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In Reply to: RE: No confusion...simple facts and reality. posted by tubesforever on May 13, 2008 at 00:09:16
Your so-called measurement must include a slight delay in the conversion of electrical energy to sound energy by the speaker driver(s), plus early reflections off room surfaces, which arrive a little after the direct sound from the speaker (of course that direct sound from the speaker to your ears does travel at the speed of sound, adjusted for the temperature and humidity of the listening room.)YOU WROTE:
"In the case of the drum strike you have air moving at 770 mph at sea level at 68 degrees. The same recorded signal playing back over speakers will rarely surpass 600 mph because that is generally about how fast the speaker can respond to the recorded signal. This is the primary reason why a recorded musical event will sound less dynamic and less realistic than the actual live event itself."RG responds:
You seem to buy good drivers for your speakers so maybe you are not totally insane, but enough to be at this here asylum arguing about the speed of sound!I will agree with your argument that speakers can't respond instantly to any sound, especially transients such a snare drum strike.
Also, early reflections off nearby walls will smear the transient sound (headphones could probably do a better job than regular speakers).
But how can those be the primary reasons recorded drums don't sound like live drums?First of all, a much more meaningful comparison, that compares a typical live popular music event with a typical recording, would be:
(1)amplified live drumming heard through PA speakers in an auditorium during a live concert along with two or more other amplified insruments (except for a rare drum solo)...
Versus(2)amplified studio recordings of drums heard through home speakers in a home listening room.
Note: Only the drummer hears live unamplified drums during a typical popular music concert, assuming he isn't partially deaf. Maybe the bass player too, if he stands close enough to the drums, and is sober.
How about these other potential recording versus live problems?
(0) Sub-par recording quality (do engineers care about sound quality?)
And even if you had a good recording with a large natural dynamic range (rare for popular music), there may be some stereo effect added to the recording, while live amplified music is mixed to mono.(1) No drummer is seen hitting a drum (there's nothing like seeing live musicians playing instruments to make the sound seem more realistic)
(2) Recording is probably not played back as loud as a live drum strike (if home stereos were played as loud as live amplified popular music, most audiophiles would probably have hearing damage) and the recording probably has dynamic range compression, possibly a lot of compression
(3) Home speaker drivers may add additional dynamic range compression and more distortion than you'd hear through concert PA speakers (the typical horns and large diameter bass drivers at concerts are designed to play LOUD, although will be used with limiters that can compress the dynamic range when necessary to protect the speakers)
(4) Home speakers will sound different than concert PA speakers
(5) Home listening rooms will sound different than auditoriums
With all these differences, it's amazing that drums still sound like drums on recordings. Of course with YOUR stereo, and its 12" diameter bass drivers, drums probably sound like a guy hitting a sewer pipe with a baseball bat.
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.Richard BassNut Greene
"The Floyd R. Turbo of Bingham Farms Michigan"
Edits: 05/14/08Follow Ups:
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