I guess I’m misinformed, but I thought the in-room was in imprecise terms, the product of the spinorama data. Essentially the FR at the LP in a theoretical room. Not your room of course, but a consistent theoretical room from test to test. I look forward to being corrected on this.
Howdy, I do think my post that you are responding to covers this. I think the basic answer is mixed into what I already stated.
Unfortunately, I am not exactly a good writer so it may be messy both there and here.
The 'Steady State Response/Equilibrium State', of a test signal captured by a single mic is not the frequency response of the speaker that you are hearing and perceiving as a listener. I can't break it all down quickly now but as you likely understand some key contributing elements= primary is the direct sound/listening window, secondary is the contribution of early reflections and then of those they need to be addressed differently. Such as horizontal early reflections are thought to be more important that ceiling and especially floor and so forth. Other contributing factors exist but this is just to show it gets complex fast (- but not too complex to manage with a Spin and a few Polars.)
It is confusing, I know.
The 'Predicted In Room Response', is essentially a prediction of the, 'Steady State in Room Measurement'. (It is created by examining, sound power, direct sound, & early arriving reflections)
Now the steady state in room measurement is not very indicative of what we hear.
If it was, you could entirely skip all Klipple testing and all Anechoic chamber testing, grab a quick steady state in room and be done.
Toole, states in his book in section 5.6.2,
"The notion that a single curve resulting from sounds picked up by an omnidirectional microphone is an adequate representation of perceptions by two ears and brain is preposterous. It is related, but it is incomplete data.... a room curve tells us very little that is reliable about the loudspeaker itself... Listeners have demonstrated an uncanny ability to 'listen through' rooms and be able to identify key properties of loudspeaker performance. It is therefore clear that one must begin with comprehensive data on the loudspeakers in order to be confident about the sounds arriving at the listening position in a room."
The reality is that that measurement only hints at what you hear, which is far more complex. In Toole's book he touts it as a meaningful novelty. One that is interesting in that the Harman data collection strategy can come close to predicting it reasonably accurately and doing so is sorta cool. It is more of a way to check that the room is behaving as a typical room will. He never says that that data point is useful for much, nor is it representative of what we hear. Mainly it can confirm rooms issues and confirm that the speakers has a slowly tilting in room energy level by frequency, rising toward bass and falling toward treble which is an
indication & property of a well designed speaker being used in a typical room(not an anechoic room by where the response would have zero tilt).
Spinorama, which is fairly detailed for many casually interested folks, is actually supposed to represent the practical limit of reduction in the data. (IMHO the Spinorama & the Polar Dispersion graphs are the minimum data to look at along with SPL capability)
You can not reduce the sound of the speaker down to the 'Predicted In Room Steady State Response' and understand more. In fact by being sort of tricked by that data points appearance and the name 'In-Room' - which grabs the user looking for simplicity and is relatable as we all have rooms, many are understanding less. ( So, there it is. The point I was making is that it seems many are using that data point and attempting to add value to it that it does not have. It has some very little value as a prediction and has some value as an actual measurement taken in your room in an effort to lightly troubleshoot room issues. And in the bass region is able to inform you of how to deal with room issues.)
Based on my interpretation of the information that I have encountered so far, it would proabily be fine to exclude the Predicted In Room chart forever, and at the same time as long as it is given proper weight (very minimal) keep it along.
That said I am a hobbiest mainly reading books and articles and listening to equipment for fun. Not a real expert by any means.
My point is mainly that, if you keep changing the measurement protocol, it stops being useful in quick and direct comparisons. I have no doubt the R3 measures great, but I get no visual cues on how it compares with -say- an LS50 Meta, based on the available charts. The "in-room response" -even if the room is not the same as mine, however is the same as speakers are tested- allows me to get immediate visual cues.
I think Amir will keep it but the dude doing this review has no Klipple NFS and so can't really create the chart.
Anyway, based on what I have stated above, hopefully you understand that I am saying any visual cue from that chart is a 'false positive' so to speak. It is not capable of representing what I believe you are hoping it does. There is essentially no point in comparing it speaker to speaker as it does not carry that value and ability. It does have some certain value just not in that way and was never intended to.