There is the power response of the source, but one can also define the power response at the listeners position. The later includes the room while the former does not. The room power response is tricky because of "statistical" issues of single point measurements. One has to define this power over and area, not at a point.
This thread has had me scratching my head a few times. I use a combination of gated and ungated measurements and it seems to work for me. I can use CLIO and my RTA and between the two I can rather easilly tailor the sound based on the measurements and get a very pleasing result.
Are all you guys taking measurements in this thread really having that hard a time getting your systems to work for you??😱
I am no rocket scientist so if I can manage it can't be all that hard. Just some knowledge and some common sense.
Rob🙂
Right, that's what I meant by in-situ. ie its valuable to measure the linear characteristics while in use (audience in place). So, we are saying the same.
Noise immunity must be a bear of an design challenge. Thats a great deal of averaging!
@Robh3606
I can only speak for myself and i guess i understand
what you are saying.
To get a speaker balanced just for myself in a particular
room for the majority of "credible" recordings is something
i would not even make much use of measuring
equipment for ...
For me the task is currently finding a "baseline" that
may serve for many rooms and hopefully a majority of
listeners in those rooms respectively.
From that baseline there may be moderate deviations
by switchable components or variation of LF rolloff by
damping.
To find that baseline it is helpfull to have a speaker in
different rooms from time to time and listen to
what is happening. A suboptimal room, having
reverberation time longer than recommended
and also non balanced over frequency may as well reveal
weaknesses of a speaker as a "well behaved" room.
Then measurement and auditive correlation is important
to get a picture of the whole. The "baseline" should
be close to the average and not in the periphery to
avoid difficulties in speaker room adaption.
Kind Regards
I can only speak for myself and i guess i understand
what you are saying.
To get a speaker balanced just for myself in a particular
room for the majority of "credible" recordings is something
i would not even make much use of measuring
equipment for ...
For me the task is currently finding a "baseline" that
may serve for many rooms and hopefully a majority of
listeners in those rooms respectively.
From that baseline there may be moderate deviations
by switchable components or variation of LF rolloff by
damping.
To find that baseline it is helpfull to have a speaker in
different rooms from time to time and listen to
what is happening. A suboptimal room, having
reverberation time longer than recommended
and also non balanced over frequency may as well reveal
weaknesses of a speaker as a "well behaved" room.
Then measurement and auditive correlation is important
to get a picture of the whole. The "baseline" should
be close to the average and not in the periphery to
avoid difficulties in speaker room adaption.
Kind Regards
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I don't read German (scares me 🙂: YouTube - Ron James: West Coast Wild (Camping & Germans)), but I believe the results in that paper were quoted with headphones. GD audibility would be much less in a reverberant room (ie higher GD thresholds).
We're veering a bit off topic, but non-flat group delay can change the audibility threshold of low level distortion. Non-flat GD changes the signal envelope and allows occasional distortion or harmonic products to peak up in the gaps in the signal envelope. Depending upon the nature of the distortion, it can be perceived as impacting tonality. See Schroeder and Mehgart "Auditory Masking in the perception of speech", for the double blind testing of this. Given that this effect does and can occur, but is not necessarily "probable" (depends on signal level, envelope, harmonic and distortion make up), I think it's safe to call this one a second order effect.
Dave Dal Farra
Can't speak for the other guys, but I'm getting decent results. That is not ruler flat, and I use a unidirectional mic. That works for me, but it's certainly not standard. And I have to tweak the last few 1-2 dB by ear.
One thing I can say. Having heard a lot of different systems in different homes and shows over the years, not many of them are well balanced to my ear. Most "audiophile" systems are too bright and forward for my ears. Most typical home systems sound bloated and muddy. Maybe I'm weird or just picky. But it's a delight to hear the occasional well balanced system.
Yes, headphones were used. If room reverberation
has influence, it can be assumed that high directivity
index of the speaker and listening distance has an
influence on the threshold too (?) ...
... and the envelope of wind instruments e.g. carries
information enabling experienced listeners to distinguish
even among individual players of the very same
instrument ...
An interesting hint, even if "a second order effect".
---
I'll have a look at the video now ... the guy seem's
to be good ... 😉
Kind Regards
Rob, I too am no rocket scientist. I'm not even close and I find it easy to make a 'flat' system sound great.
Dan
Dan
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Sorry again Dave, but my research and that of say Brian Moore (look him up), indicates the exact opposite. Group delay, in and of itself, becomes more audible at higher SPLs, completely independent of any nonlinear effects. This is an extremely critical result that few understand. It needs to be understood.
@ Line Array
Why?? I find music content way to variable to use to set up a system. I use pink noise typically unless I am using CLIO where I can use use both Sine and MLS and typically use both and look for correlation between the two.
Are you talking about an "accurate baseline" or a pleasing one?? If you are going strickly by ear with music as your source do you have a reliable method to get there?? There is so much variation from recording to recording how do you know which are correct??
Don't get me wrong I am with Pano and use my ears for any final adjustments. They are usually minor ones. I just can't see not using measurements to get you in the ballpark.
Regards Rob🙂
Why?? I find music content way to variable to use to set up a system. I use pink noise typically unless I am using CLIO where I can use use both Sine and MLS and typically use both and look for correlation between the two.
Are you talking about an "accurate baseline" or a pleasing one?? If you are going strickly by ear with music as your source do you have a reliable method to get there?? There is so much variation from recording to recording how do you know which are correct??
Don't get me wrong I am with Pano and use my ears for any final adjustments. They are usually minor ones. I just can't see not using measurements to get you in the ballpark.
Regards Rob🙂
Let me go one step further. I "just can't see" NOT using measurements to calibrate your ears. When did "ears" all of a sudden become so inflallible? In all my work "ears" and people are extremely unreliable. It's only arrogance that suggests otherwise.
I could have been a rocket scientist, but I liked audio. And if you are claiming that all this is "easy" then all I can say is that you are doing it wrong. What you think of your own system is pretty much irrelavent, isn't it? It's when other recognize your system as being exemplary, then you have something. We all love what WE do!!!
Hello Earl
I am sorry but any tweeking I do by ear is minor and I see the necessity as issues in my room and speaker interface that anecholic meaurements can't predict.
Rob🙂
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Earl, I think you misread what I wrote. I never made any claims about audibility being higher or lower at any signal levels.
Schroeder and Mehgart created a signal that was "speech like" in power spectrum, and used this as the masker for a 1020 Hz tone. The masker was a fundamental and set of harmonics. Fundamental was always a sub-harmonic of 1020Hz. They then either kept the phase of all harmonics in the masker equal or not. When they were equal, the 1020Hz tone was not as well masked. Theory is that the envelope of the masker had "quiet periods" where the 1020Hz could be unmasked.
By "low level" I was referring to the harmonic relative to the masker. Interestingly, the lower the masker fundamental frequency, and the lower the 1020Hz could be in level before it was masked.
I have no idea if this is inconsistent with Brian Moore
AES E-Library: Discrimination of Group Delay in Clicklike Signals Presented via Headphones and Loudspeakers
but it appears he was measuring different attributes than Schroeder and Mehgar
Hello Earl
I didn't say it was easy. All asked was if the guys using measurements really had all that hard a time of getting what they thought was a good sounding system based on their measurements.
I am sorry but you seem to be missing the boat on that one?? Who gives a tinkers damn if you can't stand to listening to it??
My friends really like my system. Does that count. If you are in NY come on by.
Rob🙂
I think it's easy. All you have to do is spend about 10yrs on the web listening to guys who make sense(sometimes hard to figure out) and read a couple massive books(Dr. Toole's in particular and my gut is telling me Dr. Geddes's book might be better but I don't know), get some calibrated measurement gear, learn to properly measure your speakers, measure your speakers, get rid of them d/t inadequate performance, repeat as many times as necessary
...... Put them in the room, pack your front wall with absorption, make an acoustic foam coffee table and a ceiling diffusor, get a few subs, try a few dozen locations, phase and crossover settings, and eq the bass to smooth over the listening area. CLD or mass loaded walls would be better to start with, but that is too much work for me.
OK, maybe not so easy, but worth it. "Failure is impossible"-Harriet Beecher Stowe
Dan
...... Put them in the room, pack your front wall with absorption, make an acoustic foam coffee table and a ceiling diffusor, get a few subs, try a few dozen locations, phase and crossover settings, and eq the bass to smooth over the listening area. CLD or mass loaded walls would be better to start with, but that is too much work for me.OK, maybe not so easy, but worth it. "Failure is impossible"-Harriet Beecher Stowe
Dan
Rob,
Blindly aiming for flat has never ever worked for me. Blindly aiming for the same response as what worked last time has also never ever worked for me.
You always get good, but not "set and forget about it" great.
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