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HZ.....How low for full range music???

Hi, please tell me what are the lowest cycles needed for good full range sound, not for HT wich you would need a sub, but for rock and pop music, my friend is looking into new speakers and I know I need the deep bass for classical, but how many HZ for a rock listener? thanks
chadnliz
rsbeck
887 posts
 
Here is one of those room simulators --

http://www.rivesaudio.com/CARAquick/CARAframe.html
ss396
22 posts
 
electric bass goes down to 41 hz. organ can go down into the 20's. it depends what you listen to. blues , rock, jazz and most music are happy with 40 hz performance. pro sound PA and bass gear is built to go down to 40 hz, so other than organ and home theater we don't get to hear much music below 40 hz, live or recorded.
sogood51
2,157 posts
 
I feel that 30hz and below could safely be called full range...not a lot going on down this low but still low enough to give the heft that full range has over speakers that can't go below 35hz or so.

Bass slam never takes place at these low freq's...I would say 35-40hz limited speakers will provide plenty of slam if thats what you are after. At around 30hz things like room-shudder (thats what I call it anyway) can set in...this can be very pleasing if your room is built well enough to have also achieved room-lock and of course is part of the music (new age comes to mind).

Dave
pragmatist
336 posts
 
The lowest fundamental tone a string bass plays is at 41hz per second.

The treatment of overtones is not relevant to your question but remember the difference tones. A difference tone could be called an "undertone". A fundadmental of 41 will generate a difference tone of 20.5,which will generate a difference tone of 10.25 and so forth. These later tones are felt as much as heard and are responsible for the visceral ambience in a live performace that is(for me) outrageously expensive to recreate.

A poster above mentions an elaborate array of subwoofers and based upon the quality of his posts,I believe he has recreated that ambience.

I'm not a subwoofer guy(which is my problem,of course) and am happy if enough of the fundamentalsin the forties and fifties are present to represent the harmonies involved.

Hope your friend finds speakers he likes.
eldartford
4,262 posts
 
One issue that never gets mentioned is the SPL (loudness) at which the LF extension is measured. At very low volume I can get close to 20 Hz with some small Dynaudio speakers which I have. But, as you turn the volume up, the bass volume stays the same, so that at normal listening level the 20 Hz capability is for all practical purposes, zero.

IMHO, frequency response should be spec'd at some SPL. Perhaps the same level used for the sensitivity spec.
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