Ron’s New System

[cjfrbw]

Specs, can't remember where I found them.

 

[microstrip]

David Karmeli was right about the Tube Traps, at least in my situation. I prefer the sound without them.

Room treatments are not band aid. We can't expect that a couple of tube traps, arbitrary placed without any program or tough can forcefully ameliorate sound quality. IMO room treatment must be considered in an holistic way, considering the overall treatments, room, equipment and preference.

My room treatment has always been dynamic - I had to change it when switching speakers.

Edit - An old recipe : tune and set up the speakers without any room treatment. Improper room treatments can make set up very hard.

 

[Alrainbow]

Specs, can't remember where I found them.

Do these speakers use a line stage output into cross over including subs ?
so all is fed signal from preamp ?
I’m curious on this.
It seems Ron has plenty of knobs to turn lol.
Has anyone tried shutting down the subs and and move speakers to get timbre , natural tone and dynamics then add the subs ? just a direction to possible try

 

[Kingrex]

I feel the word "room treatment" almost has a negative connotation. But I do believe devices properly utilized around the room can be a game changer when it comes to getting good sound. I have a set of curtains to the left of my system that cover a large window set. Think 12 feet of window. On the other side of the room there is a pass through to the kitchen that is 4 feet by 8 feet. My room definitely sounds best when I bunch the curtains on the last 4 feet of window and slide a 4" thick pile of 2.4 lb fiberglass board insulation into the door space.

I think Ron would have been hella lucky to drop a new set of speakers in a new room and WOW, its all perfect. It never seems to be that easy. In 2 to 4 months he is going to be posting about some adjustments he made and how stellar it all sounds. And it will be stellar sounding.

 

[cjfrbw]

I don't think at 250 Hz crossover, the bass towers can be considered just 'subs', since the range includes the upper bass and lower midrange as well. Depending on the crossover choices, you might presume the bass towers are audible contributors up to 400 to 500 Hz.

 

[morricab]

Do these speakers use a line stage output into cross over including subs ?
so all is fed signal from preamp ?
I’m curious on this.
It seems Ron has plenty of knobs to turn lol.
Has anyone tried shutting down the subs and and move speakers to get timbre , natural tone and dynamics then add the subs ? just a direction to possible try

Reminds me of my infinity IRS betas, that also had active servo bass towers (had to supply your own amp though). The planar panels also had adjustments in the passive crossover…quite complicated to setup properly.

 

[morricab]

I don't think at 250 Hz crossover, the bass towers can be considered just 'subs', since the range includes the upper bass and lower midrange as well. Depending on the crossover choices, you might presume the bass towers are audible contributors up to 400 to 500 Hz.

Maybe partially why they went with 8 inch woofers?

 

[cjfrbw]

Being able to sense spatial information with some reasonable clarity starts at 200 Hz or so, so the bass towers do contain spatial and imaging information at that crossover point of 250 Hz.

 

[morricab]

Being able to sense spatial information with some reasonable clarity starts at 200 Hz or so, so the bass towers do contain spatial and imaging information at that crossover point of 250 Hz.

When I did my planar hybrids I picked a 10 inch woofer with a good smooth roll off (no breakup) at 1khz. I crossed at 300 with 2nd order with my Accuphase F25, driving both drivers with KR Audio VA-350i amps . Having a plastic sandwich woofer with very smooth roll off I think really helped the blend.

 

[Alrainbow]

Gary’s super subs have three sizes and to me the most articulated low freq
Even his small one pc model was amazingly transparent. I never new 200 hertz had any spacial ques good to know. but I still feel it’s easier to start with less drivers.
my Maggie’s having the tweeters turned off allowed a faster starting point
with no tweeters it’s grungy until you get close to good timbre. This makes it simpler
Then so many tones all at once to decern.
ron said he thinks he hears a bass boost at a given freq
I think while he maybe correct having mids
Too loud or tweeters can mask issues.
the Maggie’s were hard to get well but once I turned of the upper it was much more to work towards

 

[Alrainbow]

Reminds me of my infinity IRS betas, that also had active servo bass towers (had to supply your own amp though). The planar panels also had adjustments in the passive crossover…quite complicated to setup properly.

An industry pro told me this. Use or try the amp output to your speakers for bass amps
it’s simple to do. This then follows the amps
Sound as the speakers affect it. Less playing with the sub gain

 

[Lagonda]

Room treatments are not band aid. We can't expect that a couple of tube traps, arbitrary placed without any program or tough can forcefully ameliorate sound quality. IMO room treatment must be considered in an holistic way, considering the overall treatments, room, equipment and preference.

My room treatment has always been dynamic - I had to change it when switching speakers.

Edit - An old recipe : tune and set up the speakers without any room treatment. Improper room treatments can make set up very hard.

Let us not forget that Ron prepare the room to be a listening room from the get go, wall stuffing, natural wood and special flooring/carpet included ! I would not expect his room to sound bad.

 

[soliver]

Lagunda, I would actually make that assumption, not that it would be horrible but certainly not at it‘s best.
I had a close friend who built a purpose built listening room, and prior to committing to the plans he had an acoustician assist. So he gets his new room months later and finally get‘s his equipment installed and fired up. He invited me over shortly thereafter and it was awful. There was a huge bass hump amongst other things, my friend was pissed because he had paid for a perfect room. The AcousticIan was called back out and he recommended some absorption panels at certain spots in the room, I helped my friend build them and install them and those helped immensely. The last touch was he added a center diffuser block from RPG acoustics. There might have been a few others but those were the big ones and it made all the difference. I think Mike Lavigne and other people who hired his design company experienced the same thing. That company tended to over damp everything, my friends system started underdamped, which I think I would always prefer, because you have at least not paid for products you have not ever needed.

 

[soliver]

Secondly big drops in ceiling height can be a big issue. I’ve never experienced one like Ron’s, but I have heard a big ceiling drop height right in front of the listening position. That drop pretty much disqualified that system for best sound, no matter the equipment , and he has a million plus invested. Last I heard he is undergoing a major remodel, to get rid of the major design flaws for a good listening room.

 

[Lagonda]

Secondly big drops in ceiling height can be a big issue. I’ve never experienced one like Ron’s, but I have heard a big ceiling drop height right in front of the listening position. That drop pretty much disqualified that system for best sound, no matter the equipment , and he has a million plus invested. Last I heard he is undergoing a major remodel, to get rid of the major design flaws for a good listening room.

It's hard to tell how a drop in ceiling hight will affect the sound until you hear it, but high ceilings are normally an advantage for big powerful system, the adjustability of the system will come in handy.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Lagunda, I would actually make that assumption, not that it would be horrible but certainly not at it‘s best.
I had a close friend who built a purpose built listening room, and prior to committing to the plans he had an acoustician assist. So he gets his new room months later and finally get‘s his equipment installed and fired up. He invited me over shortly thereafter and it was awful. There was a huge bass hump amongst other things, my friend was pissed because he had paid for a perfect room. The AcousticIan was called back out and he recommended some absorption panels at certain spots in the room, I helped my friend build them and install them and those helped immensely. The last touch was he added a center diffuser block from RPG acoustics. There might have been a few others but those were the big ones and it made all the difference. I think Mike Lavigne and other people who hired his design company experienced the same thing. That company tended to over damp everything, my friends system started underdamped, which I think I would always prefer, because you have at least not paid for products you have not ever needed.

my designer was Chris Huston. Chris did design in lots of extra bass traps, telling me at the beginning that it's not possible to know how much bass trapping might be needed, but that it's much easier to remove them than to add them later. over a 10 year period i did one by one eliminate all of those traps, except for the -4- floor to ceiling traps along the rear wall. the other design concept was retaining energy, which the room surely did. all diffusion, minimal absorption. in the end i needed to add surface cloth treatments to fine tune the room after i evolved enough myself to know where i was going.

i had no big bass hump at the beginning. and i did not have an acoustician assist, my room was ground up designed by Chris and built to spec within a 1/4" by my contractor, including the structural details. but it was in a separate building from my home, a room within a room. lots of interaction between my contractor and Chris including a visit mid project.

the bones of the room were perfect. i do have a drop ceiling with large recesses which i have treated with added diffusion. but these recesses are symmetric, and are part of why my bass is so smooth.

rooms do need to get lived in and adapted to the chosen evolving system. rooms with large speakers and lots of live-ness don't hatch fully grown, they grow up into what they become. my room is oval, it's sealed, and it's totally symmetric. rooms that are living areas first, and listening rooms second maybe have compromises in that single-minded ness, but make up for it in lifestyle appeal. no one right way to do it.

i'm sure over time Ron will minimize the sonic effect of his ceiling imbalance one way or another.

 

[morricab]

Being able to sense spatial information with some reasonable clarity starts at 200 Hz or so, so the bass towers do contain spatial and imaging information at that crossover point of 250 Hz.

Well middle C is 261 Hz...I would call that midrange already.

 

[Alrainbow]

It’s simple to try this by using tones.
I have a yes you can tell where it’s coming from unlike 100 hertz tones. but the question is with music playing can you tell if it’s just one driver left or right. To me yea.
but I do feel Ron’s system needs to be changed slowly and with no sub at first to get things close then add them back.

 

[Alrainbow]

No subs
Seat is 2/3 from front wall
1/3 behind them.
no absorbing or min you can add diffusion later to try
have inside tweets not cabinets but drivers about the same distance as where you sit
then move them closer and more apart making notes as you go.
no tow in at first varying volumes at some
Point his room might become reflective tow in helps this and later absorption to try
Gary has a wonderful detailed set up on his website even has tracks to use.
i went to a demo in New Jersey
Really nice audio showroom
Gary demoed his one tower set up.
just a half turn on the floor spikes made a very large difference. So imagine all
Ron’s knobs and moving the speakers lol.

I would use his at least to start
Years i asked how to set mine up only Gary and one of his buddies gave me solid advice that worked and can be reproduced over and over
I even asked Paul ps audio how to help Arnie said just keep moving them
Lol. so not true we must have a process to guide us.edit I really don’t know what armies reply was as this came from
Paul.
when I had my cross over made new it was designed by Arnie very much as old but new updated parts. Now external when it was voiced Arnie felt the mids were being over driven on the low end side he made a removable tap to use if needed. now Paul best I know did not use this but each room is not the same.
While I disliked Arnie for many years due to my having little to no idea how to sw these up and room sizing , once I found a few willing to help me and key was they really knew how. I grew to have tremendous respect for him and his audio achievements
this leads me
Gary in my view is an amazing talent for making improvements on already complex systems
to me it’s easy to blame the designer for issues and being ignorant as I was makes it perfect


Ron’s system is very complex
And I feel wish him well in his journey
ron keep making changes but you need a process to follow with known songs each having a purpose to use them.
just saying

 

[Kingrex]

Like I said earlier, how amazimg would it be to drop a large speaker into a living room, or any room for that matter and TADAAA, it's spot on. I think Al and others are correct. It is going to sound amazig one day. Its just going to take time to figure it all out. Ron is one step ahead of many in that he knows how to use a mic and measure the room.