Audio Science in the Service of Art
- Thread starter tonmeister2008
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If it measures good and sounds good, it's good; if it measures bad and sounds good, then you're measuring the wrong thing.
Trying to pin you down Sean is harder than trying to catch a greased pig at a county fair.
I spent the weekend at Steve Williams house listening to the Big Wilson's. It was quite amazing how they sounded different on every recording. In my mind that is a strong indicator of neutrality. I can't remember the you tube video. But Dave Wilson talked about designing a speaker to established measurements and putting it in a special room and then having it sound awful. He then takes it to anther room and "dials" it in.
I did have a a talk with Alon Wolf. My point is, just for example, if Alon can design the Q5 and assuming he used no audio alchemy, then he was doing it on existing scientific principles with existing scientific equipment. Let's just assume then for the sake of argument that the Q5 is SOTA. We ought to be able to build on that technology and not reinvent the wheel.
Let me state we don't generalize to the specific. You can't make a rule with some anecdotal exception. If you don't think Wilson is neutral, I can make a similar analogy with another speaker company.
I don't want to go down the the blind test road test again . I concede we need an objective evaluation of the results of our work.
Let's not twist and turn. Design a speaker with the parameters you say it must have(or pick an existing one). Then we will stick it an a room and deal with the problems of the room. You cannot have it both ways. You can't demand that a speaker be properly designed and then wiggle out by saying it does not matter anyway because the room will muck it up. These problems are being dealt with everyday by real world speaker designers.
Finally, don't call me anti science. I assume the best speakers were designed by science. I further assume that pushing the envelope will involve more science.
I spent the weekend at Steve Williams house listening to the Big Wilson's. It was quite amazing how they sounded different on every recording. In my mind that is a strong indicator of neutrality. I can't remember the you tube video. But Dave Wilson talked about designing a speaker to established measurements and putting it in a special room and then having it sound awful. He then takes it to anther room and "dials" it in.
I did have a a talk with Alon Wolf. My point is, just for example, if Alon can design the Q5 and assuming he used no audio alchemy, then he was doing it on existing scientific principles with existing scientific equipment. Let's just assume then for the sake of argument that the Q5 is SOTA. We ought to be able to build on that technology and not reinvent the wheel.
Let me state we don't generalize to the specific. You can't make a rule with some anecdotal exception. If you don't think Wilson is neutral, I can make a similar analogy with another speaker company.
I don't want to go down the the blind test road test again . I concede we need an objective evaluation of the results of our work.
Let's not twist and turn. Design a speaker with the parameters you say it must have(or pick an existing one). Then we will stick it an a room and deal with the problems of the room. You cannot have it both ways. You can't demand that a speaker be properly designed and then wiggle out by saying it does not matter anyway because the room will muck it up. These problems are being dealt with everyday by real world speaker designers.
Finally, don't call me anti science. I assume the best speakers were designed by science. I further assume that pushing the envelope will involve more science.
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Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
....
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Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
....
Just about every stupid thing I've done involved a pretty girl!
If you catch it you get a prize.
Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
....
Just about every stupid thing I've done involved a pretty girl!
Too funny!
Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
....
OK. I'll be serious now.
1. If Steve's speakers sound good on many recordings then that is great! That doesn't mean his speakers are necessarily accurate because we don't know for sure the source of the recordings (see circle-of-confusion problem). Comprehensive measurements of his speakers would confirm they are accurate.
2. Dave Wilson's experience you describe above confirms the problems with all listening rooms that I discussed. The loudspeaker and its interaction with the room acoustics is a big problem that needs solving. i agree with you that solutions are at hand, but are not well documented or validated in the scientific literature.
3. Where in my previous post did I say something that would lead you to say: "If you don't think Wilson is neutral". I never even discussed Wilson or the Q5. I think you have mistaken me for another poster.
4. Where in my previous post did I say "you are anti-science"?
5. "You cannot have it both ways. You can't demand that a speaker be properly designed and then wiggle out by saying it does not matter anyway because the room will muck it up"
You have misunderstood what I wrote. The optimal design targets of the loudspeaker DO MATTER and they are clearly defined and remain the same regardless of the room and its influence on the sound.Our loudspeaker design targets are defined and verified based on anechoic measurements that remove the influence of the room. We don't include the influence of the room in the design of the loudspeaker. Why? Because all rooms are different, and you cannot possibly predict the influence the room on the loudspeaker's performance until it's actually installed in the customer's room. I did say that a room will muck up the bass, but how does that constitute "wiggling"?
A well-designed loudspeaker will always sound better in more rooms than a poorly designed one (with or without room correction) because the direct and reflected sounds produced by the speaker will be more neutral as you move around the room. The problem with the room then becomes isolated to mostly low frequencies (< 200-400 Hz) where judicious loudspeaker/listener placement, multiple subwoofers, and room correction solutions can help.
Do you still think I'm "wiggling" and feel like you are chasing a greased pig? Or is that more clearly explained? I hope so because I won't sleep well tonight with the imagery of being a greased pig being chased by you
....
OK. I'll be serious now.
1. If Steve's speakers sound good on many recordings then that is great! That doesn't mean his speakers are necessarily accurate because we don't know for sure the source of the recordings (see circle-of-confusion problem). Comprehensive measurements of his speakers would confirm they are accurate.
2. Dave Wilson's experience you describe above confirms the problems with all listening rooms that I discussed. The loudspeaker and its interaction with the room acoustics is a big problem that needs solving. i agree with you that solutions are at hand, but are not well documented or validated in the scientific literature.
3. Where in my previous post did I say something that would lead you to say: "If you don't think Wilson is neutral". I never even discussed Wilson or the Q5. I think you have mistaken me for another poster.
4. Where in my previous post did I say "you are anti-science"?
5. "You cannot have it both ways. You can't demand that a speaker be properly designed and then wiggle out by saying it does not matter anyway because the room will muck it up"
You have misunderstood what I wrote. The optimal design targets of the loudspeaker DO MATTER and they are clearly defined and remain the same regardless of the room and its influence on the sound.Our loudspeaker design targets are defined and verified based on anechoic measurements that remove the influence of the room. We don't include the influence of the room in the design of the loudspeaker. Why? Because all rooms are different, and you cannot possibly predict the influence the room on the loudspeaker's performance until it's actually installed in the customer's room. I did say that a room will muck up the bass, but how does that constitute "wiggling"?
A well-designed loudspeaker will always sound better in more rooms than a poorly designed one (with or without room correction) because the direct and reflected sounds produced by the speaker will be more neutral as you move around the room. The problem with the room then becomes isolated to mostly low frequencies (< 200-400 Hz) where judicious loudspeaker/listener placement, multiple subwoofers, and room correction solutions can help.
Do you still think I'm "wiggling" and feel like you are chasing a greased pig? Or is that more clearly explained? I hope so because I won't sleep well tonight with the imagery of being a greased pig being chased by you
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Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
....
Sean:
OK. I'll be serious now.
1. If Steve's speakers sound good on many recordings then that is great! That doesn't mean his speakers are necessarily accurate because we don't know for sure the source of the recordings (see circle-of-confusion problem). Comprehensive measurements of his speakers would confirm they are accurate.
2. Dave Wilson's experience you describe above confirms the problems with all listening rooms that I discussed. The loudspeaker and its interaction with the room acoustics is a big problem that needs solving. i agree with you that solutions are at hand, but are not well documented or validated in the scientific literature.
3. Where in my previous post did I say something that would lead you to say: "If you don't think Wilson is neutral". I never even discussed Wilson or the Q5. I think you have mistaken me for another poster.
4. Where in my previous post did I say "you are anti-science"?
5. "You cannot have it both ways. You can't demand that a speaker be properly designed and then wiggle out by saying it does not matter anyway because the room will muck it up"
You have misunderstood what I wrote. The optimal design targets of the loudspeaker DO MATTER and they are clearly defined and remain the same regardless of the room and its influence on the sound.Our loudspeaker design targets are defined and verified based on anechoic measurements that remove the influence of the room. We don't include the influence of the room in the design of the loudspeaker. Why? Because all rooms are different, and you cannot possibly predict the influence the room on the loudspeaker's performance until it's actually installed in the customer's room. I did say that a room will muck up the bass, but how does that constitute "wiggling"?
A well-designed loudspeaker will always sound better in more rooms than a poorly designed one (with or without room correction) because the direct and reflected sounds produced by the speaker will be more neutral as you move around the room. The problem with the room then becomes isolated to mostly low frequencies (< 200-400 Hz) where judicious loudspeaker/listener placement, multiple subwoofers, and room correction solutions can help.
Do you still think I'm "wiggling" and feel like you are chasing a greased pig? Or is that more clearly explained? I hope so because I won't sleep well tonight with the imagery of being a greased pig being chased by you
Playing devils advocate, I'd say the majority of the best high-end speakers undergo very vigorous testing, retesting and voicing. Whether or not the sound is to your liking (or works in your room or with your amplifiers, is another story and one that is being neglected here; one can have the best sounding speaker but if it can't be driven with a wide range of electronics, then what good is it?) But I think the leading designs from Vandersteen, Thiel, Focal, Magico, Verity, von Schweikert, Sonus Faber, Wilson, Martin Logan, Sanders, Rockport, NOLA and your company for example, all follow the same general principles and practices. Now MBL might be an example of another story because of it being an omnidirectional and exciting everything in the room and in my experience can sound very, very good or very, very bad.
Just about every stupid thing I've done involved a pretty girl!
We may be related!
Sean I hope you slept well. I assure you I was not chasing any greased pigs last night. I am nt so much chasing you as I am your opinions. My response was not entirely attributed to you but was a response to all the posts that followed.
Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
I would know because the sign at the event says greased pig contest.
I watched the contest organizer take a substance out of a can and smear on the pig. When I tried to grab the pig it slipped out of my hand leaving my hands and clothes greasy.
When the next contestant stepped up he re-greased the pig. He had similar results in trying to apprehend the pig.
Farm animals do occasionally escape their enclosures and catching them can be quite an adventure. Sometimes it can be quite humorous. I never participated in a greased pig contest but I have chased various un-greased farm animals.
I imagine like anything the pig chasing can become quite competitive with someone taking quite a bit of pride in being the best dam pig chaser in these here United States.
Suppose I want to run the best pig chasing contest or be the best greased pig catcher. I could hire experts to show me the best pigs or best grease to use. The pig chaser could hire an expert to show me the best technique for catching the pig. Or I could just do it by trial and error.
The bottom line is one will be judged on how hard it s to catch his pig and the other on how fast he can catch it. Each year the contestants will adopt the tactics of
the winner.
The bottom line is you gotta go catch that pig faster than anyone else. Nothing else really matters.
Hmm... never chased a greased pig around a county fair,since that's not something we do in Canada (we chase hockey pucks around on a frozen pond, which makes much more sense). Why is the pig greased? And why are you chasing it? Do you have scientific evidence that the pig is greased or did some audio reviewer simply tell you it is greased and you are accepting it based on faith, or because you purchased a pig at great expense advertised as greased, and would be embarrassed to find out that in fact it wasn't greased ??
I would know because the sign at the event says greased pig contest.
I watched the contest organizer take a substance out of a can and smear on the pig. When I tried to grab the pig it slipped out of my hand leaving my hands and clothes greasy.
When the next contestant stepped up he re-greased the pig. He had similar results in trying to apprehend the pig.
Farm animals do occasionally escape their enclosures and catching them can be quite an adventure. Sometimes it can be quite humorous. I never participated in a greased pig contest but I have chased various un-greased farm animals.
I imagine like anything the pig chasing can become quite competitive with someone taking quite a bit of pride in being the best dam pig chaser in these here United States.
Suppose I want to run the best pig chasing contest or be the best greased pig catcher. I could hire experts to show me the best pigs or best grease to use. The pig chaser could hire an expert to show me the best technique for catching the pig. Or I could just do it by trial and error.
The bottom line is one will be judged on how hard it s to catch his pig and the other on how fast he can catch it. Each year the contestants will adopt the tactics of
the winner.
The bottom line is you gotta go catch that pig faster than anyone else. Nothing else really matters.
The event sign saying "greased pig contest" is not sufficient evidence that the pig is greased: they could be lying just to get you to pay admission. But it sounds like if you get a few more contestants who confirm their hands are greasy after handling the pig under the same controlled conditions, and you do some chemical analysis to confirm the grease is real, then a logical conclusion is that the pig is greasy within a probability of p < 0.05.
Determining who is the best pig chaser in the USA is something that can be easily quantified with a calibrated stopwatch. You measure how long it takes each pig chaser to catch the same pig measured under the same conditions. The one with the fastest time wins. You may want to repeat the measurement several times to determine how reliable and accurate the measurement is. It doesn't take an expert to do that. We just need to agree that time (measured in msec) is the most relevant dependent variable to assess the performance of the pig chaser.
To that end, a couple of research scientists in the field of pig chasing spent 20-30 years doing research to see if time or speed might be the best metric for measuring the performance of the pig chaser. Why was such research necessary? Because either a) this idea had not occurred to the other pig chasers (the answer was just too obvious), b) too many people had already formed their own biased opinions made at different pig chasing contests where the conditions were not the same and were not controlled, or c) the bean counters and marketing people who represented the pig chasers said "we can't maximize growth and profit margin in our targeted market segment based solely on the speed of the pig chaser. Our market research indicates the pig chaser must also handsome, tall, muscular and be fashionably dressed because those are important qualities that attract our target demographic to pig chasing contests, and they will pay a higher admission price. If speed is really important, we can simply tell people our pig chaser is really fast since not many people have a stopwatch to validate our claim" . Note that some of those qualities provide no real benefit to the speed of the pig chaser, and may in fact slow him down.
Finally, the research was published and time-taken-to-catch-the-pig was shown to be the best metric for measuring the performance of the pig chaser. However, the other pig chasers decided they could not agree on that standard or never bothered to read the research that explained why time is the best performance metric. Some of the slower, heavier and more muscular pig chasers couldn't afford a personal trainer to improve their times, and felt they might be disadvantaged if their performance was based on speed alone.
Today, greased pig chasing contests remain highly unregulated. In fact, many pig chasing contests strictly forbid the use of calibrated stopwatches. Instead, they rely on "expert" pig chaser judges (who may or may not have a good sense of time) to report on how long they think it took the pig chaser to catch the pig. The judge's estimates of time are highly controversial, and there continues to be heated debate on how long it really took the pig chaser to catch the greased pig.
A calibrated stopwatch exists that would resolve these debates -- but most people are not aware that the stopwatch and the scientific research on pig chasing performance exist. Others, are simply too afraid of the truth: that their favorite pig chaser may actually be slower than what the judges and pig chaser claim.
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Then we could do some tests on coefficient of fiction. Experiment with different lubricants.DNA tests to ensure it is in fact a pig. Then we have to make sure every pig was the same size. That the pig was properly motivated to escape. That the lubricant was applied the same way. Wow! I'm getting dizzy. Just talking about greased pig contests is fun.
It's time to get back to the purpose of this thread. If I can remember.
It's time to get back to the purpose of this thread. If I can remember.
Then we could do some tests on coefficient of fiction. Experiment with different lubricants.DNA tests to ensure it is in fact a pig. Then we have to make sure every pig was the same size. That the pig was properly motivated to escape. That the lubricant was applied the same way. Wow! I'm getting dizzy. Just talking about greased pig contests is fun.
It's time to get back to the purpose of this thread. If I can remember.
Agreed. I think I have worked through my problem with the pig chasing imagery you introduced. Time to move on.
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Not sure this is a valid test for being related. This particular trait is likely shared by every straight male of the species.
Obviously can't drive the forum software yet. Was trying to reference the fact that every silly thing I (we) have ever done usually involved a pretty girl in some fashion.
Obviously can't drive the forum software yet. Was trying to reference the fact that every silly thing I (we) have ever done usually involved a pretty girl in some fashion.
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Wow that sounds like the 40 yd timing at the NFL combines (hope no one believes their fave players times-and one has to wonder, why, with football being a multi-directional game, why running in a linear pattern would have any bearing on outcome
). No electronic timing; instead, three people with stop watches at the finish. Each a time and rather than averaging the three, they argue and finally pick one of the three times. For real.This particular characteristic is what led to the purchase of my current B&W 801's. The old Matrix Series 3, unfortunately not the new Nautilas version which I think sounds even bettter. But I digress. I don't recall the measurements other than being decent for the time but one thing I noticed about them after listening in several different shops and setups is they always sounded at least good in a poor setup and excellent when dialed in Other speakers would sound good in one place and nasty in another. I can hardly say I listened to every speaker available and didn't always have the option of hearing the same speaker in different rooms or set ups but this consistency has been valuable when moving around the country. I can't afford a dedicate room yet as much as I want one. Having a speaker sound good just sticking it in a room and sound great after tweaking has been a more than slightly useful commodity.
If science can do this I'm all for it. Still not convinced that you can go all the way from a merely compentent speaker to one that has that bit of magic that grabs you, pulls you in and makes you suspend belief for a while purely by these techniques, but if you can find it at least you should be able to do it repeatedly.
Of those companies you mention, how many have access to and use anechoic chambers to measure and test their designs?
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