Is it possible to cover the whole spectrum, high SPL, low distortion with a 2-way?

^Hi, yeah, I'm trying to connect how to listen the difference, relationship with speaker setup to a room, what should I hear?

Taking Griesinger thought literally that when direct sound is loud and good enough so that brain locks in to harmonics and separates stereo phantom sound to its own neural stream while the "noise" in the room gets another, you'll hear both separately in a way, the recording as direct sound and your room as envelopment. Brain gets focus on the recording, lifts it out from "noise in the room".

I speculate if you took the listening setup with this neural separation to another room then sound of the recording, sound that you hear in front of you the main content, would be quite closely the same but quality of envelopment would change. But, if you listened further away so that both direct and room sound are perceived as one, no neural stream separation per Griesinger. In this case, there would be more of a difference, also sound that's in front of you would change.

Does this make sense to you? I'm trying to connect perceived phenomena to the communication, and vice versa. Speculating some, as I only have one speaker setup in one room so haven't experimented with this topic too great extent yet. There is clear transition between phantom image being clear and enveloping listened with small enough stereo triangle, and with more diffuse sounding where local room makes it hazy when listened further away.
 
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Hello Camplo

Why don't you try different radiation patterns in the same room?? Changing the direct to reflected ratio. Get a HEIL driver and adjust the back-wave through absorption using layers of fiberglass. Completely changes perceived image/sound stage.

Full omni image diffuse and enveloping. Absorbing completely and it changes to very sharp imaging less diffuse. Go in between and season to taste.

Has the same effect as walking front to back into a deep room.

Rob :)
 
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Earl, how many milliseconds difference (compared to straight on @ listening position) before the reflection becomes late (after the fusion time)?
The answer to this can most readily be gleaned by looking at the impulse responses for the Gammatone filters that researchers use to model human hearing as shown below:
Gammatone.jpg


From this we can see that the ear resolves a 7.5 kHz tone in under 2 ms, but it takes almost 20 ms to resolve a 500 Hz tone. There is no single number that encompases the entire bandwidth of hearing, so 15 ms is often used, although it is much more complex than that. Fussion time then would be the length of the wave packet. Reflections arriving within this packet get fussed with the direct sound while outside they are heard as a separate distinct sound.
 
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Wouldn't a "they are here" presentation deprive you of the possibility to appreciate the differences in the acoustics of the original venues where the music was recorded? (assuming the recording technique used allows for capuring that in the first place, of course).
I aim for a "you are there" presentation which allows me to close my eyes and forget that I'm in my room, and instead get "teleported" to another venue = the one where the musuc was recorded.
The problem here is that the recorded "reverb" is not natural. Natural reverb arrives at the ear from a multitude of direction. With 2 channel they all come from the speakers - not correct. Thus, in principle, 2 channel can never accurately record a rooms acoustics. But, with "they are here", the room acoustics are accurate.
 
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I don't think rising DI will stop one from achieving nuetral room character.
I would disagree here, I think that it does. That's certainly what my experience has been.
Less room treatment will be needed in the case of higher DI that is rising vs lower DI that is constant. That's just a guess but what seems to be true is that large rooms have rising DI and they sound good to many people. So have rising DI as I do that is smooth and lacking large dips/peaks only makes my small room sound more diffuse. I also sit about 56"-36" making the room even more diminished... all this happening before a lick of room treatment.
Higher DI does indeed require less room treatment.

" large rooms have rising DI " rooms don't have a DI, only sources do.

Sitting so close will indeed diminish the room regardless of DI, but it's like wearing headphones - not as pleasant as natural room ambiance.
 
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Increasing the DI and room dampening are the first 2 methods to diminish the levels of ER. IMO Increasing DI is more desirable than Room treatment, possibly more effective too... room treatment added to a system of high Di is the icing on the cake.
This is true, but I still contend that the DI needs to be flat to as low a frequency as practicable. But as the frequency falls the importance of DI also diminishes such that below some frequency it is irrelevant.
Or....maybe less effort going into increasing DI where the spectrums above the room modes.... and more effort into getting directivity down to 200hz or lower....

🤔
This IMO is the wrong approach. Better to have a flat and high DI and ignore it as the room becomes modal. DI means nothing when there are discrete room modes.
 
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Geddes pointed out earlier on another thread that there is plenty of time to compute high frequency information from direct sound before reflections come in, regardless of DI, while at low frequency this is about never the case, reflections come in before direct sound has had enough time to be perceived as such.
My previous post elucidates what you are saying
At some low frequency loudspeaker DI is about 0, and it is natural to have quite high DI at high frequency when wavelength gets smaller than transducer, so importance of DI for perception must be somewhere in between.
Yes, it's importance at LFs is zero and at MF and HFs it is significant.
 
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Sitting so close will indeed diminish the room regardless of DI, but it's like wearing headphones - not as pleasant as natural room ambiance.
Perhaps to a small degree, but of course pleasantness is quite a personal thing. However, for me the difference between close listening and headphones is still quite profound, whether one prefers it or not. Mostly because the perceived spatial sound-stage that can be created is (for me) hugely better from a pair of well designed close speakers, and there are still real-world reflections from nearby surfaces for good ambiance at that distance. And I appreciate that moving about changes where one hears the sound from; again it seems more real. Not to mention being unencumbered with headgear.

Though of course there are circumstances where headphones are necessary or better. I'm not criticising them, just suggesting they're quite different perceptually, and appropriate for fairly different tastes or situations.

I do accept that properly good room speakers with appropriate DI in an adequate room are even more enjoyable 'where circumstances permit'. Provided they have the capability for SPL and dynamics needed to overcome the extra distance (which IMO many don't). But if circumstances don't permit, I'd encourage people to at least try close-listening as an alternative to headphones, to decide for themselves. It was a small revelation to me.
 
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Agreed, except that the image that I am looking for is "they are here".
Thinking about this: CD systems like yours increase relative power response and thus late reflections of the HF vs. systems with narrowing beamwidth. Forgive some round numbers for the sake of discussion: minimizing early HF reflections in the 0-3ms range is a requirement for intelligibility and clean polar response, but once that job is done, you're delivering more energy and thus more late reflections at 7-10k+ than with a narrowing beamwidth system vs. CD. The bass has its own approach to maximizing room interaction via multiple sources, as it's forgiving of 0-15ms reflections perceptually, and that's much more practical as LF/MF directionality has decreasing benefit and increasing requirements.

Doesn't distance attenuation due to high toe-in putting the boundaries further away at HF mitigate the greater excitation energy in that instance? Meaning it's more the MF/LF where room is maximized, but at HF, the lack of early reflections and the attenuation of cross-wall reflections would tend to highly favor direct field?

This is getting the noodle cooking, I'd always thought of directional speakers as significantly limiting room involvement through HF, whether CD or not.
 
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Thinking about this: CD systems like yours increase relative power response and thus late reflections of the HF vs. systems with narrowing beamwidth. Forgive some round numbers for the sake of discussion: minimizing early HF reflections in the 0-3ms range is a requirement for intelligibility
As well as imaging.
... but once that job is done, you're delivering more energy and thus more late reflections at 7-10k+ than with a narrowing beamwidth system vs. CD.
Correct and highly desirable IMO.
The bass has its own approach to maximizing room interaction via multiple sources, as it's forgiving of 0-15ms reflections perceptually, and that's much more practical as LF/MF directionality has decreasing benefit and increasing requirements.
Yes, it is more "forgiving", but there is also the fact that in a small room there isn't anything that you can do about it.
Doesn't distance attenuation due to high toe-in putting the boundaries further away at HF mitigate the greater excitation energy in that instance?
I'm not so sure that I get what you mean, but in my experience (and data) the timing of a reflection is more important than its level. Hence a far wall reflection is preferred to a near wall one.
Meaning it's more the MF/LF where room is maximized, but at HF, the lack of early reflections and the attenuation of cross-wall reflections would tend to highly favor direct field?
Sure, that's the intent.
 
unless you are a fan of headphones - which I am not. Useful when you need them, but not for critical listening.
I love theorizing... but why I feel that my cd+horn is more revealing in the HF than my hd600... is beyond me. Neither have the best HF FR in terms of smoothness. I think the margin of error is either very similar or in the favor of the headphones... yet I've long discovered well before my horns, that critical listening in headphones, in regards to HF, isn't the most revealing. Hf and Lf Spl perception seems to be less discerning in headphones. With the horn, I anticipate this, as I attribute this to loudspeakers in general yet There seems to be another level of revealing, achieved with the horn, and I believed it has to do with the reduction of reflective energy.
" large rooms have rising DI " rooms don't have a DI, only sources do.
My mistake, I guess the obvious starting point is an anechoic situation. The room is just reflective energy. So off axis performance will differ in rooms but that is separate from DI which is solely direct sound.
I see you saying the same old things. THD is a pointless measure - without any subjective correlation. Nonlinearity can be an issue is a poorly designed or inadequate system (like a small full range driver.) I just prefer not to listen to unsatisfactory designs.
This brought me to think another statement you made about thd and imd.. both are forms of non linearity. Imd can be low but imd high, potentially. Even that is leaving out whether we are talking about AM or FM. The point has been mentioned several times that I'm covering 6 octaves with one driver, my reply is usually along the lines of how anyone over comes non linear distortion, through high levels of VV. The horn isn't small, and SPl expectations are of domestic nature not to mention the close listening proximity... at levels of 90db/1m, excursion could be 0.06mm at 200hz and 0.13mm at 105db/1m...



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The audibility of intermodulation distortion (IMD) can vary greatly depending on many factors, including the frequencies involved, the nature of the original audio content, the listening environment, and individual differences in hearing. Consequently, it's challenging to provide specific thresholds of IMD that are just becoming perceptible for different parts of the audio spectrum.

That being said, some general observations can be made:

  1. Low Frequencies (20 Hz to ~200 Hz): IMD can be particularly noticeable when it affects the low frequency range because it may produce audible 'beats' or 'buzzing' sounds when low frequencies interact. This range is also where our hearing is less sensitive, so it might require a higher percentage of IMD to become noticeable, potentially upwards of 1-3%.
  2. Mid Frequencies (~200 Hz to ~2 kHz): This range contains many of the fundamental frequencies of human speech and music, so any distortion here can be quite noticeable. The human ear is quite sensitive in this range, and IMD as low as 0.1-1% could potentially be heard.
  3. High Frequencies (~2 kHz to 20 kHz): While the ear is sensitive to distortion in this range, the IMD products of high frequencies often fall outside of our hearing range and therefore may be less noticeable. However, IMD that shifts high-frequency content down into the mid-frequency range could still be audible. The percentage at which IMD becomes audible here might be lower, potentially 0.1% or less.
These values should be considered very rough estimates. Audibility of IMD is highly dependent on the specific situation and individual listener. Further, keep in mind that high-quality audio equipment often aims for total harmonic distortion plus noise (THD+N) - a closely related measurement to IMD - of well below 0.1% across the entire frequency range.
 
Higher DI does indeed require less room treatment.

" large rooms have rising DI " rooms don't have a DI, only sources do.

Sitting so close will indeed diminish the room regardless of DI, but it's like wearing headphones - not as pleasant as natural room ambiance.
Like others have said, I perceive a difference between headphones and 1 meter monitoring. Modes obviously are complex and can surround you at your listening position, close or far.

Listening close, lessens the faults of the room.

I can hear the room as ambience, above the modal region, when sitting 1 meter. I believe there is a common thread between low reflective energy and large concert halls and large rooms. By lowering Early and Late reflective Spl, the room sounds bigger. So increasing DI and increasing proximity have similar effects on this aspect of increasing the direct sound portion of the summed SPL.
Everywhere the DI is significantly lower the room will sound more involed and thus smaller. In so many words, outside of modes... larger rooms have lower reverb levels than smaller rooms... somehow force gets traded for distance, that is, Spl level traded for longer decay times. Im guessing that this is directly tied to the increase of path length to boundaries.

The two examples would be one very large room like a large theater and a living room. Listening Distance and source level would have to remain the same in each example..the larger room would measure lower Spl at the listening point...

With that being said, High DI and sitting closer causes one the impression of being in a larger room. Sounding like headphones... in my untreated living room, that never happens. Headphones are still much much drier. In a very large room, sitting at 1m will be much closer to "headphones" but honestly, I don't think that even that would work. The position of the sources and sound fields created are so different. I would compare decay and rt60.
When the rt60 of the system+room nears or matches the rt60 of headphones, then we can say the presentation is as dry as headphones

The decay measurements of my horn measured outside, might of been similar to some measurements I took of my headphones. I can't imagine that this would be remotely true in a small untreated room listening at 1m. The lack of the equilateral triangle in headphone monitoring is the other aspect, removing loudspeakers at 1m from becoming "headphones" not to mention the lack of cross talk in listening experience
 
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