denpuresound's quest for speakers

[davef]

Curtis, not so per Philharmonic Audio PH3's web site, it specifically states above 200Hz. and explains why, and are "Anechoic" measurements. Read down under Freq. Response and Impedance Measurements on the first page.

Dennis,

You are incorrect. Those are not chamber measurements, DM does not have an anechoic chamber -- very few loudspeaker companies / designers actually do. It is BECAUSE the measurements stop at 200Hz why they were not taken in a chamber

If they were in a true anechoic chamber, they would extend down accurately to 40Hz or below (depending on what the chamber is actually tuned to)

You do not need an anechoic chamber to take accurate anechoic measurements. Curtis is correct, the measurements are pseudo-anechoic or sometimes called quasi-anechoic. With the proper equipment and knowledge, reflections can be gated out of the response by calculating a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) on a limited time domain window (impulse response), typically 5-7 milliseconds in length. Anything outside of this window size is meaningless. In addition, the smaller the gate time the less resolution in the actual measurement so while we are removing reflections from the measurement, we are also limiting resolution of the entire measurement. It is because of this why we still prefer to use MLSSA systems for our measurement gear. MLSSA offers an "Adaptive Window" mode which allows it to maintain excellent resolution in gated measurements. However, MLSSA is brutally expensive and requires years of experience as it is absolutely NOT user friendly. It is, however, still used extensively and considered an industry standard.

There are as many techniques to obtaining accurate gated measurements as there are measurements themselves. It is because of confusion/misunderstanding like this why I mentioned comparing measurements from one manufacturer to another is often meaningless. I can make a loudspeaker look fantastic in one method or poorly in another.

Compare manufacturer claimed anechoic measurements to actual NRC measurements (taken in a true chamber.) You are going to see many surprising differences.

Hope this makes sense.

Please take any further discussion of the matter off-line. This thread is about the Sierra Towers.

[billy p]

As usual Dave, handled with class!

[RicardoJoa]

Also, for a $3K pair of speakers, there are about 15 Plots or so for a potential buyer to digest. Extensive data is shown (approx. 15 or so Plots) even for their Phil 1 and 2's at around $2K/Pair.

Well, there are 0 graphs for customers or potential client for the $4000+ Salk ht2tl and there are MILLIONS of happy customers, what is your point?

If you dig deep enough there are actually "graphs" of the standard sierra towers.

[DenPureSound]

Well, there are 0 graphs for customers or potential client for the $4000+ Salk ht2tl and there are MILLIONS of happy customers, what is your point?

If you dig deep enough there are actually "graphs" of the standard sierra towers.

Not correct at all. There are tests if you go to the Salk web site, and click on Measurements of the HT2-TL, then you will see some plots!

Also, J. Salk has NOT SOLD Millions of those either, way OFF base.

If you have data showing how many SongTowers, HT2-TL, HT3, SS10 and SS12's have been sold bring it forward, as your Magnitude associated with the number of sales for these models is way off the mark, Salk is not Sony.

Also, the NHT Absolute Zero's specs go right against the Sierra 1's, and are even more Ruler Flat +/-1db and they sell for $200 per speaker! The Sierra 1's have a large dip at 3kHz. vs. the NHT's.

So, what was your incorrect point all about?

[Sam1000]

Not correct at all. There are tests if you go to the Salk web site, and click on Measurements of the HT2-TL, then you will see some plots!

Also, J. Salk has NOT SOLD Millions of those either, way OFF base.

If you have data showing how many SongTowers, HT2-TL, HT3, SS10 and SS12's have been sold bring it forward, as your Magnitude associated with the number of sales for these models is way off the mark, Salk is not Sony.

Also, the NHT Absolute Zero's specs go right against the Sierra 1's, and are even more Ruler Flat +/-1db and they sell for $200 per speaker! The Sierra 1's have a large dip at 3kHz. vs. the NHT's.

So, what was your incorrect point all about?

Hi Dennis:
Looks like you will be really happy with $200 NHT Absolute. I'm not sure why you are wasting your time on this and other numerous other forums unless you have an hidden agenda. Buy your reference FR speaker(NHT), dial in your room with iAudioInterface and be done with it. You will come out light years ahead of all of us. Don't forget to share your in room response of your ruler flat speaker.
Sorry guys for feeding the troll here. This is my last post replying to him.

[DenPureSound]

Hi Dennis:
Looks like you will be really happy with $200 NHT Absolute. I'm not sure why you are wasting your time on this and other numerous other forums unless you have an hidden agenda. Buy your reference FR speaker(NHT), dial in your room with iAudioInterface and be done with it. You will come out light years ahead of all of us. Don't forget to share your in room response of your ruler flat speaker.
Sorry guys for feeding the troll here. This is my last post replying to him.

Last post here, off to NHT and Revel Salon 2's. No hidden agenda, just FACTS.

[billy p]

Last post here, off to NHT and Revel Salon 2's. No hidden agenda, just FACTS.

You probally suffer from hearing damage having listened to those Klipsch all those yrs....

[RicardoJoa]

Not correct at all. There are tests if you go to the Salk web site, and click on Measurements of the HT2-TL, then you will see some plots!

Also, J. Salk has NOT SOLD Millions of those either, way OFF base.

If you have data showing how many SongTowers, HT2-TL, HT3, SS10 and SS12's have been sold bring it forward, as your Magnitude associated with the number of sales for these models is way off the mark, Salk is not Sony.

Also, the NHT Absolute Zero's specs go right against the Sierra 1's, and are even more Ruler Flat +/-1db and they sell for $200 per speaker! The Sierra 1's have a large dip at 3kHz. vs. the NHT's.

So, what was your incorrect point all about?

Well ok, im seriously not seeing the "measurement" page of Salk you are refering. Could you refer me to it? Dont get me wrong im not bashing about Salk at all. And Jim should know better. My point is, not every one who buy speaker need to have some sort of measurement that they can see.

As far millions HT2tl sold, im just joking, my point is, there are quiet a lot of happy customers.

The Sierra dip @3Khz are in between 2.5KHZ-3.5KHZ, I see around 3-3.5 db dip on it. A FR withing +/-1db could still have a 2 db dip. The good thing is Dave had published everything and nothing is hidden. The $2000 Songtower has dip too and i dont see any one complaining. In fact the nht will go against alot of other speaker that fall within +/_3 range not just the sierra. Though i cant find that piece of info on their site.

[edmondwolfman]

Well ok, im seriously not seeing the "measurement" page of Salk you are refering. Could you refer me to it? Dont get me wrong im not bashing about Salk at all. And Jim should know better. My point is, not every one who buy speaker need to have some sort of measurement that they can see.

As far millions HT2tl sold, im just joking, my point is, there are quiet a lot of happy customers.

The Sierra dip @3Khz are in between 2.5KHZ-3.5KHZ, I see around 3-3.5 db dip on it. A FR withing +/-1db could still have a 2 db dip. The good thing is Dave had published everything and nothing is hidden. The $2000 Songtower has dip too and i dont see any one complaining.

I've actually seen at least 1 poster, quite knowledgible in the audio field state that he wished the speaker he was listening to at home had a slight dip in the 2.5kHz - 3.5kHz range as that is the part that comes across as too forward for him on most recordings.

My 2.1 channel music has no equilization or tone controls but just for "testing" I have run through my Denon 3808 and used the manual equalization to lower settings in that band (2.5 to 3.5) and I can say on a lot of recordings I actually also preferred the music with my artificial dip in that area.

[davef]

Also, the NHT Absolute Zero's specs go right against the Sierra 1's, and are even more Ruler Flat +/-1db and they sell for $200 per speaker! The Sierra 1's have a large dip at 3kHz. vs. the NHT's.

You are joking, right? Do you really think the NHT Absolute Zero specs are comparable to our Sierra-1 or are you just trolling? Actually, the Absolute Zero, while indeed a great speaker for the money, is comparable to our $100 less per pair, HTM-200SE.

Where do you get +/-1 dB for the AZ? I don't see any measurements on NHT's site Here is the only 3rd party measurement I can find of the zero: http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/art...ystem?page=0,3 That response is certainly not +/- 1dB and I see a fairly prominent dip at 1.5kHz followed by a nasty peak (dips followed by even larger peaks are typically quite annoying to listen too) -- and these measurements are extensively smoothed to 1/3 octave.

Shall we examine... Sierra-1 vs Absolute Zero

Bamboo cabinet vs MDF?
-3dB point of 44Hz vs -3dB at 77Hz (and I have my doubts about this)
20 pound speaker vs 8 pound speaker?
100 watt peak power handling vs 200-400 watts

The two speakers are in entirely different leagues.

That said, if you are serious about the zero's and not simply trolling, why haven't you considered our CBM-170 or even answered the questions I have asked of you? Here are verifiable 3rd party chamber measurements: http://www.soundstagemagazine.com/me...ascend_cbm170/ and you will notice that the measurements they took match ours.

The 170 is in an elite group of 3-4 speakers representing the flattest loudspeaker ever measured by SoundStage at the NRC. The listening window and on-axis measurements are at worst, +/- 1dB and with even a minor bit of research, you will quickly learn that our 170's have become the speaker of choice for various universities and research scientists due to its remarkable "accuracy"...

Still, for me and for nearly all of our customers who have compared the two speakers directly, -- the vast majority of listeners prefer the Sierra-1. Why do you think that is? Certainly the on-axis posted measurements favor the 170's (and a pair of these still cost less than the Zero's and also provide better overall specs)

The Sierra 1's have a large dip at 3kHz. vs. the NHT's

Actually, the dip in the response at 3.25kHz is a diffraction artifact and even basic knowledge of loudspeaker design and sound propagation would reveal this. Do the math yourself... the cabinet width is 7.5 inches with 3/8" roundover edges and the tweeter is center positioned. This translates to an equivalent baffle width of 8.25". This places the tweeter position at 4.125" which effectively means that the tweeter sees (2) diffraction edges at 4.125". 4.125" is equivalent to a wavelength of.......(cue drum roll) ~3.2kHz.

Because this dip is due to diffraction, the dip completely disappears off-axis, as evidenced by the Sierra-1's remarkable off-axis measurements.

Dennis, if we are going to continue down this path I would very much like you to share with us your definition of accuracy and how it relates to your interpretation of what you have described as loudspeaker facts.

For example, with regard to your definition of accuracy:

What do you expect to see in an on-axis frequency response graph and what is acceptable to you with regard to how the measurement was taken?

What do you expect to see in horizontal off-axis measurements? What about vertical?

What is the acceptable bandwidth of the speaker?

What is the acceptable dynamic range of the speaker and how accurate must the speaker produce transients?

And what about cabinet resonance modes? How inert must the cabinet be? What about acceptable rub and buzz levels? For example, a tweeter with a high level of “buzz” can certainly measure as flat as a non buzzing tweeter but since it is producing unwanted levels of excess noise – I know that I would not call it accurate even though its on- and off-axis response measurements are perfect…


And finally, from other posts I have read – you loved the way your Klipsch speakers sounded and it was only until you learned that they did not measure as flat on axis as you would have liked (did not meet your interpretation of accuracy) that you began your hunt for what you consider to be more accurate speakers.

I would say your Klipsch are amongst some of the most dynamically and transient accurate speakers available in their price range. If your goal is purely frequency response accuracy, look no further than our CBM-170 (it is tough to beat.) If your goal is a combination of (with sacrifices of course) response accuracy, dynamics, resolution and transients – our Sierra Towers are an excellent choice. If you want pure accuracy in all aspects, I recommend purchasing a superb 500 watt amplifier and a pair of TAD Reference 1’s and be done with it. Although don’t be surprised if those Reference 1’s have a few dips in the on-axis response – all coaxial drivers do but they provide superior off-axis response. Which is more accurate