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What do floor standers really bring to the table?

pseudoid

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I think I'm at just under $5k with my Buchardts and Rythmiks. That's not including supporting equipment. To think what else I could have done with the money! But, they bring me much enjoyment.
Shut Up, @Chromatischism!:mad: If our 'better halves' hear the kinda money we are talking about here, I will end up needing a whole new mini-system that fits in the backyard doghouse...:p
 

Pearljam5000

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My bookshelf currently retails for $7500. The next step up, the smallest floor standers cost $12000 a pair. So, bookshelf plus stands is significantly cheaper.

Add a pair of the top of the line 10" subs from same company, total retail is $11K. Still cheaper.
What speakers do you have?
 

pozz

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The true answer is "nothing" because some floorstanders don't even output higher SPLs than some bookshelves, for example there's no way a Kef R5 is ever going to compete with a Genelec 8361A in terms of SPL.

However, *some designs of floorstanders* can:
  • control directivity to lower frequencies due to the use of larger woofers(ie, they turn omnidirectional at lower frequencies).
  • reduce the impact of SBIR and/or room modes due to having multiple woofers closer to the floor and spaced out.
Also, some people think they look nicer than bookshelves on a stand.
Larger image size being another.
reduce the impact of SBIR and/or room modes due to having multiple woofers closer to the floor and spaced out.
Is this really true? The woofers don't overlap in FR and the distance between them is pretty small relative to wavelength.

I've seen this mentioned a few times but the measurements don't show it. Look at the rear radiation.
Two floorstanders vs. one bookshelf from @hardisj
JBL%20HDI-3800%20Horizontal%20Contour%20Plot.png

Kef%20R5%20Horizontal%20Contour%20Plot.png


Emotiva%20Airmotiv%20B1%2B%20Horizontal%20Contour%20Plot.png
Two floorstanders and one bookshelf from @amirm:
index.php

index.php

index.php
I picked random speakers. Pretty sure this is just another thing people say.

Unless of course I'm misunderstanding something.
 

DanielT

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I once had my sub right behind my couch. that sure vibrated my ass hahahhahah
But you can solve that. This person got enough of the scrxxm massage of his under sofa sub and reinforced the sofa. :)
 

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Duke

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I'd be interested in say a high-quality 3-way standmount (or floorstander) that made no attempt to go below say 60 Hz (since I'd use a sub), but I don't believe such things exist?

Imo large stand-mount speakers and/or floorstanders designed from the outset to be used with a distributed multi-sub system is a logical approach, one which I have been using for many years, though all of mine have been two-way designs. Here is a photo of one of my first such systems introduced in 2008, now long since discontinued:

PlanetariumBeta.jpg


The big main speakers were bipolars, same drivers on the back as on the front, and the 12" midwoofers had enough linear excursion headroom that, in a normal home audio application, no protective highpass filter was needed. The four blocks of wood are subwoofers, with the woofers facing away from the camera.

At the moment I don't manufacture any floorstanding speakers optimized for use with subs (only some large stand-mounts), but my product development department has been tasked with rectifying that.
 

MattHooper

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personaly I never understood that feelling bass thing. you don't feel bass unless it's a havy roommode shaking your floor. I can throw in a 10Hz sine wave and stop to hear it when putting my fingers in my ears

I certainly feel bass in my room. (And my wood floor vibrates). As I mentioned, I actually had more "bass feel" in terms of a sense of impact, with the subwoofers off. For instance the soundtrack from Inception, one of my all time favorites (as a soundtrack nut)...if the subwoofers had even made just that album sound "better" to me I might have kept them. But even on that album I was hard pressed to identify much important
contribution in bass by the subwoofers. It felt almost as big, but even a little more powerful (and better tonality IMO), without the subs.

Again...this just my own experience and perception.
 

Pdxwayne

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here it vibrates around 2:09 (Spotify)...and again it's a relativly high frequency I am feeling
How about this one from beginning to 40 seconds? Feel anything?



Spectrum analysis for 30 to 40 seconds:
30_40_seconds.PNG
 

Head_Unit

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Back to the towers, I prefer discrete midrange to push the crossover points out past the main vocal range, because crossovers inevitably have error no matter how well designed. They literally can't sum flat over all angles as I recall. And very few bookshelf speakers are 3-way.
- Then yes, some little 5" woofer is going to be strained trying to reproduce midbass at high levels; 6.5" somewhat less so. Because of bass limitations the bookshelf speakers are almost always ported, and not to a super low frequency, so they cannot reproduce the lowest bass. And the port complicates the phase for integrating to a subwoofer
- Because yeah, integrating a sub really well takes work and/or software like Audyssey or Dirac etc.
- For the lowest frequencies you just need a sub(s) or ginormous towers, period. This interesting research summarizes as "if you can't play the lowest frequencies pretty dang loud, it is useless, because you literally cannot hear it." https://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=5147 (Caveat: harmonics be they natural and/or distortion may give an impression of bass-indeed there is DSP for this-but not "da real BASS")
- As reference, the Focal 936 we run tune down to 40 Hz. But they are pretty big, like 4' tall. Low enough for any regular music; not for movie explosions or long organ pipes or some electronica. An SVS SB2000 Pro definitely enhances the bottom. And these days, who doesn't want their bottom enhanced? :D
 

Head_Unit

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I was hard pressed to identify much important
contribution in bass by the subwoofers.
That's back to the integration-presuming they weren't just lousy subwoofers, there might have been some actual cancellation between the subs and satellites.
 

Pdxwayne

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The strong bass hits at the beginning are at 40 Hz and yes, I can feel them as a vibration in my head. But it's very different than what happens when I play 2049.
Definitely. 2049 goes lower. One of my favorite tracks.
 

JRS

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Off topic but can you really hear what speakers sound like via a recording of those speakers - played through another, third set of speakers??? Seems far fetched? (I'm counting the mic as the second speakers)
I would have laughed my ass off at the absurdity of such a setup, but yes--the systems are tuned really well and it seems as if I am listening to the source directly. That's pretty effing extraordinary. What's more is half the time I don't even hear the switches from one to the other--the tonality and voicing are so similar. I'm listening thru Sundara's with close to stock Oratory EQ. I am still dumbfounded how transparent audio has become.
 

Galliardist

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I certainly feel bass in my room. (And my wood floor vibrates). As I mentioned, I actually had more "bass feel" in terms of a sense of impact, with the subwoofers off. For instance the soundtrack from Inception, one of my all time favorites (as a soundtrack nut)...if the subwoofers had even made just that album sound "better" to me I might have kept them. But even on that album I was hard pressed to identify much important
contribution in bass by the subwoofers. It felt almost as big, but even a little more powerful (and better tonality IMO), without the subs.

Again...this just my own experience and perception.
But what we'd expect. With music, you don't feel the very low bass. Even with the lowest organ pipes, if they do have that effect it's from harmonics.

Generally, though the lowest bass should "hardly be there", and is heard as improved ambiance unless very big drums, synth bass, or a very large purpose built bass instrument is in use. Even with the big organ pipes, the low harmonics tend to be more important. I know from a practical demonstration of turning off subs crossed very low in a friend's setup that we can be aware of the presence or absence of the fundamental, but I don't find it important enough to chase.

Because the lowish to mid bass that you feel in the chest is really an impulse from the speakers, if the main part of that frequency is fed to subs in different locations you won't really feel it (unless you are using subs next to the speakers and also firing directly at you, of course).
 
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