What causes listening "fatigue"?

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#1,261
Poor PWK. All that research and all has to show for it is what is arguably the best overall speaker compromise in around 70 years, The Klipschorn still in production. If only he would have had an extra pocket to carry a few extra tiny scientists in, he would not have made the mistakes he did. But then his lapel pin wouldn't work with his outfit.
gedlee said:
Yes, I do agree with a lot. Where I differ with him is on the perception of nonlinear distortion which was a big part of PWK's legacy. He studied the physics of nonlinearity but never really linked that to perception. Had he tried to correlate his measurements to perception he would have found some rather disappointing results.
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#1,264
Let's try and get more focussed here. 🙂

Here's my favourite motorbike of all time. Engineering excellence to die for, enter the Kawasaki KH500 two stroke:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


OK, a bit of a dodgy frame around corners, and fuel consumption to break your heart, but really, what's not to like! 😱

Here's the classic AR-MST cone tweeter speaker:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


And here's my effort with an 8" Visaton W200S and a Visaton TW 70 Cone tweeter. All impeccably modelled in Boxsim. The one on the right:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


What's not to like? 😉
 

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#1,265
If you get right down to it, Tom Danley may have solved the whole shebang. Or am I missing something here?

speaker dave said:
The issue is generally the spacing between drivers vs. wavelength at crossover. If you can get you drivers within a wavelength (or preferably less than 1/2 wave) apart at crossover then you have a good chance of an invisible crossover with smooth drivers.

This is why upper range crossovers are more difficult. The physical size of the drivers is too large. My Avatar shows an effort to move drivers tighter together. The tweeter is rear mounted and slightly overlaps the mids, getting them as close as possible. A tweeter capable of a lower crossover point was also used.

I agree that high frequency crossovers with horns are usually unsatisfactory. Phase allignment is generally impractical. If you push the tweeter back to the plane of the mid compression driver it is likely to reflect big time off of the mid horn. Even then the lateral displacement is great enough that any vertical motion pushes the time allignment off.

Always better to squeeze the top octave out of the mid horn if you can.

David
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#1,266
Steve we need you here in the Mississippi swamp. Real guy no BS. Plus we have parts for your Kowie everywhere and the third largest casino strip in the world. Oh wait.Reality just hit me. What I probably need to do is buy chili and hide it.
system7 said:
Let's try and get more focussed here. 🙂

Here's my favourite motorbike of all time. Engineering excellence to die for, enter the Kawasaki KH500 two stroke:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


OK, a bit of a dodgy frame around corners, and fuel consumption to break your heart, but really, what's not to like! 😱

Here's the classic AR-MST cone tweeter speaker:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


And here's my effort with an 8" Visaton W200S and a Visaton TW 70 Cone tweeter. All impecably modelled in Boxsim. The one on the right:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


What's not to like? 😉
Click to expand...
 
#1,270
badman said:
I find that a proper speaker system doesn't hide warts- it also doesn't emphasize them. Even with poor recordings, the vast majority of systems aren't extracting all the "good" from the recordings-they're swamped by room behavior, excessive diaphragm displacement, compression, and other playback system artifacts. Those who use the room as part of the system and optimize their (big enough) speakers accordingly, tend to find a lot more of the "good" out of even bad recordings.

I can tell an immediate improvement between speaker designs, level matched with similar FR, even on MP3s, meaning that many systems leave a lot more on the table, relative to the recording quality, than many of us would care to believe.
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Exactly my point. The better the system, the less "bad" recordings you will find. But it's true that you will also reveal the flaws more clearly, but in my opinion they is not always annoying. Personally I don't find occasional clipping, tape hiss or other typically analog-related artifacts annoying, but I do hate the brickwall limiting that is so typical in modern music.
 
#1,271
StigErik said:
Exactly my point. The better the system, the less "bad" recordings you will find. But it's true that you will also reveal the flaws more clearly, but in my opinion they is not always annoying. Personally I don't find occasional clipping, tape hiss or other typically analog-related artifacts annoying, but I do hate the brickwall limiting that is so typical in modern music.
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I second this wholeheartedly!

Personally I find that some recording artefacts like fret noise, channels that weren't muted actually ADD to the illusion and make the recording more 'life-like'.
Sadly it is too easy to remove these 'imperfections' in the digital realm which IMO goes along way towards the perceived anodyne sound of digital.
I get a similar feel from some high-budget '80s analogue productions.
 
#1,274
StigErik said:
Exactly my point. The better the system, the less "bad" recordings you will find. But it's true that you will also reveal the flaws more clearly, but in my opinion they is not always annoying. Personally I don't find occasional clipping, tape hiss or other typically analog-related artifacts annoying, but I do hate the brickwall limiting that is so typical in modern music.[/QUOTE

The majority of our work these days is hip hop. I'm sure this is the same everywhere.These days most stuff is going to be heard in a car or on phones. Blame the car. Noise floor is already high, we try to artfully restrict dynamic bandwidth, we do have not much choice for a variety of reasons. Here is but one: Hip Hop *is* Pop. Hip hop is the paradigm, it is by nature compressed. Most straight ahead pop now contains elements of Hip Hop such as the ubiquitous tr808 as opposed to acoustic drums. Samples and loops abound are everywhere, are already compressed and are used in lieu of live instruments. We are in this cycle for the near future. This is bleeding down to everything. Will this change?Yes probably and quickly in the next few years. After that happens perhaps a few years down the road (haha) we can worry about our hifi's and dynamic range. I would not be surprised if reality makes a comeback, acoustic instruments along with it. I listen to everything, all of the time. I love jazz. So do my components (-:
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#1,276
StigErik said:
Exactly my point. The better the system, the less "bad" recordings you will find. But it's true that you will also reveal the flaws more clearly, but in my opinion they is not always annoying. Personally I don't find occasional clipping, tape hiss or other typically analog-related artifacts annoying, but I do hate the brickwall limiting that is so typical in modern music.
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Not sure if we're discussing the same thing here, but the best speakers I've ever liked Quad 57/63's also showed most every little flaw mastered into a recording, warts and all were there. Music that was flawed, sound much better on a crap dept store stereo, which appears to be the norm today just wider freq range and edgy.
Now when I still had my mod'd Denon DP52F / Shure V15TypeV-MR then the Vxmr snap crackle pop was never bothersome, actually surprised at how light they become once you have a good high slew rate RIAA preamp. Much lighter touch to those artifacts. Same with tape hiss, especially on a RtR. Local FM radio station WVUD University of Dayton broadcast in Dolby FM. Uninterrupted full albums every Saturday night. All sound fine, better than 256k mp3s IMHO
 
#1,277
peteleoni said:
StigErik said:
Exactly my point. The better the system, the less "bad" recordings you will find. But it's true that you will also reveal the flaws more clearly, but in my opinion they is not always annoying. Personally I don't find occasional clipping, tape hiss or other typically analog-related artifacts annoying, but I do hate the brickwall limiting that is so typical in modern music.[/QUOTE

The majority of our work these days is hip hop. I'm sure this is the same everywhere.These days most stuff is going to be heard in a car or on phones. Blame the car. Noise floor is already high, we try to artfully restrict dynamic bandwidth, we do have not much choice for a variety of reasons. Here is but one: Hip Hop *is* Pop. Hip hop is the paradigm, it is by nature compressed. Most straight ahead pop now contains elements of Hip Hop such as the ubiquitous tr808 as opposed to acoustic drums. Samples and loops abound are everywhere, are already compressed and are used in lieu of live instruments. We are in this cycle for the near future. This is bleeding down to everything. Will this change?Yes probably and quickly in the next few years. After that happens perhaps a few years down the road (haha) we can worry about our hifi's and dynamic range. I would not be surprised if reality makes a comeback, acoustic instruments along with it. I listen to everything, all of the time. I love jazz. So do my components (-:
Click to expand...

Which is why this guy is one of the few rays of light in the music scene:

seasick steve with John Paul Jones @ Glastonbury 2013 full set.. - YouTube
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#1,278
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