I'm starting to think that music and speakers are like bullets and guns. You never should have tried to play that piece on those speakers. As has been mentioned earlier I bought a copy of the Hilliard Ensemble's Lassus based on jostenmeat's recommendation. I finally got around to playing it on my main system as I was trying to figure out my next step with tuning my EQ. I quickly realized that while I was okay with exploring this music on other (lesser) systems, I could not tolerate another minute of it on my living room system. It was making me nuts. Maybe it's the state of my EQ but trying to define where those four singerfellas were was brutally grating.
Choral music is very revealing test material, and I usually include some, but time did not permit.
While I have always claimed to dislike any kind of jazz save one LP, while at ParadigmDawg's house listening to his choice of demo music on his Studio 100's powered by whatever flavor of overkill that he has over there, I found that I liked it. That demo didn't fail to impress even though it was a type of music I had never enjoyed before. I'm starting to think that I had never heard it on the right speakers.
I see where something is going on at ~3KHz. The speech discrimination band (?) keeps getting mentioned and I wonder exactly that is. I did a test with my RTA and I seem to have a range from 100Hz-1,000Hz. You mentioned not crossing in the speech discrimination band and not below 350Hz. You have some explaining to do unless I am to remain confused about this too.
I didn't realize Minnesota was that cold already ... and -20F in winter?
You must have been a bad man in a previous life.
That is what a former Russian colleague of mine used to say!
Yes, the waterfall plot shows that the situation is pretty disastrous either side of the upper crossover point were things really start to fall apart.
One thing really stands out, for some reason they elected to go with a misalignment. If you look at the impedance curve the camel humps in the bass show a severe misalignment, and accounts for the splashy spreading bass. In a correct alignment the low point of the curve between the tuning humps should be right at the driver resonant frequency Fs. I know darn well the tuning frequency of those small bass drivers is not 20 Hz, which even the best sub drivers have trouble achieving.
There is a dip, in the lower mid range and then a peak centered at 3 kHz. This always sounds bad to me. You must never have a rise of even 0.5 of a db around in the 3 kHz region, or violins, brass, piano, and flutes will sound very unnatural. A dip in that region is a far better tolerated vice. Associated with all of this is is severe phase aberrations, and this usually goes hand in hand.
All in all those graphs, show a speaker that I would dislike a lot, and I would not expect a purchaser with a large varied classical collection to be able to abide them.
The issue with low crossover points with passive crossovers is due to the severe problems produced as a consequence of the huge values of the inductors and caps involved. The load becomes insanely reactive. I'm unrepentant in my belief that 350 Hz and preferably 400 Hz should be as low as you should design a passive crossover. If you want to go lower than that you need to design an active speaker.
The critical speech discrimination band is from around 350 Hz to 2 kHz however the band is usually considered to be from 350 Hz to 4 kHz. Not only is reproducing this band critical for intelligible natural speech, it carries over into music reproduction also, as it is a region where the ear is most sensitive to aberrations of all types.
In closing I did recently here a very nice speaker on my trip to England at my sister and brother in laws house. It was small ATC bookshelf selling at roughly $1000 per pair. The speaker was beautifully voiced, although stated rolling off around 90 Hz because of its small size. However its tonal balance and articulation were superb.
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Marantz DV 9600 Rotel 1098 Quad Direct TV HD 20 HD DVR Carter audio workstation RME Fireface 800 Fujitsu 50XHA40 Front left and right Carter dual transmission line studio monitors MK II. Center Carter coaxial transmission line center speaker Rear Carter NFM-1s Center backs Carter dual transmission line studio monitors MK I. My system: - http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/...27077317_Pufg7
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Have you spent any time with PSB speakers ? Paul Barton is a classical violinist. I find his speaker lines to be more consistent. Especially compared to Paradigms newer lines of speakers which tend to be noticeably brighter. PSB's tend to be more neutral to my ears.
I'm sorry, I have never had a chance to hear a speaker from PSB.
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Marantz DV 9600 Rotel 1098 Quad Direct TV HD 20 HD DVR Carter audio workstation RME Fireface 800 Fujitsu 50XHA40 Front left and right Carter dual transmission line studio monitors MK II. Center Carter coaxial transmission line center speaker Rear Carter NFM-1s Center backs Carter dual transmission line studio monitors MK I. My system: - http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/...27077317_Pufg7
I'm going to give the rest of your response a better going over. Thanks.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TLS Guy
If you look at the impedance curve the camel humps in the bass show a severe misalignment, and accounts for the splashy spreading bass. In a correct alignment the low point of the curve between the tuning humps should be right at the driver resonant frequency Fs.
It's easier to look at the graph being spoken about.
If any one of us were to spend a lot of critical listening time on a speaker that offered a response that was in the range of +_ 1db across its range set up properly and in a good acoustic environment, that would change our perception of good, or even acceptable forever.
Your comment about "in a good acoustic environment" is where most people stop working on getting the best sound from their system but I have seen few systems that were within 1dB. Oddly enough, the closest I have seen to that was in an LDS Stake Center, where they use Atlas ceiling mounted speakers, have commercial carpeting, White equalizers and the system is equalized so a person can move around the whole space without hearing much difference in the sound of the speaker. Those speakers are nothing special, in any way but they do what the requirements call for. They actually sounded good for music, too.
Some people buy and sell equipment on a regular basis in hopes that the sound will be the best ever and it always falls short. That 3KHz peak I mentioned early on in this thread is bad enough on its own but in a room with strong first reflections and being a generally reverberant space, it would require some analysis and treatment to cure the faults.
Bias has more to do with a predisposition, perception can be, according to dictionary.com, "the act or faculty of apprehending by means of the senses or of the mind; cognition; understanding", which is closer to what I meant.
Not that I'm widely considered "an expert" but as someone who has sold and listened to audio equipment for over 30 years, I doubt if I could care less about who makes what and what brand a speaker system is. If it sounds great, I'm in. If it sounds bad, forget it. We all have preferences and sometimes we develop biases based on what we read and hear about things but our perceptions are from the real experience, coupled with those biases. Familiarity and our minds makes it possible to prefer a sound that's not necessarily "correct", but it sounds good to us.
We all have some degree of hearing damage, regardless of where we live, what we do and how careful we are with exposure to dangerous sound levels. That makes it possible for us to hear some frequencies better or worse than "normal". In my case, my left ear is less sensitive in a fairly wide band in the mid-range than my right, but it still qualifies as "normal for my age". My right ear is more sensitive than "normal for my age" and that affects how I hear balance between the left and right channels. It also makes some speakers grate on my nerves worse than fingernails on a chalkboard (which really doesn't bother me). I think that any person who wants to find the best sound for them, needs to have their hearing tested, so they know if/where any areas of increased/decreased acuity are. It would definitely make for a more informed opinion.
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I want government to be run the way a business is run, with great attention to profit and loss. Programs and departments that lose money will have their management changed so all aspects of all government is required to turn a profit, in an honest way.
I feel like I should say something on this thread but I've got nothing....
I feel a little bad that I'm using your speakers to get an education on by the evil Dr. Carter but the good news is that he's in Minesota freezing his @ss off and you're in toasty Texas not listening to classical music anyway.
That waterfall I posted showing the peak @ ~3KHz appears to be a measurement of external cabinet resonance. I think putting two layers of Peel & Seal on the outside of your cabinet should take care of that. A trip to Lowe's and a pair of scissors ...just kidding, well ... kind of. I'm kidding about putting it on the outside anyways ... yes, I am prepared to take my lumps for saying that but I think it's clear that I wouldn't hesitate.
... back to my studies ...
Edit: My motto?: If you're not taking it apart, your missing half the fun.
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We all have some degree of hearing damage, regardless of where we live, what we do and how careful we are with exposure to dangerous sound levels. That makes it possible for us to hear some frequencies better or worse than "normal". In my case, my left ear is less sensitive in a fairly wide band in the mid-range than my right, but it still qualifies as "normal for my age". My right ear is more sensitive than "normal for my age" and that affects how I hear balance between the left and right channels. It also makes some speakers grate on my nerves worse than fingernails on a chalkboard (which really doesn't bother me). I think that any person who wants to find the best sound for them, needs to have their hearing tested, so they know if/where any areas of increased/decreased acuity are. It would definitely make for a more informed opinion.
I'm curious, do you implement any type of EQ or balance adjustments to compensate for your assymetric hearing, or do you look for whatever best compromises between both ears?
Pre-Amp sections used to have ganged tone controls. The forward half of the knob was for the left channel and the rearward half of the knob was for the right channel.
I feel a little bad that I'm using your speakers to get an education on by the evil Dr. Carter but the good news is that he's in Minesota freezing his @ss off and you're in toasty Texas not listening to classical music anyway.
That waterfall I posted showing the peak @ ~3KHz appears to be a measurement of external cabinet resonance. I think putting two layers of Peel & Seal on the outside of your cabinet should take care of that. A trip to Lowe's and a pair of scissors ...just kidding, well ... kind of. I'm kidding about putting it on the outside anyways ... yes, I am prepared to take my lumps for saying that but I think it's clear that I wouldn't hesitate.
... back to my studies ...
Edit: My motto?: If you're not taking it apart, your missing half the fun.
So, this presents an interesting quandary. If I test my ears and discover their faults and sensitivities, do I try to replicate what I hear today at a live concert, or what I believe it sounded like before the "wear and tear".
It would be interesting to get thorough hearing tests done, but would it really be of siginificant use in deciding what is good vs bad SQ?
Don't feel bad and I don't really care if anyone likes my set up or not. At times I want to go get the 802D's but then I go into my living room, hit the play button and just smile.
My major drawback is my room. I have said many times that the room treatments where my best upgrade ever but you and Andrew took all my acoustic panels. I fear that even 20k speakers would just get confused in my room and it wouldn't be worth even trying them.
It's cold here too, only getting up to 80 today.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alex2507
I feel a little bad that I'm using your speakers to get an education on by the evil Dr. Carter but the good news is that he's in Minesota freezing his @ss off and you're in toasty Texas not listening to classical music anyway.
That waterfall I posted showing the peak @ ~3KHz appears to be a measurement of external cabinet resonance. I think putting two layers of Peel & Seal on the outside of your cabinet should take care of that. A trip to Lowe's and a pair of scissors ...just kidding, well ... kind of. I'm kidding about putting it on the outside anyways ... yes, I am prepared to take my lumps for saying that but I think it's clear that I wouldn't hesitate.
... back to my studies ...
Edit: My motto?: If you're not taking it apart, your missing half the fun.
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A bunch of Paradigm stuff, a big sub and a few amps.
If I test my ears and discover their faults and sensitivities, do I try to replicate what I hear today at a live concert, or what I believe it sounded like before the "wear and tear".
If you replicate the live concert you hear what you heard and all is well. If you happen to have a dip in your ability to hear at 5KHz to the tune of say 20dB from the norm and EQ that wayyyy up, it won't sound natural to you but you will be hearing what normal people hear.
I just got through asking WmAx about this. I'm striving to get a pretty flat room response with a little roll off at the high end. I thought about boosting the response @ 5KHz because my hearing is afflicted there.
You completely floored me with that. 
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