Eh, it depends on the speakers. If the speakers were from the Focal Utopia line then the room is exceptionally important, with dipoles or waveguide/horn speakers the dispersion pattern is far narrower and it makes the room much less important.
What determines "believability of the reproduction illusion"
- Thread starter jkeny
- Start date
Eh, it depends on the speakers. If the speakers were from the Focal Utopia line then the room is exceptionally important, with dipoles or waveguide/horn speakers the dispersion pattern is far narrower and it makes the room much less important.
Steve williams
Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Ron
I do not think we can nicely say they're both right. The views are quite opposite and I happen to share Steve's.
A great system is that : great System and the room is very much part of that of this system.
The thing in most instances,great components, especially speakers require an above average room. You will not drop a MM7 or Gen Dragon, XLF or Q7, etc in a room sit and expect great things.. That will not happen. OTOH Good rooms does not equate room treatments.There are rooms that happen just by happenstance to be good in most acoustics metrics that matter. It happens that a normal room is above average but one is likely to obtain better results with purposefully built or treated room and I have come to believe more and more in this aspect, speakers that are compatible with the room.
I do not think we can nicely say they're both right. The views are quite opposite and I happen to share Steve's.
A great system is that : great System and the room is very much part of that of this system.
The thing in most instances,great components, especially speakers require an above average room. You will not drop a MM7 or Gen Dragon, XLF or Q7, etc in a room sit and expect great things.. That will not happen. OTOH Good rooms does not equate room treatments.There are rooms that happen just by happenstance to be good in most acoustics metrics that matter. It happens that a normal room is above average but one is likely to obtain better results with purposefully built or treated room and I have come to believe more and more in this aspect, speakers that are compatible with the room.
Steve williams
Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Frantz I totally agree. As well some of the arguments put forth here IMO are absolute nonsense and thank you for trying to set things straight.
Good point. In average I agree with you - it agrees with my experience.
And not all treated rooms are equal - some have minimal treatment, just to correct some faults and help some specific effects, some are professional treated by knowledgeable consultants and knowledgeable audiophiles, but unfortunately those I have seen are overdamped for my taste.
BTW, IMHO most of the time the best audio treatments I have seen were size and furniture.
In all this talk of "great room" is there an agreed consensus as to what measurements signify that the room is "great"?
Not that I want to raise the "measurements" card but I'm genuinely interested as it seemed to me that there were some different opinions as to what makes a great room?
Not that I want to raise the "measurements" card but I'm genuinely interested as it seemed to me that there were some different opinions as to what makes a great room?
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Steve,
I would be careful. Just because someone is wrongly using an argument does not imply it is all an absolute nonsense. There are many nonsenses in Frank argumentation, and his credibility is very low, but there is some truth and some interesting aspects in his arguments.
Steve williams
Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Again we need to agree to disagree. I totally agree with Frantz about listening to a video through a speakerB and being able to make comments about speaker A.
The problem with having no objectivists around seems to be people who don't know better think it's all subjective, but people do get degrees in acoustic engineering for a reason.
While there is plenty of latitude for personal preference, there are lot of things posted recently that are factually incorrect and are tolerated or even supported.
And I also agree on this particular one. But this was just a drop in the ocean that became a wave. Unfortunately it killed an interesting subject - what we can learn from recordings carried with limited bandwidth.
Steve williams
Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Frequency and amplitude of feet tapping?
OK, maybe another thread is the best place for it as I see DaveC nor anyone else has commented on the difference between the room interaction with distributed mode loudspeakers (DML) Vs highly directive speakers & the naturalness or believability of the sound. Which makes me wonder what is the "issue" with rooms that is being addressed by treatment?
I've never experienced DML but I can comment on omnis since I've heard MBL and German Physiks (?) omnis several times each.
IMO... it's mostly personal preference but the omni speakers are going to be more dependent on room acoustics. I also think that acclimation is a key factor and most people are used to hearing a certain proportion of direct vs reflected sound. People need time to acclimate to different speaker types or they can just sound weird. Even conventional speakers can sound a little weird for a minute or two after listening to my more directive speakers. So I take the Harman testing on this subject with a grain of salt, other then the fact that people need to give them selves some time to adjust to different speakers. After adjusting some love omnis, others might prefer horns. There's no right answer here imo.
Personally, I like directive speakers because the room effects the sound less and I like the soundstage to resemble the venue rather then when the performance seems to be located in my room and the listening room boundaries are audible. I've heard this accomplished with conventional wide-dispersion speakers too but it takes a room that doesn't mangle the fine details. With a directive speaker you need to adjust decay times but critical things with conventional speakers like addressing first reflection points just don't matter as much if there's a lot less off-axis energy to reflect in the first place.
Thanks Dave
I haven't heard these DML speakers either but what I read makes sense to me. The main points about DML speakers & room interactions are summarised in this paper
Essentially it compares what happens in live performances Vs speakers in rooms:
As I said, makes sense to me but as you say the proof of the pudding.......
Maybe this does deserve a separate thread?
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John, this is an important aspect of "believability" - the almost eery invariance of "perceived amplitude". Subjectively, this means one can walk around the room, to points furthest from the direct sound, to immediately in front of and next to the drivers - and the apparent volume does not alter! I've known this behaviour for 30 years but did not appreciate what was going on inside of our hearing to make this happen, until you drew my attention strongly to ASA. The processing inside our brains keeps adjusting for the information hitting out ears so that it matches what our minds have decided, unconsciously, is going on - which includes the volume level, as necessary. When the quality of the direct sound is good enough then this happens seamlessly, effortlessly - and the illusion of the musical event is rock solid, no matter what one tries to do to shake it.
This is most certainly incorrect - I've done this so many times, with such a variety of dynamic speakers, in rooms of all persuasions ... the key factor mitigating is the actual quality of the sound being produced at the surface of the drivers - if sufficiently free of anomalies then the believability snaps into place, every time. I've spent days where the sound shifts in and out of this mode continually, because I'm fiddling with the system or trying to resolve some issue.
Yet again, the key point is being missed ... someone tries to impersonate someone you know over an ordinary phone line - you have no trouble discerning that the sound is fake, because you have a deep knowledge of the characteristics of that person's voice. When you watch a YouTube clip you just need to compare the characteristics of the sound you hear with how it comes across when the source is the "real thing"; that is, the clip is the recording, or the video is of live action, music making.
It is ridiculous trying to assess "how good" the sound is - all one is doing is noting where the replay fails to be convincing, and perhaps rate it on a scale out of 10 so to speak, of how close it is to nailing such.
