Skip to main content ↑ ↓

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: How do you know if your sound is right? (Read 19255 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

How do you know if your sound is right?

Reply #75 –
Quote from: Rich B on
Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on

The listener hears the summation of the direct sound straight from the speaker, and the indirect sound that bounces around the room on its way to the ear. The direct sound first, the indirect sound delayed by the reverberation time of the room. The usual goal is flat response for the direct sound, and downwardly sloped indirect sound. This then corresponds to how we hear natural sound in a performance room or concert hall.


And this is what Sean Olive and similar sources advocate?


Yes.

Also true if you measure their products. For example I have some Primus speakers including a pair of P-363s, and have done on-axis measurements of them using Holme Impulse.  They are pretty flat.

You may have to know a little something as to whether the measurement you are looknig at was done using a technology that looks at on-axis response and ignores off-axis room response as much as possible (most modern techniques such as REW and Holme Impulse), or it was done using a technique that sums the room response over a period of time (classic RTA & pink noise-based measurements). 

Measurements are usually done using an omnidirectional mic, so some kind of time-sensitive methodology has to be used to compare and contrast the two kinds of measurements.  The basic trick for getting on-axis measurements is to use a swept test tone and some kind of a tracking filter. By tuning the tracking filter's center frequency you select out the sound that came out of the speaker in a certain time range in the recent past. If the tracking filter is narrow and tuned to the frequency of the sound that just came out of the speaker, then it is measuring primarily direct sound.  If you use a broad filter that follows with some delay, then you are measuring sound that has bounced around the room for a while. If you are using pink noise you have to average the measurement over a signficant amount of time, and your measurement is heavily tipped towards room respoonse.

The usual rule of thumb is that if you get the on-axis response right, and let the rest pretty much fall where it may.

How do you know if your sound is right?

Reply #76 –
It is well documented that one's brain gather, analyse, combine and make sense of your sensual perceptions (create your reality) in ways that cannot be referenced back to any one particular sense (although a particular sense may be the obvious main contributor).

It is the emotion that follows from that which is the important part. But then it is pretty useless trying to explain that to a cynical and clinical engineer-like personality. 

How do you know if your sound is right?

Reply #77 –
Quote from: Rich B on
But then it is pretty useless trying to explain that to a cynical and clinical engineer-like personality. 


One burden that engineers have to carry is the anger (an emotion!) caused by the widespread dumbed-down stereotypes of engineers promoted by people who themselves could apparently never gain the intellectual acuity required  to join our profession. ;-)

If I had a nickel for every education and business graduate who started out his university career by dropping out of an engineering program, my retirement would be even cushier than it already is. ;-)
 

How do you know if your sound is right?

Reply #78 –
Sound being "right" is subjective and personal as others have said. I've arrived at a practical answer for me:

If my playback system does not impart a consistent coloring or distortion to the sound that I notice, then I consider the system to be transparent to whatever signal I'm feeding it. This is all I really ask of my system. My personal "test" for "right sound" to me is if over a long period time and different program material there is not a consistent "sound" to what I notice.

Even if there was an ideal playback system there are artistic choices and shortcomings on the recording side that would keep you from feeling like you were recreating the original acoustic event. There are a lot of variables here. If the playback sounds "pleasing / good" to me some times, "bright" others, "dull" others, harsh sometimes, etc. then I've found that playback system will typically be transparent enough for me to forget about the playback and enjoy it.

I have a pet theory that over time our brains can compensate to be able to ignore some playback shortcomings (speaker limitations, room acoustics, etc.) like how we can hear a person talking to us when there is a lot of background noise. I don't have any scientific evidence for this, but my experience seems to back it up (very well could just be bias). Unless of course you're more interested in the system performance than the program material...
Was that a 1 or a 0?