Top DIY speaker resources / projects of 2023?

[GM3]

Bit out of date on the DIY front, has there been some innovative or performance redefining drivers in the last couple of years? Such as cheap drivers with phenomenal performance, or new drivers/kits which somehow redefine performance or value at certain price points, etc.?

More than a decade ago, http://zaphaudio.com/ released a slew of designs and driver measurements, but his latest designs seems to be around 15 years old now... 2008...!

http://www.speakerdesignworks.com/index_page_2.html also has a lot of what appears to be excellent designs. But, ex; looking at for instance the Invictus and ZRT from Zaph (both use the SS Revelator which at the time was very well regarded), both are now 11+ years old. I'm sure it still sounds excellent, but is there now better?

For stores / kits, so many choices... Ex;
https://meniscusaudio.com/product-category/speaker-kits/
https://www.madisoundspeakerstore.com/speaker-kits/
https://www.parts-express.com/speaker-components/speaker-subwoofer-kits
https://solen.ca/en/categories/speakers/products

It's just, so many DIY designs out there, how do you make heads or tail? Is there like some sort of ranking resource for available designs? Or comparisons? Ex; say you're looking for a $1-2.5k design for a small/medium room, aiming for ultimate music performance*, how/what would you choose?

* 'ultimate music performance', of course would probably vary from person to person, but imho; best accuracy/resolution, good dynamics (don't need 200dB SPL nor 10Hz bass.. But solid ~30-40Hz would be good; be it from a 2 or 3 way, MTM, extra sub(s), etc.)

Thanks!

 

[Rick Sykora]

Suggest you start by checking out Directiva r1 and the Philharmonitor BMR. Directiva is an ASR project and the Philharmonitor kit can be found at Meniscus Audio. While a bit pricey, some of the new SB Acoustics designs can be found at Madisound.

Not aware of any good DIY speaker database, so hope this helps a bit!

Rick

 

[GM3]

Thanks! Yeah I kinda half forgot about MiniDSP. Opens a new world of possibility, probably ends up being more expensive than a standard crossover given amplification cost, but I guess that if you went with a receiver route, you could get together a system for a fairly decent price... But looking at the measurements of a lot of traditional designs, by choosing the right drivers and crossovers, there are exceptionally flat measuring designs...

Would DSP help a lot for directivity or other metrics vs a traditional crossover? Driver quality should have a significant impact, but if you need to buy a receiver to replace your 2ch amp it adds up quite fast. That's why solutions like Genelec studio monitors also felt interesting when compared to audiophile/hifi solutions, being powered is 1 less headache/cost.

Also, with DSP also becomes much more expensive to go for 3 way with DSP given DSP and amp cost... It's certainly something that could factor in; my preconception/guess is that if you start off with great drivers and a great design, you basically won't gain anything by going DSP... Designing or working around driver weakness/limitations surely would be easier with DSP, but if your drivers can result in a flat FR, you don't need DSP?

2 vs 3 way is again a huge question for me; I know that pretty much it's up to implementation, but again, going with the drivers and knowledge we have today, is there like a magic 3 way or magic 2 way that just blows everything away? Ex; I was listening to some trade show listening impressions; there were comments; think it was about a 'magic' combination of mid/tweeter, which supposedly was exceptional (looking something like this SS woofer?), but yeah, maybe for off-axis response or something there's special driver combination where drivers just ends up complementing each other and working exceptionnally well together vs just 'randomly' picking a mid & tweeter?

 

[gene_stl]

MAC/DIY

Midwest Audio Club's forum for discussion of DIY enthusiast audio.

diy.midwestaudio.club

Meniscus Audio is involved with the diy Midwest Audio Club. If you are in or near the Midwest there are a lot of crazed speaker builders and they meet once a year to listen to each others creations. Sometimes more often.

 

[MSP0416]

Check out these guys! https://www.css-audio.com/online-store/Kits-c29751664
There is also the DIY speaker group on Facebook.

 

[morpheusX]

MTG Designs - DIY Speaker Plans

Links go to the original build threads for each of these designs. All plans linked here are free for personal use.

www.mtg-designs.com

GitHub - mbrennwa/osmcdoc: Documentation for the Open Source Monkey Coffin

Documentation for the Open Source Monkey Coffin. Contribute to mbrennwa/osmcdoc development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

SB Acoustics Kits - Sbacoustics

sbacoustics.com

Humble Homemade Hifi

Very high quality loudspeaker kits, components, upgrades, modifications and custom solutions.

www.humblehomemadehifi.com

www.audioexcite.com » Loudspeakers

Asathor - Preiswerte Männerbox

In unserer kleinen aber feinen DAU-Runde haben wir uns auf die Fahnen geschrieben, Lautsprecher zu entwickeln, die dem Nachbauer sowohl ein möglichst hohes Maß an Klangqualität bieten als auch messtechnisch und vom Preis/Leistungs-Verhältnis gesehen keine Wünsche offen lassen. Einzig unser...

www.der-akustische-untergrund.de

Eigene Entwicklungen

www.donhighend.de

Heissmann-Acoustics | Driver tests | reviews

Comprehensive reviews with detailed measurements on drivers in different price ranges.

heissmann-acoustics.de

 

[GM3]

Thanks! Btw, for TLDR; I'm not looking for more options, in the contrary, I want to narrow the options!

But in the end, there's probably no answer. I think that at this point, most DIY projects are great, as speaker & driver design are almost solved problems, so we've reached a level where performance is really high all around... So whether you choose Purity, Scan Speak, SB, etc., and choose a proven design, you'll likely to end up with excellent performance...

Where that leaves designs from 10-15 years ago... I'm not entirely sure, maybe worse value today as per bang for the buck, but likely slight as I don't think there's been like major advancements in the last decade... Or was there? True that tech typically trickles down, so RAAL, Accuton, etc., tech maybe is now more affordable, or more budget models available today vs 15 years ago, making price/performance of 10 year old drivers significantly worse than today... shrug..

 

[Rick Sykora]

Advancements in drivers have continued incrementally. Prior to the pandemic, would have argued that price/performance has seen a significant improvement.

As for DIY design, the tools keep getting better and cheaper. This results in speakers that are more likely to achieve design targets. Use of active filtering also helps in both design and implementation of better speakers. Sure, you may find decade old designs that hold up well. However, if you are going to try to spend on enough high-quality drivers to make DIY worthwhile, I want to know the design has the ability to exceed what I could buy from a traditional brand name supplier. Since you aren't likely to be able to locally audition a speaker any longer, measurements have become more critical as a differentiator.

The designs are not for everybody, but the best DIY examples of more contemporary out-of-the-box designs are from Linkwitz Labs.

 

[Wolf]

I would keep the Spirit Winds on your list. These really knocked te socks off a lot of us in 2014. Old tech, but SOTA performance.

 

[Jazzman53]

The labor is horrendous but the drawings are free and the sound is spooky-real:

Jazzman's DIY Electrostatic Loudspeaker Page

DIY electrostatic loudspeakers

jazzman-esl-page.blogspot.com

 

[Newman]

It's just, so many DIY designs out there, how do you make heads or tail? Is there like some sort of ranking resource for available designs?

How's this for a novel way to make head or tails:-

1. If spinorama data is not available, put it in the lowest priority on your list. Goodbye sexy-looking electrostatics etc, goodbye ultra-costly-driver kits with ultra-costly crossovers. All the millions of words of sighted-listening worship for exotic kits are just waffle. We know this on ASR.
2. The only exception to Rule #1 is if the kit has triumphed or held its own in a controlled listening comparison test with speakers that have good spinorama. I am not aware of any exceptions to Rule #1 on the basis of Rule #2. Any takers?
3. What's left? I know of Directiva, I know of BMR. Any others?
4. Examine the spinoramas of kits in Rule #3 and push them down to the second rank of priority if they appear to have issues. Erin raised a few issues with the BMR that put it into the second rank for me.

That just leaves Directiva! (subject to more speakers being listed under Rule #2 and Rule #3, per my request).

Simplified enough?

cheers

 

[Savi]

If you are interested in DIY, I would had two website to the nice MorpheusX list:
the well known hificompass (drivers measurements, reviews and few DIY designs
- pkaudio: beautiful speakers with measurements
- I also learn a lot reading ASR thread like directiva and sigberg manta and many others

 

[somebodyelse]

What's left? I know of Directiva, I know of BMR. Any others?

From #6:
* some of the MTG designs have spinoramas - VBS-6.2 and VBS-10.2 at least. Older designs have more basic measurements.The VBS ones look pretty respectable given the low price.
* Heissmann don't quite have the full spinorama, but do have most of the plots we look at. https://heissmann-acoustics.de/en/dxt-mon-vs-neumann-kh-120a/ for comparison.

 

[Newman]

Yes I forgot about the Heissmanns, some of their models definitely deserve to be on the shortlist based on (the company's own) graphs.

 

[somebodyelse]

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/revel-m105-copy-diy-build.29465/ - also with as-built spinorama

 

[Plcamp]

If I were doing a new speaker DIY, I might pick one from https://josephcrowe.com/ where you can purchase detailed construction plans. He has a wide variety of designs using commercial drivers and with test results for each. His blog is interesting.

 

[Jazzman53]

Thanks! Yeah I kinda half forgot about MiniDSP. Opens a new world of possibility, probably ends up being more expensive than a standard crossover given amplification cost, but I guess that if you went with a receiver route, you could get together a system for a fairly decent price... But looking at the measurements of a lot of traditional designs, by choosing the right drivers and crossovers, there are exceptionally flat measuring designs...

Would DSP help a lot for directivity or other metrics vs a traditional crossover? Driver quality should have a significant impact, but if you need to buy a receiver to replace your 2ch amp it adds up quite fast. That's why solutions like Genelec studio monitors also felt interesting when compared to audiophile/hifi solutions, being powered is 1 less headache/cost.

Also, with DSP also becomes much more expensive to go for 3 way with DSP given DSP and amp cost... It's certainly something that could factor in; my preconception/guess is that if you start off with great drivers and a great design, you basically won't gain anything by going DSP... Designing or working around driver weakness/limitations surely would be easier with DSP, but if your drivers can result in a flat FR, you don't need DSP?

2 vs 3 way is again a huge question for me; I know that pretty much it's up to implementation, but again, going with the drivers and knowledge we have today, is there like a magic 3 way or magic 2 way that just blows everything away? Ex; I was listening to some trade show listening impressions; there were comments; think it was about a 'magic' combination of mid/tweeter, which supposedly was exceptional (looking something like this SS woofer?), but yeah, maybe for off-axis response or something there's special driver combination where drivers just ends up complementing each other and working exceptionnally well together vs just 'randomly' picking a mid & tweeter?

I think once you've gone active, you would never want a passive crossover again. And if you take it as step further and go DSP, the tuning capabilities become infinite.

The first thing I noticed when I changed to an active crossover / bi-amp setup was tighter, cleaner bass. This is so because the amp has tighter control over the woofer without the passive crossover inductor coil between them.

I now use a DBX Driverack Venu 360 because I wanted its digital inputs, but it's little brother PA2 version has everything needed for home audio at 1/2 the cost. And if you buy the matching microphone ($100), you can use it's auto-correction which does a few quick frequency sweeps and then overlays parametric EQ's to bring the response to you're pre-selected curve. And you can tweak channel gains, crossover points and slopes, driver time alignments, and EQ tuning-- all in real time from your listening spot on the sofa, using it's Tablet or smart-phone user interface. It's truly amazing and so EASY!

 

[GM3]

That purity driver & Directiva look pretty awesome! Driverack is pretty expensive vs miniDSP... Is there a source of cheap/clean power that would do the job for such a speaker set?

I purchased a while back a Fosi Audio BTA20A (100W x2 class D, TPA 3116) amp, and somewhat had mixed feelings; sure, powers speakers, sounds ok, good enough for its use, but it's not great by any stretch of the imagination... So cheap amplification is out, so I guess you're left with something like a Yamaha, Denon, Sony, etc., receiver; class AB, but then again, ~$4-500 get you around ~70-100W, is this adequate? Wow 95+dB sensitivity?! Guess that's a big benefit of active, no crossover to eat all that power... If you need something like 2x Schiit Vidaar (100W), at 800 bucks each adds up pretty fast...!

Really starting to think Active/DSP is the way of the future... But all in all, not cheap drivers, add amps, not a cheap project!

 

[Newman]

You keep saying you want ‘cheap’, or some kind of price point project. These days I don’t think that is what DIY is all about. If your true objectives are performance and a pretty attractive price point, you are better off buying some ready-made products, eg a JBL 305P and a string of other options at various price points.

Today, IMHO, DIY is the best choice for one of two reasons:-

1. You simply love DIY
2. You want to do something a bit different to the ready-made options

cheers

 

[GM3]

You keep saying you want ‘cheap’, or some kind of price point project. These days I don’t think that is what DIY is all about. If your true objectives are performance and a pretty attractive price point, you are better off buying some ready-made products, eg a JBL 305P and a string of other options at various price points.

Today, IMHO, DIY is the best choice for one of two reasons:-

1. You simply love DIY
2. You want to do something a bit different to the ready-made options

cheers

DIY to me is about price/performance. For instance, I could build Zaph ZRT for ~1300 which would give me great performance, and that wouldn't require a MiniDSP, a new receiver, etc. These ZRT from brand name speakers would likely cost at least double, more likely 3 times what it would cost to build... And they would likely outperform retail speakers of that price. Another example would be the Holtz Statements, to get retail speakers of that type, with matching dynamics and all, these would cost a lot more!

The ASR Directiva looks like an interesting option, but out of all these options, these do require new electronics for most people, who tend to own stereo amps rather than receivers... So you have to consider them part of the cost of the project. IMHO, just looking at measurements, driver & driver costs, etc., they should overall, maybe even all around the board (including bass..) outperform the ZRTs, but as I was asking, if they require $1k electronics or whatnot to drive them properly, it does affect the bang for the buck quite a bit, as passive speakers do not require 4 channels of amplification... Also, I'm not even entirely sure if they should be considered full range, or whether you should also factor the cost of a sub?

For a little bit more than 2500 bucks you could build the Enthraals, of course, apples and oranges, but there are always tradeoffs, and going active has a big tradeoff in price of entry...

But yeah, of course, I would rather spend less money to achieve a certain performance, than paying more... For instance, rather than buying McIntosh, Classe or I don't know what else, I went with used pro amplification. So I don't know each watt cost maybe 1/25th or what it would have cost going 'audiophile' wattage?

But anyway, my question was basically; what do you need to properly drive a pair of Directivas to their potential? There's likely also pro solutions for the Directivas, but these seem to me a little bit more 'high end' than your average DIY; where some DIY solutions are about bang for the buck, these are more chasing absolute performance, so the equation for amplification might be a little bit different than your average DIY project. Kind of speaker making it worth spending a bit extra on amplification to match the speaker performance? Or maybe I'm wrong, and they're fine with your typical $500 receiver. Certainly sensitive enough!