Robm321...Maybe my earphones (that I no longer use) were better than average, or perhaps my head is bigger than yours, but the soundstage I experienced when I closed my eyes was as real (and expansive) as it gets. Of course all this soundstage stuff is in the head (or mind), regardless of how the air vibrations reach the ears.
Why Energize the Whole Room/Virtual Reality Audio?
Nearly all high quality loudspeakers are designed to fill, or at least attempt to fill, an entire room with sound. Why haven't more manufacturers and listeners taken an alternative path towards a more localized and individually oriented sound reproduction paradigm? I'm inspired by the concept of virtual reality video glass where the moving picture image is placed so close to the eye that the viewer is totally immersed in the image. Why not place the speakers within inches of the listener's head? Since you're not trying to fill a room with sound the speakers could be physically smaller (and cheaper) and the drivers should have less travel (and lower distortion) than traditional loudspeakers setups. Soundstaging and imaging should be greatly enhanced and the negative effects of the listening room should be greatly minimized. Except for the social aspect of sharing music with friends or it's impracticality for listening to music in the background, maximum extreme nearfield listening (MENL, pronouced MEN-L) should have enormous appeal for the serious listener. Or, am I missing something? I've never actually tried those virtual reality glasses, so I really don't know if they work let alone this idea inspired by the VR glasses.
On a practical note, this concept would probably require a single cone or planar type speaker in order to maintain coherence and proper sound integration which is probably not a bad thing. If anybody reading this has a pair of those mini Gallo balls, try placing them free field six inches in front of your head and let us know how they sound.
The obvious question is, why not just use headphones? Unless the music was recorded for headphone playback you'll get that sound in the middle of your head effect. I'm looking for a properly placed soundfield.
On a practical note, this concept would probably require a single cone or planar type speaker in order to maintain coherence and proper sound integration which is probably not a bad thing. If anybody reading this has a pair of those mini Gallo balls, try placing them free field six inches in front of your head and let us know how they sound.
The obvious question is, why not just use headphones? Unless the music was recorded for headphone playback you'll get that sound in the middle of your head effect. I'm looking for a properly placed soundfield.
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Strange post....You can’t sit inches away from regular speakers with multiple drivers because drivers need some distance to sum. At typical farfield distances, 2 speakers/stereo is largely inadequate for providing a fully enveloping 3D soundfield, layered detail, plentiful spatial cues within such a soundfield, (as is representative/perceived with real unplugged live music), adequate soundpower, etc....On the same note, when stereo purists talk about ’3D’, it’s quite laughable... Hence, multichannel/object based audio systems exist. If you can’t do that, half baked playback with stereo it is...or headphones..or move yourself to nearfield (and hope the stars somehow start to align for you).
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I understood the premise alright....It appears you are a bit confused about what would suffice for a practical solution. The closest practical thing outside of 360 reality headphones (sony), not granpa's cans/headphones would be something like this. https://youtu.be/fpLMtVvirzk?si=xhLRZ0Oh3m09mpDS
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- 15 posts total