bigshot
Headphoneus Supremus
Back when I was trying to figure out if binaural had anything to offer, someone recommended a Chesky music disc to me. I listened to it in headphones and it sounded just like any other music... guitar on left, vocals in the middle, keyboard on the right, etc. I tried playing it on my speakers and it sounded like it had a much more focused sound location on speakers than it did on headphones. It sounded more naturally present too. Are there binaural recordings that are intended for speakers? This one sounded better that way.
To be honest, I listened to a half dozen binaural CDs and none of them sounded at all dimensional to me in cans. They just had slathered on room reflections. For spatial accuracy, I've never heard any headphone that can match a well implemented multichannel speaker system. With surround you get real front, back, sides and top, not just reflections that your brain is supposed to decode. It could be that binaural recordings only work for certain people, but if you can recommend one that you think would have really good spatial location, I'd like to get it and check it out. My mind is still open to the possibility.
As for quick attack, what are you referring to? A snare hit? Because it seems to me that upper mid / treble speakers aren't likely to have much problem with reproducing a natural attack. If a tweeter can reproduce up to 20kHz without significant distortion, I don't know why it couldn't reproduce the transient in a drum hit that is a couple of orders of magnitude slower. Larger bass speakers might get floppy with a quick hit, but my old school JBL woofers do a real good job reproducing bass thump.
My point was that headphones may measure better in a lot of ways, particularly when it comes to distortion levels, but speakers sound more natural. The reason for that has less to do with the speakers than the real three dimensional effect of the room perhaps. Headphones can't seem to match that, even with binaural recordings.
To be honest, I listened to a half dozen binaural CDs and none of them sounded at all dimensional to me in cans. They just had slathered on room reflections. For spatial accuracy, I've never heard any headphone that can match a well implemented multichannel speaker system. With surround you get real front, back, sides and top, not just reflections that your brain is supposed to decode. It could be that binaural recordings only work for certain people, but if you can recommend one that you think would have really good spatial location, I'd like to get it and check it out. My mind is still open to the possibility.
As for quick attack, what are you referring to? A snare hit? Because it seems to me that upper mid / treble speakers aren't likely to have much problem with reproducing a natural attack. If a tweeter can reproduce up to 20kHz without significant distortion, I don't know why it couldn't reproduce the transient in a drum hit that is a couple of orders of magnitude slower. Larger bass speakers might get floppy with a quick hit, but my old school JBL woofers do a real good job reproducing bass thump.
My point was that headphones may measure better in a lot of ways, particularly when it comes to distortion levels, but speakers sound more natural. The reason for that has less to do with the speakers than the real three dimensional effect of the room perhaps. Headphones can't seem to match that, even with binaural recordings.
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