Thanks for posting this. It was frustrating taking into account my speakers/headphones and the digitized path that sound used to get to me. Really hard to tell what improvements were real or just artifacts of the whole process.
Interesting to read your thoughts on the various speakers/set ups. And, while I can not argue against your preferences, I do think we need to acknowledge that since none of us viewers were able to actually hear them, all of our preferences are secondhand. In my original comment, I did express a different preference and while I still think that, it is because I based my preferences on what I could hear at home. The only "real" conclusion I am willing to make from this video is this: These flat panel speakers are definitely worth my time to build and hear for myself in my home. I will also say that when I do build a pair, I will not be going with the triangle shaped panels to start with--even though they were the ones that sounded best to me in this video. Because I have not *actually heard* them yet, it only makes sense to start with the original square panels and then see if any changes seem needed. I really do enjoy the videos you have posted about these speakers and I fully agree with your view of this latest video as a comparative tool rather than a definitive ranking of the various designs. Thank you for sharing this and for your thoughts on the specific designs, well done!
The dual exciters made by far the most difference on these panels. the microphones didn't exactly sound natural but it was pretty darn close. great job by the way I cannot compliment you enough for your dedication for doing this this is an absolutely amazing video and it should be in the top 100 of RU-vid if you want my opinion. I am really impressed by the amount of work you put into this Bravo sir! I think I'm going to have to order some of these soon as I didn't really realize just how good these actually were at least it makes him great outdoor speakers. I think with the addition of a super Tweeter it should really make things a lot better and of course addition of a subwoofer as well. it's amazing that there really wasn't that much actual difference between the fabric in the sanded and the non sanded that I could actually hear between the different musical pieces especially when it came to the classical stuff. it did seem that the rounded edges took off a little bit of the harshness but again that's just my subjective opinion. overall grade a effort wonderful presentation!
Agreed. They showed to have the most dramatic increase in quality. I think the dynamic range was overall better because you could begin to separate the instruments from each other and the sound opened up a bit compared to the other options.
Agreed. I closed my eyes after the first cycle through the speakers, then opened them when I heard what sounded the best to me. It was usually those or the addition of the sub. 😁
dual exciter plus subwoofer was clearly head and shoulders above everything else. I'd tune the sub down a bit, for my taste, it was a little over powered, but yeah. dual exciters by a LOOOOOONG shot
First off, Let me Thank You for an amazing video. Your dedication and attention to detail on editing really created some of the best content I've ever enjoyed on RU-vid. Second, I took a page from your playbook, and used 3 different high quality headphones and then finally, through my speaker array to listen to your results. I must say, ALL of your home made speakers sounded amazing, no matter what I used to listen. Personal preference? The duals with the subwoofer. Hands Down. The rich, full sound won me over... I am a huge fan of Klipsch Speakers, but I found them to sound rather dull in comparison. (that says a lot!) Your attention to detail when editing was most impressive though. Seamless. I subbed, liked, and am going to try to locate 4 identical exciters now, and make my own set to replace this stack of various speakers in my hobby room. (keeping my 300 watt sub though!) Again, THANK YOU for your hard work and attention to details!
I'm sure many, including myself appreciate the work you put into this video. Outstanding that you kept the music going between panels, makes all the difference!! Heard in isolation the Klipsch would sound ok for a small box speaker. When you brought the heavy guns in it all started to happen and the Klipsch sounded thin and boxy. Are these panel jobbies the last word? Of course not, but bang for buck they're phenomenal. Much bigger soundstage than the box speakers, and solo instruments really did the biz. Skip the dual exciters and the sub, and any of them sound brilliant. I liked the triangles particularly. Mine are in a mdf frame, four panels each a foot square, so 4.5 feet high and 15 inches wide, each array.The panel edges fixed to the frame with duct tape. Each panel has an exciter which is rigidly fastened to a rigid spine. I did this because I used coroplast and I doubted it will support an exciter long term. I love 'em, though the treble is a little down. I hope to fix this by adding a tweeter and a separate crossover. Don't like crossovers much and I hoped to make these arrays truly full range, but alas not. A separate tweeter might fix things. I tried several amps. My fleawatt tube amp wasn't particularly interested. My various mini Chinese amps did a lot better but currently I'm using my Adcom power amp with separate volume pot. It's around 100 wpc, very beefy, and still performs well despite being nearly 30 years old. It makes these panels fly....
To my ear the dual exciters with subwoofer sounded the best, and dual exciters setup being a strong follower. All other modifications only worsened the thing to some degree. It was also amazing to see and hear how a tiny modification can change the sound dramatically. Unbelievable. Thanks for great video and for taking a trouble of making it.
The dual exciter setup showed one critical element. The size of the panel requires power to move out you suffer dynamic compression. You need enough power to move the panel size, and two showed a very clear improvement. Because of this, I would test more exciters, 3, 4, etc. and find the point of diminishing returns. It also seemed like the fixed transducer had a distinct change to clarity, but relative to above, it lacked power. A multi-exciter fixed setup may show more significant improvement. Another aspect was rounding the edges seemed to reduce high frequency output. This might have to do with resonance of the material near the tips being higher, but I don't know. However, it also seemed like multiple exciters fixed this too. It seems to be a game of resonance and free gains versus just having the needed power in the first place.
I'm having tough time picking out a favorite. The duals, despite the comments below, to me sound like the gain is cranked too high or something and we've got some clipping or something going on. The originals still sounded pretty good. Triangles were slightly brighter no doubt because of their smaller surface area. Light and heavy fabric was tough to say. Maybe I just don't have good taste, but I don't think I really liked the edition of the binaural microphone. To me, your lapel mic or whatever mic you used last time had better clarity. Thank you for the video, was highly anticipating it. My second time through trying to decide my favorite
I also thought I heard clipping, but for me, it wasn't just the DIY panels. I heard it on the fancy speakers, too, in the hard rock / metal portion. It might be my audio setup, though. In any case, the clipping I hear is so omnipresent that it feels hard for me to judge the sound.
Clearly the dual exiters sounded “best”, with the triangle dual exiters in the 2nd place. But for me there is way too much mid-upper range. I would tone down those a bit with eq
That is exactly what I do with my daex25x4-4 DML's - I eq the high frequencies down a good deal, also a sub woofer tuned to the speakers is a must, takes DML's to a new level.
One good thing to measure, if you can, probably the single most important detail of any speaker is the sound pressure level (spl) which essentially tells how efficient the speaker is in reproducing sound. The frequency reaponse graph will illustrate this across all frequencies, and that is good information, however having an average SPL rating says a lot all on its own
amazing how the two fabrics work the sound. for me I would be curious how double exciters with light fabric would sound. but you did use 2 amplifiers for the double exciters. I'm also curious what would happen if I would take a larger panel (say twice the size) and use 2 exciters to make the panel able to produce lower frequencies. anyway, I feel the subwoofer was a bit too loud in the tests, I would probably turn them down so they are just noticable, but it might feel different when you're in the room... thank you for your extensive work!
i would persononally say if you´d take the fixed binding try different sized exciters HIGH/MID/LOW different sized plates maybe and maybe acryllic it would be so much better
The dual exciters with sub for me. Interesting how different genres levelled the playing field up a bit for some of the other panel styles, and how stereotypical🙂 the bookshelf speakers sounded, flat and boring at times - not at all the best considering. Excellent video and test. Thanks for putting in the effort. Really interesting.
Thank you so very much! It seems with headphones on, it's a question of brightness. Just being able to compare with my own ears, I am able to select the following: Dual Exciters, rounded and sanded squares, and covered in light fabric. Hanging is better but I know immobilizing at least one exciter won't kill the sound. Oh, and if I have a sub lying around that's bonus depth. With the effort that went into this one video, I have subscribed. Thank you.
This is amazing. Major points for doing all of the testing and A plus on the editing work. By far my favorite are the dual exciters. I think the sanded panel with dual exciters and a light fabric may just be the winner for me.
interesting idea, i wonder how they would perform when hung just inside of a cabinet behind a fabric to hide them. might need to line the cabinet with something but the dual exciters sounds so crisp and balanced.
I suspect placing them into any sort of enclosure will sound worse: These panels produce sound out the front *and* back, so you'll have destructive interference produced by sound waves coming off the back of the panel and reflecting around inside the cabinet. Possibly could mitigate with some acoustic insulation, but the whole point is that these things are incredibly cheap and easy to make yourself. Once you start making things more complicated by building enclosures, adding insulation, etc, at some point it's cheaper and easier to go with a traditional loudspeaker setup. Thanks for watching!
I don't know if it's just my headphones (or stereo speakers that I tried also), or is it the test microphone You used, but the dual exciters sounded very loud/harsh on the upper soundarea with lots of unnecessary noise. Maybe turning down the volume a step or two would have improved that, but on the other hand it would have distorted the comparison results. Over all the originals with subwoofer were the best for my taste, with separate tweeter they might have been even better, maybe you could make a test with those ;)
Listen to the classical guitar sample on the Klipsch. There is no doubt that a proper set of speakers demolishes the panels in dynamics and tonal range. My pick for the panels though was the mounted exciters, I felt that gave the panels the best balance. Every other configuration was "lazy" sounding and not exciting to listen to. The subwoofer test was a bust because it was just way too high in the mix... needed to be about half the volume it was set to.
spray painted are the best. the subwoofer is absolutely awful because it practically only booms at the resonance frequency of the tube. there needs to be some hankeys stuffed into the tube to get a precise bass. people prefer the dual exciter version, however, it messes up the highest frequency and timing that this test cannot show. the subwoofer needs to go up to probably 250Hz and the panels need some frequency equalization. you need a measurement microphone and have to do some really serious measurement. btw dayton audio also has some dsp stuff to make a good equalisation. also, the panels should never be square. height and width should have a golden ratio. the bigger the panels are, the lower the frequency they can play. an added subwoofer is a good idea, but a closed one, not a boomy vented one. and don't place it in the corner. you can apply the golden ratio as well, to reduce standing waves. but thanks for the cool comparison!!!!!!
Ya. Pretty much the dual exciter with a sub sounded the best but... Your panel speakers to your microphone to RU-vid, to my Raspberry Pi, to my Altec Lansing speakers... What I would like to hear is some actual full orchestral. For instance... Ravels Daphnis Et Chloe by the Montreal Symphony Orchestra with Dutoit conducting. A really rich and dynamic recording... Just strings just doesn't give us a real reveal, you need the woodwinds and horns also. That said... good on you, that was really a fun listen.
Brilliant test and all that editing well done. The highs come out brilliantly, I thought some of the "group" conglomeration of sound you played was terrible but the addition of the sub and second exciter helped a lot indicating that 'messy' sound is a bit of a problem for a single exciter. The violin at the end I am sure I could hear the individual horse hairs going over the cat gut. I would live to hear The Denvermen play Blue Mountains on this setup. A couple of things I would like to know. 1 Why did you use a second amp and wires when running dual exciters rather than daisy chaining the attached speakers. Would the shift from 4 ohms to 8 ohms have required you to readjust the volume and you decided not to do that. 2 The BT30d, did you have main the speaker tone controls set to the top neutral position. And were you running the sub off the BT30d?
I decided to use a separate amp so that each exciter would get it's own channel. I absolutely could have wired them in series as the amp is capable of dealing with the extra resistance - I just wanted to let all the exciters get full power. Tone control was set to neutral, as I recall. And yes, the sub was on the dedicated sub channel of BT30D. Thanks for watching!
For me the triangles sound quite linear - admitted with a loss of bass, but I wonder if trapezoid - 4 sides in different length - might give the best results. Thus the wavelength of any tone could resonate at some place. The sub was too aggressive for my taste. Keep on with your good work, I am waiting for further samples. And keep healthy.
Thank you for doing this. Adding a fabric really changes the sound for the better. I only wish you would have added a sample of something that resembles spoken text (like an audio book) and movie dynamics (balance between spoken lines on SFX and music), as music is not the only thing that people use speakers for. I guess I'll have to see the movie quality in my own living room.
Dual exciter and subwoofer. I'd like to hear that with the heavy cloth. I think the results would be a full bodied sound. I could be wrong though. I'm using desktop speakers. LOL I'm at work.
What if….. these had four mounts for a ceiling setup…. Edges or corners? This may go in the ceiling of a workout room we’re building. Dual driver rounded squares, plus two triangles. Will report (in feb/March, when this is old news :) thanks for the great work!!!
Hey Charlie! Mounting them on the ceiling for a workout room is a great idea! If you go through with that, keep in mind that the sound comes off of the rear of the panels just as much as it comes off the front. You should put some acoustic insulation directly above the panels on the ceiling, so you don’t get destructive interference from reflections off the rear of the panels. Good luck!
aaaaand, im curious, what happens, when you set up 3 way panels(3 panels each side, foam for bass, paper or lightweight wood for mids, and lightweight metal for highs 😍) and separated bands for each driver(panel) by amplifier
The various combinations of panel size and placement are virtually infinite! Unfortunately it's impossible for me to test them all... have you considered grabbing some exciters and panels and testing your own setups? Thanks for watching!
@@AmplifyDIY no i didnt, im in czech republic, and at my country there is not absolutelyknown fact, that flat panel speaker is existing and working, but i found another channel, where the man tested up rezonantion frequencies, with the help of sand on vibrating panel found all rezonant spots and placed counterweights on back side, and second thing is, he made panel from styrofoam(or that pink material you used) second one was thin wood, and finnaly he made the metal one. Metal one was horrible - it was annoying making echoes and reverbs, so he made this setup - pink(violet) styrofoam has your size and has smaller driver, wooden panel was much longer and was powered by much bigger and powerful driver, i dont know if he electricaly separated bands, but the styrofoam has crisp clear trebbles and acurate mids, and the wooden one added fulfiled clear warm bassy wide sound! it was excelent to listen it! and im just thinking if i can setup it at my home, i think i will do it like this: i will connect drivers in serie connection, and i will not split bands to make both panels sounding the most fulfil and realistic, and maybe i will not add counterweights, because pianos, violas, cellos, and other instruments ARE resonating, so i think, for realistic sound, panels has to resonate, because if you add counterweights, you make resonation curve flat, but if you try to measure real instrument, you will see so much rezonations. rezonations of body of each instrument are making its sound colour, if you counterweight stradivary, it will not be stradivary, you will make it 5bucks violin, beacuse it will lost it typical sound colour. :-)
Triangles surprisingly spacious sounding. Double exciter + sub combo I felt worked much better than the original + sub, where I felt a lot of heaviness and laziness was added in resulting in muffled mids and a boomy character to the bass. Maybe the double exciter + bass was just better integrated - it can’t be easy getting a sub like that working with those super light and large speakers. Some of the classic music, especially guitar, I felt that the light weave actually helped calm things down a bit. The unsanded one and the square one felt different but not better. Triangles would be a keeper for me, and the all round winner, the original. Definitely getting double exciters for some music. Also I would try combining with a dipole sub instead of a small vented box. I am thinking two N-ripoles (Axel Ridtahler) because cheaper. All around most boring, uninspiring and muffled sound: the Klipsch :)
I just built two pink foam 2'x2', rounded, sanded. The mid-range and treble really pops, but poor low frequency performance. I am going to try a 2'x4' panel in conjunction with the 2x2 panel. I am concerned about Home Depot's foam board has precut slits in the 4x8 sheet. I think this might affect the sound adversely. Comments??? I also have plans for a new subwoofer, and ordered a 100W amp from Parts Design.
Hi Glen - I'm not sure the pre-cut slits will affect things... I've looked at the 4x8 sheets at my local home depot before and didn't notice any slits. Were there slits in all of them at your local store? My only real concern with slits like that would be a potential buzz where the 2 sides of the slits touch each other. You'd just have to try it and see. Good luck!
@@AmplifyDIY Yes, it is where you might snap the foam so it would fit between two wall 2x4 boards, instead of trying to cut it. Slits run the entire 8' of the board, and looks like for both 16" on center and 24". BTW slits are on both sides...
This would be 300x more useful with a sound sweep graph at various listening positions (on and off axis) as well as more information on the room accoustics as the room impacts the sound almost as much as the speakers themselves.
Well, I don't think any of them sounded "good", but I do really appreciate your effort in making all these side by side comparisons. I would much prefer to see a frequency graph though for a better apples to apples show and tell. Room EQ Wizard is free and the UMIK sound analysis microphone is $79 now. Those two tools are pretty essential for anything audio nowadays. Anyway, good job, I enjoyed the video. Cheers 🍻!
Thanks for the feedback, and for watching! If you check out the @TechIngredients channel they have a video where they built an anechoic chamber and did some really in-depth testing including generating frequency response curves for several different designs.
@@AmplifyDIY: Yep, I've seen their video on these speakers mere moments after it went live, many years ago now. Long time subscriber there, but I was and still am looking for independent verification. Different environments and different ideas and just different folks running different tests. Cheers 🍻 and thanks for doing all of your comparisons.
Makes me wonder if you could use a crossover to put midrange out to a different (larger?) panel and have a smaller panel for treble. Two different drivers per "speaker" similar to standard speakers.
I have to dissent from the majority here; I find the dual exciter setup a little murky and lacking in bass compared to the original setup, though even that suffered a little unpleasant resonance on certain notes. I don't particularly like that subwoofer; it seems to have a lot of unpleasant mid-bass resonance, so I'd expect the original setup with a better subwoofer (or maybe the same one with equalization that cut out some of the mid-bass) to be my favorite. PS: I agreed with your evaluation of the Klipish speakers; there seemed to be a big gap between the not-so-lows from the woofers and the highs from the tweeters. All the panels had more presence.
I agree about the subwoofer - it does not sound great in these recordings. In person it was significantly cleaner, but the mics on my recording setup didn't do a fantastic job picking them up. I also should not have placed the sub in a corner. Paired with a decent sub though, the original panels really do sound amazing.
Dual exciter is so popular, but... I think the originals with sub are better, with some tweaking in the frequency cut and levels, maybe sub position and room acoustics. Specially after a while... dual I think has some redundance, almost an echo and I'm sure it can be stressful. It seems that even the light fabric spoil the sound... that horrible cellular speaker sound. Thanks. That's a lot of work. The mic setup, fantastic.
Honest opinion, 18:16 Classical Guitar dual exciters + bass sound best, all other options are either tinny, muted ie; fabric / painted, even the originals sound better. And the triangles sound like really cheap store bought 2.0 speakers. And having the exciter mounted, did sound very good.
@@AmplifyDIY you are very welcome, thanks for putting all the time & effort in this project, in my haste, I should have added, I listened on my PC with the Logitech Z5500 5.01 speakers, it could have made me a bit biased, and I did pump up the volume a fair amount.
Hi we saw a lot of testing configs, which was impressive. What i missed was the impact of the size of the board. What will be the sound difference when using a much lager board. Will this increase the bass or just not or for the other frequencies. Thank you
Hi Johan - I have not tested different sizes of boards myself, but I've seen and read from others who have that the effect is that larger boards reproduce lower frequencies better, but sacrifice fidelity in the higher frequencies. Smaller boards to the opposite: higher frequencies are better, but low end is sacrificed. The size I tested is something of a middle ground. Thanks for watching!
Hi David - I used 2 amps so that each exciter could have its own channel. I ran a splitter from the laptop so that the audio signal was sent to both amps simultaneously. One amp is just a 2 channel, the other is a 2.1 (2 channel + subwoofer) which is how I drove the sub for those tests. Note: if you don't have 2 amps, you can probably just connect 2 exciters to a single channel. Just make sure the amp is capable of handling the different impedance this will cause. Great question, and thanks for watching!
@@AmplifyDIY ok, so in that setup, you would've been driving each amp at 4 ohm instead of a single at 8 (exciters in series), and therefore double the power to each panel since the same power to each, but two exciters.
TBH i would really like to hear you opinion. I was surprised sanding makes a difference. dual exciters just isnt worth the performance boost. the originals FTW
Thank you for putting so much work into this and and for such clean editing and presentation! I was thinking about building some after seeing the Tech Ingredients channel and your exploration on the topic really helps flesh these out! Outstanding work, Thank you!
bit late but I have been considering getting these for a long time. i'm honestly wondering if these could be used as surround sound or even atmos, the ability to pay a relatively small sum and have decent speakers anywhere I want is tempting. what I wonder about the most is can these act as a subwoofer or is that unavoidable, and do you need tweeters or are these good enough in the highs? I know you cant do a great job with a frequency response curve, but it would be VERY helpful in seeing where I would need to spend money
Hi Alidan - you will definitely want to pair a sub with these. As for highs - I feel like they do a pretty good job, but if you really want super crispy highs, you may want to add tweeters as well. However, everyone's preferences are different, so I'd suggest you build a pair to hear them in person before you invest in any other extras. Good luck!
Hi Nicholas - I'd be curious to hear what you think about such an application if you try it out. One tip: make sure you place some acoustic foam on the ceiling directly above these speakers, as they will radiate sound out the front AND back of the panel, and anything coming off the back will reflect off the ceiling and muddy up/distort the overall sound. Good luck!
Jazz in Paris, Dual Exciters, Sub are giving me some nasty distortion. The sub is booming too much. I'd turn it down a notch. On the other hand, duals do open up the sound a lot. Especially when compared to the reference speakers. Probably worth the addition. Sanded actually "sands off" / polishes the sound as well. Slight shift to lower frequencies, if I'm not mistaken. Interesting. Triple on Triangles?? But not the ones with less material. Same surface area for fair comparison. Or single, stronger exciters dead center of a perfect circular panel... Basically, the panel is one big-ass membrane... Interesting also, how much better the classical guitar sounded (to me) on ref spkrs. It needed that full-bodied sound, whereas the metal piece was one big mess of a wet mud on them. I think the panels are lacking in the low (mid) range, and simply slapping a sub on top doesn't do it for me. I would combine them with existing speakers. ...but I don't know what YT does to your audio.
@AmplifyDIY , I built the same speaker using Dayton audio 25w speaker (stereo) frequently response is 80hz-12khz. The output was not expected, the mid is really poor wit voice is sounding like echo. I suspect I did something wrong of the following the caused this issue. 1.)Painted acrylic painting on the panel, like art work. 2.)Using Dayton Audio DAEX58FP Flat Pack exciter. 3.)Sticked the speaker using silicon past. 4.)using wuzhi audio amp. Cheap one. Please let me know what could have went wrong.
Ah - I just saw your comment on the other video: I'd suggest that the combination of paint and mounting with silicone is the main cause of poor performance. Also make sure that the amp is rated to drive 8 ohms. Good luck!
For context, I listened with a very good planar magnetic headphone and a dedicated headphone amp. There's a lot of nuances to be heard here. Each panel sounds different. My favorite are the original one and especially the dual driver ones. Both sounded amazing on their own and I think my preferred sound of all the combinations here are the dual driver without subwoofer. The sub was a bit too heavy and slow and definitely not at the quality level of the panel sound. You really makes me want to experiment myself now, because I wasn't expecting that level of reproduction from that cheap an investment. To hear the Klipsch after the panels was a shock. You made a great job with this video, and I shall thank you for that.
I won't comment on the sound, because I'm not an expert and because it is subjective, but OMG I just HAVE to comment on the editing ! SO MANY switches without missing a beat (much less any clicks & pops) Unbelievable. Subscribed immediately. If it was done by telling siri/alexa, PLEASE nobody tell me, let me bask in the glow of artistry with visions of more to come.
I actually find personal opinions interesting. I could never understand why people argue over subjectivity. I built a set of these and felt they were in need of DSP. Some instruments sounded better than others. There was a clarity that was amazing, and a good sound stage. Very life like. The timber seemed a bit upper mid heavy, but lacking in the high registers. I was able to play an 80Hz test tone which surprised me. I agree about how the high quality of this video production.
I watched the original Tech Ingredients video about 2 years ago and was dubious when this video (and your previous one) popped up. I admit that I'm impressed. You gave credit where credit was due and you brought a mountain of value added to the subject. I'm now adding this to my "to do" list.
@@ricksmediaarchiveyoutube9398 "Fraught with uncertainty or doubt; undecided". Yup. That describes what I initially thought when I started watching his videos. But he came through. Must be a pretty miserable life you have when the best use of your time is trying to point out perceived grammar mistakes; especially when the intent is crystal clear.
He is right though… You probably meant curious or doubtful. Dubious are things that are a cause of doubt. So no need to get that defensive. I too was unsure what you were trying to say and had to read your comment twice.
@@jpw5996 If you're going to attack someone's grammar online, make sure you're correct first. The definition I quoted is the definition I used. I was undecided on his video. I had doubts about his video. Therefore I was dubious about him and his video. Heck, even you said I should have used "doubtful" which is part of the definition of "dubious". Grammar Nazis are bad enough -- but when the Grammar Nazi is wrong is just over the top.
I was listening with my eyes closed and I kept picking the same two, the dual exciter and the light fabric sets. Your set up and work in doing this is amazing. Thank you so much for taking your time, effort and money to create this content, I think its safe to say that it is greatly appreciated by all.
Thank you, Spicy! I really appreciate hearing what you thought, and am glad you liked the video. I also prefer the dual exciters and light fabric. Thanks for watching!
I’m in agreement on those choices as well! I kind of liked the single exciters with a subwoofer, but it seems like the subwoofer sometimes added too much bass! I’m thinking of trying to build the speakers in the original shape with light fabric AND dual exciters! I do have a question though, I know you treated so many options, but what about bigger panels? What if you made them 4’ X 4’? Would that have much of an effect negatively or positively?
@@Spetznatz01 Hey Steven - I have not had a chance to test them yet, but I believe that larger panels will do a better job of reproducing lower frequencies. I'd hesitate to call them a replacement for subwoofer, but they should round out the lower end better. If I ever take another swing at testing even more variations / setups, I'll be sure to include some larger panels. Thanks for watching!
@@AmplifyDIY in this video when you were talking about the speakers from the original video did that mean the exciters are placed with the 2/5--3/5 rule on both speakers or 2/5--3/5 on one panel and dead center on the other. I found the dual speaker design the most pleasing but was wondering if you could achieve the same with 2 exciters (1 dead center and the other 2/5--3/5 on the other) rather than 4 exciters with and 1 amplifier rather than 2 as I am on a tight budget. And thank you very much for all the work you put into this video. Your content is consistently some of the most helpful and enlightening on the platform.
Totally agree. I wonder what a duel exciter w/ light fabric would sound like? Also I noticed the placement was called out as 2/5 2/5 this time rather than 2/5 3/5. Was that intentional?
Issue I have is I need to know what you thought, since I only have my headphones to judge the sound. Was it worth buying the extra 2 exciters to flatten the response curve? I would also like to know if wrapping the dual is an issue.
@@boonjabby If you want a fuller more powerful sound then yes. But there are limitations to this style speaker that are inherent with the design and materials, specifically in the high and low ends. But paired with a subwoofer, you can get very satisfying sound from the system. Acoustic instruments sound best and the midrange is actually pretty good.
Unsanded squares sounded crisp and incredibly exacting and accurate. However dual exciters setup was clearly the most well balanced/pleasing listening experience. The subwoofer did add a smoothness to the bottom end,but the level was much to high for my taste. The most stunning revelation was how lifeless and dead the reference speakers sounded against the panels. I own a set of those bookshelf monitors and they sound very very good,until now….. Thank you for your thorough and informative analysis.
I have the same feeling, im listening in my studio and Unsaneded square was the best sounding here. And i have the sound calibrated with soundId. I would try the dual exciters on that panel, i believe that will sound really good!
@@Donder1337 I was about to say the same. The highs are def more crisp unsanded, but are missing the mids that make the dual exciter panels sound more full.
Im listening on Klipsch speakers that has been compared to studio monitors by some reviewers. And listening to those Klipsch bookshelf speakers on my Klipsch they sounded very flat and lifeless when compared to all the other variations. And this is after RU-vid's horrendous audio compression. I can imagine how much better they must sound irl.
I am planning a build that uses three exciters per panel with carbon fiber honeycomb panels, tweeter dome cutouts and a mid bass box. I may sandblast the surface. Will build it when I can find a good price on the carbon fiber
I'd love to hear dual exciters with heavy and light fabric. Or, in my opinion Heavy fabric middle and Light fabric offset per channel may be the best option. Also some size variations would be interesting and possibly circle with middle mount for lows because i think that may help Either way, fabric does add something unexplainable that makes them better than the rest.
this is exactly what I was thinking, the fabric is taking some sharpness out of it i think, and Im surprised that the dual exciters worked out. also interesting that i think the fixed mount had a bit more natural low to it, but being mounted to those tripods vs a wall would be interesting too
Wow, the dual exciter setup is absolutely great! Maybe you should take that idea and extend it to 5 drivers, 1 per corner and 1 in the middle to reduce resonance in the panels? Probably give a much better bass response too.
That would not be substantially different to just having one exciter in the middle. The resonances are the whole point of the exciters being offset in the first place. The 3/5th (or 2/5th if you will) distances is the Golden Ratio of a square (1/1.618... = 0.618... ~ 3/5th).
Bad idea to create them symmetricaly. It has to do with how sound travels through the board. If you place exciter in the center - there will be resonant frequencies because the distance between exciter and edges will be equal lenght and at certain frequencies they will interfere. This is why you need to make the speaker rectangle not square and place exciter so distance between exciter and edge is different for all 4 edges. The matematically ideal position of multiple exciters is by using the Fibonachi spiral as template.
@@amsb4dafunk406 Not realy. The original NXT technical documents and patents shows that “moar exciters = moar betterer”. The thing that has deminishing returns is size of the speakers. Distance between furthest edges of the speaker, to be speciffic. Larger the speaker - the lower frequencies it can produce. But if tou start to think about making DML speaker for sub-frequencies - the speaker will be so big that it will be more practical to just get a subwoofer. :D
Dual exciters sounded best. I felt like they needed bass, but the sub you had didn’t sound good to me. The heavy fabric also sounded good and i think pairing theses up would be a great idea. I would love to see dual exciters on a round shape. Thanks for an excellent video!
I agree. The normal panels have much more treble, but the subwoofer just made it sound like a cheap tv soundbar. Lots of low bass, lots of treble, but a lot less mids. The fabric and dual exciters were definitely the best, and I’d like to see how they would sound paired up.
@@brianburke808 That's the problem with these panel speakers. You have to set the sub high-pass to around 150 hz because these speakers have precious little deep bass no matter how large the panels are. If you cross the sub high and place it in between the speakers, you should be able to get a good blend.
I built a pair a couple of weeks ago and this test is really helpful. From what I can discern, the dual exciters give a fuller sound. And I agree with most of the comments that the subwoofer was cranked too high, but that's an easy fix. I'm also hooking up a 21-band eq to reduce the mid to mid highs (which these DMLs seem to be good at producing) and boosting the mid-lows. And lastly, a slight boost to the highest frequency range. Thanks, AmplifyDIY. And for those that are laughing at these speakers as if they're crap... If you didn't build these and listen with your own ears, your opinion is not rooted in fact. But thanks for sharing... I guess?
I really liked the balance from the heavy fabric one. My headphones aren't the absolute best but they are clear enough to tell the difference between ever single one of them. The heavy fabric just has a more comfortable feel to it.
I could hear a difference in each one, with my headphones and my speakers here, as well. Very interesting how these sound! I'm glad I didn't make them all, because my house would have speakers hanging everywhere and I would be fumbling to hook them all up! Haha.
Ah good, I’m not the only one to prefer the heavy fabric… though I do wonder how much of that is to do with the response of the headphones I have (which aren’t great, I don’t think.)
I think it's total weight of the panel to some extent. The heavier setups had better low response (especially the dual exciter one) but they seemed to muddy the middle a bit. I wonder what it would sound like with a bunch of weights around the edges, or in a resonance cancelling pattern like tech ingredients used. I think, because the weights have a rigid connection, that they would work to drive bass better (at a cost to total amplification) without muffling other frequencies.
To me, the originals sounded best. I could hear the potential when the subwoofer was added (my second choice), but to me this particular subwoofer sounded a bit muddy with each accompaniment. I would be interested in the originals with a better subwoofer. Kudos for really well done editing. Could showing how you edited this please be your next subject?
Hey Joseph! Thanks for watching and sharing your impressions! The muddy sub is mostly due to the mics I used for the recording. In person, it was pretty clean, if a bit loud. I could have turned it down some, but I like a fatter low end. As for how I edited it: it’s easily the most complex timeline of any of my projects to date. It’s a very very good thing that DaVinci Resolve (the editor I use) allows an unlimited number of video tracks! I basically added all 12 recordings to the project timeline, synced them up perfectly, then added about a bajillion jump cuts between them. Piece of cake! (That took weeks!)
It's not a huge surprise that they did, because if you ever watched the original videos from Tech Ingredients, you know they went through a lot of testing to find optimal materials, shapes, and exciter positioning. They even combined several different panels per stereo channel, to create a particularly flat response curve.
@@brei2670 Which ***SHOULD*** produce the best dynamic range possible, and it did improve things.. I think a combination of exciters, each with a panel it drives, would probably be best. Think of it like a 3-way exciter setup, per channel of sound. It would take a bit of work to find exciters & panels that match up, but should be legit when done.
I don't understand why, but the dual exciters seemed more "solid" both in sound and imaging, while not giving up the "airiness" of the original design. The subwoofer with those (if the sub was turned down some, maybe a lower rolloff point set too) would be a pretty amazing set! Most of the others sounded similar to me, with the triangles sounding as I expected they would (a hair thinner) but having a nice "lift" in the physical soundstage. I thought the biggest disappointment were the Fixed Mount panels... to my ears they had a harsh edge compared to the other panels. Absolutely fascinating! I want to see what happens if you size up the panels, and if there's a point of diminishing returns on size increase, or if you could hang 50 ft x 50 ft panels from a crane and have it sound better than whatever the previous step down would be... lol
I too am curious about 50x50ft 😂 -or other large sizes.. and if 2 exciters was good... More? 🤔 Haha🔥 -fun and cheap project to do some personal experiments with, love it!
Two years later I stumble across this video and I am absolutely stunned. Not only by the dramatic difference in sound quality between the Klipsch and the exciter panels, but by the excellence in your scientific approach to sonically document the difference for your viewers. Thanks so much! After 50 years of speaker building I will be building my first pair of exciter panels, while spending a tiny fraction of what I typically spend on a new project. Amazing.
Obviously the best was dual Exciters with the sub. I have the duals on 2x4 though and dual subs and for the back channel I put duals on 2 guitars just for fun lol. Took my Towers out lol. These panels sound better and it's like the singers are right in front of you Live. Nice job !!
This is THE best comparison video between versions of a theme in speakers. There are horses for courses as each example showed with the differing genres of music presented. But I'm definitely going to have a crack at making a set. Thank you so much for the effort in putting this together. Cheers Pete'.
My favorite was the dual with sub support, but for my personal taste the sub could be turned down a decent bit to make it just a support speaker. Amazing video, I can see lots of work was put in, not just in the setup of all the speakers, but the immaculate mixing of sound during the speaker swaps. I may have to talk my wife into letting me set up a set like this :D
@@harrisondodge6956 I'm thinking about doing some longbois kind of hidden in an accent wall behind the tv in this method. dual driver, home made sub (using a flat pack kit) built into the floating shelf as part of the design.
I've got some opinions about what sounded the best based on what I heard while performing all these tests, but I'm holding off on sharing that until I've heard from lots of you about what you think. Was there a specific design that worked better than others? Was one design better for one type of music than another?
With all of the layers of variables between your speakers and our ears, including the microphone you are using, as well as the quality of the speakers your audience is hearing the sound from, I don't think any of our opinions on the sound comparison between any of the speaker sets is going to be at all objective. Your opinion, being the guy who is there in person, is the only one that matters.
The specific way I set up and did the testing was designed to eliminate many of the variables that you mention: it's not about how "good" any specific setup sounded, but rather how each setup sounded *compared to* the others. That's why I hopped from design to design during each track, so you could hear the subtle differences between them.
@@AmplifyDIY the only part i found hard to deal with that is how the music would play continuously, rather than looped. They all "sound" good when playing, but it's really tough to pick out which one sounds the best since we never really hear the same signal repeated across each of the test subjects. It may seem like a huge bore to us, but I think a couple test samples repeated across all of them and then played one after the other may serve as a better comparison rather than letting a whole song play through and switching variables at different time frames.
@OtherDalfite - yes, I struggled for a long time to try to figure out the best way to present the testing. I do have full 16 minute recordings of every single speaker setup, and I spliced them up the way I did in this video simply because it was the best way (to my ear) to accentuate the differences in the panels. But I still have the full recordings....
@@AmplifyDIY hey, I'm not saying you have to, but if you're willing to put the time in and cut some important sections you think of together and play them one after the other and maybe do some analysis on them, I'd really appreciate it! Regardless of your choice, the information you gave here is awesome.
To clarify: they did say these are the best “budget” speakers. Birch wood end grain is __very slightly__ better in terms of sound quality, but foam panel is by far the best without spending $$$$$.
Btw, the solid mounts have a little more base response, curious how a twin solid mount exciter would stack up to a twin floating exciter. Btw, check out antigravity Bluetooth speaker. It’s basically an exciter but meant to be portable. Slap it on a desk or car window or tool box and turns it into a speaker. My wife and I used on the shower door when we were on vacation lol. If you hang it vertical you need to make sure the both service are incredible clean for it to stick. Actually now that I’m thinking of it, I can use my antigravity speaker to test different material properties before building one.
I found the dual exciter with subwoofer sounded best. There was warmth in the tone. The sub sounded a bit heavy-handed and blended the best in the classical track where it helped the cellos come through. However, after RU-vid compresses this video and my Bluetooth compresses it again, there's no telling what is getting lost. What an incredible video. You're a legend!
Absolutely amazing amount of work and effort, It's fantastic! The dual exciters through your setup and the countless other variables sounded interesting. I wonder if they could be set up so one exciter is smaller and vibrates only on higher frequencies while the other is bigger and responsible for lower frequencies.
The subwoofer integration would have benefitted from a more sophisticated crossover. With a little more attention to placement, crossover frequency and level, I’m sure you could have avoided the mud in the low mids- while keeping the extra low-end extension.
I wonder how these would sound if you had three wired up through a 3 way cross over, size would need to be adjusted for bass, mid and highs I guess. Fun to play with.
Based on what I heard with my high end headphones I think I’m going to give a build a try with dual exciters, unsanded, uncut panels with my particular amp and eq setup and see how it sounds and go from there.
