No wonder they need subs...Bass drivers cross over at 100Hz if I remember correctly, imho the 8Cs are the most complete single box design available and there is much more to come from a company three metres under water!
Keith
No wonder they need subs...Bass drivers cross over at 100Hz if I remember correctly, imho the 8Cs are the most complete single box design available and there is much more to come from a company three metres under water!
Keith
I would say it is a 3-way design.So is the 8C basically a 2-way with built in subs?
I read about them but specs are confusingI would say it is a 3-way design.
Already a lot is said about these loudspeakers, also on this forum so if you use the search function you will have a lot to read.
Good introduction video is the before the review video from Erin
Another one I liked is the interview John Darko had with Martijn Mensink from Dutch & Dutch.
I read about them but specs are confusing
1 tweeter
1 mid
2 subwoofers
So I wasn't sure if it's 2-way + subs
Or a 3-way
View attachment 167603
That's what I'm asking the experts here, obviously 2 subs instead of a normal woofer are not common.what's your definition of a 3-way?
It's a 3 way, same way barefoot MM27s are 3 way despite having a crossover point around 100hz to the subs.That's what I'm asking the experts here, obviously 2 subs instead of a normal woofer are not common.
I can't help but feel you are telling a Ferrari owner that they should drive in a school zone. It seems this argument is missing the single most obvious point: The speaker is designed to accommodate specifically rooms where positioning is a problem. All this talk about ports vs cardioid, and placement, and subs misses the obvious point: Some people have living rooms, not dedicated listening rooms.Mind you the 8c needs also placement close to the front wall
They do. Otherwise the cardioid setup won't work. The tweeters and subs are sealed, and the midrange has the vent.I'm not sure if the 2 units in the back have their own enclosure because maybe then you can talk about a 2-way with built in subs.
The 8C work best when they are placed against a front wall. It's what the manufacturer recommends. You can place them elsewhere in the room, but you won't get the benefit of the boundary coupled bass that eliminates SBIR from the front wall in low frequencies.I can't help but feel you are telling a Ferrari owner that they should drive in a school zone. It seems this argument is missing the single most obvious point: The speaker is designed to accommodate specifically rooms where positioning is a problem. All this talk about ports vs cardioid, and placement, and subs misses the obvious point: Some people have living rooms, not dedicated listening rooms.
They do. Otherwise the cardioid setup won't work. The tweeters and subs are sealed, and the midrange has the vent.
But really does anyone have a clear definition of what it means to be x-way, or what it means to be a subwoofer?
No, my comment was a reply to the post that other loudspeakers suffer from SBIR because they are usually placed too far from the front wall because like you sayI can't help but feel you are telling a Ferrari owner that they should drive in a school zone.
and that the 8c cannot solve this limitation as it also needs to close to the front wall placement as it has a normal sub on its rear side and is not a cardioid below 100 Hz.Some people have living rooms, not dedicated listening rooms
Err, that's precisely the limitation it solves. Lack of space. The cardioid design specifically deals with SBIR when placed against the front wall (common practice in a living room). The subs are not supposed to have a cardioid pattern, they benefit from the boundary effect when close coupled to the front wall. What is bad for the midrange at that distance benefits the sub. It's basically an ideal speaker design for those people who have to have speakers between 10-60cm from the wall and would otherwise trip over them in the room.and that the 8c cannot solve this limitation as it also needs to close to the front wall placement as it has a normal sub on its rear side and is not a cardioid below 100 Hz.
Exactly my point. Living rooms, not dedicated listening spaces. Most of us don't have the space or the tolerant significant others to put speakers in the middle of the room and are limited to placing them against a front wall.The 8C work best when they are placed against a front wall.
We say the same thing from different aspects, my comment was that its not a solver for someone who cannot place his loudspeakers close to the front wall.Err, that's precisely the limitation it solves. Lack of space.
I was browsing preference ratings yesterday (here: https://pierreaubert.github.io/spinorama/) and noticed something odd. If you use a subwoofer, apparently you are better off spending a fraction of the price getting a pair of KEF R3s (rating of 8.2 w/sub) or Polk R200s (rating of 8.3 w/sub) rather than the 8Cs, which score 8.0 for the same.
I own the D&D 8Cs so not trying to dismiss their full range achievement here, it just made me wonder what could have been possible at a lower price with excellent satellite speakers and a well integrated sub.
I'd love to see a D&D Tower speaker . When taking into account it's full range capabilities, the 8C may be the best overall speaker I've ever heard. Given what they accomplished with a bookshelf speaker, I'd love to see what @Martijn Mensink and crew could do with a tower speaker.but are essentially trying to squeeze an awful lot out of one small package. This applies to Genelec/D&D and a number of others.
A typical 2 way + sub is not going to have the low frequency directivity control that the 8C has. Some research has shown that LF directivity control correlates with listener preference.The problem is, D&D its way expensive and doesn't have the '' unique '' UNIQ. Only the typical top tweeter and bottom woofer (You can buy the typical bookshelf and add subs, and its better and cheaper), and that setup would sound like the d&d 8c, but you cannot buy the typical 2 way bookshelf and expect the same sound because the R series uses a special coaxial.
Don't to mention the fact that that UNIQ from KEF R3 which all of their adventage ( coaxial ) still have lower distortion than the D&D8, even the woofers are better in Kef R series, because these woofer have much less distortion overall.
Naah, I'm not aware of any other speaker of that size that digs as deep, controls directivity as low, for less. The Kii 3 is probably the closest counterpart, but it's more expensive. Mesanovic MTM 10 digs almost as deep, but lacks the LF directivity control, though I'd still love to hear those speakers side by side. Keep in mind the studio version(no streaming and lesser finish) is $9,000.I think D&D 8c should cost far less.
Check out the masters thesis I posted above. It seems to suggest that, all else constant, lower directivity control creates more preferable sound.I'd love an explanation of how the cardioid is either already taken into account in the preference score, or is ignored. To me this is an area that has not been researched properly, speakers like the 8c are controlling their sound at the frequencies where most of the energy in music is, this must matter, but how much? I expect they break the findings that speaker preference from room to room does not change, as smaller less good rooms should benefit more from lower pattern control and should change the preferred speaker rankings.
If cardioid designs are best close to the front wall (well, rear wall - why is it called the front wall when it is behind?), then I suppose floorstanders that are going to be further out in the room somewhat defeat the point of having cardioid reproduction.I'd love to see a D&D Tower speaker . When taking into account it's full range capabilities, the 8C may be the best overall speaker I've ever heard. Given what they accomplished with a bookshelf speaker, I'd love to see what @Martijn Mensink and crew could do with a tower speaker.