Jump to content

AA networks...


Schu

Recommended Posts

  • Klipsch Employees
On August 8, 2016 at 9:51 PM, Schu said:

 

In the past, I have always been an EQ'er... however, since aquiring the LSii's I have been listening to the system flat and trying to tune my ears to the way Klipsch built the system.

 

I spent a year listening to the AL-4's in this manner, and learned to really love the speakers as they left the factory. There really was only one thing that really bothered me, and that was the ringing and beaming of the mid/upper mid range areas of the sound. There were many times where the ringing was very agressive and left me squinting and wanting to turn the music down to try and tame the assault... never once did I try to EQ this characteristic back into line with the other aspects I was really enjoying, which were the beautiful in focus and tight low frequencies and the shimmering long decay times of the upper frequencies. I am quite sure I could tame the mid range if I did EQ the signal, but Ive also had bad experiences in the past with eq'ing where I managed to tame the sound to my liking, however it also killed any of the life and spatial qualities of the music.  

I don't understand what ringing and beaming mean.   

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Chief bonehead said:

I don't understand what ringing and beaming mean.   

It's sort of like a tuning fork which frequency hangs in the air or where you generate a sound when you take a wine glass and rub the rim with wet fingers you'llget that "humming". 

I believe the horn inside the Klipsch when hit with a certain frequency the actual metal will react to the frequency independent of the music and cause a  "ring" or "beam". There's a scientific term when an object is influenced by sound and creates a frequency. Forgot the term.

Perhaps someone can define it better. Hmmm.. maybe putting rubber rings around the horn wouldn't be a bad idea. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Chief bonehead said:

I don't understand what ringing and beaming mean.   

 

Very high directivity that assaults the hearing/listener with high frequency unpleasantness.

 

Some might consider secondary frequencies a characteristic of this also.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Rxonmymind said:

It's sort of like a tuning fork which frequency hangs in the air or where you generate a sound when you take a wine glass and rub the rim with wet fingers you'llget that "humming". 

I believe the horn inside the Klipsch when hit with a certain frequency the actual metal will react to the frequency independent of the music and cause a  "ring" or "beam". There's a scientific term when an object is influenced by sound and creates a frequency. Forgot the term.

Perhaps someone can define it better. Hmmm.. maybe putting rubber rings around the horn wouldn't be a bad idea. 

The horns are plastic not metal in the LaScala ll and how do you propose changing the crossovers would solve this type of ringing if it did happen?

 

miketn 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Rxonmymind said:

There's a scientific term when an object is influenced by sound and creates a frequency.

 

Sympathetic vibrations... They can resonate at a harmonic as well, but as Mike stated above, the composite resin horn in the LS II won't do that.

 

Beaming usually has to do with the polars of the horn/driver combination (I believe), where above a certain frequency the high frequency response becomes narrower. I don't design horns or speaker systems, so I'm just coughing up what I understand from reading.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Rxonmymind said:

It's sort of like a tuning fork which frequency hangs in the air or where you generate a sound when you take a wine glass and rub the rim with wet fingers you'llget that "humming". 

I believe the horn inside the Klipsch when hit with a certain frequency the actual metal will react to the frequency independent of the music and cause a  "ring" or "beam". There's a scientific term when an object is influenced by sound and creates a frequency. Forgot the term.

Perhaps someone can define it better. Hmmm.. maybe putting rubber rings around the horn wouldn't be a bad idea. 

 

Although many in this discussion are leaps and bounds ahead of me technically I would have to think, logically, that over the many years the cast horn used in the LS and KHorn was analyzed over and over for any overt problems such as ringing. And don't you think either PWK or Chief Bonehead would have isolated and corrected the issue? The change to the plastic horn was due to costs and from what I gather problems with or a lost casting for the metal horn, not due to ringing. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am sure you are correct. With the K400 in my LS firmly attached to the front baffle, I can't detect any ringing at all. If it were not mounted, that would be a totally different story. I also believe that the newer horns are more precise from piece to piece (my K400 horns have some awful ridges in them.

 

Bruce

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Rxonmymind said:

It's sort of like a tuning fork which frequency hangs in the air or where you generate a sound when you take a wine glass and rub the rim with wet fingers you'll get that "humming". 

A tuning fork sound is easily damped with thumb and forefinger.  I would think the shape of the horn would have more to do with its acoustic qualities, especialy beaming.  I have seen a chart of the "ringing" and it looks like an acoustic ringing caused by the compression driver behaving badly.  I'm sorry I don't remember where I saw that, it's better if you see if for yourself rather than hear a second-hand report.

 

Quote

I believe the horn inside the Klipsch when hit with a certain frequency the actual metal will react to the frequency independent of the music and cause a  "ring" or "beam".

If you take a bell and screw it down, it will not ring. 

 

There's a scientific term when an object is influenced by sound and creates a frequency. Forgot the term.

Resonance frequency. 

 

 

Quote

Perhaps someone can define it better. Hmmm.. maybe putting rubber rings around the horn wouldn't be a bad idea. 

 

Sorry, I know my comments above are somewhat rambling and argumentative, but I'm not trying to ramble.  That resonance is real and audibly noticeable to the point I took several steps to get rid of it in my CF-4's, which I was successful at.

 

That "beaming" is also real.  With some horns if they are pointed right at your ears you get a wonderful articulate sound, but if you move off-center by a foot the sound is less impactful.  You have to physically change the horn shape to change that beaming characteristic, no XO component change is going to affect that off-axis sound

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ringing means multiple things... I'd suggest choosing different words to clarify meaning.  The OP is describing his subjective experience which can be difficult to convey.  There even seemed to be contradictions in what you were saying but I might just not quite get what you were trying to say.  I've tried a lot of crossover variations in my Heritage speakers and it while some difference is usually immediately obvious it can take some time to decide what you like better.  There is usually pros and cons with anything.  

In the end... what makes you forget about listening to crossovers and you find yourself listening to the music?  That's when you know you've got something good!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had a tube amp that had too much gain in its original design and would overdrive 300-500hz.  It produced an uncomfortable sustaining sound that walked over the rest of the FR.  Nothing wrong with the horns in that case,  The amp designer reduced the gain of his amp on a successive version and also added a stepped attenuator for even more adjustability and that took care of the issue.  Is the gain structure of your system adjusted acceptably?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would love to hear Roy's description of the development and evaluation process for crossover networks and speaker voicing. When the decision was made to develop the AK-4 to replace the AK-3 it seems to have represented a significant change in how the crossover network is used to balance more attributes of the speaker system performance. In the case of the AK-4 and AL-4 being developed for existing systems, how many people were involved in the evaluation process, what are the discussions like, how closely does everyone agree before crossover voicing specs get locked in?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Klipsch Employees
8 hours ago, Rxonmymind said:

It's sort of like a tuning fork which frequency hangs in the air or where you generate a sound when you take a wine glass and rub the rim with wet fingers you'llget that "humming". 

I believe the horn inside the Klipsch when hit with a certain frequency the actual metal will react to the frequency independent of the music and cause a  "ring" or "beam". There's a scientific term when an object is influenced by sound and creates a frequency. Forgot the term.

Perhaps someone can define it better. Hmmm.. maybe putting rubber rings around the horn wouldn't be a bad idea. 

It takes a lot of acoustic energy to mimic what you hear when you tap on a horn. In in the case of where the 400/ 401 horn is use they are isolated from the bass freqs. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Klipsch Employees
8 hours ago, Schu said:

 

Very high directivity that assaults the hearing/listener with high frequency unpleasantness.

 

Some might consider secondary frequencies a characteristic of this also.

And that beaming can be made quite apparent when you have two acoustic sources covering the overlap band as is the case with shallow slope filters. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Klipsch Employees
8 hours ago, wdecho said:

There are tradeoffs with most everything. Just as Schu has stated, he has been listening for awhile without using an equalizer. With an equalizer you are listening to a lot of 5532 chips most certainly. With more components something is going to be lost. Some say more components "sucks the life out of music". A AA xover is about as simple as one gets unless one designs his own personal Xover for his speakers in his room. I would suggest Schu to try attenuating his mids 3db more with some resistors or L-pad to see what he thinks. Not hard to do and many find this simple fix sounds much better. Resistors are the least offensive electronic component right behind a straight piece of wire. There is no predicting how a one size fits all Xover is going to sound when you throw the room into the mix. No two rooms are alike. 

 

So we are willing to pay lots for caps and inductors and resistors and not willing to pay lots for a really good eq?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...