I got my Swan Diva 6.1s....** Review **

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One of my favorite speakers is the Focus Audio FS-788. It uses the Scan-Speak Revelator tweeter and an excellent 7" Eton woofer.

The Scan-Speak driver costs $179.00 and the 7" Etons go for around $130 or more. At least that's the price I paid on the four Eton's I have in my garage right now. I was using them for a DIY 2-way project but gave up because the Eton's die like a shot duck below 130hz. Not sure how you got them to work in a two way because of this problem...{shrug}.

Anyways, Scan-Speak build drivers that are amongst the best in the world, Eton isn't exactly Walmart either, while the Diva uses a $12 tweeter. I don't care if you put the Scan-Speak drivers in a styrofoam cooler and secure them with duct tape - they'll sound light-years better than a $12 tweeter, and that's my point. Hi-Vi builds low to barely mid-fi gear, and one of the dominant rules of speaker engineering is that you can save money with labor in China building cabinets, and maybe using a lower end woofer or mid woofer, but tweeters and vocal mid-ranges are purely the result of their build and determine the main character of the speaker. So let me repeat; the Diva 6.1 is using a $12 tweeter and $45 midrange. *If*, and I repeat *IF* they can hold a candle to the B&W's let alone be in the same room with them, then Hi-Vi is selling world class drivers at cost or well below cost, and Scan-Speak is ripping us off.

As the "proprietary drivers'....I'm quite skeptical about this approach.

I'm not, and lets please stop comparing Paradigm to B&W.

I have no arguement with DIY'ers building killer speakers that rival if not surpass the big guys. *But*, those really good DIY designs I've heard *all* use Scan-Speak level drivers, or better. They don't use $12 tweeters, and that's my point.

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I have no arguement with DIY'ers building killer speakers that rival if not surpass the big guys. *But*, those really good DIY designs I've heard *all* use Scan-Speak level drivers, or better. They don't use $12 tweeters, and that's my point.

First off, Scan-Speak is really more at the top end of the cheaper drivers in the DIY world, nowhere near being among the best in the world.

Second, your point about the $12 cost of a tweeter in $1000 speaker just isn't a good or relevant point at all. The cost in a lot of tweeters isn't always for superior sound. Quite often it's for a lower Fs so you can mate it with a larger woofer. Good crossover topology can make a $12 tweeter sound better than a $100 tweeter. Easily. Probably not a $200 one, but you get my point. It takes some crossover work which is difficult, but caps and inductors are cheap, Revelator tweeters aren't.

Look at the drivers in the Athena FS speakers I've seen you speak highly off...That might be an $8 tweeter, maybe.

If the only DIY speakers you've heard ALL used Scan-Speak or better drivers (which Scan-Speak drivers by the way, the $12 Scan-Speaks?) then you just haven't heard any good DIY designs. Unfortunate for you. Scan-Speak is just one of many companies that make decent tweetsers. Morel, Dayton, Usher, North Creek, etc, all make excellent, inexpensive tweeters. You don't need an expensive tweeter to get good sound.

And if there was one shortcut I would make in a design, a $12 tweeter crossoved over at 4000Hz that really only handles the last 2 Octaves where the least important information exists would be it. Much better than $4 drivers in a lot of $200-$300 designs. Throw in a series notch filter, maybe pad the tweeter a bit and you can go a long way.

Most $1000-$2000 speakers I know of have $15-$25 tweeters in them, but these are mostly 2-way designs with higher crossover points than a 3-way would likely have. $12 seems more than reasonable at this price point - it wouldn't have to work nearly as hard.

I'm not saying a $12 tweeter is as good as a $200 Scan-speak, but many commercial designs in the $1000 and range use drivers in this ballpark and sound fine.
I've only heard 2 speakers with a $150 -$200 Revelator tweeter in it, but these made the B&W 803's sound broken. I doubt the tweeter in those is anywhere near as expensive.

As for the Eton's in your garage - I feel bad you have $500 worth of drivers sitting there doing nothing. Why did you buy them? What model? I could recommend a few books for you to read so you don't waste these excellent and highly regarded woofers. If not, I'd be interested in buying them since you aren't doing anything with them.

FYI - a lot of DIY-ers do make their own drivers - with good results.