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Best speaker for sound stage under 4k
- Thread starter Earwaxxx
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Miniyouuuu
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I completely agree but you have to set a goal and have some guidance in the process of knowing what you what.
Before buying my speakers I demo more than 10 speakers. And soon I noticed my sibilance issue. Almost 8 of the speakers I had tried made me feel that “s” had too much presence to my liking. And then I discovered that many brands tend to implement a gain in the range of 6000 to 12000hz in order to “force” the feeling of more detail retrival for the aged listeners. Bowers is known for this, SonusFaber also and many other brands.
You can get a lot of info from the frequency graph of the speaker so you don’t have to hear every speaker in the market.
Brands tend to have a sound character and is good to know if you are in their target or not.
Before buying my speakers I demo more than 10 speakers. And soon I noticed my sibilance issue. Almost 8 of the speakers I had tried made me feel that “s” had too much presence to my liking. And then I discovered that many brands tend to implement a gain in the range of 6000 to 12000hz in order to “force” the feeling of more detail retrival for the aged listeners. Bowers is known for this, SonusFaber also and many other brands.
You can get a lot of info from the frequency graph of the speaker so you don’t have to hear every speaker in the market.
Brands tend to have a sound character and is good to know if you are in their target or not.
Would try MoFi Sourcepoint 8, particularly for localization. Reverb can be a tad dull, and do not expect lowest bass.
Chris A
Senior Member
To help you focus on what loudspeakers do all of these things (loudness, sound stage, fidelity), it's been my experience that the following characteristics are to be sought after (simultaneously)--
Soundstage/imaging:
1) Point source, i.e., crossed drivers are mounted within 1/4 wavelength at the crossover frequency and time aligned
2) <=90 degrees horizontal polar coverage down to the room's Schroeder frequency (which is usually less than 200 Hz in any reasonably sized room) with smoothly varying polar response, or even better...constant coverage, i.e.,
Loudness:
1) high efficiency, i.e., fully horn loaded or many direct radiating woofers having large diaphragms, including midrange and midbass frequencies below 500 Hz
2) controlled coverage down to the room's Schroeder frequency
3) ability of loudspeaker to be placed near walls without incurring nearfield midrange/midbass reflections
Fidelity:
1) very low modulation distortion (i.e., achievable almost exclusively via full horn loading)--which reduces sideband levels by 20+ dB relative to the same drivers used in direct radiating mode).
2) smooth passband response from all drivers (i.e., not ragged amplitude response). (This usually means higher-priced drivers.)
3) flat amplitude and phase response (i.e., eliminating all-pass phase growth due to crossover networks--usually via DSP/FIR filtering)
The better the loudspeaker performance in all of these areas (simultaneously), usually the higher the price.
Chris
p.s., I'd recommend looking at Danley Sound Labs products (i.e., Synergy technology): virtually all models possess all the characteristics listed above simultaneously. They are the most compact loudspeaker designs that also have all the characteristics you stated that you wanted, above.
But note that list prices may exceed your stated budgetary limit. Recommend looking for good deals on used models, such as this: https://www.usaudiomart.com/details/650143529-danley-sound-labs-studio-2/
Chris
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Purchased the 1723's about a year and a half ago. Delighted. Great sound stage , excellent sub base, very clean. i push them with 500w @4ohm.
JeremyFife
Major Contributor
Plenty of choice. Plenty of good questions already posed that should be thought about first.
What's the room like? potentially some of that budget should go there too.
What's the room like? potentially some of that budget should go there too.
- Thread Starter
- #29
lol my integrated tube amp has 1/10th of that
- Thread Starter
- #30
Room is small but I rather spend a bit more now and be able to scale the room up with the same speakers
- Thread Starter
- #31
I guess I want to just feel immersed. Like I’m standing on stage
Penelinfi
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Imo small room requires more treatment or likely a speaker with more narrow and even dispersion?
But then wide dispersion can give you more of a different type of envelopment.
As for standing on stage; I feel like surround sound would be better for this . Or create a nice diffuse room to create that kind of ambience without it being bathroom like
Yes. Very sensitive and easy to drive speakers. I also tried them with a Fosi ZA3 and with a Loxjie A40. All worked great and provided more than enough power.
We need to clarify your terminology. What you desire is typically called envelopment. A feeling of being there, because the sound is not only in front of you but rather all around you.
Some people who haven't heard it from a stereo system mix it up with surround sound. But surround sound is typically used for distinctive sound from other directions than the front. While very good 3D surround sound setups also "can" deliver good envelopment.
Soundstage is typically used for the virtual sound stage in front of the listener and contains the positioning, seize and depth information of the instruments or tones.
It is important to know that it is very hard / expensive / more inconvenient to optimize all of these properties at once.
boxerfan88
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With a stereo setup, the brain can be tricked to hear immersion & envelopment.
If you haven't tried ... go play with uBacch plugin trial ... muck around with the angle setting ... one can make the soundstage stretch to just beyond the shoulder area.
It's quite fun, 3D like, yet a bit gimmicky, that's why I didn't continue beyond the trial period.
If you haven't tried ... go play with uBacch plugin trial ... muck around with the angle setting ... one can make the soundstage stretch to just beyond the shoulder area.
It's quite fun, 3D like, yet a bit gimmicky, that's why I didn't continue beyond the trial period.
Some stereo systems with the fitting room acoustics and placement provide very good envelopment if the recording provided such. But most stereo systems only provide a glimpse of such envelopment if at all.
The extension of the soundstage like the q sound technique are impressive but you typically need an extension to over 60° soundstage width to get convincing envelopment. But first this is hard to get with a typically 30° stereo system and second it will sound artificial since no real soundstage is build that wide.
An increase of the width of the stereo triangle placement in combination with omnidirectional speaker which are placed in the middle of the room, so you don't get early reflections and an ultra near field listening position will work. Linkwitz had given some documentation of such a technique to get convincing envelopment. The downside is the odd placement of the speakers and that you aren't allowed to move your head.
kemmler3D
Master Contributor
Yes but it's at least possible to say which ones are bad for those things.
Any suggestions, you say?
I recommend a B&W 704 S3 floorstander for 3999 a pair. I have mine for 2 months now for my apartment and omg the speakers do disappear as if the music is coming from the center and not from the left and right speakers. I use it for movies too and its deceiving me that i have an atmos or surround system. The bass can be tiny depending on the source but my amp has tone compensation ( i set mine +2) problem solved. You need space between the speakers and the sidewalls, thats mandatory for any system to get a nice balanced sound.
2Sunny
Active Member
I can not speak to anything I have not tried, but 3 of the 4 I tried I feel fit the bill, and all have excellent spinorama data to support that subjective view. The Ascend are just over $4k and the F226s are way over. but the F36 is cheap and would do the job nicely I think.
The Revel F35, F36, F226, and Ascend ELX were all hooked up to Outlaw 2220 monoblocks providing 200 watts of power, and although I didn't keep it at this level I did push everyone to over 100 dBs measured with an iPhone app NIOSH set on instant dB(C), and all sounded like I was in a real concert at that level while listening to Take the Power Back by Rage Against the Machine. (I did have a sub attached at all times.)
EDIT: Actually I think the lowly Revel F35 if combined with a sub would work and it's on sale at Crutchfield for $449, but they only have 2 pair left, BUT they have a super generous return policy as well so you could demo them in your home and simply return them if they didn't meet your hopes.
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