JBL 4309 Review (Speaker)

[Dmitri]

The problem with two men getting into a willy measuring contest is the person arguing with Amirm will say "OK, I have a ruler, whip it out and lets measure" then Amirm says "Ok, but I need to go get a yardstick". The moral of the story is to know who your getting into a contest with!

Thanks for the laugh!
FYI....I have a 30ft. tape measure I keep just for such arguments....; )

 

[Spocko]

Bingo, you are a winner. The brain will "cover up" or fix fairly bad looking frequency responses many times. Of course not all the time, but many times the speakers sound great until you see the frequency response, then your brain says "oh no" and your enjoyment of those previously very nice speakers tanks. Then in a few months you have a new different pair of speakers. The two biggest issues with audio is the room interaction and the brain. Usually though the brain makes everything sound better than what it probably is. So, thank heavens for the brain!

Isn't this arguably what many describe as "break in" where we're conflating the effects of a speaker changing with use when in reality it's our brain that's adapting to the speaker?

 

[Spocko]

Oh, that's sad. Engineer geeking is one thing. The method a DAC uses may be mentally pleasing. But on the magical sound quest, it's sad.

I think it's even more fundamental and "primordial" than a magical sound quest - it's the eternal hunt for something new because you're bored: "engineer geeking" is really rationalizing an excuse to purchase something new and different because you have money burning in your pocket and you're too old for strip clubs and but there's not enough money in that pocket for a faster car. This is why you have audiophiles literally buying/upgrading to a new DAC every 2 years. The appearance of MQA was a great relief for many audiophiles because it justified yet another upgrade! This is a cycle as old as time. Guitars, bicycles, watches, etc. Boredom is the enemy of one's retirement account.

 

[Spocko]

The problems come when data gets analyzed and compared to listening impression - human perception and individual preferences can overrule some measured imperfections and reveal some features measurements cannot.

Referring to an interview that @hardisj had with Earl Geddes where he concluded that playing music above a certain SPL masks distortion/resonances that would be more apparent in low volume listening. In other words listening to music above 80db may be a problem in and of itself if you hope to capture the audible nuances of these measurements. On the one hand, one needs to play loud enough to observe SPL related distortion but on the other hand one must also play at a low enough volume for subtle resonances to be apparent. Or, in practical terms, play something loud enough and all speakers sound better.

 

[oivavoi]

Bingo, you are a winner. The brain will "cover up" or fix fairly bad looking frequency responses many times. Of course not all the time, but many times the speakers sound great until you see the frequency response, then your brain says "oh no" and your enjoyment of those previously very nice speakers tanks. Then in a few months you have a new different pair of speakers. The two biggest issues with audio is the room interaction and the brain. Usually though the brain makes everything sound better than what it probably is. So, thank heavens for the brain!

There is obviously much truth to this. The most recent research that I've seen, however, does not indicate that adaptation is "complete": Some quality differences between loudspeakers and rooms seem to remain, even after adaptation. There is just no way that a small and tinny mono speaker will sound as good as a SOTA multichannel rig in an acoustically pleasant room, no matter how long we adapt to the small mono speaker. So it does make sense to get good loudspeakers, and to work towards room acoustics that are not horrible. But our brain luckily makes it much easier for us to live with whatever imperfections which remain!

 

[Jim Shaw]

@amirm Looking only at your measurements, those gross peaks and valleys between 1kHz and 2kHz would worry me... a lot. I listen to a great deal of classical and solo piano recordings. That uneven range includes at least a dozen piano fundamental notes, not to mention important overtones of a couple of dozen other keys.

Q: Do you listen to solo piano music (a la Steinway, etc.) in your subjective reviews?

 

[Juhazi]

IMO 2-way speakers shoud be banned for piano music! Fullrange or 3-way with 1st or 2nd order crossovers are superior!

 

[GXAlan]

IMO 2-way speakers shoud be banned for piano music! Fullrange or 3-way with 1st or 2nd order crossovers are superior!

JBL Professional M2

M2 Master Reference Monitor Addressing the growing need for high dynamic range and reference-mon...

jblpro.com

 

[Chromatischism]

IMO 2-way speakers shoud be banned for piano music! Fullrange or 3-way with 1st or 2nd order crossovers are superior!

Yes! More crossovers!

/sarcasm

 

[hardisj]

or 3-way with 1st or 2nd order crossovers are superior!

You lost me here. Are you talking acoustical or electrical?

 

[Juhazi]

You lost me here. Are you talking acoustical or electrical?

Just between us - 1st electric tends to be 2nd acoustic. By 2nd I mean acoustic 2nd.

( I simply had to throw that comment, let's not make a debat of it. But Jim Shaw's comment is allowed! )

 

[abdo123]

Referring to an interview that @hardisj had with Earl Geddes where he concluded that playing music above a certain SPL masks distortion/resonances that would be more apparent in low volume listening. In other words listening to music above 80db may be a problem in and of itself if you hope to capture the audible nuances of these measurements. On the one hand, one needs to play loud enough to observe SPL related distortion but on the other hand one must also play at a low enough volume for subtle resonances to be apparent. Or, in practical terms, play something loud enough and all speakers sound better.

it's important to keep in mind that Geddes was referencing harmonic linear distortion, that means the driver is still within linear excursion.

compression usually happens when the driver runs out of linear excursion and still is asked to produce louder volumes. since the distortion is neither harmonic or linear at that point these comments no longer apply.

 

[puppet]

I'd bet this weeks lottery winnings that a frequency sweep produced by a concert pianist != a regular computer generated sweep.
How deep does this rabbit hole go fellas?

 

[Spkrdctr]

Isn't this arguably what many describe as "break in" where we're conflating the effects of a speaker changing with use when in reality it's our brain that's adapting to the speaker?

YES! That is part of it. Good catch on bringing that up.

 

[beefkabob]

I think it's even more fundamental and "primordial" than a magical sound quest - it's the eternal hunt for something new because you're bored: "engineer geeking" is really rationalizing an excuse to purchase something new and different because you have money burning in your pocket and you're too old for strip clubs and but there's not enough money in that pocket for a faster car. This is why you have audiophiles literally buying/upgrading to a new DAC every 2 years. The appearance of MQA was a great relief for many audiophiles because it justified yet another upgrade! This is a cycle as old as time. Guitars, bicycles, watches, etc. Boredom is the enemy of one's retirement account.

When I click like more twice, you don't get two likes. It just unlikes. Unfair!

I went 20+ years without upgrading. I did my homework this time and ended up with an awesome but not perfect system. Wife was willing to let me go with a full benchmark stack, but I don't need perfect. I just want excellent.

I don't see myself following that same audiophile upgrade fever. I'd rather just get a new car every few years.

 

[amirm]

Q: Do you listen to solo piano music (a la Steinway, etc.) in your subjective reviews?

I have some but not in my standard playlist. I could never get into the "piano is revealing" thing. It may be me, or maybe it is not revealing.

 

[GXAlan]

I have some but not in my standard playlist. I could never get into the "piano is revealing" thing. It may be me, or maybe it is not revealing.

A Window In Time - Rachmaninoff performs works of other composers - Concord - Label Group

Rachmaninoff performs classic piano works in a spectacular new recording made on a Bösendorfer 290SE Reproducing Piano. This remarkable listening

concord.com

Look for this on Tidal (I know it is on Amazon Music). Rachmaninoff recorded himself on sophisticated player piano rolls which were restored and played back on a Bosendorfer piano and recorded by Telarc engineers.

 

[pozz]

No dog in the fight here but just to throw another wrench into this and make sure all of the info is out on the table for consideration...we actually want bass to cut back a bit at high volumes to maintain equal loudness.

Can you justify this? The curves never reverse and aren't very flat at 100Hz and under.

I've mentioned it before, but I'd really like to see a test where you take a very flat speaker like a Neumann or Genelec and you just progressively make the response more jagged with DSP, while keeping the overall tonality and flatness the same. Kind of like an anti-smoothing filter, lol. At what point does it become audible and at what point does it make the music sound worse? how wide do the peaks and dips of the jaggies need to be?

Doesn't Toole's paper on resonances answer just this?

 

[rebbiputzmaker]

Does not have to be classical necessarilyI have some but not in my standard playlist. I could never get into the "piano is revealing" thing. It may be me, or maybe it is not revealing.

That’s disheartening. Does not have to be classical necessarily, or even solo for that matter. What about some Bill Evans trio, or some other jazz greats. (Also a good source for mono recordings.) The percussion and the harmonics/overtones can be very useful for evaluation. For explosive piano dynamics listen to some Dave Brubeck.

One of my favorites instruments is the vibraphone. I learned how to play as a kid and spent a great many years listening live to Milt Jackson’s vibes and other jazz greats in clubs around the city.
The Vibes are beautiful and very revealing when auditioning audio equipment IMO.

 

[amirm]

That’s disheartening.

It is the other way around. We are not talking about music enjoyment. We are talking about what makes good content for testing speakers. Such content needs to be broadband and have constant spectrum. These then enable you to make changes and notice their effect immediately. With music that varies a lot, you have to rewind to the same point which is not as practical. And lack of full spectrum reduces the effectiveness of such content.

All of this has been researched. Read this article of mine: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...sic-tracks-for-speaker-and-room-eq-testing.6/

And pay attention to this graph:

Notice how piano is forth from the bottom. The top music track is Female Pop Rock and hence the reason I start all of my testing with female tracks.

Piano can be great in hearing speed variations but we are past that in digital domain.