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Horn Speakers - Is it me or.......

Sal1950

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My room has multi-channel capability (7.2) as well as regular stereo, and I do listen that way. While the experience is different between multi-channel and stereo with good spatial information, the surround speakers in multi-channel usually don't completely disappear as point sources and there is not a completely smooth and convincing side and rear soundstage, no matter how good the original recording or how it gets mixed - its not as smooth as good spatial stereo. And I certainly don't lack good program material.
Do you have identical speakers in all 7 base positions?
I get great side soundstaging, rear soundstaging can be a bit more dodgy due to the human ear design and I don't find many producers attempting to put precise instrument position back there. A chicken or egg deal being involved there I believe.
On the whole, a great multich rig can provide a much more rewarding listening experience than a great 2 channel, all other things being equal.

I would add a re-think of the conventional equilateral triangle - currently I use a very squashed isosceles arrangement, with the speakers 14' apart, and the altitude only 6'.
I played with that many years ago. The closer you become to the speakers the more the image becomes headphone like. At some point it begins to go inside your head and less free space positioned. Speaker radiation pattern and angle has much larger effect on the results. If you like it that's up to you.
 

MakeMineVinyl

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Do you have identical speakers in all 7 base positions?

No, my room was originally built as a music pre-mix / editing dubbing stage for film, and I still do original music recording there. As such, the surrounds are the same JBLs as in any Hollywood dubbing stage would have, as mixes performed here have to translate to the final mix stage. My mains are the size of a refrigerator and it would be impossible to duplicate them for surround.

That said, I regularly do listen to multi-channel where all speakers are all identical (such as the sound room here at work), and the same problem exists where the surround speakers call attention to themselves to a greater extent than in pure stereo which has spatial information beyond the usual which doesn't go beyond the boundaries of the physical speakers. It seems to come down to the difficulty of our ears to parse smooth imaging information coming from the sides / rear verses that which comes from two speakers in front.
 

Sal1950

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No, my room was originally built as a music pre-mix / editing dubbing stage for film, and I still do original music recording there.
That's like you saying your stereo doesn't image correctly when you have completely different speakers for the L & R's.
That said, I regularly do listen to multi-channel where all speakers are all identical
And I'm sure you've taken great pains to optimize that system or it's source when you have little to no interest in multich music.
Others from engineers and artists like Steven Wilson, Alan Parsons, Floyd Toole, J Gordon Holt, so - so many more in the industry will testify that multich is the superior system for music reproduction. There is so little you can do artistically as an engineer when your restricted to only 2 ch. Cinema moved on from 2ch decades and decades ago, way past time for the music industry to do the same.
If you prefer to remain stuck with 1960s technology enjoy, but time continues to move on and technology improvesJ Gordon Holt.
YMMV
 

MakeMineVinyl

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That's like you saying your stereo doesn't image correctly when you have completely different speakers for the L & R's.

And I'm sure you've taken great pains to optimize that system or it's source when you have little to no interest in multich music.
Others from engineers and artists like Steven Wilson, Alan Parsons, Floyd Toole, J Gordon Holt, so - so many more in the industry will testify that multich is the superior system for music reproduction. There is so little you can do artistically as an engineer when your restricted to only 2 ch. Cinema moved on from 2ch decades and decades ago, way past time for the music industry to do the same.
If you prefer to remain stuck with 1960s technology enjoy, but time continues to move on and technology improvesJ Gordon Holt.
YMMV
What is your problem with accepting that other people might have far different preferences than you? Please stop it. ;)
 

Newman

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Your sighted preferences are basically your biases. Easy to accept them on those terms. Not so easy if you think you are describing the effects of the sound waves alone.
 

Newman

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So you feel it necessary to emphasize that Toole's statements are based on controlled listening test conditions?
The suggestion here is that I and other forum members are not aware of this.
Which makes me wonder if you have a deeper understanding of the implications of Toole's post.

Educate me then. Better than snide insinuations, I'm sure you agree.
 

Sal1950

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What is your problem with accepting that other people might have far different preferences than you? Please stop it.
OH, you want me to stop it when you've had no problem banging on your drums loud and hard with your opinions and preferences? ROTFLMAO
 

MakeMineVinyl

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OH, you want me to stop it when you've had no problem banging on your drums loud and hard with your opinions and preferences? ROTFLMAO
Um, I never dismissed the experiences that you or others take from their preferred listening format. Stating what I prefer is not challenging what you or anybody else might prefer. I have tried to explain why my preferences are what they are in as unambiguous and non-pejorative terms as possible. Is that really such a hard thing to accept?
 

jhaider

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Speakers are bought in pairs and listened to in stereo.

Actually, in 2021 home speakers are bought in numbers ranging from 1 to 15 for a given system and deployed accordingly. The 21st century has its flaws, but none of those can be mitigated by clinging to mid-late 20th century audiophile dogma.

To make matters worse because in stereo each speaker is closer to the nearest wall this generates distortion unless the early reflection is either treated or deflected.

I’ve never understood the “audiophile” boner for padded cells…

Toole stance on this matter which is I repeat a question of preference.

The research as I interpret it has found (a) flat and smooth axial response and (b) smooth off axis response to be universal keys. Directivity within those guardrails is a matter of preference, and likely setup. Wide is a common preference, but only that.
 

Ro808

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This would parallel that the sharper a change in frequency response, the more noticeable it is at least in large systems. A change in DI would be modulating the spectrum of the off axis energy in the room.


I would add there is what i think of as the "source spatial identity issue" which is not easily measurable (as it is within the difference between two signals reaching ones ear / brain system that creates the 3D sound world we live in).
Imagine two different design speakers which have essentially the same Frequency response.

You walk into a room with either set playing and they both sound good.
In the stereo sweet spot, they sound entirely different so far as the image.



Ok first off, this could be the difference in sidewall reflections so you move outside on a quiet day and they still seem very different so far as stereo image even with no room reflections.


Now you listen to just one speaker at a time. With eyes closed, it is easy to point at the direction of both speakers BUT with one speaker, with your eyes closed you can easily guess how far away it is but the other is much harder, in fact with a soft muffled voice with reverb you guess it is much farther than a dry voice that sound up close. The difference is the ones that are still easy to hear usually radiate a complex radiation pattern that carries the clues your ears need to localize the source (my conclusion).


The pair that are easy to hear how far away they are, are the ones that stand out as part of the stereo image no matter what it was, they anchor the sound to that location in space, the ones that were hard to tell with your ears are the ones the disappear behind the stereo phantom image and can produce the most solid phantom image and your least aware of them as a source.


The problem with horns in most multi-way system is that if you have sources separated in space, your ears can also detect that as the source in time and space because there are small difference between the sources.

The more horns you have and or the larger they are (and true of direct radiators) the more spatial information those separate sources can carry in addition to the signal.



In other words once you are far enough away to not detect multiple sources, you still may well be able to localize the location in depth by the separate info reaching the right and left ears.


I would bet some reading this are skeptical about what i am saying about "hearing aspects of a loudspeakers radiation" and the effect on the stereo image part.
For those curious, I can point you to a simple DIY construction project which will I think cement what i am getting at.
First get 2 of these small full range drivers, i use these at work, they are pretty amazing.
https://faitalpro.com/en/products/LF_Loudspeakers/product_details/index.php?id=401000100


Make yourself a flat baffle about 2 feet square or maybe larger using 1/2 inch plywood, put a hole for the front mounting the driver in the center and cover it with 1/2 inch foam (use spray glue like super 77).


Then open the hole a bit and mount the driver through it and screw it down so it compresses the foam. You can add a small back box and go the T&S alignment if you wish.


This driver here radiates as a simple half space omni point source over much of it's range and can be eq'd until it complains and on axis goes up quite high but it is the very simple radiation over much of it's range and the wonderful stereo image these produce that is the point.
I have a friend that made these and he liked them so much they are his office speakers.
At work, the objective is this kind of simple fractional space single point source radiation but over smaller angles using CD horns

Best,

Tom Danley



An(other) excellent post attesting to broad experience.

The cited examples not only illustrate the advantages of a point source, but also touches on the (perceived) differences between horn-loaded loudspeaker systems and direct radiators.

While all (large format) Danley/Pure Groove point source Synergy Horn systems I know are based on the same technological principles, there are - sometimes subtle - differences in the actual listening experience.
These differences are related to horn depth, mouth size, coverage angles, drivers etc.

For years, my personal favorite has been the Jericho (J1-94), because it does indeed sound like a large format studio monitor on steroids -
and even better in close proximity due to the point source characteristics.
In this case the original promotional text is not a fairy tale made-up by the marketing department.


For those interested in the suggested concept - a full range driver in a baffle - I'd like to suggest 2 cheaper alternative drivers.
The GRS 4FR-8 is a clone of an old Pioneer driver with a freq. response similar to the Auratone 5c.
No. 2 is of Chinese origin, features a neo magnet and demodulation ring > aliexpress. This driver looks suspiciously similar to a wideband driver from Kartesian Audio.
Both drivers have cloth surrounds, which is an advantage imho.
 

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Ro808

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Educate me then. Better than snide insinuations, I'm sure you agree.

If personal preference is a factor regarding DI, even in controlled listening test conditions, what does it imply?
 
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tuga

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Actually, in 2021 home speakers are bought in numbers ranging from 1 to 15 for a given system and deployed accordingly. The 21st century has its flaws, but none of those can be mitigated by clinging to mid-late 20th century audiophile dogma.



I’ve never understood the “audiophile” boner for padded cells…



The research as I interpret it has found (a) flat and smooth axial response and (b) smooth off axis response to be universal keys. Directivity within those guardrails is a matter of preference, and likely setup. Wide is a common preference, but only that.

Not a single one of my friends or acquaintances is an audiophile, only a handful own a stereo system and only one has multichannel system (for cinema, not music).
Maybe in the States HT systems are more common because the houses are bigger and maybe cinemas are far?

I see no point in discussing stereo for non-audiophiles. Most don't give a toad about sound quality, many will probably think we're mad and belong in a padded cell.

As for your final "interpretation", I believe that you missed the point that I was trying to make...
 

Chromatischism

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What we need is a small space the listener sits in with a light scrim all the way around them so they really can't see anything about the room they are in. Then all sorts of things could be changed in the darkness behind the scrim to test myriads of factors - room construction, room size, speaker placement, acoustic treatments, type of speaker, etc. We could spend billions testing this stuff! We need something like NASA. We could call it NARA, the National Audio Reproduction Administration.
Idea:

Just outfit a few Boxabl units with different layouts, treatments, etc and roll the listener through them on a track:

https://www.businessinsider.com/elo...ab-boxabl-casita-50000-person-waitlist-2021-8
 
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Ro808

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I see no point in discussing stereo for non-audiophiles. Most don't give a toad about sound quality, many will probably think we're mad and belong in a padded cell.


Earl Geddes once said, "Who needs measurements when you have audiophiles?".

Audiophiles generally tend to swap equipment and experiment with cables based on favorable reviews online or in magazines.

Forums such as ASR contribute to educating the old-school audiophile and shed some light on 'black box' phenomena.
There is a chance that the acquired basic knowledge of certain metrics will turn into an anal focus on DI, SINAD etc.

This is where informed personal preference comes into play > knowing what's important in a given context (room), taking into account personal objectives (SPL, bandwidth etc.) and preferences (e.g. faithful reproduction of a recording vs believable re-creation of an event).
 
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asrstedt

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No. 2 is of Chinese origin, features a neo magnet and demodulation ring > aliexpress. This driver looks suspiciously similar to a wideband driver from Kartesian Audio.

Any more information on this driver? Make / model?
 

kipman725

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Ran this system the other weekend which is fully horn loaded down to 100Hz and got lots of positive reviews of the sound. Environment was a tent. Without horns it would be very difficult to avoid squashing the dynamics of live music.

two_stack.jpg
 

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Ro808

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3 Orbit 4s per side should be plenty loud.

The Orbit 4 is a cleverly designed coaxial 3-way that weighs only 16 kg.
75332821_1182205758654202_3390678007889788928_n.jpg

orbit4.jpg
 
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