[DS-21]

So let me get this straight.    So your speakers sit against the wall.

Practically, yes. The inside-front corner is maybe 3" from the wall, but they are toed in to cross in front of the listening position, so the outside-back corner is further out from the wall. (The center channel fires straight ahead, and its cabinet is all about 3" from the wall. I design my system to play multichannel music. The axes of all three speakers cross a couple feet in front of an above the listening position)

The only material issue with close wall placement, if one uses loudspeakers that have any degree of constrained directivity in the midrange and lower treble, is the bass loading. That can be fixed in the crossover design or external EQ. It's also one of the best applications of automated room correction. If one uses speakers that are nearly omnidirectional, then one also has more midrange/treble smearing. The typical ~7" midwoofer/1" flush mounted tweeter design cannot be so used, because one will suffer from lots of midrange smearing due to the tweeter's wide-open radiation at the bottom of its passband.

You see, I start with the room rather than the loudspeakers. Speakers, like other audio gear, are just tools to access the music. Just tools. I don't romanticize them. And I find people who do ascribe romantic qualities to electronics boxes and transducers silly.

You have no room treatments.

Nothing that's a dedicated room treatment, no. And I'm not going to hide behind WAF here. I don't have them because I don't want to engage in room mutilation.

As an aside, one thing I find really funny is when people have lots of room treatments - and a wood and/or metal and/or glass coffee table in front of the listening position!

Your inexpensive receiver sounds just as good as the best separates.

First, only in some silly little world is a thousand dollar or more AVR "inexpensive." And I thought I was a snob!

And the correct answer is not "just as good," but "better," due to the excellent room correction software. (ARC and Trinnov; I'm less fond of Audyssey because unless one springs for the Pro variant Audyssey imposes a non-defeatable notch in the midrange under the assumption that most people have incompetently designed loudspeakers.)

Wire is wire and will have no impact on the sound.

Not necessarily. If wire is incompetently specified for the task, then maybe. For instance, some "high end" wire is stupidly designed with very high capacitance. That can lead to problems with incompetently-designed "high end" electronics, such as Naim gear.

But beyond that, if we rephrase your assertion to "wires that are competently specified for the task (line level cables properly shielded and terminated correctly, speaker wire of sufficient gauge for the minimum impedance of the loudspeakers and the length of the, power cords of sufficient wire thickness to handle a given piece of gear's current draw, etc.), then the assertion is correct. I'm no idiot and am not a wire merchant, so obviously I'll stick with the reality-based position rather than the con man position.

And of course all capacitors sound the same.

No, obviously not. Different value caps have different effects. But if you mean that there is no sonic difference between two capacitors of a given value that measure in all relevant aspects within close tolerances of each other - one thing I've noticed about so-called "high end" caps is that the tolerances are often markedly inferior to "mid-fi" caps from Dayton, Solen, etc. - then, yes. Again, I'm neither an idiot nor a cap merchant, so I'll stick with the reality-based position rather than the con man position.

Yet those of us (everyone else in high end audio) that think we can hear differences in these things are the deaf ones.

See, there is your profound intellectual error. Sonic differences is not something one can "think" about, or hold a position on. Rather, the presence or absence of sonic difference is a falsifiable claim. And that claim cannot even be addressed unless all confounding biases are removed and one uses just her/his ears.

Now, in cases where differences are actually present, then preference comes in. But the threshold question of difference cannot be merely wished or asserted away, as you wish to do.

Don't forget to tell us that the world is flat.

The world was shown to be round by experimentation. And dead-enders have a puzzling allergy to the experiments that would prove or disprove their hot air claims.

And in other news, tomorrow we have front-mid hall center tix to see the Robert Spano guide the ASO through Sibelius's "Tapiola;" some Sibelius, Grieg, and Rachmaninov songs with soprano Jessica Rivera; and Beethoven 5. For me, it's about the music, not the audio parts.

[Danny Richie]

DS-21,

If you place more value in aesthetics over performance that's fine.

If you want to design a speaker for yourself that minimizes room interaction that's fine too. I also have designs with that in mind and that work really well (much better than most) in rooms with little to no room treatment.

The Dunlavy speakers were a good example of speakers with very controlled off axis response and worked well in any room. However, they had their limitations. They were a one seat speaker. Anything outside of that one center seat and they didn't work out very well.

The same is true for digital room correction software. You can correct for one point in the room, but outside of that one point and the whole thing can easily look (or sound) just as bad as it did before correction. In short any room correction above 200Hz or so really doesn't work very well and is more of a novelty than anything. A reflection is still a reflection and the ear perceives it as such. Turning down the output in the range of the reflection, so that there is no peak in the averaged on and off axis energy, does not do away with the reflection. It is still a time delayed arrival.

I have also realized that when a person doesn't understand why things like wire and capacitors can have such a varied impact on either degrading or preserving the signal that they either dismiss what they do not understand as impossible, or they have an open mind to learn. Those that are dismissive (for some reason) tend to be argumentative about their stance and for some reason feel the need to prove their position to everyone else. Those that are open minded tend to learn.

HAL pointed you to this link earlier: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=87808.0  The point of the exercise was to allow those with an open mind to learn something. And the point of the title was to get the attention of those who are dismissive of these things and challenge them to take the challenge.

To no surprise almost everyone heard clear and easy to discern differences. And to no surprise the couple that heard little to no change had a system consisting of very inexpensive receiver, with inexpensive wire, and speakers placed near a wall with no room treatment. All of those things degrade or disrupt the signal to such a degree as to hind the increased level of clarity and improved imaging that the higher quality parts allow to pass through.

So you can be dismissive if you want. You can even call us names and claim that we are con men trying to pull the wool over every ones eyes.... The real truth is that we love this hobby and try to get the most out of it that we can. We share what we know and experience. And you aren't going to gain favor hear claiming that those of us that report hearing clear differences in these things are deaf. We would also gain no favor claiming that you are deaf because you cannot or have not experienced what the rest of us here have.

And around here we know that the room is part of the system. And if you (or anyone else) want to take their system to the furthest level  then treatments to the room or building a dedicated room is part of the effort. And you cannot knock anyone for loving their music enough to want to go that extra mile to make it great.

[Guy 13]

 

[DS-21]

If you place more value in aesthetics over performance that's fine.

I do not wish my home to look like the showroom of an audio dealer, that's for sure! Not only is most audio gear ugly, but also the sight of it actively detracts from the sonic image for me, because my eyes go to the gear. (Others may find that they like music more when staring at imposing gear, of course. That's a preference thing.)

But by designing the system for the room, one can have both performance and aesthetics. It does take a little bit more thought than, say, switching one stupid con wire for another stupid con wire, though.

The Dunlavy speakers were a good example of speakers with very controlled off axis response and worked well in any room. However, they had their limitations. They were a one seat speaker. Anything outside of that one center seat and they didn't work out very well.

I agree with you about the old big Dunlavies being a one-seat-with-minimal-head-movement speaker, though "World's Biggest Headphones" is my preferred term.

That said, they're actually not well-controlled off-axis. Someone with good ears walks around with Dunlavies playing, and it is obvious to her/him without even taking measurements that they have very lobey and inconsistent off-axis performance. I know because I've done it with several of the old DAL models. That lack of consistent off-axis performance, I'm guessing, is caused by the very large driver overlaps from the 1st order acoustic crossovers the late Mr. Dunlavy believed in. But it is in fact that obvious lack of consistent off-axis performance that makes the old Dunlavies they're basically ginormous headphones. If you keep your head in a virtual vise - don't want diffraction one would get from a real vise! - they do sound very good, though.

The same is true for digital room correction software. You can correct for one point in the room, but outside of that one point and the whole thing can easily look (or sound) just as bad as it did before correction. In short any room correction above 200Hz or so really doesn't work very well and is more of a novelty than anything. A reflection is still a reflection and the ear perceives it as such. Turning down the output in the range of the reflection, so that there is no peak in the averaged on and off axis energy, does not do away with the reflection. It is still a time delayed arrival.

Sorta/kinda/not really. You have some valid points, but they only apply to what I'd consider basically incompetent setups. Room correction only works well under the following conditions, which I consider baselines of a competent setup:

1) Multiple subwoofers to randomize excitation of room modes and minimize spatial variation in the modal region.
2) Speakers with smooth design-axis response and relatively controlled directivity.

Both of those conditions allow corrections made from good measurements - spatially averaged sound power, not single point - to fix the response along a pretty wide area (say, a whole 8' wide Florence Knoll, and a few feet in front of it) rather than a small point.

As for limiting electronic correction to the modal region, that's a reasonable preference. One thing I like about ARC is that it does allow the user to select the upper bound of correction, and in fact (in the AVR variant) only allows correction up to 5kHz. (Also, it does not automatically flatten the bass, like Audyssey, but instead builds in "room gain" to compensate for perceptions of bass in small rooms.) It's worth noting, however, that in the Harman room correction tests, full-band correction was preferred by trained listeners to bandwidth-limited correction. Perhaps if the starting point had been decent speakers - I think they used B&W N802's for those tests, rather than a competently-designed speaker with flattish design-axis response and smoothly declining sound power - that may not have been the case.

And automated room correction, with the possible exception of Trinnov and with the caveat that I've not tried the Dirac or RoomPerfect systems, still isn't as good as an experienced person adjusting a flexible DSP-based parametric EQ/delay box based on listening and good sound power measurements.

I have also realized that when a person doesn't understand why things like wire and capacitors can have such a varied impact on either degrading or preserving the signal that they either dismiss what they do not understand as impossible, or they have an open mind to learn.

It is the con men who peddle such nonsense who have no desire to learn.

The funny thing is, just one test in which listeners reliably distinguish between two wires or caps that "shouldn't" sound different in the absence of confounding biases would absolutely destroy my position, and make yours unassailable to anyone who respected reality. The mere fact that, after all these years, all con-men have to fall on is "belief" speaks volumes. Some of us reserve faith for things that science cannot readily and definitively explain. Seems a waste to "believe" in wires.

Those that are dismissive (for some reason) tend to be argumentative about their stance and for some reason feel the need to prove their position to everyone else. Those that are open minded tend to learn.

An intelligent person realizes the the burden of proof for an extraordinary claim - such a claim sonic differences between wires, or well designed and properly functioning amps, etc. - lies with the claimant.

HAL pointed you to this link earlier: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=87808.0  The point of the exercise was to allow those with an open mind to learn something. And the point of the title was to get the attention of those who are dismissive of these things and challenge them to take the challenge.

Don't be silly. Nobody went into your silly little marketing exercise and listened with just their ears. They listened with their eyes, confounding biases, etc. Their ears played a bit role at best.

In fact, I offered to give you a big marketing coup in that thread if you were correct, but you were too cheap, scared, or both to take me up on it. Interestingly, our exchanges no longer appear in that thread. Hmm...perhaps it was my stated intention to publish comparative measurements and also to listen blind that scared you away? I'm still game if you are, though, under the same conditions:
-send me the speaker(s) (you have to cover shipping, because I've no desire to supplement your marketing budget with my own funds)
-listening will be blind, following sighted listening to get comfortable with the sound of the speakers and see if I can think I hear any differences.
-all electronics used will be of known excellent performance, based on reviews by Dr. David A. Rich and other similar-caliber actual experts. All wiring will be suitable to the task.
-I'll let you send a disk along if you like with tracks that you believe showcase the alleged differences, otherwise I will go through snippets from this list,
-Comparative FR, impedance, and sound power measurements will be taken, and published at seriousaudioblog.blogspot.com.

[SoCalWJS]

I hope the little digs stop soon - this thread (like many others) was an informative thread that many of us were following to learn things. Dismissive and derogatory descriptors aren't necessary to argue ones viewpoint.

This forum invites discussion. It would be nice if people were polite when making their points. 

[HAL]

How is there a bias with your eyes on the test speakers?  The crossovers are internal to the box.  All the user does is flip switches and cables.

The speakers were made available to anyone that wanted them.  They are still available to try if anyone is interested.

The only stipulation was that after anyone completed their listening trials, then they are responsible for the cost to ship them to the next person on the list.   Pretty simple terms from my point of view.  Was that the issue?

[DS-21]

How is there a bias with your eyes on the test speakers?  The crossovers are internal to the box.  All the user does is flip switches and cables.

Knowing which crossover is which. That pollutes the test with listener bias. Which Danny had to do, because it is a marketing stunt for him and it wouldn't do to mix reality and marketing. Had he made it impossible to tell which crossover was in use, unless he changed the transfer function of one, the answers would more likely than not have been the equivalent coin-flips. Almost everyone would likely have eventually convinced herself/himself that one of the crossovers was much better than the other. But likely about half of them would've picked the stock crossover if the sample size got big enough!

By contrast, not informing the listener which was the "inferior" crossover and which one had con-man parts wouldn't push said con-man parts, even though it would have actually addressed the issue Danny claimed to want to resolve.

In other words, rather well crafted marketing, but abysmal science.

At any rate, I stated my conditions then (and Danny or someone else appears to have deleted the correspondence) and I restated them above. If Danny's interested, he knows how to find me. If he's not, fair enough. But I think I've written all that is warranted for me to write in this thread. When I replied to the first post, I did so from the "recent posts" front page. I'm not interested in what Danny has to peddle, so I probably shouldn't post further in his little echo chamber. And if Danny wishes to delete our correspondence in this thread (as I expect he will, if not immediately then at some point such that it cannot be searched for in the future) that is entirely his right. It's his bought-and-paid-for sandbox, after all.

[jparkhur]

Ya ya ya.. doing a double blind study of wire and xo parts has been done.. I did it.  I had 90 students take the test, with myself not knowing which was which, information held by another.  Of the 90 students age from 14-24, 85 of them picked the speaker xo with the higher quality wire and parts.  Now, this being double blind, there is no mix of self bias or instructor interaction on any part.  Its almost as if in many cases, high quality parts do make a sonic difference, and students are hearing a JND at least 50 percent of the time-actually 85/90.  So,where are we at...  From the subject, I agree, moving speakers off the boxes is a better sound, but sometimes is unexceptable for WAF.  In a perfect world, placement would be somewhere else, besides under the speaker. 

Its Wednesday.. Have a great Thursday..

Jon P

I have also completed a double blind of another speaker modifier her in AC.  The results are also posted.  This had to do with driver coatings... 

[Danny Richie]

I do not wish my home to look like the showroom of an audio dealer, that's for sure! Not only is most audio gear ugly, but also the sight of it actively detracts from the sonic image for me, because my eyes go to the gear. (Others may find that they like music more when staring at imposing gear, of course. That's a preference thing.)

Try listening with your eyes closed. I do.    Even with my eyes open I am not distracted by the gear.

But by designing the system for the room, one can have both performance and aesthetics.

You can design a system around the limitations of the room, but the room will still severely limit performance to the point to where some of us would feel as if there was no real performance at all. 

It does take a little bit more thought than, say, switching one stupid con wire for another stupid con wire, though.

You see, insinuating that a higher quality wire is a con is what keeps you from having any credibility here.

Sorta/kinda/not really. You have some valid points, but they only apply to what I'd consider basically incompetent setups. Room correction only works well under the following conditions, which I consider baselines of a competent setup:

1) Multiple subwoofers to randomize excitation of room modes and minimize spatial variation in the modal region.
2) Speakers with smooth design-axis response and relatively controlled directivity.

I am also a fan of multiple subs. It will even out the room loading, but that does not support the case for using digital room correction.

Secondly, regardless of how smooth the off axis response is the room reflections will drastically alter the response. Take a typical side wall reflection from a speaker with perfect off axis response. The side wall reflection arrives to the listener, or microphone used for correction, with a time delayed arrival. So at certain wavelengths the delay will either be in phase or out of phase with the on axis response. So you will have either as much as a 6db peak where they are in phase and as much as a 15db dip where they are out of phase.

If you think digital correction will solve this then you are highly mistaken. Even if you average your amplitude to correct for it, it will still be completely off just a few inches away.

It doesn't work.

The only way to control the side wall reflections is with room treatment.

Furthermore, at the level of performance I am used to, those processors considerably degrade the sound. There isn't a digital correction system currently on the market that is even close to the same performance level that I am used to with my current DAC. Everything else regardless of any correction, has been a large backward step. Some of them like the Behringer or Mini DSP systems are horrible and completely suck the life out of the music. There is a reason they are so cheap. They are cheaply made and use cheap parts. Some of them are on par with a $49 CD player that you can buy at Walmart.

It is the con men who peddle such nonsense who have no desire to learn.

The funny thing is, just one test in which listeners reliably distinguish between two wires or caps that "shouldn't" sound different in the absence of confounding biases would absolutely destroy my position, and make yours unassailable to anyone who respected reality. The mere fact that, after all these years, all con-men have to fall on is "belief" speaks volumes. Some of us reserve faith for things that science cannot readily and definitively explain. Seems a waste to "believe" in wires.

Actually this stuff has been proven time and time again. Even the challenge we mentioned confirms that.

And calling the people trying to teach you something con men is only making you look bad.

Don't be silly. Nobody went into your silly little marketing exercise and listened with just their ears. They listened with their eyes, confounding biases, etc. Their ears played a bit role at best.

Actually many listened blindly while others made the switch. They had no idea which was which and had to rely only on their ears.

In fact, I offered to give you a big marketing coup in that thread if you were correct, but you were too cheap to take me up on it. Interestingly, our exchanges no longer appear in that thread. Hmm...perhaps it was my stated intention to publish comparative measurements and also to listen blind that scared you away?

I don't delete anything from a thread too often. This thread is the proof of that. Your rudeness and name calling is still here for all to see.  So I doubt that I ever deleting anything from that thread.

Both networks measure the same. I published measurements of both networks. This was also confirmed by another nay sayer that wanted to prove that they did indeed measure differently. Again they measured the same. And admittedly the nay sayer also confessed that they did indeed sound different.

You are still welcome to give them a shoot. 

[PDR]

It wouldnt work with him anyway.....bias works both ways.
He wont hear a difference because he expects, doesnt believe he will.

It would have to be done in a setting as jparkhur noted.
But that wont happen, it would take too much effort on his
part......them that can do, them that cant preach.

[Danny Richie]

Knowing which crossover is which. That pollutes the test with listener bias.

Again, most listeners did not know which was which as someone else was doing the switching.

Which Danny had to do, because it is a marketing stunt for him and it wouldn't do to mix reality and marketing.

This challenge was for education purposes only. I was not marketing upgraded crossovers for cheaply made Behringer speakers.

In other words, rather well crafted marketing, but abysmal science.

This was a very valid comparison and can easily be conducted as a blind A/B comparison for the listener.

And if Danny wishes to delete our correspondence in this thread (as I expect he will, if not immediately then at some point such that it cannot be searched for in the future) that is entirely his right. It's his bought-and-paid-for sandbox, after all.

I am not wiping the egg from your face. i am leaving it hear for all to see. 

Splitting the thread from where it got off coarse is a good idea though.

[DS-21]

First, Danny, cute little juvenile move in choosing the subject name. Speaks appropriately to your character. (And does not speak in the least to my actual words.)

Ya ya ya.. doing a double blind study of wire and xo parts has been done.. I did it.  I had 90 students take the test, with myself not knowing which was which, information held by another.  Of the 90 students age from 14-24, 85 of them picked the speaker xo with the higher quality wire and parts.  Now, this being double blind, there is no mix of self bias or instructor interaction on any part.  Its almost as if in many cases, high quality parts do make a sonic difference, and students are hearing a JND at least 50 percent of the time-actually 85/90.***

I would like to know more about the study.

How closely were the transfer functions of the two circuits matched?

Where is it published?

I have also completed a double blind of another speaker modifier her in AC.  The results are also posted.  This had to do with driver coatings...

Driver coatings should, if nothing else, lower the efficiency of the driver due to added mass, which is often perceived as deeper bass even though it's not the bass that has changed but rather the midband efficiency. Coatings may also fix various resonance/break-up issues. If people can hear those things (even with levels matched and EQ used on the worse-measuring part) that wouldn't be a huge surprise. If people can hear them without the proper controls (see supra), then...I hope you didn't spend too much time on the experiment.

You can design a system around the limitations of the room, but the room will still severely limit performance to the point to where some of us would feel as if there was no real performance at all.

Danny, you designed the Usher Tiny Dancer, right?

You see, insinuating that a higher quality wire is a con is what keeps you from having any credibility here.

If sonic claims are made about wire, the claimant is hearing something that just isn't there. (And if s/he's trying to sell wire based on those claims, s/he is a scammer.)

If you want to talk about looks or something like that, that is a separate issue. As I wrote, for those few feet of wire in my room that are visible (wires are certainly better hidden than seen!) I do dress them to look nice with techflex. Though anything of my design will use the superior Speakon rather than a lesser monopole speaker connector such as a banana, spade, or your silly little contraption. (The Speakon is sonically identical, but functionally superior because they're insulated, positively locking, quick disconnect, and multipolar so they can't be connected in the wrong polarity.)

I am also a fan of multiple subs. It will even out the room loading, but that does not support the case for using digital room correction.

It does, as stated, because then the correction will not be a single-point correction, but an area correction.

Also, in the first-mode region, multisubs don't do anything but add headroom. EQ is needed there.

Secondly, regardless of how smooth the off axis response is the room reflections will drastically alter the response. Take a typical side wall reflection from a speaker with perfect off axis response. The side wall reflection arrives to the listener, or microphone used for correction, with a time delayed arrival. So at certain wavelengths the delay will either be in phase or out of phase with the on axis response. So you will have either as much as a 6db peak where they are in phase and as much as a 15db dip where they are out of phase.

Define your terms, namely "perfect off axis response." I suspect my definition of that term will differ markedly from yours.

Furthermore, you know or should know about this little thing called "gating" in audio measurement. Anthem, Trinnov, Dirac, etc. certainly do.

The only way to control the side wall reflections is with room treatment.

Ignoring the question of whether or not controlling side wall reflections is a good thing (studies by Klippel and Toole actually suggest otherwise), you're wrong. One can control sidewall reflections by using narrow-pattern speakers and determining the amount of side-wall illumination via placement (close to sidewalls vs. far away) and rotation of the speakers.

Furthermore, at the level of performance I am used to, those processors considerably degrade the sound.

You like your nonsense snobbery, don't you Danny?

Do you consider the Usher Tiny Dancer a speaker that offers at least a taste of "the level of performance [you] are used to" if deployed in the conventional manner (well out into the room, equilateral triangle, fairly well-damped room, etc.)?

And calling the people trying to teach you something con men is only making you look bad.

What, besides how to suspend my cognizance of reality so that I can fall for silly cons, are you trying to "teach me," Danny?

I don't delete anything from a thread too often. This thread is the proof of that. Your rudeness and name calling is still here for all to see.  So I doubt that I ever deleting anything from that thread.

Rudeness and name calling, accuses the pathetic charlatan who named this thread "DS-21 with egg." Irony, or hypocrisy? (And countdown to this thread's demise in...)

Furthermore you (or someone else on your behalf) systematically deleted my posts in your challenge thread, and any resultant exchange.

Do you deny that we've had this conversation about your "test" before? And that it has been deleted?

What, exactly, threatened you about reality, Danny?

Both networks measure the same. I published measurements of both networks. This was also confirmed by another nay sayer that wanted to prove that they did indeed measure differently. Again they measured the same. And admittedly the nay sayer also confessed that they did indeed sound different.

Did the "naysayer" do her/his own measurement, or do you really expect us to rely on yours? That's why one of my baseline conditions is that I will take, and publish, comparative measurements. After, not before, listening.

Which means if they are measurably different in a way that should be material and I don't hear it, I will indeed have egg on my face. I'm willing to trust my ears on that.

You are still welcome to give them a shoot.

If you wish me to participate in your marketing gimmick, my terms and conditions are above. If they are acceptable to you, then you can PM me for contact information.  No point talking further in public about it. If you actually believe in what you peddle, my terms are not onerous and in fact are geared to proving you right if there is any underlying truth at all to your claims. My position is clear, and your action/inaction will speak for itself.

Now, if you're scared that some rigor might make your marketing gimmick blow up in your face, either because you've rigged it in some way or because there is no underlying truth to your claims, then, well, fair enough. I understand.

[SoCalWJS]

*** moved to correct thread (I hope)

Danny, since the topic has come up a few times in this thread regarding various Room EQ and other marvels of modern audio, I'd like to ask if you've had the opportunity to listen to any of them in a high quality system?

The last few times I've attended the shows, I've at least been impressed by the sales pitch of a few of them, especially the DEQX system. Unfortunately, they have used systems that are not of very high quality. The demo shows a considerable improvement when they put the correction into the loop. They even made a PA horn sound considerably better, almost "hi-fi" for lack of a better term. 

......but I wonder if I'd have the same opinion of the technology if I heard it in a high resolution system that I was familiar with listening to music that I am intimately familiar with.

Would love to hear others opinions if they've had the opportunity to hear them in their systems.

edit : looks like I posted this right as you split off the DS-21 thread - move as appropriate

[Danny Richie]

Danny, since the topic has come up a few times in this thread regarding various Room EQ and other marvels of modern audio, I'd like to ask if you've had the opportunity to listen to any of them in a high quality system?

I have heard several A/B comparisons at CES showing a with and without digital room correction. In both systems the uncorrected response was really rough and had considerable room gain in the lower end. So it did sound much better corrected, but it was still bad. The same processors and D/A conversion was used for both and it really bottle necked the whole system.

If the comparison was here are the speakers in an untreated room using digital correction, verses here are the same speakers in a well treated room with no processing and a really good digital front end and DAC, then there really is no comparison. I think our room at RMAF is proof of that.

[HAL]

SoCalWJS,
If you want to try a DEQX 2.6P, you are more than welcome to try my unit.  It is the latest version of that model with analog outputs.  I do have the calibrated Earthworks M30 measuring mic and software that would come with the unit for setup and use.  I have whatever the latest software is for it as well.

PM me if you are interested.

[SoCalWJS]

SoCalWJS,
If you want to try a DEQX 2.6P, you are more than welcome to try my unit.  It is the latest version of that model with analog outputs.  I do have the calibrated Earthworks M30 measuring mic and software that would come with the unit for setup and use.  I have whatever the latest software is for it as well.

PM me if you are interested.

That's a very generous offer HAL! I may take you up on it - be happy to cover shipping, etc. 

I forget which version I was looking at at RMAF. There was one that was designed for analog connection between the preamp and amps that I was looking at - also had provision for a sub which I would like to try as well.

What do you think of it? I know that they push consulting the company regaring the software - is it pretty straight forward?

[HAL]

The latest one is the HDP-4 for all the capability.  The 2.6P I have is the preamp version of the original series.

If you have ever measured a speaker, it is pretty straight forward.   There are a ton of functions in the software to use, but the basics are easy.

If you are starting from scratch with drivers it is a lot of fun.  You can try just about every style of crossover type and slope ever made.   

It is better than the Behringer DCX-2496 design sound quality wise.  It is not up to the latest DAC standards for sound, neither is the Behringer.

It is a tremendous learing experience in speaker design.  It can be a challange.  This is why they like to consult. 



 

[mojave]

*** moved to correct thread (I hope)

Danny, since the topic has come up a few times in this thread regarding various Room EQ and other marvels of modern audio, I'd like to ask if you've had the opportunity to listen to any of them in a high quality system?

The last few times I've attended the shows, I've at least been impressed by the sales pitch of a few of them, especially the DEQX system. Unfortunately, they have used systems that are not of very high quality. The demo shows a considerable improvement when they put the correction into the loop. They even made a PA horn sound considerably better, almost "hi-fi" for lack of a better term. 

......but I wonder if I'd have the same opinion of the technology if I heard it in a high resolution system that I was familiar with listening to music that I am intimately familiar with.

Would love to hear others opinions if they've had the opportunity to hear them in their systems.

When using the computer as the source you don't have to have any other equipment in the signal chain and you can use whatever DAC you want and still perform room correction. I just started using Audiolense in my system with my LS-6 speakers and it has improved the soundstage, detail, and tonality. I'm still playing with all the settings. I may also try going fully active with my LS-6's.

I'm also playing with crossover settings. The bass from my infinite baffle subs sounds better than the LS-6's. Currently I'm using a 40 Hz 24 db/octave crossover but will try higher. I also want to try overlapping crossovers. The nice thing about Audiolense is that it perfectly integrates the speakers and subs.

[satfrat]

He comes across like a heavy smoking electrician who just ate at Denny's and is filming this inside his work van, rather than an MIT engineer   


Anyway, DS-21, please flesh out your arguments.

rclark's constant egging on of DS-21 along with Danny's egg on face picture got me so hungry today, I had to run down to Denny's for a "fleshed out" Grand Slam breakfast. 



Cheers,
Robin

[HAL]

Eggselent!