I agree.. and the current level of knowledge is sufficient to lead us to what we want, even though it may not be complete.
However you mentioned every person wanting something different, and I hope you are not conflating this with psychoacoustics. Whether it does cross over into psychoacoustics, it is still a different question in my mind since there are two points of view.
Firstly, if you want natural reproduction, then the same output is needed for everyone.
On the other hand, if a person wants their own 'sound', then they can add distortion as they wish.. but it may be folly, because such distortions are usually wanted to cover up other distortions that we haven't found the cause of yet.
In my opinion if natural reproduction could be found, and that's not something I see a lot of, I feel that most people would prefer it.
Morning coffee philosophy:
Good start is to read David Griesinger and about limit of localization distance, try and listen to that in various circumstances, which leads to revelation that you are now listening a change in your own auditory system. Basically, the conscious mind, the perception of sound one is having now, is not just sound in room but filtered and proccessed before. I like to think auditory system makes sound into my reality.
Being aware of auditory system, even just a little bit, gives huge advantage to trim a sound system. For example, learning to listen the Griesinger LLD one is now able to leverage that, to understand in which state the auditory system is at. Utilize that with logic, bam, listening skill improves quite dramatically in a sense that some confusion about perceived sound is removed immediately, now there is firm foot hold to layer listening experiments and logic.
Conversely, if state of auditory system is not known, it's random, meaning that one is not aware of it, no matter which speakers in which room the perceived sound could vary jusy by state of auditory system. Opinion becomes noise as it's random. And, this makes into record making process, and to playback process, as we are all humans and share pretty much similar auditory system, and I think is the circle of confusion. But, also the common thing we all share, regardless of loudspeakers and rooms, the problem and the solution.
Learning listening skill to be able to listen changes in your own auditory system helps with it, each of us on our own. I mean it, perception of sound is not just listening speakers, or even your ears, but the mind taps outputstream of your own sound processor inside your brain, your conscious mind floats on top of it.
Reading Griesinger papers and experimenting with ithe stuff to get experience helps to get started with this, to understand how profound stuff it is, and that everyone have to do it on their own. Even if someone writes aboit this stuff, it's not enough, doesn't come with sound, you must go out there and seek to hear it and understand it.
Now, with some understanding like with the LLD it's also possible to communicate better about perceived phenomena, without too much confusion, as long as all participants in discussion know it, have some common listening skill. Without, it's mostly just noise, no one knows what auditory system state they talk about, nor can understand which the others have, or even know about the concept there might be such thing. In paper perhaps, but don't understand what it means perceptually and it's always present, always affects what we perceive. On very general level one can do without listening skill, bluetooth speaker on the beach could be just the right ticket, but seeking top performance hifi system, no, one must understand what they hear on their own for very least to be able to position a system to ones liking.
Good start is to read David Griesinger and about limit of localization distance, try and listen to that in various circumstances, which leads to revelation that you are now listening a change in your own auditory system. Basically, the conscious mind, the perception of sound one is having now, is not just sound in room but filtered and proccessed before. I like to think auditory system makes sound into my reality.
Being aware of auditory system, even just a little bit, gives huge advantage to trim a sound system. For example, learning to listen the Griesinger LLD one is now able to leverage that, to understand in which state the auditory system is at. Utilize that with logic, bam, listening skill improves quite dramatically in a sense that some confusion about perceived sound is removed immediately, now there is firm foot hold to layer listening experiments and logic.
Conversely, if state of auditory system is not known, it's random, meaning that one is not aware of it, no matter which speakers in which room the perceived sound could vary jusy by state of auditory system. Opinion becomes noise as it's random. And, this makes into record making process, and to playback process, as we are all humans and share pretty much similar auditory system, and I think is the circle of confusion. But, also the common thing we all share, regardless of loudspeakers and rooms, the problem and the solution.
Learning listening skill to be able to listen changes in your own auditory system helps with it, each of us on our own. I mean it, perception of sound is not just listening speakers, or even your ears, but the mind taps outputstream of your own sound processor inside your brain, your conscious mind floats on top of it.
Reading Griesinger papers and experimenting with ithe stuff to get experience helps to get started with this, to understand how profound stuff it is, and that everyone have to do it on their own. Even if someone writes aboit this stuff, it's not enough, doesn't come with sound, you must go out there and seek to hear it and understand it.
Now, with some understanding like with the LLD it's also possible to communicate better about perceived phenomena, without too much confusion, as long as all participants in discussion know it, have some common listening skill. Without, it's mostly just noise, no one knows what auditory system state they talk about, nor can understand which the others have, or even know about the concept there might be such thing. In paper perhaps, but don't understand what it means perceptually and it's always present, always affects what we perceive. On very general level one can do without listening skill, bluetooth speaker on the beach could be just the right ticket, but seeking top performance hifi system, no, one must understand what they hear on their own for very least to be able to position a system to ones liking.
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I find both the subject and responses of this thread to be almost dystopian as it assumes that there is reference system input which is measured by reference capable equipment which effectively represent the human ear/brain mechanisms…. neither of which are even remotely true. And this statement does you all the favor of excluding the variance of the 3D space…..for all intents an purposes, we can assume that as time tested professionals, we’ve at least got that worked out.
Keeping it brief from the input side, you folks should be aware that outboard studio gear and consoles are specifically chosen and matched per project BECAUSE of the distortion profile and colorization they add to the source. Sub-groups or entire mix buss outputs run through empty tape machines because of the character of their output transformers. While this is just a very small example of what goes into a recording, it’s important to know that even the small sample group has ZERO consistency….there’s no flow chart format here….it’s individual, artistic and almost purely subjective in its context.
And on the human side?…..woah….the variance among individual listeners is even more extreme…….I giggle out loud at home when I read posts here of folks sweating the output angle of a CD into a horn of a few degrees or a few mm of this and that when just a few mm of difference in the shape of my outer ear compared to yours will impart an even greater change to the frequency response my brain gets from yours. Add biological factors like blood pressure, age, gender, fatigue, hair style, etc………tell me again about a reference? Lol
Listen, it’s ok to prefer blue pens to black,…..and it’s ok to feel like a piece of peach pie for desert instead of crème brûlée….in as much as it’s ok to like the sounds of a Scanspeak dome midrange instead of an Accutron ceramic cone midrange…….and for those that can afford both?….I highly recommend it………and don’t forget the ice cream!!!!
Keeping it brief from the input side, you folks should be aware that outboard studio gear and consoles are specifically chosen and matched per project BECAUSE of the distortion profile and colorization they add to the source. Sub-groups or entire mix buss outputs run through empty tape machines because of the character of their output transformers. While this is just a very small example of what goes into a recording, it’s important to know that even the small sample group has ZERO consistency….there’s no flow chart format here….it’s individual, artistic and almost purely subjective in its context.
And on the human side?…..woah….the variance among individual listeners is even more extreme…….I giggle out loud at home when I read posts here of folks sweating the output angle of a CD into a horn of a few degrees or a few mm of this and that when just a few mm of difference in the shape of my outer ear compared to yours will impart an even greater change to the frequency response my brain gets from yours. Add biological factors like blood pressure, age, gender, fatigue, hair style, etc………tell me again about a reference? Lol
Listen, it’s ok to prefer blue pens to black,…..and it’s ok to feel like a piece of peach pie for desert instead of crème brûlée….in as much as it’s ok to like the sounds of a Scanspeak dome midrange instead of an Accutron ceramic cone midrange…….and for those that can afford both?….I highly recommend it………and don’t forget the ice cream!!!!
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If you’re crossover points are 400 and 3k, assuming a 2nd order filter or less, for the $$$ you’re not going to do any better than this
https://www.parts-express.com/B-C-8PE21-8-Midrange-Speaker-294-652?quantity=1
a first order highpass electrical starting at 1.5 mounted in a reasonable enclosure gives you a table top performance from 400-3k. Your high pass is only limited to your output level needs tailored to your alignment. Pair this up with a capable 15” woofer and it just doesn’t get any better……well…..maybe vertical pair of 12’s if you don’t mind the whole coffin in the room thing.
High efficiency, rediculously low HD and zero power compression when it matters (output not capable of destroying the sense and virtue you’re attempting to exalt). Yes….there’s a trade off…….you’ll need to sit back a bit to let the drivers sum in the high frequency range and you’ll need to dampen out early reflections a bit……or use a horn on the tweeter to keep directivity constant…..no free lunch. But take the above driver in your passband and listen to it in free air?…..you won’t find another that will sound as good. Head to head with a dome midrange of closed back cone?……level the playing field and use a back cup to achieve the proper Q……again, this driver wins….handily. Oh…..it ain’t small and it ain’t pretty………but Rubens opened the eyes of multiple generations that quality and quantity are subjectively interchangeable.
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More succinctly, sensation and perception are not the same thing. Audio engineering in the pursuit of high fidelity reproduction is restricted to the former.
Yeah I'm not known for short and concise posts 
Have you checked out about the Griesinger LLD and more specifically the neural stream separation in auditory system?
To me, sensation and perception are linked in a way: sensation is enhanced with stream separation, and stream separation can be found using perception. Actually I think "hifi" sound happens only when auditory system has stream separation going on, and ability to detect it is crucial in order to be able to position a system for it to happen, for example, or design a system for given room with given preference of stream separation or not, preferably for both.
Not knowing about this makes everything just random, while knowing it it's possible to connect logic to perception and master speaker positioning for example, and after that ability to change listening position a bit to change perception of the sound at will by mood and by which recording is playing. Some recordings seem to work better on either, very much likely the recording and mixing process was influenced by the people knowing which state they had, or not knowing about it but just optimizing sound for which ever it was, likely with stream separation. Also, sometimes it's just fun to zoom in (with stream separation) brain giving lot's of attention to sound, while most often bit more relaxed sound is the ticket, no stream separation, brain is not paying attention basically so it's easy to read or think for example, have music literally on background.
To me its archaic to think that one can either have clarity or spacious (stereo) sound, and that both can't be achieved at the same time, because it's not even necessary to happen them at same time, just change at will, it's about stream separation in auditory system which can be manipulated easily by changing listening distance. Basically transition between the two could be optimized for listening spot, lean forward for zoom in, lean back for relaxed sound. Or, just drag the chair for either if always preferred. Most importantly, it's not confusing or random anymore, but the whole system including auditory system is at preferred state all combining to good sound. If stream separation is the always preferred one, then one is able to evaluate clarity and spaciousness together as well, envelopment, and do something about it. Regardless of speakers, auditory system would still affect perception, so somewhat separate issue, although interlinked as it's all needed to align for some particular sound.
Have you checked out about the Griesinger LLD and more specifically the neural stream separation in auditory system?To me, sensation and perception are linked in a way: sensation is enhanced with stream separation, and stream separation can be found using perception. Actually I think "hifi" sound happens only when auditory system has stream separation going on, and ability to detect it is crucial in order to be able to position a system for it to happen, for example, or design a system for given room with given preference of stream separation or not, preferably for both.
Not knowing about this makes everything just random, while knowing it it's possible to connect logic to perception and master speaker positioning for example, and after that ability to change listening position a bit to change perception of the sound at will by mood and by which recording is playing. Some recordings seem to work better on either, very much likely the recording and mixing process was influenced by the people knowing which state they had, or not knowing about it but just optimizing sound for which ever it was, likely with stream separation. Also, sometimes it's just fun to zoom in (with stream separation) brain giving lot's of attention to sound, while most often bit more relaxed sound is the ticket, no stream separation, brain is not paying attention basically so it's easy to read or think for example, have music literally on background.
To me its archaic to think that one can either have clarity or spacious (stereo) sound, and that both can't be achieved at the same time, because it's not even necessary to happen them at same time, just change at will, it's about stream separation in auditory system which can be manipulated easily by changing listening distance. Basically transition between the two could be optimized for listening spot, lean forward for zoom in, lean back for relaxed sound. Or, just drag the chair for either if always preferred. Most importantly, it's not confusing or random anymore, but the whole system including auditory system is at preferred state all combining to good sound. If stream separation is the always preferred one, then one is able to evaluate clarity and spaciousness together as well, envelopment, and do something about it. Regardless of speakers, auditory system would still affect perception, so somewhat separate issue, although interlinked as it's all needed to align for some particular sound.
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There are several contributions to this thread that make reference to the importance of the recorded source in assessing fidelity by measurements and sound quality by subjective responses. IMHO it is (for the most part) clear in this thread that there is a difference between engineering an accurate loudspeaker from engineering a "pleasant sounding" one.
In the latter case deliberately engineering soft non-linearities can often afford great rewards, for example. But I do not believe the pursuit of the former case is dystopian, just rather pointless without acoustic recordings made with equal attention given to the recording method. Nevertheless, I would suggest that modelling the "ear/brain mechanism" (and its individual variations) is more advanced than you seem to be claiming.
Neither am I!Yeah I'm not known for short and concise posts
I think a better way to think of/model the process is via parallel processing of hierarchical data structures, rather than via separate streams. Here we can more easily infer the Bayesian layered networks that provide the basis of our cognition, wherein our perception is generated. (Where the concept of a stream might be handy is when we recognise that we can only be consciousness of one thing at a time).
Critical here, and to the thread content, is that we have an ability to learn that we cannot turn off. By listening, we learn and acquire knowledge - and hence provide highly non-linear "test instruments". Hearing the fineries of loudspeaker reproduction is most definitely a learned skill/hindrance. The majority that share no such motivation do not sense any less, rather they just perceive benign noise (at best), so have no conscious subjective response.
It is interesting that the work of Griesinger I am aware of pertains to acoustic generation and therefore to the "clarity vs spaciousness" choice you highlight. I am not sure that reproduction fidelity matters here, since both extremes can be reproduced with maximum fidelity of that recorded. Of note again in this thread is the control that Ambisonics/Soundfield microphony possesses to allow the choice of "clarity or spaciousness" without compromising fidelity.
Sadly that’s not going to happen ‘in stereo’.
We do have a much better shot at it with multi channels embedded now………….8 should do the trick…….if one could come up with a positioning standard and varying time based processing to match the sound field environment…….
To expand what I've picked out from Griesinger papers, in layman terms, is that stream separation happens when some sound rises enough above noise floor, and this happens when harmonics of a sound line up every fundamental cycle superimposing huge periodic amplitude peaks, and the particular sound source would stick out from all sounds around you. Like a spouse saying important words to you, or cave bear breathing next to your ear, very important sounds, and memorable. When this happens, auditory system then provides it's own foreground neural stream to the sound, basically provides heightened awareness to it while lumping all the noise to a background stream, which seems now perceptually suppressed, brain pays full attention to the foreground stream. This heightened awareness just provides the clarity, accurate localization, engagement, attaches to memory and so on, while without neural stream separation it's just noise around us like any other sounds. Assuming this is true, it is never possible to have clarity, or at least the max clarity, unless stream separation is happening in auditory system. Or engagement for example, many if not all hifi adjectives only happen with stream separation, when you are actually hearing what's in there, brain paying involuntary attention.
On poor speakers, poor acoustic environment with loud early reflections, poor recording, it's possible the stream separation never happens, while a good recording would have preserved original harmonics well enough, speakers preserve them well enough and as long as room early reflections are low/late enough the stream separation can happen, and will happen. Basically, there is an area around speakers where it happens likely on most recordings, beyond which it doesn't as direct sound reduces compared to room sound, especially with loud early reflections. My theory is shrinking stereo listening triangle size enough would provide stream separation. What's enough mostly depends on your speakers, acoustics and recordings, but almost any setup could have it, might be quite small. Better tuned systems just extend it further out into the room.
So, clarity in the recording and ideal speakers can be destroyed by auditory system, basically if listening too far out allowing early reflections to prevent stream separation happen, no matter how ideally optimal speakers. I bet most appeal to horn and fullrange driver loudspeakers comes from the fact that stream separation can happen at a practical distance from speakers, like few meters away in a domestic living room.
Spaciousness can be perceived with clarity, but as explained for clarity to happen it's required that stream separation happens, so the spaciousness is now called envelopment, it's the background stream. Good envelopment at home is tough challenge, I suspect room needs to be quite reflective except with attenuated and delayed early reflections, and listening position needs to be maximally far away, about at transition, to have max "late reverberation", max envelopment. Or, perhaps some extra channels to provide envelopment while preserving stream separation, optimized lows etc. Anyway, a tough task and no-one would stumble on it by accident on domestic environment so I speculate not many have this, or like clarity because it typically comes with no spaciousness (which also depends on recording!).
Conversely, envelopment cannot happen with the early reflections laden spacious sound most people likely have, as it is effortless to achieve: no toe-in, far listening distance, no acoustic treatment, low DI and so on, typical home system. This sound is easy and fun, but will never provide clarity, per definition, because the spaciousness is achieved by having no stream separation, by utilizing loud early reflections
Well, all this is just my limited experience and observations, but seems very true for my audio reality. Found the phenomenon perceptually experimenting and took a while before I found any papers that would talk about this stuff, and Griesinger papers seem to match best.
ps. particular harmonics (distortion) in particular polarity would increase amplitude of fundamental and original harmonics, while some others don't. These effects would also affect to stream separtion I think, while noise kind of distortion like IMD would taketh away, definitely. All system noise would, like box resonances and so on, hiss.
pps. thinking more, zipping cofffee, "hifi and accurate reproduction" to me is perhaps more in the auditory system than in the playback system! I can get more hifi by utilizing listening skill, positioning myself and the system so that "hifi" increases, auditory system stream separation happens.
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Sadly the major limitation of stereo is the manner in which it is used, rather than the limitations of the information it records (or is capable of recording). The deletion of "stereosonic" filtering in the recording process is one such early example of a trend in which more accurate shuffling was eschewed in the measurements game. Simply increasing the number of channels is not a panacea for better success - or reproduction accuracy, where more can actually compromise the result!
Hi mayhem13,
I've been involved in the entire recording chain, start to finish.
In the recording studio, we are creating a sound, a performance to be recorded. The outboard gear is selected for it's "sound", even the mixing console is selected for that reason. When we used tape, even the amount of level we hit the tape with became part of "the sound". Motown was famous for overdriving tape to get the sound of that studio. Once that process is done, the final mix-down and master, we have a product. That is the intended sound.
At home or other venue, our job is to reproduce that product as faithfully as reasonably possible for it to be called accurate, or high fidelity. The same holds true for a radio broadcast, although we have technical limitations and must do other things in order to transmit farther with lower noise, compression being one process. Our comparison is the original sound.
At home (or wherever), we can colour the sound as we see fit. However, when we do that, we knowingly deviate from the original sound, and that's fine. It is just that we can no longer call it high fidelity, or suggest a more accurate system is inferior as we have really added our own piece of outboard effects gear to everything we listen to. So as an example, if we decide for some reason that we like a single ended tube amplifier with very high distortion and a definite sound, that's fine. We may claim it sounds "more musical", but that is to that person, and we have groups who currently like this. But the bulk of the population does prefer a more accurate system, given a choice. But I'll also say that if we don't measure a system fully, we can in fact have equipment with problems that measure by those methods pretty well that sound terrible.
I have said many times, when we measure equipment, we also listen to it. People who only listen lack the instruments and associated training to guide them. Measuring incompletely guides us part way and if we don't listen to whatever it is, we can be lead astray. So when I refer to measuring a system, my intention is that it is done properly. I have found this agrees with subjective opinions.
I've been involved in the entire recording chain, start to finish.
In the recording studio, we are creating a sound, a performance to be recorded. The outboard gear is selected for it's "sound", even the mixing console is selected for that reason. When we used tape, even the amount of level we hit the tape with became part of "the sound". Motown was famous for overdriving tape to get the sound of that studio. Once that process is done, the final mix-down and master, we have a product. That is the intended sound.
At home or other venue, our job is to reproduce that product as faithfully as reasonably possible for it to be called accurate, or high fidelity. The same holds true for a radio broadcast, although we have technical limitations and must do other things in order to transmit farther with lower noise, compression being one process. Our comparison is the original sound.
At home (or wherever), we can colour the sound as we see fit. However, when we do that, we knowingly deviate from the original sound, and that's fine. It is just that we can no longer call it high fidelity, or suggest a more accurate system is inferior as we have really added our own piece of outboard effects gear to everything we listen to. So as an example, if we decide for some reason that we like a single ended tube amplifier with very high distortion and a definite sound, that's fine. We may claim it sounds "more musical", but that is to that person, and we have groups who currently like this. But the bulk of the population does prefer a more accurate system, given a choice. But I'll also say that if we don't measure a system fully, we can in fact have equipment with problems that measure by those methods pretty well that sound terrible.
I have said many times, when we measure equipment, we also listen to it. People who only listen lack the instruments and associated training to guide them. Measuring incompletely guides us part way and if we don't listen to whatever it is, we can be lead astray. So when I refer to measuring a system, my intention is that it is done properly. I have found this agrees with subjective opinions.
This is essentially a process that is modelled via the bispectrum and cross-bispectrum that enable us to model sonic signatures of objects, and to recall them - or to recall them with some "surprise" if there exists anything we discern as being new to our memory. The model you describe just sounds to me like a less clear way of explaining the process.
I think here two different factors are being confused - firstly what information is included in a recording, and secondly the learning experience of the listener that will dictate how they perceive the information that is presented. I believe the "steam separation" you speak of is more simply whether the information is known to the listener, or is a surprise.
But this is physically measurable, and our processing of listening room acoustics can be well-modelled as a separate exercise.Basically, there is an area around speakers where it happens likely on most recordings, beyond which it doesn't as direct sound reduces compared to room sound, especially with loud early reflections. My theory is shrinking stereo listening triangle size enough would provide stream separation. What's enough mostly depends on your speakers, acoustics and recordings, but almost any setup could have it, better tuned systems just extend it further out into the room.
So, clarity in the recording and ideal speakers can be destroyed by auditory system, basically if listening too far out allowing early reflections to prevent stream separation happen. I bet most appeal of horn and fullrange loudspeakers comes from the fact that stream separation can happen at practical distance from speakers.
Spaciousness can be perceived with clarity, but for clarity it's required that stream separation happens, so the spaciousness is now called envelopment, and good envelopment at home is tough challenge, basically quite reflective room except attenuated and delayed early reflections, and listening position about at transition. Or, perhaps some extra channels to provide envelopment while preserving stream separation. Anyway, a tough task and no-one would stumble on it by axident on domestic environment. Conversely, envelopment cannot happen with the early reflections laden spacious sound most people likely have, as it is effortless to achieve: no toe-in, far listening distance, no acoustic treatment, low DI and so on, typical home system. This sound is easy and fun, but will never provide clarity, per definition, because the spaciousness is achieved by having no stream separation, by utilizing loud early reflections
Well, all this is just my limited experience and observations, but seems very true for my audio reality. Found the phenomenon perceptually experimenting and took a while before I found any papers that would talk about this stuff, and Griesinger papers seem to match best.
My earlier comments pertained instead to the mix of direct and reflected energy in the recording environment, and the result of its reproduction over loudspeakers. And in that, "clarity" and "spaciousness" are somewhat exclusive pursuits.
Hi, see Griesinger papers for what stream separation means here. Actually I now notice he refers to "source separation", each sound source getting their own neural stream. So perhaps my writing was not clear
what he means is very clear to me, or actually the other way around, what is clear to me perceptually seems to be exactly what he writes about. Learned skill as you repeatedly highlight. I speculate it's rather easy to hear, and everyone has a chance to learn it. I've attached conclusion from paper "Pitch, Timbre, Source Separation, and the Myths of Loudspeaker Imaging" available online. Another paper is also found online, here link, this one explains it nicely, like some of his youtube videos. This paper contains some info his measure of LOC, and that while it works quite nicely in a concert hall it's not accurate in small room, while listeners were able to hear ot easily and quite similarly to each other
https://www.akutek.info/Mitt Biblio...ustics Hamburg 2018/Additional/papers/p35.pdf
His site has some material as well http://www.davidgriesinger.com/
I'm quite sure stream separation could be reduced to some measured numbers, it's really quite easy just to listen.
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Ha!...give me an ATMOS enabled DAW or Console and an 8 channel long linear soundbar or similar soundstage and i'll crush that supposition.
I'm not splitting hairs here with the essentials.....of course those hold true.....it's the nonsensical debates that in sum are less than the objective weight they are given individually.....i can literally ask a listener to don a coat with a fleece collar or have them put on some wide frame eyeglasses and it all changes in an instant.........these are just some simple baseline observations.
How do you know something is being "reproduced" unless your perception recognises it? How about reproduced "accurately"?
Belabouring an earlier example, say that a recording has been made of an orchestral string section.
Audio engineer 'A' kicks off the Audio Reproduction Olympics with an impeccable pair of 3-way speakers:
-- high end drivers,
-- carefully designed XOs
-- machined cabinets, low diffraction, tuned flat response, just the right amount of stuffing, (all the best stuff, ad nauseum)
-- highly regarded amplifier, DAC/phono/etc,
Maverick 'B' says, "ha! I raise you with..." :
-- 9 (or 11) FR drivers on open baffles, with nonsensical variations in shape and size, placed all around the room like it's a graveyard filled with wooden headstones.
-- Custom amp, stereo crossfeed circuit, bass boost and other tone controls.
Which one is going to more accurately reproduce the sound of an orchestral string section?
I'll go out on a limb and suggest the maverick system could still win. Not only by sounding "better" as a subjective judgment call by listeners, but also being objectively more accurate, given the specific task. I suppose it can all be brushed off as subjective philosophy, but then that's like hating your customers because your business model failed.
Just looking at definitions, sound reproduction is literally producing the sound a 2nd time. So there must be a first time, which sets the benchmark. Except that the benchmark is our perception (preferably of a live event). A secondary (but seemingly pointless) goal could be to minimise the rate of deterioration of downstream copies as the loudspeaker output is re-recorded and played back through the same system.
As to the technical details of the above reproduction systems: a string section can consist of dozens of individual players, so there is going to be constructive and destructive interference all over the place, leading to the unique sound of strings. We could find out by doing a listening test. However, if we then find that system 'B' did sound better, but keep the metrics that incorrectly predicted that system 'A' would win, then that's not sensible.
~~
As for sensation, I don't know anything about that. There's a lot of philosophy of mind stuff.
Hi abstract,
Hardly. Ain't never going to happen, not even with random chance. If you ever get enough experience, you'll see this is a complete fantasy. In other words, you're saying "could happen", or could possibly occur. It won't, the very variables you brought up defeat you right out of the gate.
We cannot capture an orchestra for every seat accurately. We have used dummy heads and mikes to capture something, but you always miss some of the performance doing that. Otherwise this would be state of the art. So we record to the best of our ability, and reproduce to the best of our ability. Still an enjoyable experience and the better and more accurate the reproduction system is, the more enjoyable it is to the listener.
Now, a jazz session, rock or country, anything we record and assemble in a studio only ever exists as a cohesive whole after the final mix and mastering. That's it. This then becomes the reference performance we want to reproduce. Want to reproduce what the Auratone speakers sound like (even though we rarely use those anymore) - go for it. I strongly doubt that is what the recording engineers' dreamed you'd listen to. Might sound like that in some cars I guess lol! No, you reproduce the end product as accurately as possible. If you disagree with the mix, adjust your tone controls or EQ (probably only for that one song). I'll admit to turning the bass down on some Madonna tracks. Normally I don't normally need tone controls and my current preamp doesn't include them. I wish it did.
You are also taking one specific example. We're talking about speakers in general. Of course, public address speakers (elevators, offices) have been carefully measured to reproduce a frequency range best for speech intelligibility, so even in that case, measurements guide them to a more suitable product. They aren't just cheap speakers (although these days the less expensive brands sure are!).
My own personal experience has been that the better speakers make classical music, and all music I listen to sound much better. No exceptions. Of course it doesn't matter with the more modern "boom-tick" type "music". My speakers are the result of a lot of measurements and listening tests. They were designed with the aid of the NRC in Canada.
So to the thread title, yes, measurements do matter and yield a better product. Do you have to use other things, yes.
Hardly. Ain't never going to happen, not even with random chance. If you ever get enough experience, you'll see this is a complete fantasy. In other words, you're saying "could happen", or could possibly occur. It won't, the very variables you brought up defeat you right out of the gate.
We cannot capture an orchestra for every seat accurately. We have used dummy heads and mikes to capture something, but you always miss some of the performance doing that. Otherwise this would be state of the art. So we record to the best of our ability, and reproduce to the best of our ability. Still an enjoyable experience and the better and more accurate the reproduction system is, the more enjoyable it is to the listener.
Now, a jazz session, rock or country, anything we record and assemble in a studio only ever exists as a cohesive whole after the final mix and mastering. That's it. This then becomes the reference performance we want to reproduce. Want to reproduce what the Auratone speakers sound like (even though we rarely use those anymore) - go for it. I strongly doubt that is what the recording engineers' dreamed you'd listen to. Might sound like that in some cars I guess lol! No, you reproduce the end product as accurately as possible. If you disagree with the mix, adjust your tone controls or EQ (probably only for that one song). I'll admit to turning the bass down on some Madonna tracks. Normally I don't normally need tone controls and my current preamp doesn't include them. I wish it did.
You are also taking one specific example. We're talking about speakers in general. Of course, public address speakers (elevators, offices) have been carefully measured to reproduce a frequency range best for speech intelligibility, so even in that case, measurements guide them to a more suitable product. They aren't just cheap speakers (although these days the less expensive brands sure are!).
My own personal experience has been that the better speakers make classical music, and all music I listen to sound much better. No exceptions. Of course it doesn't matter with the more modern "boom-tick" type "music". My speakers are the result of a lot of measurements and listening tests. They were designed with the aid of the NRC in Canada.
So to the thread title, yes, measurements do matter and yield a better product. Do you have to use other things, yes.