[Gary Eickmeier]

Scott wrote:

"Gary, we know what you've been doing. You have told us about it many
times. You like your stereo bounced off the walls of your listening
room. You find it pleasing and that is completely fine. I have heard
the Bose 901s on several occasions including a couple of demos set up
by Bose themselves in custom rooms built just for the 901s. It wasn't
to my liking. Not one bit actually.

Not talking about 901s.


I already explained what it is you are actually hearing. Temporal
differences between your two ears. If you think you can actually hear
angles without the temporal differences put it to the test. See if
you can still "hear angles" with one ear blocked so your brain does
not receive the temporal differences.

This is some of the crazier statements that you have made Scott. Still not
sure which Scott you are - but can't hear angles? All of a sudden we can't
hear in stereo? What kind of nonsense is this? Where did you get it?


No doubt reflected sound/ hall acoustics has a profound effect on the
sound quality of live acoustic music. But the spaciousness is real.

Yes, and it needs to be real on playback as well.

The separation of instruments in a live concert is due to...the
actual separation of instruments in a live concert. Think about it.
There is a whole science behind concert hall design. It's something I
find quite interesting and have done a fair amount of research on. It
does not apply to stereo playback rooms. They are entirely different
beasts and serve very different purposes. On top of that much of what
we perceive as "imaging" and "spaciousness" at a live concert is due
to visual cues. We don't get visual cues in stereo playback. If you
could get the same exact sound in the playback room that you got at a
concert hall the perception of imaging would not sound "right" and
would be deemed inadequate.

No, they are not different. If you don't reproduce, or reconstruct, the
spatial realism it will sound different.


Reflected sound is recorded along with direct sound with most
traditional stereo recordings. It's already there and is brought out
quite nicely with a well designed stereo system in a stereo room that
is not plagued by a lot of reflectivity. No need to double up on what
was already recorded at the concert hall. It only creates spacial
confusion by presenting spacial cues from two different spaces on top
of each other.

You would be correct if we were talking about binaural systems. Stereo is a
field-type system. Do you know the difference?

My message is simple: When both ears are free to hear all sound fields in
front of them, the system is not operating binaurally. Stereo does not work
by piping the two "signals" to the ears, it works by recreating sound fields
in rooms. Those fields must have the same spatial characteristics as the
live sound. The most efficient way to reproduce the early reflected field is
by reflection. If you do this with the speakers positioned in a certain way
and with a certain radiation pattern the imaging will be improved and the
spaciousness and depth will be reproduced. If you do it by directional
speakers with sound killing in the room you will be folding the early
refected field onto the direct field, destroying the spaciousness that was
recorded. It will sound like double mono. All of this should have been
obvious to you after a certain number of years of listening to speakers of
various radiation patterns. Can you hear differences among box speakers,
dipoles, bipoles, omnis? Good. Those differences are caused by differences
in the image model, or reflection patterns and strengths, among those
speakers. Study that for a while.

Gary Eickmeier