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Phrased another way:"The sound quality at ONE SWEET SPOT is all that matters to most two-channel audio system owners."
I would like to find out if that's a true statement. Is the sound quality in ONE SWEET SPOT all that matters to you?
Thanks,
Duke
Follow Ups:
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First of all, thank you to all who participated. I appreciate your time and the thought you put into it.Since most people wrote comments, I could see that there were more divisions of opinion than the two the poll allowed for. Since this is all informal anyway, I decided to classify the responses into three rather than two categories because that made more sense to me given the additional information available in the comments made.
Category One - The one sweet spot is where it's at: Ten votes fit into this category. I think Acres Verde's comment was excellent, so in case anyone missed it here it is again:
"It is more important for me to have one place where everything is just optimally locked in than any other scenario which would constitute compromise for the sake of a broader, more stable, but generally more diffuse soundfield."
Category Two - The one sweet spot is preferred, but the sound quality in other areas is still important: Ten votes fit this descripton. Musetap summed it up well for this group:
"For "critical" listening the sweet spot is best, but certainly NOT all that matters to me, not by a long shot."
Category Three - One sweet spot not favored over other locations; or many sweet spots; or one very large sweet spot: Nine votes in this category. I'll use Drew Eckert's comment:
"Properly setup good speakers lack a sweet spot for tonal correctness, and image correctly over an area."
Bob Rex noted that there is often a row of "sweet spots" along the centerline of the room were the speakers & listener form an isosocles triange. This has been my experience as well, and I've noticed that my chosen "sweet spot" is usually farther back along this centerline than that which most people would choose.
Just for the record, I didn't vote - but my vote would have landed in the second category.
Duke
To deviously attempt to negate my obvious assertion that the stereo sweet spot is most important for two-channel audiophiles, you devised a slanted biased almost evil question that gave two EXTREME choices for the answer:
-- Either the sweet spot is ALL that matters, or it is not.This biased writing style is just like G. W. Bush blathering: "Either you support me, or you support our enemy!"
Well the sweet spot is VERY important for me (90%) but even I couldn't literally say I ONLY care about the sweet spot! So to be literal when answering your slanted biased devious so-called polling question, even I would have to say no to the question (because I'm at the 90% sweet spot / 10% other seats level, not at 100% sweet spot!!!).
Since the mid-1960's when stereo showed up, audiophiles who have been interested in improving the sound quality of their stereos realized that they had to sit equal distances from the two speakers to hear the correct stereo image. Usually only one listener could hear the optimum stereo image at a time.
If the seats were located far from the speakers, two side-by-side seats could fit into that stereo sweet spot, even though each listeners' ears were not exactly equal distances from the speakers. Close enough for government work.
While audiophiles may sometimes do other things while listening, and sometimes sit away from the sweet spot, WHEN they are focused on sound quality, either for themselves or demonstrating the stereo to a friend, they make sure the listener sits with his ears equal distances from the speakers, or darn close to that!
That's the sweetest spot for every two-channel stereo.
When audiophiles buy new components, or tweak their systems, they do so to improve the sound quality at the best seat in their house -- the sweet spot.
It may not be the only seat they are concerned about -- there may be another seat right next to it so both are in the sweet spot.
If the speakers are quite far away, perhaps three people on a couch will all fit into the sweet spot, although I've only experienced this once in 40 years as an audiophile.
It would be a bizarre two-channel audiophile who optimizes his system for a seat that is not equal distances from the two speakers. Bizarre because optimizing the sound quality for a seat outside of the two-channel (equal, or close to equal, distances from both speakers) sweet spot is an oxymoron.
It would be rather interesting to find a two-channel audiophile who has spent $1000's on expensive wires ... yet for serious listening usually does not sit with his ears equal distances from his two stereo speakers. You perhaps?
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
I think that fits the preference breakdown pretty wellI have customers that couldn't care *less* what the sound is like out of the sweetspot
I have customers that would like to have the sound be at least decent out of the sweetspot
I have customers that are annoyed that they have to sit in the sweetspot
Women, especially, fall into category 3 and don't understand the point of a speaker that only sounds good in one spot.
What is amazing to me is how the last 5-10dB or so of dispersion is critical. I have speakers that are down less than 5B off axis and they have a *dramatically* bigger sweetspot than those that are down only a few dB more. I can understand now what people see in omnidirectional speakers if and when they can give them the room they need.
Some people reading my posts (47.5%) just don't get my (over-the-top) humor, which takes me so long to create (about five minutes) in posts that readers so often print as hard copies (for their birdcages) and then get in violent arguments with me over (life or death) issues such as:
(1) How long it takes speakers to break-in
(2) Whether it is possible to imagine two components sound different; and
(3) Whether the bass heard in the two-channel sweet spot is more important than the bass that would be heard elsewhere in the room if anyone happened to sit there ... (or in the next room, oh so important to Duke because he evaluates speaker sound quality from the next room ... which must look pretty strange at audio stores!)Well That's all folks!
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
You are insinuating that I made some claim about people "optimiz[ing] sound quality for a non-sweet-spot seat".Argue against what I said, not what I didn't say.
Duke
Ba-Da-BoomIt only took me two days to come up with that clever response!
That's a new record for me!
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
...that the language you are now whining about is your very own?"The sound quality at ONE SWEET SPOT is all that matters to most two-channel audio system owners." - Richard BassNut Greene, 4-7-07, http://www.audioasylum.com/audio/speakers/messages/245601.html
"Two channel audio has one sweet spot" - Richard BassNut Greene, 4-12-07, http://www.audioasylum.com/audio/speakers/messages/245996.html
The more you object to the wording in my poll, the more you are objecting to YOUR OWN WORDS.
I put your claims to the test using your own language. The results speak for themsleves.
Also, did you read the comments people wrote? Very few people simply agreed or disagreed - most explained their exact position. So whether or not you like my poll, the responses are quite useful.
Duke
You seem to be a rare two-channel audiophile who doesn't agree.That would make you WRONG with a capital W.
The sweet spot is where audiophiles sit when they want the highest sound quality from their two channel stereo system.
It's possible that two chairs side by side will fit into the sweet spot for some stereos.
I once sat on a three-man wide couch located very far from the speakers where the left and right seats sounded just as good as the center seat. That was a rare three-seat sweet spot.
I said the sound quality at one sweet spot is all that matters to most two-channel audio system owners. That statement was not strong enough -- most can mean 51%. If I could, I would re-write my sentence to say:
"When high quality sound is the primary concern, a large majority of two-channel stereo owners judge sound quality while sitting in their "sweet spot", rather than from other room locations,
... or from an adjoining room, like you!Therefore the bass frequency response in a relatively small sweet spot area is considerably more important than the quite different bass frequency response elsewhere in a room.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
Richard BN Greene, 4-16-2007 (to Duke): "Two channel stereo sounds best when the left ear to left speaker distance equals the right ear to right speaker distance. You seem to be a rare two-channel audiophile who doesn't agree. That would make you WRONG with a capital W."Duke, 4-15-2007: "Bob Rex noted that there is often a row of "sweet spots" along the centerline of the room were the speakers & listener form an isosocles triange. This has been my experience as well, and I've noticed that my chosen "sweet spot" is usually farther back along this centerline than that which most people would choose."
Argue against what I said, not what I didn't say.
You persist in making "straw man" arguments. This is a common internet tactic wherein a person attributes an extreme and/or ridiculous statement to his opponent, and then argues against that statement. It usually works well, unless the opponent calls him on it and points out that at best his argument is based on a fallacy, and at worst (if he realizes what he's doing) he is being dishonest.
This is the last time I give you the benefit of the doubt on this subject. Here, click on the link below and read up on the "straw man" fallacy. Learn to recognize it in yourself and in others.
Regarding your other statement, I often suggest listening from another room as a quick and effective way to evalutate the power response, or reverberant field response, of a loudspeaker system. This also is good for evaluating system dynamic contrast. It is not the only listening test I advocate. No point in doing this test unless the speaker sounds good from the sweet spot, but suppose you have several speakers that sound good from the sweet spot. Listening from another room will give you additional useful information that can help predict which speaker is the least likely to become fatiguing long-term. You don't alway have the hours necessary to find out at what point listening fatigue sets in. Also, in case you missed the poll, many people do care very much about how their speakers sound from outside the traditional sweet spot.
Once again, you misrepresented my position by making it sound like listening from another room is the only way I judge sound quality. It is one of several tests I use.
Please stick to arguing against what my position really is. And if you don't know what my position really is, just ask me.
Thanks,
Duke
Only to find out you are a very strange audiophile who DOES judge speakers by how they sound from another room!So here I am arguing that the bass quality in the sweet spot is much more important to a two-channel stereo owner than the bass in other room areas ... with a guy who judges speakers by how they sound from the next room!
You worded your poll so that ONLY an audiophile with absolutely zero percent concern about sound quality at non-sweet-spot locations could answer "YES".
Since two-channel audio system owners sometimes have people listen from non-sweet spot locations, it would make sense that they apply at least a little attention to those alternative seats.
The sweet spot seat(s) location is still most important for two-channel audio quality.
And you can't sit behind someone in the sweet spot and still get the same high sound quality sound he hears ... unless he is a midget.
I give up! You are judging speaker quality from the next room ... while I argue about how important the sweet spot is for two-channel stereo sound quality.
Do you judge concerts from the street outside the theater?
Saves money on tickets.
Or do you just love to argue.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
I think listening from another room makes it *far* easier to answer the most important questions that many people never really ask when auditioning.1. Is the sound natural?
2. Is the sound realistic?Many subjectively "good sounding" speakers don't sound anything like a real instrument playing in the next room, but really accurate/transparent ones do.
I don't see how Duke is the one being argumentative here. Sounds like he's being reasonable to me.
Thanks for letting me know you use it too.I've heard it called the L.I.A.R. test - stands for "listening in another room".
When giving a demo to a customer, I usually ask them to step into an adjacent room specifically so I can let them hear the reverberant sound thusly isolated. I explain why this test is a good predictor of long-term listening enjoyment, as outlined in my "not a good analogy" reply to Richard. No it's not the only thing that matters, but in my experience it's rare to find a speaker that sounds wrong from the next room but is still highly enjoyable long-term. I can only think of one offhand.
Duke
Unless you often listen to speakers from another room away from the primary listening room.Otherwise it is most likely a complete waste of time to audition speakers from a room that does not contain the speakers when you could have used the same time to listen from the primary listening room!
While I would guess if speaker A sounded better than speaker B in the primary listening room, then it's likely that speaker A would still sound better than speaker B when you listened from another room, but who cares?
Some audiophiles are pretty strange when it comes to logical thinking.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
Weight may or may not have anything to do with the sound quality. Listening in another room is throwing a spotlight on one of the more initially elusive but long-term significant factors.A speaker can sound initially impressive from the sweet spot but can become fatiguing over time. I can cite studies that show a correlation between radiation pattern and long-term listener preference. Briefly, a speaker with an irregular power response (which typically arises from radiation pattern issues) is more likely to generate listening fatigue over time.
Let me explain one reason why this can happen. The ear/brain system is constantly analyzing incoming sounds to see if they are new sounds or reflections of a recent sound (recent meaning like within the last 40 millisconds). The ear looks primarily at the spectral balance when deciding whether it's a new sound or an old one. With naturally-occuring sounds, the spectral balance of the reflections is very similar to that of the first-arrival sound. With loudspeakers, whose directional characteristics change with frequency, the spectral balance of the reverberant energy usually starts out skewed - there's more reverberant energy at frequencies where the radiation pattern is wide and less where the radiation pattern is narrow. The ear/brain system has to work harder to correctly classify these spectrally-skewed reflections, and over time the result can be a headache. I'm not saying this is the one and only source of listening fatigue, but I believe it's a fairly significant one in many cases.
Listening from another room is a quick way to hear what's going on with the reverberant field, and the reverberant field matters because most of the sound that reaches your ears in a normal home listening setup is reverberant sound. Note that live voices and instruments sound realistic from the next room, but few speakers do. If we're looking for speakers that do a good job of recreating a live music event, generating a natural-sounding reverberant field is part of that. Note that the choice is not between speakers that do or do not generate reverberant field energy - the choice is between speakers that do or do not get it right.
The little NHT 3-way speakers John Ashman believes in use a very intelligent spacing of driver diameters and crossover frequencies to minimize the spectral discrepancy between the direct and reverberant energy. I would bet that, if these speakers sound good from the next room (and since John uses that test I'm sure they do), they are also very non-fatiguing to listen to long-term. I have gone a different route in my own designs, but if I wasn't playing around other radiation pattern control techniques I'd be working on 3-ways or 4-ways philosophically very similar to the little NHTs.
And as John noted, there's something special about a speaker that can recreate the illusion of live music without any help from imaging and soundstaging. Nothing against imaging of course, but some people are less interested in where the musicians are on the stage than in why they are on the stage.
Duke
It's not THE way of judging a speaker, but it does give you an insight. I don't know why, but once you can't see the speaker and you've divorced yourself a bit from the room, the only question you can really ask yourself is "does it *sound* like someone's playing live or just a reproduction?" It takes imaging out of the question and substitutes tonality/reality. Don't know why that's such a hard concept. It's not an audiophile trick, it's a music lover's trick.
Listen to one speaker playng mono IN your listening room if you want to judge amplitude response without the distraction and comb filter cancellations from two stereo speakers.Old audiophile trick.
The DIY Altec Lansing Valancia "monster speakers" I built in 1971 sounded better from other rooms -- unfortunately sounded not so great while listening in the same room (my 150 square foot teenager bedroom.)
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
Boy do you need a course in statistics :-)Next thing you know, you'll be trying a poll to see if most people listen to music on speakers (as opposed to non-music on speakers or music off speakers, i.e. live) :-)))
David Aiken
...five out of four people have trouble with math.Duke
…once asked her class what statistics had in common with the bikini.After what I assume was probably a reasonable pause for stunned silence, he told them "what the reveal is interesting, what they conceal is vital". A very valuable lesson that frequently informs my assessment of statistically based claims.
I think most people can do arithmetic, ie the basic tasks of adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing, reasonably well by which I mean well enough for the normal activities of life. Where the problems start is when they start to reason with numbers, to read meaning into them, or engage in activities where numbers are descriptive in ways other than the descriptive use of numberical information like "36-24-36". You have to learn some things over and above arithmetic to understand what statistical measures and some of the other things done with numbers mean , and that's where the level of education in the general population starts to fall off.
David Aiken
I know that you like to build speakers. I am wondering what you were hoping to learn from an informal poll? Will it change your design criteria? It's none of my buisiness, just currious.Or was it just for fun? That's cool too.
Inquiring minds . . . .
I guess one conclusion might be that audiophiles are fairly diverse in their listening styles, but it's not haphazard. We each like what we like for very good reasons.The catalyst for the poll was a battle of wits that had degenerated into a war of attrition - to see who would develop carpal tunnel first. My sparring partner had made some claims about the priority audiophiles placed on the sweet spot, and I decided to find out if audiophiles agreed with him or not. The quotes in my original post were his words, which he subsequently objected to as being "too strong" and therefore likely to bias the poll. But I think the comments people wrote made it clear what their opinions were, which was much more useful than a simple "agree" or "disagree".
Duke
I came in way too late to to the game, as usual.I'm always currious to hear what people are learning when they are designing their own stuff. That's why I thought I would ask. But it's just a FYI poll. Got it.
Btw, I agree with your conclusion : a diverse listening style, but not haphazard.
Thanks Duke!
Another parameter that could enter here is the degree of "critical listening" - 99% of my listening is in the sweet spot but I am often reading while listening (although I wouldn't call it 'background music')so my attention might waver between what I am reading and the music; although I am always aware of the music I only put my full continuous attention on it for critical listening about half the time. One might ask what's the point of being in the sweet spot if you are not fully involved with the music and doing nothing except listening? I guess it comes down to how good a multi-tasker you are.
Yes, the sound in the sweet spot for my speakers is better than out of it but 45%, at most, of my listening is tied to that sweet spot. To me bad speakers sound bad whether you are in the sweet or not and most good speakers still sound reasonably good outside of the sweet spot.
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NO.The sweet spot is great and all...like looking at the detail in a great painting... but how loudspeakers work with the room, how they sound from another room, down the street and sometimes even how they are perceived to sound while your sitting at your desk at work and missing them.. all that matters a lot.. at least to me.
and like a painting.. a loudspeakers proportions, aesthetic, "color" and.. it's "context" are all factors in my enjoyment of them... take vintage theater speakers.. alec, klangfilm etc.. what they are lends to the enjoyment of them..
perfect sound does in no way equal enjoyment..
best example i can think of.. listening to Vin Scully call a Dodger game from old radio...
anyhow.. my 2 cents.
I have among other things a pair of old Ohm walshes i got at the thrift shop for 50 dollars... and no matter how much money i plunk down on other speakers.. i still come back and enjoy these so much..
needless to say.. they are not a sweetspot speaker.. but they set a stage thats visible from wherever i am at in the house.listening to them right now in fact.. and Norman Blakes "The Fields of November"... and it seems perfect from a completely different room.
Yes two channel has one sweet spot.Yes, once I have identified the sweet spot, I tune, modify, or adjust the system for best results in that spot.
Yes, it is hard for me to ignore the sweet spot and pretend that it doesn't exist. I know that it is there.
Yes, I like to be there when I can.
But no, the quality of sound in the sweet spot is not ALL that matters. That makes it seem like if I don't sit in the sweet spot, then I can't listen to music at all. That's a little too extreme for me.Life is too short for that.
Just reading the header...I'd say one sweet spot that was as large as possible. But when you phrase it another way you open up a can of worms.Think of a live musical event that caused you to sit comatose in rapt attention. Then compare that with one that made it impossible to stay in your seat.
Now if that girl singing A cappella makes the hairs stand up on the back of your neck, and that does it for you, then maybe you like the sweet spot/full range driver/set thing. But if you want music to make you boogie and get up and move maybe some controlled directivity is in order?
Russ
While there was an ulterior motive to my poll, it was less noble.Richard BassNut Greene and I had been fighting to the death over semantic nuance in the secret life of farm animals, when he made a couple of statements (with which I disagreed) that looked to me like they could be proven or disproven by a simple poll.
Shortly after I posted the poll, I saw on the back-page thread that Richard had proposed we bury our hatchets. So we each took one last mighty swing and buried our hatchets as deeply as possible in one another's skulls, then hitch-hiked back to civilization where my poll was cooking along.
I think some excellent comments have been made by many of the respondents. And I have a better appreciation of our diversity in listening styles, and more respect for styles dissimilar to my own.
Now the radiation pattern issue is another can of worms. Frankly I see benefits to most listening styles from controlled directivity, obviously with a wide pattern better suiting some styles and a narrow pattern others - but then maybe I'm like the guy whose only tool is a hammer so to him everything looks like a nail.
Duke
It is the American way. However records reflect that you not in debt enough; but if you could manage to fall behind in your payments that would qualify you immediately!Attempting to win an argument or prove a technical point with RBG is an act in futility. Subterfuge will be cast in the way of your attempts to further understand what should be the simple act of audio reproduction in our homes. So despite your comments about hatchet burying and such I truly feel your motives are nobler. I actually think you care about how others perceive sound quality and the methodology used to gauge such. I often use examples to illustrate my point and I will do so again.
Say you have a perspective customer. So of course you sit him in the sweet spot. You want him to hear the best and ideally be impressed. But if he is impressed, you are likely to have him move about and notice that with “these speakers” the sweet spot doesn’t collapse until he is outside certain wide boundaries in the left-right/front-back plane. Boundaries that are far more lenient than “normal” speakers allow
Now I don’t wish to put words in your mouth and I may be entirely wrong. If I am, please set me straight for the good of all. But I see what your designs are like and I know what I hear. One can now build speakers, set your friends up on a couch almost as wide as the speakers are apart, toe the speakers in so that they cross a little before the middle of the couch and first wall reflections are well behind the listeners, and hear little difference no matter where you are seated.
That said I can’t quite get it to beat the best of the best sweet spot stuff achieved when that special synergy exists between source/amp/speaker. I reckon I need some help. Or maybe some combos sound better than what is “real”???
Russ
Any setup has many sweet spots and all of them sound different. At different times one may prefer one over another. Also not everyone will agree on what is the 'best' sweet spot for any given room/listening position/setup combinationDo you think there's only one sweet spot in a concert hall? It's the same question, really, and that is "Do you think that the sound is good only in one particular spot and that it's impossible for you ever to enjoy it as much in any other spot in the room?"
On the other hand, while there is more than one sweet spot, there are also quite a few 'sour spots'. All spots in the room are definitely not sweet, and some are definitely sour all of the time :-)
David Aiken
I've lived with speakers with both wide and narrow sweet spots. All things being equal, I'll take the wide sweet spot any day. Like with a pair of U-1s. ;)rw
Hey Duke,I was pondering the meat of your question just a couple of days ago. For myself, it is more important for me to have one place where everything is just optimally locked in than any other scenario which would constitute compromise for the sake of a broader, more stable, but generally more diffuse soundfield. Serious listening at my house where "audiophile sensibilities" come into play is limited to times when I'm entertaining the A-list (and I'm the only guy on it). Note, I do not consider audio club to be under the banner of "serious listening". I'm sure I don't have to explain why.
I know there is a cult following for MBL and Mirage and other omnipolar/bipolar designs but I just don't get it. I want to be able to close my eyes and have the whole musical panorama unfold in proper context and detail before me. In my experience, this can only be achieved in a cozy, defined area. Just my $.02 worth.
Better answers are:(1) Strongly agree
(2) Agree
(3) Not sure
(4) Disagree
(5) Strongly disagreeYour question "The sound quality at ONE SWEET SPOT is all that matters to most two-channel audio system owners." states too strong a position ("all that matters") ... so even if the sound quality heard at his sweet spot seat was very important to an audiophile, that doesn't mean it is "all that matters" to him.
I have written some polls in the past, before I retired, and know that poll question wording can bias answers.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
Richard,Both of my quotes are word-for-word from you, from our discussion that's now on the back page. Since it was a point you had brought up several times and obviously worded in strong language, I wanted to see if it was true - I wanted to see if you were accurately representing two-channel owners. This was among the few things you and I disagreed on that could be tested.
And, we have a pretty good spread of responses here - so I think the poll question is relevant.
Since most of the respondents elaborated on their answers, there is no need to have a multiple-choice poll. For some the sweet spot is pretty much all that matters, just as you claimed. But for just about as many others, it's the most important but certianly not the only thing that matters; and for a few it doesn't stand out as significantly more important than the sound elsewhere. These latter two cases run counter to what you claimed.
But totally apart from you or me proving or disproving statements, I think it's interesting to get an idea of what others think on the subject.
Frankly I expected the results to be skewed heaviliy in favor of "disagree", and they're not. So while maybe you weren't as right as you thought, obviously you weren't as wrong as I thought. The truth lies somewhere in between our extremes - not for the first and probably not for the last time.
Duke
People who do not listen often in the sweet spot can be disregarded as they are doing other things.People who feel the sweet spot is very (80%) important but give a little consideration (20%) to other seats may answer no to your question because the sweet spot isn't the ONLY location important to them. That's how you worded the question. Taking your question literally I would say my sweet spot isn't the ONLY location important to me although it's weighted 90% for my sound quality evaluations, measurements and equalization settings.
We can't even agree on how to ask a question without bias!
Why don't you ask how many two channel listeners have subwoofers located to their sides or behind them?
In our prior free-for-all, er "debate", I regret using the word "clueless", but on the other hand I'm proud I never compared any of your posts with farm animal excrement, or compared your intelligence with G. W. Bush, or compared your poisonality with Hitler. By my standards**, I rank three out of a possible four in this "Polite Poster Test"!
R. BassNut Greene
** What standards?
Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
...those whose listening style is different from my own, and that's the truth.Overall, I think we kept it pretty clean all things considered in our knife fight back there - though we did trade lunch meat a time or two.
Balony sandwich, anyone?
Duke
You are both rather knowledgeable so I wouldn't get worked up over anything. We all have our own tastes and thoughts and possibly wish others to enjoy music as much as we do as well as gain knowledge from said others' experience. Ones own experiences, sometimes painful when viewed after the fact, can really steer their opinions regardless of how well that fits into another's world.Richard is pretty good when it comes to bass issues and it helped me out when I had some in my new home. One odd note; When I read "Richard Bass Nut Greene", I seem to always read it as "Richard Brass Nut Greene". I wonder why that is? Regardless, he is a useful member here who most likely has seem some serious bass issues in folks rooms.
I hear that Duke's speakers sound very nice. Our design mantras overlap more than they differ and I wish him the best.
Bill
Hi Bill,The subject of our discussion is deep into Richard's territory: bass and the nuts who care about it. He and I disagree about an approach that I suggest. I agree with you that he knows a great deal about the subject, and up until recently my paradigm for optimium subwoofer configuration was very similar to his.
Duke
ESLs if that were all that mattered.
By definition, for stereo to work "properly" you need a position at which signals from both speakers arrive at the same time. This basically describes an isocolese triangle with the listener sitting somewhere on a line described by the perpendicular to the centerline of the base of the triangle. So the "sweet spot" can be anywhere on that line. Therefore, front to back, there can be many sweet spots, but right to left there is only one.Now, once you throw the room and decor into the equation, all bets are off.
have good sound in more than just the sweet spot.Some systems I have owned[ heard] sound like a giant headphone rig but lack the freedom of beening able to move your head like it needs to be locked in a vise.Why should one suffer so? realy no need to.
having spent the better part of a year tweakin out crossovers-- i can honestly say, as the XO got better, the sweet spot widened significantly. i think that if you account for dispersion (or are listening to speaks with dispersion accounted for), you'll end up with WAY wider sweet spots.. if not.. woe be the listener.. i remember the earliest days and how PAINFUL that 'sweet' spot was too.. aaahh textbook crossovers.thank goodness for yer advice, amongst others like RCAfan, freddyi, GM, doc edgar, je2a3, and others.. otherwise i might NEED one of those stereotactic devices to stay in the sweet spot still, and my fillings
dve fallen out long ago...
d
There is one "sweetest" spot BUT.... I am happiest when the folks just outside of the sweet spot can get something almost as good.My wife and I listen side by side so we're both off to one side or the other and if it can't sound good there too, there's a big problem.
The next level is testing is having it sound good, albeit no real soundstage, when one is moving about the room or even [ shudder ] in the other room. There I go with the "other room" test again. :)
Bill
.......Both my main system and my HT system (which is 2 channel) has been optimized for sweet spot listening although the HT has more flexibility from the couch. The main system has a futon but has been "focused" for a center seated listener. The main system speakers have also been positioned for near field listening.Both rooms have been optimized with ASC bass traps/panels and when one is sitting in the sweet spot(s), it is very "sweet" indeed.
Who needs surround sound :-)
Cheers,
~kenster
Like some of the others responding, the sound quality in the sweet spot matters but I am rarely in it. My system planning took this into account and made me look into reverberant sound fields.
actually it matters little to me. I would say though, that my system sounds better when I'm in the sweet spot. I'm just not there very often.
If we were real particular we'd have to say the coffee table is in the sweetest spot, but we like to lay on couches when listening and don't mind being a little off-center. Pics in gallery if needed.Cheers
You can have whatever kind of sound field you prefer by speaker type selection and set up.I have 'graduated' from elecrostats back to dynamic floorstanding 'monitor's' and the sweet spot is where its at for me.
.
really, my room couldn't be less ideal.
---James
Wish it was wide enough for two listners sometimes.But in that sweet zone it's Heaven.
Sound Labs eliminated the head-in-a-vise issue altogether. The image changes very little across a four person wide listening area.rw
for my Acoustat X were $1,800. SL now are $18,000-
Life's not fair.
but that was 1977. Adjust for inflation and $1800 becomes $6500. There is a used pair of M-1s on the SL website now for around nine. I bought my U-1s used for about 2/3s list. And they had freshly refurbished cores and newly hot rodded backplates.The differences are substantial.
rw
.
Will they be my last speakers? Most likely. I've yet to hear any speakers that offer their levels of purity and coherence. Rugged as the Acoustats? No. That's not to say they are problematic though. But like women, they do need attention. Unlike the Acoustats, however, you will find that setting bias is a regular activity. The stators are run at far higher voltages and for best performance, you need to find the optimal settings.Dr. West has continued to improve the overall reliability of the product. Development of the PX (professional series) has resulted in some changes to the core design to make them more rugged. It certainly is a bonus that the company is most alive and well for any servicing need.
I remain quite an Acoustat fan. Had four different pairs over a period of twenty eight years. The SLs are just plain better in every respect. More extension at both ends. Better defined and more solid image. More resolution. Neutral frequency response.
rw
x
With my system in our living room, and properly setup, the sweet spot is rather within a few feet on our sofa.With the current trend of Real Estate to "declutter" rooms, its been deemed essential that our system be relegated to a corner in the living room.
Funny, other than a slightly boomy midbass (speakers are dipoles), it sounds like the musicians are located in the corner of the room, with an image that sounds rather like some clubs I've played at!!! The realism is still there, just smaller!
"David! You can KILL a man with a chopstick!" -Keith Charles, Six Feet Under
Properly setup good speakers lack a sweet spot for tonal correctness, and image correctly over an area.
This is true as well, Guess thats why I still "hear" the band over in the corner!
"David! You can KILL a man with a chopstick!" -Keith Charles, Six Feet Under
If it were, I'd just have a pair of 'phones.
After Paul Klipsch developed the Klipschorns, he realized that the sweet spot was so small, he had to have a speaker right in between the two cornerhorns to make the sweet spot bigger. Cheers.
Sure, there is the sweetest spot, which on my system is pretty big, and sweet. Sometimes though, certain aspects of the music jump out and are even more noticible from other rooms of our small apartment. Listening to Matt Hamowitz' version of the Bach Cello Suites yesterday, the sweetness soared throughout our home, filled the place with lovely music.For "critical" listening the sweet spot is best, but certainly NOT all that matters to me, not by a long shot.
"I always play jazz records backwards, they sound better that way"
-Thomas Edison
With my Altec theater system, there was sweet spots all over the room. I did not need a surround with this on. Cheers.
...the size of the sweet spot can be larger or smaller depending on the system.When I want to listen to music it's to really listen to the music. I rarely have my system on for background music except for the occassional dinner music for a special meal.
Since usually I am sitting while listening one sweet spot is all i need....otherwise if I am walking around the house etc. its all just background music and sweetspots are pointless.Either way it sounds good to me.
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