What difference should I expect to hear?

TennMan

I understand how upgrading the crossovers on my monitor 10Bs will bring the electronics back up to factory specs. There is a lot of information available here on the subject of technical aspects of the electronic parts that should be installed. Most everyone agrees that the speakers will sound "better" after the upgrades but I was wondering exactly what will change in the sound I will hear. Could someone please explain changes in the sound that make the speakers better in terms of what you actually can hear?

Thanks!

ben62670

First I haven't ever found a Polk crossover cap out of spec that wasn't obviously physically degraded. I would recommend reading the crossover upgrade threads posted all over the place. You can get a good idea of what the different caps sound like.
Happy hunting.
Ben

Edit: Here is a thread on different caps. Also within the thread there are posts that have links to other discussions on other websites.
http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61727

PolkMaster1

First - know the character of the sound coming from your speakers. Then go for the XO upgrade. Here is what to expect:

The sound will be smooth, sweet, and you will hear more detail than you are hearing now - if you go with the SonicCaps and Mills Resistors. The change will not be subtle. Although the SCs and Mills will be more expensive than the Daytons and Solens, it will be well worth it!! I dont know how Daytons and Solens sound compared to the Soniccaps and Mills - from those that do know, the general consensus is that the SCs and Mills do a better job with sound.

Dont be surprised if it does not sound great at first when finishing the XO mod - there is some break-in time expected before you realize the full potential of your XO upgrade. The total breakin time is usually about 200 hours or so. I hooked up my i-pod to the speakers and left them playing for 10 days straight (at low volume before going to work), so I found this to help out tremendously when it came time to do critical listening.


Remember to use good quality speaker wire to get as much sound potential possible for these speakers - even if it means paying $100-200 for a set of speakerwire.

It is not a strech to say that when you complete your XO mods, it will sound better than factory spec and you will love it!

Good luck with your adventures!!!

TennMan

Thanks for taking the time to give a detailed explanation. That's what I was looking for.

jcandy

TennMan wrote: »

I understand how upgrading the crossovers on my monitor 10Bs will bring the electronics back up to factory specs. There is a lot of information available here on the subject of technical aspects of the electronic parts that should be installed. Most everyone agrees that the speakers will sound "better" after the upgrades but I was wondering exactly what will change in the sound I will hear. Could someone please explain changes in the sound that make the speakers better in terms of what you actually can hear?

The inductors and resistors in your crossover are not subject to degradation, whereas the capacitors are. There are three capacitors per crossover board on your monitor 10s (two in the tweeter HP filter and one in the woofer LP filter). Each of these serves a very different purpose in the crossover and so failure of a particular one will have its own signature. So, its not really possible to say what the difference will be. In short, if the capacitors have managed to stay in spec (I don't have data for drift of Polk capacitors), then is is unlikely that you will hear a difference. If any one of the capacitors has failed, the change will be dramatic.

With regard to the type of capacitor, I recall that I have already recommended Erse from Meniscus (or elsewhere) because they are very good quality and made in the USA.

jcandy

Also, to add to the last post, no break-in period is needed for new capacitors. Also, for $43 you can get 50 feet of 12-gauge Dayton speaker wire

http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=100-024

There will be no sonic benefits to something more expensive, although you may choose something else based on appearance, or with banana/pin connectors already attached. If you have only a short run (say 6 feet or less), this is overkill and a smaller gauge (14 or even 16) can be used.

ben62670

The caps rarely fail or drift out of "spec", but the sound quality degrades over time. Plenty of XO's have been modded here at Club Polk. For the cheap but still a big improvement over stock I suggest all Dayton's. A little more money and you could use SonicCaps on the highs and Dayton's on the lows. The best route without going totally nuts would be all SonicCaps. Use the Mill's resistors.

Edit:Again our resident troll Jcandy is way off base.

jcandy

ben62670 wrote: »

Edit:Again our resident troll Jcandy is way off base.

Where?

F1nut

It's like I told you TennMan, the guy is clueless.

TennMan

Thanks for the replies but it appears we are drifting back into the technical aspects of replacing capacitors and other electronic parts of the crossovers.

With this thread I was hoping we could focus on discussing the sound qualities that could be heard after the crossover upgrade is completed. What I really want to know is what differences between the before and after I can expect to actually be able to hear.

ben62670

Which caps will you be using? Did you read the cap thread? There are plenty of opinions on how they sound there.

Ricardo

jcandy wrote: »

Also, to add to the last post, no break-in period is needed for new capacitors. Also, for $43 you can get 50 feet of 12-gauge Dayton speaker wire

http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=100-024

There will be no sonic benefits to something more expensive, although you may choose something else based on appearance, or with banana/pin connectors already attached. If you have only a short run (say 6 feet or less), this is overkill and a smaller gauge (14 or even 16) can be used.

This is just your opinion. You should not post that as a true statement.

I have experienced break in changes when changing capacitors in several xovers. I have also experienced the differences between different cables, and incredible changes in sound while MIT cables were breaking in.

I don't push my experiences as the absolute truth and I understand different people might experience differently. I don't have measures other than what I know I heard. I could care less if others here the same differences or not....but the point here is that we should let everyone try for themselves.

TennMan

ben62670 wrote: »

Which caps will you be using? Did you read the cap thread? There are plenty of opinions on how they sound there.

I will probably be taking your advice ("For the cheap but still a big improvement over stock I suggest all Dayton's.").

I have been reading a lot of threads about caps but they don't have good descriptions of changes they are actually able to hear. They use terms such as "they sound great" and "Wow!" but I was hoping to hear more details. Is there a particular thread that you are referring to that maybe I have not found. If you could point me to it I would appreciate it.

ben62670

Post #2

TennMan

Sorry. I should have paid more attention to what you were saying. I'm still reading that one. It's a long one with lots of links to other threads that got me side tracked. I really appreciate your help and your comments.

Schurkey

TennMan wrote: »

I was hoping to hear more details.

I think that's exactly the results you're likely to experience when you upgrade the caps.

jcandy

Schurkey wrote: »

I think that's exactly the results you're likely to experience when you upgrade the caps.

Well put.

jcandy

TennMan wrote: »

Thanks for the replies but it appears we are drifting back into the technical aspects of replacing capacitors and other electronic parts of the crossovers.

With this thread I was hoping we could focus on discussing the sound qualities that could be heard after the crossover upgrade is completed. What I really want to know is what differences between the before and after I can expect to actually be able to hear.

You can expect to hear essentially no difference unless there was a component problem. Once you have the new RDO tweeters installed (without touching the crossovers) you should see if the two speakers sound the same. If you can detect a difference, there is probably a problem with one (or both) crossover components and the upgrade is warranted. If you hear no difference then you are probably not going to hear a difference after upgrade.

jcandy

TennMan wrote: »

I have been reading a lot of threads about caps but they don't have good descriptions of changes they are actually able to hear.

You can't conclude that there was a change based on subjective accounts. When someone invests alot of time and money into something like a crossover upgrade, the introduction of a huge selective bias is introduced.

The sad fact of the matter is that in order to significantly improve your monitor 10s, a redesign of the crossover from the ground up would be required.

ben62670

jcandy wrote: »

You can't conclude that there was a change based on subjective accounts. When someone invests alot of time and money into something like a crossover upgrade, the introduction of a huge selective bias is introduced.

The sad fact of the matter is that in order to significantly improve your monitor 10s, a redesign of the crossover from the ground up would be required.

No. I have invested a lot of time and money(for me anyways) in many projects that just sucked. Did I want them to suck? Obviously not. My mind didn't trick me into believing my bad purchases were good, or that my bad work was good. Try again Tcandy.

Face

jcandy wrote: »

You can expect to hear essentially no difference unless there was a component problem. Once you have the new RDO tweeters installed (without touching the crossovers) you should see if the two speakers sound the same. If you can detect a difference, there is probably a problem with one (or both) crossover components and the upgrade is warranted. If you hear no difference then you are probably not going to hear a difference after upgrade.

I've done capacitor blind testing here with friends, there are differences even if they're both "in spec".

TennMan

Face wrote: »

I've done capacitor blind testing here with friends, there are differences even if they're both "in spec".

Please describe the differences you heard when doing the blind testing. That is what I'm hoping to hear about.

Thanks to everyone for your comments but I don't care to respond to the arguments that seem to be developing (or developed before I came here). I don't see how that is helpful to anyone.

F1nut

TennMan, let me offer a suggestion. After you do the crossover mods, report back with what, if any, differences you heard.

PolkMaster1

TennMan wrote: »

Please describe the differences you heard when doing the blind testing. That is what I'm hoping to hear about.

Tennman - the best way to find out is to take the best suggestions on here and do it yourself. When we say it will be money well spent (as long as you purchase the caps and resistors suggested here, dont mix and match different resistors and caps or you may not hear the WOW factor we mention here), we mean it! Lots of people here performed the mods and you will hear a difference. I can tell you with the utmost confidence that the seasoned members on here really know their stuff. Ben is one of them, DarqueKnight, ToolForLife, Heiney9, are also great people to talk to. The member list is a small sample.

As for jcandy - I cannot support the statements you post on this thread. I can tell you with personal experience the following:

That changing wires (whether speaker or interconnects), I DO hear a difference, even when moving from guage to guage (speakerwire).

The tweeter modifications I made to my speakers - going from an SL to an RD0 tweeter - there IS a sonic difference!!!

When the XO modifications were performed, I HEARD a difference.

When the amp modifications I made myself, I HEARD a difference.

When I applied mortite and Dynamat to my speakers, I HEARD a difference.

When the inductors were modified, I HEARD a difference.

When I applied BlackHole 5 to my speakers, I HEARD a difference.

When brass spikes were applied to the speakers, I HEARD a difference.

Note that when performing my mods, my equipment was in full working order, with no malfunctioning what-so-ever. There is NO bias in my statements that the sonic characteristics are imaginary after each modification. I would not make such statements or spend lots of $$$$$ if I did not find my results to be true. The first order of business before performing ANY of these mods is to familiar with the sound coming from your speakers. Without this knowledge, you will not realize the sound improvements you expect.


With your statements, I have to wonder what your equipment is, if it is up to snuff, and if you personal experience with moding your speakers with the mods we done. If you have experience with modding, perhaps you need to look into your mods and what you are using, and/or your equipment not being capable of producing the detailed sound that we come to expect with our equipment. Perhaps you should locate a polkster who has done these mods in your area and see if you can arrange a listening session.

If your statements were to be true, then it would lead one to believe that there would be no sound difference when moving from speaker to speaker or from equipment to equipment whether its from the same manufacturer or different manufacturers.

TennMan

F1nut wrote: »

TennMan, let me offer a suggestion. After you do the crossover mods, report back with what, if any, differences you heard.

That is a very good suggestion and I will certainly do that. It will be some time before I'm ready to do the crossovers. I should have the 194s I ordered from Polk tomorrow. FedEx says they should be delivers then. I intend to take a few days to thoroughly evaluate differences between the sl2000 and RDO194 and will report back here what I think.

TennMan

PolkMaster1 wrote: »

Tennman - the best way to find out is to take the best suggestions on here and do it yourself. When we say it will be money well spent (as long as you purchase the caps and resistors suggested here, dont mix and match different resistors and caps or you may not hear the WOW factor we mention here), we mean it! Lots of people here performed the mods and you will hear a difference. I can tell you with the utmost confidence that the seasoned members on here really know their stuff. Ben is one of them, DarqueKnight, ToolForLife, Heiney9, are also great people to talk to. The member list is a small sample.

You are probably right. When I started this thread I was wanting to use someone else's ears to hear the difference in sound quality the new caps would make. That was a little unrealistic on my part.

I will let candy address the rest of your post.

Toolfan66

WTH is going on around here??? first we get hit hard with spam now all the trolls come out to play old and new...

Freaking crazy it's like some people were drinking out of the same water fountain..

PolkMaster1

TOOLFORLIFEFAN wrote: »

WTH is going on around here??? first we get hit hard with spam now all the trolls come out to play old and new...

Is JCandy a troll, posting spam, or is just naive when it comes to believing that electronic components and wiring DO make a difference?

PolkMaster1

TennMan wrote: »

You are probably right. When I started this thread I was wanting to use someone else's ears to hear the difference in sound quality the new caps would make. That was a little unrealistic on my part.

As I said before to you in a PM, try to locate a forum member near you to check out some PA speakers that they modified.

If that is not possible, go ahead with the mods using the parts that we suggested. Dont hesitate to ask for further advice when the time comes. The rewards will be fruitful.

treitz3

TennMan wrote: »

That was a little unrealistic on my part.

Threads like this are pitiful on this forum. Tennman, you still there?

treitz3

jcandy wrote: »

The sad fact of the matter is that in order to significantly improve your monitor 10s, a redesign of the crossover from the ground up would be required.

What is truly sad is the quote above.

Damn, I hate it when folks troll this forum. I really do.