Titanik subs

[savroulis]

I think I was too late on my decision to buy the Adire RAVa sub!!!!!!from $399 like 3 months ago, now the new version Adire RAVAII is double that to $750

I read comments from our friend Kexodc, and Titanik II 12" is the new only way to go:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&PartNumber=300-762&DID=7

has them on sale for $540 + shipping.

Quick question, :confused: if I have an extra 200W channel on my amplifier (Anthem MCA30) do I need to use a plate amp on the subwoofer, or can I just that extra channel to drive a 12" woofer in a cabinet? How long can the cable be, between the two?

[NoMSG]

[QUOTE=savroulis]...I read comments from our friend Kexodc, and Titanik II 12" is the new only way to go:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&PartNumber=300-762&DID=7

has them on sale for $540 + shipping....[QUOTE]


nmnmnm

[kexodusc]

I read comments from our friend Kexodc, and Titanik II 12" is the new only way to go:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&PartNumber=300-762&DID=7

has them on sale for $540 + shipping.

Quick question, :confused: if I have an extra 200W channel on my amplifier (Anthem MCA30) do I need to use a plate amp on the subwoofer, or can I just that extra channel to drive a 12" woofer in a cabinet? How long can the cable be, between the two?

The Titanic MKIII 12" is a very good versatile subwoofer, but I wouldn't say it's the only way to go. If you're looking for a good sub available in kit form with a cabinet included, then I'm not aware of any others at this price point with this kind of performance, but it seems more and more companies are throwing together subwoofer kits (good for buyers, hard to keep up with).

If you decide to go with the Dayton Titanic MKIII, you really should have a plate amp. And for the 12" woofer, I strongly recommend the 500 watt unit. The 12" woofer is 4 ohms, might be too much for your Anthem. More importantly, the Titanics like power, and 500 watts is a better match than your Anthem.

I thought Adire had a smaller, cheaper subwoofer coming to fill in the hole in the market the Rava left when it went to $799?

[daviethek]

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this unit and also if anyone had an opinion of the musical differences between a 12 and 15 inch sub. I would be using this sub for music only enhancement of my current spekers which roll-off at around 35. I currently have a 12 but because of performance problems, I am thinking about getting rid of it and replacing it with a 15 just for the sound of the seemless and endless bottom end.

The last time I heard 15 inch speakers is when I was a kid and my friends dad had console stereo separate cabinet speakers with 15 inch three way units in them. With his fisher tube amp, well, it was my first taste of hi-fi and I liked the sound..

[kexodusc]

I built the 12" Titanic for my folks. A very nice sounding subwoofer for sure with plenty of bang.
However, I think there's a better option.

The 15" Quatro/240 watt amp combo is currently the Dayton subwoofer of choice. For good reason. Musically, it sounds a good step up on the Titanic subs. It's 15", and plays down to 20 Hz in a sealed cabinet. It plays loud and shakes the house with only a 240 watt amp because of the high sensitivity. You don't need to spend an extra $150 on a plate amp here.

The one area the Titanics have the advantage is maximum output, because of the large excursion of the woofers. That excursion advantage is probably the biggest contributor to inferior sound quality compared to the Quatro's.

Best part is you could build 2 15" Quatro's/240 watt amp combo's for the price of the 15" Titanic kit, and throw in a Behringer Feedback Destroyer for two channel full parametric equalization, and be far ahead of the Titanic IMO.

It's not that the Titanic is bad, but rather the newer Quatro's are just real gems...take a look at the Parts Express forums and you'll find this combo talked about more than the others all put together.

As for woofer size and musical sound quality. I used to feel that the larger woofers were NOT as musical sounding as smaller ones. I attributed what I was hearing to size. This was wrong of me. As I study more about how a speaker works, I've changed my opinion. Size wasn't so much the issue as some other properties of the woofers. Transient response of larger woofers can be just as good as that of smaller ones. Having a shorter excursion helps immensely. High excursion is the trend right now, more output capability, but seriously, how many of us listen at 110 dB volumes? Go for the shorter excursion woofers, better response.
Of course excursion alone isn't enough to judge sound on but and small difference will go unnoticed. But start doubling it and you'll lose some of that fast, accurate attack. I think a 15" woofer working with less difficulty than a 12" woofer might perform better. All things equal, you get more output, and lower response.. But you need a big box and more power usually.

[Woochifer]

The Adire Audio Rava actually hasn't shipped since at least the end of last year. They're in the middle of a major restructuring of the company right now. They set up a new manufacturing subsidiary in Chile to manufacture their drivers, and completely changed their product lineup and distribution setup (they no longer sell directly to consumers -- you have to buy through one of their retail/mail order partners).

Adire announced the Rava II back in April when they put out the specs for their new driver lineup. But, as of now, the Rava II isn't for sale yet, and neither are the drivers that Adire announced. Keep in mind that the $800 price posted on their website is a list price. Actual selling price will get set by their dealers, but I would expect it to still price out a lot higher than the $400 that the original Rava sold for.

Adire has not announced anything else about any other prebuilt subwoofers other than the Rava II (no successors so far to their other models like the Sadhara or the Daeva). I get the impression that they're leaving it up to their retail partners to come up with prebuilt designs built around the various Adire drivers. Acoustic Visions, Adire's main retail partner, sells their 10" MRS-10 subwoofer for $450. The unit is built around a 10" driver with Adire's XBL^2 motor design (with a longer throw than the 12" Shiva driver used in the Rava) and uses a sealed box configuration (again, similar to the Rava, except that it's downfiring instead of frontfiring). Subwoofer reviewer Ed Mullen indicated that it measures close to the Rava's in-room bass output, so it might be a good alternative. Supposedly, Acoustic Visions plans to build an entire series of MRS subwoofers using various new Adire drivers.

http://www.acoustic-visions.com/~acoustic/products/subwoofers/pre_finished/mrs10.shtml

[NoMSG]

The 15" Quatro/240 watt amp combo is currently the Dayton subwoofer of choice. For good reason. Musically, it sounds a good step up on the Titanic subs. It's 15", and plays down to 20 Hz in a sealed cabinet.

I've been trying to decide on whether to enclose the 15" Quatro in a sealed or ported box. In your opinion, what's the optimum internal volume for sealed box and how good would it be for HT? I listen to movies at moderate levels.

I'm very new to this DIY field and have difficulty trying to find out just how low the sealed design would go for the 15" Quatro/240 watt amp combo. If it would be good enough for HT, I would prefer to go sealed rather than ported.

[kexodusc]

I've been trying to decide on whether to enclose the 15" Quatro in a sealed or ported box. In your opinion, what's the optimum internal volume for sealed box and how good would it be for HT? I listen to movies at moderate levels.

I'm very new to this DIY field and have difficulty trying to find out just how low the sealed design would go for the 15" Quatro/240 watt amp combo. If it would be good enough for HT, I would prefer to go sealed rather than ported.

How do we get to 20 Hz in a sealed cabinet?
The 20 Hz relies on the very real, and substantial benefits of room gain from the gradual acoustic slope that sealed cabinets provide. You benefit a lot more from room gain in a sealed cabinet than you do from porteds, but porteds tend to have lower response to start with. Sealed cabinet specs will show a higher F3 but they bass is dropping off at roughly the same rate that room gain is adding it back on. In a ported cabinet, the bass is dropping off much faster than room gain can add it back on. Often a sealed sub with a higher F3 (-3 dB limit of bass extension) will sound as if it goes lower and has more bottom end than a ported sub with a lower F3.

I have a calculator for this somewhere I can't find, you might be able to google it. A good ballpark would be the -9 dB or -10 dB which companies often list as the "LFE or bass extension".
The sub still makes some sound below its frequency of resonance too, but with the Quatro in a sealed cabinet, not very much.