Revel Salon2, B&W 802 D3, or similarly priced speakers + Benchmark chain?

[QMuse]

because sometimes I find that some material on my f208s sounds less pleasing than on my headphones and I'd like to check those tracks SplitTime found "not right", no matter sighted or not

"Less pleasing" is a subjective cathegory which means it will differ highly between different people.

Have you proeprly EQ-ed your F208s?

 

[vavan]

"Less pleasing" is a subjective cathegory

sure it is but that doesn't change my point

Have you proeprly EQ-ed your F208s?

the answer depends on what is "proper eq" for you

 

[QMuse]

sure it is but that doesn't change my point

"Less pleasing" is a subjective cathegory which means it will differ highly between different people.

Btw, sound on your headphones will alwas differ form the sound of your F208s. You have nothing to worry about, F208 is an excellent speaker and the only thing it requires is a proper EQ to give it's best in your room. But then, every speaker requires proper room EQ if you want it to give it's best in your room.

the answer depends on what is "proper eq" for you

Post a measurement graph and we can discuss it. You can also search posts of Mitch Barnett (aka @mitchco) to get the idea how a proper EQ should be done.

 

[vavan]

"Less pleasing" is a subjective cathegory which means it will differ highly between different people

right

sound on your headphones will alwas differ form the sound of your F208s

sure, for example f208s produce better bass than my HF

You have nothing to worry about, F208 is an excellent speaker

even excellent speaker might be defective, have some irregularities etc., see for example recent discussion in revel owners thread on avs. my own f208s were delivered with wrong spikes so I've had to contact harman and ask for replacement

every speaker requires proper room EQ

I already played with few different target curves and yet to choose my favourite one. anyway I only used basic rew peq filters generation tool and didn't even touch phase issues yet

You can also search posts of Mitch Barnett

I even sent him some of my measurements few weeks ago
anyway couple of days ago I moved my f208s again and have had no chance to take another set of measurements yet so I'm at the sq.1 now

 

[Kal Rubinson]

because sometimes I find that some material on my f208s sounds less pleasing than on my headphones and I'd like to check those tracks SplitTime found "not right", no matter sighted or not

I guess I am curious about those, too, keeping in mind that "less pleasing" and/or "not right" may really be what is on the recording.

 

[vavan]

I’d brought 10 of my favorite SACDs - covering a wide range of music to listen to

could you please name at least few of those tracks that did not sound right to you?

 

[Frank Dernie]

Floyd Toole talks about the "circle of confusion" that gets in the way of us knowing how to reproduce accurately what is on recordings. Dealers, too, can create another "circle of confusion" as they introduce additional uncontrolled/undefinable environmental factors in demonstrations, along with their own biases, implied or expressed. Finding a really fair dealer/demo is almost impossible unless you have an established and honest relationship with the dealer. I achieved that with 1-2 dealers before I began reviewing. It has become easier for me now but still not something to be presumed. Home demos are hard to arrange but they are important when we are spending relatively large sums of money and hoping for long-term enjoyment. It is probably worth paying for it, within reason.

What I can say is that I have had the wonderful opportunity to have heard most of the mentioned speakers, many side-by-side, in my home and those of friends. That allows me to be more certain about my choices and, although many others might have made other choices after such experiences, there was usually a consensus among those present. Friends who share an interest in audio can be invaluable.

I am lucky in having a dealer in Oxford who always offers home demonstrations. He doesn't give a discount but the service, I have been going there 30 years, is fantastic and I am glad to pay for it.
There is a saying in the UK "penny wise, pound foolish" which sums up the risk of going for a big discount.
The only downside is that he no longer stocks brands that discount heavily for obvious reasons.

 

[Frank Dernie]

IMO, judging accuracy isn't that difficult. All it takes these days is a high quality handheld digital recorder. (I use a Tascam.) It helps if you are a musician or have access to some. Acoustic guitar is very interesting, especially a dobro. My favorite is a piano playing scales. Acapella voices, especially baritones, can tell you a lot about a tricky frequency range for some speakers. Closing a car door in a garage is interesting too. The important part is being there when the recording is made, and optimally make it in the same room as your system is in. A friend taught me this trick years ago and it's only for the brave, because "sounds good" isn't good enough for this test.

My concern with such a methodology is the huge, and unexpected by most people including me, influence on the recording of microphone position.
I learned early on to get my sound balance for recording (2 channels was the most I had) by moving the microphone. It is surprising how big a change you get in the recording by moving the microphone a foot. Certainly massively more than psychoacoustics(?) allows us to hear ourselves.
Try making 2 recordings with the microphone in 2 places, then listen on headphones. You will almost certainly find that the 2 recordings differ from each other, and what you heard...

 

[Frank Dernie]

But those those ideas are generic. Do we/you/I have any idea of what any individual music recording is supposed to sound like? Sometimes, I think I do if I've been to the same venue to hear the same performers. Most often, I can only guess. A standard not yet completely realized.

This is indeed absolutely the key point. It is the recording we are reproducing and we don't know what that sounds like, even if we are intimately familiar with the instrument and music being played. It may well not be a realistic recording at all. It may have tricks in it to impress. And so on.

 

[blueone]

My concern with such a methodology is the huge, and unexpected by most people including me, influence on the recording of microphone position.
I learned early on to get my sound balance for recording (2 channels was the most I had) by moving the microphone. It is surprising how big a change you get in the recording by moving the microphone a foot. Certainly massively more than psychoacoustics(?) allows us to hear ourselves.
Try making 2 recordings with the microphone in 2 places, then listen on headphones. You will almost certainly find that the 2 recordings differ from each other, and what you heard...

I've been making recordings for decades, and I disagree that a one foot difference in microphone position makes a huge difference in the resulting recording.

 

[Frank Dernie]

I've been making recordings for decades, and I disagree that a one foot difference in microphone position makes a huge difference in the resulting recording.

I am surprised.
Setting microphones to record classical concerts the expert who taught me (many decades ago, they just spot mike and multi channel everything nowadays) used to balance the whole recording by moving the microphone pair. It was always above the conductor but the height and fore-and-aft position made all the difference to the balance of the recording.
There was absolutely no other dicking about with the signal at all.
My recordings were all done that way.
Edit: if you are doing a simple recording of a single instrument like a piano or violin a foot makes a big difference too, so what is it you record where moving the microphone makes little difference? You are the first person who makes recordings I have heard noting microphone position making no difference.

 

[blueone]

Edit: if you are doing a simple recording of a single instrument like a piano or violin a foot makes a big difference too, so what is it you record where moving the microphone makes little difference? You are the first person who makes recordings I have heard noting microphone position making no difference.

I didn't say moving a mic makes no difference, because you can measure it (I do with OmniMic). I said I disagreed with it making a "huge difference" (your words). And for the simple recordings I'm advocating in this accuracy testing procedure, the microphone is relatively near the sound source and the differences are not great in my experience. Typically for these very informal recordings I'm talking about the mic is a few feet away from the source. Obviously, if you are recording a piano and put the mic in a corner you will hear a difference from a mic position in open space, but I think most people here would be smart enough to know that.

 

[Sal1950]

I am lucky in having a dealer in Oxford who always offers home demonstrations. He doesn't give a discount but the service, I have been going there 30 years, is fantastic and I am glad to pay for it.
There is a saying in the UK "penny wise, pound foolish" which sums up the risk of going for a big discount.
The only downside is that he no longer stocks brands that discount heavily for obvious reasons.

That's why we have so few brick and mortar dealers left. People would take advantage of a store dealers service and then go buy for the lowest priced online seller. It eventually spelled doom for all but a few very strong and smart ones.

 

[DonH56]

In a small'ish space moving the mic a foot can make a huge difference. Google "comb filter" or "SBIR" effects and look at the curves. It actually takes less than a foot; 1' is a full wavelength at about 1 kHz so SBIR etc. effects start about an octave below that. Recordings in large rooms, or well-treated rooms (most studios), do not suffer from those effects as much as most consumer listening rooms IME.

But my bias shows; after many years (though some years ago now) running live sound boards, recording live and in studio (on both sides of the mic), and endless fiddling with mic placement (usually in inches, not feet), I hate to read all that effort and change in sound was just in my head. Along with all the other voices...

 

[QMuse]

Recordings in large rooms, or well-treated rooms (most studios), do not suffer from those effects as much as most consumer listening rooms IME.

This.. In studios moving mic for a foot simply doesn't matter that much as reflections are greatly reduced so sounfield at mmic position is much more uniform than what we measure at our homes.

 

[direstraitsfan98]

Order for a mcintosh amp and pre has been placed. My dealer reckons the gear should arrive by the end of the week after next.

To say I’m excited would be an understatement of the decade. I’ve never received product that wasn’t a dealer demo or used. It will be a pleasure to have a. The unboxing experience of a factory sealed container b. The comfort and knowledge of anything goes wrong my dealer will take care of me, not to mention free delivery and setup, and c. Warm fuzzy feeling of pride of ownership of being the first time owner of a classic, timeless heirloom piece.

Ymmv of course.

 

[blueone]

This.. In studios moving mic for a foot simply doesn't matter that much as reflections are greatly reduced so sounfield at mmic position is much more uniform than what we measure at our homes.

I will admit that the rooms I've used for these recordings are quite large for a residential space, >10,000 cu-ft, but I think the detractors are making a lot of a little. For simply determining "sounds like" accuracy, not producing a reference recording for the ages, the differences are relatively small. And yes, I do choose a mic position by some experimentation, but not anything like the OCD behavior Don describes (only joking). As for whether of not this technique can convey any accuracy information because mic positions do produce measurable differences, just sitting in a slightly different spot while the musician is performing would have an effect too (though not identical, because mics have different response patterns than ears do), and you can still determine obvious differences regardless of where you stand or sit.

 

[andreasmaaan]

...just sitting in a slightly different spot while the musician is performing would have an effect too (though not identical, because mics have different response patterns than ears do), and you can still determine obvious differences regardless of where you stand or sit.

I'm not arguing that you can't maybe get a subjective impression for yourself that means something to you. But the effects of moving a microphone and then listening to a recording of it are different from the effects of moving your head in a performance space, because when your ears move, so do the relative delays and amplitudes between reflected sounds arriving at them, allowing you to preserve information about the directional character istics and timbre of the acoustic source, as well as the reverberant properties of the space.

Not so for a mic, which can't discriminate between the relfections like your ears/brain can, hence why the perceived effects of moving the mic are greater than when one simply moves themselves.

It's not particularly to do with the mic's response pattern. It's much more about the relative timing and amplitude responses of the reflections arriving at your ears, and the way your brain is able to process that information, which ability is lost when a mono mic dumbly captures all the reflections without retaining any of the relevant discriminating information.

Perhaps it's not too great a difference in your subjective experience - that I'm happy to accept

 

[Kal Rubinson]

Not so for a mic, which can't discriminate between the relfections like your ears/brain can, hence why the perceived effects of moving the mic are greater than when one simply moves themselves.

I don't think it is proper to say that the "perceived effects of moving the mic are greater than when one simply moves themselves." Given binaural listening and HRTF, I think the response changes due to head movement might be greater but I'd prefer to say that the two transducer systems are quite different in their responses to movement.

 

[Sal1950]

Order for a mcintosh amp and pre has been placed. My dealer reckons the gear should arrive by the end of the week after next.

That's super awesome! I know that feeling of getting an expensive new product, it's also been rare here. Mostly bought used , in need of repair, etc. Care to share which pieces you've ordered