Best 1" compression drivers & compact 1" horns 2024?

[SBA_SLOB_GUY]

Hi there,
i have made a lot of measurements with the NSD1095N with different horns

my findings are that above the ground resonance of the compression driver in the horn the horn makes the sound and in the treble range two or three octaves above the ground resonance the driver makes the sound but the horn directivity can make the difference listening with at least a stereo setup in a room

from the measurements the best behaviour was mounting the NSD1095N in a small wooden tractrix horn with only 5 inch mouth diameter

a first good idea how the driver will work with the horn is looking here

https://celestion-horn.netlify.app/

here an example with my cost no object elliptical wood horn

for cost is an object a nice combination could be

NSD1095N

https://www.eighteensound.it/en/products/hf-driver/1-0/8/NSD1095N

FAITAL LTH102

https://faitalpro.com/en/products/HF_Horns/product_details/index.php?id=903010110

hope it helps, Stefano

P.S.:

i have read the AudioXPress test, but i wonder where this is coming from

with my wooden horn i got this here

 

[SBA_SLOB_GUY]

here in addition the ZR graph for NSD1095n with 5 inch wood horn

 

[anio]

I'm looking at coupling it to the H100 horn. Does anyone have any comment on that combination? Anything to speak against it?

It will work, but do not expect too much. To get a good sound from a driver, you must couple it to a good horn, preferably a shallow one. Why? Every additional depth will colour the sound by raising its output in the low end and will then sound crappy and honky. Also the deeper the horn, the bigger difference in phase shift you get, resulting in the limited crossover options. Moreover a non-constant profile shape will affect directivity.

 

[Pano]

Shallow horn? I don’t like them, they lack reality to my ears.

Good discussion on drivers. 👍

 

[SBA_SLOB_GUY]

Hi @stoneeh ,
i can offer a little bit of insight with a measurement done with the combination NSD1095N + Visaton H21, similar to the RCF H100 but in my eyes with a better build quality

For reference the very expensive Visaton DR45N with the same Visaton HT21 horn

i hope the comparison is interesting, Stefano

P.S.:

I tried to compare the difference in listening experience NSD1095N / DR45N with the HT21 horn, much less than expected from the difference noteable in the SPL graphs - this may be related to my 60+ age with no sensitivity above 10 kHz

trying to couple the horn already at 1500 Hz the DR45N is the winner, NSD1095N do not like to be coupled too low under 1700 - 2000 Hz

 

[SBA_SLOB_GUY]

to be complete here the ZR graphs in order NSD1095N / HT21 - DR45N / HT 21

 

[IamJF]

I was on the search for exactly this some time ago - the best 1" driver for a smaller horn, going down to at least 2kHz and have no resonances up to 20kHz.
Es pecially the no resonances part was relatively hard to find, the reason I didn't test NSD1095N and similar cause they all show some kind of resonance inside the hearable range. (*)

So I ended with DE360 - ring radiator similar to BMS but with harder membrane and shiftet peak/resonance compared to BMS. For me these sound very good and not like a metal membrane tweeter - more like a HiFi ring radiator (who would have thought that ... it took me a while 🤓 )

For sure one of the best 1" horns is the Limmer 021. https://www.limmerhorns.de/021/
It's a better H100 with pretty good behaviour >10kHz. But of course it has not the size for a 1kHz crossover.

This combination is the best I could find.


(* With my HiFi tweeter trials I found that I prefer membrane resonances far outside the hearing range. Beryllium membranes just do that, about 35kHz for ScanSpeak and 50khz for Bliesma. This was the reason to search for a compression driver with the membrane resonance as far up as possible.)

 

[Arthur Jackson]

List of drivers so far:

18Sound NSD1095N on an XT120 horn
BMS 4552nd
B&C DH series drivers
Faital HF108 on the Eminence WG10
Celestion cdx1-1430
DN10.172M
RCF ND350
DN10.172K
RCF NDX495
RCF NDX595
Celestion CDX1-1745
BMS 4524
Celestion Cdx1-1720
Celestion CDX1-1731
Bliesma T34BE in waveguide

I might have missed one or two. Looks to me like Celestion cdx is winning but not one specific model. Interesting, no Pyle Drivers in the lot. 🤣

 

[IamJF]

List of drivers so far:

B&C DE360 ?

XT120 is for sure not under the best 1" horns? I would rate even an old H100 better?
DH series looks better as idea as on measurements (both are pretty bad >10kHz)


Maybe start from one step earlier? What are the REQUIREMENTS for our best 1" driver?

For me - no resonances in the audio frequency area.
Low THD at high and low levels, esp. higher order THD (cause some H2 is always present with these drivers)
Low crossover frequency would be great - that's the thing the DE360 falls a little short.

 

[superlian]

All those compression drivers are either soft diaphragms or alu/titan.

The most important drivers to have in such «best test» are TAD 2001/2002 and one of Radians beryllium drivers.

 

[marco_gea]

Here we go again.affordable?,best premuim?,what do you mean.define parameters.

Indeed. This question seems to come up every year.
The answer is still the same... the "best" is still probably: https://www.proaudiodesign.com/products/tad-td-2002
But of course that's not what the OP wants to hear.
Oh, well.
Then, there are many that are more than decent... but "best"? Not really.

 

[IamJF]

probably:

Are there any serious measurements of these drivers? That's a lot of money for checking them ...
Why doesn't TAD publish a serious datasheet? It's a pitty.

 

[Arthur Jackson]

Indeed. This question seems to come up every year.
The answer is still the same... the "best" is still probably: https://www.proaudiodesign.com/products/tad-td-2002
But of course that's not what the OP wants to hear.
Oh, well.
Then, there are many that are more than decent... but "best"? Not really.

At a whopping $3,000 I don’t think they meet the “but still somewhat affordable” criterion. However, I would love to build some econowaves with $6,000 in tweeters. 😃 Just how expensive of an econowave can one build? I’ll start a thread on that.

 

[Ro808]

I'd check this out:

 

[Arez]

Affordable, and best is not always comparative.
For a decent price:

B&C DE360.
Bms 5530ND.
Faital HF108.

 

[Dmitrij_S]

plenty of 1" horns measured here, mostly with Celestion CDX1-1731

https://www.mtg-designs.com/tips-tricks-tests/waveguide-shootout

Thanks. I can't imagine how I could have missed such a link

 

[IamJF]

I'd check this out:

Impendace indicates the membrane resonance <20kHz and frequency response is strongly smoothed.
Do you have more meaningful measurements you can share?

 

[Arez]

At a whopping $3,000 I don’t think they meet the “but still somewhat affordable” criterion

Depends what you compare them to, and budget🙃

Compared to other exclusive" Japanese brands like ALE, GOTO, Linear Technology, GT sound, etc. They are in the medium price range really. Excluding rarities as field coil modified drivers. So everything is relative.

 

[Ro808]

Impendace indicates the membrane resonance <20kHz and frequency response is strongly smoothed.
Do you have more meaningful measurements you can share?

Which marketing plots aren't (except those published by BMS perhaps)?

FR/Imp plots of drivers with softer polymeric diaphragms:

such as those used for the Faital HF108 and the RCF NDX series, will never be as clean/smooth as those of drivers with Be diaphragms.
As always, it's a matter of preference. I've yet to hear a system with Be drivers that I really like. Most of them lack coherence imo, due to woofers not keeping up with Be's superior features/properties. I'm not fond of high-tech cone materials either, like the carbon varieties that are available.

There's a reason why certain materials are still popular, even after 100 years of audio R&D.

 

[Michael C]

In addition to the best most affordable driver there are other variables which will affect sound. eg to what horn is it matted to, xover freq,xover slope, what bandwidth to cover.horns like every other peice of audio gear dont opperate in isolation.