What is Really Important...

N

nicoff

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1) Your room and seat location in that room. And that includes room treatments & good power.
2) Your speakers.

It is physics, it is measurable. And both count, in my opinion, for 80% (that’s my ratio).

Everything else. And that includes electronics, cables, etc. is secondary.

Yes, everything matters. But not everything matters the same.

Concentrate on what is important.
 
nicoff said:
1) Your room and seat location in that room. And that includes room treatments & good power.
2) Your speakers.
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Come to my room at Flexpo and I will physically demonstrate for the umpteenth time, why the latter far exceeds, even negates, the former, unless pathological.

nicoff said:
It is physics, it is measurable. And both count
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Yes, absolutely, but without correlating to perception, not meaningful.

cheers,

AJ
 
The room/speaker interaction is so important and with that, listening position.

Power second. Dirty power can kill a great system.

Source third. You can’t fix downstream what’s broken upstream.


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After selecting the correct amplifiers for the speaker load being driven , room setup and acoustics is the 2nd most important issue to deal with, no amount of front end , fiddling and cables are going to fix a bad amp/speaker load selection and while everything makes a difference , IMO amp to load mismatch is the number one issue with bad sound ..

Exceptions being Open baffle designs Corrected with DSP and being driven by class D amps those are just horrible all the time ..!

:)

In coming ..! :rofl:
 
kiwi_1282001 said:
Agreed.

Time and time again I have found where your listening chair [and thus your ears] are located in the listening space is of incredible importance.

In order to get the best bass performance you need to discover where in the room to sit, picking a location that mitigates obvious standing wave peaks and dips in the bass.

This is objectively measurable (see my system thread) but also subjectively audible. One can hear the dramatic difference between smooth bass, bloated bass or diminished bass on a recording with repetitive bass just my moving the location of your ears during playback. Get the bass right and its amazing how much that can potentially improve the experience of the rest of the frequency range (above 250 Hz).
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This is exactly right. Step number one.
 
AJ Soundfield said:
Come to my room at Flexpo and I will physically demonstrate for the umpteenth time, why the latter far exceeds, even negates, the former, unless pathological.
Click to expand...

AJ, are you implying that the speakers / room are not tied together with respect to optimal performance ? and if so, 'negates' the room ?? as a general statement that is utter nonsense(again, if that is what your implying), my counter to you would be di-poles (planar / electrostatics)

Mike said:
The room/speaker interaction is so important and with that, listening position.

Power second. Dirty power can kill a great system.

Source third. You can’t fix downstream what’s broken upstream.
Click to expand...

agreed ........
 
Spock said:
Some people think quite differently.
Some say that electricity is 50% of the sound (start at 2.20).
...
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I know. Some people also believe the earth is flat. It is a free country after all.
 
nicoff said:
I know. Some people also believe the earth is flat. It is a free country after all.
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So if someone thinks differently from you, it's the equivalent of saying that the earth is flat ...
You must have a terrible room (from an acoustic point of view)
 
My wife's grandfather was a 'flat earth' farmer who spent most of his life on or near his land. When he was very old, they took him to the beach for the first time. Upon seeing the ocean, he remarked, "Hmm, not as big as I thought it'd be!" (And indeed, if it really was flat, it would have looked 'bigger.') So from an audiophile perspective - needed a bigger room!!
 
nicoff said:
1) Your room and seat location in that room. And that includes room treatments & good power.
2) Your speakers.

It is physics, it is measurable. And both count, in my opinion, for 80% (that’s my ratio).

Everything else. And that includes electronics, cables, etc. is secondary.

Yes, everything matters. But not everything matters the same.

Concentrate on what is important.
Click to expand...

A question on picking the seat location first.
Don't the room node locations change with the placement of the speakers?
I certainly hear changes from a fixed seat position when moving the speakers.
This leads me to believe that the room is being excited differently.
Therefore how do you go about initially setting the speakers so that you can set the chair?
 
nicoff said:
1) Your room and seat location in that room. And that includes room treatments & good power.
2) Your speakers.
Click to expand...

Mikado463 said:
AJ, are you implying that the speakers / room are not tied together with respect to optimal performance ? and if so, 'negates' the room ?? as a general statement that is utter nonsense(again, if that is what your implying).
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I'm responding to what Nicoff stated, in quotation for brevity.
I'm not an audiophile. All statements can be supported by repeatable, verifiable science...and demonstrable, unlike utter nonsense. Most will be oblivious to.
Seating in room: https://www.linkwitzlab.com/Links/Optimized-listening-area-Davies.pdf
Rooms mandating "treatments" (audiophiles, absolutely, yes, more the merrier)
https://www.audioholics.com/room-acoustics/room-reflections-human-adaptation
https://www.audioholics.com/room-ac...ons-human-adaptation/what-do-listeners-prefer

http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue62/capital_audiofest.htm
https://www.dagogo.com/3rd-2012-capital-audio-fest/
A system that was both unusual and very good was that from Soundfield Audio, in Tampa FL. A.J. is the designer...He also likes a lively room and indeed, his room lacked any sort of room treatments. I am often amazed at the number of audiophiles who will spend tens of thousands of dollars on audio gear, but not a single penny on room treatments – often not even simple absorbers for the first reflection points. (This is true for both their home systems, and the ones they set up at shows.). To my ear these rooms usually sound like echo chambers, concealing much of what their systems are capable of. Much to my amazement, to a large extent this was not true of AJ’s room. It seems that the problem is not reflections per se but rather, that the off-axis reflections of most speakers have a very different tonal characteristic from the direct sound.
Click to expand...
https://www.audioholics.com/trade-shows/capital-audiofest-2013
....
https://parttimeaudiophile.com/2019...audio-vac-nad-big-sound-or-little-you-decide/

Dave, I have no issue with folks treating themselves for all sorts of maladies, "Class A", digititis, "condition", etc, etc, etc. If that makes them happier, I'm all for it.
I choose a different path and don't just "talk" (or type). Actions speak louder than words.
Swing by, I'd be more than happy to demonstrate the science, not nonsense. Any time.

cheers,

AJ
 
jadedavid said:
A question on picking the seat location first.
Don't the room node locations change with the placement of the speakers?
I certainly hear changes from a fixed seat position when moving the speakers.
This leads me to believe that the room is being excited differently.
Therefore how do you go about initially setting the speakers so that you can set the chair?
Click to expand...

I would recommend reading the article in the link below by Jim Smith for a more detailed explanation (and Jim’s book Get Better Sound). The short answer to your question is that, while there will be some changes in low frequency response by moving the speakers, they are orders of magnitude larger by moving the listening position and won’t change much as speaker position is changed.

https://www.psaudio.com/article/location-location-location/
 
kzhtoo said:
Oh no. It isn’t?
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I have a brother in law that, though considered relatively sane by some in the family, honestly believes the earth is flat, the earth is only 4,000-5,000 years old and other odd things that have made many in the family avoid him and his conversations.
 
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