Hello, common stereophonics, say two-channels transmissions or recordings, do not work with just two loudspeakers. Headphones do work, if one accepts to not fathom for further information by moving one's head. With loudspeakers, one needs a curved horizontal array of many, say 32 fullrangers each fed by a different sum of left and rite signal. One also needs recording engineers, who use pure intensity-stereo-microphonics. Public research into correct stereophonics stopped in the sixties, which coincidently also was the time, when Acoustic Research went on tour with two-loudspeakers stereophonics. Some mono afficinados survived, and recently Elias, others and me tried to repair stereophonics.
There's a wealth of information right here on this forum. We've had some very cool threads discussing stuff like this. What I used to do is sort the forum on number of views and see which threads surface.
That's how I got to read this one: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/177403-linkwitz-orions-beaten-behringer-what.html
Lots of interesting parties involved in a thread like that.
Keep in mind, it isn't all about the speakers. Don't forget the room! I chose my speaker design for it's capabilities to work with the room with minimal help needed.
Don't assume, measure
. Most preferably at the spot of interest. And learn how we perceive sound to be able to read the measurements.
That's how I got to read this one: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/177403-linkwitz-orions-beaten-behringer-what.html
Lots of interesting parties involved in a thread like that.
Keep in mind, it isn't all about the speakers. Don't forget the room! I chose my speaker design for it's capabilities to work with the room with minimal help needed.
Don't assume, measure
. Most preferably at the spot of interest. And learn how we perceive sound to be able to read the measurements.The Denovo is a very good clone of a DE250 and actually has a better frequency response and more output lower down, I don't think that the B&C is really an upgrade in this situation.
The Fusion is a pretty good basic design and with a Jeff Bagby crossover you know that some thought has been put into it. The low bass will be missing in action though, this is not really a full range speaker to use without subs.
This kit from SEAS is interesting as it is using a coaxial and an L26 woofer. I know from my LX521's that they can go low.
SEAS KingRO4Y Mk II
Anything from Troels Gravesen would be worth building, plenty of information and measurements to help decide.
Also Bill Waslo's Small Syn's are very impressive and come with all the information you could need to build them including the crossover. If I wasn't in the middle of building Line Arrays and hadn't got XT1464 waveguides waiting for a Synergy style speaker I would probably build Bill's.
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It is a shame, how you use the words soundstage and imaging for weaseling thru commerce. Two-loudspeaker stereos cannot reproduce a soundstage and put forth a sonic image with voices appearing in any point within a at least one-dimensional space. All they can do is put out dialog stereo AKA either-l-or-r stereo, with no voice appearing in both channels simultaniously. Thanks
soundstage and imaging have as much to do with room acoustics as they do with speaker type. Making very directive speakers or having a lot of absorption near them can reduce room interactions and can even make your speakers sound a bit "headphony". Usually this is not good for imaging.
You can also splash sound all over the place ala Bose 901 or many bipolar or multidirectional speakers (Mirage, deftech, etc..) or many speakers with rear facing tweeters... and try to use room reflections to make it sound spacious.
Big dipoles are another way of splashing sound all over - some of the best (Soundlab, Quad) and worst (Martin Logan) systems I have ever heard require careful room treatment to sound their best. Then they only show their potential with "trick" recordings - I have yet to find a "trick" recording with music that I really like... None of my favorites have ever provided a "you are there" quality with any system....well maybe the drum solo on Rush's By-tor or ELP's Sheriff...when turned up to eleven on crappy, but efficient party speakers
You can also splash sound all over the place ala Bose 901 or many bipolar or multidirectional speakers (Mirage, deftech, etc..) or many speakers with rear facing tweeters... and try to use room reflections to make it sound spacious.
Big dipoles are another way of splashing sound all over - some of the best (Soundlab, Quad) and worst (Martin Logan) systems I have ever heard require careful room treatment to sound their best. Then they only show their potential with "trick" recordings - I have yet to find a "trick" recording with music that I really like... None of my favorites have ever provided a "you are there" quality with any system....well maybe the drum solo on Rush's By-tor or ELP's Sheriff...when turned up to eleven on crappy, but efficient party speakers
What on earth does that mean?
Maybe not but two speaker "stereo" sound is not going anywhere anytime soon and I don't see the market for 32 speaker hemispherical arrays in most peoples living rooms no matter how good they could be made to sound. I suspect those would be for a man cave only.
They could line up next to the Betamax recorder or any superior format that was sent into obscurity by a more popular competitor
Some of this comes down to personal preferences and your own experience of sound events that inform you of what you expect a recording to sound like.
Some people like the drier presentation of narrower directivity, other's hate it so I think you have to try for yourself to see what you like.
The room you have and desire or opportunity for treatment has a big part too. As Ron says some speakers demand treatment to sound good other types you can get away with much less.
Linkwitz sets out his requirements (halfway down the page) for much of this, if you can get all of this then I think you would be in a good position to get the best out of whichever speakers you chose.
The-Magic-in-2-Channel-Sound
Most conventional loudspeakers sound good if placed far enough from room boundaries, not so easy in practice though.
You bring up specific brand models as viable solutions, while they are all broken technically.
We had that popularity dominance of a broken technics for a man's age. Do you not mean, it is time to move on and stop lying at least on this topic? We may find another topic to lie our souls out.Maybe not but two speaker "stereo" sound is not going anywhere anytime soon and I don't see the market for 32 speaker hemispherical arrays in most peoples living rooms no matter how good they could be made to sound. I suspect those would be for a man cave only.
They could line up next to the Betamax recorder or any superior format that was sent into obscurity by a more popular competitor
I was replying to the OP where his writing suggested that he was favouring building a commercial kit. There is nothing currently available that doesn't have any compromises, the ones I posted are decent versions of what they are it's up to the individual to decide which compromises they want.
Exactly and who won was it better or more popular? Being better has never been good enough to last out. You might wish it otherwise, good luck with that history and human nature is not on your side.
I tend to find it more productive to concentrate on trying to improve what is available and what will work with the majority of already recorded material.
Please point out where I lied? That is a pretty big accusation to make.
For many years this didn't interest me. In the early 80's I built a couple of the Maplin Mosfet amps based on the Hitachi datasheet, they are still going strong. I used them with some old Celestions. 15 years down the line I was passing a junk shop and saw a pair of old KEF Concertos in the window, popped in, asked how much, £40 he said, he didn't have a clue what they were, just thought they were ugly, so I didn't tell him, just gave him £40. They were an eye opener and I enjoyed them for another 10 years until I moved to a smaller house where they were too big. So, what to do.... I wanted to build my own, so did a lot of reading, not sure how,why or when but I started to get interested firstly in fullrange single driver speakers and then open baffle, the simple minimalist approach appealed to me. I had an old pair of 6" Pioneer coaxial car speakers knocking around and thought they'd make a reasonable substitute for a fullrange just to play around with and see if there was any potential.
I put them in a couple of very large sheets of cardboard and was immediately impressed with the result. I continued to play with them and they ended up a u frame kind of contraption. Ok this is going somewhere me thinkst, so I did a lot more reading about fullrange and finally bought a pair of the original Jordan Eikonas and stuck them in the same u frame.
Fine, great, but of course no real bass, so after a lot of soul searching I decided to abandon OB (or did I?) and built the VTL cabinet for them...............but with a removable back panel..aha!
Ok, I'll wrap this up now, at the moment I'm listening to them OB in a FAST set up with 4 M12 HiVi woofers in U frames, TADA!
Last time you replied to me.
Nothing's gonna change my world
Soundstaging of two-loudspeakers stereo cannot become improved, because it is broken by design.
You participated in a topic, which means to improve soundstaging, and advocated devices, which cannot do any soundstaging, except for dialogues. Any two-loudspeakers stereo can play back dialogues. The problem is the phantom center, which was discussed in two topics recently. Left&Rite-loudspeakers stereos cannot establish a stable center impression, and so cannot reproduce a soundstage.
That was an excellent read, including the Linkwitz evaluation. The conclusion should have been "no statistical significance" user preference got in the way.There's a wealth of information right here on this forum. We've had some very cool threads discussing stuff like this. What I used to do is sort the forum on number of views and see which threads surface.
That's how I got to read this one: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/177403-linkwitz-orions-beaten-behringer-what.html
Lots of interesting parties involved in a thread like that.
Keep in mind, it isn't all about the speakers. Don't forget the room! I chose my speaker design for it's capabilities to work with the room with minimal help needed.
Don't assume, measure
I still have some 80's gear and listen to it daily. How are your OB U-frame woofers configured? Four frames or 2x2 frames and generally how do you place them in the room.For many years this didn't interest me. In the early 80's I built a couple of the Maplin Mosfet amps based on the Hitachi datasheet, they are still going strong. I used them with some old Celestions. 15 years down the line I was passing a junk shop and saw a pair of old KEF Concertos in the window, popped in, asked how much, £40 he said, he didn't have a clue what they were, just thought they were ugly, so I didn't tell him, just gave him £40. They were an eye opener and I enjoyed them for another 10 years until I moved to a smaller house where they were too big. So, what to do.... I wanted to build my own, so did a lot of reading, not sure how,why or when but I started to get interested firstly in fullrange single driver speakers and then open baffle, the simple minimalist approach appealed to me. I had an old pair of 6" Pioneer coaxial car speakers knocking around and thought they'd make a reasonable substitute for a fullrange just to play around with and see if there was any potential.
I put them in a couple of very large sheets of cardboard and was immediately impressed with the result. I continued to play with them and they ended up a u frame kind of contraption. Ok this is going somewhere me thinkst, so I did a lot more reading about fullrange and finally bought a pair of the original Jordan Eikonas and stuck them in the same u frame.
Fine, great, but of course no real bass, so after a lot of soul searching I decided to abandon OB (or did I?) and built the VTL cabinet for them...............but with a removable back panel..aha!
Ok, I'll wrap this up now, at the moment I'm listening to them OB in a FAST set up with 4 M12 HiVi woofers in U frames, TADA!
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The irony of my little tale that was not concluded, cuz I didn't want to bore people, no, to be honest I haven't got an issue with that! I'm not used to typing and I got tired, is I mentioned that I didn't have room for the KEFs, that is a lie, I still have the drivers, which I might have plans for, but I didn't like the bass reflex set up and that definitely didn't work in the room. So, I cut the baffles out of the cabinets, did some internal bracing, and mounted 2 woofers in what was the back. The room is about 12' by 15' and they spend most of the time approx 4' away from all walls and I listen close field
That's right. I lived just with the Jordan VTL for a while, very impressive too, occasionally I'll go back to that. I have tinnitus, don't know if it's a combination of things, maybe even psychological, but I feel I've became sensitive to air pressure, I started to find low notes even from the VTL uncomfortable pressure wise, that's one of the reasons I went for the dipole bass. Happy to say it has worked for me too. I would be interested to know if anyone else has this issue with pressure, it doesn't seem to get mentioned.
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