I know this should go in the general audio forum, but since you guys always seem to know, or know someone who knows, I am posting this here, but you can change it. In all my reading and research I have never come across 2 things that are bugging me.
1. What is the smallest amount of time an average human ear can hear between 2 sounds? I have read the whole time delay feature on receivers is a joke, and since one manufacturer put that feature on, now everyone does it. I have read that the ear can pick up differences between left and right really well, but what about if both drivers are on the right side.
2. What is the dissipation rate of higher frequencies as they travel throguh the air? I know low frequencies can travel really far and high ones can't, but I want numbers.
Now for the reason it's bugging me. I have been thinking of building a taller set of speakers, maybe a line source, that has multiple drivers and tweeters. During my research on ideas and designs I have seen many that have really ugly shapes. Even though I love the JM Lab Grand Utopia, it has one of the shapes I am talking about. They put the tweeter further back from your head and say it is because you want all the voice coils the same distance so one sound doesn't travel to your ear faster from one driver than another. So with the speed of sound, does the small difference between a tweeter and woofer's voice coils, say 2 inches, at 10 feet away make a difference? Then does the rate at which high frequencies fade away make it so you need the tweeter closer, negating the reason for making it further away in the first place. This whole idea of making the tweeter further away seems like voodoo science to me, that's why I ask. It's ight up there with people who claim that speaker wires need to be the same length. Thanks in advance for any help.