Starting out with a music setup at home

[lovinthehd]

Tried both. -10dB setting gives higher volume but still anemic. Max output I get is about 80 dB at 1 meter max.

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Looked back at your devices, my Galaxy S4 has very low output via the headphone jack; I did get a bluetooth transmitter to solve that, it has sufficient output (for use on the aux input jack in my truck mostly altho I did use one of the aux inputs on one of my avrs and it was fine for that as well). Which BT transmitter did you get?

 

[yepimonfire]

OP here. Thank you everyone for helping. I will take it to a JBL repair facility. I am glad that they are still returnable till Jan 1.

So if I can not figure it out what I am doing wrong, they go back to JBL.

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While they’re at the repair facility, you might pick up some Klipsch R-15pm speakers. You’d have less issues trying to connect them vs studio monitors, if you like their sound over the jbl, you could return them and keep the Klipsch, or vice versa.

 

[shkumar4963]

Looked back at your devices, my Galaxy S4 has very low output via the headphone jack; I did get a bluetooth transmitter to solve that, it has sufficient output (for use on the aux input jack in my truck mostly altho I did use one of the aux inputs on one of my avrs and it was fine for that as well). Which BT transmitter did you get?

Ubittek BT 217 is my Bluetooth receiver bought from Amazon. It works well with my AVR but some how does not have enough output to drive this lsr 305.

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[MrBoat]

In my experience, accurate speakers sound good with everything. My dad has a pair of krk rokit 8s, and I listened to a bunch of low budget Black Metal on them and it sounded just fine. Speakers I have now measure +-2dB and again, everything sounds great.

Honestly, I have no idea why the OP is having issues.

I may be a young millennial who hasn’t been around to see that many administrations. . . .

I quoted this from another thread but I don't mean this as a point of condescension or disqualification because I agree with a lot of what you say with regard to audio, simply because science is on your side and I can accept that for what it is.

But, I come across this a lot on the internet and it begs this question whenever I read the 'safe' and measured take with regard to "accuracy." Such as: "I wonder how many AC/DC, Ted Nugent, Boston, Judas Priest, Def Leppard, Ozzy(with Randy Rhoads), Zeppelin, Pat Benatar, Pink Floyd etc. concerts this person has been to- Have they ever heard Stevie Ray Vaughn live?" Or, "How much live music did they grow up with in how many different environments?"

The reason I ask this is, with regard to the new audiophile trends, something has been washed from the craft. Such as, the live references we all used to choose and tune our equipment to, in which to emulate a certain presence or ambience with regard to powerful music. These days, when someone tells me their speakers do it all well, and then I listen to it, I ask the questions again.

And I don't care how much this disqualifies my audiophilism, if I was ever qualified in the first place, to what amounts to a pretty narrow and sterile spectrum these days, much of which is also hiding behind some 'skirt' known as. . . .WAF! As-ef'n-if!

I figured it out back then, and I am figuring it out again now. But for real analog 'power' music, it takes a beast of a speaker in all but a near field arrangement. I don't care how powerful a 6-8" woofer is or how many computer sims it has had applied to it but nothing replaces displacement and this is not just true for subwoofers. For the real hard rock/pop feel, it takes no less than a (and I am just squeezing that in)12" woofer and preferably a 15" and not a subwoofer bump'n around from 80hz and below. A 15" woofer that handles the bass as well as the lower mids, rolling off to a potent midrange and a capable tweeter. A speaker that even has the presence of heft at lower volumes.

I've tried enough of the newer trends in which to weigh against the past. A lot of which I actually happen to like for certain things, but when I want to rock out, I know where to look. And it certainly isn't going to explode forth from some needle-ass box that barely squeezes under <eye roll> SWMBO's (She Who Must Be Obeyed) snooty little radar.

So, with that said, by all means keep to the science, but don't discount a bunch of other tried and true methods either.

Also, don't totally rely on the word of those who are walking on eggshells around some "WAF" as part of their audio workaround with regard to powerful music beyond face value. Audio (the science, or otherwise) development with regard to true sound reproduction, should not have this as a limitation. This is just so the marketers can sell gear to the henpecked faction too. Apparently there is a lot of this going on. I can now see where they would have to cover that base. Still freaks me out to see it mentioned as much as I do. Which amounts to, in my experience, the neutering of audio. ​

 

[Bucknekked]

​

I figured it out back then, and I am figuring it out again now. But for real analog 'power' music, it takes a beast of a speaker in all but a near field arrangement. I don't care how powerful a 6-8" woofer is or how many computer sims it has had applied to it but nothing replaces displacement and this is not just true for subwoofers.

MrBoat:
"there is no substitute for displacement", one of my favorite thoughts from back in the day. If you want a bottom in your music, the air has to move. No air movement, no bottom. One way to move a lot of air at the bottom is with a lot of surface area on the driver. Go back and look at the legacy Klipsch line, or the JBL's of yesteryear. Big, efficient air movers. Or look at TLS Guys setup. Just click on his name, go to the bottom of any of his posts, and you can find links that give you a tour of his stuff. His stuff moves air and doesn't distort or boom when it does it.

There are trends in speakers of course, the marketeers guarantee that. As well as audiophile reviewers and the various publications. If new trends stopped coming out, they'd have nothing to write about so we are guaranteed to have more trends. The most alarming trend I see over the past 1/2 decade or so is the one where you just buy a system in a box. Home theater in a box. The whole system "in a box". No listening rooms anymore, just stuff on shelf or stuff on a website. Price and the WAF factor seem to be the key variables. That and putting 2 dozen stickers with all the audio buzzwords all over the front of the AVRs.

The OP here was only interested in what to plug in his phone with to make music. One of today's challenges for audio enthusiasts is how to help someone that only has that interest have a good experience without pounding them about what they are missing. Yet, after the basic requirement is met and the phone is plugged in and merrily making music, how to build enthusiasm for something that might be more rewarding on top of the basics.

One of the challenges of the folks on the AH is to do both things: help the OP with his challenge in a meaningful way first and foremost. Help the OP have a good experience. Then, if there's room and time and interest, toss out the handy stuff on better audio. Mrboat did both. I'd give him a high five.

 

[yepimonfire]

I quoted this from another thread but I don't mean this as a point of condescension or disqualification because I agree with a lot of what you say with regard to audio, simply because science is on your side and I can accept that for what it is.

But, I come across this a lot on the internet and it begs this question whenever I read the 'safe' and measured take with regard to "accuracy." Such as: "I wonder how many AC/DC, Ted Nugent, Boston, Judas Priest, Def Leppard, Ozzy(with Randy Rhoads), Zeppelin, Pat Benatar, Pink Floyd etc. concerts this person has been to- Have they ever heard Stevie Ray Vaughn live?" Or, "How much live music did they grow up with in how many different environments?"

The reason I ask this is, with regard to the new audiophile trends, something has been washed from the craft. Such as, the live references we all used to choose and tune our equipment to, in which to emulate a certain presence or ambience with regard to powerful music. These days, when someone tells me their speakers do it all well, and then I listen to it, I ask the questions again.

And I don't care how much this disqualifies my audiophilism, if I was ever qualified in the first place, to what amounts to a pretty narrow and sterile spectrum these days, much of which is also hiding behind some 'skirt' known as. . . .WAF! As-ef'n-if!

I figured it out back then, and I am figuring it out again now. But for real analog 'power' music, it takes a beast of a speaker in all but a near field arrangement. I don't care how powerful a 6-8" woofer is or how many computer sims it has had applied to it but nothing replaces displacement and this is not just true for subwoofers. For the real hard rock/pop feel, it takes no less than a (and I am just squeezing that in)12" woofer and preferably a 15" and not a subwoofer bump'n around from 80hz and below. A 15" woofer that handles the bass as well as the lower mids, rolling off to a potent midrange and a capable tweeter. A speaker that even has the presence of heft at lower volumes.

I've tried enough of the newer trends in which to weigh against the past. A lot of which I actually happen to like for certain things, but when I want to rock out, I know where to look. And it certainly isn't going to explode forth from some needle-ass box that barely squeezes under <eye roll> SWMBO's (She Who Must Be Obeyed) snooty little radar.

So, with that said, by all means keep to the science, but don't discount a bunch of other tried and true methods either.

Also, don't totally rely on the word of those who are walking on eggshells around some "WAF" as part of their audio workaround with regard to powerful music beyond face value. Audio (the science, or otherwise) development with regard to true sound reproduction, should not have this as a limitation. This is just so the marketers can sell gear to the henpecked faction too. Apparently there is a lot of this going on. I can now see where they would have to cover that base. Still freaks me out to see it mentioned as much as I do. Which amounts to, in my experience, the neutering of audio. ​

Oh I do agree. Bigger is always better. Believe it or not, I grew up with my grandma taking me to symphony’s on a regular basis, played piano when I was younger, acoustic guitar, etc. I know what live acoustic music should sound like.

Budget is the only thing keeping me from owning monster speakers.

I don’t think it’s directly related to woofer size however. Obviously, larger drivers can move more air with less excursion, but if a smaller driver is able to reproduce the same frequencies at the same spl as the larger driver, with low distortion and no power compression, there shouldn’t be any difference.

I have measured my speakers producing 100dB from 50hz-20khz at a distance of 11’ with less than 3% THD from 50hz-200hz, and less than 1% above that. Considering this is about 5dB above what I normally listen to with movies, they are plenty adequate.

There is a reason I am a fan of more efficient speakers vs just shoving more power at them.

If budget wasn’t a concern, I’d probably be using 3 of these for lcr

The trend of tiny speakers for home audio is definitely a problem, mainly due to WAF. I’m lucky in that my wife doesn’t mind so long as the audio equipment isn’t a tripping hazard, after all, I originally had the rather large sub 1500 in our tiny bedroom

 

[MrBoat]

Oh I do agree. Bigger is always better. Believe it or not, I grew up with my grandma taking me to symphony’s on a regular basis, played piano when I was younger, acoustic guitar, etc. I know what live acoustic music should sound like.

The trend of tiny speakers for home audio is definitely a problem, mainly due to WAF. I’m lucky in that my wife doesn’t mind so long as the audio equipment isn’t a tripping hazard, after all, I originally had the rather large sub 1500 in our tiny bedroom

Your way is the current right way. It just freaks me out when someone knows so much by the book without near as much actual experience in which to weigh it against, a lot of which ends up being physiological experience due to exposure.

I started to get into the inner workings of it, but it was starting to ruin it for me from a critical standpoint. I've enjoyed this hobby immensely for many years just by the feel of it and some pretty solid proven basics that never fail.

Kind of funny, that when I joined this forum and had just scored some big JBL speakers, a friend of mine was trying to sell me on surround (which is how I ended up here) sound, telling me about room modes, suck-outs, imaging, soundstage on/off axis response bla bla bla. So he walks in and sees these beast speakers and called them; "refrigerator boxes." So I put on Whitesnake's "Still of the Night" cranked, and he's just speechless standing there with his jaw dropped. I asked him where my "room modes" were and he says. . . ."Somewhere out near the end of your driveway."

He had forgotten all about this approach and what was so fun about it, having gotten lost in the clinical aspect. Now he comes by sporting beers and CD's and stays awhile. He's a fan of the fat JBL's and has recently picked up some party speakers to jam out to at home and his wife actually plays those more than their HT setup.

And as far as efficient? The fat JBL's are 92 db and the Fusion 12's are 98db. The JBL's are solid down into the mid 30's and do not need a subwoofer other than for fine tuning, perhaps. My smaller speakers take significantly more power to drive, even though they are significantly lower rated power wise.

 

[yepimonfire]

Your way is the current right way. It just freaks me out when someone knows so much by the book without near as much actual experience in which to weigh it against, a lot of which ends up being physiological experience due to exposure.

I started to get into the inner workings of it, but it was starting to ruin it for me from a critical standpoint. I've enjoyed this hobby immensely for many years just by the feel of it and some pretty solid proven basics that never fail.

Kind of funny, that when I joined this forum and had just scored some big JBL speakers, a friend of mine was trying to sell me on surround (which is how I ended up here) sound, telling me about room modes, suck-outs, imaging, soundstage on/off axis response bla bla bla. So he walks in and sees these beast speakers and called them; "refrigerator boxes." So I put on Whitesnake's "Still of the Night" cranked, and he's just speechless standing there with his jaw dropped. I asked him where my "room modes" were and he says. . . ."Somewhere out near the end of your driveway."

He had forgotten all about this approach and what was so fun about it, having gotten lost in the clinical aspect. Now he comes by sporting beers and CD's and stays awhile. He's a fan of the fat JBL's and has recently picked up some party speakers to jam out to at home and his wife actually plays those more than their HT setup.

And as far as efficient? The fat JBL's are 92 db and the Fusion 12's are 98db. The JBL's are solid down into the mid 30's and do not need a subwoofer other than for fine tuning, perhaps. My smaller speakers take significantly more power to drive, even though they are significantly lower rated power wise.

Don’t know what you’d qualify as experience, but I’ve been to many commercial cinemas including IMAX, and live performances (acoustic and amplified). In addition, I’ve done a fair amount of musical work and some recording at others home studio setups with monitors way outside of my budget. That’s my “reference” I compare stuff too.

When I first started getting into audio and home theater it was pretty obvious most “consumer grade” speakers just didn’t have the ability to reproduce the dynamics of movies and music the same way. Sure, they could sound “accurate”, but the “theater” experience of home theater wasn’t there. Crank up the volume to cinema levels, and the sound just mashed into dynamically compressed distortion during the loudest parts of the movie.

Klipsch was an impulse buy on Black Friday awhile back, and that was the first time I’d actually heard a “home audio” speaker get very close to handling the kind of dynamic range that you experience in a cinema, fast forward, and I ended up replacing my entire system with reference and reference premiere stuff.

Obviously, Klipsch Reference speakers aren’t the only way to achieve realistic dynamics you’d find at the big screen, or even the ideal way, but short of diy or putting down lots of money to get the real thing, it does a pretty good job.

I’m a bit of a nerd who spends way too much free time reading and researching things out of curiosity, including audio related things, which is probably why I know so much “by the book” stuff. Audio is a science, and the numbers and theories generally translate into the real world well enough IME.