jmecbr900

You know I like these a whole lot for SQ:

GaryDell

One 12", simply because the second 12" driver isn't necessary for an SQ setup. Now if you're talking about an SQ setup that you want to listen to at very high volumes, a second 12" could be useful as now the subs do not have to excurt as far to produce a given volume, keeping BL/ linearity high.

IB= infinite baffle, or freeair.

It's going to take quite a while before you start winning competitions, if ever. You're buying some damn good equipment, but with diminishing returns, install plays a huge part in overall SQ.

No experience with Servodrive, but Oz makes some great products. Their Matrix components were the best prepackaged set I've listened to under $500...

Hameed

Thanks!
Why do you not think I will win any SQ competition? The reason why I am fairly confident I will win is quite simple. I am getting the install done by two guys who have won IASCA SQ competitions and are well versed in the rules and regulations and now do their own installs. One of their recent installs also won SQ competitions - http://www.sounddomain.com/id/drspd (their name is JAM competition). Their installs are high quality and I intend to hire them to do mine.
Please elaborate what you mean by that. Are you saying I am going overboard as far as the quality of the equipment goes and will not see as much a difference by going to lesser quality equipment? If in fact that is what you are saying, what do you suggest I get? I have not bought any of the equipment yet, so can still change directions.

04GS300

Whatt he means is that the better equipment you get and the more money you spend, you start running into the law of diminishing returns. Home audio is a great example: You can get a Panasonic CD player for say, $100. Or you could get a Rega CD player for $1000 that will be a ton better. Or you could get a Linn CD player for $20,000 and arguably have the best CD player in the world, however you won't get the same dollar for dollar improvement that you did at the beginning. You spent $900 for a great improvement, but you have to spend $19,000 to get an equal improvement again, so as you spend more and more money you get less improvement per dollar. Does that make sense? Basically he's saying that your install is extremely important, and simply having the best components isn't enough. At least that's how I read what he said.

Another head unit to consider is a Sony CDX-C90 ES. I have one and absolutely love it! It doesn't have the EQ thrills and frills of the Pioneer P9, but it's got great hardware. I'm don't think Sony makes them anymore, but you can find them used. As far as front amps, I would get McIntosh. Zapco is excellent as well, but I don't think you can beat McIntosh. You've picked out some great stuff, don't get me wrong, I'm just throwing out a couple more ideas.

I have heard of OZ Audio, and I've heard they're really good, but I've never heard them myself.

mumbles

Morning Hameed,
Let me just say that I'm not in anyway trying to tell you what to buy equipment-wise. The components you have picked out are all of very high quality, and I've heard great things about all of them. In fact, I started using Zapco amplifiers as far back as 1980 when the company was trying to establish themselves.
Anyway, what I was really trying to point out was the fact that the DEQ-P9 is a very trick, expensive piece of hardware, but if you use it with the configuration you mentioned (not the hardware), you really wouldn't get much use of all of it's features, except the equalization. You can by stand alone 31 band equalizers for much less then the cost of the DEQ-P9, so that's money that could be spent towards the install.
Now, on to your question... You don't have to have a 4 channel amp just to power the front speakers, but to make the most use of the DEQ-P9 it make more sense. Here's why. The DEQ-P9 can do equalization, crossover and time-alignment functions, right? Time alignment allows you to delay the sound coming from certain speakers, high mounted tweeters, low mounted midranges as well as left and right speakers, to make it appear that they are all arriving at your ears at the same time. But, you can't do that if the speakers are connected to the same channel the way they will be if you use the crossovers that come with the speakers (except left & right). The same concept holds for the crossover function of the DEQ-P9. It will want to separate the frequencies and output them on separate channels, the highs would exit one channel of the DEQ-P9, and feed one channel of an amplifier which will feed one speaker, the tweeter. The midrange signal will exit one channel (probably as a low pass signal) and feed one channel of an amp, which will be output (probably as a high pass signal) to feed one speaker, the midrange. The combination of the low pass and high pass outputs effectively creates a band pass filter which means that everything above, say 100Hz and below, say 2kHz is passed as a range or band to the speaker. Again, not really possible using the crossover the comes with your speakers. It's sole purpose is to take the full range signal (possibly high pass) from one amp channel and divide it up into a high pass and low pass signal to feed the tweeter and midrange respectively.
Here is another thought to mull over. Most good passive crossovers (that come with the speakers) have a switch that attenuates the volume of the tweeter, making it seem louder or softer, but that is typically a three position switch... not a whole lot of flexibility. If you ditch the passive crossover in favor of the multichannel scheme I described above, you can use the amplifiers gain to act as an infinitely variable volume control for each speaker, and really fine tune things. If you are serious about competing, flexibility is a great thing to have!
Again, not trying to tell you what to do, just hoping to point out some of your options. Using the multi-channel approach has it's downsides also... more wiring, maybe higher cost, depending upon the amplifiers. Tuning will be more difficult, but it can also lead to better accuracy, so that becomes a wash.
I don't really know your knowledge level on this stuff, so I hope I wasn't boring you with basics, but I'll be happy to discuss this until the cows come home, so to speak. There are lots of knowledgable folks here, and it's great to get everyones perspective on things, but it can sometimes be overwhelming!

Hameed

Hi Eric,

Yes what you're saying makes perfect sense and I guess my next question to you would be:

Please specify in as much detail as you can, what setup (eq, hu, speakers, amps etc), and configuration you would do to achieve a winning setup. This will help to clarify some of my confusion as it would eliminate my proposed setup that seems to be not optimal.

Thanks!

ikankoi

Hameed,

IB setup is bassically a mounted subwoofer without any dedicated enclosure. it needs a sealed form between the cone and the back magnet, like the GS rear deck, and using the trunk space as the "box". the stock GS sub is using this application method. i did this setup with single 10" O series from Elemental Design, heres the pic how it looks:



about the sound quality, it is a very subjective matters. for sure it is not a booming bass setup, and ive read pro opinions that a proper designed IB subs can give the best SQ. the limitation is the SPL: most likely IB setup has half of power handling compare to sealed or ported box design. i dont know about IASCA rules of SPL for SQ, but im sure a higher SPL number will add some points in SQ comp.

the sub of my choice is Elemetal Design O series coz it is designed for IB. i give 300watt on this and that is enough SPL for me. as the characteristic of a ten incher, it gives tight accurate bass, but it is a bit lacking of deep long bass like in rap songs. but if you listen to dave matthews or coldpaly, the bass guitar is reporduced fantastic. so again, it is a matter of preference. if you want to know about elemental design, you may check out www.soundillusions.net they have special forum for ED and some of the active members are world class champions of SQ and SPL.

I consider, if you are going for competition, it is not having the "best' setup to win, but to compromizing the rules and pleasing the judges "ear" in order to get points. what for you is the best might be not for them, so again, you gotta find a way around that. but so far you have a list of potential winner equipments, so good luck!

mumbles

Hameed,
Here is my take on things... You can buy the best amps, processors, speakers, etc... and the system can still sound like crap if not installed properly. In my opinion, a clean signal is important, but the speakers are what you hear, so buy the ones you like the most. I have heard nothing but good things about cdt, so I'm sure you'll be happy with those. In contrast, I have heard extremely high praise for the DynAudio's, but also heard that they were a bit harsh. When listening to them, I also found them to be a little to harsh for my tastes.
Since you are working with IASCA champs, they'll probably have their equipment recommendations, and I'm sure you'll walk away with a killer install. I wouldn't change anything in your list, I'd just add one more amp. That would give each speaker in your front stage 100w of clean signal, you would be able to cross them over and time align them independantly and have 31bands of eq at your disposal.
The choice as I see it still lies with the subs which we discussed earlier. When you find out the SPL requirements for IASCA, then you can decide whether to go with a single driver or multiples. That will determine what type of amp to get. Personally I don't like having different brands of amps in the same system, so I'd pick another Zapco if that is what you wind up going with. For one sub, you could use the C2K-6.0X, bridged for 600w x 1 @ 4ohms, or if you use a dual 4ohm voice coil sub, you can run the voice coils in parallel on the same amp and get 1325w x 1 @ 2ohms.
Remember this when deciding whether or not to use multiple subs... when trying to generate SPL, there is no replacement for displacement. In other words, all other things being equal, the more cone area you move the higher the SPL. But wait... you say you don't want SPL... well, really you do, you just don't want massive amounts of it. So, one sub may play a little bit cleaner than two, but with two you won't necessarily have to play as loud to move the same amount of air, so you don't necessarily need as much power. Like anything else, it's better to have too much than too little, so more power means more headroom etc...
I think you are on the right track with your equipment, but like I said, just need to add another amp and then determine your choice of subs.
Hope this helps and keep asking questions,
Eric

Hameed

Ok, so if I understand you correctly, you are proposing the following:

1. Pioneer Premier DEX-P9
2. Pioneer Premier DEQ-P9
3. Zapco C2K-4.0X to power the front speakers
4. CDT Audio HD-62ST with the SatNet 560 crossovers
5. Zapco C2K-6.0K to power the subs
6. I am leaning towards a pair of 12 inch OZ Audio Oz Me12.2 - the Matrix Elite 12 inch series http://jti-innovation.com/oz/oz_prod_matrix_elite.htm

Correct me if I am wrong.

mumbles

Except for two things, or maybe only one...
Item 3, you won't use the crossovers as this will be handled by the DEQ-P9 and the C2K-4.0K to drive each speaker directly.
Item 6, (this is the maybe) the choice of sub can be more difficult than that of front stage, because unless you have first hand knowledge of them, it's not easy to walk into a stereo store and audition subs because very seldom do you find a store that will go to the trouble of putting a demo speaker in the proper sized box. So, you usually have to go by word of mouth. The OZ looks to be a real quality sub, although the sensitivity is a little low at 86db, but not that bad. You'll just need to drive them a little harder.
If you go with this speaker, you have several options because the come in both dual 2ohm and dual 4ohm flavors, so here's what you could do;

- One dual 2ohm; run amp in stereo with one voice coil per channel. Total theoretical output = 600w.
Well maybe, but if you're only going to run one speaker might as well go for option 2...
- One dual 4ohm; run the voice coils in parallel for a 2 ohm load, bridge the C2K-6.0K for a total theoretical output of 1325w. Much better.
- Two dual 4ohm; run the voice coils in parallel for a 2 ohm load, run the amp in stereo with one speaker per channel; Total theoretical output = 600w. Same as #1 but with twice the surface area. Should be a pretty safe option with good output.
- Two dual 2ohm; run each speakers voice coils in series, then parallel the voice coils with the other speaker for a 2ohm load. Bridge the amp for a total theoretical output of 1325w. Same output as #2 with twice the surface area. This should maximize your SPL.

I hope this makes sense. All the configurations above will also work for the 10" subs, but will save a few $$ and require a smaller enclosure. Outputs of course are assuming maximum signal level driving each combination to it's fullest. This is not real world, so your mileage may vary... Like I said earlier, your IASCA friends can probably guide you better in selecting a sub since they are more familiar with current products. I'd also do some google-searches (gawd I love saying that) to find recommendations. Then gather the info and decide what suit you best. Ideal of course would be a sub that could handle 10,000watts, with sensitivity of 300db, was only 8" in diameter and required an enclosure the size of a coffee can... and if you find that, my phone number is....

engin_ear

iTrader: (1)

"Ideal of course would be a sub that could handle 10,000watts, with sensitivity of 300db, was only 8" in diameter and required an enclosure the size of a coffee can... and if you find that, my phone number is.... "

That's funny. I think that they have these on Neptune. Where there's no air. Or coffee.

O. L. T.

iTrader: (17)

I seriously neglected mentioning one thing that has pretty much been the standard in SQ systems, but i have been focusing on subs and not much else since they are so critical (BTW IMO free air is sloppy without a membrane, JMO)

check out the USD compression drivers. waveguide aluminum horns set the standard and will run you about $1500.00 just for two horns. that's basically $1,500.00 for a pair of tweeters, but MAN i have never heard a soft dome tweeter do what they can do. (which they are not)

This next comment is just for me, i personally wouldn't run anything but tubedriver amps in SQ, but again, that is just my 2 pennies.

If i set up an SQ system i'd run -

- tubedriver amps
- USD waveguide horns
- servodrive subs (OZ my CLOSE second choice)
- 8 inch USD midbass
- USD upper fill mids
- FULL Aperiodic Membrane

and i'll leave out the head and processing since there are so many to choose from.

mumbles

Agreed. IB just doesn't have the cone control to get serious in competition.

See, now this is where subjective opinion comes in. I actually heard a set of Speaker Works installed wave guides, and I found them to be too harsh. It seems to me that you are trying to get one speaker to cover too much of the freq spectrum, since they are typically run with only a mid-bas to handle the whole front stage. Judges seem to (or used to) like them so...? Maybe I just need to give them another chance...

Yep, tube amps have been long heralded as great sounding, very warm and gentle.
I run a server sub in my home stereo, and in my car (when it gets installed) I have an Autosound 2000 Aperiodic Membrane system for my subs. If you want a bigtime system in your daily driver, it's hard to beat an aperiodic system for helping retain some trunk space!

BTW O.L.T., have any leads on those silicone LED covers yet? PM me if you wish.

O. L. T.

iTrader: (17)

like i say, i'd run an upper fill mid, like in my list. it would be a set of 4 inchers.

no dice on the caps.

Hameed

Where can you find the above? I have done some google searches, but cannot find anything useful. Especially the tubedriver amps and servodrive subs.

If you look at the OZ subs, they now focus more on SPL (it clearly states that in the description of the product on their site:

I need to figure out what are the best subs for SQ. I found out that the min db for SQ competitions for SPL is 135 db.

Anyone of you heard these subs - Decware in a deathbox? http://www.decware.com

Now where can I find the Servodrives? and Tubedriver amps?