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I have a few questions regarding the topic. As I am a noob in this area I am very aware of the fact that it is hard to get into this stuff. Some sort of beginners guide would be helpful. The more people we can get on to this technology, the faster and easier we will be able to make progression I think.
I have a small background in speaker design. I have built a couple of speakers in the past, but never got to make something of outstanding quality because high quality paper cone drivers are very very pricey. Also the amps and the crossover electronics are a nightmare for your bank account.
Since a few days I have bumped into this plasma audio stuff and from what I have heard this is absolutely amazing. This solves all the problems conventional speakers suffered from: massless diaphragm, very point-source, perfect polar dispersion, perfect frequency response, perfect transient response, no resonance at all, good efficiency, and so on...
I think it could very well be that this is the future. That's why I want to get into it asap.
TL;DR: basically I'm looking for people who have built these things before. And I'm looking for some opinions regarding what type of plasma, what type of system works best.. what is the most efficient... ?
Maybe we could gather as much as information as possible and make this some sort of guide for every one who is interested. (because now it seems that it is hard to find any reliable information on this topic)
Registered Member #2919
Joined: Fri Jun 11 2010, 06:30PM
Location: Cambridge, MA
Posts: 652
As much as plasma speakers sound like the speaker from happy land, in reality the engineering and safety issues presented by one (ozone production, fire hazards, etc) means you do *not* want to use a plasma speaker as an everyday speaker.
Registered Member #3781
Joined: Sat Mar 26 2011, 02:25AM
Location:
Posts: 701
Bwang is right. Also, it is quite expensive to make your own plasma speaker that is loud but also sounds good. Professionally made plasma tweeters cost between $1,000 and $2,500. And while a homemade one can be built for ~$20 depending on what components you use, it won't be that great
Registered Member #3766
Joined: Sun Mar 20 2011, 05:39AM
Location:
Posts: 624
IMHO, plasma speakers are quite awesome, but they are quite quiet, and making them loud makes them more dangerous.
Also, there are plenty of schematics out there, it's not that hard to get into, and if someone can't read the schematic they probably shouldn't build one.
Registered Member #3429
Joined: Sun Nov 21 2010, 02:04AM
Location: Minnesota, USA
Posts: 288
2many -- Your comments about how wonderful plasma speakers are, may be a little mis-guided. Commercially produced plasma speakers have been around since the 1950's, but you don't see them in every household, and there's a reason (actually many reasons) for that. Besides the problems already mentioned, they also have limited frequency response. Sure, they are great at reproducing audio in the upper frequency range, but they do not work very well at all below a few KHz.
Plasma speakers (also known as "plasma tweeters", "ion speakers", "singing arc speakers", and a few other names) fullfill the desires of two groups. One is the upper class, who can afford to buy and maintain commercially purchased ones. And electronic hobbyists, who build their own out of "junk box" parts. Some of DIY plasma speakers sound fairly decent, but MOST of them sound like CRAP (listen to the zillions of YouTube videos demonstrating homemade designs and you'll see what I mean!).
So, there ya go. It's a fun project to build and experiment with, but don't expect too much from it. If you do, then you will be terribly disappointed.
Registered Member #3888
Joined: Sun May 15 2011, 09:50PM
Location: Erie, PA
Posts: 649
then i guess we need to think up a better design then huh? has anyone tried the "grid of pointy things" mass corona generator idea to produce lower frequencies? or would that take way too much power?
As much as plasma speakers sound like the speaker from happy land, in reality the engineering and safety issues presented by one (ozone production, fire hazards, etc) means you do *not* want to use a plasma speaker as an everyday speaker.
my idea was to make a HHO arc. Or is that even more dangerous?
Camp Badger wrote ...
Bwang is right. Also, it is quite expensive to make your own plasma speaker that is loud but also sounds good. Professionally made plasma tweeters cost between $1,000 and $2,500. And while a homemade one can be built for ~$20 depending on what components you use, it won't be that great
Those professionally made ones are that expensive because they aren't produced on a mass scale. Also high fi speaker designers need to make a living out of selling maybe 5 or 10 speakers a year... so yeah.
If you design a home made one with a lot of research and experimenting put in to it, with quality material I don't think you'll need to go over 1000 dollars.. I could be wrong though
magnet18 wrote ...
IMHO, plasma speakers are quite awesome, but they are quite quiet, and making them loud makes them more dangerous.
Also, there are plenty of schematics out there, it's not that hard to get into, and if someone can't read the schematic they probably shouldn't build one.
Yeah well, that's what my experience was on youtube from all those diy. they tend to sound fantastic in the upper range but they drop off at 3k or something...
I can read schematics.. but not yet all of it. I'll have some more reading to do.
Xray wrote ...
2many -- Your comments about how wonderful plasma speakers are, may be a little mis-guided. Commercially produced plasma speakers have been around since the 1950's, but you don't see them in every household, and there's a reason (actually many reasons) for that. Besides the problems already mentioned, they also have limited frequency response. Sure, they are great at reproducing audio in the upper frequency range, but they do not work very well at all below a few KHz.
Plasma speakers (also known as "plasma tweeters", "ion speakers", "singing arc speakers", and a few other names) fullfill the desires of two groups. One is the upper class, who can afford to buy and maintain commercially purchased ones. And electronic hobbyists, who build their own out of "junk box" parts. Some of DIY plasma speakers sound fairly decent, but MOST of them sound like CRAP (listen to the zillions of YouTube videos demonstrating homemade designs and you'll see what I mean!).
So, there ya go. It's a fun project to build and experiment with, but don't expect too much from it. If you do, then you will be terribly disappointed.
Well yeah I know it is a hassle compared to paper cone speakers but I have an issue in my current speaker design and that is to get the high frequencies omni directional.
The idea is to build an omnidirectional speaker with a perfectly balanced polars dispersion over the whole frequency band. The reason is that this gives a natural sound in bad rooms. I can go on and on about it but that's the basics.
I already read that making a plasma that reproduces bass was very hard and very dangerous so I wasn't really thinking about that. (have no real interest in blowing myself to bits)
I would just want to make one that plays from 20khz to 5khz.. maybe 3khz if it's possible. It should also reach a certain dB level. Something like at least 100 dB @ 1meter..
I have built speakers so I am pretty familiar working with electronics..
Just wondering about the opinions here to make one running on HHO.. And also what are the different techniques to do it? One is calling Frequency modulation (basically the same as with normal amplifiers but only here there are much higher frequencies modulated right?) But are there also other ways to do it? What are the best components to use in terms of efficiency and sound quality?
Registered Member #3766
Joined: Sun Mar 20 2011, 05:39AM
Location:
Posts: 624
2many wrote ...
bwang wrote ...
As much as plasma speakers sound like the speaker from happy land, in reality the engineering and safety issues presented by one (ozone production, fire hazards, etc) means you do *not* want to use a plasma speaker as an everyday speaker.
my idea was to make a HHO arc. Or is that even more dangerous?
Registered Member #3781
Joined: Sat Mar 26 2011, 02:25AM
Location:
Posts: 701
Forty wrote ...
then i guess we need to think up a better design then huh? has anyone tried the "grid of pointy things" mass corona generator idea to produce lower frequencies? or would that take way too much power?
That's on my to do list for next year!
As for making a really good plasma speaker for under $1,000: Yes it's most certainly possible, however the time spent researching everything and all the equipment you may or may not need will probably not be worth it. Besides, there is actually not that much research out there anyway, even on google. The most common things you will find online are full schematics without any description on how they work.
There are a lot of youtube videos that sound great but the thing they don't tell you is that they are volume limited and some only work with certain audio sources. For example: when I built a plasma speaker based off the 555 timer it would only work well with my blackberry. If I plugged it into my stereo I would get a lot of distortion even at very low volume.
EDIT: As long as you are not trying to sell them, don't worry about ozone unless you're in a really small room or have a corona wind speaker. My air purifier makes more ozone then any of the plasma speakers I have made.
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Plasma Audio Thread
