Slowly piecing together your very own DIY HT

**Exocer** · **02-06-07, 11:11 PM**

Well, its been a while since I built the Natalie P's and I'm about ready to get started on the other speakers. The plan is to build an upcoming matching center and a pair of Modula MT's for surround duty. As things progress I'll post pictures/updates/impressions of the process. My current listening space doesn't allow for anything more than 5.1 speakers. It measures 10'x13' with an 8' ceiling, so even with mtm mains I am in danger of going deaf

Not much space to fill.

Oh yeah, another silly thought...you know how people rotate their car's tires? I'll be doing the same with the drivers. There isn't a proven scientific fact stating an increase in sound quality when rotating the drivers...I just thought it made a lot of sense to place the newer drivers in the speakers that'll receive the most information. In my case, those are the Nat P's. The drivers from the natalie P's will be divided among the Modula MT's and the 3-way center.

**kano32** · **02-06-07, 11:53 PM**

Have you thought about the GR-Research AV1-RS surrounds? They reflect off the ceiling and provide a huge rear sound stage. I've built some of these and they sound great and do well in small rooms. But it sounds like you already have a bunch of RS drivers.

**Exocer** · **02-07-07, 12:03 AM**

I did give the GR research speakers a look well before I went the RS driver route though.There was a sale not too long ago, so i grabbed 4 rs180's and 2 rs28a's and an r52mid. So yeah, sorta stuck going this route for now.

Good suggestion nonetheless.

**SteveCallas** · **02-07-07, 12:33 AM**

Great news - now I assume you can spit in the face of dynamic range compression from downmixing?

I don't know what your thoughts are on the Modula MT crossover, but JonW's simple tweak makes them sound a lot better...they sound kinda dead otherwise. Might be interesting to hear your impressions between them and the Natalie Ps. By the way, what display did you ever decide on?

**Exocer** · **02-07-07, 08:05 AM**

Steve you have me wondering about those tweaks

Is there a link to those tweaks? (you can send it over Pm if necessary)

Yeah it'll be interesting to hear some Modula MT vs Natalie P action. My hope is that they blend together well. I don't see why they wouldn't especially since they're using the same drivers. The Modulas will probably be the smoother sounding speaker overall, obviously because of the crossover. I haven't decided yet if I'd use the port or not though since in the sealed .75Ft^3 box they yield an f3 of around 80 hz. For surround duty that would be acceptable.

As far as displays, I got caught up in the Westinghouse 37" 1080p craze. Don't own it yet but thats possibly the number 1 display on my list. Then, next in line is the newer sharp 32" lcd pictured here http://www.sharpusa.com/products/Mod...8,1782,00.html.

**Darren** · **02-07-07, 09:29 AM**

I second the GR-Research AV1RS speakers if you ever get the itch... I have them now and will never go back!

**SteveCallas** · **02-07-07, 12:27 PM**

Quote:

Steve you have me wondering about those tweaks Is there a link to those tweaks? (you can send it over Pm if necessary)

"it looks like making R3 smaller would do that. R3 in the stock RS28 crossover is 5 ohms. If you put another 5 ohm resistor in parallel with R3 using alligator clips, making R3 2.5 ohms, it should boost the highs some"

So you'll want to play around with R3. A lot of the music Jon listens to has lots of top end emphasis in it already, like hissing and scratching and stuff, so he settled on 4 ohms. I guess I'd classify a lot o his stuff as "jazzy rock"

When I listened to my types of music on them, I preferred 3 ohms. My music is kind of all over the place, everything but rap and country. The lower the value, the more top end. Seems like a small change, but it makes a pretty noticable difference.

Quote:

As far as displays, I got caught up in the Westinghouse 37" 1080p craze. Don't own it yet but thats possibly the number 1 display on my list

Can't fault your for that, I love my 42"

**Exocer** · **02-07-07, 02:44 PM**

Quote:

SteveCallas wrote:

Great news - now I assume you can spit in the face of dynamic range compression from downmixing?

This is definitely something i've been looking forward to

In my room I lose a good 4-6 db (or in some cases more) in the LFE channel due to downmixing. Sorta makes me wonder what else im missing out on.

**SteveCallas** · **02-07-07, 03:30 PM**

Quote:

Exocer wrote:

Sorta makes me wonder what else im missing out on

The additional, clean, low end headroom a port provides

I know...I know, just having a good time.

**WillyD** · **02-07-07, 09:30 PM**

Quote:

SteveCallas wrote:

The additional, clean, low end headroom a port provides

I know...I know, just having a good time.

Yeah, I can attest to that.

I tried the whole port stuffing thing.

Never again.

**SteveCallas** · **02-07-07, 11:23 PM**

Quote:

Willd wrote:

Yeah, I can attest to that.

I tried the whole port stuffing thing.

Never again.

Oh, already? Excellent. Care to elaborate? By your wording, I hope something bad didn't happen

**WillyD** · **02-07-07, 11:53 PM**

Nah, nothing bad happened. I was really just messing around. Took some measurements in REQ of stuffed/un-stuffed, from the same position. FR though, as I had to move my sub from away from CRT cause of interference.

I didnt really do it long enough, I just know I didnt like what I heard. Exocer brought up the point that my driver in such a large enclosure sealed has a very low system Q. Still, the added output below 30Hz is excellent to have.

I really wish I had a proper measuring setup and a place I could do some GP measurements (e.g. Ilkka).

**SteveCallas** · **02-08-07, 12:34 AM**

Come on Exocer, with you adding more speakers to your system, this time is ripe for the picking to go LLT!

Join the brotherhood

**Exocer** · **02-08-07, 12:23 PM**

Hehe. You guys and your ports

LLT will certainly be an option somewhere down the road...my parents vetoed the idea of a large sub in the living room while my sister and her children are still living with us. After she's gone we can start talking LLT again

**F1 fan** · **02-09-07, 09:46 PM**

Quote:

Exocer wrote:

The plan is to build an upcoming matching center and a pair of Modula MT's for surround duty.

Awesome, I look forward to following your progress.Those designs over at HTGuide that use the Dayton RS drivers by all accounts are excellent performers.So you should have yourself a serious surround set up when you get them completed.

**Exocer** · **02-23-07, 06:52 PM**

My thoughts exactly F1. This is very exciting.

Enclosures for the Modula MT's have been ordered and were shipped earlier today.
PROGRESS

As far as enclosures go this project is at 100% completion.

Other things on the list include:

Ordering BOM for Modula MT's (already have the drivers in-hand)

BOM for 1ft^3 3-way WTMW center to be designed

Ordering the tweeter for the center.

As far as amplification goes, the HK AVR will power the entire 5.0 portion of the system until Budget allows for two Behringer A500's.

More thoughts: With a new 15" sub on the way...lets just say a few really crazy subwoofer ideas floated through my mind. Icing on the cake!

**Exocer** · **02-28-07, 12:06 AM**

The enclosures arrived today. They are ~3x the size of my NHT SB-2 bookshelf speakers...possibly bigger than any MT speaker I've seen in stores. It's amazing how deceiving internet pictures can be!

The bom will be ordered some time within the next two weeks. Once they're built up they will temporarily serve as mains and there will be many subjective comparisons between these and the Natalie P's for those interested

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