Daniel Marx
Floriana Grundy
It's been over two years now since I've updated this web site, but certainly not as long since I've been playing around in the world of audio and speakers. At this point I will probably no longer be updating this web site as I've moved all of my projects over to my Wordpress Blog. I'll leave this site up as an archive to some of my older projects but will no longer be updating it with any new content. To stay up to date with speaker projects I'm working on, please visit The Blog for Whoever over at While not necessarily dedicated to speaker projects only, the majority of what I write about is audio related for the most part, with the occasional computer project, home DIY project, or RC car/plane project thrown in for good measure. So thanks for stopping by, and don't forget to check out for all future DIY speaker endevours. Thanks again! - Dan
Latest project - 15" Ultimax UM15-22 subwoofer! I just finished this new addition to the family room theater a couple weeks ago. We've got some bumping bass once again! The project was super fun to work on and only took me about a week to complete. Now I remember why I enjoy building subs so much, they are way easier than building full-range speakers. Not having to deal with designing and testing the crossover and buying a bunch of extra parts. It's just a driver and a box. I did complicate things a little bit by adding a miniDSP, but that really just makes things more fun. The sub is powered by a Crown XLS 1002 amplifier with a sleep relay to enable it to be powered on and off with the rest of the setup. It's a great-looking sub and adds plenty of bump to our little theater.Check out the whole write-up over at www.danmarx.org/blog August 28, 2019So it's been two years since my last speaker project, which in reality seems like too long, but alas, I present you with my latest and greatest speaker project! TheDayton HiVi RTS181.3 Two-way Bookshelf Speaker. This isn't actually a new build, but a makeover of my old Monitor W690X speakers. They consist of a Dayton Audio RS180-8 7" woofer and HiVi Research RT1.3WE Planar Ribbon tweeter. I designed a custom external 24 db/octave crossover which features full baffle step compensation and special notch filters on the woofer and tweeter to help improve the frequency response and lower the cone break-up modes of the woofer. It was a fun project and kept me busy for several months. Plus I really got to dive into crossover design and measurement techniques. Click the link here to head on over to my blog to read all about them!
The speaker project is complete! Yesterday I installed the last driver into the all-new DM-4 Reference Speaker system and set them up in my house and they look awesome! Definitely my greatest speaker-building masterpiece yet. I haven't got the crossovers or any of the stereo gear hooked up, so I haven't listened to them yet, but they at least look the part for now. I'm working on packaging up both the MiniDSPs into an old VCR enclosure that I gutted. I still need to purchase a bunch of RCA cables to hook up all 6 channels and I'm looking at picking up a pre-amp as well. Until then if you want to read about the DM-4 speaker build from beginning to end, here's the link to each of the blog entries for a complete (and long) write-up of the entire process.
Check it out, there's almost a thousand pictures of entire build process plus I did my best to do some decent write-ups describing the build process for each step. It's by no means a speaker building tutorial, but there's definitely a lot of good (hopefully good) information amongst those pages. So feel free to check out the links above and feel free to leave a comment in the comments section of my blog if you like the project!
The DM-4 Active Reference Loudspeaker project is alive and in full force! The details can be found over on my Blog for Whoever located at www.danmarx.org/blog. Stop by and check it out to see how it's coming along. Lots of pictures and long-winded write-ups. Plus cool videos with music! Click the link above to check it out.
So the last time I updated this site was 6 years ago. Wow. I am the worst. Ever. Life has been busy for me these last 6 years so I honestly can't blame myself entirely for not posting as much as I should. But I've vowed once again to try and be better, to update this site, to correct stuff that's wrong and to try and make this site more useful. The last project I worked on was pretty awesome actually, I got to work with my little brother on his Home Theater and we built enclosures for (4) 15" TC Sounds LMS-R drivers and powered them with (4) Crown XLS-2500 series amps. You can check out the entire project over at my blog here. It was overall an amazing time, hanging with my bro, building speakers, just like we did when we were teenagers. So check it out, it's a quick read with lots of pics. I can highly recommend that sub/amp combo. It's a match made in heaven.
The Airport Expresses are 1st gen wirelessG only (but hardwired to my LAN) and run for about $20. The Lepai amps are $20 all day long from Amazon. And for speakers, the sky is the limit, but I usually opt for something cheap at around $50. I mean they are speakers mounted into drywall, how good can they really sound? So there you have it, less than $100 per zone for a fully-functional whole-house audio setup that already integrates seemlessy with iTunes, iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch devices. I'll post pictures of the setup once I get around to it, but it doesn't look nearly as cool as how well it actually works.
The other project I have in the works is a new full-range floorstanding set of high-end, hi-fi speakers utilizing the brand new Paper Cone series of Dayton Audio Reference woofers from Parts Express. You can check out the details of the beginnings of this project here. Like it or hate it, this is going to keep me occupied for the next several months (or years). But I'm not it a huge rush to get them done, I'm hoping it can be something I can work on at nights in the garage after the kids go to bed and just enjoy building and working on. I know me though, I get so eager to finish stuff that I rush through it and make mistakes and get mad and throw stuff and get hurt and I'd rather this just be a stress-free fun project to work on with no time contrainsts to speak of. So check it out! And that's it for me. May 24th 2008 - My Home Theater is Finally Complete After 3-1/2 years in the new house, I finally finished all the projects which would make up my home theater. Okay, well it's more like a living room theater, but just the same. The only speaker I didn't rebuild is the center channel, for now. But every other speaker started from scratch and is brand new. Starting with the new two-way bookshelf speakers modeled after Parts Express's Encore speakers which utilize an RS-150 6" woofer and RS28A tweeter. These speakers sound so great and take up very little room. They offer big sound in a small package and I am very delighted with their performance. You can read more about them here.
I finally got around to installed a new pair of Dayton ES series 6-1/2" surround sound speakers. I haven't had surround sound for so long, I forgot what it sounded like. The first few movies I caught myself peaking out the back window wondering why it suddenly started raining. So for the most part, they add enough realism to movies to really bring in the action. You can read about the whole installation of these speakers on my blog.
I also finished building a new subwoofer using an Audiopulse EPIC 12" driver. The sub sits in a modest 95L box tuned to 22Hz but man oh man does it sound awesome. It was designed to be integrated into the new entertainment center that I recently built. It's hidden away and offers some great LFE for just about every movie. It can produce some great bass into the high teens and sounds amazing. I couldn't be more happy with it Click here to read all about it.
And last but not least is the entire entertainment center that houses all these new speakers. I thought building speakers was hard enough, building this beast really took its toll. But it was definitely worth it. You can read more about the entertainment center build here,
And that's about it. I'd say the first half of 2008 has been a productive one. Please click on the links to some of the projects I've been working on and as always, feel free to email me with any comments or questions! Thanks. -DM
Here's my first sub project for '08! It's TC-3000 sub mounted in a 100L sealed enclosure with a Parts Express HPSA1000 amplifier. Click on the picture below for more details. This sub rocks the house and looks good doing it.
July 19th, 2007 - Got Some New Measurement Equipment - Behringer ECM8000 and Xenyx MixerIn my quest to understand designing, building and testing loudspeakers better, I bought a Behringer ECM8000 Omnidirectional Measurement Microphone and a Xenyx 802 Mixer. They arrived today from Parts Express and I've been having some fun measuring my two-way monitor speakers in my living room. If it weren't for the huge thunderstorm that passed over tonight, I would have done these measurements outside. I've actually had more fun trying to mic my piano so I could get some decent recordings of me playing. The ECM8000 definitely sounds better than my old PC mic, and a lot better than my old EV voice mic. If my piano only sounded better and didn't squeak so much. Soon to come will be outside measurements on several more of my other speakers I've built in the past, as well as some FR plots of the Dayton RS1505 6" woofer and RS28A tweeter which will be going into a new 3-way speaker design that's in the works. Here's some pics!
The first plot of my Monitor W625X Speakers measured at 10" from baffle and 34" from floor w/1/3 smoothing on. July 8th, 2007 - The Completion of the Dayton-Morel MTM Home Theater Speaker SystemWe just finished a set of MTM speakers for my friend's basement home theater. Click on the picture below for more details.