Has anybody ever added a Super Tweeter to their Klipsch speakers?

[vman71]

I was thinking about do this and wanted to get some feedback from those that have done this. I have a pair of Chorus II's and a pair of KLF-20's.

Thanks.

[Guest srobak]

You mean like one of these bullet tweeters? I don't know that I would advise that... if you thought some people thought Heritage lines were "harsh" before - these thing sound like two metal plates scraping against each other... *cringe*

[Mallette]

My K'horns and Cornwall came with really super tweeters...

Dave

[seti]

I want to hear one of these Tannoy super tweeters.

http://www.usspeaker.com/Tannoy%20Supertweeter-1.htm

[Brac]

Have you verified you can actually hear above 15khz?

Did you say something?

[jacksonbart]

Have you verified you can actually hear above 15khz?

Well if an amp can produce anomalies in frequencies above 20khz in such a manner as to eliminate it from contention as a valid amp, then who to say how high we can hear.

[Mallette]

Have you verified you can actually hear above 15khz?

Indeed. However, it is my belief (scientifically unsubstantiated by any available evidence of which I am aware) that the presence of harmonics that may be inaudible in themselves has impact on audible lower frequencies.

There has to be a reason why extremely wide frequency response recordings seem to be more "open" and "airy" than those that are restricted even though the "restriction" may be at frequencies many of us cannot hear directly.

Dave

[vman71]

Yes, I bought a pair of vintage JBL 075 Alnico V bullet tweeters and was thinking I could use them either with my KLF-20's or Chorus II's.

From somebody's description of the JBL 075 bullet tweeter:

"JBL developed the 075 as a "super-tweeter" to extend the high-frequency range of the larger midrange horns (using i.e. a 375 driver), or to be used as a tweeter in a two-way system with an "extended range" (i.e. D130) bass driver. The physical quality is superb - the front of the horn is machined aluminum, with a huge magnet of about 5 pounds, made from Alnico V. The rated frequency range is "from 2500 cps to beyond the limit of audibility". Its response is very even across its rated 90-degree dispersion angle. They are rated at 16 ohms, but rumor has it that all JBL 075s are the same impedance regardless of whether they say 8 ohms or 16 ohms."

[seti]

Have you verified you can actually hear above 15khz?

No I haven't but I'd like to give the pretty tweeter a spin anyway. If it is one thing I have learned it is to at least give everything you can a chance. I'd love to give these a spin.

[Mallette]

Mark:

>The acoustic side is not the same as the electrical side.

After I sent that it occured to me that, properly recorded, any such interactions would be audible on a CD even if caused by harmonics beyond the range of a CD.

Is that what you are saying?

As you know, I have come to believe through experiments to which you've been privy that the limitations of 16/44.1 are not as severe as what we've been served up had us believing. OTOH, there ARE audible differences in this sampling rate compared to higher resolutions.

In my case, I know I have little after 13khz in one ear and barely 15khz in the other, so I remain mystified as to why I can hear these differences.

Regards,

Dave

[Don Richard]

Have you verified you can actually hear above 15khz?

Thats what I'm talkin' about!

Don

Honk if you love Horns

[Marvel]

As you know, I have come to believe through experiments to which you've been privy that the limitations of 16/44.1 are not as severe as what we've been served up had us believing. OTOH, there ARE audible differences in this sampling rate compared to higher resolutions.

In my case, I know I have little after 13khz in one ear and barely 15khz in the other, so I remain mystified as to why I can hear these differences.

So I guess you wouldn't be interested in the Sonoma recording system, which does 32 channels of DSD at 2.8Mhz. Smooth and transparent is the way it is described.

Bruce

[Mallette]

Bruce:
I like the SACD spec, but recorders have been way too expensive and there is (to my knowledge) no way of distributing the files without transcoding to PCM or making a SACD disc, for which almost nobody has a player.

My plan at the moment is to acquire a Sound Devices 744T, about 4k new. It's good to 24/192X4 and I believe that is about all the resolution anybody needs (not that I wouldn't use more if there was more...more is good, and how can I know what YOU hear?).

Further, even with my limitations I seem to be able to detect nuances and such that many younger ears miss entirely. My goddaughter and her husband are nerd/geek/artists (she owns a highly successful web design studio) and they listen to new age music mp3's all day. They get irritated when I ask just how they can stand the sound of castrated music grating on their ears constantly. They have no idea what I am talking about. I do not understand it.

As a young man my hearing extended well into the ultrasonic to at least 22khz. I could clearly hear "silent" audio based motion detectors in banks and such (actually quite painful when I stepped right under one). Wish I still had that problem, but I wonder if I don't at least still have the memory.

Dave

[maxg]

I have heard those Tannoy super tweeters - but only on larger Tannoy's.

As far as I know they only come in at about 20 KHz - which is way beyond my hearing (16 KHz when last tested - about 2 years ago).

Funny thing is - they do make a slight difference to the sound - even to me. God only knows why....

[seti]

I have heard those Tannoy super tweeters - but only on larger Tannoy's.

As far as I know they only come in at about 20 KHz - which is way beyond my hearing (16 KHz when last tested - about 2 years ago).

Funny thing is - they do make a slight difference to the sound - even to me. God only knows why....

That is interesting. Did you get to hear one of the big Prestige line Tannoy's? This is on my list of just gotta hear speakers.

[Daddy Dee]

I'd like to compare the super tweeter to the CT125, which I know to be killer. If you can improve on that, more power to you.

[Coytee]

This seems like a good place to ask this. I once asked it 20 years ago in college... well...actually 25 years ago [:$] (damn time flies!)

If you have a tweeter that will play to 20khz and another that will play to 40khz ( just using round numbers for reference)

Then it seems to me the 40khz tweeter will oscilate faster because it goes higher, right?

So, if the 40khz tweeter can move faster, have a quicker motor & all that stuff... would it also then follow that the 40khz tweeter would be able to "fill in" the sound more accurately at 15khz where the 20khz tweeter, not being as "quick" might not fill in as accurately??

In other words, it's like painting a picture with a 4" brush verses a 1" brush. The 1" (being the 40khz tweeter) will allow you to fine tune more detail than the 4" brush would.

The gist of my logic would be that although you might not hear specifically above 15 or 20khz, that which you would directly hear would (or might be?) more accurate with a tweeter capable of playing to a higher frequency.

??

[Daddy Dee]

Mark:

>The acoustic side is not the same as the electrical side.

After I sent that it occured to me that, properly recorded, any such interactions would be audible on a CD even if caused by harmonics beyond the range of a CD.

Is that what you are saying?

As you know, I have come to believe through experiments to which you've been privy that the limitations of 16/44.1 are not as severe as what we've been served up had us believing. OTOH, there ARE audible differences in this sampling rate compared to higher resolutions.

In my case, I know I have little after 13khz in one ear and barely 15khz in the other, so I remain mystified as to why I can hear these differences.

Regards,

Dave

Test 1.

Two speakers:. One with 20khz level response, the other with a rolloff beginning at 15khz. Using an oscillator you confirm that you can only hear up to 14khz on either speaker.

Test 2.

One pair of speakers with level response to 20khz. Add 2 amplifiers. One that rolls off beginning at 15khz, the other has flat response to 250khz. They are otherwise the same circuit. Prediction: you will easily hear the difference between these amplifiers, even though you have previously shown that you can't hear above 15khz.

Mark,

The substitution on the amp side is interesting.

I think I've heard and appreciated differences between tweeters producing sound at frequencies beyond my hearing, but I don't understand why that should be the case.

What sort of thing is going on there?

[Mallette]

>I think I've heard and appreciated differences between tweeters producing sound at frequencies beyond my hearing, but I don't understand why that should be the case.

What sort of thing is going on there?

I am with you, DD. Mark has confirmed the phenomenon, but we still don't know WHY. It would effectly prove the point about 22khz being too low a cut off point for Redbook if you did this experiment with an amp that did not pass anything beyond 22khz and one that did and were able to clearly tell the difference.

Sure would like to understand the why of it...

Dave

[Deang]

What the heck is a "super" tweeter? A tweeter that goes 4kHz to 20kHz, or something that goes 8kHz to 40kHz? Some tweeters get the "super" designation from their marketing folks, but there isn't much "super" about them -- the Eminence APT driver that BEC uses is a good example of that. It's a good tweeter, but it's just a tweeter for cry'in out loud. When I think "super tweeter" I think about "bullet" tweeters -- very narrow dispersion -- coming at you like a laser beam out to 100kHz. Anyways, a tweeter that goes to 40kHz should have better transient response than one that goes out to 20kHz, so it's not necessarily the extended frequency response one is perceiving (especially if you can't hear past 15kHz). There is also the issue of attenuation -- if the tweeter you substitute or add on is a dB or two higher, you can easily be faked into thinking it's going higher. Filter slope is a big factor too -- if you add a "super" tweeter that goes out to 40kHz to one below it that goes out to 20kHz -- and you do it using a first order filter crossing over at 20kHz -- there is a load of overlapping energy between 10kHz and 20kHz. So again, the difference being heard probably doesn't have much to do with having FR out to 40kHz. Finally, don't forget about the power response and its role in what we hear -- the ratio of on and off-axis energy.

Leave your speakers alone unless you can test and verify and/or know what you're doing. Replacing caps in a crossover is one thing, changing/adding driver/horns is something else entirely.

"One pair of speakers with level response to 20khz. Add 2 amplifiers. One that rolls off beginning at 15khz, the other has flat response to 250khz. They are otherwise the same circuit. Prediction: you will easily hear the difference between these amplifiers, even though you have previously shown that you can't hear above 15khz."

Right, but it's not necessarily related directly to FR.