Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #41   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 03:51:52 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

Well, while those Wilson Audio speakers were definitely the "best of show"
Their longsuit seemed to be that they excelled at getting the dynamics of
live music correct. In an unfamiliar venue such as half of a hotel
ballroom,
any observations that I might make about imaging and soundstage (they
seemed
to do that very realistically) would be tempered by my unfamiliarity with
the
room and the equipment. So I make no claims there. The sound was big and
real-sounding from a standpoint of my familiarity with the source material
and nothing else. The speakers are huge. The Alexandrias, each had two
woofers, one a 13" and the other a 15". The "Thor's Hammer" subwoofers had
two woofers as well, both 15". The three speaker systems moved a LOT of
air
and the bottom descended to 10 Hz!


I'm beginning to agree with your idea about the dynamics of the high freqs.
I read Dick Pierce's explanation, which was great, but again maybe neither
of you is taking power response into the equation. Maybe the speakers were
voiced with a microphone at 1 meter on axis etc etc, and so in a large room
the high freqs lose oomph and power compared to the more omnidirectional
lower freqs. Just a guess. Thinking about a typical ribbon tweeter a'la
Magnepan, how does that delicate little fellow have the kind of dynamics
required for live sound?


According to Pierce's explanation (which seemed to make sense physics and
maths-wise) it doesn't need to. But obviously, something's missing. speakers
simply cannot reproduce that sense of "aliveness" that is imparted on the
listener by live instruments. If one can walk down a street, pass a venue
where real music is being played, and be able to TELL INSTANTLY as one
passes, from a momentarily open door, that a real band is playing unamplified
music inside, then it's obvious that speakers are missing something in their
attempt to reproduce a musical waveform.

But what I really have to contribute to the discussion is the headphone
solution. How about finding a pair of the best electrostatic headphones (or
other highly respected transducers) and listening to the horns and
everything else through those, and seeing if something gets lost, frequency
wise or dynamics wise, by listening to speakers? No, it won't tell you
anything about stereo imaging, or bigness of the soundstage and similar, but
just to see if the horn problem resides in the tweeters or in the recording.


Interesting thought. I see where you're coming from, but I've tried that too.
Headphones, even the most expensive Stax, while they sound very good, don't
produce any more of a realistic rendering of instruments like brass and
drum-kits than do speakers. So, that doesn't seem to work either.

Jenn's remark about not being impressed with anything at the show may be due
to not having your recording at hand, which is more food for thought.


Well, I can't say that. There were rooms playing some fairly impressive stuff
(with or without my jazz recording playing). I was impressed by the new
Magico S5, the MBL-101s (again, as usual), the big YG acoustics speakers, the
biggest Focal speakers (don't recall the model numbers) and the KEF "Blades".
And of course, the most jaw dropping of all, the aforementioned Wilson
Alexandria XLFs. All showed me that at least at the "cost-is-no-object" end
of the spectrum, speakers are improving. I heard cone speakers (virtually all
of the speakers mentioned were cone designs) especially, are now doing things
that 20 years ago, I would have bet money that come speakers could NEVER do.
Maybe Jenn's jaded. It does happen.

Gary Eickmeier




  #42   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 08:43:32 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):
On Aug 30, 8:17pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Thu, 30 Aug 2012 08:51:26 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):

On Aug 30, 5:37am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Audio Empire" wrote in message


...


Here we are in complete agreement. Why go to hear "live musicians" when
all
you are listening to is a set of PA speakers. If I want to listen to
speakers, I'll stay home where my listening chain (amps, speakers) is far
better than those of even the most elaborate of public address systems. I
have attended so-called live concerts where I've turned around and left
because I saw a bevy of microphones on stage and stacks of speakers near
by.
And you're right, it's only a matter of time before the PA craze hits
symphony orchestras too. In fact is some locals, it probably already has.
Bah!


Good point. Someone took me to a concert of *name* artists. The alleged
concert was composed of live segements, karoke segments and video
segments.
In no case was the sound or video as good as my home stereo which is
itself
not elaborate.


Was this a classical concert? If not then this is nothing new. Rock
and pop concerts have suffered from bad sounding PAs since the
beginning of the genres. Fans don't go to these concerts to hear
better sound. They go to *see* the artists, who are often celebrities,
in the flesh perform what will hopefully be a unique live experience.
It's a lot different than the live classical music experience. Well,
not including concerts at The Hollywood Bowl or other such venues.


Well, I have yet to hear a "sound reinforcement augmented" Â*symphony
concert but I have seen classical chamber music concerts so augmented.
It's just not necessary. I've been to the Hollywood Bowl and heard
chamber music played on stage. The acoustics of the place made them
easily heard in the proverbial back row.


We must be talking about two entirely different Hollywood Bowls. The
one I know always uses sound reinforcement and is my sole exposure to
symphony orchestras that regularly play under such conditions. I think
chamber music at the bowl would hardly be heard in the front row
without sound reinforcement much less the "proverbial" back row. I
would guess the "proverbial" back row is no where near as far from the
stage as the "actual" back row at the bowl.


I think we're talking about the same Hollywood Bowl LOCATION, but
we're, indeed talking about two different Hollywood Bowl performance
shells and we're talking about talking about two different times. My
experience with the 'Bowl is from the mid-1960's. They weren't using
any sound reinforcement then. They are certainly using it now, and
may have been using it for a long time. I don't know. But almost 50
years ago, they weren't using it. I was just a 16-year old kid then
but my cousin with whom I spent the summer in LA was a big music lover
and we went to the 'Bowl at least 6 times that summer and NO sound
reinforcement was used in any of the concerts I attended. Perhaps I
should have made it clear that my experience with that venue is from
the 1960's. In my defense, here, however I must say that I haven't
been there since, and I was unaware when I wroth the above, that they
had significantly changed things in the ensuing years.

The Hollywood Bowl seats something like 18,000 people! I don't know
about the "proverbial" back row but the "actual" back row at the bowl
is probably close to 1,000 feet away from the stage. If not it sure
seems like it. The place is huge! this web page should give anyone an
idea of just how big the bowl really is.

http://www.answers.com/topic/hollywood-bowl


Oh yes, it is huge. And every time I went there it was SRO. But
realize that the 'Bowl was built back in 1929, when the idea of sound
reinforcement for musical events was deemed ludicrous (due to the
primitive state of amplification and loudspeaker technology then).
Also, if you look at the overhead satellite view of the 'Bowl,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_Bowl

you'll notice that there are now FIVE tiers of seating that "fan out"
from the stage. Notice that the third through the fifth tier look
"different" from the first two. Now, It's been half a century since
I've been there, but it seems to me that there were only the two front
tiers of seating in those days but I recall that there was a big lawn
where the top three tiers seem to be today. People would bring picnic
baskets and blankets and spread-out on the lawn to listen to the
music. Also, the shell is totally different than it was back then.
And indeed, the article says that the shell was replaced in 2005 with
a bigger one. I can see scaffolding around the new shell that looks
like a structure for holding speakers. The original one from '29 was
smaller and apparently more acoustically efficient. With modern sound
reinforcement, I suspect that it was deemed that the new shell didn't
need to be that acoustically efficient any more. You can just turn-up
the volume 8^)

  #43   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 09:34:21 -0700, Dick Pierce wrote
(in article ):

Scott wrote:
Well, I have yet to hear a "sound reinforcement augmented" symphony
concert but I have seen classical chamber music concerts so augmented.
It's just not necessary. I've been to the Hollywood Bowl and heard
chamber music played on stage. The acoustics of the place made them
easily heard in the proverbial back row.



We must be talking about two entirely different Hollywood Bowls. The
one I know always uses sound reinforcement and is my sole exposure to
symphony orchestras that regularly play under such conditions. I think
chamber music at the bowl would hardly be heard in the front row
without sound reinforcement much less the "proverbial" back row. I
would guess the "proverbial" back row is no where near as far from the
stage as the "actual" back row at the bowl.

The Hollywood Bowl seats something like 18,000 people! I don't know
about the "proverbial" back row but the "actual" back row at the bowl
is probably close to 1,000 feet away from the stage. If not it sure
seems like it. The place is huge! this web page should give anyone an
idea of just how big the bowl really is.

http://www.answers.com/topic/hollywood-bowl


Looking at high-resolution satellite imagery of the Hollywood
bowl, the distance from the edge of the stage to the current
last row is about 320 feet. Even to the last row of what appears
to be the legacy seats is on the order of 150 feet.

Notice that the orchestra pit is NOT under the shell, thus
does not benefit from the directional reinforcement of the shell.

While it's not 1,000 feet, 320 feet is WAY far away. Best case
you're going to get from the cheel is on the order of 6 dB or
so of gain. The "natural ampitheater" better suits visual sighting
than the acoustics. Remember that the ancient Greek ampitheaters
with there legended acoustics were TINY compared to the Hollywood
Bowl. Recall that Wayne Newton is not quite THAT old to require a
large venue 2300 years ago. Also recall that "legended" is not the
same as "actual."

What's interesting is that from 150 miles in altitude, the number
of sound towers and speakers is, well, humbling.



This is not the same shell as was there when I attended Bowl concerts in the
mid-1960s. It was replaced in 2005 with the one that is shown in the
satellite pictures. When I attended, the orchestra did, indeed sit on stage
with the shell around them and it was easy to hear them (or any musicians on
stage) from anywhere in the seating area of the original seating tiers (the
first two?).
  #44   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...

Looking at high-resolution satellite imagery of the Hollywood
bowl, the distance from the edge of the stage to the current
last row is about 320 feet. Even to the last row of what appears
to be the legacy seats is on the order of 150 feet.

Notice that the orchestra pit is NOT under the shell, thus
does not benefit from the directional reinforcement of the shell.

While it's not 1,000 feet, 320 feet is WAY far away. Best case
you're going to get from the cheel is on the order of 6 dB or
so of gain. The "natural ampitheater" better suits visual sighting
than the acoustics. Remember that the ancient Greek ampitheaters
with there legended acoustics were TINY compared to the Hollywood
Bowl. Recall that Wayne Newton is not quite THAT old to require a
large venue 2300 years ago. Also recall that "legended" is not the
same as "actual."

What's interesting is that from 150 miles in altitude, the number
of sound towers and speakers is, well, humbling.


Received wisdom is that performance rooms with about 3,200 seats is the
extent of what can be done acoustically, with good results.

Given that there are no walls or ceiling to reflect sound, and that the
number of seats is at least 5 times greater, SR is the salvation of this
establishment.

MeadowBook Music Festival in Rochester MI is far smaller, usually 100%
acoustical for orchestral music, but has a ceiling of sorts.

  #45   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Aug 31, 9:34*am, Dick Pierce wrote:
Scott wrote:
Well, I have yet to hear a "sound reinforcement augmented" *symphony
concert but I have seen classical chamber music concerts so augmented.
It's just not necessary. I've been to the Hollywood Bowl and heard
chamber music played on stage. *The acoustics of the place made them
easily heard in the proverbial back row.


We must be talking about two entirely different Hollywood Bowls. The
one I know always uses sound reinforcement and is my sole exposure to
symphony orchestras that regularly play under such conditions. I think
chamber music at the bowl would hardly be heard in the front row
without sound reinforcement much less the "proverbial" back row. I
would guess the "proverbial" back row is no where near as far from the
stage as the "actual" back row at the bowl.


The Hollywood Bowl seats something like 18,000 people! I don't know
about the "proverbial" back row but the "actual" back row at the bowl
is probably close to 1,000 feet away from the stage. If not it sure
seems like it. The place is huge! this web page should give anyone an
idea of just how big the bowl really is.


http://www.answers.com/topic/hollywood-bowl


Looking at high-resolution satellite imagery of the Hollywood
bowl, the distance from the edge of the stage to the current
last row is about 320 feet. Even to the last row of what appears
to be the legacy seats is on the order of 150 feet.

Notice that the orchestra pit is NOT under the shell, thus
does not benefit from the directional reinforcement of the shell.

While it's not 1,000 feet, 320 feet is WAY far away. Best case
you're going to get from the cheel is on the order of 6 dB or
so of gain. The "natural ampitheater" better suits visual sighting
than the acoustics. Remember that the ancient Greek ampitheaters
with there legended acoustics were TINY compared to the Hollywood
Bowl. Recall that Wayne Newton is not quite THAT old to require a
large venue 2300 years ago. Also recall that "legended" is not the
same as "actual."

What's interesting is that from 150 miles in altitude, the number
of sound towers and speakers is, well, humbling.

--
+--------------------------------+
+ * * * * Dick Pierce * * * * * *|
+ Professional Audio Development |
+--------------------------------+


Of course it's not 1,000 feet. I did not do a good job of expressing
that as obvious hyperbole. My bad.

I did on one occasion at the bowl make the hike all the way to the
back row just to see the view from there. It seemed comparable to that
of a small football stadium. Looks like by your estimates that is not
far from the truth. One of the issues they have at the bowl is being
an outdoor venue there are laws regulating how loud the P.A. system
can play. The worst I have sat was about midway back for Keb Mo and
Robert Cray. The sound was definitely not loud enough even half way
back. It wasn't disastrous but it needed more. Pretty rare for an
amplified blues concert. And the view? The *video screens* were too
small from half way back in the house. The video screens! We could
barely see the actual artists at all. Sure we could see them. (I don't
want to get busted on my hyperbole) But from that distance they could
have been anybody. That is half way back. I really don't know how they
manage to sell so many tickets to their classical season at the bowl.
But thank goodness they do.

Thanks Dick for the far more accurate estimates on the size of the
bowl and it's effects on sound.



  #46   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Aug 31, 1:56=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 08:43:32 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):









On Aug 30, 8:17pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Thu, 30 Aug 2012 08:51:26 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):


On Aug 30, 5:37am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Audio Empire" wrote in message


...


Here we are in complete agreement. Why go to hear "live musicians" =

when
all
you are listening to is a set of PA speakers. If I want to listen t=

o
speakers, I'll stay home where my listening chain (amps, speakers) =

is far
better than those of even the most elaborate of public address syst=

ems. I
have attended so-called live concerts where I've turned around and =

left
because I saw a bevy of microphones on stage and stacks of speakers=

near
by.
And you're right, it's only a matter of time before the PA craze hi=

ts
symphony orchestras too. In fact is some locals, it probably alread=

y has.
Bah!


Good point. Someone took me to a concert of *name* artists. The alle=

ged
concert was composed of live segements, karoke segments and video
segments.
In no case was the sound or video as good as my home stereo which is
itself
not elaborate.


Was this a classical concert? If not then this is nothing new. Rock
and pop concerts have suffered from bad sounding PAs since the
beginning of the genres. Fans don't go to these concerts to hear
better sound. They go to *see* the artists, who are often celebrities=

,
in the flesh perform what will hopefully be a unique live experience.
It's a lot different than the live classical music experience. Well,
not including concerts at The Hollywood Bowl or other such venues.


Well, I have yet to hear a "sound reinforcement augmented" =A0symphony
concert but I have seen classical chamber music concerts so augmented.
It's just not necessary. I've been to the Hollywood Bowl and heard
chamber music played on stage. =A0The acoustics of the place made them
easily heard in the proverbial back row.


We must be talking about two entirely different Hollywood Bowls. The
one I know always uses sound reinforcement and is my sole exposure to
symphony orchestras that regularly play under such conditions. I think
chamber music at the bowl would hardly be heard in the front row
without sound reinforcement much less the "proverbial" back row. I
would guess the "proverbial" back row is no where near as far from the
stage as the "actual" back row at the bowl.


I think we're talking about the same Hollywood Bowl LOCATION, but
we're, indeed talking about two different Hollywood Bowl performance
shells and we're talking about talking about two different times. My
experience with the 'Bowl is from the mid-1960's. They weren't using
any sound reinforcement then. They =A0are certainly using it now, and
may have been using it for a long time. I don't know. But almost 50
years ago, they weren't using it. I was just a 16-year old kid then
but my cousin with whom I spent the summer in LA was a big music lover
and we went to the 'Bowl at least 6 times that summer and NO sound
reinforcement was used in any of the concerts I attended. Perhaps I
should have made it clear that my experience with that venue is from
the 1960's. In my defense, here, however I must say that I haven't
been there since, and I was unaware when I wroth the above, that they
had significantly changed things in the ensuing years.

The Hollywood Bowl seats something like 18,000 people! I don't know
about the "proverbial" back row but the "actual" back row at the bowl
is probably close to 1,000 feet away from the stage. If not it sure
seems like it. The place is huge! this web page should give anyone an
idea of just how big the bowl really is.


http://www.answers.com/topic/hollywood-bowl


Oh yes, it is huge. And every time I went there it was SRO. But
realize that the 'Bowl was built back in 1929, when the idea of sound
reinforcement for musical events was deemed ludicrous (due to the
primitive state of amplification and loudspeaker technology then).
Also, if you look at the overhead satellite view of the 'Bowl,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_Bowl

you'll notice that there are now FIVE tiers of seating that "fan out"
from the stage. Notice that the third through the fifth tier look
"different" from the first two. Now, It's been half a century since
I've been there, but it seems to me that there were only the two front
tiers of seating in those days but I recall that there was a big lawn
where the top three tiers seem to be today. People would bring picnic
baskets and blankets and spread-out on the lawn to listen to the
music. =A0Also, the shell is totally different than it was back then.
And indeed, the article says that the shell was replaced in 2005 with
a bigger one. I can see scaffolding around the new shell that looks
like a structure for holding speakers. The original one from '29 was
smaller and apparently more acoustically efficient. With modern sound
reinforcement, I suspect that it was deemed that the new shell didn't
need to be that acoustically efficient any more. You can just turn-up
the volume 8^)


Here is a terrific webpage on the history of the bowl.

http://www.hollywoodbowl.com/philped...d-architecture

On the time line they claim attendance for a concert in 1936 to be
over 26,000 so that would suggest that even back then it was as big a
"house" then as it is now.
The photos from 1945 show a vast array of microphones. Maybe just to
record the orchestra? Maybe sound reinforcement.

I have been to many non classical concerts at the bowl but I have only
been to two classical concerts and that was only because a friend of
mine was playing.

The bowl really is rich in it's history but it really is a crap venue
for any sort of concert. I only go if there is no alternative for a
must see concert. The Greek just down the road is so much better and
the John Anson Ford Theater is better still although it is really
small. It is ironic that the L.A. Phil lives in arguably the best
concert hall in the world during it's regular season and the worst
venue in the world for their summer season.

  #47   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:56:40 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...

Looking at high-resolution satellite imagery of the Hollywood
bowl, the distance from the edge of the stage to the current
last row is about 320 feet. Even to the last row of what appears
to be the legacy seats is on the order of 150 feet.

Notice that the orchestra pit is NOT under the shell, thus
does not benefit from the directional reinforcement of the shell.

While it's not 1,000 feet, 320 feet is WAY far away. Best case
you're going to get from the cheel is on the order of 6 dB or
so of gain. The "natural ampitheater" better suits visual sighting
than the acoustics. Remember that the ancient Greek ampitheaters
with there legended acoustics were TINY compared to the Hollywood
Bowl. Recall that Wayne Newton is not quite THAT old to require a
large venue 2300 years ago. Also recall that "legended" is not the
same as "actual."

What's interesting is that from 150 miles in altitude, the number
of sound towers and speakers is, well, humbling.


Received wisdom is that performance rooms with about 3,200 seats is the
extent of what can be done acoustically, with good results.

Given that there are no walls or ceiling to reflect sound, and that the
number of seats is at least 5 times greater, SR is the salvation of this
establishment.


Maybe now, but that wasn't always the case. As I said in another post, the
original "shell" was completed in 1929 and was designed to fill the bowl with
sound which it did for almost forty years without SR. What happened after
that, I can't say. Since the shell was replaced in 2005 with a bigger one
obviously designed with SR in mind, I sure that it is 'salvation" now. But if
I lived in the LA area I wouldn't spend a penny to go there. Not when they
have a venue like the Disney Hall available. I understand that it's a sonic
masterpiece

MeadowBook Music Festival in Rochester MI is far smaller, usually 100%
acoustical for orchestral music, but has a ceiling of sorts.


The 'Bowl used to.


  #48   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 13:51:19 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

OTOH, you are correct about rock and some other forms of pop. These
performances were created in the studio where they were recorded,


Obviously only true of studio recordings.

Rock and pop groups still give regular live performances, and still
distribute recordings of those live performances.


Who said they didn't? And those concerts sound just like the studio
recordings except with the added audience response. They have to be that way.
The audience attends the concert to see and hear their favorite bands play
their favorite music and this music MUST sound to the live audience like it
does on the recordings the fans bought of that music.

and essentially only exist as an electronic waveform.


The same can be said of even minimal-miced orchestral performances.


That's wrong. Orchestral performances can exist without microphones, without
SR and indeed without electricity. IOW, they exist as a sound-field first.
Whatever a recording engineer/producer does with microphones is completely
after the fact and irrelevant to the music making. OTOH, rock performances
don't exist at all without these things. Solid body electric guitars make
almost no sound without their amplifier/speakers. Fender Rhodes pianos (and
other electronic keyboards) make, essentially NO sound without their
amps/speakers. Rock vocalists need a microphone to do what they do and the
performance, the way the audience hears it, does not even exist outside of
the mixing console. That's why, when on tour, rock groups have to take their
mixing consoles with them. The difference here, is that instead of the "mix"
going to a recorder, it goes to SR amps and speakers. That way, the audience
hears their favorite band playing their favorite songs in a way that sounds
just like the recordings of those songs.

IOW, I don't get your point.

  #49   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 16:33:43 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):

On the time line they claim attendance for a concert in 1936 to be
over 26,000 so that would suggest that even back then it was as big a
"house" then as it is now.
The photos from 1945 show a vast array of microphones. Maybe just to
record the orchestra? Maybe sound reinforcement.


Most likely broadcast.

I have been to many non classical concerts at the bowl but I have only
been to two classical concerts and that was only because a friend of
mine was playing.

The bowl really is rich in it's history but it really is a crap venue
for any sort of concert. I only go if there is no alternative for a
must see concert. The Greek just down the road is so much better and
the John Anson Ford Theater is better still although it is really
small. It is ironic that the L.A. Phil lives in arguably the best
concert hall in the world during it's regular season and the worst
venue in the world for their summer season.


It wasn't always a terrible venue. Back in the mid-sixties, the LA
Philharmonic played at the 'Bowl often during the summer. I heard three
concerts there, but I don't remember the conductor. Perhaps it was the LA
Philharmonic's young Music Director, Zubin Mehta, but perhaps not. There was
so much musical talent in LA in those days, that it could have been anybody
from Andre Previn to Miklos Rozsa. (although I suspect I would have
remembered them).

In the old shell, They sounded great even though I was in the second tier of
seats off to the left. I could still see and hear them perfectly. Same with
a string quartet I heard a few weeks later. Whatever it became, it was a
pretty good natural amphitheater with good acoustics for much of it's
history. The modern shell, erected in 2005, might require SR (and maybe not.
Once the decision was made to build-in SR facilities, whether or not a venue
actually NEEDS the SR facilities of not becomes moot. The venue is going to
use them as a matter of course).

  #50   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Gary Eickmeier Gary Eickmeier is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,449
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

Well, I can't say that. There were rooms playing some fairly impressive
stuff
(with or without my jazz recording playing). I was impressed by the new
Magico S5, the MBL-101s (again, as usual), the big YG acoustics speakers,
the
biggest Focal speakers (don't recall the model numbers) and the KEF
"Blades".
And of course, the most jaw dropping of all, the aforementioned Wilson
Alexandria XLFs. All showed me that at least at the "cost-is-no-object"
end
of the spectrum, speakers are improving. I heard cone speakers (virtually
all
of the speakers mentioned were cone designs) especially, are now doing
things
that 20 years ago, I would have bet money that come speakers could NEVER
do.
Maybe Jenn's jaded. It does happen.


Preface, you guys aren't going to believe much of this, because you just
hate Bose 901s, but here is my story and I'm sticking to it.

I was just playing the Sheffield Creme de la Creme album because it contains
one cut from the Harry James Version album, Corner Pocket, which is terrific
and has some great horns in it. They sounded fine, so I nudged the gain up a
bit, and they sounded even finer. But they still didn't pierce the air over
all the other instruments like they do live, so I nudged it a little more,
then more yet - and I sat astonished at the liveness that these little
beasties can pump out. It wasn't long before the bass was thumping my chest,
the drum kit was kicking and tingling the air like no other percussion
instrument can, except maybe piano wihich is also superb on my system, and
the horns were still fine and beginning to pierce on out there.

Brought a couple of thoughts to bear on AE's question. How can my 901s do
such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch dome
tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust cap
behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs), and I have
two up front plus two for surround plus a center speaker that has two
drivers, but is also pretty good on dynamics. It harkened me back to the
early days at Pecar Electronics in Detroit, when I had one of AE's "that HAS
to be live music in there" moments, only it wasn't, it was one stupid pair
of 901s hanging from chains in front of a reflective wall and playing some
rock music like LOUD. I have in my current system those four 901s plus the
Velodyne F-1800 sub, and the main speakers are driven by Carver m1500s to
the tune of 600 watts per channel. Bose says these speakers can take any
amount of power that you want to shove in them, and I think I have just
proved it.

Second thought, so the name of the game is DYNAMICS pure and simple. Forget
my descriptions above if you are Bose Bashers and not paying attention any
more because you don't believe any of it.

OK, so, dynamics. Digital is capable of much greater dynamics than analog
ever was, but as recording engineers you know well that it is really hard to
catch all of the dynamics without overloading at some point, and the high
frequencies are the scariest part, because they will drive the needles over
the top in a heartbeat, so you give yourself a little headroom and hold the
gain down, back off a little from the instruments, raise the mikes in the
air to get a more even balance from front to back, a lot of things so that
you don't get the dread digital clipping.

Live music doesn't have that problem. It can just get louder and louder and
the dynamics are sometimes a major part of the enjoyment. They take great
pleasure in "shocking" you with a riff here and there that you weren't
expecting.

Anyway, hard to catch in a pure digital recording, but these Sheffield discs
started out life as analog recordings - very good analog, maybe tape maybe
direct to disc, but carefully made. THEN, to transfer these to CD, they
already know precisely how loud each part of each section is going to be,
and they can master a more dynamic digital track than if it was live digital
recording. If the horns are the limiting factor in setting the gain, so be
it, but they can be mastered at max levels without distorting and if your
system can handle that, there is no reason you can't have live sounding
music at home.

Crank it up.

Gary Eickmeier





  #51   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 20:12:34 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

Well, I can't say that. There were rooms playing some fairly impressive
stuff
(with or without my jazz recording playing). I was impressed by the new
Magico S5, the MBL-101s (again, as usual), the big YG acoustics speakers,
the
biggest Focal speakers (don't recall the model numbers) and the KEF
"Blades".
And of course, the most jaw dropping of all, the aforementioned Wilson
Alexandria XLFs. All showed me that at least at the "cost-is-no-object"
end
of the spectrum, speakers are improving. I heard cone speakers (virtually
all
of the speakers mentioned were cone designs) especially, are now doing
things
that 20 years ago, I would have bet money that come speakers could NEVER
do.
Maybe Jenn's jaded. It does happen.


Preface, you guys aren't going to believe much of this, because you just
hate Bose 901s, but here is my story and I'm sticking to it.

I was just playing the Sheffield Creme de la Creme album because it contains
one cut from the Harry James Version album, Corner Pocket, which is terrific
and has some great horns in it. They sounded fine, so I nudged the gain up a
bit, and they sounded even finer. But they still didn't pierce the air over
all the other instruments like they do live, so I nudged it a little more,
then more yet - and I sat astonished at the liveness that these little
beasties can pump out. It wasn't long before the bass was thumping my chest,
the drum kit was kicking and tingling the air like no other percussion
instrument can, except maybe piano wihich is also superb on my system, and
the horns were still fine and beginning to pierce on out there.

Brought a couple of thoughts to bear on AE's question. How can my 901s do
such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch dome
tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust cap
behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs), and I have
two up front plus two for surround plus a center speaker that has two
drivers, but is also pretty good on dynamics. It harkened me back to the
early days at Pecar Electronics in Detroit, when I had one of AE's "that HAS
to be live music in there" moments, only it wasn't, it was one stupid pair
of 901s hanging from chains in front of a reflective wall and playing some
rock music like LOUD. I have in my current system those four 901s plus the
Velodyne F-1800 sub, and the main speakers are driven by Carver m1500s to
the tune of 600 watts per channel. Bose says these speakers can take any
amount of power that you want to shove in them, and I think I have just
proved it.

Second thought, so the name of the game is DYNAMICS pure and simple. Forget
my descriptions above if you are Bose Bashers and not paying attention any
more because you don't believe any of it.

OK, so, dynamics. Digital is capable of much greater dynamics than analog
ever was, but as recording engineers you know well that it is really hard to
catch all of the dynamics without overloading at some point, and the high
frequencies are the scariest part, because they will drive the needles over
the top in a heartbeat, so you give yourself a little headroom and hold the
gain down, back off a little from the instruments, raise the mikes in the
air to get a more even balance from front to back, a lot of things so that
you don't get the dread digital clipping.

Live music doesn't have that problem. It can just get louder and louder and
the dynamics are sometimes a major part of the enjoyment. They take great
pleasure in "shocking" you with a riff here and there that you weren't
expecting.

Anyway, hard to catch in a pure digital recording, but these Sheffield discs
started out life as analog recordings - very good analog, maybe tape maybe
direct to disc, but carefully made. THEN, to transfer these to CD, they
already know precisely how loud each part of each section is going to be,
and they can master a more dynamic digital track than if it was live digital
recording. If the horns are the limiting factor in setting the gain, so be
it, but they can be mastered at max levels without distorting and if your
system can handle that, there is no reason you can't have live sounding
music at home.

Crank it up.

Gary Eickmeier




You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just don't
want to come too close to that MSB. While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you never
want to do so in digital. Of course, that means that you can set the gain low
so that peaks never exceed -3 or so on the meters, and if an analog recording
engineer were watching over your shoulder, he might accuse you of recording
down in the "mud". Of course digital's wide dynamic range essentially means
that, especially with 24-bit or DSD, that "down in the mud" comment really
hasn't any meaning. as, even in 16-bit, the "mud" is about 30dB below the
level or magnetic tape. But the dynamic range of an actual musical
performance can exceed even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.
Whether this has anything to do with reproduced music never being able to
fool you into thinking it's real, I don't know.

On the Bose 901 front. I have to admit that I haven't heard a pair of 901s
since the early 'Seventies. What I heard then, I didn't like. That
artificially boosted bass (with tape-loop control box), the lack of decent
highs (no tweeters) and the lack of image specificity, really turned me off.
I suspect that Bose has continued to develop the 901s, and for all I know
they might have improved considerably in the ensuing years. I must make a
point to give the latest ones another listen. So any comments I make about
Bose speakers are about the early generations of these speakers, not the
later models.
  #52   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Jenn[_2_] Jenn[_2_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2,752
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

In article ,
Audio Empire wrote:

On Wed, 29 Aug 2012 05:45:54 -0700, Jenn wrote
(in article ):

call, email, call again your state
and local representatives


Nice Idea. Unfortunately, no one will pay the slightest attention to you.
They'll mumble platitudes, yes. "Thank you for your concern." We share your
concerns, but.... Nothing will be done because it's a matter of money. The
world has become so greedy and revenues have lagged so far behind costs over
the last half-century, that all schools can do is cut programs, slash
budgets, and layoff teachers. These "non-essential" programs like music
appreciation go first. They can't cut athletics because they actually
bring-in money to the schools (football games, basketball games, baseball
games, track and field meets, swimming competitions, etc). But they can cut
the arts. And we raise another generation of kids who are never even
introduced to the finer things in life. No wonder symphony orchestra concert
venues and high-definition broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera at movie
theaters are a sea of gray, silver and blue hair.


Mostly they don't pay attention, but sometimes they do, depending on the
size of the response. The "sometimes" makes it worth the effort, in my
view.

And yes, audiences are pretty blue haired, but I see encouraging signs.
For example, the LAPO is riding the youth, vigor, and excitement of
Dudamel (and a pretty young orchestra) plus the excitement of Disney
Hall and a downtown revival, to market to a younger crowd and it seems
to be working. Other ensembles (like my own) are doing performances
with multimedia aspects, inviting the audience to blog, etc. We'll see
what the long terms effect is.

--
www.jennifermartinmusic.com
  #53   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Jenn[_2_] Jenn[_2_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2,752
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

In article ,
Audio Empire wrote:

On Fri, 31 Aug 2012 03:51:52 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article ):


Jenn's remark about not being impressed with anything at the show may be due
to not having your recording at hand, which is more food for thought.


Well, I can't say that. There were rooms playing some fairly impressive stuff
(with or without my jazz recording playing). I was impressed by the new
Magico S5, the MBL-101s (again, as usual), the big YG acoustics speakers, the
biggest Focal speakers (don't recall the model numbers) and the KEF "Blades".
And of course, the most jaw dropping of all, the aforementioned Wilson
Alexandria XLFs. All showed me that at least at the "cost-is-no-object" end
of the spectrum, speakers are improving. I heard cone speakers (virtually all
of the speakers mentioned were cone designs) especially, are now doing things
that 20 years ago, I would have bet money that come speakers could NEVER do.
Maybe Jenn's jaded. It does happen.


Oh, I wouldn't say that I'm jaded at all. I heard things that impressed
me at the shows, but they weren't the huge buck systems, which were more
often that not, playing way too loudly for my taste. The KEF Blades
were indeed wonderful, and as I mentioned, I loved the little LS5s. I'm
encouraged by what can be had for really reasonable money these days
(including in the analogue area), but I'm also concerned about where the
prices are on the upper end these days.

--
www.jennifermartinmusic.com

  #54   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Andrew Haley Andrew Haley is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 155
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

Audio Empire wrote:

But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed
even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.


Bluff. 32-bit PCM has a (theoretical) dynamic range of ~ 190
decibels, the ratio of the quietest sound anyone can hear to the blast
of a pound of TNT ten feet away, which would certainly deafen you. As
far as I'm aware it's not possible to make an analogue to digital
converter with such a range anyway: it'd need self noise of 0.25
microvolts and 1 kV full scale!

I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is.
The greatest range I've personally experienced in an audience is a
performance of _Monochrome_ by Maki Ishii, which exceeds 60dB from the
quietest drumming at the start to the crescendo. This can lead to
some practical problems with audibility in a concert hall because it
is hard to hear over people breathing and occasionally coughing.

Andrew.

  #55   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Gary Eickmeier Gary Eickmeier is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,449
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...


You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just don't
want to come too close to that MSB. While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you never
want to do so in digital. Of course, that means that you can set the gain
low
so that peaks never exceed -3 or so on the meters, and if an analog
recording
engineer were watching over your shoulder, he might accuse you of
recording
down in the "mud". Of course digital's wide dynamic range essentially
means
that, especially with 24-bit or DSD, that "down in the mud" comment really
hasn't any meaning. as, even in 16-bit, the "mud" is about 30dB below the
level or magnetic tape. But the dynamic range of an actual musical
performance can exceed even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.
Whether this has anything to do with reproduced music never being able to
fool you into thinking it's real, I don't know.


Yes - I forgot that there are higher bit systems for recording. In fact, I
have at least one of those, in the form of a Tascam DR-01. The Zoom might
also be able to go up, I forget. I wonder if some sort of compander might be
employed even in digital, so that you can record a huge dynamic range
without fear, then re-expand it upon mastering.


On the Bose 901 front. I have to admit that I haven't heard a pair of 901s
since the early 'Seventies. What I heard then, I didn't like. That
artificially boosted bass (with tape-loop control box), the lack of decent
highs (no tweeters) and the lack of image specificity, really turned me
off.
I suspect that Bose has continued to develop the 901s, and for all I know
they might have improved considerably in the ensuing years. I must make a
point to give the latest ones another listen. So any comments I make about
Bose speakers are about the early generations of these speakers, not the
later models.


Well, certainly they have improved in many ways, such as the surrounds being
more impervious to Florida humidity destroying them. The sound? Perhaps in
the dynamics a little due to refined drivers. But no, you probably would
still not get a good demo of them in any environs except my own home. Even
the company has not learned how to use them properly. I am on the Series VI
now, and the manual still has us putting the speakers a foot or two from the
walls, where mine are pulled out five feet from all walls, a la standard
audiophile practice and IAW Image Model Theory.

The "no highs" accusation because they don't have tweeters (darn it) is
simply not true. I have measured them many times on various occasions, and
they go behond 16k I know. But the beauty of them is that the basic response
does not change as you get louder - all freqs, including the highs, just
keep getting louder and more dynamic, unlike perhaps a ribbon or a Quad
ESL-63 or something.

On the imaging, this is again totally dependent on the positioning of the
speakers, and when you get it right, by accident or by listening to me,
everything comes into focus and you suddenly understand what causes the
imaging qualities that "the big boys" try to charge you the big bucks for
and seldom quite get right. My imaging does not change with frequency and
all sounds come from the same point in space where they originated in the
recording, rather than coming forward with frequency or collapsing to the
speaker grills. The speakers totally disappear and project a soundstage
behind and beside them.

In this latest adventure with them, I noticed something new again - as I
cranked them up more and more, the image layering front to back increased to
an even more realistic degree, i.e. forward sounds came a little further
forward and rearward sounds recessed more, surprisingly. Maybe because I am
hearing deeper into the recording as I turn the gain up.

I wish you could be here. I will have to tear down this system some fine day
around 5 years from now, and in our new apartment none of this will be
possible ever again. If any of you are in Florida please give me a call
863-670-0850.

Gary Eickmeier





  #56   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Sun, 2 Sep 2012 10:42:06 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...


You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just don't
want to come too close to that MSB. While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you never
want to do so in digital. Of course, that means that you can set the gain
low
so that peaks never exceed -3 or so on the meters, and if an analog
recording
engineer were watching over your shoulder, he might accuse you of
recording
down in the "mud". Of course digital's wide dynamic range essentially
means
that, especially with 24-bit or DSD, that "down in the mud" comment really
hasn't any meaning. as, even in 16-bit, the "mud" is about 30dB below the
level or magnetic tape. But the dynamic range of an actual musical
performance can exceed even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.
Whether this has anything to do with reproduced music never being able to
fool you into thinking it's real, I don't know.


Yes - I forgot that there are higher bit systems for recording. In fact, I
have at least one of those, in the form of a Tascam DR-01. The Zoom might
also be able to go up, I forget. I wonder if some sort of compander might be
employed even in digital, so that you can record a huge dynamic range
without fear, then re-expand it upon mastering.


I don't know. signal "companding" brings along with it it's own set of
problems. I used to record using Dolby "A" and unless you put a calibration
tone before each "take" and got the calibration spot-on on playback you
could hear the artifacts. The DBX round-trip companding scheme was even more
demanding because it was a full-spectrum companding.

  #57   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just don't
want to come too close to that MSB.


This is an audiophile myth, just as surely as the idea that having extensive
unused power reserves makes power amps sound better.

Craftsmanship suggests that you don't want to clip, but actual listening
reveals that a few short overages will escape even the most critical ear.

While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you never
want to do so in digital.


That's primarily because the position of the 0 dB mark on analog tape
recorders is almost always a judgement call.

In some people's minds 0 dB was supposed to represent 1 % THD or 3% THD at
400 Hz or 1 KHz, but in reality things were never stable enough to make
those points stable, repeatible, or even necessarily audibly meaningful.

In contrast, digital FS is a stable, reliable, well-defined point. As a rule
its the same at every frequency in the audio band.


  #58   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Andrew Haley" wrote in message
...

Audio Empire wrote:


But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed
even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.


Bluff.


True. If there actually were musical performancese that exceeded the the
range of 16 bits, then we should be able to find them on DSD or 24 bit PCM.

I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is.


I've found some recordings of Beethoven Symphonies on the Bis label that
pushed up into the middle 80s.

The greatest range I've personally experienced in an audience is a
performance of _Monochrome_ by Maki Ishii, which exceeds 60dB from the
quietest drumming at the start to the crescendo.


My CD-Rcorder coincident mic recordings at music festivals not infrequencly
push up into that range. I've done some 24 bit test recordings with
computer audio interfaces that had 110 dB dynamic range, and found that the
electronic noise floor of my setup was about 93 dB down. If I applied
phantom power to the mics, then room tone reduced that to about 70 dB.
However, allowing living breathing performers into the room pushed the noise
floor up a little more and I was back around 65 dB. If we could just
address thase annoying habits of performers such as breathing, having
beating hearts or moving their bodies!

This can lead to
some practical problems with audibility in a concert hall because it
is hard to hear over people breathing and occasionally coughing.


Or just being alive, beating hearts included.

  #59   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Dick Pierce[_2_] Dick Pierce[_2_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 151
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
How can my 901s do
such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch dome

tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust cap
behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs)


This is not about Bose, but rather about Mr. Eickmeiers specific,
testable technical assertion:

"the dust cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs"

Simply stated, it most assuredly does NOT.

WE may safely assume that what Mr. Eickmeier is claiming is
that the 1" dust cap of a 4" driver has the same behaviour
as a 1" purpose-designed dome tweeter. The two differ
in profound and fundamental ways. Let's just look at a few.

First, let's compare the voice coils. The voice coil and
former of a 4" driver is longer, thicker, has more wire on
it and thus is SUBSTANTIALLY heavier than the voice coil of
a purpose-built 1" dome tweeter. By "substantial" I assert,
having measure literally thousands of such beasts, it's
a minimum of 4 to 5 times heavier.

Second. the mechanical tolerances required of a 4" driver
are very different and result in the magnetic gap being
substantiall (by a factor of 2) wider than that of a typical
1" dome tweeter. The result is a substantially lower
magnetic reluctance and thus a higher flux density in the gap.

Third, the effective moving mass of the 4" driver is at a
minimum or order of magnitude (that's a factor of 10) higher
than that of a 1" dome tweeter. Why? Because the 1" dome
tweeter's moving mass is not encumbered with the moving mass
of the spider, the entire rest of that 4" diaphragm, the
surround, the lead-in wires, and so on.

Fourth, the radiating area of a 1" dome tweeter at 10-15 kHz
is pretty much a 1" diameter dome. That of a 4" driver at
those frequencies is substantially greater.

The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.

--
+--------------------------------+
+ Dick Pierce |
+ Professional Audio Development |
+--------------------------------+
  #60   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Mon, 3 Sep 2012 07:54:49 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just don't
want to come too close to that MSB.


This is an audiophile myth, just as surely as the idea that having extensive
unused power reserves makes power amps sound better.


I'll tell you what you do, overmodulate PCM so that you're trying to use
more bits than you have and watch what happens!

Craftsmanship suggests that you don't want to clip, but actual listening
reveals that a few short overages will escape even the most critical ear.


In analog that's true. Especially on a good pro tape recorder at 15 ips.
I've had recorders (like my old Otari MX2020) where you could bang the
needles against their pins momentarily with no APPARENT audible effect
(although I'm sure you could measure it at greater than 3%, you just can't
hear it) In digital recording, that kind of laissez-faire attitude toward
100% modulation is a distinct no-no.

While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you never
want to do so in digital.


That's primarily because the position of the 0 dB mark on analog tape
recorders is almost always a judgement call.


It shouldn't be a judgement call. There is an ANSI spec for reel-ro-reel
tape. It's supposed to be: 0 VU = +4dBu = 1.23 V AC RMS or a fluxivity of 320
nWb/m. I used to always calibrate my tape recorders to that standard. Now, it
is true that with most CONSUMER tape recorders, that spec is reduced to *10dB
= 100% modulation or "0 Vu" or 200 nWb/m of fluxivity. That. BTW, is what
Dolby B was calibrated at for reel-to-reel tape but the Dolby "A" calibration
tape was 320 nWb/m at 400 Hz, however. The original Bell Labs spec called for
this spec to be adhered to at 1KHz, but the NAB used 700 Hz and a lot of pro
recorders used 400 or 500 Hz as the reference. In reality, the difference
between 400, 500, 700, or 1KHz is negligible as any pro recorder worth it's
salt is going to be ruler flat at any of those frequencies.

In some people's minds 0 dB was supposed to represent 1 % THD or 3% THD at
400 Hz or 1 KHz, but in reality things were never stable enough to make
those points stable, repeatible, or even necessarily audibly meaningful.


0 Vu or 100% modulation is not defined by the distortion in the ANSI or NAB
spec, it is merely defined as a voltage level or more usefully, a coercivity
spec. However a rule of thumb in a properly calibrated pro analog tape
recorder is that 0 Vu = 1% distortion and +3dB = 3%. But again, that's based
on a combination of characteristics including head and tape saturation levels
at a given frequency as well as the linearity of the recorder's electronics
and the amount of distortion present in the bias signal.

I used to know a guy who recorded on an Ampex 350 transport fitted with the
latest design sintered ferrous heads from Nortronics with some custom tubed
electronics that he built using the high-end audiophile practices of the day.
He took the standard Ampex record/playback electronics and rebuilt them using
simplified circuitry with metal film resistors replacing the carbon variety
and "WonderCaps" polypropylene capacitors replacing the original paper
capacitors for the larger stuff and polystyrene caps replacing the mica and
ceramic capacitors for the smaller values. The recordings he made were the
cleanest reel-to-reel tape recordings I've ever heard. He let the needles
bang the pin so hard that they often looked like they were stuck there during
orchestral crescendi! But on playback, one never heard the slightest soupcon
of audible distortion. Amazing.

Don't know what happened to him, but he did produce a couple of records for
the Musical Heritage Society while he was doing that.

In contrast, digital FS is a stable, reliable, well-defined point. As a rule
its the same at every frequency in the audio band.


Yes, thank whatever gods there may be, that we don't have to sit for hours in
front of a tape recorder before a session, calibrating, first the playback
using a standard calibration tape, and then the recording bias and eq using
an oscillator to make sure that the round-trip response was flat to at least
15 KHz. And that's the drill if you WEREN'T using Dolby A or DBX!

Digital recording has put all that in the past and frankly, good riddance!


  #61   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Sep 3, 7:56*am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Andrew Haley" wrote in message

...

Audio Empire wrote:
But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed
even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.

Bluff.


True. If there actually were musical performancese that exceeded the the
range of 16 bits, then we should be able to find them on DSD or 24 bit PCM.

I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is.


I've found some recordings of Beethoven Symphonies on the Bis label that
pushed up into the middle 80s.

The greatest range I've personally experienced in an audience is a
performance of _Monochrome_ by Maki Ishii, which exceeds 60dB from the
quietest drumming at the start to the crescendo.


My CD-Rcorder coincident mic recordings at music festivals not infrequencly
push up into that range. *I've done some 24 bit test recordings with
computer audio interfaces that had 110 dB dynamic range, and found that the
electronic noise floor of my setup was about 93 dB down. If I applied
phantom power to the mics, then room tone reduced that to about 70 dB.
However, allowing living breathing performers into the room pushed the noise
floor up a little more and I was back around 65 dB. *If we could just
address thase annoying habits of performers such as breathing, having
beating hearts or moving their bodies!

*This can lead to
some practical problems with audibility in a concert hall because it
is hard to hear over people breathing and occasionally coughing.


Or just being alive, beating hearts included.


The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.

  #62   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Mon, 3 Sep 2012 16:59:10 -0700, Dick Pierce wrote
(in article ):

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
How can my 901s do
such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch
dome

tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust
cap
behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs)


This is not about Bose, but rather about Mr. Eickmeiers specific,
testable technical assertion:

"the dust cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs"

Simply stated, it most assuredly does NOT.


You are right. The dust cap might be one inch or less in diameter, but
the frequency response of the driver is determined by the dynamics of
the entire driver, not just its dust-cap. If the rest of the speaker
has poor response at, say, 15 KHz, then so does the dust-cap.

WE may safely assume that what Mr. Eickmeier is claiming is
that the 1" dust cap of a 4" driver has the same behaviour
as a 1" purpose-designed dome tweeter. The two differ
in profound and fundamental ways. Let's just look at a few.


Yep.

First, let's compare the voice coils. The voice coil and
former of a 4" driver is longer, thicker, has more wire on
it and thus is SUBSTANTIALLY heavier than the voice coil of
a purpose-built 1" dome tweeter. By "substantial" I assert,
having measured literally thousands of such beasts, it's
a minimum of 4 to 5 times heavier.

Second. the mechanical tolerances required of a 4" driver
are very different and result in the magnetic gap being
substantiall (by a factor of 2) wider than that of a typical
1" dome tweeter. The result is a substantially lower
magnetic reluctance and thus a higher flux density in the gap.

Third, the effective moving mass of the 4" driver is at a
minimum or order of magnitude (that's a factor of 10) higher
than that of a 1" dome tweeter. Why? Because the 1" dome
tweeter's moving mass is not encumbered with the moving mass
of the spider, the entire rest of that 4" diaphragm, the
surround, the lead-in wires, and so on.

Fourth, the radiating area of a 1" dome tweeter at 10-15 kHz
is pretty much a 1" diameter dome. That of a 4" driver at
those frequencies is substantially greater.

The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.


That matches my thoughts on the subject as well. I think that Gary is
comparing his dust-cover theory to "whizzer cones" a popular concept
in the late 1950's and early 1960's. I worked at that time (as a
teenager) for a large stereo shop in Washington DC. A couple of the
test instruments we had in the shop was a Ballentine Audio generator
and (as I recall) a B&K sound level meter with an attached, calibrated
microphone (equalized flat to 20KHz). I once took an Electrovoice
"Wolverine" 12" "full-range" speaker (with whizzer cone) in a Karlson
enclosure and ran a frequency response sweep on it. EV advertised
that the whizzer cone was "good" to 13K. Well, it depends upon one's
definition of good, I suppose. If Â*9 dB at 13 KHz (relative to 1K)
is "good" Then I guess it was.

You can't get around needing a purpose-built tweeter because the
design criteria for speakers with the speed, dispersion and low
distrotion required for tweeters are pretty specialized.
  #63   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Scott" wrote in message
...
On Sep 3, 7:56 am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Andrew Haley" wrote in message

...

Audio Empire wrote:
But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed
even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.

Bluff.


True. If there actually were musical performancese that exceeded the the
range of 16 bits, then we should be able to find them on DSD or 24 bit
PCM.

I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is.


I've found some recordings of Beethoven Symphonies on the Bis label that
pushed up into the middle 80s.

The greatest range I've personally experienced in an audience is a
performance of _Monochrome_ by Maki Ishii, which exceeds 60dB from the
quietest drumming at the start to the crescendo.


My CD-Rcorder coincident mic recordings at music festivals not
infrequencly
push up into that range. I've done some 24 bit test recordings with
computer audio interfaces that had 110 dB dynamic range, and found that
the
electronic noise floor of my setup was about 93 dB down. If I applied
phantom power to the mics, then room tone reduced that to about 70 dB.
However, allowing living breathing performers into the room pushed the
noise
floor up a little more and I was back around 65 dB. If we could just
address thase annoying habits of performers such as breathing, having
beating hearts or moving their bodies!

This can lead to
some practical problems with audibility in a concert hall because it
is hard to hear over people breathing and occasionally coughing.


Or just being alive, beating hearts included.


The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.


Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.

Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent air
in and around the ducts and vents.

Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.



  #64   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 3 Sep 2012 07:54:49 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just
don't
want to come too close to that MSB.


This is an audiophile myth, just as surely as the idea that having
extensive
unused power reserves makes power amps sound better.


I'll tell you what you do, overmodulate PCM so that you're trying to use
more bits than you have and watch what happens!


You seem to labor under the false belief that I don't already know. In fact
the true statement is that not being there, you have no idea about what
happens.

Craftsmanship suggests that you don't want to clip, but actual listening
reveals that a few short overages will escape even the most critical ear.


In analog that's true.


Also true with digital. Brick wall filters in the amplitude domain are just
like brick wall filters in the frequency domain - they can remove
significant amounts of program material and as long as it is below the
thresholds of audibility, it doesn't matter.

Thing is, there is no such thing that is as well known for the amplitude
domain as the Fletcher Munson curves are for the frequency domain. However,
people who observe such things know that the human tolerance for clipping is
greater than zero and very dependent on the circumstance.

A certain amount of lore about digital clipping was based on converters that
didn't clip cleanly. As a rule, modern ones do clip cleanly. So much for
thinking rooted in the 1980s...

Especially on a good pro tape recorder at 15 ips.
I've had recorders (like my old Otari MX2020) where you could bang the
needles against their pins momentarily with no APPARENT audible effect
(although I'm sure you could measure it at greater than 3%, you just can't
hear it) In digital recording, that kind of laissez-faire attitude toward
100% modulation is a distinct no-no.


Apparently, only in the minds of people who lack experience with good modern
equipment.

While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you
never
want to do so in digital.


That's primarily because the position of the 0 dB mark on analog tape
recorders is almost always a judgement call.


It shouldn't be a judgement call. There is an ANSI spec for reel-ro-reel
tape. It's supposed to be: 0 VU = +4dBu = 1.23 V AC RMS or a fluxivity of
320
nWb/m.


That would be a contemporary standard whose conformance is as it is in the
judgement of the people who do the work. Legacy recordings vary for
systematic reasons, and contemporary recordings vary because people are
people.


  #65   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Tue, 4 Sep 2012 10:40:00 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 3 Sep 2012 07:54:49 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

You've brought-up a good point. When recording digitally, you just
don't
want to come too close to that MSB.

This is an audiophile myth, just as surely as the idea that having
extensive
unused power reserves makes power amps sound better.


I'll tell you what you do, overmodulate PCM so that you're trying to use
more bits than you have and watch what happens!


You seem to labor under the false belief that I don't already know. In fact
the true statement is that not being there, you have no idea about what
happens.


Having heard the effects of overmodulating digital into clipping many years
ago, I "don't go there". Why should I?

Craftsmanship suggests that you don't want to clip, but actual listening
reveals that a few short overages will escape even the most critical ear.


In analog that's true.


Also true with digital. Brick wall filters in the amplitude domain are just
like brick wall filters in the frequency domain - they can remove
significant amounts of program material and as long as it is below the
thresholds of audibility, it doesn't matter.

Thing is, there is no such thing that is as well known for the amplitude
domain as the Fletcher Munson curves are for the frequency domain. However,
people who observe such things know that the human tolerance for clipping is
greater than zero and very dependent on the circumstance.

A certain amount of lore about digital clipping was based on converters that
didn't clip cleanly. As a rule, modern ones do clip cleanly. So much for
thinking rooted in the 1980s...


Well since I never allow clipping, I wouldn't necessarily know that, now
would I?

Especially on a good pro tape recorder at 15 ips.
I've had recorders (like my old Otari MX2020) where you could bang the
needles against their pins momentarily with no APPARENT audible effect
(although I'm sure you could measure it at greater than 3%, you just can't
hear it) In digital recording, that kind of laissez-faire attitude toward
100% modulation is a distinct no-no.


Apparently, only in the minds of people who lack experience with good modern
equipment.


I suspect that I have at least as much experience with "good modern
equipment" as you do.

While a pro analog tape machine can go
over the 0 Vu mark occasionally with little or no consequences, you
never
want to do so in digital.


That's primarily because the position of the 0 dB mark on analog tape
recorders is almost always a judgement call.


It shouldn't be a judgement call. There is an ANSI spec for reel-ro-reel
tape. It's supposed to be: 0 VU = +4dBu = 1.23 V AC RMS or a fluxivity of
320
nWb/m.


That would be a contemporary standard whose conformance is as it is in the
judgement of the people who do the work. Legacy recordings vary for
systematic reasons, and contemporary recordings vary because people are
people.


That "contemporary standard" of 0 Vu = 1.23 VRMS as you call it was first
agreed upon by Bell Labs, CBS and NBC in 1939 originally for network use of
phone lines to carry network programming and for STLs. The coercivity spec
was agreed upon by the NAB (then the NARTB) and SMPTE in the early 1950's. As
far as the use of the coercivity spec is concerned, you can't calibrate a
tape recorder and guarantee it's round-trip frequency response (and
distortion) specs without using a standard calibration tape and every studio
in the country had them. They all conformed to the 320 nWb/m = 0 Vu because
that's the standard. If you don't calibrate your playback side first, you
can't calibrate your record side. Now, it's true that the DIN spec was a
little different, and the British used a different spec as well. But sometime
in the 1960's they converged as I recall (possibly because Willi Studer and
Nagra sold so many of their pro machines here in the USA).


  #66   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Sep 4, 10:39=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Scott" wrote in message
...


[quoted text deleted -- deb]

The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.


Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.

Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent air
in and around the ducts and vents.

Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.


I believe the question posed was what is the dynamic range of the real
world for us as listeners. If you don't like the sound of the rooms
you are recording in I suggest finding better rooms. But that sound,
whether or not you approve of it is part of the real world and is not
noise in the same sense as you have noise in the gear itself. so if
one is actually interested in capturing everything one can hear one
does need a dynamic range of at least 120 dB. At least. If one is
interested in getting it without gross distortion one needs
substantially more headroom.
  #67   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Tue, 4 Sep 2012 16:36:09 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):

On Sep 4, 10:39=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Scott" wrote in message
...


[quoted text deleted -- deb]

The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.


Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.

Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent air
in and around the ducts and vents.

Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.


I believe the question posed was what is the dynamic range of the real
world for us as listeners. If you don't like the sound of the rooms
you are recording in I suggest finding better rooms. But that sound,
whether or not you approve of it is part of the real world and is not
noise in the same sense as you have noise in the gear itself. so if
one is actually interested in capturing everything one can hear one
does need a dynamic range of at least 120 dB. At least. If one is
interested in getting it without gross distortion one needs
substantially more headroom.


Exactly. The dynamic range that I was talking about is on the top end of the
loudness scale anyway... the noise floor being a case of "it is what it is."
But Mr. Kruger brings up a good point. The recordable dynamic range, that is
to say, the actual difference between the noise floor (whether that floor be
technology limited as with analog tape or environmentally limited like HVAC
systems and traffic outside of the venue or people noises) is generally far
short of what the technological dynamic range is for modern digital
recording. The truth is that we must set the levels high-enough for the
tripple "p" sounds to be captured in spite of the ambient noise level of the
venue yet at the same time, be able to capture the tripple "f" crescendi of
the orchestra during instrumental climaxes without distortion.

The main advantage of 24/32-bit PCM recording or DSD recording is that you
can record wide dynamic range material without the danger of overmodulating
and distortion. You just record at a lower average value. There are dynamic
limitations on both ends of the loudness scale, and having enough bits to
comfortably record everything without resorting to gain-riding is a real
luxury. Take it from somebody who spent a lot of years recording in 16-bit,
first on video tape, using a Sony F1 and a Betamax recorder, and later using
an Otari R-DAT recorder. 24-bit was a real help when it became generally
available to modest location recordists like myself.
  #68   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Sebastian Kaliszewski Sebastian Kaliszewski is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 82
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

Scott wrote:
On Sep 4, 10:39=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Scott" wrote in message
...


[quoted text deleted -- deb]

The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.

Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.

Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent air
in and around the ducts and vents.

Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.


I believe the question posed was what is the dynamic range of the real
world for us as listeners. If you don't like the sound of the rooms
you are recording in I suggest finding better rooms. But that sound,
whether or not you approve of it is part of the real world and is not
noise in the same sense as you have noise in the gear itself. so if
one is actually interested in capturing everything one can hear one
does need a dynamic range of at least 120 dB. At least.


Nope. Try to play 120dB SPL signal into your ears (not for long as permanent
damage will occur promptly) and then check your hearing threshold. It won't be
even close to 0dB for considerable time (measured in minutes). Even 60dB SPL
talk will sound badly attenuated (to the border of being intelligible).

It's called accomodiation. It occurs all the time to us. For example during
silent night ticking of wirswatch sometimes disturb me falling asleep. Yeat
during the day in the very same room I'm not even able to hear thet very same
wirs****ch. That's in a city. In my family's summer cottage, far from any
traffic, during a night if a weather is calm I could hear bark beetles feasting,
hear my own body noises, etc. Simply noise floor at my summercottage at calm
night is porbably around 20dB SPL, in my city apartment it rather does not fall
below 30dB (maybe 28dB if all windows are shut hardly and neighbours are asleep
or left for vacation) and 40dB during a day. We could hear 10 maybe 20dB below
wide band noise floor but not much more.

Populated concert hall is not going to have 20dB SPL ever. It's rather ~35dB if
audience is behaving (i.e. to coughing, no mobile phones in 'meeting mode') and
seats are in good technical order. In case of clubs, rock concerts, etc, noise
floor is (often many) tens dB higher.

Besides, real life orchestra does not play at 120dB when listened from audience
perspective (even first row). And were talking about real life performances not
all nonmusical stuff like jest engine at 20m distance. So 105dB of properly
dithered CD quality signal is plenty enough


If one is
interested in getting it without gross distortion one needs
substantially more headroom.


Please support that statement with actual technical arguments.

rgds
\SK
--
"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity" -- L. Lang
--
http://www.tajga.org -- (some photos from my travels)
  #69   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Sep 5, 10:27*am, Sebastian Kaliszewski
wrote:
Scott wrote:
On Sep 4, 10:39=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Scott" wrote in message
...


[quoted text deleted -- deb]


The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.
Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.


Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent air
in and around the ducts and vents.


Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.


I believe the question posed was what is the dynamic range of the real
world for us as listeners. If you don't like the sound of the rooms
you are recording in I suggest finding better rooms. But that sound,
whether or not you approve of it is part of the real world and is not
noise in the same sense as you have noise in the gear itself. so if
one is actually interested in capturing everything one can hear one
does need a dynamic range of at least 120 dB. At least.


Nope. Try to play 120dB SPL signal into your ears (not for long as permanent
damage will occur promptly) and then check your hearing threshold. It won't be
even close to 0dB for considerable time (measured in minutes). Even 60dB SPL
talk will sound badly attenuated (to the border of being intelligible).

It's called accomodiation. It occurs all the time to us. For example during
silent night ticking of wirswatch sometimes disturb me falling asleep. Yeat
during the day in the very same room I'm not even able to hear thet very same
wirs****ch. That's in a city. In my family's summer cottage, far from any
traffic, during a night if a weather is calm I could hear bark beetles feasting,
hear my own body noises, etc. Simply noise floor at my summercottage at calm
night is porbably around 20dB SPL, in my city apartment it rather does not fall
below 30dB (maybe 28dB if all windows are shut hardly and neighbours are asleep
or left for vacation) and 40dB during a day. We could hear 10 maybe 20dB below
wide band noise floor but not much more.


But what you describe is masking. Not accommodation. And certainly
listening to anything at 120 dB will cause temporary desensitization
if it is constant. But that affliction aside we still do hear at both
ends of that dynamic spectrum.


Populated concert hall is not going to have 20dB SPL ever. It's rather ~35dB if
audience is behaving (i.e. to coughing, no mobile phones in 'meeting mode') and
seats are in good technical order. In case of clubs, rock concerts, etc, noise
floor is (often many) tens dB higher.


True but that 35 dB is "signal." You are hearing it because it is
there. and if we make a recording of it we would need all of that 35
dB of signal to capture what we hear in that original acoustic event.



Besides, real life orchestra does not play at 120dB when listened from audience
perspective (even first row). And were talking about real life performances not
all nonmusical stuff like jest engine at 20m distance. So 105dB of properly
dithered CD quality signal is plenty enough


who said anything about an orchestra? The question was what is the
dynamic range of our hearing. I can hear plenty of things that are
louder than an orchestra.


If one is
interested in getting it without gross distortion one needs
substantially more headroom.


Please support that statement with actual technical arguments.


That's easy. If you have 1 bit of signal what is the distortion as
expressed in percentages? If you have 2 bits of of signal what is the
distortion? You need headroom, plenty of it if you are worried about
getting low level signals with as little distortion as possible.


  #70   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Gary Eickmeier Gary Eickmeier is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,449
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Andrew Haley" wrote in message
...
Audio Empire wrote:

But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed
even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.


Bluff. 32-bit PCM has a (theoretical) dynamic range of ~ 190
decibels, the ratio of the quietest sound anyone can hear to the blast
of a pound of TNT ten feet away, which would certainly deafen you. As
far as I'm aware it's not possible to make an analogue to digital
converter with such a range anyway: it'd need self noise of 0.25
microvolts and 1 kV full scale!

I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is.
The greatest range I've personally experienced in an audience is a
performance of _Monochrome_ by Maki Ishii, which exceeds 60dB from the
quietest drumming at the start to the crescendo. This can lead to
some practical problems with audibility in a concert hall because it
is hard to hear over people breathing and occasionally coughing.


Two things Andrew: One, I would think the 32 bit PCM would be a recording
medium only. Then you have to squeeze that into a 16 bit CD for mastering.
Two, the dynamic range problem is greater for the recording engineer than
for the audience. Mikes are usually placed much closer to the orchestra than
a good seat back in the audience. Back there, everything has mellowed out a
bit (so to speak), and the perceived dynamic range is not so bad. But up
where the mikes are, the range can be formidable. Experienced recordists
please correct me if I am wrong, but that is my impression and experience.

Gary Eickmeier





  #71   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Scott" wrote in message
...
On Sep 4, 10:39=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Scott" wrote in message
...


[quoted text deleted -- deb]

The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.


Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of
atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.

Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my
recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent
air
in and around the ducts and vents.


Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building
a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.


I believe the question posed was what is the dynamic range of the real
world for us as listeners.


The question was answered.

If you don't like the sound of the rooms
you are recording in I suggest finding better rooms.


You've got me confused with the people who organize these events, and
ultimately the people who build the rooms.

The rooms I record in are purpose built for the performance of musical and
dramatic events. Some are very good, and some are not so good.

But that sound,
whether or not you approve of it is part of the real world and is not
noise in the same sense as you have noise in the gear itself.


True, but withiout giving more information about the nature of those sounds,
no light is shed.

It is a prinicple of signal analysis that if you mix a large number of
unrelated noises both coherent and not, you end up with random noise. IOW a
large collection of independent artificial and natural noise sources in a
sonic context can add together to create a noise floor that can't be easily
distinguished from an electronic noise source by ear or by means of
instrumentation.

Some natural noise sources such as turbulent air are acoustic signals that
are difficult or impossible to distinguish from shaped electronic noise.
Their spectral and amplitude distribution can be very much alike. Nature
itself is not always very quiet. While it can be pretty quiet on a still day
in the middle of an isolated desert, throw in a few trees or some buildings,
and the natural noise floor creeps up. Add a lake or a stream, and even
quiet days are pretty noisy. And of course when things start building up,
the din is all you can stand and more.

I am probably among the few people with undergraduate and graduate
university training in signals and systems analysis who also records music
professionally on a routine basis, so you aren't going to find these
observations in every book or article about recording.

so if one is actually interested in capturing everything one can hear one
does need a dynamic range of at least 120 dB.


That idea would appear to be based on an apparent belief that there is no
such thing as threshold shifts in the human ear. In fact listening to a
sound at levels of approximately 80 dB SPL and higher sensitizes the ear in
such a way that sounds at substantially lower levels cannot be heard at the
same time, and in fact can't be heard for some time following it. The amount
of time over which the ear is desensitized can range from minutes to hours
to days to the rest of your life. If you include what we call concurrent
masking and temporal masking, this effect happens at just about any SPL that
we can hear.

Some insight to this effect can be found in this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auditory_fatigue It correctly points out that
the recovery time from auditory fatigue to to loud sounds that is not
permeanently damaging can range from minutes to days.

There is a reason why we consistently build venues with relatively poor nose
performance and tolerate performances that include numerous spurious
noises - they don't bother us because we don't perceive them.

  #72   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Sebastian Kaliszewski Sebastian Kaliszewski is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 82
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

Scott wrote:
On Sep 5, 10:27 am, Sebastian Kaliszewski
wrote:
Scott wrote:
On Sep 4, 10:39=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Scott" wrote in message
...
[quoted text deleted -- deb]
The problem with all of this is considering the room tone to be a
noise floor the same way you have noise floors in the equipment
itself. The noise floor in real life is 0 in that all the "noise" in
real life is actually signal not noise. I want to hear the sound of
the room. that isn't noise that is the sound that transports me as a
listener to that space. The true dynamic range of real life is about
120 dB depending on one's thresholds of pain.
Back in the real world, the primary sources of room tone in most
contemporary live recordings is HVAC noise and/or other forms of atmospheric
or structure-borne noise from the environment.
Every time I do a spectral analysis of room tone from one of my recordings I
see the LF spikes from the HVAC air movers and hiss from the turbulent air
in and around the ducts and vents.
Everybody who wants to suffer the economic slings and arrows of building a
120 dB dynamic range recording system in order to produce 60 dB dynamic
range recordings of HVAC and traffic noise can be my guest! As things
stand, I'm usually producing recordings of them with 30 or so dB dynamic
range, and seems to produce little concern on the part of the paying
customers. A nicely done fade in and out at the beginning and end of the
song, and all seems well.
I believe the question posed was what is the dynamic range of the real
world for us as listeners. If you don't like the sound of the rooms
you are recording in I suggest finding better rooms. But that sound,
whether or not you approve of it is part of the real world and is not
noise in the same sense as you have noise in the gear itself. so if
one is actually interested in capturing everything one can hear one
does need a dynamic range of at least 120 dB. At least.

Nope. Try to play 120dB SPL signal into your ears (not for long as permanent
damage will occur promptly) and then check your hearing threshold. It won't be
even close to 0dB for considerable time (measured in minutes). Even 60dB SPL
talk will sound badly attenuated (to the border of being intelligible).

It's called accomodiation. It occurs all the time to us. For example during
silent night ticking of wirswatch sometimes disturb me falling asleep. Yeat
during the day in the very same room I'm not even able to hear thet very same
wirs****ch. That's in a city. In my family's summer cottage, far from any
traffic, during a night if a weather is calm I could hear bark beetles feasting,
hear my own body noises, etc. Simply noise floor at my summercottage at calm
night is porbably around 20dB SPL, in my city apartment it rather does not fall
below 30dB (maybe 28dB if all windows are shut hardly and neighbours are asleep
or left for vacation) and 40dB during a day. We could hear 10 maybe 20dB below
wide band noise floor but not much more.


But what you describe is masking. Not accommodation. And certainly
listening to anything at 120 dB will cause temporary desensitization
if it is constant. But that affliction aside we still do hear at both
ends of that dynamic spectrum.

Populated concert hall is not going to have 20dB SPL ever. It's rather ~35dB if
audience is behaving (i.e. to coughing, no mobile phones in 'meeting mode') and
seats are in good technical order. In case of clubs, rock concerts, etc, noise
floor is (often many) tens dB higher.


True but that 35 dB is "signal." You are hearing it because it is
there. and if we make a recording of it we would need all of that 35
dB of signal to capture what we hear in that original acoustic event.


Nope. 20dB below that 35dB i.e. 15dB would be enough -- anything below would be
inaudible. So you have 105dB range from 15 do 120dB SPL.


Besides, real life orchestra does not play at 120dB when listened from audience
perspective (even first row). And were talking about real life performances not
all nonmusical stuff like jest engine at 20m distance. So 105dB of properly
dithered CD quality signal is plenty enough


who said anything about an orchestra?


Everyone but you. In this very branch of the thread talk was about range of
musical performances.

"But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed[...]" --
Audio Empire
"I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is." --
Andrew Haley
"If there actually were musical performancese that exceeded" -- Arny Krueger

Even the very title of this thread is "Speakers That Sound Like Music" not
"Speakers That Sound Like Jackhammer, or TNT Detonation or Jet Blast".

The question was what is the
dynamic range of our hearing. I can hear plenty of things that are
louder than an orchestra.


Some of them being the last thing you ever hear...
Anyways, 120dB is threshold of pain and in fact we don't perceive stronger
stimuli as louder but as more painful then simply directly stunning then
damaging more things that ears and finally deadly. But all of that is irrelevant
to music and musical performance.


If one is
interested in getting it without gross distortion one needs
substantially more headroom.

Please support that statement with actual technical arguments.


That's easy. If you have 1 bit of signal what is the distortion as
expressed in percentages?


In could be as low as 0.00000001% in audible range as DSD shows us

But what that has to do to your statement of requiring substantially more than
120dB range to capture real life sound?

If you have 2 bits of of signal what is the
distortion?


All other things being equal close to doubly better.

But see above.

You need headroom, plenty of it if you are worried about
getting low level signals with as little distortion as possible.


You won't hear even 10% distorion is signals being close to actual audibility
threshold, signals below actual noise floor.

It all boils down to that 120dB contains enough (=15dB) headroom to record
things. Aim at detectability threshold of 9dB SPL (to allow for 6dB setup error)
and still be able to record 129dB peaks.

rgds
\SK
--
"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity" -- L. Lang
--
http://www.tajga.org -- (some photos from my travels)
  #73   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Gary Eickmeier Gary Eickmeier is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,449
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...
Gary Eickmeier wrote:
How can my 901s do
such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch
dome

tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust
cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs)


This is not about Bose, but rather about Mr. Eickmeiers specific,
testable technical assertion:

"the dust cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs"

Simply stated, it most assuredly does NOT.

WE may safely assume that what Mr. Eickmeier is claiming is
that the 1" dust cap of a 4" driver has the same behaviour
as a 1" purpose-designed dome tweeter. The two differ
in profound and fundamental ways. Let's just look at a few.

First, let's compare the voice coils. The voice coil and
former of a 4" driver is longer, thicker, has more wire on
it and thus is SUBSTANTIALLY heavier than the voice coil of
a purpose-built 1" dome tweeter. By "substantial" I assert,
having measure literally thousands of such beasts, it's
a minimum of 4 to 5 times heavier.

Second. the mechanical tolerances required of a 4" driver
are very different and result in the magnetic gap being
substantiall (by a factor of 2) wider than that of a typical
1" dome tweeter. The result is a substantially lower
magnetic reluctance and thus a higher flux density in the gap.

Third, the effective moving mass of the 4" driver is at a
minimum or order of magnitude (that's a factor of 10) higher
than that of a 1" dome tweeter. Why? Because the 1" dome
tweeter's moving mass is not encumbered with the moving mass
of the spider, the entire rest of that 4" diaphragm, the
surround, the lead-in wires, and so on.

Fourth, the radiating area of a 1" dome tweeter at 10-15 kHz
is pretty much a 1" diameter dome. That of a 4" driver at
those frequencies is substantially greater.

The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.


Well then it is Amar Bose doing the "speculation" because that is what he
told me. I just assumed that it sounds reasonable because at the highest
frequencies the center of the driver is probably all that can move that
fast.

Bose may have all kinds of test equipment to look at the vibrational
behavior of a moving driver. Isn't there equipment that does vibrational
analysis?

What do you say is happening at the highest frequencies? The whole driver
moving as a solid unit? This isn't the only full range 4 inch driver out
there - what generally do they do at the highest freqs?

Gary Eickmeier


  #74   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Sep 6, 4:33*am, "Gary Eickmeier" wrote:
"Andrew Haley" wrote in message

...









Audio Empire wrote:


But the dynamic range of an actual musical performance can exceed
even the the range of DSD or 24 or 32-bit PCM.


Bluff. *32-bit PCM has a (theoretical) dynamic range of ~ 190
decibels, the ratio of the quietest sound anyone can hear to the blast
of a pound of TNT ten feet away, which would certainly deafen you. *As
far as I'm aware it's not possible to make an analogue to digital
converter with such a range anyway: it'd need self noise of 0.25
microvolts and 1 kV full scale!


I wonder what the greatest dynamic range in the musical repertoire is.
The greatest range I've personally experienced in an audience is a
performance of _Monochrome_ by Maki Ishii, which exceeds 60dB from the
quietest drumming at the start to the crescendo. *This can lead to
some practical problems with audibility in a concert hall because it
is hard to hear over people breathing and occasionally coughing.


Two things Andrew: One, I would think the 32 bit PCM would be a recording
medium only. Then you have to squeeze that into a 16 bit CD for mastering..
Two, the dynamic range problem is greater for the recording engineer than
for the audience. Mikes are usually placed much closer to the orchestra than
a good seat back in the audience. Back there, everything has mellowed out a
bit (so to speak), and the perceived dynamic range is not so bad. But up
where the mikes are, the range can be formidable. Experienced recordists
please correct me if I am wrong, but that is my impression and experience..



In a good hall the sound does not "mellow out" in the optimum seats.
That is one of the marks of a great concert hall. Orchestras really
aren't all that loud even up close. Unless you are sitting in the row
or two in front of the brass section. In an excellent concert hall the
SPLs should be just as loud 10 to 15 rows back as they are in the
first row. Maybe ever louder.

  #75   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Arny Krueger Arny Krueger is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 205
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...

Third, the effective moving mass of the 4" driver is at a
minimum or order of magnitude (that's a factor of 10) higher
than that of a 1" dome tweeter. Why? Because the 1" dome
tweeter's moving mass is not encumbered with the moving mass
of the spider, the entire rest of that 4" diaphragm, the
surround, the lead-in wires, and so on.


As I understand the operation of speakers, they are mass loaded over most of
their upper frequency range. The primary effect of larger mass given all
other things are equal is that efficiency is reduced. This would be
broadband efficiency, not just efficiency at high frequencies.

I think it is fair to say that if the diaphragm does not break up,and if
the voice coil does not decouple from the diaphragm, then the speaker
cone+dust cap acts like a piston driven with a magnetic motor at all
reasonable frequencies.

Secondary effects are provided by the inductance of the voice coil and the
large piston causing stronger directivity effects at higher frequencies.

Fourth, the radiating area of a 1" dome tweeter at 10-15 kHz
is pretty much a 1" diameter dome. That of a 4" driver at
those frequencies is substantially greater.


The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.


Seems to me that without knowlege of break up modes and possible decoupling
from the voice coil, all relevant facts are not known.

The idea that just the dust cap (as opposed to the entire diaphragm+dust
cap ) is in play seems to presume signficiant break up of the cone/dust cap
asssembly.

I am informed that this break up mode can be controlled to a useful degree,
but I would surely defer to more experienced practitioners.



  #76   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Thu, 6 Sep 2012 08:06:37 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article ):

"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...
The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.


Well then it is Amar Bose doing the "speculation" because that is what he
told me. I just assumed that it sounds reasonable because at the highest
frequencies the center of the driver is probably all that can move that
fast.

Bose may have all kinds of test equipment to look at the vibrational
behavior of a moving driver. Isn't there equipment that does vibrational
analysis?

What do you say is happening at the highest frequencies? The whole driver
moving as a solid unit? This isn't the only full range 4 inch driver out
there - what generally do they do at the highest freqs?

Gary Eickmeier


This is one of those things, Gary, that looks like it makes sense on the face
of it, but it doesn't really (like "cartoon physics." It seems reasonable
that once Wyley Coyote has walked off the edge of the cliff, that he can
scramble back again, but we all know that real physics says that he can't.).
It looks as if a "whizzer cone" would work as well, but the fact is that it's
not just the whizzer that has to vibrate at high frequencies, it's the entire
mass of the cone. Now I'm not saying that a whizzer cone does nothing.
Without it, the 12" EV Wolverine speaker that I tested MIGHT have been much
more than 9 dB down at 13 Khz. I had no way to test whether that 12"
speaker's upper midrange/lower treble was improved by the addition of that
whizzer cone, as I had no wolverine without it to test.
  #77   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Dick Pierce[_2_] Dick Pierce[_2_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 151
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
How can my 901s do

such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch
dome

tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust
cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs)


This is not about Bose, but rather about Mr. Eickmeiers specific,
testable technical assertion:

"the dust cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs"

Simply stated, it most assuredly does NOT.

WE may safely assume that what Mr. Eickmeier is claiming is
that the 1" dust cap of a 4" driver has the same behaviour
as a 1" purpose-designed dome tweeter. The two differ
in profound and fundamental ways. Let's just look at a few.

First, let's compare the voice coils. The voice coil and
former of a 4" driver is longer, thicker, has more wire on
it and thus is SUBSTANTIALLY heavier than the voice coil of
a purpose-built 1" dome tweeter. By "substantial" I assert,
having measure literally thousands of such beasts, it's
a minimum of 4 to 5 times heavier.

Second. the mechanical tolerances required of a 4" driver
are very different and result in the magnetic gap being
substantiall (by a factor of 2) wider than that of a typical
1" dome tweeter. The result is a substantially lower
magnetic reluctance and thus a higher flux density in the gap.

Third, the effective moving mass of the 4" driver is at a
minimum or order of magnitude (that's a factor of 10) higher
than that of a 1" dome tweeter. Why? Because the 1" dome
tweeter's moving mass is not encumbered with the moving mass
of the spider, the entire rest of that 4" diaphragm, the
surround, the lead-in wires, and so on.

Fourth, the radiating area of a 1" dome tweeter at 10-15 kHz
is pretty much a 1" diameter dome. That of a 4" driver at
those frequencies is substantially greater.

The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.



Well then it is Amar Bose doing the "speculation" because that is what he
told me. I just assumed that it sounds reasonable because at the highest
frequencies the center of the driver is probably all that can move that
fast.



And, like many things, Bose has failed to produce any
repeatable technical data in a peer-reviewed forum that
would allow others to confirm or refute such claims.

In fact, we have no knowledge, save your anecdotal claim,
that Bose ever made such claims.

So, without that, we can only conclude that these are your
spculations, not Amar Bose's since you have presented nothing
from his had that makes such claims.

Bose may have all kinds of test equipment to look at the vibrational
behavior of a moving driver. Isn't there equipment that does vibrational
analysis?


Yes, there is. It's been in reasonably common use for
3 decades and mor, so?

What do you say is happening at the highest frequencies? The whole driver
moving as a solid unit?


I never made such a claim, did I?

In fact, the driver is largely moving at these frequencies,
but most assuredly not as a "solid unit." The acutal detailed
motion of the come is extremely complex and difficult to
predict. The resulting integration of this complex motion
is what results in the frequency and power response of the
driver, and, without any exception, these figures for 4"
drivers are far from optimum: VERY ragged response crives,
irregualr and highly-frequency dependent radiation patterns.

This isn't the only full range 4 inch driver out
there


"full range" is a claim, not an irrefutable property.

what generally do they do at the highest freqs?


Whatever they do, they do nonuniformly and, generally
badly.

Of course, you are welcome to use whatever definition
of "good" or "bad" suits your fancy, but having done
so, the conversation is shut down because of the lack
of a common agreed-upon language.

--
+--------------------------------+
+ Dick Pierce |
+ Professional Audio Development |
+--------------------------------+
  #78   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Thu, 6 Sep 2012 17:46:20 -0700, Dick Pierce wrote
(in article ):

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
"Dick Pierce" wrote in message
...

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
How can my 901s do
such a show of dynamics? Well, most speakers have but one little 1 inch
dome
tweeter, maybe one or two midranges. I have NINE - on each box (the dust
cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs)

This is not about Bose, but rather about Mr. Eickmeiers specific,
testable technical assertion:

"the dust cap behaves like a tweeter at the highest freqs"

Simply stated, it most assuredly does NOT.

WE may safely assume that what Mr. Eickmeier is claiming is
that the 1" dust cap of a 4" driver has the same behaviour
as a 1" purpose-designed dome tweeter. The two differ
in profound and fundamental ways. Let's just look at a few.

First, let's compare the voice coils. The voice coil and
former of a 4" driver is longer, thicker, has more wire on
it and thus is SUBSTANTIALLY heavier than the voice coil of
a purpose-built 1" dome tweeter. By "substantial" I assert,
having measure literally thousands of such beasts, it's
a minimum of 4 to 5 times heavier.

Second. the mechanical tolerances required of a 4" driver
are very different and result in the magnetic gap being
substantiall (by a factor of 2) wider than that of a typical
1" dome tweeter. The result is a substantially lower
magnetic reluctance and thus a higher flux density in the gap.

Third, the effective moving mass of the 4" driver is at a
minimum or order of magnitude (that's a factor of 10) higher
than that of a 1" dome tweeter. Why? Because the 1" dome
tweeter's moving mass is not encumbered with the moving mass
of the spider, the entire rest of that 4" diaphragm, the
surround, the lead-in wires, and so on.

Fourth, the radiating area of a 1" dome tweeter at 10-15 kHz
is pretty much a 1" diameter dome. That of a 4" driver at
those frequencies is substantially greater.

The point being, the claim that "the dust cap behaves like a
tweeter at the highest freqs" is unsubstantiated, technically
unsupportable specualtion.



Well then it is Amar Bose doing the "speculation" because that is what he
told me. I just assumed that it sounds reasonable because at the highest
frequencies the center of the driver is probably all that can move that
fast.



And, like many things, Bose has failed to produce any
repeatable technical data in a peer-reviewed forum that
would allow others to confirm or refute such claims.

In fact, we have no knowledge, save your anecdotal claim,
that Bose ever made such claims.

So, without that, we can only conclude that these are your
spculations, not Amar Bose's since you have presented nothing
from his had that makes such claims.

Bose may have all kinds of test equipment to look at the vibrational
behavior of a moving driver. Isn't there equipment that does vibrational
analysis?


Yes, there is. It's been in reasonably common use for
3 decades and mor, so?

What do you say is happening at the highest frequencies? The whole driver
moving as a solid unit?


I never made such a claim, did I?

In fact, the driver is largely moving at these frequencies,
but most assuredly not as a "solid unit." The acutal detailed
motion of the come is extremely complex and difficult to
predict. The resulting integration of this complex motion
is what results in the frequency and power response of the
driver, and, without any exception, these figures for 4"
drivers are far from optimum: VERY ragged response crives,
irregualr and highly-frequency dependent radiation patterns.

This isn't the only full range 4 inch driver out
there


"full range" is a claim, not an irrefutable property.

what generally do they do at the highest freqs?


Whatever they do, they do nonuniformly and, generally
badly.

Of course, you are welcome to use whatever definition
of "good" or "bad" suits your fancy, but having done
so, the conversation is shut down because of the lack
of a common agreed-upon language.



Well, the best we can say is that a 4" driver probably cannot be optimized
for high frequencies and midrange-bass frequencies at the same time. One
thing. If you go to Bose's website and open the PDF of the owner's manual,
there is a page near the back with specifications. They give distortion
figures, and maximum loudness plus the eq range of the active equalizer that
comes with the speakers, but NOWHERE in those specs do they even hint-at
frequency response. Checking the rest of the website, nowhere does it
mention, hint-at , or discuss frequency response in any way. I have to ask
myself why?
  #79   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Scott[_6_] Scott[_6_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 642
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Sep 7, 4:00*am, Barkingspyder wrote:
On Thursday, August 30, 2012 8:17:56 PM UTC-7, Audio Empire wrote:
On Thu, 30 Aug 2012 08:51:26 -0700, Scott wrote


(in article ):


On Aug 30, 5:37am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:


"Audio Empire" wrote in message


...


Here we are in complete agreement. Why go to hear "live musicians" when


Was this a classical concert? If not then this is nothing new. Rock


and pop concerts have suffered from bad sounding PAs since the


beginning of the genres. Fans don't go to these concerts to hear


better sound. They go to *see* the artists, who are often celebrities,


in the flesh perform what will hopefully be a unique live experience.


It's a lot different than the live classical music experience. Well,


not including concerts at The Hollywood Bowl or other such venues.


Well, I have yet to hear a "sound reinforcement augmented" *symphony


concert but I have seen classical chamber music concerts so augmented.


It's just not necessary. I've been to the Hollywood Bowl and heard


chamber music played on stage. The acoustics of the place made them


easily heard in the proverbial back row. Back in the 40's and 50's


night clubs would feature bands playing and the only "PA" might be the


announcer or perhaps the band singer. The musicians playing


instruments needed no such crutches. A few years ago I went with some


friends to a Brazilian nightclub in San Francisco. They had a great


brazilian jazz band playing all the familiar samba favorites from that


country, along with Bossa Nova, Lambada as well as selections that I


had never heard before. They were using this huge PA system and


playing it so loudly that patrons had to cup their hands around the


ears of those next to them and yell at the top of their lungs into


those cupped hands to make themselves heard. It looked like there was


a war going on between the band, who wanted to be heard, and the


patrons who wanted to talk. Before the current sound reinforcement


craze, people would go to night spots and listen to unamplified music


playing while they politely whispered to one another. Now the band


turns up the volume on their sound reinforcement in order to be heard


over the talk and the people talk louder in order to be heard over the


sound reinforcement. Loudness wars.


OTOH, you are correct about rock and some other forms of pop. These


performances were created in the studio where they were recorded, and


essentially only exist as an electronic waveform. For recordings, this


waveform is "cut" to some physical media and is not a performance


again until it emanates from the listener's speakers. To have this


"performance" occur as a "live concert", the studio conditions must be


reproduced. The difference between the concert and the recording is


that the middle man, the physical media, is eliminated and the output


of the "studio" electronics is fed directly into large scale speakers


designed to play loud and cover a large group of people. While not my


cup of tea, that is a legitimate reason and use for sound


reinforcement because, without it, the performance couldn't exist.


If you've been to a classical concert at the Hollywood Bowl since 2007 you've heard sound reinforcement, it's getting better all the time and is probably why the Bowl and the new dome have been getting rave reviews. *The sound reinforcement has been going on for a long time. *Check out the following links: *http://livedesignonline.com/theatre/...und_with...and go to Wikipedia to read their brief history of the bowl and its acoustics. *I never knew that Lloyd Wright had designed not one but 2 domes for the Bowl.


have been to two of them. It may very well be better than it was
before but by the standards of live classical music in proper concert
halls without sound reinforcement the sound is still horrible. Anyone
giving the sound a rave review in that context is not to be trusted in
any matters of sound quality.

  #80   Report Post  
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
Audio Empire Audio Empire is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,193
Default Speakers That Sound Like Music

On Fri, 7 Sep 2012 09:19:12 -0700, Scott wrote
(in article ):

On Sep 7, 4:00am, Barkingspyder wrote:
On Thursday, August 30, 2012 8:17:56 PM UTC-7, Audio Empire wrote:
On Thu, 30 Aug 2012 08:51:26 -0700, Scott wrote


(in article ):


On Aug 30, 5:37am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:


"Audio Empire" wrote in message


...


Here we are in complete agreement. Why go to hear "live musicians" when


Was this a classical concert? If not then this is nothing new. Rock


and pop concerts have suffered from bad sounding PAs since the


beginning of the genres. Fans don't go to these concerts to hear


better sound. They go to *see* the artists, who are often celebrities,


in the flesh perform what will hopefully be a unique live experience.


It's a lot different than the live classical music experience. Well,


not including concerts at The Hollywood Bowl or other such venues.


Well, I have yet to hear a "sound reinforcement augmented" Â*symphony


concert but I have seen classical chamber music concerts so augmented.


It's just not necessary. I've been to the Hollywood Bowl and heard


chamber music played on stage. The acoustics of the place made them


easily heard in the proverbial back row. Back in the 40's and 50's


night clubs would feature bands playing and the only "PA" might be the


announcer or perhaps the band singer. The musicians playing


instruments needed no such crutches. A few years ago I went with some


friends to a Brazilian nightclub in San Francisco. They had a great


brazilian jazz band playing all the familiar samba favorites from that


country, along with Bossa Nova, Lambada as well as selections that I


had never heard before. They were using this huge PA system and


playing it so loudly that patrons had to cup their hands around the


ears of those next to them and yell at the top of their lungs into


those cupped hands to make themselves heard. It looked like there was


a war going on between the band, who wanted to be heard, and the


patrons who wanted to talk. Before the current sound reinforcement


craze, people would go to night spots and listen to unamplified music


playing while they politely whispered to one another. Now the band


turns up the volume on their sound reinforcement in order to be heard


over the talk and the people talk louder in order to be heard over the


sound reinforcement. Loudness wars.


OTOH, you are correct about rock and some other forms of pop. These


performances were created in the studio where they were recorded, and


essentially only exist as an electronic waveform. For recordings, this


waveform is "cut" to some physical media and is not a performance


again until it emanates from the listener's speakers. To have this


"performance" occur as a "live concert", the studio conditions must be


reproduced. The difference between the concert and the recording is


that the middle man, the physical media, is eliminated and the output


of the "studio" electronics is fed directly into large scale speakers


designed to play loud and cover a large group of people. While not my


cup of tea, that is a legitimate reason and use for sound


reinforcement because, without it, the performance couldn't exist.


If you've been to a classical concert at the Hollywood Bowl since 2007
you've heard sound reinforcement, it's getting better all the time and is
probably why the Bowl and the new dome have been getting rave reviews. The
sound reinforcement has been going on for a long time. Check out the
following links:
http://livedesignonline.com/theatre/...und_with...and
go to Wikipedia to read their brief history of the bowl and its acoustics.
I never knew that Lloyd Wright had designed not one but 2 domes for the
Bowl.


have been to two of them. It may very well be better than it was
before but by the standards of live classical music in proper concert
halls without sound reinforcement the sound is still horrible. Anyone
giving the sound a rave review in that context is not to be trusted in
any matters of sound quality.


Well, when I was last there in the sixties, I thought that the Frank
LLoyd Wright shell and the 'Bowl was excellent acoustically.

Frankly, I would not attend a 'Bowl concert where I knew SR was being
employed. I'd rather listen to a broadcast of the concert over my
stereo system, then to go to a live one where I'm forced to listen to
PA speakers. I know that my speakers are much better than any PA
speakers, and frankly, if I'm going to have to listen to speakers, I'd
just as soon listen to my own in the comfort of my own living room.
In my humble opinion, SR is not what the live music experience is all
about!


Reply
Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules

Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off


Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Good music for sound quality WannaKatana Car Audio 5 December 29th 06 09:33 AM
How technology has transformed the sound of music dale Pro Audio 1 July 3rd 05 01:03 AM
Sound card for recording music Roger General 1 September 9th 04 01:43 PM
Hey there, thoughts on Impala speakers, I want a warm sound, spoiled by home speakers..... ReEfEr MaDnEsS Car Audio 0 December 30th 03 04:45 AM
Sound, Music, Balance Robert Trosper High End Audio 1 November 21st 03 05:09 AM


All times are GMT +1. The time now is 03:53 PM.

Powered by: vBulletin
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©2004-2024 AudioBanter.com.
The comments are property of their posters.
 

About Us

"It's about Audio and hi-fi"