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Thread: Experiments with M2 horns.

  1. #61
    Senior Member grumpy's Avatar
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    Do you have the auto "last state save" feature turned on (or whatever it's called).
    Sometimes it saves your butt, sometimes it's a pain in the same place.

    If I get to it tonight, I'll see if I can replicate the issue/feature.

    (ah... you're using Audio Architect ... may be the same behavior as LA, will try).

  2. #62
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    Quote Originally Posted by Don C View Post
    Changing topic for a while, I was dissapointed to hear the BSS at first, not the audio output, but the noise that it's fans make. So I decided to look into disconnecting the fans, as others have apparently done. First, I looked inside. It seems that the brains of this BSS are an Altera Stratix 2 FPGA and two Analog Devices Sharc DSP chips.
    The FPGA is from a family introduced over ten years ago, a 70nm process platform. But I guess it's maker must still regard it as a good chip, it seems to still be in production, and is available at Mouser for $460.00 Ouch.
    The fans are four Sunon KDE0504pkv3s. I looked them up, and they are specced as some of the quietest 40mm fans available, at 18Dba each. So replacing them with something quieter probably wouldn't help. That's a lot of fans and It doesn't seem to me that the engineers would have put them there if they weren't needed.
    I wanted to see where the heat was coming from inside the unit, and used the low tech method of putting my finger on all of the chips and cans. There are air flow dividers inside, the the left two fans cool the left side only, and the right side air is directed to the power supply and main board. The whole left side, where the input and output cards live, seems to be nice and cool. It doesn't make sense to me that those cards have two fans cooling them. So I disconnected those two fans right off the bat, and that works great, half the noise. My theory is that if you had ordered the unit with digital cards over there, you would probably still need those fans.
    On the right side of the unit, the DSP chips were very warm to the touch, and the FPGA was hot, so hot that I couldn't leave my finger on top. Ouch again.
    I decided not to just disable those two fans on that side. For some reason, these chips don't have heat sinks. Reverting to my old overclocking habits I decided to add some to those three chips. I cut an older Foxconn P3 CPU heatsink into four parts, with the bandsaw. Then I glued them in place on the FPGA and DSP chips. I used Arctic Alumina heat sink epoxy adhesive. It conducts heat well. And those heatsinks are there to stay.
    I then disconnected one of the remaining two fans on the right side of the box.
    There is a lot less noise with this single fan setup, it's hardly noticeable if you walk away from the rack. Now it's about the same noise level as the satellite DVR that lives in the same rack. I'm looking at adding a foam filter to the remaining fan to further silence it. And now you guys may be wondering if I'm OCD or something, and why can't I just leave anything alone. Well it was bugging me, and now it's not, so to me it was worth the time.

    PS, For any fellow OCDs, to open the box you should have a Pozidrive PZ2 screwdriver available, and a 5/32 allen wrench.
    (@#$% Pozidrive!)

    Attachment 66186
    HAve you looked at the temperature difference after doing this modification? When you connect to the BLU, you can read the temperature. I have thought about doing the exact same thing on mine as you have done, but I would be so angry with myself if I ruined it :/ So now my equipment is in another room as the speakers.

  3. #63
    Senior Member Don C's Avatar
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    Hi Jonas
    Please describe the method for showing temperature. The help file doesn't show how.

  4. #64
    Senior Member Don C's Avatar
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    It might be early to reach this conclusion, but the temperature monitoring seems to be one more feature that works in London Architect, but not in Audio Architect.

  5. #65
    Senior Member srm51555's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by grumpy View Post
    Horns are due next week
    I was told more horns are due at the speaker exchange today and Monday, so we are all getting closer.

    Also a really big thanks to DonC for his write up on getting a used BSS Blu to connect to the network. I just want to add pushing the locate button after performing the steps mentioned by him and Grumpy made mine appear in the network area of LA. Not sure if it really did anything but after pushing it my BLU100 appeared, so I thought I'd mention it.

    Two questions I have are can you look on the BSS unit from LA to verify what is on there and when loading the M2 file as it is will that blow away all other settings. I didn't wipe it clean before I loaded the file because I assumed it didn't need it.
    Last edited by srm51555; 08-07-2015 at 07:42 AM. Reason: Typo

  6. #66
    Senior Member Don C's Avatar
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    Audio Architect gives you the option to save your Venue file into the BSS unit, and to download it from there also, it's on the file menu. And it asks you if you want to save your file to the unit when you go online. You have to open a file that matches your unit to go online. You can apparently only save one file at a time into a unit, but can have multiple equalizer and crossover presets saved into one file. But the file that is saved into the unit with this method is not necessarily the same file that's running in the unit. You can make changes to the unit on the fly when you are online, and the changes are applied immediately, and are persistent. You can hear this working if you listen and make changes at the same time. But the changes won’t be in the file unless you save them to your disc after making the change, and the changes won't be in the file uploaded to the unit either unless you upload it separately again.
    My unit didn't have a file saved into it that could be downloaded. It may be that it was only worked on previously with London Architect, or just that no one ever saved a file to it. I'm not sure how these functions work In London architect, as I'm not using it. The two programs don't seem to be compatible, so you may be better off picking one and sticking with it. For better or worse I'm married to Audio Architect for now, as my file was created in it, and apparently as a result the unit won't go online with London Architect.
    I have a long way to go in learning this software myself, and it's probably not wise for me to be instructing anyone at this point, but I'll tell as much as I can.

  7. #67
    Senior Member srm51555's Avatar
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    Thanks for the reply. I performed the upload using the little green arrow button down by the Network section. is this not the same thing as using "File" then "Save to Device Network"

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    Quote Originally Posted by Don C View Post
    You can make changes to the unit on the fly when you are online, and the changes are applied immediately, and are persistent. You can hear this working if you listen and make changes at the same time. But the changes won’t be in the file unless you save them to your disc after making the change, and the changes won't be in the file uploaded to the unit either unless you upload it separately again.
    I really wish the manual had something more than just pointing to what a RS232 and Ethernet port looks like, because I have no clue on performing the above in LA and have had no luck searching the BSS forums. Is there a place where one can learn more on the real life application side of things? This may just a thing of practice with LA also. Thanks, Scott

  8. #68
    Senior Member grumpy's Avatar
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    The BSS site has a good introductory training video set for LA. Answered a few questions I had been pondering. I haven't looked for similar AA training, but I expect much of the LA stuff would carry over.

  9. #69
    Administrator Mr. Widget's Avatar
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    Here's a basic question... why use one over the other? AA v LA?


    Widget

  10. #70
    Senior Member Don C's Avatar
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    AA seems to be newer and looks like they are actively updating it. It's a little bit prettier and for me, more intuitive to navigate around in. On the negative side, there are no videos yet. AA was the first program that actually worked for me. I could never seem to get London architect to go online, even with the JBL Blu80 file. To be fair, I could have solved it but I stopped trying once I got AA working.
    I did find the temperature display in AA. You have to left click on the BLU160 in Room view to highlight it, then right click to find the Default control panel on the menu. I could never find that before because I was going straight to the right click without highlighting first, and that doesn't work. It's tricky.
    My internal temperature shows as 53.5 C right now. Seems pretty high. It's sitting right on top of a hot Lexicon NT225 (Really a Bryston 4B-ST) though.

    Information From Harman

  11. #71
    Senior Member Don C's Avatar
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    AA seems to be newer and looks like they are actively updating it. It's a little bit prettier and for me, more intuitive to navigate around in. It was the first program that actually worked for me. I could never seem to get London architect to go online, even with the JBL Blu80 file. To be fair, I could have solved it but I stopped trying once I got AA working.
    I did find the temperature display in AA. You have to left click on the BLU160 in Room view to highlight it, then right click to find the Default control panel on the menu. I could never find that before because I was going straight to the right click without highlighting first, and that doesn't work. It's tricky.
    My internal temperature shows as 53.5 C right now. Seems pretty high. It's sitting right on top of a hot Lexicon NT225 (Really a Bryston 4B-ST) though.

    Information From Harman

    Edit: One minute I say there are no videos, the next minute, I find some.

  12. #72
    Senior Member grumpy's Avatar
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    I think Don's right. I was lazy the other way, having already spent significant time with LA
    and bringing the system right up. Functionally, for me, there's little difference. I'll probably set up everything in AA once my connectors and output card arrive and I want to start saving my "experiments"

    (running at 35°C steady state, cpu and memory well below 50% with M2 LCR config)

  13. #73
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    Interesting that all but one were added a mere 22 hours ago.

  14. #74
    Senior Member grumpy's Avatar
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    OK... couldn't wait as the horns and Klippon-style connectors arrived and had to do -something-
    (so this is a little off topic, but related).

    Setup LA with factory M2 LCR config but with BLU160 and Digital out
    (as those were the cards I was initially dealt ... so to speak). I also have one
    Analog in and one Digital in, so -later- there may be some interesting comparisons.

    AES/EBU output to MOTU Traveler (used as a 2-ch DAC) and monitored the output via ...
    headphones (just a test for throughput and level check). Very clear but obviously
    a bit wonky with HF on the left and LF on the right ... a quick virtual rewire and config upload
    put HF L&R on the headphone monitored channels. Stereo at least. Obviously not tuned
    for headphone use so any critical judgement would be pointless, but noticed nothing I
    could attribute to the ADDA process or gain problems . So now, time and a box...

    Been thinking about the C34 form factor (chamferred rear corners and angled grill,
    but no rear horn loading and much less inset. This thought may pass.

    Don, any thoughts beyond a rectangular box?

  15. #75
    Senior Member Don C's Avatar
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    Look for cards on amazon.com if you decide to swap them.
    My idea was to make a more basic clone of the M2 shape, with Walnut veneer. OK just a rectangular box. But actually to make the height whatever the width of a sheet of MDF is. I thought it was always 48, but saw some later that was 49 inches. I wouldn't get as fancy with the baffle as the factory did, just make it flat fronted. It would end up looking like a bigger L200t3. I like the idea of making a two color grille too. Getting fancy with the grille can make up for a plain looking box. JBL had that same idea a long time ago.
    I dropped off drawings with a cabinet shop, he said he's real busy, but he'd look at the work and get back. That was two months ago. I liked the looks of the shop though, stacks and stacks of thick sheets of MDF were everywhere I looked, and they had automated machines that looked very accurate. Everybody did look busy there. So I'm still hoping and will bug him again.
    For home use or for people who don't listen over the top of a mixing console, something shorter would probably be better, and I may redraw mine. Maybe lower but deeper, maybe even with a slanted baffle.

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