Newbie Type Qs RE Cornscalas and LaScalas

[nola]

Newbie Type Qs RE Cornscalas and LaScalas

 

This was prompted by a PM from another forum member, regarding SEOS CSs. In brief, if you already have a LS or CS (or other similar Altec, etc) why bother to change anything (besides horns, drivers, etc, like many of us do) if you have a sub? I am excluding the desire to tinker, which you have by definition if you are on the Forums - and that is likely why most of you are reading this post. If you are getting your first larger speakers, that is a different issue. Best to audition some first, realizing that most folks out there likely have no means to do this in the real world, especially in an A-B fashion.

 

I have LaScalas and Heresys in a 550 sq ft place in the DC area, the rest of my stuff is still in NOLA. My single Fender 18” driver ported pro sub is roughly the size of a LaScala. Nice thick walls up North...LOL.

 

I took a look at some SEOS CS webpages including diysoundgroup dot com  where the SEOS waveguides or horns are listed and also looked at their LS or CS equiv, the Titan 615/615LX - under $600 each shipped !!  Incredibly flat response from 100->15000 Hz; too good to be true? Several different curves below 100 Hz found in diff places. Let’s assume they roll off at 60 Hz. I assume bass bin size relates, perhaps not directly, to low end extension, eg 18” cubed maybe to 100 Hz, 25 x 25 x 12 (Titan) to around 60 Hz, 25” cubed (LS or CS) to around a 35-50 Hz roll off). The Titan bass bin size is maybe 40% of a LS bass bin size. So maybe if they had used a bigger (ported) bass bin maybe they could have gotten lower bass extension like the CS or LS. Perhaps that would also have required a different bass driver, xover, etc. But as stated below, add a sub, and you are done.

 

And yes, I realize that this does not take into consideration tonality of the speakers, their “size” presence either in the room (almost “triangle” yard for K-horn) or whether you seem to be listening to a 10 piece band (K-horn) vs 2 high school kids (bad tower speakers), etc.

 

One major Q: If you have sub that matches your speakers, whatever that means, what difference does it make to have lower bass extension from the mains? (No flame wars please, just looking for information.) Mind you I have big speakers per the above comment, but not directly for the bass extension. I resisted the “dark side” for decades as I thought the bass from the LSs and K horns was enough. I was very wrong. I am a bass a holic with many 15 and 18” subs, but no furnature/couch bass shakers (LOL).

 

The CS adds about 10 HZ lower extension from the lower limit of the LS at the price of going from about 104 to 100 db/watt according to Crites' CS a-d webpage. Likely not a big deal to most of us with at least ?20+ watt tube amps. No doubt that is of some importance to some folks. However, if you have sub(s), does it really matter as you can program a receiver to output anything, say below 60 HZ to the sub(s)?

If your audio receiver cannot do that, a dedicated sub amp can do that in almost all cases. (Though mains will run full spectrum, see below)

Exception: I have thought of directly coupling the output of a turntable preamp to a stereo only amp and then directly into R and L speakers. But even here you could Y split the TT preamp output to add the sub amp as well. All you would lose is the ability to filter out the lower bass extension for the mains. It is only a guess, but I don't think the overlap, say below 40-80 HZ would be too noticeable to most of us (based upon whatever you use as the sub amp bass cutoff point). Outside of using maybe a Radio Shack Potentiometer, no idea how to control the volume inexpensively and ?cleanly. It makes the signal path as clean as possible (I think) - assuming that makes much of an audible difference to anyone. No remotes, so no couch potatoes.

 

Just my 2 cents.

Comments welcome.

NOLA