[Sanctuary]

Oh I fully expect to spend a few hours, at least, getting this thing to sound right.

LOL. "A few hours". I fully expect the process to take me at least a few days to get something that I'm temporarily satisfied with, but that's a me issue. I'll be scouring the manual and reading on how to fine tune everything, and that's before I end up renting a room and setting up the nice home theater package I sold a friend a few years ago (since I can't currently use it) and recording that too.

Not that it's going to cause me to lose any sleep or anything, but I'm still wondering how the unit handles the subwoofer sound. I know that many were contemplating using a feedback device that you put on a chair for the tactile sensation, but I'm wondering how the actual sound will be through headphones.

 

[castleofargh]

LOL. "A few hours". I fully expect the process to take me at least a few days to get something that I'm temporarily satisfied with, but that's a me issue. I'll be scouring the manual and reading on how to fine tune everything, and that's before I end up renting a room and setting up the nice home theater package I sold a friend a few years ago (since I can't currently use it) and recording that too.

Not that it's going to cause me to lose any sleep or anything, but I'm still wondering how the unit handles the subwoofer sound. I know that many were contemplating using a feedback device that you put on a chair for the tactile sensation, but I'm wondering how the actual sound will be through headphones.

I'd expect the sound to be based only on objective audio cues. boosting bass is only a band aid(that I happily use on IEMs sometimes). and you can never tell how the listener will react to it. with subs, our subjective issue is indeed the lack of lungs being shaken by a deep rumble and other very physical sensations. Toole said that in his experiments, physical vibrations even without the proper tempo helped to give at least some of that tactile bass impression. but I have yet to try vibrating toys while listening to music. *reminds self no to post terrible jokes*.

 

[raband]

I've got a subpac and a buttkicker setup to try out with the A16 when it turns up.

Buttkicker bolted to the bottom of the couch for movies I reckon and the subpac (basically a vest with rumble packs in it) for when in the chair gaming.

The A16 has "Tactile Out" built into it, so feeding those 2 systems should be pretty straight forward.

Dying to try the system out with these and the Vive VR

 

[Got the Shakes]

You're right!, many of us thnk that we will unpack the realiser and have the wow effect outside the box but seem that need to more time to master it ; I choose the headstand, because the realiser will be like no other piece of hardware so the headstand i think captivate my eyes, the 2u version look like any other piece of gear.

I was originally going to go with the headphone stand model since I was going to have this setup on my desk, but I redid my whole setup so I went with 2U to go with my new 4K tv that is setup on a stand with all of my other A/V components.

 

[VandyMan]

If you got a calibration from Smyth at an audio show, it is supposed to come with your A16. You should be able to get the sound you heard at the show right out of the box. Of course, being audiophiles, we will all want to tweak it, take new measures, etc. But it should be usable right away.

 

[illram]

Last time I researched the calibration process was a while ago, so might be wrong, but assuming one is willing to go the "85%" route and just download a room calibration (BRIR), my understanding is you can just then do your own HPEQ on top of that, which seems simple enough (done with headphones on), and you're done. You won't get the full experience but it would still be a lot better than a generic HRTF. Or, download a BRIR from an awesome speaker setup, then do a PRIR on top of that with your not-as-awesome-speaker(s), then do the HPEQ.

 

[VandyMan]

I should qualify what I said above as the show calibration is for the speaker system they demo with. You would still want to calibrate your headphones before using, for best results.

 

[Om ma Ni]

Hi everyone, i also ordered the A16 and will wait for it patiently.. but still so confused regarding all the calibration stage etc..
I only have the headphone (hd800) and not a home cinema system to do full calibration so..
The reason why i took the step with the A16 is to have the Full multi channel experience with my headphone setup only..
Will be great to find some people willing to share their capture of the best multi channel system with their specific acoustic signature around the world.
Really don t know if the A16 processing will be able to fully recreate these acoustic environment for us to enjoy it..
My dream will be to have some virtual room with speakers like the Sphere from Cabasse for example in my room...

 

[raband]

I think you can do your ear/headphone calibrations with just a single speaker - turning your body or moving the speaker to get the different angles.

With those settings you can use other speaker/room/studio files to get a pretty good recreation on your own unit and the inbuilt setups.

 

[illram]

Hi everyone, i also ordered the A16 and will wait for it patiently.. but still so confused regarding all the calibration stage etc..
I only have the headphone (hd800) and not a home cinema system to do full calibration so..
The reason why i took the step with the A16 is to have the Full multi channel experience with my headphone setup only..
Will be great to find some people willing to share their capture of the best multi channel system with their specific acoustic signature around the world.
Really don t know if the A16 processing will be able to fully recreate these acoustic environment for us to enjoy it..
My dream will be to have some virtual room with speakers like the Sphere from Cabasse for example in my room...

My understanding is you have two options: (1) do a calibration in a hifi speaker setup/studio/theater (wherever) or (2) download one of those, then do a calibration using any speaker you have laying around, like a tweeter or something, by moving your head. Then the A16 will mix option (2) with whatever you downloaded. Then on top of that you do an HPEQ calibration, with the headphones on.

 

[VandyMan]

That is my understanding too. The user base of the Realizer platform is about to greatly expand when the A-16 ships, of course. I hope and expect that we will see more home theater retailers offering calibrations for a fee.

 

[W C H]

I sure hope the user base expands. I kinda thought it was cool being 1 of about 15 or so people in Canada having this but I would really like to see the Smyth team sell a boatload of these things and get some success. However, I worry this product is a bit too niche.

Just ordered a pair of Stax 009's from another head-fier to go along with my Hd800's so my anticipation has just shot up a notch.

 

[Fox1977]

It IS a niche product. The price of the A16 will be lower than the A8 but still retail price is expected to be around 2000$ in the US or 2300€ in Europe, so i don't expect thousands and thousands of sales for it. I'm curious to know how much A8 were sold over its 10-year existence.
I hope that people will not ask for too much for the PRIR that they will put on the Exchange platform. Asking for a small fee if they had to pay themselves to access a high quality installation, i can understand but it should not be the place to just make money.

 

[Sanctuary]

I sure hope the user base expands. I kinda thought it was cool being 1 of about 15 or so people in Canada having this but I would really like to see the Smyth team sell a boatload of these things and get some success. However, I worry this product is a bit too niche.

Just ordered a pair of Stax 009's from another head-fier to go along with my Hd800's so my anticipation has just shot up a notch.

You meant 1 of about every 15 thousand people in Canada (high estimate) right? Or did Canada suddenly have a major population loss? Because I'm fairly sure there aren't going to be 2.4 million units in Canada. Not for a long while and without major advertising at least. It's very niche. Most people have never heard of it, and even of those that have, not many would be willing to pay the asking price (which IMO is cheap if the production models deliver exactly the same experience as the prototype).

 

[Sordel]

I sure hope the user base expands. I kinda thought it was cool being 1 of about 15 or so people in Canada having this but I would really like to see the Smyth team sell a boatload of these things and get some success. However, I worry this product is a bit too niche.

Other than the incredible impatience I feel for this thing to come out, over the last few months I've been celebrating the fact that I was gripped by insanity and pledged this much to a tech project on Kickstarter. The Realiser is an incredibly difficult thing to pitch: even people who have the money and are willing to spend it on surround sound are going to struggle to understand quite what this is and why they shouldn't just spend their money on source, amplification and speakers as usual. There's even been confusion in this thread about exactly what this is and does. So, yes, way too niche!

On the other hand, it was people speaking in hushed tones about the A8 that put this on my map; word of mouth can play its part here.