There is another type of speaker called an open baffle that has no box. And check out our newest RU-vid channel / @octaverecordsanddsdst... Octave Records.
Relatively few people in the world got a chance to meet Toby Guynn. For years he ran "Toby" a small speaker manufacturing company in Fort Worth, Texas. He was once the bassist for the famed NTSU One O'clock Jazz Band, and I met him about 15 years into his speaker making career. My first experience with his speakers were one of his oldest transmission-line designs, an oddity at the price point he managed to hit. The bread and butter of his operation was bandpass subwoofers. Probably anyone much outside the Dallas/Fort Worth area who knows of Toby was introduced to his work by those car subs. He knew his market well. And because he designed every component of them, they were extremely flat for bandpass designs...they'd rearrange your guts if you weren't careful with them. I met Toby right after I graduated from college, because I wanted to actually meet the guy who'd designed those amazing transmission line cabs (and to know why the ones I tried to design had failed so miserably). He spent an afternoon with me, and that led to a whole series of afternoons as the years went by. Whenever I was closeby and had a little time, a stop at Toby's place was always a treat. Once when I'd needed a small set of monitors to take on the road, I'd bought a set of Dynaudio BM5As, which sounded great for their size and fit a flight case I already had. I brought them by his place once, knowing he'd grumble about them, and take them straight to the "lab" and measure them every way but loose. By the time I left, he'd modded the ports and was proud of himself for making them flatter for the price of a couple db output. The guy loved what he did. But he constantly worked on large dipole designs. That was his secret passion. If he knew you were a musician or serious audiophile, he'd sit you down in the "showroom" and play his latest for you. Toby always listen-tested those with acoustic music. He had a whole set of recordings selected, those he felt had the best soundstages for judging imaging. His passion was small group jazz, trying to perfect the soundstage to the point you could pinpoint each player. And those dipoles he designed (if you had the kind of scratch to design a room around them, which is pretty much what it would take to hear them properly) were absolutely the most thrilling speakers I've heard in my entire life, bar none. You could not sit in that seat and deny what you were hearing. Toby was never in the best of health, and he was not particularly careful in his habits, so he died relatively young. And there probably are not that many people in the world who sought him out, and sat in that room to listen to his Franken-dipoles du jour. But there's definitely something to it. Like I said, you'd have to dedicate a room to them if you were really serious about it. There's no other practical way to create them--not to the degree which there are just literally no compromises. The baffles themselves simply have to be too large, even for mids/highs. And Toby was the first to admit there was a threshold at which you had to cross the lowest frequencies to a sub unless you had an entire 7500 foot lot to devote to your listening room. But all practicality aside, I've never heard anything before or since like that.
What a great story. I highly recommend checking out Spatial Audio. Clayton Shaw is the man behind them, and they build incredibly innovative open baffle speakers in Utah. I have a pair of M3s and they blow every other speaker I've heard out of the water. When done right, open baffle is really hard to beat.
I don't think one can discount one speaker design over another; however, I have a small pair of full range open baffles being run by a Decware single ended tube amp, and I think for the kind of music I listen to, they are the best I've heard to date. I know if I were to put the speakers, or even the amp on a bench test, they'd spec out horribly-- but there we are...
Audio enthusiast, sound engineer, recording artist... love your insights...use to build speaker cabinets with my dad back in the old 60-70s Wharfedale / Tannoy days...
As an advocate of subwoofers I'm surprised Paul did not speak about open baffle speakers with subs supporting the bottom end. This is what I have at home, it's fantastic!! OB speakers are super efficient, airy, have immense soundstage and dynamics. With a set of subs they are very very hard to beat. For relatively cheap (I have a pair of sealed SVS subs and a set of entry level spatial audio speakers) they will blow away any box speaker that is double or more the price.
Paul, your favorite speaker, the Infinity IRS-V is a hybrid with OB for the mid and treble and a closed servo controlled sub. This is a very typical OB configuration where OB is used for everything down to mid bass and its then augmented by a closed box sub woofer. An open baffle is not defined as a cone driver on a baffle, its any kind of transducer on a baffle as opposed to a box. So your favorite speakers are open baffle.
Yes, and he was good enough to make that distinction in the vid with separate commentary from woofers. Just didn't give the benefits enough for the mids. Porting a midrange cabinet is something too few manufacturers do because you need to build a separate midrange cabinet, but it gives many advantages of an open baffle. Removing the back panel gives you a transmission line midrange with a good blend of benefits. These "open baffle" derivatives would make a great follow-up video also.
I sometimes (or actually often) mess around and experiment with speaker setups, and the one time I tried an open baffle setup, I really loved the sound even though I didn't have any really good drivers. It just sounded so alive and fun, but indeed there was no proper bass except for a little bit of extremely low bass.
Love seeing the Rocket RS250 speaker in the background! I still love my Rockets in my home theater. Wish things didn't go down the way they did at AV123. I still am enjoying many of their products.
Paul. I love your no nonsense interpretation and GIVING A SHOUTOUT TO YOUR KIDS ! I have 4 as well. Don’t know if you will see this but I love your products and your style!
I’ll have to get a copy of The Rock and The Tree. This sounds completely assinine, but I didn’t think about phase cancellation. It makes perfect sense now. Thanks for clarifying the topic for me!
I go back and forth-sealed, ported. I had an older but we’ll know pair of 18 inch subwoofers Kove Armageddons 4 inch coils 55 pounds each 2500-3k rms dual 2ohms out of lazy ness and inexperience I but then in a sealed box-separate chambers of course only had a 3k rms amp one bass track witch is well known to “bass heads”- Bass I love you by Bassotronics sounded beyond incredible. I ended up blowing the subs by 1.not having proper current and I didn’t know I was clipping almost all the time but the coils held up UNTIL I not knowing better started putting 4 inch ports in the box. But it lead me to meet my sub builder so hey I guess it was worth it. Fast forward to today I still play the same song with twice the rms 6k got more then enough current my amp has a clip light so that is awesome. Like I’ve mentioned I’m set to 28-19 hz but that song just does not have the same impact as when I had those 18’s in sealed box and a 3k rms amp. Maybe it’s the cone surface or It wasn’t as loud and powerful as I remember. If my subs were not 90 pounds each-Adire Audio 3001kh’s custom made as well I love to play around with different boxes. Some days I fantasize about just that :). Some do infinite baffle,isobaric chambers you know all different means of getting bass it’s just so much fun being an audiophile.
Bob Carver developed a open baffle speaker that didn't need an equalizer & had solid bass response down to 20 Hz and was reasonably efficient. Fed a strong enough signal I was able to rattle windows at 10hz. I could not hear the bass at 10 Hz but the fact that it was rattling windows meant that was definitely reproducing it & not only that but there was no audible harmonics at 10 hz meaning very low distortion even at that low frequency. The window in question were in a fairly large room & the speakers were along the far wall facing the wall with the windows. Oh this was with an Adcom 100 watt per channel amp so not a huge powerhouse amp. The only problem is they were quite large & were often referred to as the surfboards from hell. They required a reasonably large room as well. The version I had had 3 twelve inch woofers each with 2 inches of travel & very small magnets for a twelve inch drivers. Those small magnets are in large part how Bob achieved bass response without requiring equalization. There was a larger version with 4 of those 12 inch woofers.
I still use a pair of Carver AL-III's that I bought in "95". I've since totally rebuilt the crossovers with much better parts and they're pretty awesome, but they are power hungry and always have been at 86db. The newer OB speakers are much better and I'm looking hard at these : )
I have some open baffle 12" vintage zenith speakers that came from an old radio cabinet and they sound stunning beyond belief. The bass isn't too great so I use my 8" polk audio sub and it fills the gap perfectly.
I don't know why Magnepan, or electrostats in general were not mentioned. Different driver, similar issues, well loved by a lot of people. Also, open vs. closed headphones. Many ways to experiment in how different things sound when drivers drive free air in both directions.
Hey Paul! What do you think about the "Danny Richie side of open-baffleness"?... because im watching all of his videos in the New record day channel here on youtube, and it looks like he has found a way to have all the benefits that you mentioned about open baffles and minimize all the down sides with high quality crossover networks and smart baffle cabinet designs
I know your comment is old, but I have just seen the videos from N(e)RD and I think most of the "problem" is not so great after all. The sound from the back has to use time to get to the front and equally does the front sound weaves is using time to get to the back, this means that the front and back sound waves meets in the sides and chancels out there, meaning that you get full sound in the front and back but no sound in the sides, resulting in that you can place your speakers closer to the side wall. Also, if you use some absorbing material to place a little behind the speaker, will you even get a louder bass. Paul says he is familiar with more box-speakers that he likes than open baffle, and yes it's guaranteed true, but to that story may I add there are only a very few open baffle speakers out there. What he says is a bit like, I know of more Lada cars I like to drive in than Ferrari testarossaes. :-)
I find it's easier to get the same pitch and texture definition in speakers, top to bottom, with hybrid open baffles. I do fill in below about 60 Hertz with stereo sealed subs. My current favourite is the Dayton Audio RSS265HF-4, in 1 foot boxes. Sealed, magnet side out, for maximum internal volume, in the smallest box. Saves a set of connectors, too.
Open baffle speakers are velocity sources, closed/ported (including transmission lines) are pressure sources, therefore the biggest difference presents itself in the placement of these in the listening room. You can not place the open baffle where you place the closed/ported box. Closed/ported designs excite the room efficiently when they are placed at the pressure maximums of the room modes, ie. all the room modes have a pressure maximum at the corners, you place them there, you get the maximum room gain (boomy bass). You place the open baffle at the corner, nothing happens, because when there is a pressure maximum, there is a velocity minimum. Velocity is minimum by the walls, therefore you have to move the open baffles towards the center of the room.
Sorry, but this is not the case. Sound is all pressure and zero "velocity". The speed of sound is dependant on the density of material it flows through. Air has density. There is no pressure in space, and no sound. Yet there is still velocity. That velocity makes zero sound. Therefore, velocity's contribution to sound is zero. [Perhaps you confused the pressure equation of PV=nRT. V is Volume here, not velocity.] Room modes are entirely geometrically dependant. Wave interference patterns result when the speakers are equidistant from two walls. When you put them into (or near) a corner their distance between each side wall becomes equivalent. You have now generated a node. That node is what you are observing. This is why 12x12 rooms don't sound as good as 10x12 rooms. As you can see, those dimensions are independent of velocity (which is constant in a room at the same altitude). Hopefully this mathematical approach is constructive and allows you to eliminate a "red herring" in your endeavor. Cheers.
@@onebylandtwoifbysearunifby5475 I am extremely sorry that you have received false information from somewhere.Whatever you are saying is so not true, I don't even know where to start. Therefore, it is best that you find it out yourself in your journey because it looks like, with the level of knowledge you have, you are going to oppose to anything I say anyway.
@@oturgator Sound is a pressure wave that travels in a medium at a constant velocity. That velocity is entirely dependant on the density and physical characteristics of the medium. That is why helium balloons make your voice sound higher. Lower density medium.[ Also, take your speakers into a vacuum chamber. No sound? But they still have velocity?? Velocity is therefore Zero contribution. ] But if we are talking listening rooms, we are talking nitrogen medium. And velocities are all equal. Hearing is 100% pressure detection. It is a mechanical system. It cannot detect velocity. More pressure is interpreted as louder. More oscillations interoperate frequency. There are no variables for velocity in audition. Extraneous variable will only serve to confuse. The point here is that all speakers from ear-buds to cones to electrostatic are exclusively pressure drivers and have to obey the same physics regardless of type. Hopefully that confusion has been clarified for all parties. Cheers.
You (or maybe not you) may also consider there is no hard line between "open baffle" and "closed baffle". It is a continuum. There are transmission line midranges that do much of the same by simply taking out the back panel of the box. "Boxes" made from Acoustic felt is another option. They are sonically transparent, yet still provide some needed pressure wave for the driver to work against. They are "open baffle" with felt behind the driver. (I use these for open baffle mids below 100Hz design criteria with good success). One great solution is ported midrange. You get a driver with less (cone) travel, so is more accurate with less piston effect. So "open baffle" is a continuum between air only and ported enclosures (for air pressure mitigation, not ported bass in this context). All of which change the pressure behind the driver, and all have benefits and compromises. Hopefully this helps readers to consider some new approaches in their next design or purchase. (Sorry for any sour grapes, but physics is physics, as they say. Cheers.)
I remember going to a local audio store back in the mid 1980's and being flabbergasted by the bass that I heard (and felt). This was the first time I ever heard bass down to 20hz and it was amazing, you couldn't tell where it was coming from, it seemed to be coming from everywhere and it vibrated your insides. Anyway I walked into the "high end" room where the speakers were, they used transmission line loading and they were quite large, don't recall the brand ... could have been Fried. Nowadays of course you can get bass like that from a "small" subwoofer that has a 12" - 15" driver with a huge motor connected to a 1000-watt amp. I never listened to open baffle speakers but I've seen them before, I would imagine they have a much better (3-D) imaging though believe it or not imaging can be improved greatly by using quality interconnects. About 10 years ago I purchased a used set of Monster M-1 interconnects to go between my Denon surround receiver which I was using as a pre-amp and my Parasound 5-channel power amp. The difference in imaging was amazing!! I was hearing my CDs like I never heard them before, with some sounds being way out in front of the speakers! My B&W 602 S3 speakers never sounded so good.
We trust your opinion. I'm with you on the sealed box over open baffle. I run infinite baffle not open subs which is the deepest possible sounds. I'm getting by with open baffle mids for sometime now. They seem to be somewhat thin sounding. Better than loading in boxes that are too small, but... However a propper sealed box is in the works. Your take on horns was also very helpful. I have lots of horns. Echoing, honking but loud! I run ribbon tweeters from now on.
Obivoiusly I'm a car audio guy but I come here to learn a different side of audio. But yeah, Open baffle or 'infinite baffle' is a very helpful application in a cars when using doors or rear decks as the speaker baffle. But in a home, where you have the room for boxes upon boxes.. not sure I would opt to go that route. Thanks for the video.
30 years ago when I had no knowledge of Bose and dipole speakers, I had great success with Philips Hi-Q speakers which I opened the back and had them placed at the L + R corners of my room, couple of feet away from the corner walls.
I built a set of Open Baffle MTM using 2ea. Audax HM130CO 5 1/4" and Vifa aluminum Dome tweeter with the rear damping chamber removed so the rear sound of the tweeter is also released. These sit on top of my DIY woofer system each made with HiVi 2ea. W10 woofers in each enclosure to produce the bass frequencies below 200 Hz. I am using a TDM Design 24CX-4 24db per octave Linkwitz Reiley Electronic Crossover set up Stereo 3 way. It sounds great. I have built several closed box systems using active setups and these sound the best to me. More realistic and larger sound stage Amplifiers i have and use are 2ea. ATI AT2505 Emotiva LPA-1, Yamaha DSP-A and many more in the past. Yamaha M-60's Yamaha M-85, Sansui AUX-,1 Sansui B2103's and many others. I have also used many different Electronic Crossovers in the past and still have several.
I have heard pure audio project open baffle that uses four Eminence 15" drivers per channel and the bass to my ears finally sounded real. If you look at bass guitar cabinets and guitar cabinets the big boys with 4 12" drivers inside they all have open backs the boxes are not tuned or ported or sealed just bracing and an open back. If you take a look at drums they are all open back no drum is sealed or ported. Instruments play in open air not inside boxes. If you want to be true to the instruments open baffle is it. I have heard many open baffles in the past and never licked them. Once I heard 8 15" speakers in a pair of open baffle speakers I fell in love
Paul, I build amplifiers today (at 35) as I did when I was 13. Push-pull mosfet designers are my bread and butter. I love your videos man. They scratch my itch in a way that you may not understand. Also, I really need to box my table top test subwoofer. It sounds like garbage. ;)
I'm using open baffle speakers and its sound more natural compared to my boxed type, just my personal preference, but all my audiophile friends love it too. It need to place a little bit further from wall to perform correctly though.
Some sound will always come back out of the cone after reflecting in the box. I may test this one day by playing a small Bluetooth speaker inside a box to see how much sound comes out :)
Walter sells the Emerald Physics open baffles. I have the EP 4.3 and use it with Acourate for a flat response. There is also quintet from pure audio. I need to upgrade mine to EP4.8 someday. Anyways i have no issues with my Ep4.3 over the last 3 years :)
Would love to see a video of correct sealed box density ...for example a sealed speaker will sound way different in a thick concrete walled box vs a wooden one....so how thick should wooden walls be for a particular sub/midbass ? Depending on the wood material chosen of course
I am an OB fan. If you use woofers of the proper Q and sufficient cone area there is no problem down to somewhere in the 40-50 Hz range. I have no problem augmenting with a sub. It is also not unreasonable to use OB for the mid and up with a sealed woofer enclosure but you do give up some of the natural sounding bass from the OB. Generally if I am OK with 40Hz lower limit I would go OB for the woofers but my next project I am looking for 30Hz f3 so will probably go with sealed below about 500Hz.
Here's a question for a future video. Many people are changing to efficient LED light bulbs these days. Most of these bulbs contain a small switching power supply to drive the LED. To what extent do you find that these add harmful noise to the AC power that can affect your audio system?
gotham61 all modern electronics use SMPS operating above audio band- the only catch is El cheapos use little or no line filters like capacitors and ferrite chokes causing electrical noises to travel or emit along the line. Triac based electronic fan regulaters also introduce lots of interference if they are not properly designed These would mostly affect more on AM SW FM radio in that order. So just keep sensitive input & speaker cables isolated, well designed modern amps will take care of noises.
Paul said early on in this video it's something he doesn't fully understand (Open Baffle Speakers) you can get where he's coming from I hope, Enclosed Speaker systems are his forte obviously open baffle systems are not. Both designs if done right can sound amazing. Open Baffle designs are not something new they've been around long before I was born but until recently they haven't been explored to see what can be done with them but now we're seeing the design possibilities and advantages the can have and the music realism they can produce.
After having gone with a set of huge baffle for 6 years, its impossible for me to listen to anything else. Everything else sounds like a hollow box almost regardless of the cost.
@@LCRLive687 I agree. Making a non box sounding boxed speaker is incredibly difficult. After hearing open baffles, there are only few speakers I've heard that Id' say are non boxy. The Kef Muon, JBL Synthesis (flagship I heard), and a couple others.
I made yea4s ago open back square for some pioneer dual cone and a craig fm 8 track powerplay 12w. They sat on the back dash of 69 4D nova facing forward just fit into the window where they would stay. Couple years later I closed the backs and even my buddy said they were louder open back.
ive been enjoying your videos a lot . what are your thoughts on the "air" type tweeters and XBL2 mid mid/woofer drivers compared to higher end traditional cone/dome drivers ? thank you sir . Jeff B , virginia USA
Hello the only reason I was considering an open baffle is I am running some 12in field coil speakers that are extremely high efficiency with a 20 watts per channel tube amplifier I was expecting very minimal low frequency response out of the speakers and was considering running 2 modern 12 in speakers under the baffled array with a class D amplifier for the low end and using the field coil woofers between 200 and 4000 Hertz for sound quality
So I just built my first sealed subwoofer box and, i suppose based on the internet, i built it the wrong way i.e. Perfect square. Will i experience Phase cancellation or Standing waves? If so what type of filling will I need to compensate this mistake
I wonder if one is to use a lot of sound deadening material around the back side of the speaker without boxing it in if that would have a bit of the advantages of an open air system (no resonance and not a lot of back pressure) and not the disadvantage of an open system (freq cancellation due to reflection)? I am currently rebuilding a radio in a classic car with a single speaker on the front middle part of the dashboard so an open baffle would make my life a lot easier but if the sound improves with sound deadening around the back I would certainly do it. I only have room for a maximum of 3.5 liter enclosure and I am using the 6.5” retrosound stereo speaker. The enclosure would make the build a lot less fun.
I'm gunna make some open baffle speakers with 10" coaxial drivers (that I built up from separate 1" dome tweeters and 10" "guitar/PA drivers). And a 10" closed box woofer facing down onto the floor beneath the open baffle driver. I have done that before with woofers and I like it. The floor is a "horn" and very effective. On just about all my floor standers, the woofers have to be resisted by several ohms to decrease bass output (to get the best blend with the "bass" on my med/treble drivers). I already have everything to make the open baffle speakers (working on 2 other pairs of speakers @ the moment). Voicing my latest big floorstanders (with semi open cone over a box). And some tiny desk speakers with some "magic" 3" FR drivers and 4" woofer. The 3" ones are really mellow for the driver type and extended highs and cheap. Not one sour note even without any filter thing! Cheers audio nerds!
The 10" guitar speakers will be open baffle? I have always thought they would be good for that because they have a stiff suspension and are often designed to be a unsealed boxes like guitar amp combos.
All nice, but I think it very depends where the speakers located, and how you build an open baffle. 4 example, I’m building a cinema room in a basement, so the room will be sound isolated. I have no much experience with an open one, but I guess it will be the best experience on a live concerts with open baffles, I hope to make a maximum vibration with a minimum volume. I guess to reduce the cancellation effects, the panel should be big enough, at least 8 -10 inch around the woofer?! I guess open baffles are not for a regular living room, it will shake everything 🤷🏽♂️ Thank you for video.
Well the funny thing is if you want a box speaker to go down to 40 hz for example you need a big box and a big woofer... And if you want an open baffle to go down to 40 hz... You still need 3 feet behind it and a large enough baffle so basically the front of the box and some space except the open baffle has the benefit of going deeper with less energy lost and it sounds more open and better and they don't shoot sound in all directions just at you so less room interference. I honestly think it's just a lot of hate for open baffles but they're honestly amazing.
If I accept your explanation, and I know your right that phase cancellation is the key to why noise canceling headphones make long trips on planes so much more bearable, however, why can we hear something from an open baffle speaker if it is subject to phase cancellation? It doesn’t make sense.
Always Great videos. For an open design concept, one may want to take a look at the Legacy Whisper. I don't get it since it needs a sub but... Oh well!
What would happen if we place a kind of horn facing backwards from the driver so waves won't interfere with the front projection? Would it fix the wave phase problem?
Hi I enjoy your videos and recently watched your commentary on horn speakers. I have read another function of a horn loaded speaker is to give the bass sound wave added space. This is to allow the bass notes to expend to near what they would be in a larger space and therefor sound more “natural”? I would appreciate to hear your thoughts on this, thanks , Steve in cleveland
I don't get open baffle systems becuase how do you design and all around crossover? I think you have to design a crossover base on every pacific room type are using them in. The room itself is a box/cabinet correct?
well, its not a open baffle in his setup. its endless baffle... different thing. and his woofers in this setup are in sealed boxes so his argument stands
He said open baffle is good in midrange and up. Woofers don't do as well. This is correct, btw. It has to do with wave launch area of the baffle. Newton showed forces are equal and opposite. In audio that means they need something to push against. Paddle a canoe in water and then use your paddle in air only. Both fluids are moving at the same speed and displacement. The reason you get propulsion when your paddle is in the water is because the fluid has a denser (higher pressure) wave than in the air. Without that pressure you don't get much done. Same with baffle pressure. The bigger the baffle, the lower frequency a driver can produce. You can get 60Hz from a 1 meter square baffle with a 6in woofer. But that is a big speaker. Midrange is not so limiting. Open baffle mids and transmission line mids can sound fantastic without the drawbacks of O.B. woofers. That is what he was saying as far as a gathered. So it shouldn't be surprising he has exactly those speakers. He doesn't strike me as a 'dope' or dishonest. [Perhaps you are jaded by american politics ;) ]
