'If expanding the space horizontally is not an option, you can go below as shown here.'
i trust the house is not in Louisiana, where the flooding would make it into one large indoors pool
i trust the house is not in Louisiana, where the flooding would make it into one large indoors pool
I am quite happy to listen to a reasonable mix from the studio.
Most producers get it right.
Occasionally you get a washed out sound or something where things are at such different levels you cant hear a guitar or a vocal very well.
I ran a mobile disco for 40 years and it was mono, yet no one every mentioned that to me. My speakers were 3KHZ tops, again no comments.
I think some people have great imagination or extremely sensitive ears hearing speaker cable differences or different resistors. Because in my experience I cant.
I am happy sitting listening to my USB DAC mixed into mono through a 1980 Fane 12 inch speaker in a folded horn cabinet. Yet it cost next to nothing.
Just add more channels. 😀
Ground water level would be the first thing to check before contemplating such house which leads me to believe that the town in that video must not have issues with it.
I'll agree that recordings are probably the biggest limitation these days, and it isn't all the producer's fault. Digital recording has made a lot of things a lot easier, and that's got upsides and downsides.
One of the downsides is that it's too easy to do too much. Back in the days of tape, cutting and splicing a track was a difficult and destructive process. You didn't have the option of using software to fix mistakes. The problem is that now, a lot of things tend to sound the same.
Sometimes giving people more tools doesn't have a good impact. I think everyone can agree that compressors are a useful and important tool. But when companies like SSL started putting compressors on every single channel, people started using them on everything, and you end up with recordings where everything is flat, nothing stands out... they're boring.
It's sad, because I hear recordings where I know the artist is truly amazing- you can tell that they're very talented, but someone decided that it would be "better" if they steamrolled all the dynamics, life and personality out of it with compressors and overuse of DSP.
At the same time, there are some artists who have really taken these technologies and used them in creative ways to make incredible, but very different music. Rather than using them to fix mistakes, they see them as another way to manipulate the sound of their instruments.
That's just my 0.02. I don't think that we can go on about limitations of stereo reproduction until we start fully utilizing the current standard. That means that artists, producers, recording engineers and mastering engineers all need to work together to make better recordings, companies need to start working a little harder to market products based on fidelity (and hopefully that will help people care about it a little more), and the audiophile circle needs to stop dithering about the "sins of op-amps" and $500+ RCA cables while putting little to no effort into fixing some of the SEVERE (some of us might even go so far as to say catastrophic) room issues that both physicists, sound engineers and musicians agree sound like utter garbage. The reputation this behavior and attitude has put on the audiophile community does not do anybody any good.
One of the downsides is that it's too easy to do too much. Back in the days of tape, cutting and splicing a track was a difficult and destructive process. You didn't have the option of using software to fix mistakes. The problem is that now, a lot of things tend to sound the same.
Sometimes giving people more tools doesn't have a good impact. I think everyone can agree that compressors are a useful and important tool. But when companies like SSL started putting compressors on every single channel, people started using them on everything, and you end up with recordings where everything is flat, nothing stands out... they're boring.
It's sad, because I hear recordings where I know the artist is truly amazing- you can tell that they're very talented, but someone decided that it would be "better" if they steamrolled all the dynamics, life and personality out of it with compressors and overuse of DSP.
At the same time, there are some artists who have really taken these technologies and used them in creative ways to make incredible, but very different music. Rather than using them to fix mistakes, they see them as another way to manipulate the sound of their instruments.
That's just my 0.02. I don't think that we can go on about limitations of stereo reproduction until we start fully utilizing the current standard. That means that artists, producers, recording engineers and mastering engineers all need to work together to make better recordings, companies need to start working a little harder to market products based on fidelity (and hopefully that will help people care about it a little more), and the audiophile circle needs to stop dithering about the "sins of op-amps" and $500+ RCA cables while putting little to no effort into fixing some of the SEVERE (some of us might even go so far as to say catastrophic) room issues that both physicists, sound engineers and musicians agree sound like utter garbage. The reputation this behavior and attitude has put on the audiophile community does not do anybody any good.
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When Harman tests speaker preferences they use mono channels. Bad speakers drift higher in preference when they test in stereo and it becomes difficult to identify the good speakers.
The additional channel improved the system, despite the fundamental flaws in two channel stereo.
The additional channel improved the system, despite the fundamental flaws in two channel stereo.
Yes, this makes it difficult for me to buy or listen to new recordings. When I find an artist that I like then it's impossible to listen to the "wall of sound" recordings. Not only are compressors way over used, but often there is so much sound piled on top of sound that it doesn't breath, the sound is smothering. Track upon track upon track leaves nothing but a constant barrage. It seems a popular sound, but it's not for me.
The one I experienced was about the same size as typical living room in the US suburban houses. Ceiling was about 10' which is little higher than typical living room. It had bass traps, absorbers and diffusers well placed.
The "wall of sound" thing that you hear in grunge recordings doesn't necessarily bother me. That's its own sound. High fidelity? Well, not exactly... but that doesn't mean it isn't fun to listen to sometimes.
It's the recordings that aren't grunge- they're just a regular pop or rock track, but they've been auto-tuned (despite the artist having no need for it) and have so much compression (compress every channel then run it through a bus compressor! Yeah!) that they're not that interesting. They tend to sound pretty much the same regardless of what equipment you're using to listen to them.
On a really good system you can close your eyes and imagine a tiny little band playing at the tip of the stylus because they're...right there. If they're not, the system is lacking. It can be in a closet or an auditorium, the same rule applies.
In regards to the recording quality being an issue for people with really good neutral speakers resolving fine detail: that has been experienced by many on this forum.
As far as recording and re-creating a sound field goes:
Advocating for N channels has little merit since one (the consumer) will require a sound field in a different tbd space. The only benefit is to the industry trying to sell more equipment.
It is true what Jan Didden said about the only requirement (for a single listener) to experience the same air pressure levels at the ears as a recording dummy would placed in front of a band (provided one wanted a live venue experience!). And that btw has been a 100% possible for years.
In my line of work I use professional equipment for SQ analysis. I once brought home a simple portable unit (SQuadrigaII from HEAD Acoustics Gmbh). Recording my speakers playback binaurally with mics integrated into their headset and playing it back through the headphones I could not tell a difference. Same thing he described: after putting on and taking off the headphones many times I constantly had the ear muff feeling so at some point I would think that I was listening to the speakers and I would be listening to the headphone binaural playback and vice versa. It is that good.
The issue presents when one does not want the listening to be a solitary activity and they want the freedom to move etc., and not have the headphones on. Well at that point you might as well listen to a recording mixed from individually recorded instruments and voices (who did not perform simultaneously in some venue) and just try to recreate some kind of illusion that makes the listening a pleasant experience. I am pretty sure that distorting tube amps and some speaker set ups can make some voice even more pleasant than in reality; and nothing wrong with that. It is all about entertainment anyways and not about listening to a nuclear sub sonar signature.
As far as recording and re-creating a sound field goes:
Advocating for N channels has little merit since one (the consumer) will require a sound field in a different tbd space. The only benefit is to the industry trying to sell more equipment.
It is true what Jan Didden said about the only requirement (for a single listener) to experience the same air pressure levels at the ears as a recording dummy would placed in front of a band (provided one wanted a live venue experience!). And that btw has been a 100% possible for years.
In my line of work I use professional equipment for SQ analysis. I once brought home a simple portable unit (SQuadrigaII from HEAD Acoustics Gmbh). Recording my speakers playback binaurally with mics integrated into their headset and playing it back through the headphones I could not tell a difference. Same thing he described: after putting on and taking off the headphones many times I constantly had the ear muff feeling so at some point I would think that I was listening to the speakers and I would be listening to the headphone binaural playback and vice versa. It is that good.
The issue presents when one does not want the listening to be a solitary activity and they want the freedom to move etc., and not have the headphones on. Well at that point you might as well listen to a recording mixed from individually recorded instruments and voices (who did not perform simultaneously in some venue) and just try to recreate some kind of illusion that makes the listening a pleasant experience. I am pretty sure that distorting tube amps and some speaker set ups can make some voice even more pleasant than in reality; and nothing wrong with that. It is all about entertainment anyways and not about listening to a nuclear sub sonar signature.
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I found somewhere which, whilst not perfect but very acceptable living room and a studio (as in dance) which is a little live, but being 3x as wide as long would certainly not have an issue with early reflections from the side. Only problem is its 150 miles away and not a good commute if I have to start going back into the office.
I have practice at hiding the dangerous stuff, although kids love to poke the ribbon tweeters on my Apogees. So mesh is needed.
This is common practice amongst most pro designer i talked with.
I don't think the added channel 'improve' the system, this is a practical thing: omni microphone doesn't have proximity effect and help in 'voicing' the speaker using a source well known by the designer ( one of the guy i talked with use his backyard as a reference before any instruments).
With 'big' space i find live less an issue than too much damped, and it is easier to treat than small space. To be honest in my room i could perfectly live with it as is (i knew it but the sloped ceiling change a lot of things) despite it being too 'lively'.
I wish you'll find a solution.
I suppose i will have to acquire those skills. My older son now understand he is in danger ( i'm kidding... well half kidding!) if he comes too close to loudspeakers and as i offered him some vinyls he likes he won't damage the turntables but the younger one is unmanageable!
I catched him trying to put fingers in the cd of my Tannoy or trying to open my SL10.
That said i had a tear in the eye when he took me Kraftwerk's 'The robots' for me to play it. 😀
I feel your concern about tweeters. Too bad Tannoy haven't included a protection on them.
Ok So back on the meander of crest factor. Pano (thank you) has pointed me at some better software for me to have a play with. I've got a few tracks which have some extreme contrasts to have a look at and I will start with the Rickie lee Jones track Bob Cordell put me onto.
For clarity I view Dynamic range and Crest factor as two completely different things as one is the overall loudest vs quietest across the track and the other is the short term peak to RMS ratio. So most DR plugins won't say much about CF.
So back to Rickie. Foobar DRM plugin output below.
Statistics for: 3/11-(03) Ghetto Of My Mind
Number of samples: 16573956
Duration: 6:16
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Left Right
Peak Value: -0.62 dB --- -0.40 dB
Avg RMS: -26.47 dB --- -26.75 dB
DR channel: 23.44 dB --- 23.69 dB
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Official DR Value: DR24
That's an exceedingly high DR value so looking good, but the fun starts when you look at the track. It has a very hot snare drum which is the bit I want to analyze. More to follow.
For clarity I view Dynamic range and Crest factor as two completely different things as one is the overall loudest vs quietest across the track and the other is the short term peak to RMS ratio. So most DR plugins won't say much about CF.
So back to Rickie. Foobar DRM plugin output below.
Statistics for: 3/11-(03) Ghetto Of My Mind
Number of samples: 16573956
Duration: 6:16
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Left Right
Peak Value: -0.62 dB --- -0.40 dB
Avg RMS: -26.47 dB --- -26.75 dB
DR channel: 23.44 dB --- 23.69 dB
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Official DR Value: DR24
That's an exceedingly high DR value so looking good, but the fun starts when you look at the track. It has a very hot snare drum which is the bit I want to analyze. More to follow.
Since we are discussing listening rooms, can anyone say something about actually MAKING a listening room? Say for those that actually can wrestle some unfinished, dedicated space from the significant other. What does the checklist look like? The larger the better? The more square the better? Minimal furniture? Do you cover all four walls with some kind of treatment or diffuser panels?
Yes, -26 is a very low mastering level. I would imagine you have to turn that album up a good bit to get a normal playback level. Have you looked at it on Goldwave yet, does it report the same numbers?
What we are looking at here are crests, but they could be either brief or sustained, and that would sound different. There are ways to look at that, too.
What we are looking at here are crests, but they could be either brief or sustained, and that would sound different. There are ways to look at that, too.
I checked. Two of them were of similar dimensions being about 20mx7.5m with height roughly 4m. Very different otherwise, one a small box theater where I worked in Paris, the other a lava cave under my house in Kona, Hawaii.
Two others were medium size hotel ballrooms of maybe 200m2 with high ceilings.
Basically rooms the size of my house. 🙂