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Reverse-engineering my speakers' API to get reasonable volume control

(jamesbvaughan.com)
287 points jamesbvaughan | 2 comments | 25 Jul 24 15:11 UTC | HN request time: 0.495s | source
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radicality ◴[27 Jul 24 03:18 UTC] No.41084224[source]▶
Seems like the author moved from a “speakers + networked amp” setup, to a one where with active speakers where everything is built-in.

When I was buying speakers for my apartment some time ago, I was similarly considering going for the all-in-one options like this, but I’m glad I didn’t. I prefer the “dumb passive speaker + networked amp”, as it allows you to pick / replace / upgrade the separate components. Went for the KEF LS50, and for the amp Lyngdorf TDAI-1120. And that’s despite KEF having the all-in-one active version of those speakers. Very happy with my choices!

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1. iamacyborg ◴[27 Jul 24 08:32 UTC] No.41085244[source]▶
I have the “wireless” powered kef ls50 and the regular ones.

The wireless model has significantly better bass response and sounds much better to my ear.

I actually had a fault with them recently and they stopped working, I’d bought the speakers used on ebay and even had I had a warranty they were past 5 years old by the point the fault developed. Regardless, kef repaired them entirely for free. 10/10 would buy again.

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2. dsr_ ◴[27 Jul 24 14:15 UTC] No.41086744[source]▶
KEF builds an equalizer into the radio->DAC->crossover->amplifiers chain, and the default for that is much of what you are hearing.

The other part is that they hugely overbuild the amplifier sections (at least by rating -- 280W for the mid-woofer and 100W for the tweeter.