Bohlender-Graebener Z1 vs Infinity Kappa 5.1

[mulester7]

"Play any sound loud enough and I think we will hear it even at supersonic frequencies. Essentially that is what we are doing with our bass instrumentation to begin with. Why is it that in music, the bass amplitudes and power output is 10x or 100x more than the midranges/treble amplitudes? It's because humans are so unsensitive to frequencies below 100 Hz that we need SPL levels 10x greater to perceive sound. To me that's unnatural, and that's why I prefer to listen to music with everything below 100 Hz filtered out"


.....Porcupine, I personally go the route, and will continue to go the route, of seeking "live presence" in my home theater as per "re-creation"....when you attend a live concert, is the audible frequency response filtered with decisive and effective roll-off at 100 cycles?.....

....I also contend humans can detect, decipher, and "hear" below 64 cycles....you hear "pitch" at about 35 up.....

.....I stated one time I had my subs cut in the mid-to-high 40's....the Paradigm unit I have, the X-30, has three satellite outputs with low cuts of 50, 80, and 120 for surround/accent speakers ....I couldn't help but lock those three numbers in my mind concerning the knob in the middle of the face of the unit that determines the high cut of the sub signal.....the three numbers are very small, and I had put on reading glasses at first to see that the lowest number stamped was 35 where the gain was all the way down....I just assumed the other two tiny numbers were 50 and 80....my bad....I got close the other night with reading glasses and the next number up is in fact 80....so I correct the 40's to be about 70, and the mid-to-high 70's produce pop....oh well, just trying not to look like an idiot, but we all know it's too late......

 

[mulester7]

.....Gentlemen, I'll most readily admit long and loud I don't know sh-sh-crap....all I've ever done is buy and make speakers, buy components I couldn't work on at gunpoint past changing a fuse, hook components up with rca's and wires,,,....and get something said to me by a salesman or friend along the way concerning this audio-equipment-thing....you know, the one that has us by the throat, but pills the thriss out of us with goose-bumps, yeah, that one....the two-faced one....guys, what are we to do?....well, we could put a suggestion box by the backdoor, but I suggest brick by brick, my citizens, not too unlike our daily walk, huh?....back, I've had things said to me along the way that painted a picture in my mind about the dirt-simple actually, signal-path, and been told ratings/specs that count.....

.....I am going to post another IM session with Bob....here's a guy to listen to, immho....

.....he's helped me see the amplified signal needs to arrive at the speakers "as close", to +/- 0.00 db-variance as possible....and then let the speaker maker's priorities take over to determine whether ruler-flat attempts are made....

.....and I claim the right to change that last statement in the next 10 minutes as per predictability of presenter.....

.....see what an idiot I am?....I meant that comment on the steam-vent section, but I've learned here in this IM to appreciate the speakers I have even more.....


Mulester360: hay
Mulester360: horses
Spkrart: hay im ordering **** to lower blood sugar
Mulester360: that could "NOT" be a bad idea
Mulester360: with the mod from Paul in your Sony player, did you mainly notice a difference low or high with the audio?
Spkrart: high mainly after extensive break in incredible difference
Mulester360: like the highs resolved?
Spkrart: overall realism, balance, extremely realistic, no harsh digital artifacts
Mulester360: ok
Spkrart: even wife thought it was incredible
Mulester360: the article at Paul's site implied both high and low differences
Mulester360: is any speaker or piece of audiophile equipment actually ruler-flat, or are there limits to be called ruler-flat?
Spkrart: ruler flat is not normal. It is electrically ideal but not true to real music. Most music played live or amplified is far from being flat. Flat is very grainy and in your face screechy
Spkrart: by setting your components to flat it just means you are not adding to the natural coloration of the recording
Spkrart: By using tone controls and equalizers you are not hearing what was recorded
Mulester360: so a rating of +/- 2db, or 1db concering speakers can be much more musical?
Spkrart: yes
Mulester360: ok
Spkrart: some speakers are rated plus or minus 3db so a response printed of 20-20K can really mean 50-17K
Spkrart: if they were really stretching the truth
Spkrart: that is legal
Mulester360: the bottom line for consumer selling
Spkrart: most commercial lines give themselves as much leeway as they can legally get away with
Mulester360: the almighty snake-skin
Spkrart: yep
Mulester360: you need some front money?
Mulester360: or a front K2?
Spkrart: either
Mulester360: ok, am working toward another couple myself....but you could be next, haha....
Spkrart: Check out www.flyingmolelectronics.com
Spkrart: Flying Mole ELECTRONICS
Mulester360: won't open for me....am still having problems
Mulester360: ok
Mulester360: the second one opened....100 watts is plenty for full-range....is this the one that you have two coming?
Spkrart: no these are only 1 X 3 inches
Mulester360: didn't see that
Mulester360: rms at 8 driven rating?
Spkrart: I think so. I am getting sent a pair to evaluate
Mulester360: what is their retail?
Spkrart: those little boogers are overpriced at 375 ea retail, i could get for half
Mulester360: audiophile quality is claimed
Spkrart: doubt it we will see
Mulester360: good
Spkrart signed off at 12:57:55 AM.
Spkrart signed on at 12:58:59 AM.
Spkrart: im going to bed. catch you tomorrow
Mulester360: ok, bud
Spkrart signed off at 12:59:35 AM.

 

[Porcupine]

cheep cheep

> canary 250-8,000 parakeet 200-8,500 cockatiel 250-8,000 owl 200-12,000 chicken 125-2,000

Just noticed these stats lol. There is no way that information is correct. Bird sounds from many species are one of the highest-pitched frequency sources I know of. When some baby birds cheep outside I can hear them from a mile away. In fact baby bird cheeps are one thing that makes me suspect I can hear frequencies well above 20 kHz (though I'm not sure, I only suspect). Some real life noises to me sound very different and better quality than CD audio.

In particular I am thinking of the young of the Northern Cardinal (the generic all-red one, like the St. Louis Cardinals). Listen to their young cheep if there are any where you live. Of course, the primary frequency of their cheep is maybe 8,000 Hz but they have harmonics many octaves beyond that I feel; that is the timbre of their cheep I think.

Also I have a Diamond Dove in my room and I am very sure it hears above 8,000 Hz. I will try to experimentally test it myself maybe in 1 month I will be more sure. Probably all I will find is that it hears to 17,000 Hz and after that my audio equipment (the source, not the speakers) is not hi-fi enough to reliably test (have a different thread on this in Beginners' Forum). My dove likes music a lot I play music for it just as much as I play it for myself. On the other hand I used to have a Shama Thrush which is one of the most famous songbirds and it never seemed to give a damn whether I had music on or not.

 

[jaxvon]

Play some test tones through your system to find out. It's not hard to find tone generator stuff.

 

[Porcupine]

> when you attend a live concert, is the audible frequency response filtered with decisive and effective roll-off at 100 cycles?

Totally agree with this point. The most important thing is to reproduce the original signal with greatest fidelity. And one should also try to listen to the original signal unaltered if possible. My above argument on low-freq sound being unnatural holds to some extent too, but I would say to most people it is not as important as it is to me.

I do try to listen to music unequalized when I can. At least once or twice for every song I hear. But eventually as I listen to music my ears usually start to hurt after 5 songs or so, even at low volume levels, and at that point I turn down the bass knob to either -6 db or -10 db (all the way).

But I may not even be lowering my bass really. The other problem is that bass resonances, bass gain and reflection are just awful in just about every small room I've been in (rooms my speakers have been in are usually somewhat cluttered places, sometimes small, acoustically terrible, etc). I can change the bass character of my speakers by 12 db or so just by moving them around. Recently I moved my BG Z1's to a new location 6 inches away and was shocked that general bass output dropped by 6 db or so (they weren't even booming earlier, I can probably find somewhere for them to boom at +24 db very easily).

When I roll-off my bass knob who knows maybe I am 'fixing' my room partially. I guess I get so frustrated attaining controlled bass in poor listening environments that I tend to just give up and equalize the bass to as low as possible.

BTW right now I listen to my BG Z1's unequalized half the time, rolled-off the other half. But I have to listen to my (newly repaired woohoo!) Infinity Kappas rolled-off all the time...they are on the floor despite being bookshelves therefore they boom like mad.

 

[Porcupine]

> Play some test tones through your system to find out. It's not hard to find tone generator stuff.

I have already. I made a separate thread on that in Beginners Forum earlier. I found that my computer sound card DAC converter unfortunately filters out sounds above 17500 Hz or so extremely sharply (instant cutoff).

If you are referring to testing my bird, the reason I said it will take a month is that it can be hard to test primitive unintelligent animals. That's why the bird data from that link is erroneous. I should have mentioned that the linked page itself explains that many of its animal data is inaccurate due to limitations on techniques of getting untrained primitive animals like birds to respond in a trained manner to stimuli.

 

[Porcupine]

BTW I'm still studying the VMPS webpage, thinking, and learning a lot about speaker design. They do have a lot of super detailed information but it is sort of unorganized, more like an enthusiast's site than a professional one. Also I think if you call them you can request a brochure, papers, etc, so I might do that as well. I'm gonna go talk on their forum today.

As I read their webpage more I see some funny things. VMPS apparently gets their drivers from OEM manufacturers, and at times these OEM manufacturers have been....Bohlender-Graebener and Infinity lol!! The same two speakers I own. And the same ribbons haha. They had Infinity EMIT-Rs tweeters, and BG Neo8 midranges. Currently they get their parts from different OEM sources though so they have different spiral tweeters and different midrange panels.

 

[Porcupine]

Just got my Bohlender-Graebener Z7 towers today. I thought they would be the same as the Z1 bookshelfs with deeper bass, but they are even more than that. To my surprise the Z7s dual 5.25" aluminum woofers are not playing the same frequencies....the Z7s are actually a 2 1/2-way design...exactly the same as their predecessors the X3s apparently. Thus their midrange-to-bass response is much flatter, controlled, and more balanced than on the Z1s.

Also, can't remember if I mentioned this already, but after further breaking in my Z1s (they improved slightly more at 30 total hours playing time, though at 20 total hours was enough for the big improvement) and comparing to my fixed Infinity Kappas I realize that now their tonal balance is very similar. The midranges on the Z1s and Z7s are basically balanced the same as the Kappas. Their whole frequency response behavior and timbre of sounds are very similar I think. So maybe the Kappas aren't as weird as I thought....I probably need to go out and listen to more types of good speakers.

The BGs are FAR superior to the Kappas though in terms of transient response, clarity, phase characteristics, imaging, etc. I've decided I will try to never buy polypropylene cones again. Their sound is very muddy compared to the tight fast response of more rigid drivers.