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Speaker Asylum General speaker questions for audio and home theater. |
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Speaker Asylum General speaker questions for audio and home theater. |
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In Reply to: SPL, rated power, and sensitivity question posted by psn on January 9, 2022 at 19:07:38:
Particularly for rock/pop music, I don't buy the into the premise that there is a 25 dB range between average volume and instantaneous peaks on recordings.
As noted in another recent post I made, I spent a number of years converting over 1,000 LPs from vinyl to digital using Adobe Audition. This program gives a lot of information concerning average and peak levels. I can't think of a single recording I converted, including a lot of classical, where the average playback level allowed for 25 dB peaks, whether "instantaneous" or just "ordinary" peaks.
Particularly with digital, there is a maximum level that can be recorded. If the live musicians strike a peak louder than that max recorded level, it is either clipped by the recording itself, or is dynamically compressed by a limiter circuit or software algorithm. Even with LPs, the vast majority of them were originally recorded on open reel tape which has a very well defined max record level. And, with both analog tape and LPs, the more limited dynamic range means that is the average level is set too low, you are introducing more of the background noise of tape hiss and vinyl clicks and pops into the music.
Using the volume level bars on Audition, most of the recordings I've seen have an average level that is only 3 to 6 dB down from 0. There may be a few more dB of headroom above 0, but thinking there is 25 dB of range above average is in the territory of fertile imagination.
One observation, a lot of people forget that the dynamic range of any recording includes a lot of portions that are =below= the average level, even if it is only for the fade in/out of a pop recording. So, yes, an LP recording can have 50, 60 dB or more of dynamic range (and digital more than that) but the vast majority of range exists =below= the average playback level, not above.
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Follow Ups
- RE: SPL, rated power, and sensitivity question - mlsstl 11:54:41 01/11/22 (0)
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