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17 of 23 speakers in my studio and home theater systems are internally powered. My studio system is all Genelec and sounds very accurate. I know the best new concert and studio speakers are internally powered there are great technical reasons to design a speaker and an amp synergistically, this concept is much more important to sound quality than the vibration systems we often buy. How can an audiophile justify a vibration system of any sort with this in mind.

128x128donavabdear

@thespeakerdude integrating the subs, that's a good idea, it would be very easy. I'll let you know. Also your advise about the headphones is spot on, exactly right.

 @kingharold Sorry it's been a while since I have listened to horns with respect to accuracy. Time alignment is working ok not great, I have to move the speakers physically to get everything right. DSP seems like a fix but not really. The front speakers are time aligned and they are imaging like I've never heard before the point source nature of the speakers is different than the Tannoy or Uri or older Genelec speakers I've heard in the past I very much disliked those older speakers but these new Genelecs are really different, they worked out imaging, transients, and dynamics to a much greater degree. As far as dynamic correctness, hard to answer that i don't think there is any speaker that can reproduce thunder or a real symphony because no microphone can record it, even our ears don't treat dynamics as opposed to transients in the same way. Probably dynamics will be the last sound variable figured out in sound playback because there is nothing that records the loudest sounds properly. I used the very best recorders and microphones available to record production sound on movies and TV I've recorded 100s of thousands of gunshots but none of the recordings sounded like the real thing. On the movie Pearl Harbor we used the real 50 caliber guns these guns were mounted on steal surfaces the ships they were so loud the camera operators had a hard time physically moving their bodies because of the sound pressure waves the guns created. Real dynamics, impossible. 

That or play with the single sub near-field. Not sure why this came to mind, but someone asked what the best sound they could get for a $1000 was. I told them $500 headphones and near field sub for the emotional impact.

Or aa Butt Shaker(TM).

@thespeakerdude on a side note can you please explain or send me to an article explaining why WMTMW drivers on speakers work at all concerning phasing? Especially the midrange drivers being 1 foot apart is seems to be silly. I'm sure it's something I'm simply not seeing I know many very expensive speakers use this system I just don't know why. Thanks. BTW I've never seen one of these speaker at a high end studio. I think after these Genelecs continue to cause big changes in speaker design you won't see WMTMW designs anymore.

 

@donavabdear didn't we go over this already :-)

MTM of WMTMW are meant to be listened to on-axis at tweeter height or whatever the tweeter height is based on the total speaker angle. At that height, there will be no phasing issues (assuming I know what you mean). The sound from the two mids-woofers at all frequencies will get to the listener at the same time. The crossover is designed as such that those frequencies all arrive at that same time. This has an advantage over a flat-front MT where the ideal response is not perpendicular to the face but typically tilted down. That can be fixed by tilting the speaker up, setting the tweeter back, or electronically. It can also be fixed with a coaxial driver. I think that is the real advantage of a coaxial driver, consistent dispersion.

The problem with MTM is the vertical directivity is narrow making the listening height more critical. I have not given a lot of though, but the wide spaced woofers in a WMTMW should provide some line source effect and reduce the floor/ceiling mode which is good as those are usually the least treated.

I personally am not a big fan of MTM, and they really are not in favor. We know enough that they do not make much sense any more. Audio Science Review probably inadvertently has given Genelec a lot of press in the consumer market. They have released a great product obviously, but that does not mean other great products not as visibile with similar design goals don't exist. As they are now going after the consumer market, it may influence that segment of the market more than anywhere. The WMTMW is an "audiophile" thing. It does not have to make sense.

@thespeakerdude You did educate me previously, and it is brilliant saying "as an audiophile thing it doesn't have to make sense". I know microphones and when there is poor off axis coloration the on axis doesn't sound as good because you are listening to the entire polar pattern off axis and all. Having your head in a vice is cool but no fun some of the most meaningful moments in sound are when you can share your emotional journey with your wife or someone like that who has let you spend so much money on this emotional hobby. MTM off axis doesn't work and the stereo image has at least 4 drivers trying to make you hear a 2 foot to 2 inch wave there is no way to get really good imaging with a non point source speaker, I feel like I'm really missing something still, the advantages are few and the disadvantages are huge, same goes with line array speakers. The blending of waves from midrange line array speakers is by definition a phase problem. Sometimes I feel like there is so much BS in the audiophile world.