Want to upgrade from SA-8v2's. Want more SQ. Need suggestions

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

i still prefer CD's. any .mp3 under 320kbps isn't played in the car.

i still have CD cases in my car. i burn good albums in .wav format. once the system becomes accurate, flaws in both the recording and lower sampling rates become intolerable.

i reserve the thousands of songs that are lower bitrate for background music.

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

wow, dude, i need cliff notes to sort through all this. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif
so you want something that can play a double bass with impact and accuracy?

and you want to spend less than $200?

it's not an issue of size of sub. it's an issue of power and mechanical parameters (BL and Qms). it's an issue of the enclosure. it's the amp.

first, you want a sealed enclosure with a Q=0.707

second, you want to locate it in the rear passenger corner of the trunk.

third, you need front midbass that is very capable down to 60Hz and and very well powered. the illusion of impact comes from midbass.

fourth, you need an amplifier that is truly capable of handling transient power needs.

Okay. Well a sealed enclosure isn't 100% needed to get that kind of response right? Because my old ES300 was ported (albeit a shi**y prefab) and sounded great, and I didn't have midbass in the front.

And isn't the Audison LrX 5.1K a good enough amp to handle that kind of stuff? I'm pretty sure I was running the same amp on the ES300.

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

I'm not looking for absolute PERFECTION. But I want to be able to play those notes without a muddy resonance playing through it all. It's hard to explain what I'm hearing out of my W7 and now the same thing (although slightly better) out of my SA-8s vs my old ES300 all those years ago.

 

---------- Post added at 09:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:56 PM ----------

 

It's almost like a distortion but I know that can't be it because it sounds the same whether played at lower volumes or higher.

 

---------- Post added at 09:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:57 PM ----------

 

And the gains are def tuned properly

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

And I'm hopefully going to be upgrading my front stage soon too. I should hopefully be getting a pair of Focal PS165's in soon

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

OK so I just did a little meddling (spelling? I dunno but anyways) with my system on the way to the store just messing around with tuning a bit and listening to some of the songs that usually sound like cra* on my system and I found that if I fade my system completely to the front so I can tolerate a little more volume from them and then crank it up pretty loud then the bass starts to sound a little better and blend a bit better. But I'm still not really "feeling" it. It's getting decently loud but I'm not feeling the hits of the kick drums like I would like to. So maybe I still do need to upgrade to 1-2 12's instead of the 8's. Cuz really even that old ES300 12" had more more cone area than my 2 8's do right now. So maybe that's what I've been chasing is the need to go back to 12's to feel that impact. Cuz just thinking about it now I haven't had a 12" sub since that ES300 and that was like 4-5 years ago haha. Had a JL 10W7 which was decent and now these 8's. I'm slowly making my way back up to a 12's cone area haha.

 

[Snapper_Slapper 10+ year member]

You really dont seem to get it do ya? Do you really think 13^inches of cone area is what makes or breaks a double kick drum? You were told how to get what you want but keep rambling about this mystical ES300 that did it all. Here ya go...buy another ES300 and shut up/thread.

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

You really dont seem to get it do ya? Do you really think 13^inches of cone area is what makes or breaks a double kick drum? You were told how to get what you want but keep rambling about this mystical ES300 that did it all. Here ya go...buy another ES300 and shut up/thread.

Obviously you didn't get the point of my last post. I'm talking about wanting to "feel" it more now. I'm definitely going to "feel" the bass a hell of a lot more with 2 12's than with 2 8's. Even if it isn't perceivably louder I should still feel it more because the cone area is well more than double.

 

[Snapper_Slapper 10+ year member]

So maybe I still do need to upgrade to 1-2 12's instead of the 8's. Cuz really even that old ES300 12" had more more cone area than my 2 8's do right now. So maybe that's what I've been chasing is the need to go back to 12's to feel that impact. Cuz just thinking about it now I haven't had a 12" sub since that ES300 and that was like 4-5 years ago haha. Had a JL 10W7 which was decent and now these 8's. I'm slowly making my way back up to a 12's cone area haha.

Then why'd you say that shit Chief?

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

Then why'd you say that shit Chief?

Just some realization I guess you could say. Had nothing to do with the ES300 being a "mystical" sub as you put it.

 

[Sonic. 10+ year member]

Spend the money on the idmax and be done with it mann, even if it one 12.

 

[mlstrass 5,000+ posts]

Yeah. I think this guy was a loud set up that will play the notes he wants. He keeps throwing SQL out there...But I don't think he fully grasps what true SQ is.From what I have picked up from reading. True SQ is being able to play 20-100hertz (or wherever you cross your next set of speakers at with your sub stage) all with a flat even response.

 

SPL is being a able to play maybe 10-15 of those numbers (lets say 27-42) really loud. And then there is a drop off for the other frequencies.[/QUOTE]

Perhaps you need to read more as neither of those definitions are very accurate.

OP 2 8's just isn't going to punch you in the chest. Takes cone area and power to do that.

 

[jockhater2 10+ year member]

I'll tell you what...the biggest bitch when it comes to what I've learned here and on some other forums is that I can't enjoy a lot of live systems now. I can tell too easily when DJs are bottoming out systems and playing bad rips of tracks (enough so that my wife has learned to do the same lol). I have royally pissed off one of my coworkers who paid about 2 grand so far for a setup in his Cruze that's all Rockford and still doesn't like it because his shop doesn't want to take my recommendations on deadening the doors so he has ZERO midbass. Sometimes I wish I could just forget everything and enjoy whatever like I used to when all I rocked were Bazooka coax off deck power and no sub lol.

Amen! HAHA

 

[jockhater2 10+ year member]

Comes from my SQ roots. Certain decks possess the processing power to show you the differences in media. I've heard the difference and can pinpoint certain details in dynamics that are significantly different between a CD and a 320 MP3 from my iPhone when playing them off the Eclipse deck I'm currently running. TBH, the internal DAC on the iPhone is shit in comparison. On most consumer level decks, there's no way you're going to be able to tell the difference and that's why you haven't so far. The bigger problem is there are very few HUs out there that will bypass the iPhone's DAC (the P99RS and Eclipse Sound Monitors will, for example). I'm not trying to dis what you're used to hearing, but I am extremely picky and I can hear the difference and it's mainly in the overall dynamics through part of the midrange and from about 10KHz on up. FLAC is a solid option, but again only as reliable as the DAC that is converting it.

So. He should look into a deck that offers more EQ control. And a LOD cable for his ipod to bypass the ipods DAC

 

[sundownz Pro Seller]

While the sundowns are nice they aren't really built to be SQ subs with super fast transient response. Even Jason @mobileenclosures said it would be tough to get a good fast response out of the sa-8s because they are more of an SPL sub.

Alot of people don't appreciate what the SA series can deliver in terms of SQ -- while it's not a fancy XBL or Underhung design it is a very good over-hung in this price range :

They also feature dual faraday rings as well; which are pretty uncommon in car audio woofers -- you can see the Le curve is pretty broad and even.

Since transient response = frequency response we can determine that woofers with inductive treatment or natively low inductance have better transient response :

http://stereointegrity.com/docs/WooferSpeed.pdf

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In any event; it does sound like you want a sealed box to me -- with the right driver a sealed box can get down as well. I almost always go back to sealed boxes for my daily vehicles.

If you like Dayton -- the Titanic MKIII achieves an F3 of about 40 hz in ~1.5 cubes sealed (add some stuffing and drop into the high 30s). A pair of these would have excellent output as well -- I ran an MK1 Titanic years ago and I loved that thing (it required 3 cubes but had an F3 of 30 Hz).

You don't NEED a sealed box to get good transients but it's much easier (essentially fool-proof) and there is alot less testing and tuning required. In my two primarily driven vehicles I'll have 4x SD-2 8s sealed in my truck and eventually either two Z v.4 12s IB or one Z v.4 15" sealed in my car //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

 

[gamehawk55 10+ year member]

Hey Jacob thanks for the input. I'm still fairly new to car audio, or at least understanding the more advanced stuff to do with car audio. I'm just starting to try and learn what those graphs and all the TS Parameters actually MEAN for the woofer and how it will sound. But thanks a lot for your input and I'm going to try and understand what all those graphs mean and whatnot, unless someone has a good informative site to look at for learning that advanced stuff. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

Thanks again everyone.