You will be surprised at the enjoyment of sound the women in my life have experienced
BasicHIFI1,
Something I would like to include here in terms of Wife Acceptance or Female Acceptance with line arrays that has not been mentioned yet - listening!
Overcoming aesthetic issues is easy, no kidding, it really is.
The key to all of this is designing something You and your family will enjoy listening to together.
Over the years, I have had many systems: 2-way bookshelf, 3-way floor standers, tall single driver rear horns, 4-way open baffle, and 5 feet tall line arrays. Of them all, my daughter and I get the most enjoyment out of the arrays. I am sure You know, most women are more sensitive to volume and sound pressure then us guys. But I have found, women can listen to my arrays at louder levels over the other systems I mentioned. (Second in line is open baffle systems). I have validated this with my daughter, mum, and other female friends who have listened to music and watched movies with me. They get into what they are listening to more with the arrays. I am a part-time single parent, so I do not have a woman around full-time, but I want to be ready in case I am blessed with a living arrangement like that again.
I do not know academically, why women are more comfortable with the array sound, but I have a feeling that it is because the sound pressure is spread out over a larger area. The listener is "caressed" by a blanket of sound, verses "poked" by a point of sound (like with a point source system). Most of what we hear in the natural world is a field of sound. Like I say, I have no scientific bases for this. I am solely basing this on the comfort level and body language I observe sharing music with women on the different systems I have owned over the years. In my case, the speakers in the room is a non-issue as that does not get in the way of a true unbiased opinion of a women's enjoyment of sound. You know how it is, sometimes a women will not even give a system a chance because "that is too big for MY living room", but I believe if they hear a well designed array, foremost for sound, then the aesthetics to get it visually pleasing for your room is the easy part and that is something You and her can work on together with some of the ideas posted so far.
If your wife enjoys the sound with You, then You can figure out ways to make it look good.
Definitely look into Derek's (Overkill's) on-wall array designs.
Also, could you post a drawing of your listening room and furniture layout? That would really help with designing a system for your family also.
Below is one of my ideas of making a large system look pretty: wood mosaics
The Avebury mosaics are still in progress, but they will look a lot like the box in the second photo, once sanded and finished.
I plan on doing something similar with my "All Aspiring Array Project"
I look forward to You starting your own thread for your build!
BasicHIFI1,
Something I would like to include here in terms of Wife Acceptance or Female Acceptance with line arrays that has not been mentioned yet - listening!
Overcoming aesthetic issues is easy, no kidding, it really is.
The key to all of this is designing something You and your family will enjoy listening to together. Over the years, I have had many systems: 2-way bookshelf, 3-way floor standers, tall single driver rear horns, 4-way open baffle, and 5 feet tall line arrays. Of them all, my daughter and I get the most enjoyment out of the arrays. I am sure You know, most women are more sensitive to volume and sound pressure then us guys. But I have found, women can listen to my arrays at louder levels over the other systems I mentioned. (Second in line is open baffle systems). I have validated this with my daughter, mum, and other female friends who have listened to music and watched movies with me. They get into what they are listening to more with the arrays. I am a part-time single parent, so I do not have a woman around full-time, but I want to be ready in case I am blessed with a living arrangement like that again.
I do not know academically, why women are more comfortable with the array sound, but I have a feeling that it is because the sound pressure is spread out over a larger area. The listener is "caressed" by a blanket of sound, verses "poked" by a point of sound (like with a point source system). Most of what we hear in the natural world is a field of sound. Like I say, I have no scientific bases for this. I am solely basing this on the comfort level and body language I observe sharing music with women on the different systems I have owned over the years. In my case, the speakers in the room is a non-issue as that does not get in the way of a true unbiased opinion of a women's enjoyment of sound. You know how it is, sometimes a women will not even give a system a chance because "that is too big for MY living room", but I believe if they hear a well designed array, foremost for sound, then the aesthetics to get it visually pleasing for your room is the easy part and that is something You and her can work on together with some of the ideas posted so far.
If your wife enjoys the sound with You, then You can figure out ways to make it look good.
Definitely look into Derek's (Overkill's) on-wall array designs.
Also, could you post a drawing of your listening room and furniture layout? That would really help with designing a system for your family also.
Below is one of my ideas of making a large system look pretty: wood mosaics
The Avebury mosaics are still in progress, but they will look a lot like the box in the second photo, once sanded and finished.
I plan on doing something similar with my "All Aspiring Array Project"
I look forward to You starting your own thread for your build!
Attachments
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Before we miss out on Jameskatie's build!
Okay, sing it out, Jameskatie
impressive, how?
What are You hearing compared to other systems you have?
Also, what do You think of the dispersion characteristics of the BMR, esp in the highs? Is the dispersion pretty uniform. As You are corner mounting these, I would think the power response is pretty consistent for all frequencies. Do You observe the same setbacks as ra7 mentioned with constant directivity systems? (as in being either too bright or to dull)
Do You have a thread documenting your build?
Thanks,
Allen
Okay, sing it out, Jameskatie
impressive, how?
What are You hearing compared to other systems you have?
Also, what do You think of the dispersion characteristics of the BMR, esp in the highs? Is the dispersion pretty uniform. As You are corner mounting these, I would think the power response is pretty consistent for all frequencies. Do You observe the same setbacks as ra7 mentioned with constant directivity systems? (as in being either too bright or to dull)
Do You have a thread documenting your build?
Thanks,
Allen
A partnership:
I think your cabinet design with my hard wood mosaics, and we would have the timeless for both genders...
Sssssttt, let me keep that dream
(I got to have fun when I have the blessing to post, some of You know my busy work situation. )
All fun aside, if we find the $$$$ market, this is a possibility
I think your cabinet design with my hard wood mosaics, and we would have the timeless for both genders...
Sssssttt, let me keep that dream
(I got to have fun when I have the blessing to post, some of You know my busy work situation.
)All fun aside, if we find the $$$$ market, this is a possibility
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Blend it into the bakcground
I am going to get flamed for this but I feel the line arrays would be nice with a cloth grille, the same color and pattern as the background wallpaper.
Why not enclose the entire thing in wall paper so it disappears into the bakcground like some Klingon starship?
Just a thought. What is its acceptance factor, though?
Derek's ("Overkill Audio" on here) on wall line arrays did pretty good in that test! If you could get something like that past the commission it wouldn't be a bad idea. His later designs aren't all floor to ceiling but have a nice modern look and are pretty unobtrusive in a more modern interior.
This was a later design:
Still floor to ceiling but I'm looking for his commercial site... Found it:
More here: CustomInstallAudio
I am going to get flamed for this but I feel the line arrays would be nice with a cloth grille, the same color and pattern as the background wallpaper.
Why not enclose the entire thing in wall paper so it disappears into the bakcground like some Klingon starship?
Just a thought. What is its acceptance factor, though?
Attachments
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You guys need to resize your pictures!
I'm pretty sure the interior of a Klingon warship will have a VERY low WAF...
I'm pretty sure the interior of a Klingon warship will have a VERY low WAF...
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
I like to think of my design as being timeless, fitting in a broad style of interiors...
Sssssttt, let me keep that dream
I think so too, just like another design...
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
It's in that thread I linked earlier, it got a rating of 3.5 out of 5.
The ones I showed on here are later models. The one at the fireplace wasn't finished yet.
I do, on my own pictures...
Just hit refresh, it will size them down (and deform the shape)
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you could also try and redesign it as a high-tech sail, generating power for the amplifier....I like to think of my design as being timeless, fitting in a broad style of interiors...
Sssssttt, let me keep that dream
I think so too, just like another design...
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Wouldn't that diffract like crazy?
I don't know if I have linked these video's here before, I've used them in a post I made on another thread and I'd like to include it here as a sort of base information of why I choose to use measurements to guide me to better sound.
first, the McGurk Effect... one that I see trough, as I know what is playing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-lN8vWm3m0
The second one is from Ethan Winer, most of you will have seen it before (I hope) but it makes some strong cases of what we humans are capable of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYTlN6wjcvQ
At 5:26 you get a strong demo from Poppy Crum (sorry, it's her name) on our perception skills. Watch it and be honest about it to yourself. There are more interesting parts in the video, every one into audio should watch it at least once. You don't need to agree with it all. But keep it in mind.
When I demo my speakers, I always ask the listener to close their eyes. Not all do that though and I'm not going to force them. I'll briefly explain why and leave the decision up to them. But for me there's no doubt how powerful our mind is to change what we perceive. Basically I trust the mind to take over and hear a better illusion with the eyes closed. I use known tricks to aid in that and it makes for a more powerful perception of stereo. The stereo effect is strong enough to keep most placing of the stage with the eyes open, but once we only hear, our mind simply drifts off into the music and you use the stereo trick to the max.
Playing a video helps too, but in a different way. Remember the video of the guy that played with speaker placement? How he claimed every voice was exactly at the right spot in Home theatre with only stereo speakers playing? Guess again how that is happening after seeing the 2 video's above....
He seemed pretty proud, while all along it's just our perceptive analyzing mind taking over.
Use it to your benefit! Not to sell ridiculous products, but to enhance your experience. That's what my ambient channels are about, and the low early reflections to be able to ignore the room your in. These effects are useful and can help us make the stereo illusion more real to us.
first, the McGurk Effect... one that I see trough, as I know what is playing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-lN8vWm3m0
The second one is from Ethan Winer, most of you will have seen it before (I hope) but it makes some strong cases of what we humans are capable of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYTlN6wjcvQ
At 5:26 you get a strong demo from Poppy Crum (sorry, it's her name) on our perception skills. Watch it and be honest about it to yourself. There are more interesting parts in the video, every one into audio should watch it at least once. You don't need to agree with it all. But keep it in mind.
When I demo my speakers, I always ask the listener to close their eyes. Not all do that though and I'm not going to force them. I'll briefly explain why and leave the decision up to them. But for me there's no doubt how powerful our mind is to change what we perceive. Basically I trust the mind to take over and hear a better illusion with the eyes closed. I use known tricks to aid in that and it makes for a more powerful perception of stereo. The stereo effect is strong enough to keep most placing of the stage with the eyes open, but once we only hear, our mind simply drifts off into the music and you use the stereo trick to the max.
Playing a video helps too, but in a different way. Remember the video of the guy that played with speaker placement? How he claimed every voice was exactly at the right spot in Home theatre with only stereo speakers playing? Guess again how that is happening after seeing the 2 video's above...
.He seemed pretty proud, while all along it's just our perceptive analyzing mind taking over.
Use it to your benefit! Not to sell ridiculous products, but to enhance your experience. That's what my ambient channels are about, and the low early reflections to be able to ignore the room your in. These effects are useful and can help us make the stereo illusion more real to us.
Have you tried the second one, starting at 5:26?
Close your eyes to really enjoy your speakers folks, they are way too powerful.
For a long time I've had a problem with a song by Soundgarden. To me it had a sibilant "S" in it I couldn't place. I think it was an acoustic song by them. After a long time I discovered it was a cymbal hit at the exact same time as the voice. Made me remind that second part of Poppy's demo. All this was in my Car audio days.
Another cute thing to know is a lot of Michael Jackson songs have very strong de-essers on his lead vocal. You never seem to notice until you know. I'll see if I can find that reference again.
Close your eyes to really enjoy your speakers folks, they are way too powerful.
For a long time I've had a problem with a song by Soundgarden. To me it had a sibilant "S" in it I couldn't place. I think it was an acoustic song by them. After a long time I discovered it was a cymbal hit at the exact same time as the voice. Made me remind that second part of Poppy's demo. All this was in my Car audio days.
Another cute thing to know is a lot of Michael Jackson songs have very strong de-essers on his lead vocal. You never seem to notice until you know. I'll see if I can find that reference again.
I listened to that and the Stairway in reverse with visual cues was a powerful demo. With eyes closed I couldn't hear anything really. The second demo, the one with the "S" in Legislature am not sure what was supposed to happen - I hear the "s" sound always in all cases before Poppy even said so. Poppy is a great name by the way.
I listened to that and the Stairway in reverse with visual cues was a powerful demo. With eyes closed I couldn't hear anything really. The second demo, the one with the "S" in Legislature am not sure what was supposed to happen - I hear the "s" sound always in all cases before Poppy even said so. Poppy is a great name by the way.
The "S" wasn't there... but you hear it because of that cough
. Listen again....
The start of my ambient project, what can I say about it..
Another way to look at it would be the spectrogram:
Mains playing only
vs
Mains and ambient channels
You can see the response of the ambient channels is messy, as planned, not a specular reflection but actually a series of reflections. Hopefully diffused enough to help de-correlate them from the main signal.
In my testing the ambient signal gets an additional low pass, somewhere above 3500 Hz. (currently at 7 kHz) But I figured it would be easier to change a couple of digital filter setting within JRiver than making new FR targets for DRC each time I want to try another slope or frequency.
I'm gonna hit Submit Reply now before I accidently lose this post
Hey there...
Someone over at AVS pointed me over here as I was interested in my own ambient project and said you had one going. I guess I found it
Anyway, I was looking at my spectrogram and yours. You dont show the control panel, so I dont know what settings you used to create the graphs shown, but here is mine, more or less like yours (to -20db depth).
As you can see, my Haas Kickers alone dont give me anything beyond 37ms or so. I am not sure if at this point, I really need to, but I am open to exploring the possibility.
Basically, I am happy with my reflection suppression <20ms. But it came with the cost of reduced leftover energy for later arrival. What I have been thinking about is how to mitigate this. I could add an extra pair of speakers in the 110-120 degrees area (where 0 degrees = forward), and delay them in time. But I want them to have a gradual decay, so I would need some sort of reverb also.
I was looking at the Illusonic Iap processors until I saw they were $20K
Thats not going to happen. So I thought you may have some ideas. Keep in mind, I am CD player-DAC limited for my source.Attachments
Wesayso,
That last picture with the oval line array on the wall has nothing on the look of your vertical array, ugly to my eyes. What I have wondered is how much smaller the actual depth of your enclosure could be rather than the somewhat large size in the depth dimension yours have. What I am thinking is that with dsp and enough power that an array with the same speakers you have used could be much thinner so they would be much closer to the wall, not sticking out as far as yours do. I imagine you used the T/S values to calculate the optimum internal volume for each individual driver. With Dsp we can overcome that and but of course it requires much more amplifier to again create the same low frequency response and output. But for those who have to make a wife happy something that is much flatter to the wall would be welcome. I saw the Overkill line arrays and though they looked nice I can hear the complaints from so many wives that they are just to large, overpowering the flat screen themselves in visual attention. I think a line array that could fit between a typical western 2x4 stud wall construction and be flush with the wall would make the idea much more appealing to so many more females. Something easily installed in the wall and flush with just a bit of work to finish the wall. Then a grill cloth or even one of those paint-able coverings would make them disappear. No diffraction and they would work like an infinite baffle but with all the qualities of a full height line array. Just my mind thinking here.
That last picture with the oval line array on the wall has nothing on the look of your vertical array, ugly to my eyes. What I have wondered is how much smaller the actual depth of your enclosure could be rather than the somewhat large size in the depth dimension yours have. What I am thinking is that with dsp and enough power that an array with the same speakers you have used could be much thinner so they would be much closer to the wall, not sticking out as far as yours do. I imagine you used the T/S values to calculate the optimum internal volume for each individual driver. With Dsp we can overcome that and but of course it requires much more amplifier to again create the same low frequency response and output. But for those who have to make a wife happy something that is much flatter to the wall would be welcome. I saw the Overkill line arrays and though they looked nice I can hear the complaints from so many wives that they are just to large, overpowering the flat screen themselves in visual attention. I think a line array that could fit between a typical western 2x4 stud wall construction and be flush with the wall would make the idea much more appealing to so many more females. Something easily installed in the wall and flush with just a bit of work to finish the wall. Then a grill cloth or even one of those paint-able coverings would make them disappear. No diffraction and they would work like an infinite baffle but with all the qualities of a full height line array. Just my mind thinking here.
Hey there...
Someone over at AVS pointed me over here as I was interested in my own ambient project and said you had one going. I guess I found it
Anyway, I was looking at my spectrogram and yours. You dont show the control panel, so I dont know what settings you used to create the graphs shown, but here is mine, more or less like yours (to -20db depth).
As you can see, my Haas Kickers alone dont give me anything beyond 37ms or so. I am not sure if at this point, I really need to, but I am open to exploring the possibility.
Basically, I am happy with my reflection suppression <20ms. But it came with the cost of reduced leftover energy for later arrival. What I have been thinking about is how to mitigate this. I could add an extra pair of speakers in the 110-120 degrees area (where 0 degrees = forward), and delay them in time. But I want them to have a gradual decay, so I would need some sort of reverb also.
I was looking at the Illusonic Iap processors until I saw they were $20K
Hi Jim, funny how that works, I looked at your results to help me shape mine
. I use speakers aimed away from me to the outside and let them scatter to what they reflect off of. That makes them more diffuse and even have some tail. Have you seen Linkwitz page on his ambient speakers? He's using a Dolby Pro Logic II to extract the ambient information. I just hustle the L-R and R-L and insert a bit of L+R, all band limited (not in that picture) delayed and attenuated driven from a separate amp. I'll think about it what it would take in your case. I did also think about adding reverb, but figured this will do for now.
Linkwitz link: http://www.linkwitzlab.com/surround_system.htm
I do use convolution to get the FR right in basic shape. But the impulses are left scattered from the reflections which is what I was after. I can test and listen to reflections only as they are fake. They have to be somewhat convincing, right? Yours seemed remarkably clean, not that diffuse at all. Even in the TDA plot.
Hahaha, they are not oval if you click on the picture, but I do agree, I like mines better as well.
What you propose I can only agree. But part of me would want to keep the adjustability of toe-in. I've played with that and there is a setting with toe in that simply works better. More bloom in the room. Not distracting but pleasant as you get at a real show.