Is impactful and visceral sound simply a product of high SPL?

[Kain]

Say you have two home theaters:

Room 1

12 feet long x 10 feet wide x 9.5 feet high.

Genelec 8361A as LCR, 8351B for all surround and overhead locations, and 2 x 7382A subwoofers.

Room 2

17 feet long x 14 feet wide x 9.5 feet high.

Meyer Sound Acheron Designer as LCR, some model of HMS or ULTRA-X20 for all surround and overhead locations, and 4 x X-1100C + 4 x VLFC.

At equal SPL levels at the listening position, will both setups sound equally as "impactful" and "visceral"? Also, will 2 x 7382A subwoofers in the much smaller room sound as "impactful" and "visceral" as 4 x X-1100C + 4 x VLFC in the larger room?

 

[egellings]

I would say high dynamic range with adequate SPL to handle the peaks. A steady loud sound blast won't cut it.

 

[Kain]

Thanks.

What about transient response? Does that have anything to do with this topic? How would the transient response differ between the two setups (Genelec The Ones vs. Meyer Sound)?

 

[Ciobi69]

I just suppose that the Meyer theather would be a lot less in stress we talking about that can do 130db+ , still a good FR not as Genelec but good enough , Meyer is a good company , they go a lot louder , like hear defening , I got some friend that said the lower the distortion the louder you can go , I mean it’s not safe but for little times you could go above by some

 

[cavedriver]

group delay on the bass - does it all get produced at the same time? If the delay is large enough you will hear it.

 

[Peluvius]

If your system is great (and certainly Room 1 would be), the rest is room acoustics and SPL. In my experience once you are at 75 to 80 dB (C weighted) you will start to feel the impact of good bass if the system and room are tuned. I have also boosted bass in the past to get this type of experience at a lower level. There is a "loudness" setting on some gear that seems to do a similar thing.

 

[Kain]

Thanks for the replies.

How would the bass/subwoofer performance differ between the two setups? Will 2 x 7382A in the small room sound equally has "violent" and "gut wrenching" as 4 x X-1100C + 4 x VLFC in the larger room?

 

[Peluvius]

I would suggest getting in touch with Genelec for some professional advice. My completely not professional advice is that much sub power seems excessive for the space……

 

[Kain]

I would suggest getting in touch with Genelec for some professional advice. My completely not professional advice is that much sub power seems excessive for the space……

Which space? The smaller room or for both rooms?

Edit: Since you were referring to Genelec, I think you mean in the smaller Genelec room. However, the goal is to have one subwoofer up front under the TV and one in the middle of the back wall (opposite of the front subwoofer). This is not to have a crazy amount of bass but bass that is low-distortion at high SPL (and still balanced with the main speakers).

 

[Peluvius]

I would consider two of the 7380a in that room (the one you have suggested for Genelec). I think that same system would also rock the larger space you have. I have found Genelec to provide great advice on these matters. I don’t know what benefits you might get from putting such powerful subs in that space….if you do it, I would love to know.

 

[sigbergaudio]

Frequency response, room integration (how uneven the bass is, how dry (or not) the room is), SPL capacity. You can easily see +20dB transient peaks in some music, which means there can be compression happening in the loudspeaker even at "moderate" levels, where you'd instinctively expect the speaker to cope.

 

[MaxwellsEq]

Visceral nerves are widely spaced, unmyelinated c-types. This means they conduct very slowly, relative to a myelinated nerve. They are also a long way from the brain. The auditory nerve is short and myelinated, so the brain receives stimulation almost immediately.

You will hear things a long time before you feel them in your viscera. In the real world, you will sense from your gut the pressure wave of a heavy item falling into a skip some time after your brain perceives the sound.

 

[Sokel]

These two "qualities" of the OP are very, VERY different.

Low, visceral, slow feeling has nothing to do with the light-speed, sudden, dry, chest hard impact.
They are coming from different freq bands and while the former can be relative easy the later used to be easy but not lately as it seems.
As mains lost real estate (specially baffles) and driver size dry impact can only be found at mains monitors range.

 

[Keith_W]

Visceral nerves are widely spaced, unmyelinated c-types. This means they conduct very slowly, relative to a myelinated nerve. They are also a long way from the brain. The auditory nerve is short and myelinated, so the brain receives stimulation almost immediately.

There are two types of nerves that are found in the abdominal cavity, C-fibres and A-delta fibres. As you mention, C-fibres innervate the gut, while A-delta fibres innervate the peritoneum (and also pleura and other things). A-delta fibres are myelinated. The classic med school example of the difference between the two types of pain is in the case of acute appendicitis. The initial pain is visceral, so it's vague, disturbing, poorly localised, and is felt in the distribution of the anatomical midgut. As the inflammation spreads through the visceral wall, it inflames the peritoneum. So the pain transitions to McBurney's point. It is sharp, localized, worsened with movement, and accompanied by clinical signs of localized guarding.

I have never thought of "visceral sound" as actually exciting visceral nerve fibres. Maybe I should spend some brain cells looking at it

 

[MaxwellsEq]

I have never thought of "visceral sound" as actually exciting visceral nerve fibres. Maybe I should spend some brain cells looking at it

Neither had I until this post popped up.

Clearly the brain expects pressure wave signals from the gut to arrive later than the ear hears them. We've grown up with that.

I began to wonder about some of the large vs small room perception effects and phase accuracy perception, once this thread appeared.

 

[Chris A]

At equal SPL levels at the listening position, will both setups sound equally as "impactful" and "visceral"?

Not according to this (from Griesinger):

The difference is the number of subwoofers and their placement. Larger rooms are better than smaller ones--in this context.

Chris

 

[gnarly]

Say you have two home theaters:

Room 1

12 feet long x 10 feet wide x 9.5 feet high.

Genelec 8361A as LCR, 8351B for all surround and overhead locations, and 2 x 7382A subwoofers.

Room 2

17 feet long x 14 feet wide x 9.5 feet high.

Meyer Sound Acheron Designer as LCR, some model of HMS or ULTRA-X20 for all surround and overhead locations, and 4 x X-1100C + 4 x VLFC.

At equal SPL levels at the listening position, will both setups sound equally as "impactful" and "visceral"? Also, will 2 x 7382A subwoofers in the much smaller room sound as "impactful" and "visceral" as 4 x X-1100C + 4 x VLFC in the larger room?

Your thread opening question is a good one!

Your two room examples and systems are ......yikes...well, not in touch with reality (not trying to offend).
Room 1 is very small at 1140 cu ft . The Genelec stuff *might* fit in such a small room, for a ball busting system.
Room 2 at 2261 cu ft is not that much bigger than #1, and the Meyer gear is crazy overkill. Heck the subs alone take up over 7% of the room's volume. The Genelec stuff is still more than enough.
(And this is coming from a true SPL/dynamics/bass junkie, that most everyone would call nuts. )

Ok, but to answer your thread opening question as best I can...
Like at least one other alluded to, it's average SPL with headroom for transients.
No matter how high or low average SPL good dynamics require sufficient headroom above the average SPL.

Headroom means uncompressed and unclipped peak SPL for short term transients, across the entire spectrum top to very bottom. I
The headroom is a function of both drivers' peak excursion capabilities; and the amplifiers ability to drive those peaks.

All speakers from small to large, will have better dynamics given such headroom.
The higher the average SPL, along with the requisite headroom, will sound more dynamic in comparison to a lower SPL system with requisite headroom.
But a higher SPL system without headroom, may sound less dynamic than a smaller average SPL system with headroom.

Excursion capability, and the amp power (or rather voltage) necessary for the headroom is the name of the dynamic game ime/imo.
Most folks seem to be concerned with thermal compression, but that's usually not the issue taking away speaker headroom, which by definition is for short term transients.
Lack of headroom is most likely first due to amplifier voltage limitations, and seconding drivers reaching excursion limits.

This prosound vid is about driver power handling, and mainly for subs and larger low/mid drivers. But it has some very good explanatory material on why headroom is important, and what short term power capability is needed for it. I started well into it...whole thing is worth a watch if you're into SPL and bass.

 

[Kain]

@gnarly

Thanks for the reply.

Based on your feedback, am I correct in assuming that I should have all the "visceral" and "impactful" sound that I want/need in Room 1 with the Genelec setup (not only in the bass frequencies but all the other frequencies as well that will be covered by the 8361A and 8351B)? Having enough headroom for transients will not be an issue regardless of how loud I am listening (and I generally listen very loud)?

Just trying to confirm because in ASR's 8361A review, the 8361A started clipping and limiting the treble at 106 dB at 1 meter. The LCR 8361A speakers will be roughly 2 meters from the listening position in Room 1.

 

[songOVERsound]

Maybe impactful but when I mix audio, I notice stereo cue’s and transients more at lower volumes

 

[Mnyb]

My amateurish take on this is spl and dynamic capacity in wide frequency range , the typical high end stand mounted 2-way don't do this it may be loud enough in the midband but not further out into the frequency extremes Below <200HZ for example . or it distorts in low treble higher midrange due to the tweeter , you might need a 3-way speaker etc etc. or they´speaker compress unevenly depending on frequency when under stress .

It looks impressive in the specs with 110dB max spl for example but it's rarely given with any qualifications . I would be really impressed with a system doing it inside 20Hz to 20kHz .

In an ideal world a speakers spl capacity would be the same inside the whole audio band and with similar compression (very low ) inside the band . And that would be the spec given