD at 100Hz, 1kHz, and 10kHz?.

Do the DM10's have a class A/B amplifier or a class D amplifier?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

I did post them on Pink Fish some years ago. They were for an earlier model, but they do show a typical THD for speakers (they don't vary much) and also that it is lower than in passivespassives, particularly so around the crossover. Search and you'll find it.

TBH it's a meaningless measurement because speakers don't vary much in THD and the dominant harmonically related stuff is higher than and masks nasties. you have to add an awful lot of harmonic distortion to a signal before you hear it.

The stuff that makes drivers sound different is in the Time Domain. Typically resonances in structure, or in air gaps and of course cone break up. This time related stuff isn't as loud as harmonic distortion, but it is a lot more obtrusive, which is why had a special driver designed.

Ours sounds much cleaner because cone distortions and bucklings are postponed to an octave above the crossover point and so anything that is suspect is 48dB down.

Hi Ashley,

I searched for the pink fish media posts, and if they are the photobucket site graphs, they are of such low resolution that I could not determine what was being presented.

So, you are stating that the THD of the AVI systems are the same as passive speakers of a reasonable design, but the AVI speakers use of active crossovers provide an 8th order filter, which reduces the speaker time domain specific distortions significantly more than a passive filter. Are we to assume that the passive filter is 4th order?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

What I thought I said clearly was that THD measurements of speakers don't tell you anything useful because the drivers all have similar amounts of harmonic distortion to one and other and this will dominate the measurement.

What I don't understand is if everyone who's heard or owns them says they're incredibly good including Sinar Baja who also says that they sound like the best headphones and not like any other speaker, even they've heard, you don't just go and listen a pair for yourself.

Once you know they're as described you can ask me why they are so different. Otherwise it sounds as though you're looking for the magic bullet that proves everything so many people have been saying for ten years is wrong. It's not going to happen.

The distortion plots were large and clear and of active and passive versions.

Hi Ashley,

Ok, Thanks. So, you are indicating that the THD distortion will be similar for both AVI and passive speakers. This then infers that the extra control the AVI amplifiers have (300x), from recollection, reduces those distortion aspects which are significantly less than THD measurements (else AVI THD will be smaller).

What specifically are those distortion mechanisms which are so low as to when they are reduced (300x ???), that the THD is not affected?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

1. Any competent active speaker will be more clear and better overall than passive speakers generally.

2. THD in our active electronics is overall 0.002%, which is dictated by the output devices in the power Amps.

3. Passive crossovers introduce very large amounts of distortion, all unpleasant. A good description is that they boom and Tizz. Good actives don't, so are much nicer to live with.

4. If you were to measure typical speaker drive units for THD, they'd all be about the same and not hugely better than 1%. Harmonic distortion, as the name implies is harmonically related to the fundamental tone. If the test tone is 1kHz then a driver will also produce up to 1% (just hypothesising) at 2kHz and less still at 3kHz. If you listen to the driver you'll struggle to hear it because it is 'in tune' with the fundamental.

However if you measure our DM10's Total noise and Harmonic distortion and it's 0.1% rising at lower frequencies, that doesn't tell you that all the electronics, crossover included are very low at 0.002%.

When we measured THD of ADM9s years ago, they were 10-15dB better than passives, but that's not enough of the story. It's much more complicated.

There's a big difference so far better to go and hear it than assume you can tell from one of an awful lot of tests and measurements we had to do to produce DM10s

I do hope this is clear now.

Ash

PS. Doctor CS posted an analysis of a passive crossover on our forum in the Reference Section. It showed that because a passive crossover was disconnecting the driver from the amp, damping could be as low as 1. Martin calculated the damping factor of our amps connected to a DM10 driver at 300. You can hear that.

Hi Ashley,

Thanks. What I am intrigued about is that at the relevant frequency, the crossover should look like a low impedance, sufficiently so, such that the damping factor should still be triple digits in the crossover passband.

If the AVI's are 10dB to 15dB lower in distortion, then this for current speakers which have 0.1% THD in general (Hifi News figures), would place them with a THD of 0.01%. Hence the reason I asked for the THD figures.

Regards,

Shadders.

i think you're getting hung up on the wrong distortions, but here's Dr CS's post minus illustrations

A while ago on this forum there was some discussion about loudspeaker crossover networks and the relative merits of the active and passive approach. This prompted me to investigate passive crossovers further.

First, some background:-

Loudspeaker drive units are designed to be driven by a very low impedance, and the published frequency response plots from the manufacturer will always be shown with the drive unit driven directly from an amplifier, without any intermediate crossover network. If the driving impedance is not low, the response will be adversely affected, and the amplifier will lose control over the speaker cone motion. The degree of control is termed 'damping' and is defined by a 'damping factor', which is simply the ratio of the nominal speaker impedance (usually 8 ohms) to the driving impedance. So for example, an amplifier having an output impedance of 0.5 ohms would have a damping factor of 16.

Amplifier designers generally strive to achieve a damping factor of 50 or more, and for good ones it can be several 100s. But what happens when you insert a passive crossover network in between the amplifier output and the speaker drive units ?

The effect of the passive crossover :-

To quantify this, we need to establish the impedance of the crossover network output, since this becomes the new driving impedance for the speaker unit. The plot below shows this impedance for a 2nd order passive Linkwitz-Riley crossover network with a crossover frequency of 2kHz.

As you can see, over most of the audio band the impedance is not very low, reaching a maximum value of 8 ohms at the 2kHz crossover frequency. By calculating the ratio of this impedance to 8 ohms, we can establish the effective damping factor when the crossover network is in circuit. This is shown in the plot below.

At 30Hz, the damping factor is a just about tolerable 34, but it drops sharply as the frequency is increased, dropping to less than 2 right from 500Hz to over 7kHz. At the 2kHz crossover frequency the damping factor is just 1 !

So what does this mean ?

The results show that a typical passive crossover has an absolutely disastrous effect on speaker damping. Over most of the audio band, the damping factor is very low, so the amplifier will have almost no control over the cone movement at all. Were it not for the mechanical self damping in the drive unit suspension, the cone would be flapping around wildly. As it is, the cone movement will certainly not be accurately following the applied signal voltage from the amplifier.

What about active crossovers ?

With an active speaker, the crossover network is connected at the amplifier inputs, and the amplifier outputs drive the speaker drive units directly. In this case, the excellent damping factor of the amplifiers is maintained, and the cone motion is accurately controlled at all frequencies. In the past, the main argument against the active speaker approach has been the cost. But these days, power transistors are cheap, so there really is no excuse !

 

[shadders]

Hi,

Does anyone have the technical measurement data of the AVI DM10 which includes those figures as per Hifi News, who provide THD at 100Hz, 1kHz, and 10kHz?.

Do the DM10's have a class A/B amplifier or a class D amplifier?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

I did post them on Pink Fish some years ago. They were for an earlier model, but they do show a typical THD for speakers (they don't vary much) and also that it is lower than in passivespassives, particularly so around the crossover. Search and you'll find it.

TBH it's a meaningless measurement because speakers don't vary much in THD and the dominant harmonically related stuff is higher than and masks nasties. you have to add an awful lot of harmonic distortion to a signal before you hear it.

The stuff that makes drivers sound different is in the Time Domain. Typically resonances in structure, or in air gaps and of course cone break up. This time related stuff isn't as loud as harmonic distortion, but it is a lot more obtrusive, which is why had a special driver designed.

Ours sounds much cleaner because cone distortions and bucklings are postponed to an octave above the crossover point and so anything that is suspect is 48dB down.

Hi Ashley,

I searched for the pink fish media posts, and if they are the photobucket site graphs, they are of such low resolution that I could not determine what was being presented.

So, you are stating that the THD of the AVI systems are the same as passive speakers of a reasonable design, but the AVI speakers use of active crossovers provide an 8th order filter, which reduces the speaker time domain specific distortions significantly more than a passive filter. Are we to assume that the passive filter is 4th order?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

What I thought I said clearly was that THD measurements of speakers don't tell you anything useful because the drivers all have similar amounts of harmonic distortion to one and other and this will dominate the measurement.

What I don't understand is if everyone who's heard or owns them says they're incredibly good including Sinar Baja who also says that they sound like the best headphones and not like any other speaker, even they've heard, you don't just go and listen a pair for yourself.

Once you know they're as described you can ask me why they are so different. Otherwise it sounds as though you're looking for the magic bullet that proves everything so many people have been saying for ten years is wrong. It's not going to happen.

The distortion plots were large and clear and of active and passive versions.

Hi Ashley,

Ok, Thanks. So, you are indicating that the THD distortion will be similar for both AVI and passive speakers. This then infers that the extra control the AVI amplifiers have (300x), from recollection, reduces those distortion aspects which are significantly less than THD measurements (else AVI THD will be smaller).

What specifically are those distortion mechanisms which are so low as to when they are reduced (300x ???), that the THD is not affected?

Thanks and regards,

Shadders.

1. Any competent active speaker will be more clear and better overall than passive speakers generally.

2. THD in our active electronics is overall 0.002%, which is dictated by the output devices in the power Amps.

3. Passive crossovers introduce very large amounts of distortion, all unpleasant. A good description is that they boom and Tizz. Good actives don't, so are much nicer to live with.

4. If you were to measure typical speaker drive units for THD, they'd all be about the same and not hugely better than 1%. Harmonic distortion, as the name implies is harmonically related to the fundamental tone. If the test tone is 1kHz then a driver will also produce up to 1% (just hypothesising) at 2kHz and less still at 3kHz. If you listen to the driver you'll struggle to hear it because it is 'in tune' with the fundamental.

However if you measure our DM10's Total noise and Harmonic distortion and it's 0.1% rising at lower frequencies, that doesn't tell you that all the electronics, crossover included are very low at 0.002%.

When we measured THD of ADM9s years ago, they were 10-15dB better than passives, but that's not enough of the story. It's much more complicated.

There's a big difference so far better to go and hear it than assume you can tell from one of an awful lot of tests and measurements we had to do to produce DM10s

I do hope this is clear now.

Ash

PS. Doctor CS posted an analysis of a passive crossover on our forum in the Reference Section. It showed that because a passive crossover was disconnecting the driver from the amp, damping could be as low as 1. Martin calculated the damping factor of our amps connected to a DM10 driver at 300. You can hear that.

Hi Ashley,

Thanks. What I am intrigued about is that at the relevant frequency, the crossover should look like a low impedance, sufficiently so, such that the damping factor should still be triple digits in the crossover passband.

If the AVI's are 10dB to 15dB lower in distortion, then this for current speakers which have 0.1% THD in general (Hifi News figures), would place them with a THD of 0.01%. Hence the reason I asked for the THD figures.

Regards,

Shadders.

i think you're getting hung up on the wrong distortions, but here's Dr CS's post minus illustrations

A while ago on this forum there was some discussion about loudspeaker crossover networks and the relative merits of the active and passive approach. This prompted me to investigate passive crossovers further.

First, some background:-

Loudspeaker drive units are designed to be driven by a very low impedance, and the published frequency response plots from the manufacturer will always be shown with the drive unit driven directly from an amplifier, without any intermediate crossover network. If the driving impedance is not low, the response will be adversely affected, and the amplifier will lose control over the speaker cone motion. The degree of control is termed 'damping' and is defined by a 'damping factor', which is simply the ratio of the nominal speaker impedance (usually 8 ohms) to the driving impedance. So for example, an amplifier having an output impedance of 0.5 ohms would have a damping factor of 16.

Amplifier designers generally strive to achieve a damping factor of 50 or more, and for good ones it can be several 100s. But what happens when you insert a passive crossover network in between the amplifier output and the speaker drive units ?

The effect of the passive crossover :-

To quantify this, we need to establish the impedance of the crossover network output, since this becomes the new driving impedance for the speaker unit. The plot below shows this impedance for a 2nd order passive Linkwitz-Riley crossover network with a crossover frequency of 2kHz.

As you can see, over most of the audio band the impedance is not very low, reaching a maximum value of 8 ohms at the 2kHz crossover frequency. By calculating the ratio of this impedance to 8 ohms, we can establish the effective damping factor when the crossover network is in circuit. This is shown in the plot below.

At 30Hz, the damping factor is a just about tolerable 34, but it drops sharply as the frequency is increased, dropping to less than 2 right from 500Hz to over 7kHz. At the 2kHz crossover frequency the damping factor is just 1 !

So what does this mean ?

The results show that a typical passive crossover has an absolutely disastrous effect on speaker damping. Over most of the audio band, the damping factor is very low, so the amplifier will have almost no control over the cone movement at all. Were it not for the mechanical self damping in the drive unit suspension, the cone would be flapping around wildly. As it is, the cone movement will certainly not be accurately following the applied signal voltage from the amplifier.

What about active crossovers ?

With an active speaker, the crossover network is connected at the amplifier inputs, and the amplifier outputs drive the speaker drive units directly. In this case, the excellent damping factor of the amplifiers is maintained, and the cone motion is accurately controlled at all frequencies. In the past, the main argument against the active speaker approach has been the cost. But these days, power transistors are cheap, so there really is no excuse !

Hi Ashley,

Thanks, I will run a simulation on the crossover.

Regards,

Shadders.

 

[spiny norman]

The design of the acoustics of this thread is such that if you listen very carefully, you can hear people whispering all the way across the other side as if they were sitting right next to you.

 

[John Duncan]

Is there an echo over there?

 

[Andrewjvt]

Is there an echo over there?

Can a starter of a thread request it to be locked?

 

[jcbrum]

JD - OMG

Don't tell me, Andrew Everard will come riding up next !

Pull the wagons into a circle boys . . .

JC

 

[richardw42]

I wonder if any of the participants have heard the track "Why So Serious ?" From The Dark Knight soundtrack, and do they think it's a good test piece ? ...

Was that the vinyl or CD version?

sometimes cd but mostly Spotify or iTunes Match.

Vinyl ? No chance. Although I have just bought the Demons are Back release of The Great Deceiver by Mortiis on vinyl) mainly because I forgot to buy the very limited hand printed poster when I saw him on tour and the limited lp came with a signed copy of the poster. Prob very few of these.

 

[lindsayt]

I wonder if any of the participants have heard the track "Why So Serious ?" From The Dark Knight soundtrack, and do they think it's a good test piece ? ...

Was that the vinyl or CD version?

sometimes cd but mostly Spotify or iTunes Match.

Vinyl ? No chance...

Why So Serious from The Dark Knight on CD: DR 8

On vinyl DR 15

 

[richardw42]

The crackles & pops must add the extra 7. Seriously though I have no ambition to get involved in that vinyl palava again.

 

[lindsayt]

I'm just finding it a little bit odd, and unexpected, that so many of the recommendations for test tracks have yellow or red DR ratings?

 

[richardw42]

Are you saying you only listen to green dr tracks Good music is good music.

Listen to. the Ugly Truth. I expect that is near 0 but it's still brilliant.

 

[lpv]

True, nevertheless I'm going reconsider my selection and choose some good music with high DR ( to avoid unnecessary...) got already some DR15 - 17

 

[Andrewjvt]

True, nevertheless I'm going reconsider my selection and choose some good music with high DR ( to avoid unnecessary...) got already some DR15 - 17

 

Songs?

 

[lindsayt]

Are you saying you only listen to green dr tracks Good music is good music.

Listen to. the Ugly Truth. I expect that is near 0 but it's still brilliant.

There's a time and a place for everything.

There's plenty of great music with dark green DR ratings.

We will have a room full of systems where the owners have invested a lot of time or money. We will be listening to the same tracks over and over again.

Might as well make the day as enjoyable as possible.

The most magical moments that this hi-fi hobby can ever provide is when you hear a great system that you've never listened to before, playing a great recording that you've never heard before, at a generous but not too loud a volume in a genre of music that you enjoy.

 

[steve_1979]

Is there an echo over there?

Long time no see John. Hope you're keep well.

Nothing's changed here while you've been away. *crazy*

 

[spiny norman]

Songs?

Never mind the quality, feel the bandwidth.