The Speedster

I built a set of these about 5 years ago, and they've been fantastic in near and medium fields. Much more extension than anything I've heard their size, and more than many larger. I keep coming back to them after bouts of Gear Acquisition Syndrome, once from a pair of speakers 4 times their price. Just so much vitality and such a great signature. A little bass boost and good extension with a great timbre that never gets dry. The only thing that I find less than great is the dispersion pattern. They have a somewhat narrow sweet spot laterally, and a very narrow one vertically.

I will start this off saying that these speakers absolutely blew me away right out of the gate, between the imaging and overall sound quality they are going to be my go-to speakers for the foreseeable future. These were my second DIY speaker build ever, and the first was a design from the parts express forum several years ago, which while sounded great, my woodworking skills, or lack thereof, left a lot to be desired, so I hesitated to jump back into the DIY speaker scene.

However, all that aside, thanks to the fantastic flat pack and a forgiving finish, they came out better than I ever expected, and WOW. Did I mention these things sound great? I might not have the best ears, but I honestly have yet to find anything about these speakers that I don't like, the bass is astounding for a speaker this size. Sure, you're not going to get near-infrasonic bass out of them, but except for on electronic music with extra low bass, you don't really need it. And the imaging, oh goodness the imaging, put on Madonna - Vogue or anything by Yosi Horikawa and close your eyes, and you'll swear there's speakers behind you, it is unreal.

Despite being nigh useless at woodworking, I still managed to get them together and finished over a long weekend, and have been listening to them every spare moment I have since. I have them set up on some cheap foam monitor wedges and powered by a small topping desktop amp, whereas my previous setup was a pair of Infinity IL40 towers driven by a pair of 80s H/K mono amps along with an admittedly overkill SVS sub, and honestly I don't see myself going back any time soon.

I seriously cannot praise these speakers and the kit enough, even the packing was top notch. Many thanks to Erich for making DIY attainable for people without the woodworking tools or skills like myself.

My grandma wanted "a Bose system" so she could listen to music. I figured I'd surprise her for Christmas and dip my toes into the DIY world at the same time. The box went together easily because the boxes were perfectly cut. The drivers were much more stout than I expected. I had a couple weeks before Christmas to play with the speakers and break them in. I was immediately impressed with the crispness of the sound compared to my KEF Q100's. The bass held their own too which was surprising for how small the drivers and enclosures are. I'm sad I had to give them away after a few listening sessions. My grandma thoroughly enjoyed the speakers also. This was an excellent kit for a first-timer.

I'm going to review the kit provided rather than the sound signature since its been done before in many places. This kit is packed with 500,000 packing peanuts. Seriously if anything arrives damaged the shipping company probably threw it off of the hoover dam. Even crossover components come individually wrapped as well. I had ordered the kit with the flat pack and the whole thing fit together perfectly, and were really smooth so I had no sanding to do before priming. There were no nicks or warping to be found anywhere. They recessed part that the tweeter goes in is perfect, certainly great for a first timer like me. The ball is in your field to make a really awesome product.

I built these as an upgrade to my Overnight Sensations as desktop speakers. The ribbon tweeter is a nice upgrade, but you'll still want a subwoofer with these. I found them to be very, very harsh when I first fired them up. They were almost to the point of being painful, even at moderate volume. I thought I'd made a mistake as I built the cabinets from scratch and shelled out some coin for a table saw as an entry into DIY speakers. The tweeters eventually settled down and now sound very nice. Are they 3x better than the OS? No, they're not. Maybe that speaks more to how much above its weight class the OS can punch than the Speedster's ability to pull away.

These were my first DIY speakers and to I loved every part of the build. Very easy to build with the flat packs. Every time I listen to these I can't believe how big they sound. I can hear every detail in any song I hear and absolutely love it.

There are replacing some Overnight Sensations for my office PC. In both cases I used some Yoga Blocks to raise the speakers up away from the desk surface according to Paul Carmody's advice:

"The speaker would work on a desk, although I might advise raising it a bit off the surface of the desk to keep bass response in-check."

Raised 8" off the desk surface, these do nicely in this configuration. A fun project with great results for an affordable price. Another winner from DIY Soundgroup and Paul C.

First, I'd like to say DIY Sound Group did an excellent job with the kit. The cabinets were made exceptionally well, and everything was packaged like they were shipping a Faberge egg. They even threw in a couple extra screws for people like me that always seem to lose them.

The speakers themselves are outstanding for what they do. If you want something that fills up a small-to-medium room, gives a great listening experience from a couch or chair, and has enough bass to pack a punch without the neighbors knocking on your door, these are perfect. Near-field, they are a lot less exciting, and there are better choices if you're going to be throwing house parties. But what they do offer, they do extremely well.

(Posted on 11/26/17 from the old site)

Well I finally found out what everyone is talking about when they say Erich and his packing unbelievable. Word of advice open the box from the bottom.
Now onto the build, got Matt to do up the cross overs, so clean and professional well worth the little extra to get Matt to do them up. The boxes went together perfectly, did a quick audio test before I painted the put the last screw in just make sure everything was working. If you don’t have binding post just get them from Erich I went cheap and they were to short but made it work but a pain. As per Matt’s recommendation I filled the cavity with poly fill from Walmart but left enough space behind the woofer and the port to allow air flow out the port.
Now onto performance, all I can say is WOW, these little guys put out some serious volume and I only have a small 15w amp hooked up to my computer. The ribbon tweeter is so clear and crisp and that little woofer puts out some serious bass , no real need for a sub unless you are a bass junkie. For music they fill up my whole main floor (1200sqft) and for movies they are incredible, just watched some trailers on the computer and you get emersed into what is playing on the screen, the clarity of there voices, the explosions makes you want to go see the movie that much more. If you are thinking about buying don’t think anymore just buy them you will not be disappointed. I hope this review helped make up your mind.

(Posted on 10/4/16 from the old site)

The Speeders are my first experience with a ribbon tweeter and, well, I sort of want to throw the rest of my speakers away now.

If you've heard the Overnight Sensations, the Speedsters are similar but better in every way. Don't get me wrong; I think the OS (particularly the MTM version) are some of the best values in the world.

But the Speeders are what I'd call an actual hi-fi speaker. Detail from that magic ribbon tweeter is simply amazing. Bass is incredible: deep and very controlled, not just boomy. It's not deeper than the Overnight Sensations, but it's more detailed and fills the room somehow - I had legit "where's the subwoofer?" moments.

These get plenty loud for a small or mid-sized room with a 50wpc amp. At 75% gain on the amp they still sounded clear as day and as if they wanted some more.

If you're considering a compact 2.1 system, forget it - go with these in a simple 2.0 config. While these are obviously begging to be used in a 2.0 music setup the bass is definitely satisfying enough to be used in a bedroom/dorm/office for games and movies as well.

These are some of my favorite speakers. The bass produced by the tiny woofer has to be heard and felt to be believed. The fact that woofer that small can induce that actual "tactile" midbass feeling in your chest in a smaller room is just incredible. The ribbon tweeters are also a delight, delivering insanely detailed (but never harsh) treble.

The downsides? They're a bit impractical. Dispersion from the ribbon tweeters is quite narrow. If you're not sitting in the sweet spot, you're out of luck.

They also don't make good "nearfield" speakers. I initially intended to use them as computer speakers, flanking my monitor. But when sitting that close, the sound from the tweeter and woofer does not blend well.

So, realistically, the ideal setup for these dudes is placed atop stands in a small room, with the listener about 6-10" away. Despite that limitation I still love them though. They're like a little sports car that makes a lousy daily driver but is so much fun you'll never part with it.