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If you don't have a wide sweet spot, are you really an audiophile?

Hi, it’s me, professional audio troll. I’ve been thinking about something as my new home listening room comes together:

The glory of having a wide sweet spot.

We focus far too much on the dentist chair type of listener experience. A sound which is truly superb only in one location. Then we try to optimize everything exactly in that virtual shoebox we keep our heads in. How many of us look for and optimize our listening experience to have a wide sweet spot instead?

I am reminded of listening to the Magico S1 Mk II speakers. While not flawless one thing they do exceptionally well is, in a good room, provide a very good, stable stereo image across almost any reasonable listening location. Revel’s also do this. There’s no sudden feeling of the image clicking when you are exactly equidistant from the two speakers. The image is good and very stable. Even directly in front of one speaker you can still get a sense of what is in the center and opposite sides. You don’t really notice a loss of focus when off axis like you can in so many setups.

Compare and contrast this with the opposite extreme, Sanders' ESL’s, which are OK off axis but when you are sitting in the right spot you suddenly feel like you are wearing headphones. The situation is very binary. You are either in the sweet spot or you are not.

From now on I’m declaring that I’m going all-in on wide-sweet spot listening. Being able to relax on one side of the couch or another, or meander around the house while enjoying great sounding music is a luxury we should all attempt to recreate.
erik_squires
ieales's avatar
ieales
1,201 posts
 
I feel that there are at least 2 speaker brands which prove you can have really good imaging and a really wide sweet spot, given a wide enough room.

Revel and Magico.

Don't these two brands prove that great imaging in the center and very good off axis listening is not mutually exclusive??
¿Que?

We must have divergent views on what constitutes imaging. Magico S7 give a very wide & expansive presentation. However, they lack focus and create their own 'space'. Nebulous and homogenized is how I hear them.

Of course, it is possible that everything else in the $400,000 system was at fault.


mahgister's avatar
mahgister
12,964 posts
 
I will only add that a room is like an hearing aids...You must fine tune it for your specific ears problems and structure...No ears are perfect....

You set a hall or a theater for group of people....it is another matter with small room early and late reflections, reverberation short time etc...

But SMALL room acoustic could be set for your own specific ears with Helmholtz method, not only passive materials treatment...


 I will add that i am not a scientist but i devised listrening experiments and it is my method to reach hi-fi experience at low cost....
erik_squires OP
16,021 posts
 
We must have divergent views on what constitutes imaging. Magico S7 give a very wide & expansive presentation. However, they lack focus and create their own ’space’. Nebulous and homogenized is how I hear them.

Well, I’m not a Magico fan boy, I just think they are commonly heard speakers we can use as a common experience to discuss. :)

Also, the problems with their imaging is not so much that they don't image, it's' that they need so much width or extremely well treated rooms.
mahgister's avatar
mahgister
12,964 posts
 
With an electronic equalizer, the measuring "rod" so to speak, are a set of tested feed back precise frequencies with a microphone for a very narrow location in millimeters...

With a mechanical equalizer , the measuring "rod", so to speak is the range and "timbre" of the human voice perceived by our ears in a room  ..

All music is derived from the innate and learned abilities of the human ears to recognize and evaluate the more subtle changes and hue in vocal timbre....
asvjerry's avatar
asvjerry
4,577 posts
 
This is, and has been, one of the most intelligent and rancor free forums I've had the pleasure to follow.
I want to express my appreciation of this instance. *VBS*
Great premise, Erik. 👍

Mahgister, earlier you apologized for seeming 'rude'.
I'm not sure you're capable of that. *L*5's*  Distaste, perhaps...;)
But you're entitled to that, for sure....and a great 'read'.

All speakers have their own 'voice', much like us.  Subject to the driving equipment, the space provided, and the music presented, they can only attempt to duplicate the latter.  That is subject to all the forgone means and methods to transcribe such.

Then it hits our ears; mine now hobbled by the aids in mine, which adds yet another layer, another device with its' own limitations.

Finally reaching the tympani and wetware between them, subject to my tastes, preferences, and interpretation of what it all is.
We hear the same; more or less.  We can only sit or stand so close together.
Our experience: similar, never the same. I suspect even conjoined twins can argue about the details.

To each, it will always be to their own.

Cheers, Gentlemen.
Have a pleasant weekend.
J
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