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JBL 4349 Review (Studio Monitor Speaker)

DualTriode

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IME this is mainly a recording related phenomenon.
On some recordings there is a lot of "venue sound" in the recording, this is particularly true of live recordings with a limited number of microphones. IME these sound the most realistic and best with narrow directivity speakers.
On most, particularly any since multi track recorders, studio recordings have no actual venue acoustic in the recording at all so, inevitably, at the mixing stage there may be a bit of artificial ambience added but basically there is nothing real there, then the listening room acoustic is probably pretty important in the creation of a space illusion. These sort of recordings will probably, therefore, sound more spacious using wider directivity speakers.

The way I see it, one is trying to reproduce the venue acoustics and the other trying to create the impression of one.

As ever the SQ of the recording is much more varied than the SQ of our equipment and what sounds most accurate to me for the old and live recordings I own, including my own, has been narrower directivity speakers, and since these are frequently my favourite recordings I use wider directivity speakers more rarely and put up with the loss of faux spaciousness.

Nothing faux here.

Reflections are a real. In-room response is real, not just an estimate in the software

If you want less in-room response, sit closer. If you want more in-room response, sit farther back.

I like sitting different places around the room, sometimes up close and personal and sometimes at the quieter table in the back, much like being there.

If you want a smaller sweet spot just for you, use narrower coverage angle speakers.

No one has talked about RT60, room treatments, or in room equalization.



Thanks DT
 

MrPeabody

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The difference is that you can have for a longer listening period a linear FR and only when you exaggerate too much the limiter comes into action.

There is now some fuzzy stuff being discussed in this thread. As for this one sub-topic it seems to me that both you and Robh3606 have made good points, but I'm inclined to think that if the VC temperature has increased enough to appreciably affect its DC resistance, it might be counter-productive to make it get hotter. But your point is valid, and together it seems to me that increasing gain to compensate for power compression is likely useful and practical when it occurs to a slight degree but not once it has become a strong effect. Of course I'm using imprecise language, and as such not really saying much, only that in practical terms I wonder how helpful it would be to apply that sort of compensation. It also occurs to me that the main thing that needs to be done, to mitigate the effect of VC heating, is to keep the sensitivity of the different drivers in proper balance. For example, if the woofer is more prone to power compression vs. the tweeter, then to keep the tonality from being skewed to the favor of the tweeter's domain, it is necessary to either add gain for the woofer or else subtract gain for the tweeter. With this in mind, it occurs to me that this may be a practical thing to do in a scenario where each driver has its own dedicated amplifier with DSP in front of the amplifier. Perhaps the strategy would be to increase woofer gain slightly, up to a point, but then when the woofer VC reaches some predetermined threshold of safety, to switch to the strategy of reducing the tweeter gain. Something like that.
 

Frank Dernie

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Nothing faux here.

Reflections are a real. In-room response is real, not just an estimate in the software

If you want less in-room response, sit closer. If you want more in-room response, sit farther back.

I like sitting different places around the room, sometimes up close and personal and sometimes at the quieter table in the back, much like being there.

If you want a smaller sweet spot just for you, use narrower coverage angle speakers.

No one has talked about RT60, room treatments, or in room equalization.



Thanks DT
Indeed but what is indubitably "faux" is the idea that the stereo image you are listening to in your listening room with wide directivity speakers has anything to do with venue or recording acoustics.
It is a euphonic colouration unique to you in your listening room. However much you like it. It is not on the recording.
 

DualTriode

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Indeed but what is indubitably "faux" is the idea that the stereo image you are listening to in your listening room with wide directivity speakers has anything to do with venue or recording acoustics.
It is a euphonic colouration unique to you in your listening room. However much you like it. It is not on the recording.

So?

I said it was an illusion!
 

Frank Dernie

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So?

I said it was an illusion!
You said it wasn't "faux".
It is.
I don't take issue with anything else, listening to a hifi in a room always adds some room acoustic to the recorded one but the popular wide dispersion speaker obviously and inevitably adds more room acoustic on top of the recorded acoustic. Clearly people like the sound it creates but it is just that, creation not reproduction.
Most people get upset about the idea of using an amplifier which adds euphonic colouration but it seems perfectly acceptable, recommended even, to add far more colouration by using the room acoustic.
To the extent it is unavoidable one may as well make it as "nice" as possible to one's taste.

The idea that it is part of accurate reproduction rather than pragmatic use of euphonic colouration is what I always take issue with. This is nothing new.
 

DualTriode

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You said it wasn't "faux".
It is.
I don't take issue with anything else, listening to a hifi in a room always adds some room acoustic to the recorded one but the popular wide dispersion speaker obviously and inevitably adds more room acoustic on top of the recorded acoustic. Clearly people like the sound it creates but it is just that, creation not reproduction.
Most people get upset about the idea of using an amplifier which adds euphonic colouration but it seems perfectly acceptable, recommended even, to add far more colouration by using the room acoustic.
To the extent it is unavoidable one may as well make it as "nice" as possible to one's taste.

The idea that it is part of accurate reproduction rather than pragmatic use of euphonic colouration is what I always take issue with. This is nothing new.

If only opinions were facts.

Reflections are a real. In-room response is real, not just an estimate in the software.

Show us the Directivity Index and in-room response of your speakers.

You can have your preferences, however accuracy is an illusion.
 

Frank Dernie

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If only opinions were facts.
Well it is a fact that a large part of the sound you are listening to in your room, particularly with wide directivity and omni speakers will have a lot of room acoustics added to the sound of the recording.
Whether you like it or not.
NONE of it is on the recording, obviously.
 

Newman

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...You can have your preferences, however accuracy is an illusion.

Accuracy to the original production is achievable. Hence, not an illusion.

The closer you can make your home playback environment resemble the mastering suite (room) and speaker performance, the more you can approach true accuracy. You want to experience the actual product that they actually made for you? Then do this. Toole calls it Closing the Circle of Confusion.

Calling it an unattainable illusion is what I would describe as settling.

cheers
 

Frank Dernie

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Accuracy to the original production is achievable. Hence, not an illusion.

The closer you can make your home playback environment resemble the mastering suite (room) and speaker performance, the more you can approach true accuracy. You want to experience the actual product that they actually made for you? Then do this. Toole calls it Closing the Circle of Confusion.

Calling it an unattainable illusion is what I would describe as settling.

cheers
For entirely studio based productions managed to the artist's preference this is certainly true.
For an old fashioned simply miked (Decca tree, for example) live recording to sound as good as it can (and IMO they are the most natural sounding recordings I own) listening in the near field is needed for the most realistic results, based on me listening to what I remember of the concert I recorded - I know we have poor long term audio memory though.
It seems to me self evident that if there is clear venue acoustics in a recording it is a shame to pollute it with listening room acoustics overlaid, and making an effort to minimise that it sensible.
Anecdotally, I find my own recordings remind me of the event much more strongly when listened to this way.
 

Newman

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@Frank Dernie far too many conclusions based on what, I assume we agree in this forum, is a discredited process.
 

Frank Dernie

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@Frank Dernie far too many conclusions based on what, I assume we agree in this forum, is a discredited process.
Please explain?
Are you saying a simply miked recording which has a lot of venue acoustics in the recording, rather than a multi-miked mix, containing none that isn't synthesised by the recording/mixing is a discredited process?
Or are you saying that adding listening room acoustics to the sound is proven to be fine and not euphonic colouration?
 

PaulD

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It seems to me self evident that if there is clear venue acoustics in a recording it is a shame to pollute it with listening room acoustics overlaid, and making an effort to minimise that it sensible.
Anecdotally, I find my own recordings remind me of the event much more strongly when listened to this way.
I can only agree with you here Frank, and all of the recording control room design also agrees with this. That is why they go to so much trouble to minimise the early reflections in the control room (or mastering room) so as not to interfere with the audibility of the early reflection in the (larger) recording room, studio or venue, because the recorded early reflections occur later than those in the smaller control room. LEDE, CID, Non Environment Room, RFZ and so on are all predicated on minimising early reflections while not making the room too acoustically dead to work in for hours.

[Edit] Not suggesting that home living rooms where audio is consumed be constructed this way at all as the acoustic environment of studios and control rooms is often unsuitable for a general living space where conversation is usually most important, but if you have the space, controlling the acoustics of your listening space is usually an excellent bang-for-your-buck upgrade.
 
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Newman

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Please explain?
Long term audio memory (as you stated, discredited). Sighted listening. Unconscious bias acting in favour of your own productions when reviewed by you.

I have to temper your broad generalised conclusions against your use of the above processes to reach and confirm them.

cheers
 

Frank Dernie

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Long term audio memory (as you stated, discredited). Sighted listening. Unconscious bias acting in favour of your own productions when reviewed by you.

I have to temper your broad generalised conclusions against your use of the above processes to reach and confirm them.

cheers
So do you have evidence that the listening room acoustic does not have an influence on the sound whether omni, wide directivity or narrow directivity speakers are used?
I thought it was common knowledge that it did (and common sense, which is rare IME).

I had read that the push towards speakers with even off axis FR was to prevent room reflections having a negative influence on the LP frequency response because the reflections were a non negligible part of what one hears.

Not something that one could test double blind, of course, but the conclusion you are keen to discount would seem self evident to me so perhaps confirmation bias.
 

Robh3606

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So do you have evidence that the listening room acoustic does not have an influence on the sound whether omni, wide directivity or narrow directivity speakers are used?
I thought it was common knowledge that it did (and common sense, which is rare IME).

I had read that the push towards speakers with even off axis FR was to prevent room reflections having a negative influence on the LP frequency response because the reflections were a non negligible part of what one hears.

It also make any equalization much more beneficial. The over all inroom is both direct and reflected so if the 2 track it makes EQ much more effective

Rob :)
 

Newman

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So do you have evidence that the listening room acoustic does not have an influence on the sound whether omni, wide directivity or narrow directivity speakers are used?
I thought it was common knowledge that it did (and common sense, which is rare IME).

I had read that the push towards speakers with even off axis FR was to prevent room reflections having a negative influence on the LP frequency response because the reflections were a non negligible part of what one hears.

Not something that one could test double blind, of course, but the conclusion you are keen to discount would seem self evident to me so perhaps confirmation bias.
I’m not saying that your conclusions are wrong. I’m saying that your process for confirmation isn’t a valid process for evaluating sound waves.

And the reason for the push to CD speakers is not to “prevent room reflections negatively impacting LP FR”, but to prevent room reflections having a different tonality to direct sound, which is proven to be less preferred in controlled listening tests.

And even then, a CD speaker needs to be supported by room treatments that don’t much alter the spectrum of incoming sound. Otherwise the benefits of CD are canceled by the room.

cheers
 
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amirm

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Something that puzzles me is that after 18 pages in this review thread, no one has commented on this bit of "wisdom" in the manual:

1619486136930.png


I meant to note it in the review but forgot. Amazing that one department would say something like this when another would say otherwise.
 

Newman

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Which department says otherwise?
 

Valentin R

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Something that puzzles me is that after 18 pages in this review thread, no one has commented on this bit of "wisdom" in the manual:

View attachment 126511

I meant to note it in the review but forgot. Amazing that one department would say something like this when another would say otherwise.
Marketing department has control of the owners manual
At least it’s just a couple of weeks not 500hr like others suggest
 
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