The Advantages of Floor Coupled Up-Firing Speakers

[LineArray]

Quote:
...
"I have very wide dispersion speakers in a very wet, large room."
...

That "large room" seems not to be the typical living room, which has to
suffer from low modal density and Schroeder frequency rather high.


The eigenfrequencies of an acoustical small room form a kind of subset
of those in a large room.

The auditive small room behaviour could be simulated using
a prepared reproduction system while listenening in the large
room easier than doing it vice versa. No ?


In the example you mentioned, the excitation of mirror sound sources
might have worked well, because distances (between speakers and walls)
were large enough. Modal density was quite high, so the room created
"ambience". But that is an idiosyncratic and subjectively reported example.
Though interesting and believable IMO.

Kind Regards

[graaf]

Originally Posted by markus76

We don't know enough about our hearing in order to objectively define optimal sound reproduction. On the other hand we have fully operational sound reproduction techniques.

You should add various and diverse fully operational techniques

some of them are more popular, mainstream, and some less popular, and some even considered weird by some

but popularity is no criterion for reasonableness

Originally Posted by markus76

That's probably why Bob does not agree with the soundstage of speakers with low directivity. Did you already ask him about his post at Gearslutz?

well, the quoted opinion from Him was posted "27th October 2007" as last post in now probably dead thread
in additon Bob Katz is not a gearslutz frequenter, His last post is from "20th November 2009", I would not expect to be given any answer

[markus76]

Originally Posted by graaf

I would not expect to be given any answer

Why not write an email? Audio CD Mastering, Mixing & Replication

[graaf]

Originally Posted by markus76

Why not write an email? Audio CD Mastering, Mixing & Replication

You gotta be kidding
who am I to expect an answer for such a highly abstract question about over 2-years old internet comment from such a busy man?
Myself I would consider such a person sending an e-mail with such a question a maniac.

besides it is not interesting why He wrote but how He wrote it - not "I dislike such imaging and soundstaging" but "I disagree with such imaging and soundstaging"

How can one disagree with a phenomenon?

On the other hand myself I would consider asking directly such a question the person concerned simply impolite.

[markus76]

It's impolite to talk to other people? Guess it depends on how you ask. He answered my emails...

[graaf]

Originally Posted by LineArray

That "large room" seems not to be the typical living room, which has to
suffer from low modal density and Schroeder frequency rather high.

well, yes, but the crucial point is that He maintains that:

it should get better in small rooms

Originally Posted by LineArray

The auditive small room behaviour could be simulated using
a prepared reproduction system while listenening in the large
room easier than doing it vice versa. No ?

I don't know, but Dr Mouton says:

DRM: No, it should get better in small rooms.

the room created
"ambience". But that is an idiosyncratic and subjectively reported example.

it was not only ambience but also "holographic imaging" (another subjective opinion) and also precision and it is not only "idiosyncratic and subjectively reported example", there are more examples and people are making control rooms according to some theoretical assumptions and those control rooms work

another idiosyncratic and subjective report from gearslutz:

I've spent the past few hours listening to music without my usual early reflection absorbing side panels. I have to say it's an interesting experience. Everything certainly sounds wider, though a sum to mono is still a very small point in space in front of me. The really interesting thing is that great recordings still sound great, if a bit more open, but mixes that were on the edge of being too strident or brittle are unbearable. That could make it a hard choice to live with for the long term. OTOH, a good monitoring system is supposed to reveal problems

this approach is just less popular but it doesn't follow that being less popular it is as such not "reasonable" and only "idiosyncratic and subjectively reported" either that those more popular approaches are in contrast "reasonable" and not only "idiosyncratic and subjectively reported"


they are just traditional and believed to be reasonable

[LineArray]

Quote:

"One major loudspeaker designer had to check that the center speaker was off, because in 2-channel stereo the imaging was so good that he couldn't believe he was hearing a phantom."

I assume even loudspeaker designers and recording engineers
to be (mostly) human beeings.

The optical presence of a center speaker is sufficient to distract
our hearing. Experiments in spatial hearing show, that the
presence of an optical stimulus may well overrule acoustic
clues for locatedness of a sound source.

Our visual system is the leading system when judging
the position of objects in those cases where optical and
acoustical stimuli are present. *

That is why i do not rate that cited occurence too much in its
relevance to spatial sound reproduction.

For making conclusions about spatial hearing one needs
very controled conditions and a minimum amount of test listeners.

To have optical stimuli out of the test setting is essential.


* That corelates to why large speakers with shiny surface or expensive
veneer always sound better. Never observed ?


Kind Regards

[graaf]

Originally Posted by markus76

It's impolite to talk to other people? Guess it depends on how you ask. He answered my emails...

not only how but also what

Am I to ask Him "Sir, what did You mean by saying "I disagree with such imaging and soundstaging"?"

[markus76]

There are no dumb questions, only dumb answers.

[LineArray]

Quote:
"
I've spent the past few hours listening to music without my usual early reflection absorbing side panels. I have to say it's an interesting experience.
...
"

I have no problem with that.

1. We all have to change things sometimes, otherwise live gets boring.

2. Is an absorber always an advantage ?

If the absorber is very frequency dependent (usually it is) the reflected
sound from that particular wall may be a more (spectral) likely copy
from the original without the absorber.

Brain has to integrate the reflection on a hard surface:
"Aha there's a wall". Nothing unusual.

If there is a frequency dependent absorber our brain has more to do,
to form a "coherent" picture of the environment.
More effort = less fun.

Simplest way is to avoid the reflection.

In an average listening environment a constant directivity loudspeaker
causes reflections to be of similar spectral content like the original sound.

The exercise from Linkwitz i posted before goes into that direction.

To me by the time it is not so important whether a speaker has narrow
or wider dispersion. Although i prefer some directivity, to me it is more
important, to have no sharp discontiuities in angular dispersion
depending on frequency.

If that is given, you can prepare the room by placing
absorbers to achieve wide band absorbtion.

But given e.g. a 2 way speaker with 20cm Bass and 2cm Tweeter
near a side wall, any HF absorber on the side wall will alter the
spectral content in the whole listening room over proportional.

Kind Regards