Copa1934
My ears are bleeding
But before I begin, very big thank you to John (nerdorama) for "gifting" me the speakers. I'm confident I can't salvage the woofers, as is, but looking into some kind of recone that hopefully won't be paper. Not against paper, but more later.
First Road Trip! I learned about John and his 910 through my other "S" series post, the Pioneer S-710. You can read more here http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=583273 also in that thread are images of 910 woofers I acquired around the same time as the replacement 710 woofer. My thought, at the time, was trying both sets in the same cabinet. But before getting that far along John contacted me and boy am I glad. I'm near the SE corner of WA, or NE corner of OR. He's just south of Seattle, where we once lived many moon ago. Driving across the state of WA is like traveling to Barstow, Palm Springs, or through parts of UT or NV. Boring! Only entertainment is dumb drivers, and boy there are plenty. Made it safely and John and I had some great conversation. Similar interests, mostly audio related. Seattle area was 10 degrees cooler than where we live, but at 60+ unconventionally warm. Felt like a shorts and sandles day. Almost.
Got them home without incident. I'll take images of the woofers I received with these speakers later. For images of the woofers that I used, check the 710 link.
Thankfully the only thing I had to do was clean up some "extra" holes used by other woofers. Once done I was able to mount my woofers cleanly into the cabinets.
About the 910 speakers. Certainly these could be compared to HPM, like 100 and 900, the latter I'm not personally familiar with. People have written that the 100 is better constructed and I would agree. It's not terribly huge, but there are differences. First the 100 have a 1" baffle, where the 910 is 3/4". Still 3/4" is not bad. The bigger difference, to me, is the use of machine screws in all the 100 drivers, where the 710 and 910 use wood screws. Again, they work, but if after service the screws are not "started" correctly the wood can be stripped out. I didn't have issues with screws, well one and that was one screw was missing. Got bloody lucky as I had a couple dozen of exactly the correct speaker in my spare speaker parts case. I think the 100 had more insulation, but not positive. I can't compare either because I've already parted with the 100 (weeks ago).
I'll say I don't miss my 100. If that doesn't grab your attention, oh well. The latter model HPM and "S" series speakers have stamped metal frame woofers and so far I couldn't find ANYTHING negative about this in listening. I'll post T/S later, but the 910 are Fs(25), I'll double check this number later. The 710 are a respectable Fs(35). Two very obvious differences between 710 and 910 (size isn't huge, they need to be side by side to see the difference). First the 910 has contour for Mid and tweeter, where the 710 is just the mid. Second, the 910 tweeter is visually cooler looking, having metal parts, where the 710 is entirely plastic. I'll do more listening comparisons later, but they seem pretty close in the high end. Both speakers share the same mid, the only thing in common really.
Bass is not lacking at all, period. Easily equal to the 100, but more controlled, tighter sounding. I was surprised, but only because of the negative comments about stamped baskets. I think thoughts on this subject are misplaced or exaggerated.
OK, correction, the 710 does have one thing in common with the 910 and that is imaging. The tweeter, in both, really are pretty impressive with the edge going to the 910. And we're talking depth. I didn't play with placement at all. I plopped them where the 100 formerly were, hooked them up and let them run. I left the room entirely so the caps could break in (due to being idle for so long). Upon my return I sat down and gave them a listen and wasn't disappointed in the least. The one thing that let me down, and only slightly at first, was the bass. It was so powerful and present, especially at lower volume. But with material that tended to be bass "heavy", the bass would tend to sound exaggerated. Not as natural sounding. The other was a tendency to become overly "bright" at higher listening levels. The first thing I noticed about the 710 was the balance was better, though coming across a tad weak in the bass department, again comparing to the 100. But, as the volume was pushed, the bass would "catchup" with the other drivers, almost non-linearly, unlike the 100 which would simply continue to get brighter and brighter. Bass would increase, of course, but still lagged behind the mids and highs. I hoped for similar with the 910, but got more. The bass was better than the 710 and tighter than the 100. Double blessing.
I think I'm going to stop here so this doesn't become too long winded. I'll make more posts, along with images. Additional posts will be about specific listening experience, with artists and selections mentioned.
The images are one woofer prior to new rubber surround and after surround attached. Since I haven't listened to a pair with foam surrounds I can't comment on the difference. But I can say they work, they work well, and the rubber looks really cool. The other images are of the crossover and back of the speaker. I'll check my 710 again but I don't believe that it's marked (R) or (L) even though my 710 are mirror image.
First Road Trip! I learned about John and his 910 through my other "S" series post, the Pioneer S-710. You can read more here http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=583273 also in that thread are images of 910 woofers I acquired around the same time as the replacement 710 woofer. My thought, at the time, was trying both sets in the same cabinet. But before getting that far along John contacted me and boy am I glad. I'm near the SE corner of WA, or NE corner of OR. He's just south of Seattle, where we once lived many moon ago. Driving across the state of WA is like traveling to Barstow, Palm Springs, or through parts of UT or NV. Boring! Only entertainment is dumb drivers, and boy there are plenty. Made it safely and John and I had some great conversation. Similar interests, mostly audio related. Seattle area was 10 degrees cooler than where we live, but at 60+ unconventionally warm. Felt like a shorts and sandles day. Almost.
Got them home without incident. I'll take images of the woofers I received with these speakers later. For images of the woofers that I used, check the 710 link.
Thankfully the only thing I had to do was clean up some "extra" holes used by other woofers. Once done I was able to mount my woofers cleanly into the cabinets.
About the 910 speakers. Certainly these could be compared to HPM, like 100 and 900, the latter I'm not personally familiar with. People have written that the 100 is better constructed and I would agree. It's not terribly huge, but there are differences. First the 100 have a 1" baffle, where the 910 is 3/4". Still 3/4" is not bad. The bigger difference, to me, is the use of machine screws in all the 100 drivers, where the 710 and 910 use wood screws. Again, they work, but if after service the screws are not "started" correctly the wood can be stripped out. I didn't have issues with screws, well one and that was one screw was missing. Got bloody lucky as I had a couple dozen of exactly the correct speaker in my spare speaker parts case. I think the 100 had more insulation, but not positive. I can't compare either because I've already parted with the 100 (weeks ago).
I'll say I don't miss my 100. If that doesn't grab your attention, oh well. The latter model HPM and "S" series speakers have stamped metal frame woofers and so far I couldn't find ANYTHING negative about this in listening. I'll post T/S later, but the 910 are Fs(25), I'll double check this number later. The 710 are a respectable Fs(35). Two very obvious differences between 710 and 910 (size isn't huge, they need to be side by side to see the difference). First the 910 has contour for Mid and tweeter, where the 710 is just the mid. Second, the 910 tweeter is visually cooler looking, having metal parts, where the 710 is entirely plastic. I'll do more listening comparisons later, but they seem pretty close in the high end. Both speakers share the same mid, the only thing in common really.
Bass is not lacking at all, period. Easily equal to the 100, but more controlled, tighter sounding. I was surprised, but only because of the negative comments about stamped baskets. I think thoughts on this subject are misplaced or exaggerated.
OK, correction, the 710 does have one thing in common with the 910 and that is imaging. The tweeter, in both, really are pretty impressive with the edge going to the 910. And we're talking depth. I didn't play with placement at all. I plopped them where the 100 formerly were, hooked them up and let them run. I left the room entirely so the caps could break in (due to being idle for so long). Upon my return I sat down and gave them a listen and wasn't disappointed in the least. The one thing that let me down, and only slightly at first, was the bass. It was so powerful and present, especially at lower volume. But with material that tended to be bass "heavy", the bass would tend to sound exaggerated. Not as natural sounding. The other was a tendency to become overly "bright" at higher listening levels. The first thing I noticed about the 710 was the balance was better, though coming across a tad weak in the bass department, again comparing to the 100. But, as the volume was pushed, the bass would "catchup" with the other drivers, almost non-linearly, unlike the 100 which would simply continue to get brighter and brighter. Bass would increase, of course, but still lagged behind the mids and highs. I hoped for similar with the 910, but got more. The bass was better than the 710 and tighter than the 100. Double blessing.
I think I'm going to stop here so this doesn't become too long winded. I'll make more posts, along with images. Additional posts will be about specific listening experience, with artists and selections mentioned.
The images are one woofer prior to new rubber surround and after surround attached. Since I haven't listened to a pair with foam surrounds I can't comment on the difference. But I can say they work, they work well, and the rubber looks really cool. The other images are of the crossover and back of the speaker. I'll check my 710 again but I don't believe that it's marked (R) or (L) even though my 710 are mirror image.
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