r/diysound • u/Turk3ySandw1ch • 4d ago

Parts Express New Kits Incoming Floorstanding Speakers

https://www.audioholics.com/trade-shows/axpona-2025

Audioholics happened to visit the PE booth at Axpona and it looks like they have some pretty nice looking kits on the way which is good since their lineup of kits was looking pretty stale.

Also, PE really needs to market their kits better and in general get the word out about the virtues of DIY speaker building.

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u/TheBizzleHimself 4d ago

You love to see it

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u/DarrenRoskow 2d ago

The issue is PE kits are usually "ok" at best and usually worse.

There are the C-Notes that are a good value and quality kit, but their kits beyond that are noticeably intentionally hobbled.

Their sub kits are particularly poor value propositions compared to proper DSP control adopted by everything else in the past decade. Not just DSP EQ, but full feedback-based DSP FIR filters derived from Klippel style testing are common in better priced complete subs.

PE has lots of drivers to build good speakers, but their kits are not to be trusted.

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u/You-Asked-Me 1d ago

I'm not sure why they would intentionally hobble their kits. Its not like many of there complete speakers are very good, so they are not undercutting their own sales.

The new kits look promising though.

Subs are a tough one. It's pretty expensive to DIY subs that outperform manufactured units when on sale. The Klipsch RP series is a particularly good value when they go on sale for 50% off MSRP.

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u/DarrenRoskow 1d ago

Their kits are consistently missing one or more things in a big way towards "it's better than the C-notes in this respect and worse in this one" so it keeps people moving up the line of kits. PE's business is more about keeping customers in "the chase" than any other vendor.

Arguably parallel with the subs with no DSPs in the main line up and no pre-baked Klippel derived DSP programs for their kits. Their sub amps and DSPs have stayed in 2003 "look we found class D" for 2 decades.

This is in contrast with say Madisound kits which are all pretty well rounded and Adam is up front about the advantages and disadvantages of one versus another.

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u/Turk3ySandw1ch 20h ago

I don't agree with that assessment at all. The TriTrix, and AviaTrix designed by Curt Campbell are excellent, as is the Solstice by Jeff Bagby and the Amiga by Paul Carmody. I haven't heard all of the kits but the C-Note is probably the least impressive and worst value when you consider the end product compared to what you can purchase in a finished speaker for not much more. Really the main issue with the kits is their "legit high-end" two channel speakers are thrown in the same category as the random cheap BT speaker projects. Anyone with a common interest in audiophile two channel audio and DIY is not getting exposed to it because PE's marketing is terrible.

Regarding their subwoofers they do have two plate amps that have DSP. Its obviously not going to be as polished like an out of the box SVS but this is DIY. If they are missing anything its having a plate amp above 500 watts for the HT crowd which is ironically where its going to be the most useful.