Mark Audio Alpair 11ms in Pensil 11 by Scott Lindgren Sound Test 

Whats the story. Are you building a pair of pensil 11's

Its much better to listen in person. Room recording doesn’t not do justice to these speakers at all !

Im sorry because I’ve sold those speakers and now im using troels Gravesen

@@berlyfredy7153 Which cabinet design for these speakers sounded best to you ?

@@KitaristChannel best was frugal horns And second best was pensil 11 (only lacks some bass extension and some room interaction benefits compared to frugals)

@@KitaristChannel according to my testing and observations frugal horn and pensils Both have almost identical sound signature above bass range. the only thing sound-wise that keeps them different is the bass response. in my suboptimal non-treated assymetric room the pensils went down to 42hz and frugals go down to 38hz. SBIR interaction which causes a dip in the 100-130hz region is less significant in the frugals because it is rear ported and this frequency region is produced by the driver and the rear port aswell. So the cancellation due to SBIR is a bit compensated with the same frequency region coming from the rear port in the frugals. in pensils the SBIR is more significant because the driver and port is in front ie equal distance from backwall. hence port doesnt compensate for SBIR cancellation. But tables turn when it comes to ease of placement though. pensils are very easy to place to get a good frequency response. since the port is in the front, it doesnt matter much if you place them all the way to touch the wall. Actually the best response i got from the pensil is when i put them all the way touching the backwall. Also another experimental trick which you can attempt to further reduce SBIR interaction in pensil is that to tightly place it between two cupboards so that there is no way for sound waves to travel from the driver to the back wall. Whether this might inturn cause any other undesired result is yet to be seen by testing. Modern studios opting for in-wall mounting is to avoid this SBIR. now when it comes to frugals placement is a bit more complicated. Keeping them all the way touching the wall causes a 200 to 300 hz region bump. Keeping them 15 to 20 cm from wall provided me with a well balanced response. Placing them in corners will further enhance bass frequencies. keeping them more than 30 cm from back wall reduces mid frequency and bass to some extent. But all these would vary according to your room conditions. So moral of the story is that frugal horns are much harder to place in a suboptimal typical living room. sound stage is the same in both Lookwise frugal horns are like a piece of art where as pensils are just rectangular boxes. hope this reply answer your question adequately. happy listening.

@@berlyfredy7153 Why did you sell it? Is there a specific reason?

You can get it directly from mark audio website

I did not do bracing as it was made with 19mm birch ply. But bracing is recommended

Yes minidsp umik 1 is at default gain settings.

Hey.. Sure. But where are you based in..? Frugal horn was built in kerala and Pensil was built in abudhabi

@@berlyfredy7153 thanks Brely for the response. Hope you and your family are staying safe. I am based out of Bangalore and would be super if you can share the contact for the Frugal Horn. Perhaps the Pensil can wait till we get over the pandemic. God Bless

@@Creeptonic all is well. The contact is Suji sudhi - +918086872678

@@berlyfredy7153 thank you so much again. Will be in touch on here with you. I shall call the number and get this going. Have a good week ahead and stay well. P.S i have made a note of the number of your wish to mask it or delete please do so. Thanks again.

@@Creeptonic enjoy your build. Let the number be here for future prospectors.😄

Objective answer is that if done without any gaps or holes it can mitigate any cabinet resonances. Subjective and a realistic answer is that the moment you place your fancy concrete speaker in a room and start to play, the resultant resonances , reflections and standing waves which is caused by the room boundaries is gonna just dominate and nullify any benefit of mitigating resonances using a concrete cabinet. Resonances resulting from plywood cabinets (decently built) is subtle or negligible compared to the resonances and standing waves resulting from room interaction.

And good luck moving around your concrete speakers😄. Might get a good outcome if you’re a body builder

@@berlyfredy7153 there are ytong blocks which weigh 3x less than standard concrete. Standing waves are inside the cabinet if it has parallel walls. So make it tubus shaped.

@@quant2011 the main reason about hypothetical case of using concrete is to avoid cabinet resonance as concrete is very stiff. But my point is that artifacts caused by room interactions completely dominate the overall sound reproduction. So just changing cabinet material to concentrate is not going to provide any audible improvement. Yes circular shapes reduces standing waves but the point of using concrete is not standing wave related but it is resonance related.

@@quant2011 and standing waves are nit just inside cabinets its also in the room resulting from room interaction. After all the room is a huge rectangular box too.

I have upgraded to frugal horns with same driver. Pensil has 5 hz less bass extension than frugal. Otherwise similar sounding

You have to be careful with them if you use them occasionally for watching movies because of the high dynamic range of movies. These drivers are not for hard rock or pop. They are amazing for jazz, country , classical soft rock,vocals, R&B Pensils are easy to place . Just putting all the way touching the back wall and listen at around 12-14 feet from them Frugals are harder to place. You need around 60 cm (give or take) space from back wall and listening spot around 12- 14 feet from speakers. Im still using them. listening to music as im typing this.

@@berlyfredy7153 Thank you for taking a few minutes to explain all that. I saw your frugal horns video. They are absolutely beautiful. I do need to think about high dynamic range and I won't be the only one using speakers..

Its a Bass Reflex design

Well technically the volume wont be the same but I don’t think it’s compromised to a point where it affects your fidelity. I did not have bracing in mine but i had all the walls lined with jute felt and was stuffed with around 350g of polyfill.

@@berlyfredy7153 Well you added that the strength of the plywood is enough for your liking. But Birch seems to be caught in politics and plywood are taking hostage by the russians too.. i might switch to mdf or some other layered board maybe - braces would be as ventilated as possible and maybe just 1 vertical and some sticks horisontal. Thx for the reply..

@@Hemshemsems if you choose mdf I would recommend to add bracing because mdf has a higher density and it resonates at a lower frequency which harder for the felt lining to damp. Hence you should try to eliminate as much as resonance. Ply usually resonates at higher frequencies which are easier to damp with the felt lining hence bracing is not really that big of a deal

@@berlyfredy7153 I've always braced mdf and to me its not that great either - but pretty cheap and easy to work with.. I'll like to go full Birch or maybe a mix depending on availability..

@@Hemshemsems all the best for builds