Call it pinpoint, realistic sounding imaging and soundstage or any other fancy name, the bottom line is that when we sit and listen to the music, we want it to sound as natural as possible. Rarely that is the case, due to the many limitations we have to deal with, from (1) the recording environment, (2) the recording engineer/equipment, (3) equipment used to reproduce and (4) the listening environment. Some (item 3-4) we can influence, others not. Forums like this are mainly established to address the items 3-4, as there are many ways to come closer to the desired end product, and certainly not always money related. For those who say it is not that important to them, they can save themselves some money, as you only need to buy one speaker ;)
Pin point imaging isn't for everyone
A subject my posts touch on often is whether pin point imaging is desirable, or natural. While thinking about wide-baffle speakers in another thread I came across this quote, courtesy of Troels Graveson’s DIY speaker site. He quotes famous speaker designer Roy Allison:
You can read Troel’s entire post here:
http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/Acapella_WB.htm
This goes, kind of, with my points before, that you can tweak the frequency response of a speaker, and sometimes cables, to get better imaging, but you are going significantly far from neutral to do so. Older Wilson’s were famous, and had a convenient dip around 2.4 kHz.
I had emphasized dispersion in order to re-create as best as I could the performance-hall ambiance. I don’t want to put up with a sweet spot, and I’d rather have a less dramatically precise imaging with a close simulation of what you hear in a concert hall in terms of envelopment. For that, you need reverberant energy broadcast at very wide angles from the loudspeaker, so the bulk of energy has to do multiple reflections before reaching your ear. I think pin-point imaging has to do with synthetically generated music, not acoustic music - except perhaps for a solo instrument or a solo voice, where you might want fairly sharp localization. For envelopment, you need widespread energy generation.
You can read Troel’s entire post here:
http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/Acapella_WB.htm
This goes, kind of, with my points before, that you can tweak the frequency response of a speaker, and sometimes cables, to get better imaging, but you are going significantly far from neutral to do so. Older Wilson’s were famous, and had a convenient dip around 2.4 kHz.
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- 65 posts total
This Stereophile article may interest some:
https://www.stereophile.com/content/stereo-image
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Yes the "Decca Tree" technique was a three mic boom (left centre right) over the orcheschra which captured those early Decca recording imaging properties when listen to with good speakers like Quad 57’s, but sadly the image got splashed all over the place, with things like Klipsch Horns ect. And it’s still used today in live recordings, but with more mics in between the main three to get even better imaging. Cheers George |
Neo6 music modenow there’s an oxymoron if ever there was one. [I worked for dts] Multichannel processor playback is only suitable for phase mangled mp3, AAC et al. when out of the room or otherwise disinterested as in background in a noisy party. Otherwise the image wander and egregious level and phase distortion forces me to ask that it be turned off or I must leave the room. I literally feel ill with continued exposure. See http://ielogical.com/Lossy/ |
- 65 posts total