For christmas my mom wants a new set of in-walls to replace their current old ones. I've made her a set of DIY 2-ways before, and as moms go, she'd rather me make her something than buy an off-the-shelf upgrade. Don't have a specific budget, but probably $500ish for the pair would be the expected range.
My plan so far is to use the DIY in-wall kit from PE, in order to get the largest woofers possible. The plan is to simply increase the current hole size from the existing pair, and drop these in. They listen to about 98% of their music from the current in-walls so a top quality replacement would be a huge upgrade. They are driven off of an older Kenwood AVR in the basement HT room, as "B" speakers, and have a local transformer-type volume dial.
For woofers, I've been looking around a lot for 8-inchers that look okay for IB use. Where they are installed isn't really a massive airspace, but a step in the corner of a slanted ceiling. I'll get a picture of this to show the location these are going, I'm modelling with a very large sealed box rather than as true IB. I've been looking for woofers with as low a resonant frequency as possible, and a Qts of 0.4-0.5, if I should be looking for something else someone please say so. My current choice is the HiVI M8a, with an fs of 30Hz and Qts of 0.43. Anyone know of a better 8" woofer for IB use? I've used the M8N in another project before and loved the sound, coincidentally the M8a looks to have good specs for IB use.
I'm not as sure on a choice for the tweeter. Definately will need the best off-axis response as possible, so should I just be looking at domes? I've found a few that look nice and should play low enough to blend with something like the M8a: Seas 27TBC, Vifa NE19VTA, Morel MDT-22. Another thing I'm worried about really is the off-axis response, since the speaker locations are by the ceiling, maybe 10ft+ high. The room is pretty large, maybe 40'x12'. Any ideas for setting up an angle-mount in the baffles for the tweets?
I'm also thinking about painting the speaker baffles to match the paint in the room, since I'm concerned about the grills not clearing the woofer surrounds completely. So a tweet with a removable baffle would be nice so I could paint that, too.
Any and all input would be appreciated.
My plan so far is to use the DIY in-wall kit from PE, in order to get the largest woofers possible. The plan is to simply increase the current hole size from the existing pair, and drop these in. They listen to about 98% of their music from the current in-walls so a top quality replacement would be a huge upgrade. They are driven off of an older Kenwood AVR in the basement HT room, as "B" speakers, and have a local transformer-type volume dial.
For woofers, I've been looking around a lot for 8-inchers that look okay for IB use. Where they are installed isn't really a massive airspace, but a step in the corner of a slanted ceiling. I'll get a picture of this to show the location these are going, I'm modelling with a very large sealed box rather than as true IB. I've been looking for woofers with as low a resonant frequency as possible, and a Qts of 0.4-0.5, if I should be looking for something else someone please say so. My current choice is the HiVI M8a, with an fs of 30Hz and Qts of 0.43. Anyone know of a better 8" woofer for IB use? I've used the M8N in another project before and loved the sound, coincidentally the M8a looks to have good specs for IB use.
I'm not as sure on a choice for the tweeter. Definately will need the best off-axis response as possible, so should I just be looking at domes? I've found a few that look nice and should play low enough to blend with something like the M8a: Seas 27TBC, Vifa NE19VTA, Morel MDT-22. Another thing I'm worried about really is the off-axis response, since the speaker locations are by the ceiling, maybe 10ft+ high. The room is pretty large, maybe 40'x12'. Any ideas for setting up an angle-mount in the baffles for the tweets?
I'm also thinking about painting the speaker baffles to match the paint in the room, since I'm concerned about the grills not clearing the woofer surrounds completely. So a tweet with a removable baffle would be nice so I could paint that, too.
Any and all input would be appreciated.