Hi sorry for the weird question
I would like to start to explain my goal In very few occasions mostly at audio show i have had the sensation that the sound were completely detached from the speakers
The speakers seemed like disconnected from the amplification units
Usually i can locate quite easily the sound inside the speaker
Often i read about a speaker sounding "boxy"
Question
Can we agree that a "boxy" sound can be related almost completely to the enclosure design and construction and not to drivers and xover ?
The boxy sound is one of the worst sensations possible Maybe even worse than distortion
What i find strange is that imho the cabinet design and construction issues are often overlooked
But the impact of a badly built cabinet could be immense
imho of course
I would like to start to explain my goal In very few occasions mostly at audio show i have had the sensation that the sound were completely detached from the speakers
The speakers seemed like disconnected from the amplification units
Usually i can locate quite easily the sound inside the speaker
Often i read about a speaker sounding "boxy"
Question
Can we agree that a "boxy" sound can be related almost completely to the enclosure design and construction and not to drivers and xover ?
The boxy sound is one of the worst sensations possible Maybe even worse than distortion
What i find strange is that imho the cabinet design and construction issues are often overlooked
But the impact of a badly built cabinet could be immense
imho of course
Hi thanks for the very useful advice So it could be that just taking out the xover from the cabinet could provide benefits ?
actually i have seen some xovers damped with bluetac or plasticine or whatever
Very interesting I will keep the xover outside
actually i have seen some xovers damped with bluetac or plasticine or whatever
Very interesting I will keep the xover outside
Maybe this gives some hints... look for "Adjectives..." per range....
https://www.status.co/blogs/the-jou...8MV-Bj4FQtGtoJeUYIIE9UhEtNywXkxzvnLJxlKYJrvRk
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https://www.status.co/blogs/the-jou...8MV-Bj4FQtGtoJeUYIIE9UhEtNywXkxzvnLJxlKYJrvRk
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Depends exactly what you mean by 'boxy', but:
Probably not. At least, I don't, since although in some cases xyz effect will be caused by some form of enclosure related issue, in others, it could be a combination of factors or something else entirely, e.g. in-room power-response. But that takes us back to exactly what is meant, since there isn't a fixed definition & what some people may describe that way, others might not. YMMV as always! 😉
Hi thanks a lot i see 6 bands Afaik 4 conventional drivers should be needed to cover the audio band
woofer midwoofer mid and tweeter
but then i see big 2 ways like Altec covering the full range
But my main goal is to understand how much of an impact on sound the cabinet can have
I think very very big like decent drivers in an excellent cabinet could sound better than excellent drivers in a so so cabinet
maybe i am overestimating the cabinet importance
I have general philosophy toward this kind of stuff: the playback equipment should not have sound of their own, because that is not sound of the music but sound of the equipment, and would compete with music to grab your attention if significant. If there is no sound of the system, your attention is with sound of the music.
Box issues would fall into this category, and per the philosophy one should evaluate how much attention the box sound takes, try experiment does it impose sound of it's own on top of the music or not? If it doesn't seem to, case closed. If it does, you need to figure out what it is in order to AB test your improvements on it, or resort to brute force. Just to address it somehow to "make it better".
It could be due to anything though, from walls resonating, resonances inside, affecting operation of the driver / box combination, noises of the motor and possible port, external stuff like edge diffraction and directivity in general. Perhaps more stuff. Most o possible issues can be minimized just by thinking about them and taking into consideration, making sure there is no glaring issues. Eliminate port noises altogether by having no port as simple example, done.
Box issues would fall into this category, and per the philosophy one should evaluate how much attention the box sound takes, try experiment does it impose sound of it's own on top of the music or not? If it doesn't seem to, case closed. If it does, you need to figure out what it is in order to AB test your improvements on it, or resort to brute force. Just to address it somehow to "make it better".
It could be due to anything though, from walls resonating, resonances inside, affecting operation of the driver / box combination, noises of the motor and possible port, external stuff like edge diffraction and directivity in general. Perhaps more stuff. Most o possible issues can be minimized just by thinking about them and taking into consideration, making sure there is no glaring issues. Eliminate port noises altogether by having no port as simple example, done.
For me boxy is when the sound can be clearly located where the speaker are This is quite evident for instance with cheap speakers with cabinets made out very thin wood Actually i guess in that case the cabinet becomes an acoustic chamber
like placing a full range in the hole of an acoustic guitar
Maybe it wil sound nice ? 😵 life is complicated
like placing a full range in the hole of an acoustic guitar
Maybe it wil sound nice ? 😵 life is complicated
You can experiement with this stuff quite easily: make simple box shell, with at least one detachable panel. Now play it empty, record the sound in various repeatable ways. Now, start adding bracing, damping material, what ever you have in mind, and compare the results. If you recorded some audio, you likely hear a difference between various stages of the build. Which one sounds better?🙂
Exactly, the speaker takes your attention from the music. Some people have this issue, some do not have it because they do not care or notice there is an issue (box sound) and just listen the music, their attention is not drawn to it. So, it's partly listening skill (basically what your attention is drawn to), and now you must utilize the skills to make it better, less attention grabbing.
What ever is new to you, at the edge of your listening skills, at first it is very hard to pinpoint what is it exactly you are perceiving, let alone what makes it, but sure there is something if your attention is drawn to it. Kind of you'll notice something is not right but just cannot put a sticker on it, which means you perceive it but do not understand the perception yet. Best you can do is to keep on experimenting with the system to figure out AB test to toggle the attention grabbing quality on / off from your perception in order to find it, and when you find it your listening skill got better, your system got better. This is why I think our playback systems can be only as good as our listening skill. When your attention is not drawn to the system, the system is good enough for your listening skill. Could be better, but you cannot appreciate it until your listening skill evolves 😉
For example resonances are like this, they really take attention, and still might be hard to kind of actually hear it, until you do then you cannot unhear it. For this reason, if you have a boxy sounding speaker and cannot figure out why is it, try to identify any resonances it has anywhere by any means necessary, and knock them down. You could expose yourself to resonances to make you sensitive to them, for example playing with the Harman how to listen -software frequency response peak listening tests. Now you might actually identify any resonances anywhere more easily.
If you do music recording and mixing you might already be familiar with parametric EQ and "fixing" sound in general. Resonances of microphones, and some resonances of instruments and environment, noises in general, make recorded sound really bad kinda, but if you move the mic or modify it or knock the offenders down with parametric EQ the sound got so much better. But you cannot strip all resonances out, some are part of the instrument sound and expression of the player, they might have intentionally utilized some particular resonance to make the sound the way it is. Some resonances might be from the playback equiment you are mixing with, so better make sure those are dealt with before you get to work! For this reason, listening skill is crucial for good sound on the recording as well, and playing an instrument / voice of course, no surprise there, listening skill altogether.
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Hi ! exactly it is the difference between to generate sounds and to play them back
i have noticed that when speakers are lets say sonically dead they seem like electrically disconnected from the system
this is quite a must for me They can have of course other limitations in FR distortion but i want to get the feeling above described Electrically deteached
Even moving a little aways from the sweet spot should not change this perception
I have also experienced this at some audio show Very fascinating
Usually this is achieved with some smart structural interventions on the cabinet like bracing damping adding mass etc.
Thanks a lot This is actually what i plan to do I love speaker with detachable panels
My ideal speaker is made with a very rigid frame on which thick front baffle and base are bolted tightly
all other panels are think sealed and attached to the metal frame with magnets
I am not at all worried about lateral top and back panels flexing Not at all The resulting emissions will be negligible compared to the direct frontal one
The box speaker sound is caused by its radiation pattern: omnidirectional at low frequencies and forward-firing at high frequencies. You can see this in the dispersion measurements, which (by no coincidence) do not include output from behind the speaker. The narrowing of the radiation pattern with frequency is entirely due to the wavelength of sound in relation to the baffle dimensions.
The consequence is that the reflected sound from the room does not match the direct sound from the speaker. This is the dead giveaway that one is listening to a speaker.
A few box speakers add rear-firing tweeters, and dipole speakers avoid the problem entirely.
Ed
The consequence is that the reflected sound from the room does not match the direct sound from the speaker. This is the dead giveaway that one is listening to a speaker.
A few box speakers add rear-firing tweeters, and dipole speakers avoid the problem entirely.
Ed
Hi i would like to thank you all for your very kind and helpful advice I am studying all the replies and it will take some hours
In the meantime i would like to show my boxiness tester The idea of course is absolutely not mine I was showed a similar device from one representative of the Fischer & Fischer loudspeaker brand at an old audio show
when I turn the crank while holding it in the air I can hardly hear the tune
If I place it against any speaker that I can find in my hand the increase in volume is shocking The amplification effect is surprising
Needless to say that leaning it against a speaker of the brand mentioned above the difference with the situation in free air was very very small
But if I ever had to place those speakers in my house they would end up in the cellar due to their enormous weight
The dream would be that performance at more human weights
I will study the answers and get back with other answers hopefully smarter
Thank you very much again
In the meantime i would like to show my boxiness tester The idea of course is absolutely not mine I was showed a similar device from one representative of the Fischer & Fischer loudspeaker brand at an old audio show
when I turn the crank while holding it in the air I can hardly hear the tune
If I place it against any speaker that I can find in my hand the increase in volume is shocking The amplification effect is surprising
Needless to say that leaning it against a speaker of the brand mentioned above the difference with the situation in free air was very very small
But if I ever had to place those speakers in my house they would end up in the cellar due to their enormous weight
The dream would be that performance at more human weights
I will study the answers and get back with other answers hopefully smarter
Thank you very much again
Hi thank you very much for your kind and valuable reply
If i have learned one thing is that i have to search for stiffness for the bass cabinet and mass for the mid high cabinet
In my mind these are very different requirements In a way tower speakers putting the bass and mid high in the same enclosure are wrong by design
All speakers should have the woofers segregated in a separate enclosure
I am pretty sure that if i take a 2 ways speaker i take out the tweeter and put it in a separate heavy little box mechanically decoupled from the woofer cabinet the sound will be better Expecially the soundstage
the idea is use a gym weight, make a little frame that can be bolted tightly to the weight to support the tweeter
then use some high density rubber to isolate the weight mechanically from the cabinet so that the bass enclosure vibes will not reach the tweeter main problem is the construction of the adapting frame Not easy
I am against dipoles on principle The back emission should be zero in my mind Only frontal
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IME having heard box speakers that did not sound boxy, they were all very stiff and inert. And yes, heavy. 🙂 Some where double wall with a sand filling, others were very dense and thick marine or bamboo plywood with solid bracing. These speakers didn't sound like speakers at all, which when you first hear that effect, is truly puzzling because we are so used to the box sound. I have even heard and built Open Baffle speakers that had some boxy sound. The baffles vibrated and caused that box sound.
The vibrating walls of the speaker are what make the boxy sound or "box talk" for me.
The vibrating walls of the speaker are what make the boxy sound or "box talk" for me.
Hi thank you very much for your valuable advice This is the point Most of listeners are used to defects in sound
Or better they are not used to a truly excellent one Like with food After being used to farmed salmon i tried the wild one Wow !!!
But i comment below what is my feeling
very interesting If even an open baffle can sound boxy well the problem is clearly the baffle as there are no other panels
i have always had a very strong feeling that only the front baffle vibrations contribute to produce the boxy sensation
the other sides vibes reach the listener only after being reflected by sorrounding surfaces And are low enough in level not to be critical
there is at least one brand that has addressed this FB vibrations Thiel
They use to make a very thick stiff and heavy FB I would love to hear one I am pretty sure that they are no boxy at all
yes but not all walls contribute the same
sometimes i read when they write about soundstage of a blurred image I.e. out of focus
I have come to the conclusion that domes are the responsibles For this reason i would try a solution like this
only in the case of dome drivers the displacement due to vibration could be of the same order of magnitudo of the diaphragm displacement during music We are talking of tenths of mm i guess
Domes are the main suspects to me for boxy sound
Exactly ! mid/tweeter domes displacement when playing music must be very little i guess Lets call it a musical vibration
If you add a mechanical vibration coming from the cabinet to which the driver is mounted this can distort the musical vibration
like when a lens is out of focus The resulting image will not be sharp The details will be blurred
There could be an easy way to check i.e. mounting the domes on a little column physically separated from the main cabinet so that the cabinet vibes cannot reach the dome driver
Going up with frequency the displacements will get minimal So any vibration reaching the driver could impact more on the sound
If you add a mechanical vibration coming from the cabinet to which the driver is mounted this can distort the musical vibration
like when a lens is out of focus The resulting image will not be sharp The details will be blurred
There could be an easy way to check i.e. mounting the domes on a little column physically separated from the main cabinet so that the cabinet vibes cannot reach the dome driver
Going up with frequency the displacements will get minimal So any vibration reaching the driver could impact more on the sound
A couple times in your various posts it has seemed that there are terminology issues. Not all of these things mean what you think they mean to the wider audience. From The Audio Glossary by J Gordon Holt:
"boxy, boxyness - lower-midrange colorations and flat imaging from a loudspeaker, due to panel resonances"
It sometimes feels like you decided what the words mean and then you're annoyed or confused because other people aren't using them that way. Digging a little more into the way the terms are commonly used might make the hobby more enjoyable. I'm not trying to be discouraging, but I am trying to point out that most words used by audiophiles mean specific things and there are sources to educate people about their meanings.
"boxy, boxyness - lower-midrange colorations and flat imaging from a loudspeaker, due to panel resonances"
It sometimes feels like you decided what the words mean and then you're annoyed or confused because other people aren't using them that way. Digging a little more into the way the terms are commonly used might make the hobby more enjoyable. I'm not trying to be discouraging, but I am trying to point out that most words used by audiophiles mean specific things and there are sources to educate people about their meanings.