[Chris J]

Quote:

 
The same way active noise cancellation works. This problem also occures in a stereo setup. Though speakers facing each other interact more. 
 

 
This is 90% of the reason headphones show more detail than speakers. Moreover the fuss about the 'nearfield' has got everything to do with this. In the nearfield you'll get some of the detail which is lost at greater distances.

 
And?
I'm not sure what your point is.
You get a similar effect when listening to headphones, your brain will do the work for you.
Two speakers, when arranged properly, will be louder than one, if they both have the same signal.
 
Then explain why you can hear soundstage from a pair of speakers, but not from a pair of 'phones.

 

[liamstrain]

Quote:

You get a similar effect when listening to headphones, your brain will do the work for you.
Two speakers, when arranged properly, will be louder than one, if they both have the same signal.
 
Then explain why you can hear soundstage from a pair of speakers, but not from a pair of 'phones.

 
1. You can hear soundstage through 'phones - though it does differ slightly. A crossfeed plugin or other mechanism can help.
 
2. With speakers, some of the sound from the left channel gets to your right ear (very slightly delayed, and off axis, so that affects the presentation), and visa versa - that added to room reflections and resonances getting to both ears with their own delays = a better presentation of soundstage. 

 

[qusp]

wow really, no ATC in this whole thread? no fullsize active hifi speakers? I kept flicking the pages thinking I would see it on the next page. these guys are at the heart of just about any decent high end British and worldwide recording studio or nightclub, as well as making some superb hifi based on the same drivers and tech. dont let the pics fool you, these things are huge
 

 
heres a classic british monitor you may have seen in the background in recording sessions. man that mid driver, I so do want that 3" dome mid, talk about dispersion, if you have the room for it. that dome mid is a big part of the ATC legendary sound. dont mind me, I posted these 2 bottom pics the other day in a thread too when someone added a zero to how can I make a 100W class A amp so had them handy
 
 

 
heres a better pic to illustrate the size of these things, this is the P4, a 4 channel 850W power amp you need 2 of these 40KG monsters and it will stay in class A for 2/3 of that 850W, those who know electronics will know how insane that is. it has built in discrete analogue active crossover. its not 1 x 850W its
 
HF: 100 Watts into 6 ohms
MF: 200 Watts into 16 ohms
LF: 275 Watts x 2 into 8 ohms
 

 
and is built to drive
 
these
haha
 

 
 
soffit mounts anyone?
 
check out the drivers. exactly the same
 

I have to crash, i'll cover some non ATC digital/software active crossover stuff in the next few days, didnt really even see it mentioned much other than the beringer and sorry, but thats yesterday's news IMO

 

[kixxit]

Keep it coming!  The more info the better!

 

[liamstrain]

I want that recording studio. Or even just access to it.  
 
Jeebus. 

 

[Chris J]

1. You can hear soundstage through 'phones - though it does differ slightly. A crossfeed plugin or other mechanism can help.

2. With speakers, some of the sound from the left channel gets to your right ear (very slightly delayed, and off axis, so that affects the presentation), and visa versa - that added to room reflections and resonances getting to both ears with their own delays = a better presentation of soundstage. 

That was a question for McMalden, not you.

 

[MorbidToaster]

That was a question for McMalden, not you.

I'd take it to PM if you're going to get bent out of shape when aomeone else answers your questions.

 

[Chris J]

Quote:

I'd take it to PM if you're going to get bent out of shape when ws omeone else answers your questions.

 
You are reading too much into this. I am aware this is an open forum.
 
I disagree with McMalden, but in the great scheme of things, if the guy doesn't like surround sound that's OK with me.
You could always argue that better to spend (for example) $1000 on stereo than $1000 on surround.......or he doesn't watch movies..... or whatever.......

 

[mcmalden]

Quote:

 
And?
I'm not sure what your point is.
You get a similar effect when listening to headphones, your brain will do the work for you.
Two speakers, when arranged properly, will be louder than one, if they both have the same signal.
 
Then explain why you can hear soundstage from a pair of speakers, but not from a pair of 'phones.

 
I think I made my point pretty clear: Speakers move air in the same space, therefore the same air and therefore work against each other to some degree. This is called interference.This effect is therefore not present with headphones and your brain won't do this for you. This is simple physics.
 

This is an image of two speakers producing the same signal... although in dutch it most me understandable. Between the speakers you see a lot of standing waves: this is the reason why I think stereo is preferable to surround. See the picture below. I hope I made my point now, otherwise just ignore it. For the record: I am a physics student.
 

 
I do watch movies and I have listened to both stereo and surround in my room with my speakers. So I think I can justify my opnion. Soundstage is another topic and so is the stereo/surround question relating to the the passive/active question. 
 
 
 

man that mid driver, I so do want that 3" dome mid, talk about dispersion, if you have the room for it.

 
My speakers actually have a (+-1,5") softdome mid driver with waveguide, talking about dispersion. Though those speakers look really impressive!

 

[qusp]

Quote:

Keep it coming!  The more info the better!

OK will do, i'll add some stuff during the week. I actually need to start setting up my own digital XO so might be able to take some screen snaps to illustrate. otherwise i'll just cover what i'm doing with my setup and how it differs from passive XO and analogue active XO
Quote:

I want that recording studio. Or even just access to it.  
 
Jeebus. 

oh yes, that would be something else alright, you should see the closeup on the instruments, the guitars are gorgeous and I can only imagine what that control room sounds like with live music playback

 

[Audiophile1811]

Quote:

OK will do, i'll add some stuff during the week. I actually need to start setting up my own digital XO so might be able to take some screen snaps to illustrate. otherwise i'll just cover what i'm doing with my setup and how it differs from passive XO and analogue active XO

I'd love to see your setup. I hope you share it all.

 

[Chris J]

The same way active noise cancellation works. This problem also occures in a stereo setup. Though speakers facing each other interact more. 



This is 90% of the reason headphones show more detail than speakers. Moreover the fuss about the 'nearfield' has got everything to do with this. In the nearfield you'll get some of the detail which is lost at greater distances.

Your taking this diagram out of context.
The bottom speaker is out of phase with the top speaker, of course you get cancellation.
But if they are in phase with each other, you get reinforcement.

Obviously, the point of a surround sound system is NOT to output the same signal from all 5 full range drivers with one half being out of phase withthe other half, and generate some measure of cancellation, the point is for the majority of the sound to be up front, and use the rear channels to add some ambience. So different speakers output different signals.
As I said earlier, if you take the time to read the manual, set up and align the loudspeakers and ensure all levels are calibrated, then a well set up surround sound system can sound quite good. If you don't, it can sound awful.

 

[mcmalden]

Quote:

Your taking this diagram out of context.
The bottom speaker is out of phase with the top speaker, of course you get cancellation.
But if they are in phase with each other, you get reinforcement.
Obviously, the point of a surround sound system is NOT to output the same signal from all 5 full range drivers with one half being out of phase withthe other half, and generate some measure of cancellation, the point is for the majority of the sound to be up front, and use the rear channels to add some ambience. So different speakers output different signals.
As I said earlier, if you take the time to read the manual, set up and align the loudspeakers and ensure all levels are calibrated, then a well set up surround sound system can sound quite good. If you don't, it can sound awful.

 
Infact the anti noise diagram is not out of context and it's an example. If you choose to ignore my other post that's your choice. 
 
So tell me: what is the use of a center speaker? And why do you need rear speakers for ambience if you have a rear wall reflection?

 

[Audiophile1811]

Quote:

 
So tell me: what is the use of a center speaker? And why do you need rear speakers for ambience if you have a rear wall reflection?

Wouldn't rear speakers be used to help create the feeling that sound or sounds actually "surrounds" you unlike a stereo system which relies on its soundstage, imaging, room acoustics, etc. to create, or rather, recreate surrounding sounds? As far as I know sound engineers setup the direction of music and sounds to specific channels in a 5.1 Surround Sound mix. So at least rear speakers serve some purpose since they don't reproduce the exact same sound every other speaker does, in a 5.1 mix that is. However, I am inclined to believe that a 5.1  or 7.1 system would be pointless for only stereo recordings.

 

[Chris J]

Quote:

 
Infact the anti noise diagram is not out of context and it's an example. If you choose to ignore my other post that's your choice. 
 
So tell me: what is the use of a center speaker? And why do you need rear speakers for ambience if you have a rear wall reflection?

 
I'm not ignoring your other posts. I've read them.
 
What is the use of a centre channel?
Virtually all dialogue will be assigned (i.e. mixed) to the centre channel.  Actors may walk in and out of a scene and you may hear them pan from left to centre (or right to centre) as they enter a scene.
Centre channel is obviously mounted either above or below your TV.
Basically, to lock the apparent source of the dialogue to the TV, dialogue is normally assigned to the centre channel, so if you are sitting at the far end of the couch in your living room the dialogue will still appear to come from the TV and not the front speaker closest to you.
 
So why have more channels?
See Audiophile1811 comments:
 
Quote:

Wouldn't rear speakers be used to help create the feeling that sound or sounds actually "surrounds" you unlike a stereo system which relies on its soundstage, imaging, room acoustics, etc. to create, or rather, recreate surrounding sounds? As far as I know sound engineers setup the direction of music and sounds to specific channels in a 5.1 Surround Sound mix. So at least rear speakers serve some purpose since they don't reproduce the exact same sound every other speaker does, in a 5.1 mix that is. However, I am inclined to believe that a 5.1  or 7.1 system would be pointless for only stereo recordings.

 
If a scene is set in a large room (for example), then if you disconnect the centre channel, then you will probably hear a reverberant soundfield in the remaining speakers (front and rear) to give the illusion of the dialogue being created in a large room, assuming that is how the movie was mixed.
If a scene is set in the jungle (for example) then you may hear different jungle sounds coming from all 5 speakers to simulate the sound of being in the jungle. The 5 channels may all have some variety of jungle sound, but the 5 channels will all have a slightly different perspective. Since they are all slightly different they will not cancel each other out. When you are in a forest, obviously you can hear sound all around you, no?
Admittedly, there are A LOT of movie soundtracks with little or nothing in the rear channels.
Apparently some directors do not like surround sound (they feel it is too distracting) and like virtually all the sound to come front the front 3 speakers only.
 
Personally, for stereo signals, when listening to music on my surround sound system, I very rarely try to use the surround sound algorithms (Dolby Music, DTS Music, etc.) to generate fake surround sound. Normally, I listen to music in plain old stereo. Fake surround sound does seem to help some poorly mixed pop music by adding a fake sense of space.
 
If you don't like surround sound, I don't have problem with that. Personally, I prefer it for movies and music mixed in surround only
 
FWIW, I have mixed live and recorded music, and I've been practicing Electrical Engineering for approx. 25 years.