A7 and Old Ears

[Steve Mac]

Old ears...you'd think adding more highs could help compensate for this. It's kinda counter-intuitive when you say you might not need a tweeter because you can't hear the highs no more. Having said that, I've kept a tweeter out of my system to this point because I'm still futzing with getting the imaging and levels of the mid bass and mid range right...which to me is where the meat and potatos reside. I didn't think I would like the 511 horn as much as I have. I have the same drivers as you and I re-magnetized the alnico drivers, replaced the diaphragms, removed the loading caps, lined the rear covers with felt...and put some non-hardening modeling clay on the upper and lower bells of the 511 metal horn. It took a while to break in...but my goodness they sound fantastic to my ears. Never heard better. I compared and previewed the 500hz wooden tractrix edgar horn with the dynaudio driver in it and it was smooth. Don't get me wrong..it's extremely good sounding...but I think this 808 compression driver is more nimble.

I had many different Magnepan products with their famous ribbon driver. I do miss the air up above without a super tweeter. But I solved so many other problems in my setup I said screw it...IF it needs doing I'll wait until the end and plop in something above 10KHz. Matter of fact I wonder what driver the gurus here would recommend for the task. I checked out the Fostex tweeters...whew 1500 clams but I hear they are very good. It's gonna have to be really good or it ain't gonna keep up with the altecs...which are phenomenal sounding drivers and designs. I sound like an advertisement this morning.

[bfish]

Well, if you're willing to settle for less because of "old ears syndrome", there's always the balanced bandwidth concept to fall back on. It suggests that if you don't produce the bottom octave (20-40Hz), you should equally ignore the top one (10k-20kHz). While the numbers suggest otherwise, the first audible 20 Hz span exactly the same musical BW as the last 10,000, one octave. In stock unequalized form, the A7 follows that dictum pretty well, being rolled off on both ends.

Then again, settling for just enough to satisfy old, damaged male ears hints that you never again intend to impress any less-damaged female ears. Just because my ears are those of an old man doesn't mean everything is. Why else am I saving those syrupy old Van Morrison albums?

Added;
When they say, "Let's talk" in their never-ending pursuit of "meaningful dialog", I just say, "Let's listen instead", and reach for the volume control...

<font color="#FFFFFF" size="1">[ July 01, 2008 12:38 PM: Message edited by: bfish ]</font>

[mah]

Hi,

I have 511Bs/808-8As with Pascalite diaphrams and JBL 2404s to make up a 3-way A7 project.
For simplicity I would upgrade the 808 diaphrams and dispense with the 2404s if my 60 year old ears are not likely to notice much difference.

What do you think?

Marshall.

[mah]

Oops, diaphrams are Symbiotic. Please excuse my senior moment.

Marshall.

[gamalot]

I am 56 and think the 808-8As can be updated to fill your needs.

My suggestion would be to either send them to GPA or purchase the 34647 diaphragms and felt lined rear covers. You will also need to remove the loading caps and trim the screws down by that ammount. I like sending them as Bill has all the necessary parts and knowhow and will recharge the magnets while there.

The addition of a tweeter will necessitate tricky reworking of the XO and I have never found the exact right upgrades nor the need for a tweeter.
It can certainly be done but I would think a good deal of technical assistance will be needed.

I have rebuilt 808-8As as I described above and they are every bit as nice as my 802-8Gs to these old ears.

Gary

[gamalot]

A well accepted bolt on driver that goes higher is the BMS 4550. Not sure just how high it does go but I have heard above the 14Khz point mentioned in many threads.

Unlike Feesh, my music needs only to make me happy and the 802/808 works just fine. Impressing the females was always expensive and never gave a great return IMHO! :-)

Gary

[bfish]

Originally posted by gamalot:
...Impressing the females was always expensive and never gave a great return...

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Expensive? A $4.99 copy of Moondance gave incredible return on investment. So much so that I'm now on my 5th or 6th copy.

Drop the needle on side 1, and if they weren't purring in your ear by the second chorus of Crazy Love, you knew you should've splurged on some deodorant (or a toothbrush).

No great return? Well, that's subjective...

[mah]

It seems that for my case, 2-way with diaphram upgrade should be fine. Simpler, also. Thanks for your help.

[mah]

Bfish,

"...on my 5th or 6th copy.."

Those old ladies must be slow starters.

[bfish]

Ooouchhh, right thru the heart! I believe that's the best one anyone has "got me" on in years!

So, instead of cracking wise about keeping your daughter home at night, I'll invite you to have a dram of ale on me, my friend.