Peaches,
Thanks for the brief discussion on TS and also the links.
Let me give you a little preface of what I listen to and what I am trying to accomplish.
My music collection is pretty eclectic. I have classical, jazz, funk, blues, etc. I spent almost two decades living in San Francisco in my 20s and 30s. I went to many live shows - it was a great place for live music. Small venues, great sound, and great acts. I can't count how many Jerry Garcia shows I saw at the Warfield, also Nirvana, Eric Clapton, Pink Floyd, Santana, the Squeeze. I also had season tickets to the Opera and was fortunate to see Pavarotti in the very early 90s in San Francisco. I saw the greatest living guitar trio live in San Francisco (Di Meola, McLaughlin, de Lucia). I was able to sit front row to see Jimmy Smith jam on the Hammond B3 and also a host of other great jazz musicians. During this time I was a taper. I had some "Core" mics clipped to my hat and wore a Sony DAT in my pocket. I couldn't get enough of LIVE music, jazz, rock, opera, classical. If there was soul and good sound I was there.
Well decades pass, you get married, have a child and move to somewhere that doesn’t have the exciting music scene. It certainly was a good move as I got on in age and a better environment to raise my son.
We finally purchased a house (out of foreclosure) and it needs fixing up. My stereo has really consisted of some Grado Lab headphones and headphone amp. It sounds great and has done the job, but I really wanted to build a dedicated system to listen to my huge collection of music.
I am a detailed investigator by nature and will take forever scouring information and creating spreadsheets and creating flowcharts. My next task was to build (on a limited budget) a stereo system to play my music - but the most important element (for me) was having a wide and live sounding sound stage. The sound stage was most important for me.
I listened (over the last few months) to many speakers - all kinds and even joined an audiophile club (listening to systems well into the 10s of thousands). Then I heard my first open baffle speaker, the Emerald Physics. I was shocked, the sound did NOT seem if it was being driven from a point source, but rather more enveloping. It was the most live sounding speaker I had ever heard. I was told this was "sound stage" that I was experiencing. I became fascinated with the open baffle concept and read all matters on the subject. The Emerald Physics were out of my price range (starting at $5k). So I ventured elsewhere, like all newbie open baffle trekkers I ventured over to the great Linkwitz Lab. Talk about an encyclopedia of information, the guy is no doubt a genius and vastly experienced in the world of speakers, even has a cross over named after him and used in a majority of cross overs around the world. I was venturing down the road to build some Orion 3.4 (Linkwitz), but again I hit my price point wall. $1000 for the cross-over, over $2000k in speaker drivers, and not even a cabinet (baffles) yet. It would be well north of $4k when all was said and done and if I choose the handmade finished product it would be over $10k.
I finally settled on building the Phoenix Dipole speaker. Linkwitz posts the complete plans and information on how to build them. However, I ran into a problem - no sub-woofer (or woofer). He did have separate plans for the Thor, which I think I could also build. However, the sub/woofer is not a dipole configuration, but rather a H-forum and relying on very strict measurements for the sound wave. I gathered all the information, plans, and was about to contact the speaker company to order some drivers (about $1000 worth), then I decided to pause and look a little more. The holidays were upon me and I had no time to dabble with this, with friends & family about to visit and getting things ready for the season. I would put it off to until the New Year and continue my research.
I had been visiting audiocircle and diyaudio forums for a few months, lurking for the most part. I had heard of this cottage industry, Hawthorne Audio, which specialized in designed open baffle speakers for the DIYers (such as myself), but gave it little mind. I had zeroed my sights early on Linkwitz's website and thought that the "bible" of Open Baffle. I decided to read more about the Hawthorne speaker drive line-up. Read some great reviews and then found the Hawthorne Audio Forums. I lurked around reading this or that.
I contacted the owner of Hawthorne as well as a speaker designer. I even contacted my brother-in-law who works for Meyer Sound. It had seemed that Hawthorne had solved all the questions that were still rattling around in my mind. Mostly about the Sub-Woofer / Woofer and cross-overs. Seeing Darrel (owner of Hawthorne) actively involved in communications with his forum members and open to mods, suggestions, and advice - it seemed that Hawthorne was more of a corporative rather than follow the leader as with Linkwitz. No doubt Linkwitz is still one of the grandfathers of the Open Baffle industry, but he talks on such a high engineering level, that most of the stuff is far over my head. I know what I want to hear, but can't really follow the engineer speak to keep up with Linkwitz. I wish I could. It seemed that Hawthorne had more room for the newbies and also budget oriented folks like myself. I need a babysitter - this looked like a good place.
I ordered a set of Silver Iris Coaxal 15” drivers and the Augie 15” woofers.
So prior to my speakers I have been ordering my equipment. Let me give you a round down of my build, I welcome comments, thoughts and suggestions.
My Source:
FLAC audio (using Vortex Box OS)
Internet Radio (listen to SOMA:FM - that's my San Francisco Roots)
TEAC CD (just used as a transport) -
DAC is by-passed with optical out.
Interface:
Squeeze Box Touch (I use this as an interface between my FLAC and Internet Radio)
The DAC is by-passed as well.
DAC:
Emotive XDA-1- this handles all my Digital to Audio conversion. Squeeze box and TEAC connect into here - optical in. While I think it is one of the better DACs I have heard, I am still open to listening to others. This is critical for transferring digital to audio. From here on out it is all analog – I don’t want to re-process the signal again and try to keep it clean.
Pre-Amp:
Stereo Knight Silverstone B&R
http://www.stereoknight.com/ I became very interested in passive pre-amps, especially the TVC (Transformer Volume Control). There were only a handful of companies making them. One was Stereo Knight, I had a decent connection to picking one up for a very low cost and snagged it when I had the chance. I recommend reading about TVC passive preamps - your might find it interesting. Here is a review if you are interested:
http://www.adventuresinhifiaudio.com/14/08/2011/stereoknight-passive-magnetic-pre-amplifiers-part-one-the-silverstone-br-reference/
Crossover:
I spend lots of time looking at the popular Behringer DCX and also the MidiDSP. I was about to pull the trigger, but I found a logic bomb in my thought process. Both of these crossovers are DSP (Digital Signal Process) - that means it would take my analog signal, convert to digital and back to analog. That would make the DAC XDA superfluous, since the sound would now be reliant on the ability of the DSP cross over to convert analog to digital and back again, if my understanding is correct. While both excellent products (from the reviews I read), I decided - after a lengthy conversation with a tech person at Behringer, to choose the strictly analog crossover CX3400 (which was also cheaper).
AMPS:
Emotiva - I purchased two UPA-2 AMPs
http://emotiva.com/upa2.shtm on sale. I was thinking about getting a third to tri-amp. I am also looking to building a SPUD AMP and have a kit in mind.
Speakers:
Hawthorne Well I just ordered 2x SI Coax 15" and 2x Augie 15".
I suspect I will build my system in a couple of phases (I welcome comments and suggestions)
Phase one: DUET configuration.
One UPA-2 amp will power the SI Coax 15" using it's passive crossover.
One UPA-2 amp will power the Augie 15"
The crossover will be set in 2-way mode.
Phase two: TRIO configuration
Purchase a second set of Augie 15"
Build the SPUD amp to power the SI COAX and have the two UPA-2 power the twin Augies.
Phase three: 3-way Cross-over
Remove the passive cross-over on the COAX and use the CX3400 to control the Coax speaker in 2-way.
Then run the Augie on the third.
In the meantime I have an excellent woodworker
http://www.srqwoodworks.com/ that has already made me a great craftsman style stereo cabinet. I will have him design the baffles for me.
I will post pictures when I have them.
Thank you and I look forward to your input, suggestions, and criticism (I have thick skin.)
