Simulated soundstage

[zeyus]

I was wondering, (I may or may not ... more likely...have a correct understanding) if it is possible to simulate / increase / decrease soundstage via some device or an amp.
In my understanding soundstage is partially to do with the stereo seperation of the left and right channels? or is that wrong?

Anyways the point was, I wanted to know if by using some kind of device or eq or effect or whatever you can alter the soundstage making it better for gaming or better for some other type of music?

 

[mintyfresh]

PowerDVD 5.0 has several music playback modes which let you alter the spatial arrangement of sound. Some computers with the "Crystal WDM Audio" drivers use that "spatial 3D" toggle panel which has separate sliders for a center imaging and spatial imaging mode.

Or, what I usually do is wear headphones while playing the speakers, with the computer audio routed into the preamp. Muaahahahaha.

 

[zeyus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mintyfresh PowerDVD 5.0 has several music playback modes which let you alter the spatial arrangement of sound. Some computers with the "Crystal WDM Audio" drivers use that "spatial 3D" toggle panel which has separate sliders for a center imaging and spatial imaging mode. Or, what I usually do is wear headphones while playing the speakers, with the computer audio routed into the preamp. Muaahahahaha.

Ive seen that, and a lot of drivers offer '3d sound' which is in effect altering the soundstage?

If I'm at home i like to use my laptop to play dvds thru my sound system, it works well... but im using linux, so i dont know what kind of 3d sound stuff works on it.

 

[mintyfresh]

I think there's a review of PowerDVD elsewhere on this site. I use the 3d modes through the sound card drivers sparingly because I believe I am hearing a lot of noise pollution when the feature is activated. It makes the music sound garbled and synthy although the "room" size created in your head is much bigger. Probably okay for games with soundtrack off and sound effects on. PowerDVD has better noise reduction software so it tends to sound better, or at least that's how it seems, but I've never tried routing game sound through that program.

 

[zeyus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mintyfresh I think there's a review of PowerDVD elsewhere on this site. I use the 3d modes through the sound card drivers sparingly because I believe I am hearing a lot of noise pollution when the feature is activated. It makes the music sound garbled and synthy although the "room" size created in your head is much bigger. Probably okay for games with soundtrack off and sound effects on. PowerDVD has better noise reduction software so it tends to sound better, or at least that's how it seems, but I've never tried routing game sound through that program.

Interesting, i think if got some playing around to do when my new gear comes!

 

[halcyon]

Bigger than life soundstaging is easily achieved using phase shifts. This can be done using many sound processors. Also, all of the known 3D audio positioning HRTF algorithms (Sensaura, QSound, Dolby Headphone) use phase differences along with interaural intensity differences to simulate a soundstage.

However another question, is it possible to "improve" a soundstage from a normal stereo signal source, using digital signal processing?

If by "improvement" we mean "sounds large than life and has nothing to do do with natural sound reproduction, but sounds cool", then yes.

If we mean "more accurate and more like in real life soundstage", then at least my opinion is no.

The best fix for a natural soundstaging is to do binaural recordings with a high quality setup and your own torso/head/ears and then play them back using binaural headphone setup.

That's about as natural and improved soundstage as one can get.

regards,
halcyon

 

[mintyfresh]

Hmmm.....So do headphones of different brands achieve any amplification or enlarging of the soundstage by tweaking the phase shift?

And is that Kosher or mere trickery?

 

[saint.panda]

Meier Audio and Headroom use the so-called crossfeed circuitry which basically feeds some parts of the left signal into the right channel with a slight time delay and vice versa, which simulates interaural time and intensity differences. As a result, the soundstage depth is increased but the soundstage width is reduced. The crossfeed is useful for alleviating listening fatigue and for creating a more coherent sonic picture but it doesn't sound more 3D this way.

By the way, nothing is trickery as long as it works.

You could say hearing is all about tricks because with two ears you can only hear 2D but with all the things like reflections from the room (direct and indirect sound), interaural time/intensity difference, HRTF equalization by the outer ear, spectral influences through your torse, shoulders and head, etc. - your brain makes 2D sound like 3D. As far as I know, that's also why the science around it is called psychoacoustics.

I thing one issue headphones need to overcome is the directional information acquired by moving your head. When I wake up hearing the alarm rining I have no idea where the stupid cell phone is until I start moving my head (cone of confusion). This is also the only part where even binaural recordings won't help.

 

[Veto]

You might want to tryout the HEARO999 from AKG.
The problem (I find) with it is that you have to put it in 'processing' mode
form the start.
If you do that they make a good illusion of you listening to speakers, they certainly increase the 'idea' of more spatial information (hard to explain).

The problem is that it gets real freaky when you switch between the processed/unprocessed sound.
If I start with processed then the normal sound realy seems flat/2d. You realy are confronted with the fact that a soundstage just is'nt there, it's all in your head.

If I start with unprocessed then the processed sound is realy weird, you realy
notice the eq and other stuff going on. It also is quite a strange thing to notice that in headphones (normal mode) you get used to the fact that for instance bass sound (which normally is panned center) realy is heard separately by both ears. When you switch to the processed sound the bass is perceived as comming from the center and as a result the music feels emptier, till you get used to 'idea' of listening to speakers.
I've not reached a conclusion on what I like best but there seems to be someone (mainly AKG I guess) that's doing research, that's a good thing IMO.

Btw with the hearo you get about 9 different ear-shape presets. It's obvious that this isn't perfect for everyone. I wish they would think of something that is realy designed for personnel use. An option to get your ears measured and load that as a setting.

Veto