Why I think Inferior Speakers sound "inferior":

[ChrisCoaster]

I speak primarily for home speakers, which usually come in their own
cabinets, but this could also extend to drivers mounted in the dashes,
doors, and rear shelves & pillars of automobiles:

ANY speaker will sound inferior if what they are mounted in/on/next to/
or near resonates sympathetically(or not so sympathetically) with the
speaker driver itself.

The news reporter reading the news: (example) "PresiDENT OBaMa
exPressed coNDOlances to the faMILies who LOst loVED oNEs at Fort
hOOD." "The NNew YOrk YaNKEEs paraDED thrOUgh LOWer MANhattaN..."
The caps in that statement represent vibrations from what the speaker
cone is bolted to, not from the cone itself.

Cut down on such resonation - Solidify existing home cabinets or build
a more solid one, and deaden portions of the car interior with
adhesive mats or additional bracing - and any speaker's sound will
improve dramatically. Most resonance I hear is well below even 1kHz -
typically between 100 - 300Hz. Cutting EQ in this range "helps", but
to me is only short term. Sure, you're no longer hearing the mounting
surface moving with the speaker cone, but you're losing dynamic
musical impact also.
Achieving a sturdier mount to me seems to make more sense. I also
believe that one does not need to spend thousands - or even hundreds
of dollars - to get that better sound without having to fiddle with EQ
or tone controls.

Is my reasoning valid?

[hank alrich]

ChrisCoaster > wrote:

> I speak primarily for home speakers, which usually come in their own
> cabinets, but this could also extend to drivers mounted in the dashes,
> doors, and rear shelves & pillars of automobiles:
>
> ANY speaker will sound inferior if what they are mounted in/on/next to/
> or near resonates sympathetically(or not so sympathetically) with the
> speaker driver itself.
>
> The news reporter reading the news: (example) "PresiDENT OBaMa
> exPressed coNDOlances to the faMILies who LOst loVED oNEs at Fort
> hOOD." "The NNew YOrk YaNKEEs paraDED thrOUgh LOWer MANhattaN..."
> The caps in that statement represent vibrations from what the speaker
> cone is bolted to, not from the cone itself.
>
> Cut down on such resonation - Solidify existing home cabinets or build
> a more solid one, and deaden portions of the car interior with
> adhesive mats or additional bracing - and any speaker's sound will
> improve dramatically. Most resonance I hear is well below even 1kHz -
> typically between 100 - 300Hz. Cutting EQ in this range "helps", but
> to me is only short term. Sure, you're no longer hearing the mounting
> surface moving with the speaker cone, but you're losing dynamic
> musical impact also.
> Achieving a sturdier mount to me seems to make more sense. I also
> believe that one does not need to spend thousands - or even hundreds
> of dollars - to get that better sound without having to fiddle with EQ
> or tone controls.
>
> Is my reasoning valid?

Yes, it is. While it's not the only issue that distinguishes crappy from
not so crappy and better, cabinet resonaces do make a mess of things.

--
ha
shut up and play your guitar

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Sat, 7 Nov 2009 08:07:11 -0800 (PST), ChrisCoaster
> wrote:

>I speak primarily for home speakers, which usually come in their own
>cabinets, but this could also extend to drivers mounted in the dashes,
>doors, and rear shelves & pillars of automobiles:
>
>ANY speaker will sound inferior if what they are mounted in/on/next to/
>or near resonates sympathetically(or not so sympathetically) with the
>speaker driver itself.

Some speakers use resonance as a design feature. Though not, perhaps,
resonance in the way you're describing.

But yes, rattles are bad. Have you any further revelations for us?
:-)

[William Sommerwerck]

> Is my reasoning valid?

It's certainly valid -- but it's not the only reason speakers don't sound
good.

[Scott Dorsey]

ChrisCoaster > wrote:
>Achieving a sturdier mount to me seems to make more sense. I also
>believe that one does not need to spend thousands - or even hundreds
>of dollars - to get that better sound without having to fiddle with EQ
>or tone controls.
>
>Is my reasoning valid?

Any decent speaker should be pretty free from cabinet resonances, but
many aren't. Check out the reviews in Stereophile or Studio Sound where
they put an accelerometer on the box and play an impulse through the
speaker.

The speaker mount and the area around the speaker should also be pretty
free of narrow resonances. You'll _always_ have the boundary effects from
the walls, floor, and ceiling, though. But if you play a sweep and find
something on the console is rattling at 55 Hz, fix it.

Careful speaker mounting is important, yes. It's all part of one big
system. All of these effects are very audible when you play sweep tones,
and they're easily measurable too.

Tap on the box. If it goes wo-wo-wo like an Altec A-7, stay away.
--Scott

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

[Geoff]

ChrisCoaster wrote:
> I speak primarily for home speakers, which usually come in their own
> cabinets, but this could also extend to drivers mounted in the dashes,
> doors, and rear shelves & pillars of automobiles:
>
> ANY speaker will sound inferior if what they are mounted in/on/next
> to/ or near resonates sympathetically(or not so sympathetically) with
> the speaker driver itself.


This is not news. If you buy speakers that are not crap, then these issue
will already be addressed. Just the mounting to worry about.

geoff