The SEPARATES vs. AVR Thread

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I agree with that point, and in fact none of my purchase decisions were made based on the in-room graphs I plotted using REW/Umik-1 mic. I ran REW for fun and to satisfy my curiosity. The graphs happened to show what I have been hearing and quite happy about, was relatively flat and smooth in the 16-125 Hz range, except that I do prefer a 2 dB boost in the subwoofer level setting for movies, but not for music.

Yeah, for accurate sound, we can just focus on the midrange and treble. The bass is just for kicks.

We’ve both been saying the same thing - people need to give it a try. It’s very easy to compare among the different modes. Then pick the mode (EQ or not EQ) that sounds like real-life crystal clear dynamic sound (midrange and treble). Then lastly adjust the subwoofer levels per preference.

I would add that you should only LOOK at the graphs AFTER you have already picked the mode that sounds like “real-life crystal clear dynamic sound”.

Don’t look at the in-room response graphs BEFORE you compare the different modes. This will introduce BIAS.

Many people assume that the in-Room response graphs that look the flattest will yield the “real-life crystal clear dynamic sound”.

Just like people will form opinions about speakers even BEFORE they hear them because they have already SEEN the response graphs.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Have you ever met or known of a dealer or professional reviewer who couldn't tell those night and day difference or something of that sort between amps? I haven't..

Hey, what? I resent that!

 

[PENG]

Good point, so true. It reminds me of a high end hi-fi store I used to frequent back in my old naive audiophile days. I’ll never forget the lines of ‘bull’ they continuously fed the customers. I cringe when I think about it now.

I am sure a lot of them do have more discerning hearing, because of their experience. In one of Dr. Sean Olive's Audio Musings article on loudspeaker preference, he mentioned that audio retailers scored higher.

 

[PENG]

Hey, what? I resent that!

If you would have waited a second for my follow post (didn't see your complaint when composing it). Mind you, in another article, by Dr. Toole, he said "when they are auditioned in isolation, listeners tend to exaggerate the importance of small differences". He's talking about evaluating loudspeaker products that are closely ranked at the top of a range of products. I wonder what their (Toole and Oive) findings would have been, had they done similar studies on amplifiers, when the differences are expected to be much more subtle.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Throughout the years I’ve seen many audiophiles attempt to achieve that flat “perfect” 20Hz-20kHz In-Room Response.

They want that Flat In-room response for their speakers and Subwoofers.

And it seems 50% of the time the complaint was that the sound seems “compressed” or “something just sucked the life out of the speakers and Subwoofers”.

Bottom line is there is no point to achieving that flat in-room response if it doesn’t sound like “real-life crystal clear dynamic sound”.

There is no point of achieving perfect flat in-room response if your brain feels like it sucked the life out of your speakers and Subwoofers.

However, if you achieve that real-life crystal clear dynamic sound and also get that flat in-room response, then that is a bonus.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

If you would have waited a second for my follow post (didn't see your complaint when composing it). Mind you, in another article, by Dr. Toole, he said "when they are auditioned in isolation, listeners tend to exaggerate the importance of small differences". He's talking about evaluating loudspeaker products that are closely ranked at the top of a range of products. I wonder what their (Toole and Oive) findings would have been, had they done similar studies on amplifiers, when the differences are expected to be much more subtle.

I definitely agree about exaggerating small differences.

When I owned all those speakers concurrently (Revel Salon2, B&W 802D2, KEF 201/2, Linkwitz Orion, Phil3, etc.),I got a huge appreciation for that statement.

Personally I don’t think that I have better hearing acuity or skills than ANYONE (who doesn’t have hearing impairments).

Everyone is extremely capable of knowing and hearing “real-life crystal clear dynamic sound” because we’ve been hearing this sound since childhood.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Yeah, for accurate sound, we can just focus on the midrange and treble. The bass is just for kicks.

Dead wrong, unless that smiley indicates you're joking.

Many people assume that the in-Room response graphs that look the flattest will yield the “real-life crystal clear dynamic sound”.

Just like people will form opinions about speakers even BEFORE they hear them because they have already SEEN the response graphs.

Using my own recordings made in my listening rooms as a comparison, and measuring my system at my listening seat, flattest response does not equal the most accurate sound. In my current room, a "flat" response curve that's about +3db at about 30Hz smoothly tilting downward to -3db at about 8KHz yields the most realistic sound, doing comparisons on the recordings versus the live sound source. The problem is, on commercial recordings you can't know what the original sound was so you can't know what is accurate reproduction. And on popular and electronic jazz music there may have never been an actual live group performance. Nonetheless, tuning your system to sound best by measuring and live recording comparison will yield more accurate sound, IMO, on live-group acoustic recordings (like most classical music). Tuning a system by what sounds good never yields an accurate system, in my experience, and it's easy to hear the difference once you know what the original sound source sounded like. Every time I measure someone's system who used placement and EQ by ear and point out what the measurements say, the human response is always surprise and, so far, always results in something like "Well, that's what I like."

For TV and movies all of this is irrelevant, of course. Their sound is completely contrived; there is no standard of accuracy.

 

[Out-Of-Phase]

I am sure a lot of them do have more discerning hearing, because of their experience. In one of Dr. Sean Olive's Audio Musings article on loudspeaker preference, he mentioned that audio retailers scored higher.

True, they’re around it all day long. However, any ABX listening test differences would still be minuscule and not worth the investment of thousands more.

 

[Out-Of-Phase]

Just like people will form opinions about speakers even BEFORE they hear them because they have already SEEN the response graphs.

Excellent point.

 

[sterling shoote]

I agree.

As a former denier of the value of bass EQ and subs, for decades, I can say that bass EQ is often very useful, especially when combined with advantageously placed subs. Not all rooms need it with all speakers. When I auditioned the Salon2s for the first time the dealer apparently had a nearly perfect room for them and probably optimal placement, but I was never able to replicate that marvelous low-end performance in two different homes, no matter how I placed the Salon2s. A sub and bass EQ was the only cure.

The challenge for music systems is that it very easy to get addicted to running the bass octaves way too hot, and becoming a bassaholic. With acoustic instruments 20-50Hz bass is a subtle experience, easily turned into a caricature of the real thing, IMO. Even for fusion jazz, with all of its synthesizers and electric basses, in a live performance the sound reinforcement subs seldom have the bass power or extension we hear with super-subs in our homes. On the other hand, when you've heard (and measured) a Bosendorfer Imperial Grand in a smallish venue (say, roughly 40K cubic feet) you realize that sub-30Hz response really is important, but good reproduction requires delicate balance. Unless you just like caricatures.

I heard you like the kind of exaggerated bass that makes you want to get out of your chair and shuffle dance.

 

[Irvrobinson]

I heard you like the kind of exaggerated bass that makes you want to get out of your chair and shuffle dance.

Oh yeah, I'm a shuffle-dancer with a digital recorder, a set of mics, and OmniMic software. I'd say I have my sub set at 11, but the factory default volume is 30.

 

[Alex2507]

In my current room, a "flat" response curve that's about +3db at about 30Hz smoothly tilting downward to -3db at about 8KHz yields the most realistic sound,

That's the response curve of an Infinity Primus speaker.

 

[Irvrobinson]

That's the response curve of an Infinity Primus speaker.

There's a difference between anechoic measurements and listening seat measurements. Even I know that.

 

[Alex2507]

There's a difference between anechoic measurements and listening seat measurements. Even I know that.

I guess theirs would be anechoic. Somehow I thought it was set up so the room was next to nothing in Harman's tests and one speaker at a time to sort of let the speaker be the speaker. I recall that curve you described as being similar to what Harman's target was for a 75% listener preference.

Honestly, I've been confused by all the love for flat, flat, flat lately. I thought a bump at the bottom and a roll off starting around 12k or so was the magic ... sorta like yours.

 

[Defcon]

That's the response curve of an Infinity Primus speaker.

That's the famous Floyd Toole NRC/Harmon curve. And those speakers have been confirmed by Harmon to be the hidden gem in their lineup and as good as some 1k-5k speakers IIRC.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Honestly, I've been confused by all the love for flat, flat, flat lately. I thought a bump at the bottom and a roll off starting around 12k or so was the magic ... sorta like yours.

In my experience, the roll-off needs to start sooner, so that the half-power point is at 8KHz.

The reason the tilted response sounds better apparently are the reflection effects of small rooms at the listening seat. The upper-midrange and highs needs to be rolled off or a flat speaker sounds bright. Most of us do that with carpeting and soft furniture. Some need more. Like I said in one of my earlier posts in this thread, sometimes awesome sound can be achieved with just careful placement in the right room. But my rooms have never been one of those rooms. In less than optimal rooms you position relatively flat speakers with great dispersion in the best locations for midrange and highs, make the room relatively absorbent, and then you do whatever is necessary to fix the bass. It took me a couple of decades of seeing John Atkinson's in-room uncorrected measurements to realize I wasn't the only one with a room without perfect positions for the entire spectrum anywhere.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Dead wrong, unless that smiley indicates you're joking.

When I say the bass is for “kicks”, I mean people will adjust the volume of their Subwoofers based on their preferences. Some people like more bass, some people like less bass.

There is absolutely nothing dead wrong or dead right about people’s preference for certain bass volumes.

There’s no point of having a system that sounds dead.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

In less than optimal rooms you position relatively flat speakers with great dispersion in the best locations for midrange and highs, make the room relatively absorbent, and then you do whatever is necessary to fix the bass.

It took me a couple of decades of seeing John Atkinson's in-room uncorrected measurements to realize I wasn't the only one with a room without perfect positions for the entire spectrum anywhere.

For clarification, do you mean equalizing the Subwoofers? For example, getting the In-Room response to be flat from 20Hz - 200Hz?

IOW, the In-Room Response from 200Hz-20kHz shouldn’t be Flat, but the In-Room Response from 20Hz-200Hz should be Flat?

 

[Irvrobinson]

When I say the bass is for “kicks”, I mean people will adjust the volume of their Subwoofers based on their preferences. Some people like more bass, some people like less bass.

There is absolutely nothing dead wrong or dead right about people’s preference for certain bass volumes.

There’s no point of having a system that sounds dead.

If you put a 22" bass drum in your room, record it, and play it back through your system, you will hear that how you adjust the bass is important.

Lots of recordings don't have a lot of bass, either because most instruments have little or no energy below 80Hz, or for a myriad of other reasons (not the least of which is being equalized for LPs.). If you want to adjust the bass for your preferences that's your business and no one else's. If you want to argue that bass adjustment doesn't have anything to do with system accuracy, that's another story altogether.

 

[Irvrobinson]

For clarification, do you mean equalizing the Subwoofers? For example, getting the In-Room response to be flat from 20Hz - 200Hz?

IOW, the In-Room Response from 200Hz-20kHz shouldn’t be Flat, but the In-Room Response from 20Hz-200Hz should be Flat?

No, I'm arguing that in-room response at the listening seat should be smooth, without some frequency ranges being exaggerated or recessed versus other ranges. And depending on the room's characteristics you may need some other equalization, placement considerations, or room treatments (e.g. carpets or other furniture) to make approaching accuracy possible.