[geoff]

"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
ion...
An interesting way to listen to 901s is to sit on the floor between them,
ears level
with the boxes, your back against the wall, facing outward, so that all
you really
hear are the four drivers on either side with some reflection but way more
direct
sound. The imaging in that setting is remarkably good. But what you've
done is
create a special sort of near-field environment removing -- surprise! --
much of the
crap from your crummy repro room, including the crap ADDED by the speakers
bouncing a bunch of sound around.


Listen to something for 30 years and become normalised to it. Everything
else sounds wrong.

geoff

[geoff]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
acquisition...

In a more perfect world two really good microphones would work well for
acoustic
music recording and reproduction. But they rarely do. **PROPER** use of
spot mics
underneath that stereo pair and even artificial reverb can go a long way
in helping
the brain ignore bad things in the local reproduction room, and
reconstitute a
pleasing illusion of the original room/performance in that same bad repro
room.

The use of spot mics and artificial reverb (in the recording) are great
ways to /ruin/ the illusion of reality.

William, you seem to forget that the 'illusion of reality' is not a criteria
that is important for most listeners, including serious musical listeners.

geoff

[None]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
I did not say that, or even imply it, and I don't believe anyone
else did.

Did Willie actually write that? LOL!

[Arny Krueger[_5_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...

Here's the thing. For a true live impression either the recording
venue or the listening space has to be anechoic. If you have an
acoustic contribution from both simultaneously you have no chance
of it sounding live.

I respectfully disagree.

Have you ever experienced approaching a large public space -- a railway
station maybe - and hearing music being played from quite far off. You
know instantly whether that is live or a recording. Quality doesn't
come into it -- it just sounds different.

With over a thousand different recordings made in dozens of venues and
dozens of happy customers I think I can weigh in on this a little.

Part of the problem is a matter of standards for an impression of the live
venue in the listening environment. What does "The same" mean to you?

If you are talking things that sound same enough to be indistingushable in
an ABX test, then a live recording that sounds the same as live sound is
never going to happen, since live sound isn't even the same thing at the
live performance.

Every different take of a musical performance is different and be
distinguished from all the others.

If you are talking similar enough that you can recognize whether or not the
singer is the same person, then probably.

Ever wonder why some recording guys walk around repositioning and
reorienting microphones, maybe with a finger in one ear? Stuff sounds very
different when you do that.

One driving force behind this little dance is the fact that the live sound
is different when you walk around and/or reorient your head and/or listen
with one ear or two.

So, when you are asking the question "Are the live and recorded sound the
same?" Your first barrier is that the live sound isn't just one thing.

Your second problem is that if you put a mic at a location, the signal
coming out of the mic never sounds identically the same as what you hear
when you put your head where the mic is. If you understand how the pickup
patterns of microphones interact with their environment then there is no
mystery to that.

As a rule the micing location that sounds the most like a performance sounds
like at a certain place in the room is closer to the source than that
certain place in the room. But it will still sound different.

If you want to get about as close to having the live and recorded sound be
very similar than a binaural recording listened to with very good earphones
probably comes as close as you can get. Too bad binaural recordings sound
so weird over loudspeakers.

[Frank Stearns]

"William Sommerwerck" writes:

"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
nacquisition...

In a more perfect world two really good microphones would work well for
acoustic
music recording and reproduction. But they rarely do. **PROPER** use of spot
mics
underneath that stereo pair and even artificial reverb can go a long way in
helping
the brain ignore bad things in the local reproduction room, and reconstitute
a
pleasing illusion of the original room/performance in that same bad repro
room.

The use of spot mics and artificial reverb (in the recording) are great ways
to /ruin/ the illusion of reality.

You are sometimes correct, but as I said, WHEN DONE PROPERLY. What part of that is
not clear? (And by "done properly" I don't simply mean arithmetic precision of some
sort, but an overall aesthetic awareness. Too many engineers don't really have that,
even though they might be brilliant in a purely engineering setting.)

The very simple idea is to offer up subconscious cues to the listener such that when
in a crap listening environment, there is a better (though not guaranteed) chance to
overcome a murky local environment -- at least in terms of the ultimate goal, which
is conveying *music*.

Frank
Mobile Audio

--

[Arny Krueger[_5_]]

"Don Pearce" wrote in message
...

Very illuminating, but it doesn't help explain why Bose speakers just
sound so bloody awful.


"Bose speakers" aren't just one thing.

IME their best efforts can be found in Bose branded OEM audio systems in
certain automobiles.

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

Like most (but not all) listeners, I was suckered by the 901s. A year ago I
figured out a likely reason why so many reviewers were fooled. If anyone is
interested...

I am curious.

It's also important to point out that Bose marketed a line of wretchedly bad
speakers (with highly inflated "list" prices) that gave Bose dealers an
opportunity to sell Bose products at a "discount".

The Bose speakers are designed to sound very good with short listening tests.
They sound brighter and boomier than the competition, because that's what
sells speakers: brief listening comparisons.

Bose looked at how people shop for and buy speakers and then designed
speakers to perform well under those circumstances. That is a sort of
marketing genius.

The most-damning thing one can say about Dr Bose and his company is that they
did absolutely nothing whatsoever to advance the art of sound reproduction.
Merchandising is another matter -- Bose mastered The Big Lie long before
Apple.

Actually, Bose has done a lot of research into speaker design and radiation
patterns, and there are a bunch of papers in the JAES that were funded by
Bose. Mind you, Bose doesn't use this research to make good sounding
speakers, because they aren't in the business of making good sounding
speakers. But you cannot fault Bose for not helping to advance the state
of the science even if not the technology.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Arny Krueger[_5_]]

"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
acquisition...


**PROPER** use of spot mics
underneath that stereo pair and even artificial reverb can go a long way
in helping
the brain ignore bad things in the local reproduction room, and
reconstitute a
pleasing illusion of the original room/performance in that same bad repro
room.

Many don't like that multi-microphone approach, and I would agree when
such
recordings are done badly.

But done properly, the "fake" approach won't hurt you in a good
reproduction
environment, but will substantially help in a poor one.

IME this is true. It is my preferred micing/mixing technique, too.

I've done it well and I've done it badly, when it is bad it is about as bad
as it gets. But there is a broad sweet spot and when you get all the
planets and moons lined up, the results can be really quite gratifying to
lots of people.

Once upon a time I was listening to one such recording in my car with the
windows open. Someone pulled up and said "That was made at such-and-such a
place?" and they were right. That's about as close as I've ever gotten to
"fooling" someone with a recording. Actually I have done better - by
playing such a recording over the house system in the same venue.

[Arny Krueger[_5_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
acquisition...

In a more perfect world two really good microphones would work well for
acoustic
music recording and reproduction. But they rarely do. **PROPER** use of
spot mics
underneath that stereo pair and even artificial reverb can go a long way
in helping
the brain ignore bad things in the local reproduction room, and
reconstitute a
pleasing illusion of the original room/performance in that same bad repro
room.

The use of spot mics and artificial reverb (in the recording) are great
ways to /ruin/ the illusion of reality.

That's what all the golden ears say... ;-)

It is not the only thing they have wrong!

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Gary Eickmeier" wrote in message ...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Gary Eickmeier" wrote in message
...

I sincerely ask -- what significant contributions did I miss?

A 12 year research project begun at MIT and ending at the Bose
corporation into why loudspeakers don't sound like live music.

And this research result in what commercial product that truly sounded like
live music?

It has not resulted in any commercial products. Really, little of the
fundamental research that Bose has financed and performed has resulted
in any real applications. Give it some time. When it is applied, it
won't be applied by Bose because they aren't in that business.

You can say the same thing about the research IBM has funded at the
T.J. Watson center. Their competitors have always taken advantage of
it long before IBM themselves ever did, but that's not to say there is
anything wrong with that.

In my brief recording career, I made at least one live recording that sounded
pretty much as if I was standing at the mic position. Current multi-ch SACD
recordings can give a strong of sense of actually being in the hall and
hearing a live performance.

It's all fake. Nothing wrong with that, at least not if the fake is a good
one.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Arny Krueger[_5_]]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...

It's also important to point out that Bose marketed a line of wretchedly
bad
speakers (with highly inflated "list" prices) that gave Bose dealers an
opportunity to sell Bose products at a "discount".

The Bose speakers are designed to sound very good with short listening
tests.
They sound brighter and boomier than the competition, because that's what
sells speakers: brief listening comparisons.

Bose looked at how people shop for and buy speakers and then designed
speakers to perform well under those circumstances. That is a sort of
marketing genius.

The most-damning thing one can say about Dr Bose and his company is that
they
did absolutely nothing whatsoever to advance the art of sound
reproduction.
Merchandising is another matter -- Bose mastered The Big Lie long before
Apple.

Actually, Bose has done a lot of research into speaker design and
radiation
patterns, and there are a bunch of papers in the JAES that were funded by
Bose. Mind you, Bose doesn't use this research to make good sounding
speakers, because they aren't in the business of making good sounding
speakers. But you cannot fault Bose for not helping to advance the state
of the science even if not the technology.

If you get into how Bose does things you can often figure out what they had
in mind when they created the product and generally they do a good job of
creating what they want to create.

Above we see several examples of that.

As you point out, what they want to create is very often something that
people think they want long enough so Bose can capture their money and the
people keep the product.

[Scott Dorsey]

Ralf R. Radermacher wrote:
Ok, let me spell it out for you, again. There are people like Georges
Cabasse who have spent their lives searching - and finding - ways to
improve loudspeaker designs. And there have been others like Dr. Bose
who have dedicated lots of time and effort to find reasons why it can't
be done.

Just because Bose makes some of the worst-sounding speakers in the world
doesn't mean that they don't also fund some serious fundamental research
into speaker design that is useful and worthwhile.

I understand that this is something like McDonalds funding research at
the Cordon Bleu, but it happens.

Put a Bose speaker next to one from Cabasse (KEF, Rogers...), switch
forth and back, and you'll find that both have proven their respective
theories quite convincingly... ;-)

That clear now? Fine.

I guarantee if you take a random audience of college students and give
them that comparison, with a total listening time of less than five
minutes, that they will pick the Bose. They will always pick the brighter
and boomier speaker. Once the listening test starts getting extended to
15 or 20 minutes the results change dramatically. But people don't do
extended listening before buying speakers, sad to say.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[John Williamson]

Arny Krueger wrote:
"Don Pearce" wrote in message
...

Very illuminating, but it doesn't help explain why Bose speakers just
sound so bloody awful.


"Bose speakers" aren't just one thing.

IME their best efforts can be found in Bose branded OEM audio systems in
certain automobiles.


Having has to suffer a few such setups on extended journeys. if that's
their best effort, give me earplugs.

Boom-tss, boom-tsss for hours on end.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

The Bose 901. It caused a sensation in the industry that built
a factory on a mountaintop.

Mr Eickmeier, your remarks will require a detailed rebuttal I don't have time
for at the moment. Suffice it to say, in the interim, that virtually
everything about the 901's design is objectively and/or aesthetically
incorrect. What comes out of them sounds little like "live music".

I worked for a radio station that did a lot of live in-studio concert
work and we had a pair of the original Electro-Voice Sentry speakers
as studio monitors. For a check mix system we had a pair of 901s
which were marked "****terizer" in the patchbay. You could press a
button on the console marked SOUNDS LIKE **** in order to switch from
the main monitors to the 901s. This was back in the days when the Sentry
and the 901 were swanky new modern products.

It was fascinating doing it, too... the midrange got very saggy, the real
bottom end dropped out but what was most interesting was that the imaging
became very diffuse. All signs of accurate image totally went away to
be replaced with this vague and "phasey" kind of sound. It was actually
very interesting and useful as a check mix.... if the vocals in the mix
weren't high enough they would almost disappear into the mix because there
was really no stable center image.
--scott




--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[John Williamson]

Arny Krueger wrote:
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
acquisition...

In a more perfect world two really good microphones would work well for
acoustic
music recording and reproduction. But they rarely do. **PROPER** use of
spot mics
underneath that stereo pair and even artificial reverb can go a long way
in helping
the brain ignore bad things in the local reproduction room, and
reconstitute a
pleasing illusion of the original room/performance in that same bad repro
room.
The use of spot mics and artificial reverb (in the recording) are great
ways to /ruin/ the illusion of reality.

That's what all the golden ears say... ;-)

It is not the only thing they have wrong!


For someone who claims to spend every weekend making recordings of
performences which he has the chance to compare with the live
performance, you surprise me by saying that.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

[Scott Dorsey]

Don Pearce wrote:
Yes, it helps a little. But even dBx doesn't come close to the dynamic
range possible with digital. But that word is the problem - possible.
Find me a recording that uses it, and has the right acoustic to sound
live through a set of speakers.

Check out the Ondekoza track that I submitted to the first RAP CD set.

The actual issued recording was severely compressed; the producer claimed
nobody could actually listen to the thing because it had such a full
dynamic range. But the version I sent to the RAP CD was untouched.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[gregz]

Frank Stearns wrote:
"William Sommerwerck" writes:

"Gary Eickmeier" wrote in message ...
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I sincerely ask -- what significant contributions did I miss?

A 12 year research project begun at MIT and ending at the Bose
corporation into why loudspeakers don't sound like live music.

And this research resulted in what commercial product that truly
sounded like live music?

The Bose 901. It caused a sensation in the industry that built
a factory on a mountaintop.

Mr Eickmeier, your remarks will require a detailed rebuttal I don't have time
for at the moment. Suffice it to say, in the interim, that virtually
everything about the 901's design is objectively and/or aesthetically
incorrect. What comes out of them sounds little like "live music".


Here's the weird thing -- the 901s do work, sort of, but in a very limited sense,
and they're something of a one-trick pony.

The "success" comes in swamping the crappy repro room with still MORE time
distortions than what's already there. It's such a smeared mess with 85% of the
sound bounced off the back and side walls that, er, well, you obliquely get the
illusion of live (er, that concert hall is a smeared mess of reflections, right? So
this kinda sorta should work, kinda sorta...)

But it's like a heavily-salted Big Mac that tastes "good" -- for the moment. But
you'd tire of that quickly, and it'll never taste like salmon or waffles, no matter
what you do.

An interesting way to listen to 901s is to sit on the floor between them, ears level
with the boxes, your back against the wall, facing outward, so that all you really
hear are the four drivers on either side with some reflection but way more direct
sound. The imaging in that setting is remarkably good. But what you've done is
create a special sort of near-field environment removing -- surprise! -- much of the
crap from your crummy repro room, including the crap ADDED by the speakers
bouncing a bunch of sound around.

YMMV.

Frank
Mobile Audio

85% may be bouncing, but the first wave front sounds louder to the brain by
some amount. My favorite way to listen to them. Not more than 10 feet away,
preferably less. The room must be treated to lessen the reflections. Eye
level. Anything above series II sounds worse.

Stop the thread.

Greg

[gregz]

Frank Stearns wrote:
"William Sommerwerck" writes:

"Gary Eickmeier" wrote in message ...
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I sincerely ask -- what significant contributions did I miss?

A 12 year research project begun at MIT and ending at the Bose
corporation into why loudspeakers don't sound like live music.

And this research resulted in what commercial product that truly
sounded like live music?

The Bose 901. It caused a sensation in the industry that built
a factory on a mountaintop.

Mr Eickmeier, your remarks will require a detailed rebuttal I don't have time
for at the moment. Suffice it to say, in the interim, that virtually
everything about the 901's design is objectively and/or aesthetically
incorrect. What comes out of them sounds little like "live music".


Here's the weird thing -- the 901s do work, sort of, but in a very limited sense,
and they're something of a one-trick pony.

The "success" comes in swamping the crappy repro room with still MORE time
distortions than what's already there. It's such a smeared mess with 85% of the
sound bounced off the back and side walls that, er, well, you obliquely get the
illusion of live (er, that concert hall is a smeared mess of reflections, right? So
this kinda sorta should work, kinda sorta...)

But it's like a heavily-salted Big Mac that tastes "good" -- for the moment. But
you'd tire of that quickly, and it'll never taste like salmon or waffles, no matter
what you do.

An interesting way to listen to 901s is to sit on the floor between them, ears level
with the boxes, your back against the wall, facing outward, so that all you really
hear are the four drivers on either side with some reflection but way more direct
sound. The imaging in that setting is remarkably good. But what you've done is
create a special sort of near-field environment removing -- surprise! -- much of the
crap from your crummy repro room, including the crap ADDED by the speakers
bouncing a bunch of sound around.

YMMV.

Frank
Mobile Audio


I know years ago, some guy used to sell monitors using a basic 4 driver box
with similar equalizer to the Bose. I don't think they sold well.

Greg

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
nacquisition...

In a more perfect world two really good microphones would work well for
acoustic
music recording and reproduction. But they rarely do. **PROPER** use of spot
mics
underneath that stereo pair and even artificial reverb can go a long way in
helping
the brain ignore bad things in the local reproduction room, and reconstitute
a
pleasing illusion of the original room/performance in that same bad repro
room.

The use of spot mics and artificial reverb (in the recording) are great ways
to /ruin/ the illusion of reality.

This is true also. But do not judge these tools just because DG has abused
them so badly.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Gary Eickmeier]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
William Sommerwerck wrote:

The Bose 901. It caused a sensation in the industry that built
a factory on a mountaintop.

Mr Eickmeier, your remarks will require a detailed rebuttal I don't
have time for at the moment. Suffice it to say, in the interim, that
virtually everything about the 901's design is objectively and/or
aesthetically incorrect. What comes out of them sounds little like
"live music".

I worked for a radio station that did a lot of live in-studio concert
work and we had a pair of the original Electro-Voice Sentry speakers
as studio monitors. For a check mix system we had a pair of 901s
which were marked "****terizer" in the patchbay. You could press a
button on the console marked SOUNDS LIKE **** in order to switch from
the main monitors to the 901s. This was back in the days when the
Sentry and the 901 were swanky new modern products.

It was fascinating doing it, too... the midrange got very saggy, the
real bottom end dropped out but what was most interesting was that
the imaging became very diffuse. All signs of accurate image totally
went away to
be replaced with this vague and "phasey" kind of sound. It was
actually very interesting and useful as a check mix.... if the vocals
in the mix weren't high enough they would almost disappear into the
mix because there was really no stable center image.
--scott

An example of collossal ignorance. Imaging is as much a result of speaker
placement as radiation pattern. With a mostly reflecting type speaker, you
first of all don't put it in a deadened studio environment, second of all
the placement errors would be magnified. It takes all 8 real and virtual
images to make up the 901 frontal sound stage. These idiots probably had
them a foot from the walls.

I went into one of the high end stores that sold 901s and were about to
discontinue them - for the usual reason that they were a lot less expensive
than the competition and were embarrassing them in direct comparison. I
asked if they were still hooked in to the patch panel, and they said yes, so
they let me switch away. It was hard to tell them from two particular close
competitors, the Ohm F and the Magneplanars, I forget which model.

I also remember well in the early days of the Series I going into Pecar
Electronics in Detroit and seeing them placed right on top of some
Electrovoice Patricians. The salesmen had fun fooling people into thinking
the 901s were the Pats. Another time when I was entering the store I heard
what was unmistakably some live rock group playing away in the next room,
louder than any speakers could go. It was just a pair of 901s hanging from
chains all by themselves in front of a wood panel wall.

In the early days around 1979 I was living in Springfield Massachussetts and
there was an audio dealer nearby that used to play any and all of their
OTHER equipment using the 901s to make it sound better. One time I remember
in particular it was the brand new Advent Dolby cassette deck. I bought one.

I may have seen but one of the travelling road shows that demo'd the 901s
but I remember it was sensational with slides of the musicians and got us
really jazzed about hi fi and music in general. But the biggest tribute to
the 901s is all of the other manufacturers that named their new whatever
with 901 in the number somewhere, just to catch the cache that this magic
name had with the public. I can't remember and didn't write them all down,
but it probably wouldn't be that hard to search.

Gary Eickmeier

[jason]

In article , says...

You can say the same thing about the research IBM has funded at the
T.J. Watson center. Their competitors have always taken advantage of
it long before IBM themselves ever did, but that's not to say there is
anything wrong with that.

Often, but not always in my experience. The [good!] idea there was that
most work should be public and open and it was. There were a few
areas..probably still are - I've been gone for years..where results were
very closely held because the commercial advantage to so doing was so
obvious. When Lou Gerstner "parachutted in" to rescue the company, he had
visits from some Nobel Prize winners who urged him NOT to toss Research
overboard to save $'s. Fortunately, he got it. I think the funding model
changed however - in tough times, IBM had usually *boosted* R&D so's to
emerge stronger than its competitors when the economy recovered. I don't
think that's the case any longer.

[Trevor]

"Ralf R. Radermacher" wrote in message
...
Gary Eickmeier wrote:
A 12 year research project begun at MIT and ending at the Bose
corporation
into why loudspeakers don't sound like live music.

During those same twelve years, others have come a long way in making
their speakers sound a lot more like live music.

Those who are willing find ways, all others find reasons.

And many good solutions start with understanding the reasons, rather than
trial and error.
Not suggesting that applies to Bose of course :-)

Trevor.

[Gary Eickmeier]

Frank Stearns wrote:
"Gary Eickmeier" writes:


4. Spatial characteristics. This is the biggie that the Bose research
introduced. If you make a plan view drawing of your speakers and
room, you can draw the reflected sound as virtual images on the
other side of the walls. You can also make an image model drawing of
a live band in the hall. We get the spatial more correct by trying
to make the repro model as much like the live model as possible.

Sorry, but no!!! You've bought into Bose marketing (I remember those
funky zig-zag flared arrow diagrams from 1960s Bose literature).
You're never going to match a domestic living room to a concert hall.
You can only do that by putting your speakers in your own concert
hall (at 1:1 scale to the original venue). But then make sure you
close mic and record anechoically, and put a speaker on your private
stage matching the position of each microphone!

It took me a long time as well to understand the difference between the
spatial and the temporal. You have the classic confusion between the two.
This confusion is shown by your reference to the room sizes not being the
same. Reflection times would be the temporal, not the spatial. Let me
illustrate the difference with a simple example.

A friend buys a new home theater in a box surround sound kit. He knows
nothing about how to set it up, and ignorantly places all of the speaker in
a row on top os his big screen up front. No matter what he plays, he says it
just doesn't work. He can hear the reverberation in the music recordings and
the surround sound pings and rain and explosions in the movies, but it just
doesn't sound right. You go over and show him how to place the surround
speakers to the rear and sides and the front speakers with a certain
separation and spacing from the walls. What you have changed is the spatial
characteristic of his reproduction. The temporal remains untouched, and is
as containded in the recordings. This difference is very important to
understand in talking about sound reproduction and sound fields. Spatial is
the incident angles from which the sound arrives at the listener. Temporal
is the timings of the reflections, which we will talk some more about below.

What you really want to do is control various timing and reflection
issues in your reproduction room such that they work _with_ (and not
against) the spatial cues recorded from the original venue.

There are some deep, esoteric theories and some big bucks in getting
control rooms to do just this. I built a very modest version of one
of these that worked very well, and am about to build another. It's
not easy, that's for sure, but the rewards are rich.

LEDE is exactly backwards from what should be done. They are mistakenly
subtracting the early reflected sound from the frontal soundstage but
letting some of the later reflections from the back of the room come
through. Perhaps this is important for recording engineers to be able to
hear what the mikes are picking up, kind of like putting on headphones, but
it is not realistic sound in the image modeling sense.

Oh yes it does!!! If you haven't experienced a "before and after"
experiment, you'd be amazed how much damage a 10 mS delay off a
sidewall can do. And here's Bose, tail-twisting the HELL out of that
critical 5-20 mS range.

What you are talking about is well within the fusion time of our hearing
mechanism, and is not heard as "smearing" or echo of any sort. We would be
in big trouble is it were, both in concert halls and in any home listening
situation. As I said, in LEDE they try to get the reflections even later
than that.

Then there is the room placement issue. If you mis-place a highly reflecting
speaker like the 901s or the Maggies or the MBLs, you can get a "clustering"
of acoustic images from the too-close walls that may sound like "smearing"
to your uneducated ears. But get it right and you can eliminate the
deleterious effects of the (still strong) reflections and make them work for
you - and in fact those reflections are exactly what gives the impression of
spaciaousness and depth of image that audiophiles prize so much but don't
realize what causes it.

You can easily hear these effects by moving speakers around. Start out with
them 1/4 of the room width in from the side walls and out from the front
wall. That is how I have my 901s. In my 20 x 30 dedicated room I have them 5
ft out and 5 ft from the side walls, forming a lattice, or matrix, of 8
evenly spaced direct and virtual images by using the walls as part of the
speaker system. Imaging is perfectly even all across the front wall, not
just from speaker to speaker. NOW, if I were to move them closer to the
front wall, I would be effectively moving their reflections closer to me and
reducing depth of image. If I moved them wider apart in a mistaken attempt
to get wider imaging, I would be moving the side wall reflections closer
together, diminishing the width of the total soundstage and defeating the
purpose. This would also cause a clustering of acoustic sources near the
corners, causing a hole in the middle and an apparent "smearing" or widening
of central images. This is the effect of mis-placement that got them in so
much trouble with CU, because the owners manual is wrong about speaker
positioning and the magazine heard the effect of speakers too close to the
reflecting surfaces.

It's a whole deal. Sorry to be long winded.

Gary Eickmeier

[Gary Eickmeier]

Frank Stearns wrote:
"William Sommerwerck" writes:

The use of spot mics and artificial reverb (in the recording) are
great ways to /ruin/ the illusion of reality.

You are sometimes correct, but as I said, WHEN DONE PROPERLY. What
part of that is not clear? (And by "done properly" I don't simply
mean arithmetic precision of some sort, but an overall aesthetic
awareness. Too many engineers don't really have that, even though
they might be brilliant in a purely engineering setting.)

The very simple idea is to offer up subconscious cues to the listener
such that when in a crap listening environment, there is a better
(though not guaranteed) chance to overcome a murky local environment
-- at least in terms of the ultimate goal, which is conveying *music*.

Frank
Mobile Audio

I'm sure William understands all that. We certainly would not mike a solo
singer only with the stereo mikes and not spot her with her own mike. It is
the construction of an illusion. Live, she would sound very distinct and
clear. Reproduced without the spot mike on her, she would sound like she was
in a well.

Might be different for opera, but I would bet even there they are going to
want to put a mike on all of the singers and speakers.

Gary Eickmeier

[Gary Eickmeier]

Arny Krueger wrote:
"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...

It's also important to point out that Bose marketed a line of
wretchedly bad
speakers (with highly inflated "list" prices) that gave Bose
dealers an opportunity to sell Bose products at a "discount".

The Bose speakers are designed to sound very good with short
listening tests.
They sound brighter and boomier than the competition, because that's
what sells speakers: brief listening comparisons.

Bose looked at how people shop for and buy speakers and then designed
speakers to perform well under those circumstances. That is a sort
of marketing genius.

The most-damning thing one can say about Dr Bose and his company is
that they
did absolutely nothing whatsoever to advance the art of sound
reproduction.
Merchandising is another matter -- Bose mastered The Big Lie long
before Apple.

Actually, Bose has done a lot of research into speaker design and
radiation
patterns, and there are a bunch of papers in the JAES that were
funded by Bose. Mind you, Bose doesn't use this research to make
good sounding speakers, because they aren't in the business of
making good sounding speakers. But you cannot fault Bose for not
helping to advance the state of the science even if not the
technology.

If you get into how Bose does things you can often figure out what
they had in mind when they created the product and generally they do
a good job of creating what they want to create.

Above we see several examples of that.

As you point out, what they want to create is very often something
that people think they want long enough so Bose can capture their
money and the people keep the product.

Methinks Mr. Dorsey doesn't know much about the Bose pro division and all of
the sound reinforcement and DJ equipment and the Modeler program that can
place speakers in a virtual room and play what they would sound like in any
position of the listener in that room. The wonderful L1 speakers and their
successors and now the Panarray line which I don't know that much about yet,
but I am not in that business.

Once upon a time I attended a stage magic show, and rather than pay a live
orchestra they just had a stack of Bose 802s on each side of the stage that
sounded so good I couldn't believe it wasn't live. But of course these
stories are legend all over the world with the Bose pro line.

The automotive stuff, I am not so sure. Sounds a little too heavy on the
bass from what I have heard. Maybe it is because at speed it needs it
(because of road noise).

Gary Eickmeier

[Trevor]

"Ron C" wrote in message
...
[IMHO] even "live music" doesn't sound like (our memory of)
the "live music" in that our memories are colored by the live
experience. Everything from lighting to room temperature, head
movements to others shifting in their seats, and so on... colors
our experience. The reality of a "live music" experience is thus
an even more complicated problem.

But the old test of putting a single performer behind a curtain with a
microphone and speaker at the same position, and swapping between the two
pretty much eliminates everything but the microphone and speaker (I think we
can safely ignore the electronics these days)
Naturally for anything other than a solo instrument, the problems of
capturing the sound are usually as great, or greater than any speaker
limitations.
And it needs careful comparison rather than the carnival show technique once
favoured for selling gramophones. :-)

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
ion...
An interesting way to listen to 901s is to sit on the floor between them,
ears level
with the boxes, your back against the wall, facing outward, so that all
you really
hear are the four drivers on either side with some reflection but way more
direct
sound. The imaging in that setting is remarkably good. But what you've
done is
create a special sort of near-field environment removing -- surprise! --
much of the
crap from your crummy repro room, including the crap ADDED by the speakers
bouncing a bunch of sound around.

Nah they still sound wrong, just like the 801's. The variable interraction
of all those drivers wrt frequency and listening position can never be
equalised properly.

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"geoff" wrote in message
...
Listen to something for 30 years and become normalised to it. Everything
else sounds wrong.

Bingo, and it doesn't take anything like 30 years. But fortunately you can
retrain your brain *IF* you want.
If you've convinced yourself you already have perfection, you won't.

Trevor.

[geoff]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"geoff" wrote in message
...

William, you seem to forget that the 'illusion of reality' is not a
criterion that is important for most listeners, including serious musical
listeners.

I guess all the work that been expended over the past 70 years on
achieving that goal has been a waste of time.

I'm a serious listener, and it is important to be.

Not everybody listens exclusively to live orchestral or chamber music. Much
other music is 'produced', and a 'closest to live' analogy is not relevant.

geoff

[Trevor]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...
Very illuminating, but it doesn't help explain why Bose speakers just
sound so bloody awful.
"Bose speakers" aren't just one thing.
IME their best efforts can be found in Bose branded OEM audio systems in
certain automobiles.

Perhaps, but still bested by many other audio specialists in other cars.

Trevor.

[geoff]

"Trevor" wrote in message
...

"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
ion...
An interesting way to listen to 901s is to sit on the floor between them,
ears level
with the boxes, your back against the wall, facing outward, so that all
you really
hear are the four drivers on either side with some reflection but way
more direct
sound. The imaging in that setting is remarkably good. But what you've
done is
create a special sort of near-field environment removing -- surprise! --
much of the
crap from your crummy repro room, including the crap ADDED by the
speakers
bouncing a bunch of sound around.

Nah they still sound wrong, just like the 801's. The variable interraction
of all those drivers wrt frequency and listening position can never be
equalised properly.

If the 901s (etc) are so fab, just imagine what they would sound like with
non-crapmeister drivers in hem !

geoff

[Trevor]

"geoff" wrote in message
...
William, you seem to forget that the 'illusion of reality' is not a
criteria that is important for most listeners, including serious musical
listeners.

How many have you surveyed?

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"geoff" wrote in message
...
If the 901s (etc) are so fab, just imagine what they would sound like with
non-crapmeister drivers in hem !

The cost Vs benefit ratio of 9 drivers becomes even worse :-(

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"geoff" wrote in message
...
Not everybody listens exclusively to live orchestral or chamber music.
Much other music is 'produced', and a 'closest to live' analogy is not
relevant.

Actually "close to live" becomes far easier for electronic instruments and
miked vocals recorded live. Use the same speakers and the only real variable
is the room. Make the listening room dead and add room simulation from the
original and you're pretty close.

Trevor.

[John Williamson]

Trevor wrote:
"geoff" wrote in message
...
Not everybody listens exclusively to live orchestral or chamber music.
Much other music is 'produced', and a 'closest to live' analogy is not
relevant.

Actually "close to live" becomes far easier for electronic instruments and
miked vocals recorded live. Use the same speakers and the only real variable
is the room. Make the listening room dead and add room simulation from the
original and you're pretty close.

I don't know about others in here, but if I'm recording "pop" music, I
aim for a result that conforms to (a) the artistes requirements and (b)
the normal sound for that style of music. So, for example, 80s style is
close mic'd and has lots of bass, while 60s style has less bass and a
reasonable amount of (Echo chamber simulation) reverb. For 70s stuff,
I'll pull out the Watkins Copycat plugin, and so on.

For classical and other acoustic sources, I try to get the sound as
close as possible to what I hear in the room when it's played back.

One community choir I heard a while ago were using sound reinforcement,
and they sounded like a badly recorded CD even when they were singing
live. A shame, really, because apart from that, they were actually quite
good. :-/

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

[William Sommerwerck]

"geoff" wrote in message
...

Not everybody listens exclusively to live orchestral or chamber music.
Much other music is 'produced', and a 'closest to live' analogy is not
relevant.

Correct. But high-accuracy speakers are still desirable, even if only to
assure that the home listener hears what the studio producer intended.

By the way, my experience has been that even teenage bimbas dragged in off the
street tend to prefer speakers with flat response.

[Scott Dorsey]

Gary Eickmeier wrote:

Methinks Mr. Dorsey doesn't know much about the Bose pro division and all of
the sound reinforcement and DJ equipment and the Modeler program that can
place speakers in a virtual room and play what they would sound like in any
position of the listener in that room. The wonderful L1 speakers and their
successors and now the Panarray line which I don't know that much about yet,
but I am not in that business.

The Modeler is okay, it's a little bit behind the technology compared with
EASE but it's respectable and it works.

You'll notice, though, that Bose really isn't selling into the pro audio
market. They make some installed sound stuff, they make the Panarray, but
they really haven't been able to sell into that market. You won't see them
at pro audio trade shows, you won't see them at concerts or installs.

Once upon a time I attended a stage magic show, and rather than pay a live
orchestra they just had a stack of Bose 802s on each side of the stage that
sounded so good I couldn't believe it wasn't live. But of course these
stories are legend all over the world with the Bose pro line.

The 802 is an oddity; it's the only non-horn-loaded PA speaker that you will
find in the MI market. This is actually a good thing; there is a market for
that.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[hank alrich]

Ralf R. Radermacher wrote:

Gary Eickmeier wrote:

A 12 year research project begun at MIT and ending at the Bose corporation
into why loudspeakers don't sound like live music.

During those same twelve years, others have come a long way in making
their speakers sound a lot more like live music.

Those who are willing find ways, all others find reasons.

Ralf

Any competent _philosopher_ could have offered a mutlitude of proper
reasons for the faiure of repro to match source. twelve years and how
much money? Hey' it gets your name into the register.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://hankandshaidrimusic.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic

[hank alrich]

Don Pearce wrote:

On Sun, 14 Jul 2013 17:49:54 +0200, (Ralf R.
Radermacher) wrote:

Don Pearce wrote:

I still have no idea what this truth is that you believe you have
revealed to me.

Never mind.

No, come on. All you managed to say to me in this series of posts is
that people have been trying to make speakers better. Was that it,
seriously?

Do you actually believe that it is the quality of speakers that makes
the difference between something that sounds live and something that
sounds recorded? If you are a professional sound person, that makes me
a little sad.

d

I have noted a direcdt relationship between quality (my interpretation
thereof) and the quality of the mimicing of the source, while obviously
I note many other factors that contribute, ambience being a huge one.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://hankandshaidrimusic.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic

[hank alrich]

Gary Eickmeier wrote:

The Bose 901. It caused a sensation in the industry that built a factory on
a mountaintop. It was sold by demonstrating it, both in the high end stores
and in travelling road shows where it was explained and demonstrated.

Audiphiles have a demonstrated ability to fall for presentations,
especially if the accompanying language sounds technically impressive
while also being sufficiently obfuscatory.

The recording and reproduction process is not intended to make it sound like
you are sitting at the mike position.

Speak for yourself and for the recordings you make. Some of us do target
a bullseye that is the source in the setting, to the best we can capture
that.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://hankandshaidrimusic.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic