Dayton DIY RS621BK reference series speaker kit

Well after looking at one bookshelf speaker after another, I finally decided on the Dayton DIY RS621BK kits. If PC building was my hobby, I guess I should see what building speakers are like as well. I wanted to see what speaker building for dummies was like.

http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=302-960

Speakers came in yesterday. Didn't expect it to arrive so fast.

So I decided to make sure everything was in there.

Bunch of boxes: (luckily it was free shipping)


Lil box contained the free gift portable speaker thingy:


RS28AS-4 Al dome tweeter: (took one out to have a look)


RS150s-8 woofer: (didn't want to cut the tape to take out)


Box of other stuff: (Xovers, wires, padding, connectors)


Cabinets packed in the big box very nicely:


Took one out to take a look:


Carefully unwrapped: Shiny!!


With grill off you can see the pre cut front baffle (speaker building for dummies like me). I hear this cabinet is pretty sturdy using 1" MDF for front baffle and 3/4" MDF for the rest of the cabinet and the interior brace.


The box also had something that looked like packing material. I realized that it was actually dampening material for the insides. Glad I didn't throw it out.

The Reference Series Tweeter and Woofers are quite well regarded amongst the DIY community.
http://www.zaphaudio.com/tweetermishmash/
http://www.zaphaudio.com/5.5test/

I think I will first test the drivers by themselves before I build the thing since PE asks you to do that in case you need to return anything (avoid scratching up the drivers).

Nice, keep us posted as the build comes along.

Please show the finished product A review would be great too. Is that $350 for each or the pair?

calvieee said:

Please show the finished product A review would be great too. Is that $350 for each or the pair?

Click to expand...

$350 for everything to build the pair.

Yeah the price is $350 for the pair (includes everything to build the speakers). For the moment, it is free shipping and for me there was no sales tax (PE is in OH).

Update:
Ok so I decided I better check to see if the components actually work. So I decided to wire up the speakers on my desk sans the cabinet. One thing I noticed is how well PE made the kit idiot proof. The connections are clearly marked so that you know which pins are the input (marked "in") and which are to the drivers (marked "T" and "W" for the tweeter and woofer respectively). Also all connections are done via connector. In other words no soldering required. Though I am ok with soldering since I had to do so much of it during grad studies, I am grateful if I do not have to do this.

The next thing I noticed was that there seems to be one wire missing. I noticed that you need 3 sets of wires: one from the binding posts to the Xovers, one from the HPF Xover to the tweeter, and one from the LPF Xover to the woofer. However, there was only two wires. Pic of the wires are below.



The top wire is the connection to the binding post to the two Xovers (1 input to 2 output wires). The lower wire is either the connection from one of the Xovers to either the tweeter or woofer. But I seem to be missing the other wire. What is interesting is the wire was missing in both speaker set (L and R).

I emailed PE's customer service to see what is going on (did I not realize something or is something really missing). I will wait to hear from them.

In the meantime, I wanted to wire the drivers up so I took one of the wires from the other speaker set and used it to wire up the drivers on my desk.



The tweeter and woofer pair looks great even before they are loaded onto the cabinet.

Next thing I realized is that I didn't have any speaker wire. Ok, off to Radio Shack to get some cheapo 16 guage speaker wire. Done.

Connected everything up and tested the thing. With the Marantz, I could run the drivers, my old Yammie PC speakers and the HSU sub all at once.

Turned the thing on, turned off the PC speakers for the moment and played Enya. Ok so no sound and it took me a little while to get the Marantz set up right. Finally got everything ready. First thing I noticed once everything was running was that the new drivers sounded very treble heavy. No mids. I figured that would be the case since it probably took longer to break in the RS150s-8 6" woofer than the RS28AS-4 tweeter. However, putting my ear to each of the drivers, I could tell both worked. Hooray!!

So as I continued listening, the woofer is SLOWLY becoming more prominent. I think these speakers are going to take months to break in but should open up really nicely eventually. The tweeter is REALLY nice to hear even now. I can hear detail that I could not hear from my cheapo Yammies (small bells and such). The clarity is quite amazing. The sound is a bit bright at the moment but I think this will tame down as the drivers break in.

What is interesting is when I turn on my cheapo Yammies and run the new drivers, the Yammies and the sub all at once, the sound is quite dramatic and enjoyable. The Yammies provide the mids for the moment, the new drivers provide clear highs and the sub provides the lows.

Ok so that was fun and I listened to some songs for a bit. I will put this away and try the other speaker drivers and Xovers later.

Well I have been running the drivers for a few hours now and the woofer is now opening up really nicely. It is still not good in the lows (even for a 6" driver) but it is really nice in the mids now. It is now louder than the Yammies (which never could go low anyway due to its tiny 2" driver) and the mids are much cleaner than the Yammy. It is also very detailed and when listening to something like Norah Jones, you can actually hear her voice go up and down in her effort to sing the song...which is something I never noticed on the Yammies.

The brightness is going away and the sound is getting more and more neutral. It is a really clean sounding driver. I feel it is not particularly overly rich nor bright and the best phrase I can use to describe the sound is "pure". It is the sonic equivalent of breathing in clean air. I was blown away listening to Like a Wind by SENS and when the clarinet came it, I was in heaven. It still needs the sub to make it a great experience but the Yammies are no longer needed to complete the sound. I presume the low end will eventually come in as it breaks in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4BZzLaZcnk&feature=more_related

If it sounds this good on the table, I can't wait to hear it once it is built and the drivers fully reveal themselves.

Will update later....

I couldn't watch the video: "The URL contained a malformed video ID."

Sorry, it has been fixed.

Well I went and ordered the Deadmau5 CD!

Will keep it to listen to the speakers when they are done!

Anyway, still waiting for Parts Express to get back to me about the missing speakers.

In the meantime, I have decided to go build at least one of the speakers using the wire from the other speaker for the moment.

Before doing anything, I went and bought a few things.

Some spray adhesive for attaching the dampening material to the inside of the cabinet.


Also though the instructions said to glue the crossovers to the inside of the cabinet, I wanted something that will let me remove the crossovers if necessary (ie servicing). So after looking around, I decided to use a combination of Velcro and wood screws. So I got some brass wood screws, some brass washers and Industrial Strength Velcro (whatever that means).


Before attaching the crossovers, I decided to measure the inside walls of the cabinet so that I can cut the dampening material. Done.

Then I first put in the binding posts. The instructions says to just lightly hammer them into the holes in the back but I found that screwing the binding posts worked well and prevented any chipping. Sorry for the bad shot.


Attached the connection pins to the inside of the binding posts.

Then I decided to put the LPF woofer crossover on the bottom of the cabinet.


To attach the crossover board, I put the velcro to the bottom of the board and attached the other side to the bottom of the cabinet so that they would hold together and not move. Then while the board was stationary, I screwed in the wood screws (including the washers) to each of the corner openings in the crossover board. There was so little space in the speaker that positioning and screwing in the wood screws was a major PITA. But it did get done and the board seems to be holding well. You can see of the screws holding the board down in the far left corner of the crossover board.


So now here is a question. There are a couple of positions available for the tweeter crossover board. One possibility is the side of the cabinet. The other is the back of the cabinet right above the binding posts. What I am not sure is if either is more favorable. Putting it in the back is easier to mount the screws but I wanted to find out if there was any other factors regarding the placement.



Well that is about it for now. Sorry for the long time in making the speakers. I only have a hour or so every night to do this. Will post again later. Hope the additional missing wires come soon.

Keep up the work, and the updates.

Zenshi said:

Well I went and ordered the Deadmau5 CD!

Click to expand...

Good man! Gonna his new one soon as well. Go see him live if you can, awesome night.

Good job so far by the way coming along good.

Thanks all! Yeah I am looking forward to getting the CD!


Parts Express said they shipped the missing wires!


Well I decided to do a preliminary build of one speaker. Its preliminary since I still have to load up on dampening material. I also have to put some gasket material on the speakers when attaching to the baffle. However, I did load up the tweeter HPF (finally decided to put in on the back of the cabinet) and wire everything up.

Did a quick run to see if everything worked, which it did. Well I have to say the speaker sounds great even now. It sounds warmer than when the drivers are out and now the woofer is sounding much stronger.

Now the small Yammies are completely drowned out and and a nice rich sound fills the room. Even with the sub off, the bass is pretty good though still a bit lacking. Maybe let them run a bit more to break in. With the sub on, the sound is just wonderful.

The only thing as they often say is that poor recording material is now more noticeable. Oh well I guess that is what an more accurate speaker is supposed to do.

Oh and the thing looks really nice too though I have to get all my fingerprints off of the piano black cabinet.

Will post pics once I do a true build of this speaker.

The wires from Parts Express came in today! Now I can finish everything.

Well finally got one of the speakers done! Whew. Got the other partially built but still need to fill it with dampening material and screw down the crossover boards (ran out of screws :frown: ). Oh well, I guess I can go visit Home Depot next week. Until then, I will enjoy listening them during this pre-finished form.

So now with these big boxes sitting in front of my old Yamahas, the desk is really crowded.




Things may be crowded but man these sound nice. The sound seems to be getting better as the drivers continue to break in. They especially sound nice now during gentle soft songs. Really enjoying Zuruck zu dir by Sohne Mannheims while I type. Imaging is terrible right now with the speakers in my face but I don't care at this time. Will clean up my desk layout later.

Eventually I guess I need speaker stands and move my desk away from the wall. But that is much much later.

For now I am just enjoying the sound.

Will post again when I finish the other speakers and get my Deadmau5 CD.

Damn....those speakers look huge!!! It's probably because your monitor is tiny. How do they sound when you sit right next to them? I used to have a pair of axiom m2 and then a set of sierra1 like that on my desk. The bass is so WEAK when i sit close to them. I sit 6 feet from my Sierra1 now and the bass is great.

awesome stuff zenshi

Thanks! Yeah the monitor is a tiny 17" one. I probably won't change it for awhile since the thing works well (no reason to swap it out until one of the family PC monitors goes out). The monitor makes the speakers look big. Compared to other bookshelf speakers, these are not too big. The Sierra-1s are bigger both in height and width (mistake: they are only taller and not wider).

The speakers sound great calvieee but bass extension is not their strength. They do have decent 6" drivers but the speaker is a small cabinet and sealed so the bass is limited. Yeah, the Sierra 1 I hear has great bass for bookshelf speakers but they are ported and have larger cabinets. Sierra 1s are really nice and almost ordered them during their sale at Ascend (I am not sure if they still have it on sale). Nice SEAS Prestige tweeter and I think they use a proprietary woofer. Also love the bamboo cabinets.

At this time I have the Marantz crossover set at 100Hz to the sub and that seems to work well. The combination of the RS621 with the HSU STF-1 sounds incredibly nice. For the small room like mine, the set is punchy enough to feel the effect on DVD movies like Transformers yet neutral and natural enough to sound great for something like the classical guitar work of Kaare Norge.

One thing I do realize now. My cheapo yammies, as limited as they are, did produce some nice sound. For tiny PC speakers, they sound nice when mated with the HSU. Of course the Daytons blow them away in depth, accuracy and range.

Edit: Sorry, I thought Sierra 1s had 7" woofers but it seems they have 5.25" woofers.
Edit2: According to the PE description of the speaker project (project Encore) Darren Kuzma (the designer of the RS621 kit) says that you can put the same drivers and crossovers into PE's larger box and port them to extend the bass of the speaker.

Yes, the Sierra1 only have a 5.25 woofer but they pack a punch. When i have them setup on my desk like you do now, they sound 'weak'. I started with the axiom m2, i found them bass weak. I upgraded to the Sierra1 and found them bass weak as well. I was like...what the hell? I have to run my Sierra1 with a Hsu Stf2/ Rythmik F15 because the bass is still weak. I upgrade my 37" lcd to a 55" and forced to move my desk away from the Sierra1. That's when i discovered that the Sierra1 have GREAT bass. Even the Axiom m2 have decent bass once i move 6 feets away from them. What i am trying to say is most bookshelf speaker need "space and distant" to sound their best. Putting them on a desk and sitting 1feet away might not be the best. For some, there might not be an option.

Bass and mid range is weak.

Sounded 10x better

Wow Calvieee, I am floored by your setup. Amazing monitor, mated to a great speaker. Mad respect man.

I finally finished both speakers. Took long enough.

I filled the other speaker with dampening foam.


They really do give just enough foam to fill each speaker as not much was left after filling both speakers. Also put the gasket material around the other speaker drivers as well and re-mounted them into the front baffle. Ok so the build was done.

Now to put the speakers on the desk, I didn't want to put them right on the desk. Also did not want to buy that expensive speaker foam stuff. The shipping manager at my job had some packing foam so I used that. Better than nothing.


I measured the foam and cut it just a bit bigger than each speaker.


So with the speakers ready (and the foam ), I needed to change my desk arrangement a bit. I put my PC down under my desk (after cleaning the bottom of my desk), and then spread out the Daytons. For the moment I put my Yamahas near the monitor. Though I did not need them, I figured I would just leave them there for now. I could always use the earbud connection on the Yammy as I did not want to go connect them to the PC under the desk.

Ok so with that, here is how the setup looks now.

Before: (that thing under my desk is my daughter's old emachines case)





After: (sorry about the chair in the way)



So with it set up as is, I needed to do a bit of tweaking. I opened the HT Omega Striker driver setup and put the setting towards "room" and "close distance". I kept all equalization untouched.

I then put the Marantz in 2.1, sub on, small speakers, LPF at 80Hz. I then adjusted the output of the HSU and kept it at 80Hz.

That seems to have made the whole thing just right. Now I am REALLY enjoying these new speakers. Mated with the HSU STF-1, they just sing. They are really nice and I cannot stop listening to one musical piece after another. They especially do well with classical and softer studio music or concert music (such as Kaare Norge, Stacey Kent, and Windham Hill). With Trance, it is harder to define the speaker's strength since trance music is often synthesized. Have not listened to enough Rock to say for harder music. Bottom line description, the sound is laid back but very detailed, and decent imaging (though I am no expert on this stuff). Again, the best single word I can come up with is the sound is "clean".

Anyway, I will give a listening review later.

One thing this whole project showed was though these Daytons are much better, the little Yamahas gave very nice sound for tiny PC speakers. Not as clean a sound as the Daytons but not the usual tinny sound you get from PC speakers. They did themselves proud for 10 years that I used them.

Yeah yeah, I need a bigger monitor.

Oh and the Deadmau5 CD supposedly arrived in the mailbox. Need to go see. I will keep it wrapped until Christmas and celebrate by opening that (and a few other items) that day.

Will post again later.

ive been looking at those kits myself.those things do look awesome cant wait for the review.

So opened the Deadmau5 CD. Its pretty good except I was disappointed that the Ghosts and Stuff track included vocals. Not that the song is bad but I love the instrumental version of this and so that was unfortunate.

Anyway so a final audiophyte analysis of these bookshelf speakers. I used the speakers to listen to music, listen to game tracks and watch DVDs. I had Deadmau5 and Star Trek saved for listening during Christmas. In addition, I listened to Yanni, Windham Hill, Black Eyed Peas, Andy Hunter, Canon by Pachelbel, 30 Seconds to Mars and a few others. Aside from Star Trek, I watched LOTR Return of the King, and Iron Man. For Games, I just listened to a bit of Dragon Age Origin as well as the demo for 3DMark03 (I love the first WWII demo).

The settings are as follows:

From my HT Omega Striker: Equalization is flat, the surrounding setting is set from "generic" to "room", and the speaker distance is set to "near".

From my Marantz: The speaker layout is given as 2.1, the room is given as small, the speakers are given as small and the crossover setting is given as 80Hz.

From my HSU STF-1: The volume is set reasonably high to give punch but not overly bass (some bass lovers may find my setting to tame). The crossover is set to 80Hz.


Without a doubt the single most impressive thing to me about these speakers are how clean they sound. Range is ok though they do not go that low in bass. I think the speakers definitely needs a decent sub. The highs in general are a bit bright normally but very detailed, the mids are wonderfully rich, and the mid bass though kind of lacking is very very clean with no indication of distortion (not boomy at all from my amateur ears). Matched with the STF-1 sub, the sound is amazingly clean and laid back.

Detail from the speakers is amazing with clear separation of each sound. The nice thing is that each of the instruments sounds true, ie the cymbals sound very metallic, yet the piano and wood instruments do not at all. In fact wood instruments sound amazingly soft from this speaker. The Armenian Duduk in Yanni's Prelude song sounds so clean, its almost emotional.

For songs, especially softer songs, the best single word I can give is "depth". The singing sounds do not sound flat. In other words the speakers can track the small nuances of the voice (such as going stronger or softer, etc). I can now even hear when the singers are taking their breath between their vocals. These small nuances gives depth to the singing, and makes the person sound like they are there with you. In fact, some of my songs do not sound as nice when I hear these nuances go against the singer's songs. Susan Boyle sounds a little bit more chopped as I feel her voice sways a bit in tonal strength during a song.

For Deadmau5, these speakers made me realize his recordings are very clean with each sound being quite smooth and distortion free. In comparison, I found Andy Hunter's music a bit more raspy and fatiguing. The speakers seem to make problems in the actual recording more evident. Yet when the recording is clean, the sound from these speakers is amazingly comfortable.

Another place I found the speakers to be clean was when I watched movies such as Star Trek. With the sub and the speakers, the sound is way more dynamic and detailed now than with the Yamaha satellites. Yet the sound is so clean, I did not feel my ears getting tired the way I do when I am at a theater. In fact the best example of the sound being clean was that I could continually raise the volume of the movie without annoying my ears. The bass was punchy but not booming (mostly due to the HSU) and the treble was very clean.

Now when I turn off the HSU, I realize just how much these speakers need bass support to complete the sound. Without the sub, the sound is anemic. If it was soft classics or listening to Norah Jones, it doesn't matter. However, for most anything else, make sure you have a sub if you are going get these speakers.

For games, the sound quality is not too noticeable compared to my Yammies. For most of the gameplay you are like meh it sounds pretty nice. But every once in awhile when the music becomes dramatic, the speakers really make the music and sound come open and alive. In 3DMark03, the sound from these speakers did not strike me as hard as my other tiny speakers during the WWII battle but I think its because they were much more smooth. When the two aircrafts collide, the sound was kick in the chest amazing.

So in the end, the speakers are quite laid back and comfortable in sound in my opinion. They are detailed yet not fatiguing at all. I did notice that I had to set the Striker to "room" to reduce some of the bright sound of the tweeter and when I did that, the sound became very relaxing. If you like you speakers punchy that hits your senses, these may not be a good choice. However, if you like your speakers that give clean, natural sound that makes it possible to raise the volume without fatiguing your ears, these speakers do really well. For me these speakers are wonderful.

Again, all of the above is from the ears of an audiophyte and so please take with a grain of salt.

Well, that is about it. I am now going to enjoy these speakers and next study the crossover layout so that I learn more about building speakers. Thanks all.

One correction to the above. Even with the sub off, if I set the amp to 2.0 and put the equalization to Bass heavy, then the speakers actually give ok bass. Again, they will nowhere mimic a sub, but for bookshelves they sound pretty good with no distortion in bass. I also notice that the bass extension has become better than the last time I turned off the bass several days back. I am hoping the woofers are still breaking in and that they will eventually extend in the bass quite well without tweaking the equalization.

Still the sub really puts the depth into the music.

i've been wanting to try this out for a long time, awesome job.

They look great! Can you do me a favor? With the sub off, instead of sitting next to them...move back 5-6 feet. Is the bass much better? Just want to know if it's my room because i couldn't get any bass out of the Sierra1 sitting close like that. Thanks

To be honest I am not sure. I am not sure if its just distance or some off-axis effect. In any case during the short test I tried this (since you mentioned it previously), I tried it. If I heard a difference it is subtle enough to make me wonder if its my imagination.

Well I have been enjoying the new speakers and mostly browsing around the internet. Today just out of fun, I put in the CD This is War by 30 Sec to Mars and Holy Cr*p! The sound was amazing. The beginning opening was so haunting it just made my hair stand on end. I didn't realize that 30 Seconds to Mars did such a good recording. It really does make one appreciate CDs vs compressed music.

Still want to sit down and look at the crossover design but never seem to have the time.

Zenshi said:

So opened the Deadmau5 CD. Its pretty good except I was disappointed that the Ghosts and Stuff track included vocals. Not that the song is bad but I love the instrumental version of this and so that was unfortunate.

Click to expand...

Screw that album, thought you had the latest one (4x4=12) get it, it's soooo good, a total return to form created with skill and recorded brilliantly too.

I've used those same drivers in cars (before the debucked 4 ohmers were released). They're VERY good, especially for the money. Mate them with the RS12HF for some real fun.

Thank you for taking the time to write down everything...I've tried to in the past but excitement usually gets the better of me and I just steam ahead with whatever I'm putting together.

I always recommend Parts Express to people who aren't afraid to roll up their sleeves and want to save some money.

Their speaker kits look like a great value. I have thoroughly enjoyed the sub kit I bought from them a few years ago (15" Titanic, 1000W plate amp, sealed enclosure). I would recommend it to you but it looks like it would be complete overkill for your room.

@Rossi Yeah I think I will look into other Deadmau5 albums as well. I don't mind the Ghost n Stuff version with the vocals but the instrument version is just sooo much better.

@Kil4Thril: I am more and more impressed with these drivers as I keep listening to them and they continue to break in. The mids on these speakers are just amazing. The highs are detailed but there is just something so smooth about the mids. Both the RS28A and the RS150s are wonderful drivers. They really do bring out clean sound. I am now wondering how the RS28F silk domes sound compared to the RS28A aluminum ones in my speaker. BTW that RS12HF sub sounds pretty nice. I am happy with my lil Hsu at this time.

@Khemist: LOL. I can imagine putting a 15" Titanic on my tiny rig. Reminds me of the beginning of Back to the Future when Michael J Fox stand in front of that giant speaker, strums the guitar and goes flying against the wall.