Can you have too much?

[ryanosaur]

Bad word choice. Rythmik offers the drivers for custom builds. Basically I asked what would be involved in a similar-to-product-x build. Rolling ones again on my lingo check. tssk. It does seem that they offer the whole product as a custom build, and it would surprise me if they hadn't already played around with a higher quality ported 12". Maybe they don't see the market for it.

Regardless... Thank you for helping me in your clarification, Shady. Definitely guilty of confusing output and loudness.

Gonna talk to Hsu tomorrow and see what they suggest.

I know these are all good products, but learning about what makes each unique from the others is awesome.

Cheers all.

 

[snakeeyes]

Bad word choice. Rythmik offers the drivers for custom builds. Basically I asked what would be involved in a similar-to-product-x build. Rolling ones again on my lingo check. tssk. It does seem that they offer the whole product as a custom build, and it would surprise me if they hadn't already played around with a higher quality ported 12". Maybe they don't see the market for it.

Regardless... Thank you for helping me in your clarification, Shady. Definitely guilty of confusing output and loudness.

Gonna talk to Hsu tomorrow and see what they suggest.

I know these are all good products, but learning about what makes each unique from the others is awesome.

Cheers all.

Think the way you are approaching it is good. By understanding the trade offs, you arrive back at enjoying what each style is doing and then you realize it’s the sound of that product to your own ears. I would personally recommend coming in on or under budget so you can feel free to make changes a few years down the road as your tastes change or refine.

 

[ryanosaur]

Think the way you are approaching it is good. By understanding the trade offs, you arrive back at enjoying what each style is doing and then you realize it’s the sound of that product to your own ears. I would personally recommend coming in on or under budget so you can feel free to make changes a few years down the road as your tastes change or refine.

Thanks Snake. When it comes to choosing an investment like this, doing it smart is the only way! Unless I had a true capitalists bankroll... where I'm just living on the interest my money is earning. Not I. *shrugs

Updates:
Hsu recommends staying on the VTF15Hmk2 vs. anything else in their lineup.
Rythmik recommends either the F12 or the F15HP / E15HP. Enrique there says he's in a 2700'3 space with Ascend Sierra bookshelf/F12 7.2 system, and can easily hit reference levels, and claims room gain extension as low as "7Hz flat." He and Dina at Ascend have a pretty strong pitch for these.

Pretty confident that my sub purchase will be in the $2500 range, give or take.

Revised list:
(Cost for duals)
Hsu VTF15Hmk2: $1749 +ship, or a day in the car to will call.
Rythmik F12: $1786
Rythmik F15HP: $2330
Rythmik E15HP2: $2680
Rythmik F18: $2860 (just for kicks!)
Rythmik F25: $2898 (one extra kick)
SVS PC2000: $1500
Not totally ruling out Monolith 15" or Outlaw X13. Just seems value is diminished alongside Rythmiks.

Leading speaker rigs going into audition weekend: Philharmonic BMR and Mini-Phils; Ascend Sierras; Tekton Design; Monitor Audio Silvers. And open for surprises.

Thanks, guys!

 

[snakeeyes]

Thanks Snake. When it comes to choosing an investment like this, doing it smart is the only way! Unless I had a true capitalists bankroll... where I'm just living on the interest my money is earning. Not I. *shrugs

Updates:
Hsu recommends staying on the VTF15Hmk2 vs. anything else in their lineup.
Rythmik recommends either the F12 or the F15HP / E15HP. Enrique there says he's in a 2700'3 space with Ascend Sierra bookshelf/F12 7.2 system, and can easily hit reference levels, and claims room gain extension as low as "7Hz flat." He and Dina at Ascend have a pretty strong pitch for these.

Pretty confident that my sub purchase will be in the $2500 range, give or take.

Revised list:
(Cost for duals)
Hsu VTF15Hmk2: $1749 +ship, or a day in the car to will call.
Rythmik F12: $1786
Rythmik F15HP: $2330
Rythmik E15HP2: $2680
Rythmik F18: $2860 (just for kicks!)
Rythmik F25: $2898 (one extra kick)
SVS PC2000: $1500
Not totally ruling out Monolith 15" or Outlaw X13. Just seems value is diminished alongside Rythmiks.

Leading speaker rigs going into audition weekend: Philharmonic BMR and Mini-Phils; Ascend Sierras; Tekton Design; Monitor Audio Silvers. And open for surprises.

Thanks, guys!

Edit: Was talking about FV15HP not F15HP

The FV15HP or the VTF15 both seem way more than enough for your room size. Can’t see you regetting either of those 2. I might vote FV15HP by a slim margin. Good luck!

 

[Steve81]

Interesting that Hsu is recommending their ported offerings and Rythmik is going with sealed. I'd still say a pair of the ULS-15s. They'll set you back less than the F12s while their performance is more in line with the Rythmik 15's.

 

[Danzilla31]

Thanks Snake. When it comes to choosing an investment like this, doing it smart is the only way! Unless I had a true capitalists bankroll... where I'm just living on the interest my money is earning. Not I. *shrugs

Updates:
Hsu recommends staying on the VTF15Hmk2 vs. anything else in their lineup.
Rythmik recommends either the F12 or the F15HP / E15HP. Enrique there says he's in a 2700'3 space with Ascend Sierra bookshelf/F12 7.2 system, and can easily hit reference levels, and claims room gain extension as low as "7Hz flat." He and Dina at Ascend have a pretty strong pitch for these.

Pretty confident that my sub purchase will be in the $2500 range, give or take.

Revised list:
(Cost for duals)
Hsu VTF15Hmk2: $1749 +ship, or a day in the car to will call.
Rythmik F12: $1786
Rythmik F15HP: $2330
Rythmik E15HP2: $2680
Rythmik F18: $2860 (just for kicks!)
Rythmik F25: $2898 (one extra kick)
SVS PC2000: $1500
Not totally ruling out Monolith 15" or Outlaw X13. Just seems value is diminished alongside Rythmiks.

Leading speaker rigs going into audition weekend: Philharmonic BMR and Mini-Phils; Ascend Sierras; Tekton Design; Monitor Audio Silvers. And open for surprises.

Thanks, guys!

Ok I can tell you in my over 8000 cubic foot room. Those SVS 4000's crush it. Not only do I think they'd be overkill. But the weight and cost since they are not needed would be not worth it. I wish I had a 2000 cubic foot space. I didn't want to go so expensive. In that space for your budget I could have gone with quad pc 2000's and that would just have been so friggin dope it would have crushed it man. And easily hit your 16hz requirement they actually extend a little deeper then the pb 2000's from what I'm told. And you wouldn't need a ton of eq. And you can just return them if you don't like them.

Since you like a little overkill though. The Monolith 15's or Rhythmik 15's all day long. All day. The 18's hell yeah except once again like the 4000's overkill and super huge and super heavy to try to move. Not worth it in my humble opinion.

EXCEEEPT for one factor we haven't thought of. Are you always going to be stuck in that room? Or is there a possible upgrade path in the future to a bigger spot. Then I would say FV18's all day long all night long totally. If they are in your budget now then you don't have to worry about needing more in the future like people said you can adjust them all day in that room. Oh and with the FV18's 16hz? no sweat they go all the way down to 12 Hz no problem. And with the room gain in that room size I bet you can get 10hz for sure. Sweeeeeeeeeet!!!!!

 

[Danzilla31]

P.S. you can never have too much in audio I want my cake and I wanna eat it too!

 

[Danzilla31]

A couple things to consider: monster 18"s will have far more dynamic range than the Philharmonic BMRs. You can get Rythmik 18"s, and that will do the trick, but its probably a bit overkill on a Philharmonic BMR system. Also consider that one of the reasons that the Philharmonic BMR speakers are made was for a bookshelf speaker that has deep extension. Pairing it up with some monster subs almost defeats the point. Not to say that it won't be a great system though.

The LVX12, not using an amazing driver, but it can be tuned very low. It might work for you if you don't need a lot of SPL.

You are right that dual driver subwoofers are only going to increase your SPL. They are not going to help much with evening out the response.

Regarding any flaws of the VTF15h mk2, I would say it is a very well balanced design for the money. I have lots of measurements of it, and when I compare them to the existing measurements of the FV18, it is surprisingly not far behind in a lot of metrics. While the 2nd revision of the FV18 is sure to improve its performance in some respects, it will also degrade its performance in other respects.

The PC-2000 is a solid subwoofer, by the way. You might just give it a try. It won't cost you anything but time to try it out, since you can send it back in 45 days with SVS covering return shipping. It may well do the trick for you. The 12" driver that is used in it is phenomenally linear. I also have lot of measurements for that one. It is not an output monster, but it is clean and it digs deep. My guess is it would outperform a LVX12.

Hey Shady do you mind briefly explaing why the second version of the Rhythmik 18 will hurt some part of its performance as well as help some parts? Really interested in your take on that

 

[ryanosaur]

Interesting that Hsu is recommending their ported offerings and Rythmik is going with sealed. I'd still say a pair of the ULS-15s. They'll set you back less than the F12s while their performance is more in line with the Rythmik 15's.

The guy I spoke to was kinda hung up on room acoustics potentially getting in the way of the extension/room gain. He quite handily walked around any attempt to ask about that.

Speaker choice is going to have a much bigger affect on my sub choice... one reason I'm not asking what I should buy, but rather what considerations I need to have in mind. Might be revisiting this over the next week or tthree as I speaker shop! Wheeee!

 

[shadyJ]

Thanks Snake. When it comes to choosing an investment like this, doing it smart is the only way! Unless I had a true capitalists bankroll... where I'm just living on the interest my money is earning. Not I. *shrugs

Updates:
Hsu recommends staying on the VTF15Hmk2 vs. anything else in their lineup.
Rythmik recommends either the F12 or the F15HP / E15HP. Enrique there says he's in a 2700'3 space with Ascend Sierra bookshelf/F12 7.2 system, and can easily hit reference levels, and claims room gain extension as low as "7Hz flat." He and Dina at Ascend have a pretty strong pitch for these.

Pretty confident that my sub purchase will be in the $2500 range, give or take.

Revised list:
(Cost for duals)
Hsu VTF15Hmk2: $1749 +ship, or a day in the car to will call.
Rythmik F12: $1786
Rythmik F15HP: $2330
Rythmik E15HP2: $2680
Rythmik F18: $2860 (just for kicks!)
Rythmik F25: $2898 (one extra kick)
SVS PC2000: $1500
Not totally ruling out Monolith 15" or Outlaw X13. Just seems value is diminished alongside Rythmiks.

Leading speaker rigs going into audition weekend: Philharmonic BMR and Mini-Phils; Ascend Sierras; Tekton Design; Monitor Audio Silvers. And open for surprises.

Thanks, guys!

I'm sure Hsu recommended the VTF15h mk2 because you mentioned 16 Hz. That sub can actually be tuned to 16 Hz, so it will be able to hold a flat response to that frequency regardless of room gain.

Regarding claims of flat-to-7 Hz extension from a sealed 12... I find that hard to believe. Anyway, you can EQ any sub to have a flat response to 7 Hz, but what is the headroom like? Those who are advising you to get a sealed sub are assuming very generous room gain. That isn't always the case, in fact it is only sometimes the case. There are a lot of factors that can affect room gain, so I wouldn't automatically assume that you would get much. For this reason, I would not consider a sealed subwoofer for the purposes of 16 Hz extension. Unless that sealed subwoofer is a beast, it will struggle at 16 Hz. Besides that, for a variable tuned sub, you can always just plug the port and turn it into a sealed sub if you find that you prefer that kind of response. The Hsu subs, SVS 4000s and 16 Ultras, Outlaw X13, and Monolith THX subs all support a sealed mode (I'm not sure if the Rythmik variable tuned subs do). And they all perform very well as sealed subs too. Just because they are ported subs natively does not mean they don't do well sealed.

 

[shadyJ]

Hey Shady do you mind briefly explaing why the second version of the Rhythmik 18 will hurt some part of its performance as well as help some parts? Really interested in your take on that

The weight of the driver's moving mass (its former, voice coil, and cone) has a big effect on the sensitivity, frequency response, and resonant frequency. The more weight you put into the moving mass, the less sensitive you make it, but you move the resonant frequency down lower (that actually increases its sensitivity at lower frequencies). If I wanted to build a driver that plays deep frequencies well, I would use a relatively heavy moving mass. Many manufacturers do this by simply adding weight onto the cone. Of course, that means it now takes a lot more power to playback the same SPL at higher frequencies. Conversely, if I wanted more upper frequency output, I would remove weight from the moving mass, but doing so means it won't have as easy of a time at low frequencies. So moving to a paper cone from an aluminum cone will have all these same effects; it will increase power in mid-bass frequencies but at the expense of deep bass performance.

 

[shadyJ]

Hey Shady do you mind briefly explaing why the second version of the Rhythmik 18 will hurt some part of its performance as well as help some parts? Really interested in your take on that

Actually I just took a look at the product page, and I was a bit off in my understanding of Rythmik's 2nd version. They offer a paper cone version, but that isn't really the change they are making in the FV18 Rev2. They are increasing the port diameter. The thing is, that will have a similar effect on the response: it trades extension for output. When you make the port diameter wider, you raise its resonant frequency, if no other changes are made. In order to keep the same resonant frequency when widening port diameter, you have to increase length at the same rate. But in order to sustain the same deep bass performance for expanding the port, you have to increase the enclosure size. I'm not exactly sure how they are handling the expansion of their port, but there will necessarily be a trade-off somewhere when all other things are being kept equal.

 

[ryanosaur]

Actually I just took a look at the product page, and I was a bit off in my understanding of Rythmik's 2nd version. They offer a paper cone version, but that isn't really the change they are making in the FV18 Rev2. They are increasing the port diameter. The thing is, that will have a similar effect on the response: it trades extension for output. When you make the port diameter wider, you raise its resonant frequency, if no other changes are made. In order to keep the same resonant frequency when widening port diameter, you have to increase length at the same rate. But in order to sustain the same deep bass performance for expanding the port, you have to increase the enclosure size. I'm not exactly sure how they are handling the expansion of their port, but there will necessarily be a trade-off somewhere when all other things are being kept equal.

A month back, roughly, when I first learned about Rythmik, I asked about that. The guy at rythmik said the front 6" roughly of the port were opned up, more like a trumpets bell, but the rest was unchanged. (Or at least thats what he told me).

 

[snakeeyes]

I don’t think you want the sealed F15HP. I thought you meant the ported FV15HP. I edited my post above. I would say the VTF15 or the FV15HP. . If you want FV18, that’s a bit overkill but sure.

 

[Steve81]

Those who are advising you to get a sealed sub are assuming very generous room gain.

Not necessarily Your measurements showed the ULS15.2 posting 95dB at 2m, ground plane (on par with the PC2000). Adding 6dB for duals breaks the 100dB mark, which is hardly shabby in my book. Obviously going from ground plane to a smallish room is going to boost that to some extent. Enough for Edge of Tomorrow at full reference w/o compression or significant distortion? I wouldn't bet money on it. Enough to meet Ryan's desire for competent reproduction of organ music at spirited levels? That seems pretty doable to me.

 

[Danzilla31]

A month back, roughly, when I first learned about Rythmik, I asked about that. The guy at rythmik said the front 6" roughly of the port were opned up, more like a trumpets bell, but the rest was unchanged. (Or at least thats what he told me).

Hmmmm I wonder what kind off benefit only widening the front 6 inches of the port does?

 

[shadyJ]

Hmmmm I wonder what kind off benefit only widening the front 6 inches of the port does?

Widening the flares of the port may reduce chuffing and make for a bit smoother port behavior at low frequencies. However, I remember reading a JBL white paper that said it was the shape of the port, not the flaring, which is what is effective in reducing chuffing. I am seeing more port designs that uses the port shape described in the JBL paper.

 

[shadyJ]

Not necessarily Your measurements showed the ULS15.2 posting 95dB at 2m, ground plane (on par with the PC2000). Adding 6dB for duals breaks the 100dB mark, which is hardly shabby in my book. Obviously going from ground plane to a smallish room is going to boost that to some extent. Enough for Edge of Tomorrow at full reference w/o compression or significant distortion? I wouldn't bet money on it. Enough to meet Ryan's desire for competent reproduction of organ music at spirited levels? That seems pretty doable to me.

The CEA-2010 numbers from that table are with the PC-2000 tested with woofer facing microphone. When tested with port facing microphone, I did see a substantial increase in low frequency measurement. There is this sentence in the review: "When we tested the PC-2000 standing upright with port facing the microphone, the CEA-2010 measurements for most test frequencies did see a small drop from 40 Hz and up, but we gained measured output below that, with a recorded 99.4 dB measurement at 16 Hz and a 106.8 dB measurement at 20 Hz." In retrospect, maybe I should have just used the higher port-facing numbers in the CEA-2010 table, but I wanted a very consistent data set out there. Anyway, the reality is the PC-2000 is a more powerful sub than the ULS-15 mk2 from 16 to 25 Hz. The ULS-15 mk2 is no slouch though and has very good all around performance for a sealed 15".

 

[Steve81]

The ULS-15 mk2 is no slouch though and has very good all around performance for a sealed 15".

Not to mention (again ) the price. The way I see it, try two. If they do the trick, great, and he's got a couple of subs that look decent, take up minimal space, and came in well under budget. If he yearns for more, get another pair. If that's not enough in 2000 cubic feet, he needs Bassaholics Anonymous.

 

[snakeeyes]

Not to mention (again ) the price. The way I see it, try two. If they do the trick, great, and he's got a couple of subs that look decent, take up minimal space, and came in well under budget. If he yearns for more, get another pair. If that's not enough in 2000 cubic feet, he needs Bassaholics Anonymous.

Those look nice but ULS15 and VTF15 are pretty close in price esp since his budget is much higher. Seems like ported would be a good choice in his den where WAF should not be part of the equation. What are your thoughts on sealed subs? Do you prefer sealed? I have a sealed sub in my bedroom system, a Rythmik L12 and it isn’t prefect but it performs well in 1400 cu ft. My current thinking is I don’t really see an advantage to a sealed design when a ported sub can produce higher output.