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Sometimes the truth hurts.
Well, sure, if you just want to ignore what I wrote earlier that I've actually done those type of tests with my omnis, and the results didn't support your claim.
Sometimes the truth hurts.
Looking like cancellations and beaming are starting above 10kHz.View attachment 104052
I'm not OP, but here's the chart for the MBL 101E Mk. II.
Looking like cancellations and beaming are starting above 10kHz.
@Mr. Speakers Do you have measurements of omnis? I don't of any speaker that is truly omnidirectional through the entire spectrum.
I don't know. Maybe a large dipole or some CBTs. Or a multichannel upmixing system.But consider, if you have twenty or thirty thousand cubic feet of space to fill, small boxes, or even larger floor standing conventional loudspeakers just aren't going to fill the bill.
Yeah. I don't know either. I've not heard them but would guess MBLs have pretty good SPL and are able to cover a large area. The point is, if you are looking to send sound outward into a pretty large domestic-oriented open space, the speakers you are looking for are likely going to be a little different than a typical monitor type, regardless of how good those are for smaller spaces.I don't know. Maybe a large dipole or some CBTs. Or a multichannel upmixing system.
With nearfield quasi-anechoic windowing (sorry for dropping all those terms at once) you can have fairly clean speaker measurement results down into the several hundred Hz. It's the bass and low midrange that poses issues. The basic idea is that you place a microphone very close (a few mm) to the speaker drivers and measure with a quick sweep (e.g., 5 seconds long to go from 20Hz to 20kHz). Since room reflections are responsible for mangled FR, if you have a short interval of just a few milliseconds where no high-amplitude reflection intrudes, you can cut it out ("window") and have pretty accurate HF, but inaccurate LF. LF will require a separate measurement that is then spliced into the graph. This is what John Atkinson uses to make his graphs. Notice, though, that he does not use the splicing technique for the polar plot, which only goes down to 300Hz.FWIW the MBL chart I posted is of in-room measurements. I am guessing that things get a bit tricky with reflections above 10kHz the same way they do with headphones.
That's pretty cool and makes total sense to me. If I had a large space where I expected a crowd I would probably do something similar with JBL's CBT arrays mounted into the ceiling.However it is, filling a large space is not going to be cheap, but if you live that kind of house, then dollars are likely not a big concern. Drew Daniels (JBL applications engineer) used the company's pro drivers for his home made system. Horn loaded HF, cone drivers for the rest, in a very large box. His space was 40,000 cubic feet, and although his speakers were quite sensitive, in order to fill the room he required a lot of watts. I think it was about two thousand watts per channel for 120 dB SPL peaks at low distortion.
So the "testing" that you did was able to show that music recorded and mastered in stereo played back on an Omni speaker was like "being at the live performance"? How exactly does that magic work? My point is subjective claims, like the "testing" you've performed, aren't just worthless, but in this specific scenario are also completely illogical. You don't have to agree with me.Well, sure, if you just want to ignore what I wrote earlier that I've actually done those type of tests with my omnis, and the results didn't support your claim.
There's a reason that science based speaker design and engineering teams with large corporate budgets and a desire to outperform their peers in a highly competitive market aren't pursuing the current Omni speaker technology for stereo reproduction.
My point is subjective claims, like the "testing" you've performed, aren't just worthless, but in this specific scenario are also completely illogical.
So the "testing" that you did was able to show that music recorded and mastered in stereo played back on an Omni speaker was like "being at the live performance"? How exactly does that magic work? My point is subjective claims, like the "testing" you've performed, aren't just worthless, but in this specific scenario are also completely illogical. You don't have to agree with me.
There's a reason that science based speaker design and engineering teams with large corporate budgets and a desire to outperform their peers in a highly competitive market aren't pursuing the current Omni speaker technology for stereo reproduction. It's not a conspiracy to stick us all with bad sounding music. You know, Occam's razor and all.
I'm familiar with the M3si, baby brother of the M1. They weren't really close to omnidirectional. Bidirectional and probably wider dispersion than usual is how I'd describe the polar pattern.My guess is that the focus of large corporate budgets is to make the best-sounding speaker that looks like all of its top competitors. That way the large corporate budget doesn't have to be spent on shifting the public's paradigm to accept something unorthodox. And it may be that the conventional configuration is best for many applications, but that does not mean it is best for all of them.
Don't forget that Toole loved the Mirage M1. Are you going to dismiss his subjective testing in his room, and his claims, as "worthless" and "completely illogical"? Here they are again:
"Over the years, a parade of loudspeakers went through that room, and all disappointed. The room was an unforgiving critic of loudspeakers in which the direct and reflected sounds exhibited different spectra, and conventional forward-firing loudspeakers drew attention to themselves... Then, in 1989, a new loudspeaker came on the scene: The almost omnidirectional , bidirectional-in-phase "bipolar" Mirage M1. They performed well in double-blind listening tests in the small NRC room, and also in this large one. They simply "became" the orchestra. " [emphasis Duke's]
Well actually I didn't hit Like or didn't realize it. Was reading on a phone and sometimes scrolling with my thumb I hit like. I'll remove it.If you read the thread one of two pages back I have provided several links to serious studies comparing omnis and other designs, as well as some of the arguments in favor of omnis, which are based on established principles in acoustics and psychoacoustics. How about engaging with those arguments in a serious way?
Also, I don't think anybody on this site thinks that subjective listening impressions are decisive arguments which settle the case. That doesn't mean they don't have any value at all. I don't see any need for throwing around words like "worthless" and "completely illogical". You can make your point in without resorting to that. (surprised that you pressed like on that post, @Blumlein 88 )
So the "testing" that you did was able to show that music recorded and mastered in stereo played back on an Omni speaker was like "being at the live performance"? How exactly does that magic work?
Yes, all instruments have the same reflection. Rather than each having its unique one. You can fix that with skillful use of reverb and delay. Doing it separately for each instrument. Fix being relative. You can make it sound better and more real, but never as good as the real thing.If I take this up in good faith, there are many valid psychoacoustic explanations for this phenomenon. I'm copying this from something I wrote in an old thread:
"I learnt a lot from this talk on spatial audio by Francis Rumsey (on youtube). In it, he explains why two-channel stereo usually has an inherent artificiality compared to real instruments.
This is how reflections behave given a real stage - if there were actually real instruments at the artificial stereo stage (screenshots from the video):
Each instrument creates reflections, also the instruments in the middle of the soundstage.
But with two speakers, this is what happens:
The instruments between the speakers don't create any reflections. Because of this, two-channel stereo usually doesn't feel "real" to me - and this is supported by some psychoacoustical research into spatial audio.
My experience has been that (good) omnis and (good) dipoles feel less "artificial" than other speaker designs. I suspect the reason is that reflections from the room are coming from many more directions than with conventional speakers, and that this mimics how real instruments behave in a real room."
This is not "magic". It's about the interaction between the speaker and the room. It's not voodoo, it's something that has been described by several researchers. Yes, you can argue that omnis are a bad solution, but there is a real debate to be had here.
Yes, all instruments have the same reflection. Rather than each having its unique one. You can fix that with skillful use of reverb and delay. Doing it separately for each instrument. Fix being relative. You can make it sound better and more real, but never as good as the real thing.
I disagree completely. If Omnidirectional speakers produced better sounding music playing the market heavily produced stereo recorded/mastered music then large companies would definitely be interested in releasing new products to capitalize on that advantage. Hell, they already try to capitalize on any unreal advantages to the best of their abilities by making all sorts of weird design choices. Let's not pretend that it's uncommon for someone to run an audio company that's heavily based on "woo" while claiming sonic superiority. Haven't you seen that before Duke?My guess is that the focus of large corporate budgets is to make the best-sounding speaker that looks like all of its top competitors. That way the large corporate budget doesn't have to be spent on shifting the public's paradigm to accept something unorthodox. And it may be that the conventional configuration is best for many applications, but that does not mean it is best for all of them.
You need to rationalize how music that is recorded and mastered specifically for STEREO REPRODUCTION would or could benefit by being reproduced on an Omni speaker. You definitely aren't listening to the sound that the mastering engineer was. What exactly are you listening to? Maybe if the music was recorded and mastered in such a way that playing it back in an unknown room on an omnidirectional speaker was the intent, then you could make actual relevant arguments. That's not what you're doing though. If we can't agree on this basic principle then who here is actually acting in bad faith? In fact you're fighting in support of an absolutist obvious troll post. At what point do you realize you're in the illogical camp?If I take this up in good faith, there are many valid psychoacoustic explanations for this phenomenon. I'm copying this from something I wrote in an old thread:
"I learnt a lot from this talk on spatial audio by Francis Rumsey (on youtube). In it, he explains why two-channel stereo usually has an inherent artificiality compared to real instruments.
This is how reflections behave given a real stage - if there were actually real instruments at the artificial stereo stage (screenshots from the video):
Each instrument creates reflections, also the instruments in the middle of the soundstage.
But with two speakers, this is what happens:
The instruments between the speakers don't create any reflections. Because of this, two-channel stereo usually doesn't feel "real" to me - and this is supported by some psychoacoustical research into spatial audio.
My experience has been that (good) omnis and (good) dipoles feel less "artificial" than other speaker designs. I suspect the reason is that reflections from the room are coming from many more directions than with conventional speakers, and that this mimics how real instruments behave in a real room."
This is not "magic". It's about the interaction between the speaker and the room. It's not voodoo, it's something that has been described by several researchers. Yes, you can argue that omnis are a bad solution, but there is a real debate to be had here.
You need to rationalize how music that is recorded and mastered specifically for STEREO REPRODUCTION would or could benefit by being reproduced on an Omni speaker. You definitely aren't listening to the sound that the mastering engineer was. What exactly are you doing? Maybe if the music was recorded and mastered in such a way that playing it back in a room on an omnidirectional speaker was the intent, then you could make actual relevant arguments. That's not what you're doing though. If we can't agree on this basic principle then who here is actually acting in bad faith? Same goes for @Duke and @MattHooper. You're the ones supporting OP's misguided claims, pony up some logical explanations and stop acting like outrage culture victims.