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In Herb Reichert's review of the Creek Evolution 100A he writes on page 73,"For this listening session I used Magnepan's new .7 speakers(review to come)..."
It was my understanding that Magnepan would not supply Sterophile with review samples because of what JA's measurements would or would not reveal about the speakers.
I do hope Stereophile does start to review Maggies because of the importance of the brand and because I do love them myself(I have a pair of 1.7's).
The whole problem with the world is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.
-Bertrand Russell
Follow Ups:
... just buy a pair and measure them?
============================
As audiophiles, we take what's obsolete, make it beautiful, and keep it forever.
Hey! I have a blog now: http://mancave-stereo.blogspot.com or "like" us at https://www.facebook.com/mancave.stereo
C'mon now, that would require an actual effort, its not like Bricktop suddenly became the editor and wanted a Vig... :)
Magnepan should supply the speakers. They are uniformly excellent and I suspect people look at these based on their in room performance, from where they sit.
Measurements pertaining to listening - at the listening position - are different than standardized measurements taken during the design of the speaker, and its affirmation or qualification. Stereophile might want to think about altering their measurement protocol in this regard.
> Measurements pertaining to listening - at the listening position - are
> different than standardized measurements taken during the design of the
> speaker, and its affirmation or qualification. Stereophile might want to
> think about altering their measurement protocol in this regard.
Stereophile publishes in-room measurements, taken at the listening position,
in every speaker review that Michael Fremer and I do, in every review that
Wes Phillips used to do, and in as many of Art Dudley's speaker reviews as
possible, given that he lives 230 miles away from me. As much as I would
like to do this in the other writers' speaker reviews, logistically it just
isn't possible.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Many of us with shoe box rooms, (condo living), and willing to "try" different set-ups have found that HK/Limage placement really enhanced the performance of our Maggies...especially in the Bass regions...
This set-up adds width and depth to my soundstage, to the point I can walk around in it...for real...Sadie over on the planar board turned quite a few of us on to this...Basically room coupling...
My Maggies are 43% into the room off the front wall...(8'-10") and 13" off the side walls with tweeters in...Works great, very happy...
Thanks
Mark
Ps. Subs are gone...could not get them to blend...
If you have to buy a speaker that measures good and sounds bad or one that measures bad and sounds good.... that's not hard to figure out.
"A lie is half-way around the world before the truth can get its boots on."
-Mark Twain
If stuff had to measure well to be reviewed in Stereophile Art Dudley would not have got a promotion!
Regards
13DoW
"If you have to buy a speaker that measures good and sounds bad or one that measures bad and sounds good.... that's not hard to figure out."
As someone also suggested, in either case, you're measuring the wrong things.
But nowadays, we do have a pretty good idea of what makes speakers sound good.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
There appear to be a large number of loving owners (on AA alone) and also dealers. Many for sale. Information about these speakers is not that costly to come by.
And how many of us fret over JA's measurements once we have heard equipment that really captures us
Of course, there's always the argument that all "Brand Z owners are devil worshipers", which i hear a lot as an SET and LS3/5A lover (which sounds esp. good to me with the 300B tube).
Observe, before you think. Think before you open your yap. Act on the basis of experience.
Chances are likely that "audiophiles" who actually bother to read magazines etc are people who care enough to audition the speaker - presumably Magnepan cares about who they choose as dealers and will select those that can properly set them up.
If you have good hearing and reasonably good experience as to what acoustic instruments sound like and the things play music you like in a way you like it - then reviews tend to serve as affirmation of your smart buying decision. Pretty much everything gets rave reviews these days so lots of happy spenders.
Of course the measurement that actually matters is the measurement taken at the listener's position. So If I am sitting 10 feet back - the mic would be at my ear and THAT is the position and the ONLY position that matters a good gall darn. And with BOTH speakers playing at the same time - none of this one speaker measured free field nonsense.
As I have pointed out a number of times, no one can possibly listen to more than a small proportion of available speakers even limiting them to those with some pretensions to be high fidelity speakers.
Not only consumers but reviewers need some way of deciding what to listen to. Some go to consumer electronics shows, and can listen to many different systems consisting of a variety of components, and judging from various reports of such shows, often the equipment is not set up to the best advantage. But even shows can only exhibit a limited amount of equipment.
Consumers find many practical constraints as to what they can audition. Local availability in one, and it depends on where one lives. So one is likely to be steered toward products a dealer prefers. Of course, if one travels, one can have a wider selections. Some speakers can be ordered in, perhaps, or sent with a period where return is possible. But even so, there are so many speakers available one could not listen even to all those within practical reach.
Other people can suggest speakers (and other products, of course), and this could include friends and acquaintances, consumer comments on line on sites like AA, and of course, professional reviewers. Of course, reviewers have varying tastes and abilities, so I have found it useful to see a good set of measurements. I find it to be a useful screening tool that gives me some more control over what I audition. Contrary to one of the old saws, I have never heard a speaker that measures well but sounds bad--sorry about that.
So, the idea that one can select speakers just by listening to them ignores the whole process of how one gets around to listening to the speakers in the first place.
Once you get to that point, of course you can evauate them by listening. And I most certainly do, and at some length.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Pat
I have no issue with a person relying on the measurements to count or discount what they wish to hear.
My argument is that for that to work one SHOULD have a "personal" experience with correlation to what is preferred - not a read first (this is deemed good) and so anything that is deemed to measure good is good.
And to build that up one still needs to listen to the speakers to figure out that "yes speaker A is ruler flat BUT my preference is for a speaker that has a gentle roll off starting at 8khz." And they will know that by listening to 100 loudspeakers and noting that 9 out of their top 10 favorites all have roll off in the treble."
The fact is you can do a Double Blind test where 90/100 people all choose speaker A - but so long as 10/100 choose speaker B you CAN'T know whether you will be in camp A or camp B - all you have is a greater statistical chance of preferring speaker A and being in camp A.
I use measurements largely to screen certain things as well so I have no real issue with what you're doing personally. The issue is when a newbie is starting out having heard next to nothing we have one camp recommending speakers entirely by measurements - this speaker has flat response and less colour than speaker 2 - but speaker 2 may actually fit more with what the listener may desire - like it has full bodied bass and dynamics - while it may bring 5% more box colouration it may ultimately sound twice as good when actually listening to music. Then there is another camp which will tell him to take a mortgage out for speaker cables. *rolls eyes*
All the other things like availability and set-up etc I agree with. You buy what is available.
I own the KEF LS-50 - it's a really nice speaker - and people can get it. I also have the Audio Note AX Two which is 2/3 the price and IMO sounds better overall. But you can't get it very easily - there's no measurements so it's simply more of a risk.
However, audio shows are cheap to attend and are now located all over the US and parts of Canada - there is the Montreal and Toronto and this year the Vancouver show in Canada - you have several in California and New York and I believe Florida and Chicago on top of all the dealers.
Companies are offering 30-60 day free home trials. Listening in the nearfield gets around some room issues and IMO speakers should be designed to work in most rooms - few people (especially where the wife is the boss) are going to allow you to cover all the walls in acoustic foam or put large bass traps all over the place or even allow the guy to buy a speaker much larger than a Totem Model 1. So whatever a speaker may look like in an anechoic chamber or "open field" at 1 meter isn't all that relevant. Some speakers are designed for the free field - some are designed to take "average" room conditions into account.
I'm fine with show conditions because it's not so much about otherwise good gear sounding bad (sho conditions suck) it's more about getting GREAT sound in bad conditions - let's say you have your system in your living room set-up Properly using audyssy or some other better program - you then go to a show where the room is about the same size as your living space but the room stinks has no DSP set-up and you play your favorite album and your subjective response is "wow this sounds a good 20 times better" - so now you have a speaker in a much worse room sounding much better that your system perfectly set-up. That to me is part of the fun of an audio show - it may not happen of course but when it does it's a pretty exciting scenario - especially if it doesn't cost a crazy sum of money.
You should at least attend one good audio show and listen to the stuff people are on about. If nothing else you get to hear a unique way (even if it is wrong to you) of reproducing music. MBL is a prime example - not in every city so the show might be a person't chance to hear statement omni-directionals. That's worth the $15 3 day pass to a show almost by itself.
This is a great post.Peter B.
RGA said:
I have no issue with a person relying on the measurements to count or discount what they wish to hear.My argument is that for that to work one SHOULD have a "personal" experience with correlation to what is preferred - not a read first (this is deemed good) and so anything that is deemed to measure good is good.
And to build that up one still needs to listen to the speakers to figure out that "yes speaker A is ruler flat BUT my preference is for a speaker that has a gentle roll off starting at 8khz." And they will know that by listening to 100 loudspeakers and noting that 9 out of their top 10 favorites all have roll off in the treble."
The fact is you can do a Double Blind test where 90/100 people all choose speaker A - but so long as 10/100 choose speaker B you CAN'T know whether you will be in camp A or camp B - all you have is a greater statistical chance of preferring speaker A and being in camp A.
I use measurements largely to screen certain things as well so I have no real issue with what you're doing personally. The issue is when a newbie is starting out having heard next to nothing we have one camp recommending speakers entirely by measurements - this speaker has flat response and less colour than speaker 2 - but speaker 2 may actually fit more with what the listener may desire - like it has full bodied bass and dynamics - while it may bring 5% more box colouration it may ultimately sound twice as good when actually listening to music. Then there is another camp which will tell him to take a mortgage out for speaker cables. *rolls eyes*
All the other things like availability and set-up etc I agree with. You buy what is available.
I own the KEF LS-50 - it's a really nice speaker - and people can get it. I also have the Audio Note AX Two which is 2/3 the price and IMO sounds better overall. But you can't get it very easily - there's no measurements so it's simply more of a risk.
However, audio shows are cheap to attend and are now located all over the US and parts of Canada - there is the Montreal and Toronto and this year the Vancouver show in Canada - you have several in California and New York and I believe Florida and Chicago on top of all the dealers.
Companies are offering 30-60 day free home trials. Listening in the nearfield gets around some room issues and IMO speakers should be designed to work in most rooms - few people (especially where the wife is the boss) are going to allow you to cover all the walls in acoustic foam or put large bass traps all over the place or even allow the guy to buy a speaker much larger than a Totem Model 1. So whatever a speaker may look like in an anechoic chamber or "open field" at 1 meter isn't all that relevant. Some speakers are designed for the free field - some are designed to take "average" room conditions into account.
I'm fine with show conditions because it's not so much about otherwise good gear sounding bad (sho conditions suck) it's more about getting GREAT sound in bad conditions - let's say you have your system in your living room set-up Properly using audyssy or some other better program - you then go to a show where the room is about the same size as your living space but the room stinks has no DSP set-up and you play your favorite album and your subjective response is "wow this sounds a good 20 times better" - so now you have a speaker in a much worse room sounding much better that your system perfectly set-up. That to me is part of the fun of an audio show - it may not happen of course but when it does it's a pretty exciting scenario - especially if it doesn't cost a crazy sum of money.
You should at least attend one good audio show and listen to the stuff people are on about. If nothing else you get to hear a unique way (even if it is wrong to you) of reproducing music. MBL is a prime example - not in every city so the show might be a person't chance to hear statement omni-directionals. That's worth the $15 3 day pass to a show almost by itself.
Edits: 06/29/15
Consumers find many practical constraints as to what they can audition. Local availability in one, and it depends on where one lives. So one is likely to be steered toward products a dealer prefers.
You really limit yourself that way? Sorry to hear that. I've traveled to both coasts of the US to audition gear and in between. I had a wonderful time when Brian Walsh hosted a meeting with the Chicago Audio Society and invited Dr. West of Soundlab. I enjoyed dinner and having many conversations with him. Along with helping out assembling the 945s for an auditioning. :)
So, the idea that one can select speakers just by listening to them ignores the whole process of how one gets around to listening to the speakers in the first place.
What on earth does this mean?
As for me, I've enjoyed auditioning a wide range of gear and meeting the principals of companies that I chose: Audio Research, VTL, Acoustat, and Sound Labs. You really need to get out more often. :)
Hello E-Stat!I agree with you 100% about the person really limiting himself that way! IMHO the statement So one is likely to be steered toward products a dealer prefers. is pure BS said by a lazy person who won't take the time travel at least 150+ miles or approx. 2 hours from his hoome to listen to audio components he cannot hear closer.
I live in Orlando, FL. and I was unable to find anything I presently own in my system from my integrated SET amp, tubed CDP, DAC to my speakers anywhere near my home! What I did was listen to what I could, did a lot of reading in forums and I took chances! For example: I heard Dr. Bob Hoekstra's Axiom Set amp ( see it at http://www.chimeralabs.com/chimera_labs_axiom_300B_single%20ended_set_tube%20amp_reviews.html ) at a Central Florida Audio Society annual, open to the public, get together! That amp amazed me, but didn't have enough power. So after a lot more reading I decided on purchasing a 40W/ch parallel SET amp, the Mastersound Reference 845 from a dealer in Canada and had it sent to Florida. Then before it was even available in the USA I read about the then BlueNote but now GoldNote Stibbert CDP. Everything I read praised this CDP. So I took another chance and purchased one directly from Italy.
Now it was time for speakers. There was a lot I liked about the Lowther driver in Hedlund horns that I heard with Dr. Bob Hoekstra's Axiom Set amp at the Central Florida Audio Society event I attended. Still I'm the type of guy who likes to try new and different things. So it was back to reading again and after a lot more reading I went to http://www.frugal-horn.com/ and paid Jeff Carder to build me a set of Sachiko double-back-loaded horns ---{ these are now the Kirishima cabinets }--- loaded with Fostex FE206e drivers. I later experimented with different Fostex, Lowther and different wide bandwidth drivers, until I settled on Dayton PS220-8 drivers with a $450 cone treatment applied! People now tell me the Sachiko/PS220-8/Fostex T900a super-tweeter combo easily competes with speakers from $10,000 to $20,000/pr!
My whole purpose in telling this story is to show only lazy people are forced to likely to be steered toward products a dealer prefers, as opposed to purchasing what they truly desire to. Yes, I took chances, but I ended up with the most musically satisfying audio system I've ever owned and ever heard, compared to 95% of what I've heard, anywhere else. In fact the ONLY audio system I've ever heard that I could immediately say I preferred was when I was invited over Arthur Salvatore's home and heard his double stacked Coincident Pure Reference Extreme speakers powered bi-amped by Coincident M300B Frankenstein for mids and highs and a pair of 211PP Dragons on the stacked bass cabinets. Of course Arthur used the Coincident Statement Line Stage as well as a Jean Nantais Lenco L-75 Idler-Drive "REFERENCE" TT and an APL NWO-Master, which is a highly modified version of the Esoteric UX-1Pi. CD/SACD! Truthfully Arthur's system sounded a lot like my system does when he played digital music, but his was a bit better at everything with even more transparency. However when he played Jean Nantais' Reference TT we moved to another planet. It was honestly that much better!
In the end we'll all end up with the system's we are willing to take the time, and yes, sometimes chances to put together. After 48 years in this hobby I've yet to have an audio sales personal anywhere take a gun and put it to my head. So, NO! no one can make you purchase any audio component you don't want to. Take the time read, read a lot, ask questions, ask a lot of questions and listen to everything you possibly can ---{ even system's that don't sound great can teach you what not to purchase }--- then when you're ready, assemble the system that sounds like live, unamplified, acoustic instruments & singers to you. If your audio system gets this part correct, it will get the rest correct by default!
I'm listening to: Positive Thinking by Acoustic Alchemy
Thetubeguy1954 (Tom Scata)
Central Florida Audio Society -- SETriodes Group -- Space Coast Audio Society
Full-range/Wide-range Drivers --- Front & Back-Loaded Horns --- High Sensitivity Speakers
Edits: 07/07/15 07/13/15
only lazy people are forced to likely to be steered toward products a dealer prefers,
A dealer. Indeed. Why limit yourself to a single dealer's products?
Hello my friend!
I cannot believe there are people who claim to be audiophiles/music lovers, but will only go listen to what can be purchased locally! One of my best tools for being able to confidentially purchase an audio component I haven't heard and cannot afford to travel to go hear ---{ the cannot "afford" can be a restraint of finances, health or time, which at that time prevents me from being able to go hear the audio device I'm interested in }--- is this:
I used to read virtually every TAS & Stereophile review printed from 1974 onto 1999. After reading an issue's reviews I made every effort to go listen to audio components that were reviewed. While listening I made notes about the components strengths & weaknesses. Then I'd go back home to see which reviewers review(s) came the closest to what I heard. In time I realized that Anthony Cordesman, HP and John Marks would usually come the closest to what my opinion of an audio component's sound was 90%+ of the time.
So if I was interested in an audio component and couldn't listen to it for myself, if one of these guys reviewed said component and gave it high marks sonically. Then the chances were quite good I'd like what I heard very much! So I'd take a chance and purchase unheard. I was never disappointed in any of such type purchases and was ecstatically happy a couple of times. I don't see why people couldn't still use that trick today!?!?! And if none of them reviewed it I would sometimes just take a chance and purchase the component anyway, but only if I found it used or on sale!
In any event heck with the audio naysayers. This is the only hobby I've ever been involved in that has so many negative people (objectivists), calling other, fellow hobbyists (subjectivists) liars and try to rob their audio joy. I'm going to enjoy the listening to the music until I either die or lose my hearing....
I'm listening to: Spirit Of The Wood by Glen Hegelson
Thetubeguy1954 (Tom Scata)
Central Florida Audio Society -- SETriodes Group -- Space Coast Audio Society
Full-range/Wide-range Drivers --- Front & Back-Loaded Horns --- High Sensitivity Speakers
Very well said. Kind of sad in a way.
I have never felt the need to have the gear I've owned validated by some review or measurement to make me feel better. I have bought and enjoyed gear that has been reviewed and measured, it was well liked, and I enjoyed it as well.
As for John Marks interest in the AT M50 headphones we can always go to the Innerfidelity website and check out the reviews of the old and improved models. I am still considering the investment, but I have owned and love my AKG K701s and just bought and broke in a pair of AKG K721mk2 (100 hours) that have not been reviewed and I love them, just a slight step below my 701 IMHO. I may still buy a pair of M50X's any way. The 721 are better than my 2 pair of Sony 7506s, but I know what those are when I bought them for $99 each.
I've gotten over buyers' remorse long ago because there might be something that sounds and measures better, because I know there always is. If people like the Maggies they should buy them for what the do, not because of what someone else thinks.
Jim Tavegia
Jim,
You and I seem to be in almost complete agreement. I've always recommended ---{ I recommend it because I do it }--- people purchase what sounds good to them ---{ which is not always the costliest }--- and not what friends or reviewers recommend they purchase. Hopefully these people will have taken the time to go and listen to as much live, unamplified, acoustic music as possible. This will allow them to know what saxes, pianos, acoustic guitars etc. sound like in as many different types of venues as possible. Thus enabling to be able to make educated choices when selecting different audio components. People who do this will usually be the happiest with their audio choices for longer periods of time.
I'm listening to: Melancholy Baby by Jaimee Paul
Thetubeguy1954 (Tom Scata)
Central Florida Audio Society -- SETriodes Group -- Space Coast Audio Society
Full-range/Wide-range Drivers --- Front & Back-Loaded Horns --- High Sensitivity Speakers
Thanks for the note and I will have to check out her music today.
I use to complain about the sound (recording quality) of some of the music I bought over time, not so much the performance but how it was captured and processed (mixed/mastered).
6 years ago I started doing some recording locally and bought some mics and a small Mackie 1202 and started recording at home and at local schools their fall, winter, and spring choral and band concerts to get a feel for how hard or easy it was go capture a performance. It really didn't matter to be how good the kids sang or played, just now well I could capture what was there.
Over time I have gotten pretty good at what I do within the confines of the gear that I own. My mic cabinet now consists of a pair of Rode NT1As and a pair of AKG C-3000 large mics 4 Behringer B5 pencil mics with uni and omni capsules, a pair of pencil Behringer C-5s for cymbals and the like, vocal mics including 2 Rode M-1s, 3 Sennheiser e835s and 1 945, and a omni Shure SM-63 vocal mic. I still have a Mackie 802VLZ and 2 Yamaha mixers my nicer MG16XU with 10 nice mic pres and built in Lexicon effects; and a smaller MG102C. The smaller ones I use at home for recording vocalist and acoustic players and I have a standalone Lexicon and Behringer reverbs for those as needed.
I have used direct micing on many performances and also use ORTF, spaced omnis ( which I like in a large venue with larger ensembles and quiet rooms, and the DECCA Tree arrangement with 3 large diaphragm mics. I need one more Rode NT-1A to really do that right. That will happen soon.
So after working on this I now have a better feel for why recordings sound like they do and how easy or hard it can be to do it right. I also know that there is way too much manipulation of performances that goes on in the mixing and mastering suites that CAN ruin a performance. I love the work of Sterling Sound as a mastering house. Most of the time doing less is the best thing to do. I get so many emails from software folks wanting to sell me plug-ins for mastering and it has become clear that there are too many ways to mess up a recording and performance.
I do some large ensemble recording for our local university with their Saxophone Ensemble that can be 25 to 50 players and have learned much about doing bigger work in a not so perfect venue. Most often it is noisy HVAC systems that can ruin a performance with a very high noise floor.
All of my work now is 2496 with redbook backups and I only record on 2 Tascam DR-2ds at 2496 and a Tascam DR-07 MK1 that is 16/44.1 . They are remarkable sounding SDHC card recorders for almost no money. I hope to buy a new Tascam 680 mk2 this year that can do up to 8 tracks of 2496 or 2 tracks of 24/192. The little recorders are great for doing needle drops of my lps very easily. I don't do many, though. I just play them.
My software is Sony Sound-Forge Audio Studio ($69) for mastering; Sony CD Architect ($59) for cd burning, and Cirlinca ($39) for burning DVD-Rs of wav files. I can burn all of my 2496 recordings using Cirlinca and play them back in any DVD player. That is very nice. Just about anyone with a current DVD player can enjoy high rez recordings in 2496 this way. All that software is affordable. Sound Forge will handle up to 24/192 pcm.
I have many folks who sing at church ( I do many solos during the year) come over and practice and take home their work so they can hear how they sound. That is the only way a vocalist or performer gets better by recording, hearing themselves and making adjustments.
Some of my recordings are on my SoundClound account under James Tavegia, even the school recordings. The Home Depot Drums is a middle school and high school band playing the large, orange paint buckets from Home Depot. Pretty neat. At 68, my singing is what it is.
So we do have much in common in that it is only how things sound that matter and there is so much affordable gear that sounds great that often it is the recording that holds our gear back, surprisingly.
I have been enjoying Mary Chapin Carpenter's Songs from The Movie CD as this is her music set with orchestrations which is very nice. But, the mastering often has the orchestra walking all over her vocals making it harder to understand the lyrics at times. One must agonize over choosing the right vocal mic for a singer. The wrong one can make the lyrics unintelligible and not make the singer sound their best. That is why I have so many and will buy a few more models. They all sound different on different voices. Wind screens are a must, generally.
I also downloaded the MCC Songs From The Movie 2496 version from HD Tracks and it sounds different and somewhat better at times, but I have no way of knowing what files they used as native files and who mastered it. But, still beautiful.
I will check out that girl singer.
Regards, Jim
Jim Tavegia
Good stuff ...... Would love to hear one of your big stuff recordings one day ..
Tom , thanks for that Jaimee Paul info , I had done a search to see if she was related to Billy Paul , apparently not, searched my CD library can't believe I don't have her on my list ...
Regards
Edits: 07/14/15 07/14/15
You can check out my soundcloud account or send me a PM with your address and I'll burn you a DVD-R of wav files.
I've been downloading a fair amount of Linn and eClassical stuff at 2496.
Jim Tavegia
This is true Tom ,I once helped a good friend who was a non audiophile but a serious music lover put together a system , he attends live shows only and constantly. After selecting what I thought was best for his budget I took him to have a listen , he was placed in the sweet spot and started listening to songs he was familiar with , well mostly from hearing them played live at different venues. I could see by the 3rd track he was kinda uncomfortable about something so I asked , what's up , his response it all sounded weird to him , where instruments and voices seem to be coming not from the speakers but floating from space around it , the imaging thing was kinda spooky to him , it just didn't sound right , nothing like when he listens live , so I moved him to the rear of the room , far from the speakers and way out of the sound field for good imaging, yep , nailed it ! He then turns to me and said , now it sounds like when he listens live , sounds like a band .
And so it goes .... :)
Regards
Edits: 07/14/15 07/14/15
It's all good, but for some of us, it helps to see the measurements while reading the subjective review, for eg...
Harbeth 40.1, abysmal measurements fluffed over and given a thumbsup on sound. Obvious both JA and the reviewer loved them , and many talk good about Harbeth, obvious to me from the measurement its a pretty colored sounding speaker, so it may not be for everyone who are sensitive to it's anomolies.
But they make Music to those who like them, just good to know the objective and subjective side of things ..
Regards...
as good an idea as your travels , dinners etc. is , it takes a healthy
disposable income to avail yourself of these opportunities. I'm not in
that category and I imagine that is not unique among members here.
Trying to audition and select components ( often nearly impossible )
is a real problem .
I was responding to Pat D's apparent lack of understanding how folks are able to hear what speakers are available. Let's review his comments:
So, the idea that one can select speakers just by listening to them ignores the whole process of how one gets around to listening to the speakers in the first place.
There is no magic to the formula. Do you share his opinion that the answer is reading graphs?
"There is no magic to the formula."
No, there isn't. There are methodologies, however, to coming up with a list of speaker one would want to audition. You have yours, I have mine.
"Do you share his opinion that the answer is reading graphs?"
Of course, I said nothing of the sort. Answer to what?
If you thought about it, you would realize that no one could find a good set of measurements for every speaker in the world, anymore than one could audition every speaker in the world.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Answer to what?
How to select loudspeakers. I listen. You interpret measurement graphs.
If you thought about it, you would realize that no one could find a good set of measurements for every speaker in the world, anymore than one could audition every speaker in the world.
You cannot find a good set of measurements (in the sense of providing enough relevant information) for any speaker in the world!
I'm with John Atkinson when he says (from the lecture linked to elsewhere in this thread):
"All measurements tell lies...The only reliable judge of quality in a speaker, of how good it is, is in the listener's ear." :)
Amen, John.
You still choose to misrepresent what I say.
"How to select loudspeakers." No, one of the things I have talked about is how to select loudspeakers to audition. To suppose that you do solely by listening unreal. You can only listen to a small proportion of the loudspeakers available and there are various ways to figure out which ones to actually audition. You rely on other people's impressions, and I do, too, to some extent. I also like to use measurements, which I use to screen out lots of speakers and which indicate to me that other speakers are worth listening to.
"You cannot find a good set of measurements (in the sense of providing enough relevant information) for any speaker in the world!"
Enough relevant information for what? They certainly can tell me that there are some speakers that I would not like, or would not like very well, or that the speaker would be difficult to place, and that there are some speakers that I most probably would like. It works for me. If it doesn't work for you, don't use measurements as screening tools. I have not suggested that one buy speakers without auditioning them, much though you try to imply otherwise.
I can only take these remarks by JA as metaphorical: "All measurements tell lies..."
You see, measurements are not the kind of things that can lie. Lying requires and intellectual being who intends to say something false or misleading. Measurements may not tell you what you want to know, or you may misinterpret them, but they do not lie.
"The only reliable judge of quality in a speaker, of how good it is, is in the listener's ear."
Of course, ears on not very reliable for that unless steps are taken to eliminate bias in the listening situation.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
> I can only take these remarks by JA as metaphorical: "All measurements
> tell lies..."Indeed.
> You see, measurements are not the kind of things that can lie. Lying
> requires and intellectual being who intends to say something false or
> misleading. Measurements may not tell you what you want to know, or you
> may misinterpret them, but they do not lie.The measurements do not lie as such. But the person performing a
measurement has to have an idea of what the outcome will be, before he
performs it, just as with a slide rule, which I instanced in my 2011
Richard Heyser lecture (scroll down at the page linked below).The example of this that sticks in my mind was back in late 1989, when
Stereophile had first purchased a MLSSA system for speaker measurement.
My assistant that that time had written a review, complete with
measurements made with MLSSA. As soon as I saw the graphs, I realized
that they were "lying," thus invalidating that section of the review.There had been a system set-up error that resulted in the MLSSA input
board measuring crosstalk from its output section rather than the signal
output by the speaker. The person performing the measurement had not
comprehended from the measurement that he had done something wrong,
that he had not measured what he thought he was measured. In other words,
he had not detected that his measurement was lying to him.He had to repeat the measurements before the speaker review could be
published.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Edits: 06/25/15 06/25/15
.
To suppose that you do solely by listening unreal.
Too funny! Sorry, I don't share your meter reader mentality. I listen to music for enjoyment. What do you do?
Enough relevant information for what?
Don't know about you, but I purchase speakers for listening to music. What is your goal?
Lying requires and intellectual being who intends to say something false or misleading.
You'll have to take up that lost cause with the individual who made that observation - John Atkinson.
This has been fun to read...I am a big image guy and I walk around "IN" my soundstage...never did that with poodle burial coffins...
"I don't share your meter reader mentality. I listen to music for enjoyment. What do you do?"
Boom...drop the mic...
I like my room dividers and really do not care how they measure...they constantly surprise me and show me the emotional spine of the music...
but hey, that's why they make Ford's and Chevy's...
Thanks
Mark
How do you decide whether to try out or audition specific speakers?
One of the tools I use is speaker performance measurements.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Hey Pat..
My speakers before the 3.7i's were 1.6's (were tweaked out with an outboard passive x-over) and I had those for 13 years. I had a pair of Infinity's for 6 years before that...
I am a guy that does not rotate allot of gear...all of those were auditioned at the dealers...any piece that I replace has to be a drastic improvement...also I am very cheap...
I have been to a few Audio shows, but don't have great expectations when I listen there. Just looking for potential then investigate more if something interests me....
I have never hidden that I am not too tech savvy on AA Forums...Hence why I like you tech guys...I have learned allot from the inmates here, which I thought this whole internet thing was about...
MY biggest test when auditioning is do my Audiophile ears lapse and I find myself being pulled into the Music....Listening verses enjoying...
I do understand where you are coming from and that works for you...which is great. But there are a million ways to get things done...hence the Ford's and Chevy's comment...
thanks
Mark
There are hundreds of speakers with pretensions to be high fidelity available in the world. E-state cannot listen to them all. Somehow, anyone who wants to audition speakers must find some manageable way of picking out the speakers he wants to audition. Some speakers are just eliminated due to circumstances beyond his control, some by conscious decisions. E-stat knows this but is just playing with me by picking a sentence out of context and applying it do a different context.
I don't change my equipment very often, either. I have tried to get equipment as good as needed. Going from memory, I got my preamp about 1993, my subwoofer in the late 90's, my speakers about 2005, and my CDP a few years ago and a receiver a few years ago to use as a tuner and spare amp, if needed.
My history with speakers is that I got Kef 104s in 1976, Quad ESL-63s in 1993, and Paradigm Signature S2s in 2005. While trying to choose main speakers, I got PSB Stratus Minis in 2004 with the intention of putting them in the family room, where they work wonderfully well for movies.
I use 12 gauge speaker cables I got in the 1980s, interconnects as needed, nothing expensive, as they should make no audible difference. When reviewers show they can hear differences with controlled DBTs, I will start to believe them.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
E-state cannot listen to them all.
First of all, I don't have to. No one is going to review nor measure every speaker available. Is this news to you?
You prefer reading graphs presenting limited information. I prefer listening to or having others listen to speakers. That is where we disagree.
E-Stat,
Here lies the ultimate problem with your approach. Full sets of measurements are facts. It's the subjective, poetic nonsense you keep spewing that is fiction, do you believe by asking the same questions over and over the facts will go away ?
What you like subjectively is yours , it's audio and eventually all choices will be subjective at decision time , what's ironically flying over your head is the ability to narrow down what works for you by using objective measurements . Morricab for example has determined amplifiers with low to no NFB hits his sweet spot , you have determined monkey coffins don't work for you and prefer panels , there are scientific reason why and that's what's In discussion ...
Regards
Full sets of measurements are facts.
Maybe but are those facts useful information and can you interpret them? If the answer is no to either one then objective facts might as well be Egyptian hieroglyphics to you. In fact that is what they are to 99% of even the people who generate those "facts" nevermind the average audiophile.
It is exactly the inability to understand those "facts" as you put it that steered us down the wrong road of hifi reproduction for so long.
Subjective can be made to have a strong degree of objectivity and reproducibility if done correctly. It is done in other fields where human senses are the detector of the quality of a thing.
Take wine, I can perform a full chemical analysis on a 5 buck bottle and also on a 100 buck bottle and present you with those "facts" and they will be true and objective. I can give you the concentrations of retinoids, tannin, sugars, acids etc. but will this give you any concept as to which one will taste better? Maybe if something is WAY out of balance you can guess it might be sour or bitter etc. but nothing in the way of texture, complexity, fruitiness most likely. Hifi measurements are like me giving you a chemical analysis of a wine and asking you to tell me how it will taste and which one will you like to drink the most based on my analytical report.
Now, you can be clever about it and measure the wine and then do taste testing to establish drinker preferences and then correlate that with what you found in your lab report...in fact this is what a lot of companies do to optimize the taste of their products to consumer demand. Hifi doesn't bother with this because the engineers who design the stuff are obsessed with what their meters read and think that people should like better what measures better. They look at this backwards. Humans are the detectors...finding out what they like best and then tailoring the gear to meet that demand is the right way. Correlation to human perception and then designed to meet those demands is the right way.
| Maybe if something is WAY out of balance you can guess it might be sour or bitter etc. but nothing in the way of texture, complexity, fruitiness most likely. Hifi measurements are like me giving you a chemical analysis of a wine and asking you to tell me how it will taste and which one will you like to drink the most based on my analytical report.
So sure are you padawan?
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/229011001_Wine_vinification_prediction_using_data_mining_tools
With a sufficiently large data set of reasonably calibrated measurements and human perceptual judgement, I bet that one could make a model which predicts judgments much better than chance averaged over judges, and when enhanced further with existing wines that a particular judge does and does not like (collaborative filtering) improve the prediction further.
(and there are hundreds of papers on predicting wine ratings and prices from various forms of inputs, chemical or agricultural or climatic)
It's pretty simple Cab, if I give you a fruity wine with an XYZ composition and you tell me it's the best , the objective measurement identifies what composition suits your subjective palete. it's the same for audio , the measurements don't tell me what you will subjectively like , it identifies it .....
Regards ...
to answer my question! You continue to prove me correct that you don't have the slightest idea as to speaker tests that show imaging or coherency abilities. Maybe you cannot sense either and don't understand the question.
Apparently, simplistic facts are all you require. Not me.
"First of all, I don't have to. No one is going to review nor measure every speaker available. Is this news to you?"
Of course it is not news to me. I maintained that for years, and it is nice to see you finally admit it. But it does show that no matter what some audiophiles say, they do not select speakers by listening alone. In fact, as you now admit, you have some method of deciding which speakers among the myriads available that you will actually audition, which means you have selected out, rejected, many other speakers without listening to them.
"You prefer reading graphs presenting limited information. I prefer listening to or having others listen to speakers. That is where we disagree."
No matter how you decide what speakers, out of the many available, you will actually listen to, you are going to decide based on limited information. Reports by others of their listening experience, s still provides limited information. I find such reports of some use in making an audition list and in some cases they indicate things I want to listen for, to see if what they say is true. So I by no means reject using recommendations by others as to what speakers are worth trying out, especially if more than one reviewer likes them.
However, in addition, I like wherever possible to see a good set of measured results. But checking out reviewers opinions is another use of measurements. If a reviewer often recommends speaker with measurements so bad that I know I will not like them, then I tend to ignore that reviewer. On the other hand, if I find a reviewer consistently recommends speakers I figure I will like, hen I would tend to try to listen to those speakers.
Measurements are also useful in assessing just how good a speaker is compared to others on the market which may be quite difficult for me to audition. I can be sure that my speakers are among the very best monitor speakers available.
Of course, there might be some other speakers which I would prefer if I ever did listen to them, which does not mean it is necessarily objectively better. But that is true no matter how you buy speakers. Someone just mght come up with a speaker you would like better. We cannot listen to everything.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
!
The Mind has No Firewall~ U.S. Army War College.
Yet another baseless comment. I've never said that every speaker available has been reviewed or tested. Are you on medication?
We already get the fact that you employ and trust simplistic tests for your evalution process. Do you forget what you have written (time and time again)?
The last time I did was in 1972 following a Hirsch-Houck test of the AR Integrated amp. Measures great. Unfortunately, it sounded poor. I learned my lesson then.
E-stat
"We already get the fact that you employ and trust simplistic tests for your evalution process. Do you forget what you have written (time and time again)?"
Really? Are you saying that listening to speakers at length with a variety of program materials chosen to show differences in speakers simplistic? Because that's how I audition speakers.
"Yet another baseless comment. I've never said that every speaker available has been reviewed or tested. Are you on medication?"
When someone says he/she selects speakers based on listening alone (the audiophile mantra), that implies he/she has checked out every speaker. This is obviously contrary to fact. Give up the audiophile mantra. You can only listen to a relatively small number of speakers out of a much larger number of speakers. How did you screen out the vast majority of speakers which you have never heard? Hint: it wasn't by listening to them.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Are you saying that listening to speakers at length with a variety of program materials chosen to show differences in speakers simplistic?You completely miss what I've said. No surprise there. Your devotion to numbers and graphs is the topic of all my observations.
When someone says he/she selects speakers based on listening alone (the audiophile mantra), that implies he/she has checked out every speaker.
So, Sherlock - when you base your trust on simplistic numbers and graphs, you must be guilty of the same thing! Too funny!
You can only listen to a relatively small number of speakers out of a much larger number of speakers.
You can only view the graphs for a relatively small number of speakers out of a much larger number of speakers.
The only difference in our culling the wheat from the chaff is trusting incomplete numbers vs listener reviews. That concept evidently continues to fly wayyyyy over your head.
You like to look at numbers. I like to hear what experienced listeners observe.
Why is that so difficult for you to understand?
Edits: 06/26/15
E-Stat
"So, Sherlock - when you base your trust on simplistic numbers and graphs, you must be guilty of the same thing! Too funny!"Not only false but utter nonsense. The results of speaker measurements are a tool I like to use when available. They are not the only tool for compiling an audition list.
"You can only view the graphs for a relatively small number of speakers out of a much larger number of speakers."
Of course. When have I ever said otherwise? Measurements results are one tool that I can use when available.
"The only difference in our culling the wheat from the chaff is trusting incomplete numbers vs listener reviews."
Actually, I use both listener reviews and measurements in compiling an audition list, a concept which you seem to refuse to understand. In any case, it is only possible to survey a small proportion of the speakers available.
When I have compiled my audition list, from that point on I rely on my own listening.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Edits: 06/26/15
yeah, i get them from my MMGs which i alternate with spendor S3/5s .....AND my 1975 Fried model RIIs that i just hooked up again after about 15 years setting in my other room. they sound just as good now as when they were new. with a sub, they are wonderful.
i never once relied on measurements for speaker selection. i guess thats why i have told myself that i can detect the differences in wire.
...regards...tr
No, I don't but I appreciate Stereophile's speaker measurements to the extent that it reveals the real sensitivity of a loudspeaker ( often very different to the manufacturers spec )and a very noticeable rising top end likely to be heard in any setup etc.
If you live outside a major urban area hearing high end components becomes a major road trip and the chances of hearing it in your own system slim.
So you read the audiophile press, try to interpret some measurements when possible and often learn the hard way which is exactly what those of more modest means don't need.
Like everything else in a consumers life ,those with higher incomes have more choices . Your story just illustrates that.
I doubt if Dr. West of Soundlab would be much interested in having dinner with me. You mention meeting with people from four (4) manufacturers. That still is quite a limited selection.
For example, did you ever spend time with Leo Lewis of Ethera and listen to his speakers? No? His Ethera Vitae is a very fine speaker, which measures superbly, BTW.
Local availability is a constraint. It can be overcome to some extent by traveling or ordering speakers in. But even if you travel to out of town dealers or manufacturers, they are still limited as to what they carry.
You can only listen to a selection of the speakers available. Willy nilly, many are selected out by many different circumstances. You may never have heard of quite a few. Others may be little more than names to you, so you lack any information that would lead you to spend the time and effort to audition them. Others may be difficult to obtain for audition. As for word of mouth, I tend to pay less attention to what some reviewer says than to what a good set of speaker measurements shows.
There are various things which might call your attention to a speaker, out of the many available. Maybe you like the brand. Maybe you hobnobbed with the manufacturer. Maybe you heard it in a show and liked it. Maybe one or more reviewers liked it. Maybe a dealer thinks it is a speaker you really should audition. As I said:
"So, the idea that one can select speakers just by listening to them ignores the whole process of how one gets around to listening to the speakers in the first place."
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
For example, did you ever spend time with Leo Lewis of Ethera and listen to his speakers?
Sorry, I'm not moved by little boxes.
Willy nilly, many are selected out by many different circumstances.
When all else fails, just make stuff up.
I carefully researched what is available, what trusted ears have said about them and explore for myself.
Enjoy returning to your graph interpretations!
On the other hand, I never had any particular desire to have dinner with Dr. West of Soundlab. Is he a gracious host? A man of wide culture? A scintillating conversationalist?
E-stat
"I carefully researched what is available, what trusted ears have said about them and explore for myself."
Yeah, so did I. But what is available? There's the rub. There are lots of speakers that you and your folks with trusted ears never heard, some never even heard of, so however you try to put it, a lot of speakers are screened out, selected out, by various circumstances over which you had no control.
Actually, a good set of speaker measurements from the NRC (Soundstage) or Stereophile can be a very useful tool, not the only one, in deciding which speaker to screen out and which speaker to audition
For example, your prejudices about little boxes would keep you from auditioning the superb Ethera Vitae. But if anyone is interested, I have linked to some NRC measurement results.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
On the other hand, I never had any particular desire to have dinner with Dr. West of Soundlab.
Forget the specific as that was an example. Wouldn't you like to have a long conversation with any designer of gear you have? Wouldn't you like to understand their philosophy and take on musical reproduction? Perhaps it would impress you more to say I met Keven Voecks at Sea Cliff years ago. Along with other designers I haven't mentioned.
I sure do. And have.
There are lots of speakers that you and your folks with trusted ears never heard,
Perhaps. Has anyone heard them? Does anyone find they are worthy?
Actually, a good set of speaker measurements from the NRC (Soundstage) or Stereophile can be a very useful tool,
Maybe for you, but not for me. They don't provide enough useful information about imaging in many different ways nor about coherency.
your prejudices about little boxes would keep you from auditioning the superb Ethera Vitae
I'll go out on a limb and say that a two way box with an 8" woofer could never provide a lifelike sized image to me. I found the same to be true with the Quad electrostat. I was always aware of listening down to them. BTW, Siggy Linkwitz finds the same to be true.
"Vertical height of the sound stage adds to its realism. I find small 2-way speakers very unsatisfactory in this respect, even when they are correctly positioned at ear level height."
Good for you, that's your preference. On the other hand, you mention some quite objective factors that you use to screen out speakers from your audition list.
When I look for speakers to audition, I prefer to have a good set of measurements, especially if I have to go to a considerable effort to find them. If I just have to go down the street to audition them, that's easy enough but the selection is pretty limited. Measurements are more reliable than other people's opinions on the sound of speakers.
I value neutrality more than a lot of image height, pace Siegfried Linkwitz. I heard some very tall McIntosh speakers which provided a very tall image, but the sound appeared to me to be somewhat colored.
As I have said before, my favorite speaker reviewers are currently John Atkinson, Andrew Marshall, and Doug Schneider. All three utilize measurements.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
that's your preference.
Yes, my preference is for the image to sound lifelike!
On the other hand, you mention some quite objective factors that you use to screen out speakers from your audition list.
Factors measurements do not answer.
Measurements are more reliable than other people's opinions on the sound of speakers.
Only if you find the most basic of information to provide sufficient useful information.
I don't. No more than looking at THD charts! :)
When I audition speakers, I don't need other people to tell me how they sound.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
just simplistic numbers and graphs to tell you how they sound. LOL!
BTW, I agree about McIntosh speakers. Did Roger Russell ever design anything that sounded good? The C-26 was horrible. Old Mac speakers are horrible. Business took me to Binghamton, NY several years back. I was given a very gracious tour of the manufacturing facilities followed by auditioning their top end gear in their listening room. Nice folks. Their best system was powerful and large, but not particularly dimensional. HP's many systems at Sea Cliff were far better.
On the other hand, I would like to hear his IDS-25 some day. Are you familiar with the concept? Full range, crossoverless floor to ceiling line array with EQ to help the extremes. In his retirement, he might actually have produced something interesting. And he used Cardas wiring to boot! Naturally to placate those who lack his superior senses. :)
What? There's a speaker you think might be interesting and you never heard it? Not worth the trouble to go find it, perhaps? Oh dear, so there's a principle of selection besides actually listening to it. I thought you listened to everything!
I heard a speaker very much like that. The young man showing it at a dealer said it was McIntosh but maybe he was just using a name he thought I might recognize. I didn't take the time to experiment with it as I wasn't really interested at the time. I just played my favorite orchestral test piece and quickly found it colored. But the speakers may have been too close for the best effect.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
If I were in the market for a speaker, I would locate a pair to evaluate which might require going to Florida where he lives. It appears RR has stopped taking them to shows. Their chief advantages for me would be two things you cannot determine via measurements: coherency and imaging. I guess that pretty much explains why you don't find a single graph on the IDS website.
What you do find is lots of philosophy, design goals and - listening impressions!
Two things you cannot determine via measurements: coherency and imaging- EStat
That's your opinion E-Stat , nothing to do with science ....
to provide some specific examples of each that correlate to what we hear? I confess that I've never seen such in any of the loudspeaker tests I've seen.
Perhaps you can enlighten all of us.
... considering what these people usually have for amps, front ends, cables etc. What good is speaker's ability to image, if POS amplifier has no such ability of its own?
Can't hear - no need to measure. Problem solved.
Pat is still waiting for "good evidence" to come in about a number of audio components. :)
Reminds me of the old PropHead days.
Somewhere along the way I guess I stopped caring about what other people believe. If they want to shortchange their listening pleasure because of a failure to experiment, it's just a "what they don't know won't hurt them" issue. No one gets hurt, and that's just fine with me.
But carry on! It's a fun read.
What I find most interesting is the reasoning process or experience behind someone's beliefs. I have changed my opinion on more than one occasion when a persuasive point is made.
"So, why do you find this to be true?"
When they cannot explain it or just throw in a graph or some terms they think sound technical, you know they really have no understanding.
I think john did already , theres a lot measurements tell us, designers have to used them , what measurements can't tell me , you or John is ones taste .
You may favor a certain distortion or coloration over another , hence we have more speaker types and brands than you can shake a stick at ..
Regards
At the expense of confusing the issue with facts, JA has stated previously (in an Ayre preamp review) there are no measurements for these characteristics.
Get back on topicE-Stat ,Magnapan has something to hide , no problem , the speaker measures poorly and John caved, gave into an informercial , I'm sure you will be happy on its release , unfortunately regardless of how much you like them , The reality is , there's no test to verifying its performance improvement , which is important to the rest of us..
Regards
Edits: 06/25/15 06/25/15
Especially when they are acknowledged by the tester to be "clearly wrong".
JA did not say the measurements are clearly wrong, he said "The usual assumption, that the measuring microphone is very much farther away than the largest dimension of the speaker being measured, is clearly wrong." To that he was referring to the far field assumption, which is an incorrect assumption for most multi-driver dynamic speakers. The assumption is especially wrong for big speakers with 3 or more drivers, line arrays, and panel speakers. Nevertheless, it does not invalidate the measurements, because at typical real world listening distances, you are still in the near field of such speakers. It's not like the measurement is near field but listening is far field. They are both near field.
Have you ever heard a Quad with a 10 db rise at 40 hz? I sure haven't.
Quad 2805 measurements
When listening to panels and other open baffle speakers in the near field, the bass balance is a variable of distance. With big panels, it's less so, because the smaller the panel, the greater the affected frequency range. I did hear Quad 988s once in a more nearfield setup at ~7 ft listening distance and there was a noticeable rise through the bass, probably not 10 dB but enough to make some tracks sound over-ripe in the bass.
All of Stereophile's loudspeaker measurements indicate bass output greater than what you will get in room, due to the near field measurement technique. JA explains this over and over again. Panels are more affected than other designs. As long as you are aware of what to expect from a given measurement technique, you can glean useful information from it.
Just from looking at the Quad 2805 measurements, you can guess that they should sound very neutral in the midrange and coherent, and have pinpoint imaging, but rolled off on top. And that correlates reasonably well with my other listening impressions. I recall a very clear and neutral midrange, tiny pinpoint images, and less sparkle, shimmer, and air on the top end than I'm used to.
As long as you are aware of what to expect from a given measurement technique, you can glean useful information from it.
I aver most folks are not and unless they read all the qualifications, would not understand. I don't know of anyone who would listen to large panels at a 4' distance which is how they are measured.
Especially when they are acknowledged by the tester to be "clearly wrong". -E Stat
Read between the lines , more than one testing facility have produced similar results , you should research more ..
Regards
yet another empty post devoid of any facts. And another comma splice.
Coherency and imaging. Coherency is a rather vague term, so it is hard to correlate it with anything. Imaging is much more intelligible.
You take a remark from a measurement of a preamp. Speakers are something else, and there are certainly some things which affect the imaging. See Fig. JA used to make a remark similar to this, but perhaps even dispersion is so common he doesn't bother anymore.
"Other than a slight lack of off-axis energy between 1 and 2kHz, presumably due to the slightly oversized woofer, the contour lines below 8kHz in this graph are both even and evenly spaced, correlating with the stable, well-defined stereo imaging I noted n speaker in my auditioning."
http://www.stereophile.com/content/paradigm-reference-signature-s2-loudspeaker-measurements
This is one case where I prefer the horizontal dispersion graph shown in Soundstage, since it gives the actual responses instead of the differences between the on axis response and off axis responses. The on axis measurements in the highs show anomalies which do not show in the off axis response, so the Stereophile article has to explain why it matters little with this Class A Limited LF Extension. See Chart 1. Notice the off axis response is at a slightly lower level.
http://www.soundstagemagazine.com/measurements/paradigm_signature_s2/
JA thought the speaker was very slightly forward, and he also explains what he thinks correlates with it.
"Fig.8 shows the response of the Signature S2s in my listening room, averaged for each speaker in a vertical window centered on the position of my ears. The graph is impressively flat from 80Hz to 20kHz, though with slight excesses of upper-bass and mid-treble energy apparent. The former goes some way toward compensating for the S2's lack of mid- and low-bass output, while the latter is not unexpected, given my feelings about the speaker's slightly forward treble balance."
Now, I think the speaker is a bit laid back, and if you look at the NRC at the Listening Window graph, Chart 2, on the Soundstage site, you may see why, as it slopes just slightly down where it counts most.
I should mention that you can be sure that those who manufacture surround sound processors have a pretty good idea what affects imaging.
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"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Coherency relates to the notion of hearing a single speaker rather than a chorus of separate drivers. I am especially sensitive to this characteristic. What measures this?
Correlation and causation are not always the same. One may assign correlation when in fact there may be other factors at work.
Tell us about image height measurements. Tell us about soundstage depth measurements.
Stereo Sound Processor manufacturers? That is hilarious. Have you ever heard one that sounded real? I'm not referring to phase gimmickry that may sound cool for a short time until you realize there is nothing natural sounding about the result. Let's return to quantifying how speakers may or may not reproduce certain characteristics of music.
Are you going to echo the same "I can't tell you what they are - but I just know they exist" line?
Well, I showed you somethings which can affect the stereo image, including forward or back presentation. One problem of the way you ask about this is that if you are measuring the performance of equipment, we are not measuring you perception of soundstage width, depth, and height. A stereo image is an illusion, and audio measurements do not directly measure your subjective experience.
I have not covered image height. There is absolutely no reason why I should explain what measured factors are relevant to stereo image, as it is not my field. Obviously, someone must know how to produce an illusory sound source extending above the speakers. I have a Chesky Test CD which using electronically generated signals can do exactly that with quality speakers placed in an environment without too many near reflections.
http://www.amazon.com/Chesky-Records-Sampler-Audiophile-Compact/dp/B000003GF3/ref=sr_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1435363098&sr=1-2&keywords=chesky+test+cd
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"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Well, I showed you somethings which can affect the stereo image, including forward or back presentation
Sorry, I'm not recalling that. So, exactly what measurements quantify what we hear as depth and width?
we are not measuring you perception of soundstage width, depth, and height.
This is what I'm saying. I couldn't have said it any better. There's a huge gap between measurements and the entirety of what we perceive.
I have not covered image height.
I have a Chesky Test CD...
Chesky does some nice stuff, but why limit the evaluation to a *test* disk? I evaluate image height with every recording. Especially those like the ASO Firebird where I participated in the recording - and heard takes from the master tape during the three day session.
You're not alone. No one covers image height with *measurements*.
"This is what I'm saying. I couldn't have said it any better. There's a huge gap between measurements and the entirety of what we perceive."
Actually, you don't get the point. I don't know how it be made clearer, but you manage to muck it up. When we measure the speaker, we are measuring the speaker, not you. You are subject to all sorts of internal influences which have nothing to do with the speakers.
"I evaluate image height with every recording. Especially those like the ASO Firebird where I participated in the recording - and heard takes from the master tape during the three day session."
I would rather enjoy the music or other program material on the recordings.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
So, exactly what measurements quantify what we hear as depth and width?
Choose whatever graphs and numbers you please. And, correlate the results.
Do enlighten all us!
... either sudden change of subject, or just dead silence.
Actually, you can see both right now - from both (non)respondents.
All those characteristics are brought into complete clarity and quantifiable means via:
Horizontal axis avg thru 40deg and step response
Not.
Horizontal axis avg thru 40deg and step response , if you could get rid of the frame buzz and stored energy you so enjoy.....
Edits: 06/25/15
At the risk of apples vs oranges , yes .....
This is what i propose, you can hear what is measured, the measurement does tell the tale, it does not tell what one will like /dislike, under such a premise, all speakers are equal, some more than others...
The End.....
you can hear what is measured, the measurement does tell the tale.
A part of the tale, yes. I'm with John Atkinson on his different take on the subject as found in this video.
"All measurements tell lies...The only reliable judge of quality in a speaker, of how good it is, is in the listener's ear." :)
My version is different,
"All listeners tell lies, or the truth as they see it ,that particular moment in time, The only reliable judge of the quality in a speaker, or of how good it is, is in the testing microphone's ear." :)
Regards...
Edits: 06/22/15
... the apotheosis of so-called "objectivist" nonsense.
Or stupidity. Not Peter Breuninger's, not mine - just your utter, unadulterated stupidity.
Peter said Chaff not "Shaft" , you can let go now .......
on the challenges of measuring tall dipole lines sources using his gear:
Here, from the Magnepan 3.6 review :
"As I have written before in these pages, measuring physically large speakers with in-room quasi-anechoic techniques is in some ways a fruitless task. The usual assumption, that the measuring microphone is very much farther away than the largest dimension of the speaker being measured, is clearly wrong. Yet without access to a large anechoic chamber costing many hundreds of thousands of dollars, in-room measurement techniques are all we have to rely on."
There is no challenge, John can drag them outside and measure, i even offered to help ..:)
Magnapan has not produced any measurements on their speakers, well none that i have ever seen released from the company.
Hiding ............ ???
John can drag them outside and measure, i even offered to help ..:)
But would an open air test be indicative of a dipole's true response? I remember Dr. West once saying "we don't want to get rid of the rear wave".
Well, inside or outside, some of JA's measurements are easier to interpret with forward radiating speakers than with dipoles. Those who just look at the results without reading the text may well be shocked by the big bass rise in the on axis curves. But measurements need interpretation, and the rules are a different for dipoles because of the partial cancellation in the bass because the front and back waves are of opposite polarity. One person who reviews equipment actually used this as an example of measuring poorly but sounding great. But of course, in room, because of dipole cancellation effects, that big hump disappears.
I have linked to the measurements section of a very fine dipole speaker, the Quad 2805, to illustrate this. One can see a big hump in the bass in Fig. 2 which disappears in the room response in Fig. 6. For a casual reader, who does not understand that dipoles react somewhat differently in a room than forward radiating monkey coffins (which is what I have!) JA always explains this.
There are ways around this, but the one I know involves adjusting the data, and I tend to agree with JA to present the actual data, not that my nonexpert opinion means much. But I can also see why Wendell Diller might not agree. I might also point out that JA shows different displays for the horizontal dispersion. In Fig. 3, he shows the actual data, and in Fig. 4, he shows the difference between the on axis and off axis responses.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Then why no counter measurements from magnapan, can i request imp/mag-phase and FR graphs from magnapan....?
look at how vague :Magneplanar 3.7
Freq. Resp. 35Hz- 40 kHz
Rec Power Read Frequently Asked Questions
Sensitivity 86dB/500Hz /2.83v
Impedance 4 Ohm
Dimensions 24 x 71 x 1.625 inches
really ..!!!!
And so it goes ..............
Edits: 06/20/15
I don't think many manufacturers provide much in the way of measurements of consumer loudspeakers, so I don't think Magnepan is unusual in this regard.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
> Then why no counter measurements from magnepan, can i request
> imp/mag-phase and FR graphs from magnepan....?Magnepan's Wendell Diller has stated that he doesn't want the company's
speakers measured because they will will reveal proprietary information
regarding the crossovers. This may or not be correct. However, in my
conversations with Wendell, it emerges that he does not like the waterfall
plots that I publish, feeling that they paint Magnepans in a bad light.With panel speakers, cumulative spectral-decay waterfall plots do tend
to look hashy. This may be due to the multiple arrivals at the microphone,
due to the physically large radiator. Or, as I have conjectured in the
magazine, it might indicate Chaotic diaphragm behavior, ie, while the
average position of the diaphragm responds pistonically to the driving
force, individual elements vary in their response, "shimmering," as it
were.I don't currently know how to best investigate either conjecture.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Edits: 06/21/15 06/22/15
Like anyone with an LCR meter can't take apart the xo, trace the circuit, and measure the individual components?
John, you've measured a number of dipolar planar speakers over the years, including electrostats, magnetic planar, and "true" ribbons. Have you found any "typical" measured behaviors that characterize these and distinguish them from monopolar box speakers?
> Have you found any "typical" measured behaviors that characterize these
> and distinguish them from monopolar box speakers?
The dipolar radiation pattern of course, and the fact that other than in
larger rooms, not just the measuring but also the listening takes place
with more of a nearfield effect than with a physically small speaker. And
the hashy-looking waterfall plots. These are all common factors with large
panel speakers.
On the plus size, there are no cabinet resonances. However, depending on
the skill and insight of the designers, there will be some effect from the
stretched diaphragm's "drumskin" resonance.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Any rectangular membrane (such as those in Maggies and other panel speakers) is going to produce modes that are even less pretty than the classical drumhead resonance, due to the asymmetry of the diaphragm. Circular membranes produce fairly predictable reflections/resonances; rectangular membranes, less so, with some ugly crush-points at corners.
I can imagine that it wouldn't look pretty under most test procedures.
If I were making a measurement for the purpose publishing in a review and I didn't know what the measurement I was taking actually represented, I might be reluctant to publish it until I did.
Or at minimum, attempt to correlate the measurement with something I heard.
But WTFDIK about publishing?
I would agree with your final conjecture , chaotic behavior of the diaphragm......
> I would agree with your final conjecture, chaotic behavior of the > diaphragm...
In a lecture I attended in the early 1990s, the mathematician Manfred
Schroeder (who passed away a few years back) mentioned that one signature
of a chaotic audio system is that it generates subharmonics.
I have investigated this with a Magnepan speaker. Yes, it does indeed
generate a strong subharmonic at exactly half the signal frequency, ie,
feed the panel a 1kHz signal and as well as the usual harmonic distortion
harmonics at 2kHz and 3kHz, you see a tone appear at 500Hz. But this is
not really conclusive evidence for Chaotic behavior.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
| But this is not really conclusive evidence for Chaotic behavior.If it were a system running in a truly chaotic regime, then a periodic input would create a non-periodic chaotic "noise" out. It would be really obvious acoustically: think about a self-feedback oscillation 'squeal' but which then turns into a horrible broadband seeming noise.
A nonlinear system can be chaotic with some parameters and non-chaotic with others.
Subharmonic generation requires a nonlinearity, and chaos requires a nonlinearity as well, but they aren't necessarily the same.
What your observation shows is that the mechanisms of nonlinearity in a panel speaker driver may be different (well it's obvious) from those of a conventional driver and amplifiers which tend to make typical higher-frequency harmonics instead of subharmonics.
My guess is that there is resonance/vibration in the panel's supporting structure which naturally doesn't vibrate very well at 1kHz , but with some weak nonlinear coupling can 'keep up' with vibration and resonate and couple to energy every other cycle.
Subharmonics often happen with nonlinearly coupled resonant systems, superharmonics often happen with nonlinearities/static input-output functions which are worse when amplitude is higher {extremes of signals}, e.g. the magnetic field isn't fully homogeneous at the limits of excursion or the transistor's transfer function isn't fully linear.
Edits: 06/22/15
Wow, you certainly said a 'mouthful' there!
'I don't currently know how to best investigate either conjecture.'
Since no one can really confirm either hypothesis it would be premature to jump to any conclusions.
from the review referenced in this post .
"...measuring physically large speakers with in-room quasi-anechoic techniques is in some ways a fruitless task."
Why bother if the information is known by all to be problematic and not representative in any sense of real world performance?
To provide overtly misleading and incorrect data as to how the speaker actually sounds in the real world?
What is incorrect about the data? The results of the measurements are what they are.
What is problematic about the information?
What is misleading about the information?
What on earth is real world performance as opposed to unreal world performance? I am not aware that measurements are taken in some unreal world.
As I pointed out, measurements need to be interpreted as to their significance.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
The difference will be especially pronounced with the wonky dispersion pattern of a large dipole, and the consequent reflections and cancellations. Measurements made IN a real room, in real time, from the listening position, will probably tell you more about its actual behavior than QA ever could. And of course this behavior will be different in EVERY room depending on dimensions, treatment, placement, etc.
What is incorrect about the data?
I'll let JA explain it to you:
"The usual assumption, that the measuring microphone is very much farther away than the largest dimension of the speaker being measured, is clearly wrong."
What on earth is real world performance as opposed to unreal world performance?
Do you really need someone to explain to you the differences in the way the measurements are taken and the way people actually listen to the speakers? It would seem so.
What? Are you trying to accuse the measuring instruments of dishonesty? Sorry, but the measured data is what it is. JA's remarks refer to how the measured data is to be interpreted.
Now, as to conditions of measurements, the ideal is to determine what the speaker itself does. Then, one can try to find out what tends to work best in rooms like the rooms people are likely to put speakers in, which is one of the things Dr. Floyd Toole did.
There is nothing to prevent you from measuring the response of your speakers in your listening room---oh yeah, you actually do that.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Ever mindful of David Bentley Hart's wise counsel that absolute subjective liberty is known only in hell, I'm curious as to what you would do if you were shopping for a speaker, found one that impressed you no end, was affordable, but measured poorly. Would you dismiss it out of hand due to the poor specs or make the purchase?
A Poorly measuring speaker would sound bad........
"A Poorly measuring speaker would sound bad........"
Yeah, just because E-stat comes up with some contrary to fact hypothetical situation doesn't mean it's of some practical value.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
Not following you .....
A lot of self impregnated fallacy's floating around .....
Regards
Well, this is a hypothetical scenario E-stat proposed:
"I'm curious as to what you would do if you were shopping for a speaker, found one that impressed you no end, was affordable, but measured poorly."
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
I answered , It would not impress ,well only in the short run and on special rcordings . You will always be aware of it 's short comings,...John referenced the 3.6 waterfall plot , ironically you can hear the smearing of details when listening to it , so I was not surprised when I saw the waterfall plot . It would have been interesting to compare it to a 3.7...
Regards
Edits: 06/24/15
Try again. Who was it who asked that question?
There is nothing to prevent you from measuring the response of your speakers in your listening room---oh yeah, you actually do that.
At the listening position devoid of employing any overtly wrong assumptions. The bonus is that it is relevant data. :)
I tell people in my lab that if they aren't going to believe the results of an experiment (or be able to convince me that the experiment might be convincing), there is no point in doing it. Similarly, if you feel a measurement is not going to be interpretable, one really shouldn't do it.
But JA's measurements of panel speakers can be interpreted, including those in the bass, and JA does so in the text.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
The poor measurement results led to a much improved 3.7 ......
!
The Mind has No Firewall~ U.S. Army War College.
He may be measuring 'real world performance', but who cares how it measures if sounds good even if it doesn't measure the same as a 'monkey coffin'?
As von Recklinghausen said:
"If it measures good and sounds bad, -- it is bad. If it sounds good and measures bad, -- you've measured the wrong thing."
E-stat
We were posting at the same time, so I did not see your post until mine was posted...
But I wonder if those measurements hurt the sales of the 3.6's???
Thanks
Mark
I seriously doubt it for anyone who auditioned them and enjoyed their sound. Especially with the big disclaimer at the end!
FWIW, I have done FR measurements using one of the Stereophile Test CDs (I have several) of my main system using simple test gear which has allowed to me get both measurably and audibly flat response in the bottom several octaves. That through lots of experimentation with speaker, bass trap and listening couch placement.
A single set of measurements may not always provide the true potential of a big dipole.
"I seriously doubt it for anyone who auditioned them and enjoyed their sound. Especially with the big disclaimer at the end!"
The disclaimer is one big grain of salt...
FWIW...I always liked your rig...
Thanks
Mark
I was quite impressed when I heard 3.7s at Sea Cliff in room 2. While this is a dark camera pic, the system was driven nicely with a VPI Classic or EMM Labs front end via Veloce preamp and McIntosh power amps. I met Michael Hobson on that trip who brought some tasty sounding "white label" pressings.
As with your SL's, it is bit of a room commitment, along with setting them up and tweaking the room/speakers...I just really enjoy the di-pole presentation...
Ran live sound for quite a few years and the sonic signature I get from di-poles is more of what I heard live...I have never been a huge bass freak, so I do not need the chest thump...Playing live I always rolled the bass off at 40...Most PA systems really struggle below that...
The Bass I get from my Maggies is tight, fast, round and musical...in my room the 3.7i's go down to about 35 solidly...faintly down to 30...sold my subs because I could not get them to blend well with the Maggies. Also current condo living is not conducive to pounding bass...
Thanks again
Mark
> In Herb Reichert's review of the Creek Evolution 100A he writes on page
> 73,"For this listening session I used Magnepan's new .7 speakers (review
> to come)..."
Yes, that is correct. Herb auditions the Magnepan .7 in his "Gramophone
Dreams" column in the August issue of Stereophile.
> It was my understanding that Magnepan would not supply Sterophile with
> review samples because of what JA's measurements would or would not
> reveal about the speakers.
That is also correct, but components reviewed in our regular columns at
the front of the book are not usually subject to measurements.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Protocol bypass ,an opinion review , not good John .....
> Protocol bypass...
As I explained, not a bypass of protocol for products that are reviewed by
one of Stereophile's regular columnists.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Understand John , but ..... SP reviews include ,
1. subjective review,
2. objective measurements,
3 recommended components list,
so i fail to see how this is considered a review as it only meets one of your 3 criteria.
SP takes a look at maggie .7 ..... sounds more like it......
Regards
...did you complain when none of the equipment Tellig discussed got measured?
Or any of the stuff in Art's column?
Never read a Sam tellig report in my life, no test , dont read , look at the pretty pics and move on. Better to look at the ads and pics of the internals than read some nonsensical blah, blah, with no reference.
And so it goes ........
> SP reviews include
> 1. subjective review,
> 2. objective measurementsFull reviews in our equipment reports section, yes, other than for LP
playback components, for reasons that have been discussed at length in
the past.> 3 recommended components list
No, this has never been the case.
> so i fail to see how this is considered a review as it only meets one
> of your 3 criteria.Two criteria for a full review, but as coverage in a regular Stereophile
[column] is equivalent to a full review in, for example, The Absolute
Sound, I don't see that is necessary to make the distinction you are
insisting on.Finally, and speaking personally, yes I would like to subject every
component that passed through a Stereophile reviewer's system to
measurement. But logistically, this just isn't possible. For example,
in theory there are 20 working days in a month. I spent 4 days this past
week - ie, 20% of that nominal working month - performing and writing
up the measurements on an extraordinarily complex integrated amplifier.
For a magazine to publish measurements is resource-intensive, which is
why it is rare. Much as I would like to, I can't create more time with
snap of my fingers.What I do do, therefore, is cherry-pick for measurement some of the
components reviewed in our regular columns, the ones where the initial
coverage has indicated some issues. In the case of the Magnepan .7, I
did spend an evening auditioning the speakers at Herb's, basically to
see if I heard what he had described in his copy. I did.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Edits: 06/20/15
@John,John I appreciate the response , I hope you mine , I read purchase and promote stereophile because of your effort to educate via measurements , your method validates ,
1. The quality
2. The sincerity of the manufacturer in their published specs
3. The confirmation of or not the personal biases of the review process
If you eliminate this , then were's the difference between you , TAS and the other opinion only WEB zines? So forgive me/ us when the feeling moves to you having apparently let Magnapan off the proverbial hook , especially knowing the contentious remarks made in the past about not testing their products , while others have to walk that gauntlet ....
@Marks,
I have in the past taken John and others to task, regarding the lack of testing of analog/TT products, truly absurd IMO , 2,3,12k cartridges with no verification as to published specs , industry disgrace on a whole ...
Regards
Edits: 06/20/15
agree and no reasonable person could expect you to especially with an unknown entity it may not be necessary in giving a column "review" , the magnapan situation is different for reasons you are well aware of John....
Disappointing really ......
Edits: 06/20/15
This has been Stereophile's approach for as long as I can remember. Are you just now noticing? And it isn't odd by any stretch. Columnists in any medium are essentially their own editors and free to do as they please. The magazine has formal reviews and it has columnists, with different criteria for each. It's a system that works, effectively doubling the amount of gear that gets heard and giving the reader a lot more content. I'm really confused as to why this is an issue for you.
As a Maggie owner, (3.7i's), I am quite familiar with ALL the threads floating around AA on this Board and the Planar Board about Magnepan not wanting Stereophile to review any of the newer .7 series...
In many of those posts, I have let my opinion be known that I do not understand why Magnepan would not want the most read audiophile magazine to review any of there .7 speaker lines...
As I am not technically savvy, here are my question...
Would Stereophile's measurements give away their "secrets" of their newer series crossover designs?
Consensus among many Maggie owners is; they would rather not have a Sphile review due to the fact Maggies do not measure well and why would they want bad measurements out there in print??? That I understand to a certain extent, but it still befuddles me...
I am very content with my 3.7i's and feel they are a great value in our hobby. I personally have not heard anything in that price range that comes close to them for SQ...
Thanks
Mark
You haven't met Wendell Diller, sales manager for Magnepan. At one point in time, he wanted Magnepan to rival Bose, and refused to acknowledge various tweaks for the speakers including spiked feet or custom stands . He actually threatened to cut off the dealer I was working for at the time if we were to market such items....
Hopefully he loosens up with age, or maybe his replacement will be more open minded.
If anything he's crankier and crazier than ever.
It will be a good day for White Bear Lake when he retires.
"A lie is half-way around the world before the truth can get its boots on."
-Mark Twain
...and refused to acknowledge various tweaks for the speakers including spiked feet or custom stands
I've never met the man but HP knew him well and used an amusing variation on his name...
Fortunately, Dr. West embraces both of the things you mentioned with the massive steel framed, spiked U-1s . :)
Yeah, 30 years ago we were experimenting with double panels and were achieving rather amazing results. When we told Diller, he in unmistakable terms said that if ever played the double panels in front of customers, he would cut us off in a heartbeat.
Same thing with spiked feet. We used to drill out the T shaped stands for the 2.7 and 3's for use with spikes or cones: The word came down: too tweaky, and it may show that the speaker design were not thought through.
Internet has forced these ideas on him though.
in his LA Apartment tri-amped Ampzillas /LP12 SME EMT cartridge-- multiple Subs as well
Sheesh-- it would rock the whole Building!
I pitied the neighbours!
Good Days--ha!
Des
How about double 922s with which Ray Kimber used to showcase his recordings?
Man always blathering about Soundlabs - what are you on their payroll?
:)
I bow down, however, to the master of promoting one brand of product.
Your experience outperforms mine by at least a factor of 100. :)
Golf clap...
thanks
Mark
And a few more.
.
regardless of the particular Sound Lab model and size, each speaker uses a single panel.
Very unlike most like Quad, Acoustat, King Sound, M-L CLS, et. al. which use multiple panels some of which are frequency specific.
or perhaps triple?It's been a few years since be brought the big Sound Labs set up to RMAF.
Don't recall the total number of panels but it sure sounded great!
Edits: 06/20/15
At four corners, too, if memory serves me right. Combined with Ray's Iso mike recordings, the sound was impressive: dynamics as well as detail wise. Imaging was unbelievable. No one else at CES was even remotely close in performance, in my opinion. Too bad stats don't last in my area ( five years max).
Double 'Pans was the old store's attempt to emulate the Tympany models. We had already brought in double Quads so were interested in doing something more than a single panel.
thanks
Mark
I worked for a dealer who carried Quad as well as Martin Logan. None of theose brands lasted longer than 5 years.
In the case of Quad, even though they have that mylar dust cover,eventually sale air and traffic dusty ( very oily) would leach in and essentially short out the high voltages.
In the case of Martin logan The horizontal strips would collect dust and the dust being slightly abrasive would cut into the conductive coating on the diaphraghm. Also in earlier models ( I have not tried the latest) the horizontal foam strips would slowly deteriorate and being under tension would c=alter the speqker parameters.
The only panels which never seemed problematic were the Acoustat. They used regular insulated wire strung up on what looked to be flourescent light grills. They offered a lifetime guarantee and they never seemd to fail, but then they did not quite have the pristine quality of sound like the other brands. Acoustat, unfortunately, did not last very long. IIIRC, Fosgate handles their service.
The ML's I have heard never really did anything for me...I could always "hear" the woofer...
The Quads I have not spent much time with either...they are in my opinion, more transparent than Maggies, but lacked weight...
Now the big SL's, they do most everything extremely well...Maggies are just much more in my price range and are great bang for the buck speakers...
I know there is a whole garden industry in rebuilding Quads...I thought it was more transformer issues than panel issues, but I really do not know...
Thank you for the reply...I just do not know allot about Stats in general...
thanks
Mark
Transformers are never the issue with Quads. I have never seen an audio transformer fail. A couple power transformers over the decades but these were either 40-50 year old original Quads or the newer ones built in China. Still very rare.
UncleStu lives in Hawaii. Humidity is what kills them in this environment. Hawaii is a temperate climate overall and some do not want to use any kind of AC to keep humidity levels under control.
For most people this is not an issue. Here in the midwest it is nearly 70% humidity outside, not good for the electrostats, but it is also 95 degrees. You bet the AC is running hard! This keeps humidity levels well under 50%.
Don't think its only humidity.
On the Quad front I have personally owned the original 57's. but have worked with the Crosby mods, the Radio People mods, the Wayne Piquet rebuilds, and there's a local guy who loves quads so much he invested in a roll of the coated miylar diaphragm material to tootally rebuild the panels.
Both the local guy and Wayne would strip the panels down to the bare wood (sanding off the black paint on older models). I know the local guy has duplicated the original weighted tensioning/stretching jig used by original Quad.
I warn customers that 'stats in Hawaii make a great SECOND pair of speakers. One of my customers was so enamored of the 57 sound that he purchased a second pair ( Wayne's) after Wayne assured him that his pair had sat in his Florida Garage for a decade with no issues. The Piquest pair lasted only two months before arcing in one panel, then the other, He no longer warranty's the speakers in "tropical" environments.
As such, 'stats here create a huge love /hate relationship with their owners. When working, they simply love the sound, but since they always seem to fail, frustration sets in, maybe not the first time, but for later failures which seem to occur with regularity.
Being on a small land mass with a hell of a lot of cars, I suspect automotive exhaust fumes. Dust accumulation here have a sticky oily feel on windows and blinds no matter where you go. The oily blow by is insidous, I believe now they cause arcng even on tube gear so repairs which come in automatically get an alcohol wash, and believe me that greasy dust is difficult to remove.
I do notice greater numbers of failures for customers living downwind of , say, the freeways...
Of course YMMV and FWIW
I appreciate the comments.
I have plenty of clients in Hawaii and other tropical islands. No problems to speak of but the clients do pay attention to humidity levels.
While I don't discount the other environmental issues you mention, the VT150SE I bought from you last year demonstrates the point nicely, I do believe humidity is still the largest issue when dealing with electrostats. No stat likes humidity some will tolerate it better than others.
Even with all these issues panels/speakers should still last much longer than a few months if working properly. I would say your original comment of about 5 years is about right if one does not watch humidity and other environmental issues in their particular situation.
Keep them dry, keep them clean and they should go decades no matter where they are located.
That VT-150 was in a hom that ran AC 24/7 then stored in an WWII underground bunker. The bunker was medium/high humidity but constant temperature.
In Hawaii, we have certain peculiar issues which occur, usually before anyone else notices it. I notified Mike Sanders that his nickel plated chassis developed large amounts of corrosion in a few years. He was flabbergasted as even his Florida customers never reported anything wrong.
I believe the thermal cycling coupled wth the humidity enables the moisture to penetrate the nickel and auses the base steel to corrode, not neessarily rusting through, but leaving unslightly blemishes.
I personally believe it is a combination of traffic dust and humidity and salt tinged air. I have seen in ocean front homes cases where after a decade the resistor leads have corroded to the point where I have to change out all the resistors on a board. Good thing tube gear does not use as many devices.
The oily traffic dust tends to accumulate dust and they, in turn, absorb moisture. In addition the slightly elevated ambient temperatures coupled with the heat of the components tends to "cook" any excesss rosin, carbonizing it and creating a pathway conducive to arcing. In the case of "stats, it doesn't take much to create arcing in the panels ( I notice that ML now advises vigrously vacuuming the panels).
Of course the environmental hazards will vary depending on your neighborhood.
Ours is fairly unique and I have learned through the school of hardknocks.
Incidentally Sound Labs with their technique of using smaller modules last longer, but not that much so.
YMMV and FWIW
Thanks for the comments and history on the VT150.
Overall the amps looked great. They actually arrived in the evening so things were dark. The next day I gave them a closer examination and my heart just sank. The corrosion on all the PCB traces was just incredible. My initial reaction was just set them at the curb and take your lose! There is no way these are ever going to work again given the level of damage to the PCB traces.
I also knew there was a way to get them working again but the solution will be drastic. Remove the boards and all the components. Carefully remove the corrosion on every trace, paste flux the board, reflow with solder, clean. About (8) cycles of this. Now the traces look perfect again time to re-populate the boards. I bought new components, sockets from the factory.
While they are apart thoroughly clean the chassis, replace all the corroded hardware, replace the main B+ caps, etc., reinstall the boards, dress all the wiring harnesses. Quite the job probably 80 hours in the pair.
I had never seen damage quite like this. Just the small amount of dust, etc., that had collected on the boards mixed with the Hawaiian environment, salt-water, etc., caused everything to corrode.
One hell of a project but I learned a lot.
Just imagine I see that on a everyday basis and on far newer devices. Even those using conformal coatings suffer from bleeding in at the solder pads which insidiously creep and corrode.
With certain brands I suffer even more issues than others. AR is one such brand, The Old Golden Tube stuff used a circuit board laid out utilizing a lot of computer techniques. They crapped out left and igh and my intial order of 6 units had only a 100% failure rate. Still have three units stashed awayy: transformers are good but boards with their ground planes and such are horrible.
Another issue I notice is that B- traces running adjacent to B+ or even ground traces cause an electrolytic issue for some reason. Its a constant battle over here. In fact on the first generation Rhue amps I took a glance at the innards and pointed out to the designer the problem and the ( the cure). Next year at CES he approached me and thanked me because the exact issue came up on certain models sold in certain areas.
And talk about batteries in remotes !!!!
I now highly recommend use of Cortex products and periodic cleaning. This is especially true if you have indoor pets like cats or dogs.....
Cortex once had Don Moses (of Wadia fame) as a resaercher and sales manager. calling the off shoot (O2 blocker), you could reach him personally, so I had the opportunity to speak to him one on one. His point in working with Cortec was that the increasingly tiny traces needed preservation in order to insure good sound. My experiences of core mirrored his comments.
Once an 02 dealer, I had a surprising customer: the USMC . A corporal called me up requesting audiophile contact cleaners because their computer mother boards had to be wiped down and cleaned every morning they were in use. In the field, the Colonel was furious, because you can't fight a war that way. They ordered some cleaner and when I explained about the 02 blocker, they called back and ordered 100 of the one inch foam squares. Colonel was so happy he came back and ordered 500 of them but I explained that this product was originally developed for the military so they had to have it somewhere in their supply system. 500 was overkill, but the Colonel did not want to ever have clean mother boards edge cards ever.
as always YMMV and FWIW
My apologies about those amps, BTW. The transformers were good, though. And you did exactly what I had to do so often:clean the traces paint them over with liquid flux and solder them over. Very tedious and painstaking. On some new components with a histor of such failures I solder over when new as the thicker layer of tin in the solder seems to resist corrosion better.
People wonder why I go through 3 to 4 ounds of solder in less than a year.....
No problem with the amps. As the old saying goes you get what you pay for!! I figured they would need some attention but I never imagined they would require that level of work.
Like many things in life if I had known up front what I know now I would have passed. But I always wanted a pair of these amps. In the end everything worked out fine.
Do you have a link for the Cortex?
Here you go; the vci stands for vapor corrosion inhibitor. In the beginning, they used oil of cloves (they still do but found a way to deodorize the chemical) so components used to smell like a Christmas ham...
They make a large variety of products including heavy duty industrial apps. Look up the VCI products when you go on their website.
They will inhibit but not completely stop corrosion. I often will tear small pieces of the foam and stick it in RCA ends and such wear open copper ends are involved. They do seem to work ( I have about a decade of experience with them so far).
.
Acoustats have better sonics than ML, Quads failed due to poor prep of their stators at assembly.
modified ones today play like no tomorrow, no issues ..
'Quads failed due to poor prep of their stators at assembly.'
And you know this how?
Huh? Reminds me of the Woody Allen line from Annie Hall :
"Are we driving through plutonium?"
Maybe his best with some great lines. "...that's okay, we can walk to the curb from here..."
I am guessing Stereo Pass Lab amps...?
thanks
Mark
one channel per panel. But wait, there's more!Why not use five pair in a multi-channel arrangement? The Prostat line is intended to be used in arrays. Since each speaker is full range and has controlled directivity (these are 22 degree models), you are able to increase the horizontal and/or vertical coverage without introducing comb effects.
Edits: 06/19/15
Not too bad a sound as I recall.
But I knew one of there lines was the 22 degree model...
I have only heard them once in the early 2000's with an all Atmosphere front end...it was one of the best systems I have ever heard...could not tell the model of the SL but looked more like your U's...truly impressive, where with the right content...brought the players into the room...goose bump city...
I am guess, in that photo, those cones sounded like a mosquito with a bullhorn...
Thanks
Mark
Columnists regularly "review" products without submitting them to JA for measurements. Only once in awhile do these products receive subsequent full reviews or follow-ups with measurements.
...unless they have been formally reviewed.
And that's the penalty?
It does seem to be splitting the baby a bit, but perhaps this is where the "romance" remains.
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
It might have been the case more than 15 years ago.
As far as I know, most of the hardware items I have covered in my "The Fifth Element" column have been considered eligible for Recommended Component List inclusion, even in the absence of a follow-up.
JM
> It might have been the case more than 15 years ago.
Never was the case. From its inception in Issue No.5 (May/June 1963),
"Recommended Components" is concerned with how a product sounds, whether
covered in a full review or in a regular column.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
How does that square with JA's editorial vision on measurements then?
It seems inconsistent to apply measurements to some and not others depending upon which location in the magazine they appear, doesn't it?
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
My favorite Political Science joke:
Q.: What's the difference between Perception and Reality?
A.: Reality, you can change.
In my more than 35 years of reading Stereophile, I think I can recall one headphone that had measurements published on it, but that could have been actually measurements of some associated effects processor and not earcup measurements. OK: NO headphone measurements!
I cannot recall Stereophile ever publishing measurements on a phono cartridge or turntable made by John Atkinson (with the advent of affordable personal computer vinyl-equipment testing software, MF has begun publishing screenshots of some measurements, but not consistently for all such components, and that is just one writer's doing that for his column and those measurements are not "official" in the sense of speaking for the whole magazine).
I cannot recall "official" measurements on surround-sound processors, but some graphs have appeared in Kal's column.
It is possible to make arguably meaningful measurements of audio cables--AFAIK Stereophile has never done so.
So, I think that the reality is that there is a huge amount of stuff written about in Stereophile that never gets measured and most people don't notice because they have never seen such measurements and so they don't miss them.
You do raise a valid point that the division of the editorial staff between columnists and reviewers can result in episodes of inconsistency, strictly speaking. My approach long has been that when I encounter a piece of gear that I think is worth the trouble, I ask John Atkinson if he can find the time to measure it. This past week he measured Wilson Benesch's second-generation entry-level speaker, the Square One v.2. Items that I was the first to write about that later received extensive follow-ups or even from-scratch full reviews by others have included DAC/HPAs from Benchmark and Grace Design; darTZeel's NHB-108 power amplifier, Bricasti's M1 DAC, and the B-1 and K-1 loudspeakers from Vivid Audio.
In contrast to how I have handled things, I think it is fair to say that Sam Tellig tended not to make his fave raves available for second opinions, a streak that was disrupted when his Class A+ Digital Processor rating for a budget DAC from Musical Fidelity was made provisional and then upon measurement and listening, that rating was downgraded.
I am not bent out of shape at the idea of a Magneplanar loudspeaker's receiving coverage and not full measurements--in just the same way that I don't think that my praise of Audio-Technica's M50 headphones was inherently suspect just because they received a place in the RCL with no other writer having heard them and no measurements made. More than one AA poster has thanked me for that recommendation. If people need measurements on the A-T M50, they are available elsewhere. And panel speakers are sufficiently sui generis that I think that how the speakers are actually set up in one's room is far more important than QUASI-anechoic measurements ever could be.
I hope this helps.
JM
Speaking of course only for myself.
Thank you very much for responding.
And just to be clear, I didn't wish to argue over the relative merits of measurement vs not - but rather was just wondering what the editorial policy is vis a vis measurements and how that squared with JA's statements from:
http://www.stereophile.com/content/god-lives-details
It seems that if it's a review, and depending on the type of equipment getting that review, there will be measurements. But if it appears in a column, that is not equal to a review and isn't subjected to measurements.
However, all are eligible for Recommended regardless.
Question though - are the columnists and what/how they cover treated as more independent entities apart from the review portions of the magazine?
Is there an over arching editorial vision or mission statement that is wound through the whole?
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
> It seems that if it's a review, and depending on the type of equipment
> getting that review, there will be measurements. But if it appears in a
> column, that is not equal to a review and isn't subjected to measurements.
That is correct, with the exception I occasionally make when a product
reviewed in a regular column appears to have issues that require further
investigation.
> However, all are eligible for Recommended regardless.
That is also correct, as a review in one of Stereophile's regular columns
is equivalent to a full review both in other magazines and in Stereophile
before I implemented the policy of including measurements in our full
reviews a quarter century ago.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
I see your Four Goals as honorable and worthwhile.
Do you really feel as far away from goal #4 as ever? Do you envision some day publishing extended thoughts on that?
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
> Do you really feel as far away from goal #4 as ever?
You are referring to what I wrote in the essay linked below: "build up a
measurement database that will eventually reveal correlations between
what is heard and what is measured."
> Do you envision some day publishing extended thoughts on that?
There are some broad correlations, yes, but nothing that I feel confident
enough to publish. But from my 2011 Richard Heyser Memorial lecture to
the Audio Engineering Society, said only half tongue-in-cheek: "if you
want to make and play back recordings that people will prefer, you use
spaced omni mikes to capture the sound at at least 176.4kHz, and play it
back through an NOS DAC, a zero- or low-negative-feedback amplifier with
very low static distortion below 1W and primarily second-harmonic
distortion at higher powers, driving large panel speakers via exotic cables."
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Yes, that's the one I was referring to.
That's some good advice..and as an Apogee owner I am inclined to agree.
Thanks - Good luck and Godspeed in the pursuit.
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
Thank you very much for responding.
And just to be clear, I didn't wish to argue over the relative merits of measurement vs not - but rather was just wondering what the editorial policy is vis a vis measurements and how that squared with JA's statements from:
http://www.stereophile.com/content/god-lives-details
It seems that if it's a review, and depending on the type of equipment getting that review, there will be measurements. But if it appears in a column, that is not equal to a review and isn't subjected to measurements.
However, all are eligible for Recommended regardless.
Question though - are the columnists and what/how they cover treated as more independent entities apart from the review portions of the magazine?
Is there an over arching editorial vision or mission statement that is wound through the whole?
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
But seriously...
Speaking only for myself, and as I understand things, columnists are given a wide latitude to request equipment for evaluation for possible inclusion in a future column, equipment that might not meet Stereophile's normal criteria.
I think that in my experience the riskiest such move I ever made was to request darTZee's NHB-108 before they had a US importer. In the event, the NHB-108 turned out to be not only the sweetest-sounding solid-state amp I have ever heard, it turned out to be a real product from a real company, and was later reviewed and tested.
As I understand it, while reviewers may suggest equipment to be reviewed, it is John Atkinson who assigns gear for review. Which only makes sense. He has to be able to make sure that there is an absolutely fetching mix of reviews in any given issue, and he has to be able to schedule his time dedicated to measurements.
Beyond those pragmatic concerns, I think that columnists in general write from a more personal perspective while reviewers write from a more objective perspective, but that might be overstating things. A review has to include subjective reactions, and a column has to impart objective data points that are relevant to a reader's deciding whether something is worth further pursuit.
And just to tweak your restatement of what I said above, column coverage does not necessarily involve measurements, but in certain cases, there may be a measurements Follow-up. Recent examples from my column include the Lindell AMPX Class A power amp and a couple of ATC loudspeakers.
In rare cases, something that I write about will turn out to merit a review and not just measurement, so the readers get the benefit of more than one complete perspective on an important product, examples being Vivid's B-1 loudspeaker and Bricasti's M1 DAC.
Ciao,
john
It's always nice to get a flavor for the mechanisms behind the curtain as to how things are structured.
I'm still not 100% on the editorial policy regarding when a component does or does't merit a visit to the test bench. But it sounds like there is a fair degree of latitude given in that regard.
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
JA once tersely remarked in print that I had not "suggested" that he listen to the Bricasti DAC; I had ORDERED him to.
OK, so what if I did?
It ended up on the cover of the issue that his review of it ran in, didnn't?
jm
Maybe it's because recommendations are based primarily on how something sounds rather than how it measures. For me, the measurements are just mildly interesting icing on top of the reviews, which focus entirely on sound and ease of use. I get that you can usually tell how something sounds by how it measures, but how it sounds is always, without exception, the bottom line.
But I am just saying, shouldn't there be some editorial consistency in that regard?
They are not treating all manufacturers the same where one can appear in one space and not receive measurements and one can appear in the other and be subjected to them.
Experience is a dim lamp, which only lights the one who bears it.
--Celine
It's not a review , it's an infomercial , figure it as such and all is well.
how it sounds is always, without exception, the bottom line.- Jeffery Lee
Who determines this, the reviewer ? IMO, both are reviews, one objective the other subjective, the combination is necessary in forming an opinion...
Regards...
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