I Need Advice and Suggestions

don't be intimidated by it all, if you can cut on the line and glue wood, you can build some goodness.

first, i'd fix the bass. four dayton dvc's powered by one behringer ep2500/4000 amp along with some eq will take care of that. build two boxes, 4.5 cubic feet each, mount the drivers dual opposed.

for the mains, have a look over at audiokarma at the econowave project.

the clearwaves look like jim holtz ripoffs or is it the other way around. in any case, neither are high sensitivity or controlled directivity. but if you like the way that they sound, go for them. just make sure that you put absorbing material on the walls or the dialog will lose some intelligibility.

forget looks.

the lansing iconic got it pretty much right 80 years ago.

http://www.audioheritage.org/html/pr...mco/iconic.htm

every company worth its salt has a horn top on 15" mid-bass for a reason.

they can be made "pretty" if you want, see jbl k2.

http://elitechoice.org/2009/02/20/jb...-bated-breath/

or ultra high performance, see meyer sound x-10.

http://www.meyersound.com/products/studioseries/x-10/

I haven't heard the 4TSE (yet), but I have read numerous positive reviews. Enough that I am building a pair right now. If you haven't already been there, I suggest you check out the Clearwave forum for more listening impressions. Jed, the designer, has been in the DIY game for quite a while, and has earned a reputation for high quality designs. It comes down to what you are looking for, and what your pocket can accommodate - as well as the amount of work you want to put in.

I think people may have understated the skills to complete a DIY speaker or subwoofer, even proven designs. If your deeply concerned with the asthetic results as am i, be pround in the humlity you showed in your first post and skip the cabinet building part.

But Alas, there are pre-built cabinets that can still make DIY worth the investment BUT there's some things to consider....

Your AVR is not a powerhouse, and to get the MOST from ANY loudspeaker system you need adequate amplification OR a very sensitive system that can make the most of an underpowered amplifier section. $3000 is a pretty healthy speaker budget, but without Pre-outs on the AVR, i'd suggest a quick resale on Ebay to recover some $$$ now before it depreciates any further. With the recovered $$$ and a small investment from your speaker budget and smart shopping, you can significantly increase your performance potential. Here's an excellent, affordable AVR that's got some serious power and a known great amplifier section.

http://www.electronics-expo.com/make...-1900BL/1.html



That being said and assuming a remaining budget of $2600, there's some options that will guarantee success. But you didn't mention the video side of things and the space is a BIG space...big enough for a screen wall to hide all of the front speakers and relieve you of the asthetic pressures. With that kind of available volume, you could also do a built in subwoofer system requiring basic carpentry skills void of the the advanced skills of finishing which al here can attest to as being the most difficult, time consuming and sometimes most costly part of ANY DIY speaker.

So i suggest you explore all of your options before moving any further. There's really nothing quite like a fixed frame acoustically transparent screen with 3 matching speakers hidden from view. The cohesiveness of the front sound stage along with the true theater image is really something to behold.

Someone needed to pop on to say that there are plenty of companies "worth their salt" who use neither horns or large midbass drivers.

Please understand that each design philosophy, whether traditional horn, cd waveguide, monopole or dipole, one two or five way, small drivers or large, tmm or mtm, first order or digital 60db eliptical, cone or dome, silk or ceramic... all have their pros and cons. All are an optimization of one set of criteria at the expense of a compromised other set.

Anyone telling you that there is only one right speaker to design, build, or buy is doing you a disservice.

I'll take the opposite stance on the AVR--I personally am of the opinion that you should buy an AVR for the inputs/outputs you need, and not much else. There is very little appreciable difference between 100W and 60W of amplification, and most any AVR out there produces next to nothing as far as distortion. So I'd keep your AVR. And buy another in 4 years when you need the new connections (which you'd need to do with a more expensive avr anyways).

$3000 is a very healthy DIY budget. With a room of that size I've go with 4 small sealed subs scattered about the room; that should give you good LFE and an even response throughout. Alternatively, a couple horns tucked in the front corners should do you just fine. I'll assume IB is out if you're in a garage. With amplification and EQ (if necessary) your budget should be about (maybe under) $1k on those.

There are any number of speakers that fit your budget requirements--off the top of my head, I'd recommend you consider the Statements and the Econowave Deluxe. Both have raving reviews by those who have built them and compare very favorably to commercial examples---with the measurements to prove it.

As others have said, making it look pretty is where things get tough. But with a bit of practice (and a lot of elbow grease) anybody can put a good finish on a set of speakers.

Most subwoofers will have their own power source. You would connect the sub to the subwoofer pre-out on the receiver.

As for the impedence, the Dynamic 4T and 4CC are both 8 ohm. The Dynamics with less than 4 woofers are 4 ohm. From skimming the manual for your receiver it sounds like you may run into some overheating (tripping the protection circuit) if you run speakers with less than 6 ohm.

Maybe someone else with a little more confidence in this area will chime in.

There are two primary concerns when loading an amplifier--stability and current capacity. A modern amplifier is typpically very stable (those older tube amps are another animal entirely) so for us the biggest issue is typically current draw.

When you reduce the resistance by half, in order to deliver the same power the current must increase by a factor of sqrt(2). this is the result of the fact that most amplifiers are voltage amplifiers--they take in a certain amount of voltage, amplify it by a set gain, then output a voltage signal. The amplifier will attempt to supply as much current as is necessary to sustain that voltage signal. And when you reduce the resistance by one half, the current then has to increase accordingly.

Basically, the ohm-rating on an amplifier is a rating of how much current the amp can deliver. Can it drive a lower impedance? Yes, but it will do so much less efficiently, with much less deliverable power, and may run into issues with overheating. On the flip side, most AVR's power capabilities are pretty overkill for most speakers, so I wouldn't worry too much about it if you don't plan on driving your speakers super hard. And the more efficient your speakers are, the less power they need, so keep that in mind (ie, a MTM version might be half the impedance of a MT version, but due to the increased sensitivity the amp won't work any harder to supply that same sound level).

Well, approaching the wattage output of your amp is always a good sign .

Most people find the 'standard' of 90dB + 15dB peaks to be a bit on the loud side. So if you're planning on playing beyond that, plan on any 'high level' precautions you deem necessary. Otherwise, keeping 6dB under your equipment's capability would keep you at 'normal' levels.

That of course depends upon your efficiency, distance from the speakers, and the power you're equipment can handle.