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Has anyone heard speakers with a wider soundstage than Revel's?
- Thread starter BingaMoon
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If you want dispersion width anything with the RAAL 64-10 has about the widest dispersion you'll find. Philharmonic BMR, Sierra 2 EX and the more popular choices with the tweeter.
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...n-s-50-wide-directivity-speaker-review.13982/
In all seriousness, at the $3k range for soundstage, it’s hard to beat Magnepan MG3.6’s or MG2.5R.
The L100 is supposed to have really nice dispersion despite its appearances.
https://www.audioholics.com/bookshelf-speaker-reviews/jbl-l100/conclusion
In all seriousness, at the $3k range for soundstage, it’s hard to beat Magnepan MG3.6’s or MG2.5R.
The L100 is supposed to have really nice dispersion despite its appearances.
https://www.audioholics.com/bookshelf-speaker-reviews/jbl-l100/conclusion
Is there a direct correlation between wide dispersion and wide soundstage?
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Focal, Ascend, and Philharmonic should all be a little wider. BMR Philharmonic towers are hard to beat around that price if you love a wide soundstage.
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From what I understand(there's a graph that Toole shows), the 2-10?kHz region dispersion width is most responsible for soundstage width. This may be why you tend to see a bulge in that region for Focal. Revel tends to be a little less wide, but smoother with respect to the surrounding regions.
That's my understanding as well. The OP said wide soundstage so I mentioned the RAAL but vertical dispersion seems very important as well and I don't think you can neglect it.
All the speakers with reasonably flat FR and smooth dispersion (whether narrow or wide) should have excellent soundstages. Look at the list of reviews. A lot of the good speakers are well under $2000 a pair.
Pdxwayne
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My living room front wall is ~23 ft wide. My Paradigm speakers (Studio 10, Signature S2, and Persona B) all can cast stage wider than my front wall.
I would say any good Paradigm pair under $3K can provide excellent width.
I would say any good Paradigm pair under $3K can provide excellent width.
Hmm. In my experience with the Beolab 90, increasing dispersion (which can be manipulated) did increase the width of the soundstage but at the expense of detail, imaging and specificity. Perhaps there are optimal values, depending on room dimensions and boundaries.
P.S.: To answer the question in the thread title, I have not yet heard any speaker with a wider soundstage in my listening room.
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To the extent that the apparent soundstage width is expanded by early reflections off the near-side wall, probably so.
To the extent that lateral soundstage extension beyond the speakers is encoded into the recording, probably not.
While I have not heard the Beolab 90's, I can't think of a more apples-to-apples comparison of narrow vs wide vs omni radiation patterns, so I find your observations about the Beolab 90's quite valuable. Your experience regarding the tradeoffs of wide dispersion (relative to narrow) makes sense to me, being a disciple of Earl Geddes:
"The earlier and the greater in level the first room reflections are, the worse they are. This aspect of sound perception is controversial. Some believe that all reflections are good because they increase the listeners feeling of space – they increase the spaciousness of the sound. While it is certainly true that all reflections add to spaciousness, the very early ones (< 10 ms.) do so at the sake of imaging and coloration."
That might explain why I've had success with using damping panels behind my head on the wall directly behind the sofa.
Everything improved.
That might explain why I've had success with using damping panels behind my head on the wall directly behind the sofa.
Dooood.
In case you'd like to read the paper, imo there are more good ideas where that quote came from: Earl Geddes' loudspeaker philosophy
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Dahlquist DQ-10s have a soundstage as wide as the Grand Canyon.
I've also seen a study that systematically added absorption panels to various 1st reflection points and basically supports your statement that the more reflections the more spaciousness that was reported but the dead room had more clarity. I too suspect there is an ideal dispersion pattern which is why I don't go for speakers where wide horizontal dispersion is prioritized over just about everything else. I also think vertical reflections are important to the overall soundstage as well.
You should write questions for Quora.
The Elac Concentro M has some type of technology that allows for adjusting between "spacious" and "focused" sound. It will be interesting to find out how they accomplish this and it may add more data about how speakers produce in-room soundstage width.
dkinric
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Just a personal data point as I see the RAAL tweeters mentioned vs Revel. I recently replaced my Sierra 2s with Revel M105s - direct replacement, same stands, same location - and soundstage appears to be noticeably wider with the Revels. Don't discount the engineering that goes into the waveguides of the speaker in addition to tweeter characteristics. Of course, YMMV.
