10k speaker system- ideas? (Yes, USD!)

[JZStudios]

2 hours ago, King_PIN said:

You guys should see what happens when sub 10hz over 100db is played in a room.  

Forget rattles the house starts to make some real weird sounds and the sensations are absolutely fascinating.   

That (doesn't) sounds awful. Anything over 100db I'm pretty much out.

 

2 hours ago, King_PIN said:

[geo3]

15 hours ago, JZStudios said:

Fast decay doesn't mean anything on a speaker and waterfall charts are for room decay response.

It does mean allot. It's a great indicator of how clean a speaker will sound. Also it can reveal if the drivers or cabinet have any resonances at a particular frequency.

It can be used for either rooms or speakers. It works basically the same with slight tweaks to the data collection methodologies.  

15 hours ago, JZStudios said:

They're literally useless for speakers unless it's measured in a completely silent room with 0 reflections.

You can go anechoic. But the more typical and easier is to gate the analysis software to a few ms after the pulse, essentially after the direct signal has hit but before the reflections have a chance to reach the mic.  Now the later way does have the disadvantage being unable to accurately measure the lower frequencies due to the wavelengths being longer than the reflection distance (unless you have a huge room and get the speaker 30ft up off the floor.) Or just go anechoic if you have access to one.  

 

15 hours ago, JZStudios said:

No one measures "speaker decay."  It's not really something that exists.

Factually false. Speaker designers do it. Some people who review or are just interested in the speakers performance also do it. 

 

15 hours ago, JZStudios said:

The only reason a long decay/travel time would be audible is if it wiggles like jelly and you're sending a blip through the signal that stops instantaneously. Which is called a step signal test. Considering no music nor instrument does this is, it's a non-issue. There's an argument that if decay was too short it would sound empty and hollow, but even that doesn't track because the speaker is a vibrating mass being driven by a signal. As long as there's a signal it's not just cutting off and stepping between bits like aliasing.

Semi-ironically for this argument, it's attack that's more important to keep in time and phase, considering the driver has physical mass.

So we're not really interested exclusively in the decay time. It's just a convenient thing to measure. Generally speaking if it decays fast it will do everything else fast too. What we're really talking about here is the cone's ability to closely follow the input signal. Or as you put it:

14 hours ago, JZStudios said:

What you're failing to attempt to describe is transient response and the settling time of the driver.

Yes, it's I've also heard it called transient response but almost no one uses that term, at least that I know of. They just call it fast. 

 

14 hours ago, JZStudios said:

You measure transient response with step pulses in a very well controlled room, with a very sensitive and calibrated mic. You could see the overshoot of the signal and the settle time back to zero. The overshoot is distortion of the signal, so better speakers will be quicker to settle.

Except literally no one does this for speakers.

So you literally already understand this concept but have been playing dumb for.... what exactly? 

 

14 hours ago, JZStudios said:

 

Except literally no one does this for speakers.

As I explained before this is just patently false. 

[JZStudios]

On 11/26/2021 at 12:43 AM, geo3 said:

It does mean allot. It's a great indicator of how clean a speaker will sound. Also it can reveal if the drivers or cabinet have any resonances at a particular frequency.

It can be used for either rooms or speakers. It works basically the same with slight tweaks to the data collection methodologies. 

It really isn't, unless it's exceptionally shit.

On 11/26/2021 at 12:43 AM, geo3 said:

You can go anechoic. But the more typical and easier is to gate the analysis software to a few ms after the pulse, essentially after the direct signal has hit but before the reflections have a chance to reach the mic.  Now the later way does have the disadvantage being unable to accurately measure the lower frequencies due to the wavelengths being longer than the reflection distance (unless you have a huge room and get the speaker 30ft up off the floor.) Or just go anechoic if you have access to one.  

So it's inaccurate. At the upper ranges it's unimportant because most people won't hear it anyways.

On 11/26/2021 at 12:43 AM, geo3 said:

Factually false. Speaker designers do it. Some people who review or are just interested in the speakers performance also do it. 

Such as?

On 11/26/2021 at 12:43 AM, geo3 said:

Yes, it's I've also heard it called transient response but almost no one uses that term, at least that I know of. They just call it fast. 

So you literally already understand this concept but have been playing dumb for.... what exactly? 

It's not playing dumb, it's calling things by the wrong name. If you want to have a technical discussion you have to use the correct terms. Speaker decay doesn't exist.

 

 

 

Just so I don't make another new post and my buddy is now invested in this, I'm adding this.

 

"Literally no one measures speaker decay and no one calls it decay. In all EE literature it is called transient response which consists of percent over shoot and settling time. Components such as peak time can be extracted out of this measurement and used in stability analysis in methods such as the root locus. Decay time means absolutely nothing in this context. All audio originates from Electrical Engineering as does most things in todays society. Use the correct terms when having technical discussions and don't make up your own terms."

[Psittac]

When it comes to high dollar equipment you should really look for a store near you that will give you the chance to actually listen to the product.  No review, audio demo or online advice can recreate just listening to a product.  Yeah if it's a $200 pair of headphones I'll go off a review, but for a $10k pair of stereo speakers, I want it to be something I've experienced when I purchase it.

[Spuriae]

22 hours ago, JZStudios said:

It really isn't, unless it's exceptionally shit.

So it's inaccurate. At the upper ranges it's unimportant because most people won't hear it anyways.

See Toole and Olive's "The Modification of Timbre by Resonances: Perception and Measurement". Resonances of the type which are typically measured via CSD are often audible enough to be distinguishable between typical speakers. Even beyond the context of this discussion it's worth a read; it's one of the foundational texts for our modern approach to objective audio design.

 

22 hours ago, JZStudios said:

"Literally no one measures speaker decay and no one calls it decay. In all EE literature it is called transient response which consists of percent over shoot and settling time. Components such as peak time can be extracted out of this measurement and used in stability analysis in methods such as the root locus. Decay time means absolutely nothing in this context. All audio originates from Electrical Engineering as does most things in todays society. Use the correct terms when having technical discussions and don't make up your own terms."

Decay is a well-understood term in EE (and science/engineering in general) for describing time domain behavior. λ in the damped oscillator equation (particularly relevant to this application) is called the decay constant for a reason.

[JZStudios]

11 hours ago, Nimrodor said:

See Toole and Olive's "The Modification of Timbre by Resonances: Perception and Measurement". Resonances of the type which are typically measured via CSD are often audible enough to be distinguishable between typical speakers. Even beyond the context of this discussion it's worth a read; it's one of the foundational texts for our modern approach to objective audio design.

I'm definitely not paying $33 for a .pdf from 1988.

 

His response;

" Yes the term decay is used in certain contexts, like capacitor discharge etc. It is not used in regards to step input transient responses with percent overshoot and settling time. They didn't go through EE. They're jacking terms from other aspects of EE and incorrectly applying them here. It's like saying I looked at the FFT of the speaker and it's fast. It makes zero sense."

In regards of your suggested reading;

"I like how he's trying to tell the tell the EE with over 50 books what's what. I guess I should burn all my books because they're all incorrect. Shit, I've only been using them for 15 years, graduating valedictorian with 10 years of professional experience and promotions. What he should do is go through the entire EE curriculum. He should read books on signals and systems. He won't be able to understand them without prior knowledge such as differential equations and circuit theory."

[JZStudios]

15 hours ago, Nimrodor said:

Decay is a well-understood term in EE (and science/engineering in general) for describing time domain behavior. λ in the damped oscillator equation (particularly relevant to this application) is called the decay constant for a reason.

He recommends you read this.

https://www.cinemasound.com/x-things-dont-know-transient-response/

 

He's worse at letting things go than I am.

"No one that knows what they're talking about would call it a decay coefficient because if the damping coefficient is negative, then the poles are in the right half plane and the system will oscillate. Therefore a system that oscillates with increasing amplitude doesn't decay. Hence why it's called the damping coefficient. It’s called the damping coefficient for a reason."

 

And again.

https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/damping-factor/

"The damping factor is the ratio of the load impedance to the source impedance. In other words the speaker impedance over the amp impedance."

 

Once more.

https://www.hi-fiworld.co.uk/index.php/amplifiers/75-amp-tests/149-damping-factor.html

"Damping factor does affect bass quality, but there's little difference between a majority of transistor amplifiers because their use of feedback results in low output impedance, around 0.1ohms and a DF of 40 or more. Very high DF suggests and amplifier uses a lot of feedback."

[geo3]

3 hours ago, JZStudios said:

He recommends you read this.

https://www.cinemasound.com/x-things-dont-know-transient-response/

So that just confirms everything I've been saying....   

 

Oh, but they used "snappy" instead of "fast" 

[JZStudios]

1 hour ago, geo3 said:

So that just confirms everything I've been saying....   

 

Oh, but they used "snappy" instead of "fast" 

Wow, way to entirely skip everything of actual value and jump to the cinema guy, instead of the multiple actual technical resources. I fucking knew you were going to come in and say that, even though it doesn't confirm your argument.

You also failed to provide me with a speaker manufacturer that tests "decay." You said they all do it, I as an outsider can't find any speaker designer that does (and neither could the guy in the article) and my buddy who designs these circuits for them hasn't heard of any that do.

 

Also, way to gloss over the fact that he's had 15 years of high-level professional experience making some of the best chips in the world. Again, he clearly doesn't know what he's talking about, he's just been doing it for multinational companies and boutique audio suppliers for over a decade. And his technical explanation of why it's not called decay.

 

Just saying "This non-technical movie guy proved you wrong" is the best argument. You're also intentionally misappropriating what he actually said, which is a great argument technique BTW. Doesn't mean you know you're wrong or anything.

 

Out of curiosity, what actually is your professional qualification in this subject? It really sounds like you're telling Gordon Ramsey he doesn't know how to cook because you saw Binging with Babish on YouTube.

[Derkoli]

1 hour ago, JZStudios said:

You said they all do it, I as an outsider can't find any speaker designer that does (and neither could the guy in the article) and my buddy who designs these circuits for them hasn't heard of any that do

IR/decay time/whatever you wanna call it at this point is measured. Sometimes not directly, but if the speaker is resonating to hell during simple FR measurements, its IR will be crap.

 

I personally don't think it matters either way. Our brain just can't differentiate the "decayed" signal that occurs after the initial signal stops, if your room is perfect.

 

Either way, the room will influence how "fast" a speaker sounds 1000x more than the speaker itself. No point having an excellent IR if your room is resonating like crazy and taking 300-500ms to decay down.

 

1 hour ago, JZStudios said:

It really sounds like you're telling Gordon Ramsey he doesn't know how to cook because you saw Binging with Babish on YouTube.

I'm using this in the future.

[JZStudios]

21 minutes ago, Derkoli said:

IR/decay time/whatever you wanna call it at this point is measured.

By who? It's not the EE's nor the speaker designers.

[JZStudios]

19 hours ago, Nimrodor said:

See Toole and Olive's "The Modification of Timbre by Resonances: Perception and Measurement".

Alright, so my buddy managed to get the .pdf free somewhere. I have no idea why you brought it up, because it has nothing to do with transients. I skimmed through it, filtering by the word "decay," which wasn't used at all in the incorrect context you guys keep using, it was only mentioned 3 times. The word "transient" was mentioned 14 times. On page 3 he might be attempting to discuss speaker transients, but then goes on to say "The subjective effect of these local irregularities is negligible if not absent in the first place."

Every later mention of transient is talking about transient sounds, like speech and instruments, not speaker transients. He then goes on to argue that an amount of resonance is beneficial and preferred.

 

In essence, the paper you linked debunked your argument. Congratulations.

 

1 hour ago, Derkoli said:

IR/decay time/whatever you wanna call it at this point is measured. Sometimes not directly, but if the speaker is resonating to hell during simple FR measurements, its IR will be crap.

He says;

"It's not "whatever you want to call it." It's an actual term used in technical literature called damping coefficient. It is not provided on speaker manuals nor documentation."

[H713]

You might look at Quested V2108s or H108s. 

 

I have a pair of Q108s (predecessor to the V2108), and I really like them. H108 is going to be a little lighter on the bass, but is more accurate.

 

MC2 HS800 would be ideal for power H108s.

[Shike]

Some of the most important questions haven't been asked/answered yet.  For example, what's the cubic volume of the space these will be used in?  How far will you be listening from?  Is there anything you'll be prioritizing specifically?

 

Without knowing the size of room recommending anything seems like a bad idea to me.  I don't know how much should be put into a subwoofer for example.

[Shike]

9 hours ago, JZStudios said:

You also failed to provide me with a speaker manufacturer that tests "decay." You said they all do it, I as an outsider can't find any speaker designer that does (and neither could the guy in the article) and my buddy who designs these circuits for them hasn't heard of any that do.

While I can't say I care for the designer much anymore, Dave F of Ascend Acoustics does measure decay in relation to ETC and CSD as can be seen here.

 

Quote

Energy Time Curve

This measurement is a good indication of overall transient accuracy and stored energy. The graph displays the decay time of a full range impulse. The impulse occurs at 3ms and decreases uniformly to the noise floor (-45db) by 4ms. This represents a decay time of 1ms, which is superb. Large diameter woofer cones, woofers and tweeters with poorly designed motor systems and/or heavy mass and poorly constructed cabinets will often contribute to far greater decay times which damage transient accuracy, coherency and overall resolution.

 

Quote

Cumulative Spectral Decay

This measurement is similar to the energy time curve but displays a 3 dimensional view such that we can examine the decay time with reference to frequency. It is an exceptional tool to reveal transient accuracy and indicate various problem areas with respect to resonance and stored energy. The CSD of the Sierra-2EX is exceptionally clean with good uniformity.

So there you go - I don't necessarily agree with the validity of his statements or put a particular level of merit on it but some designers do pay attention to it.

[Entropy.]

6 hours ago, Shike said:

Some of the most important questions haven't been asked/answered yet.  For example, what's the cubic volume of the space these will be used in?  How far will you be listening from?  Is there anything you'll be prioritizing specifically?

 

Without knowing the size of room recommending anything seems like a bad idea to me.  I don't know how much should be put into a subwoofer for example.

You might've missed a bit in my original post. That's fine, the room should be about 50-60 cubic meters, 1-2.5 ish meters with the speakers around a meter off of the wall, priority is on a soundstage, speakers without especially bright or sibilant voicing. 

[CTR640]

22 minutes ago, Brok3n But who cares? said:

You might've missed a bit in my original post. That's fine, the room should be about 50-60 cubic meters, 1-2.5 ish meters with the speakers around a meter off of the wall, priority is on a soundstage, speakers without especially bright or sibilant voicing. 

Nothing is more cringy than sibilant voicing.

[JZStudios]

7 hours ago, Shike said:

While I can't say I care for the designer much anymore, Dave F of Ascend Acoustics does measure decay in relation to ETC and CSD as can be seen here.

 

 

So there you go - I don't necessarily agree with the validity of his statements or put a particular level of merit on it but some designers do pay attention to it.

Huh. So back to the waterfall plot, which is room decay. Again, unless it's done in an anechoic chamber, it's a pointless test and just measuring that speaker, in that position, in that room, at that mic position. He even says the mic is 1m away, so it's just the room response.

 

Not aimed at you, but looking at stuff like PS audio and GR-research, they're legit selling snake oil and/or don't know what they're talking about. GR-Research has a $250 power cable that's "cheap" that uses wire larger than what's in your wall. Standard Romex is 12-14 gauge (smaller number being larger diameter) and he's selling 8 gauge per leg and requires "burn-in" for a POWER CABLE. It's literally snake oil, and these are the kinds of guys that hear about this "speaker decay" from the audiophile circle jerk, so they measure it without knowing how it actually works and it seriously brings into question the rest of their entire product line.

[CTR640]

3 minutes ago, JZStudios said:

Huh. So back to the waterfall plot, which is room decay. Again, unless it's done in an anechoic chamber, it's a pointless test and just measuring that speaker, in that position, in that room, at that mic position. He even says the mic is 1m away, so it's just the room response.

 

Not aimed at you, but looking at stuff like PS audio and GR-research, they're legit selling snake oil and/or don't know what they're talking about. GR-Research has a $250 power cable that's "cheap" that uses wire larger than what's in your wall. Standard Romex is 12-14 gauge (smaller number being larger diameter) and he's selling 8 gauge per leg and requires "burn-in" for a POWER CABLE. It's literally snake oil, and these are the kinds of guys that hear about this "speaker decay" from the audiophile circle jerk, so they measure it without knowing how it actually works and it seriously brings into question the rest of their entire product line.

Something like the iFi iPower2 power cable nonsense? It brings "noise-free and audiophile" quality.

[Entropy.]

13 minutes ago, JZStudios said:

Not aimed at you, but looking at stuff like PS audio and GR-research, they're legit selling snake oil and/or don't know what they're talking about. GR-Research has a $250 power cable that's "cheap" that uses wire larger than what's in your wall. Standard Romex is 12-14 gauge (smaller number being larger diameter) and he's selling 8 gauge per leg and requires "burn-in" for a POWER CABLE. It's literally snake oil, and these are the kinds of guys that hear about this "speaker decay" from the audiophile circle jerk, so they measure it without knowing how it actually works and it seriously brings into question the rest of their entire product line.

Different strokes for different folks. People will beileve whatever they want to beileve, as is demonstrated by just this topic, I suppose. People like spending money, or have hobbies, or hear things, or get placeboed, whatever. 

 

I would just refrain from making such abstract judgements of products from say, GR-research from what looks to be purely from unrelated products and speaker decay measurements. Ears should be the judge of a speaker, no?  

[Shike]

2 hours ago, JZStudios said:

Huh. So back to the waterfall plot, which is room decay. Again, unless it's done in an anechoic chamber, it's a pointless test and just measuring that speaker

It is quasi anechoic (I'm guessing he's using Ground Plane for bass measurements) so is not measuring the room but instead checking for resonance/energy storage.  Linkwitz has used CSD in investigating energy storage in drivers as shown here.

[JZStudios]

1 hour ago, CTR640 said:

Something like the iFi iPower2 power cable nonsense? It brings "noise-free and audiophile" quality.

Haha, no. These cables are legitimately just a cable and that's it. 

https://www.gr-research.com/store/p119/B24_Power_Cable.html

1 hour ago, Brok3n But who cares? said:

Different strokes for different folks. People will beileve whatever they want to beileve, as is demonstrated by just this topic, I suppose. People like spending money, or have hobbies, or hear things, or get placeboed, whatever. 

 

I would just refrain from making such abstract judgements of products from say, GR-research from what looks to be purely from unrelated products and speaker decay measurements. Ears should be the judge of a speaker, no?  

Not really, no. See, the power cord is just a cord, which sends the power into the power supply of your unit. Even if your power into the unit was perfectly "clean," you'd still be running it through the same power supply that's converting it from AC into DC with a constant steady state of flowing energy. It literally does not matter and can not in any way effect audio quality.

 

The thing is, there's signal measurements you can make using proper tools that are inaudible, even within audible frequencies. So when you're buying a $700 power cable that isn't affecting the signal response at all, it is literally impossible for the speaker to sound any different. It's getting and producing the exact same signal. It's snake oil.

 

Same thing with THD, they've done lots of studies about the audibility of THD (since it's easier to just add it into the speakers) and found that it kind of doesn't matter below like .1 percent or something. I'd have to find the actual results. But people still get all obsessed with having it be lower than .01. It's already inaudible, what is that supposed to be? Less than inaudible? Even crappy budget systems have less than .1 THD.

 

You want to blow your money, go for it. But as you said, it's the placebo effect. You spent $700 on a cable, it MUST be better. Then you go and tell everyone it makes a difference, and you have fast speakers, and the misinformation is spread around, all while typically ignoring the single biggest aspect of what will actually impact sound the most, room treatment and correction.

[Entropy.]

10 minutes ago, JZStudios said:

Haha, no. These cables are legitimately just a cable and that's it. 

https://www.gr-research.com/store/p119/B24_Power_Cable.html

Not really, no. See, the power cord is just a cord, which sends the power into the power supply of your unit. Even if your power into the unit was perfectly "clean," you'd still be running it through the same power supply that's converting it from AC into DC with a constant steady state of flowing energy. It literally does not matter and can not in any way effect audio quality.

 

The thing is, there's signal measurements you can make using proper tools that are inaudible, even within audible frequencies. So when you're buying a $700 power cable that isn't affecting the signal response at all, it is literally impossible for the speaker to sound any different. It's getting and producing the exact same signal. It's snake oil.

 

Same thing with THD, they've done lots of studies about the audibility of THD (since it's easier to just add it into the speakers) and found that it kind of doesn't matter below like .1 percent or something. I'd have to find the actual results. But people still get all obsessed with having it be lower than .01. It's already inaudible, what is that supposed to be? Less than inaudible? Even crappy budget systems have less than .1 THD.

 

You want to blow your money, go for it. But as you said, it's the placebo effect. You spent $700 on a cable, it MUST be better. Then you go and tell everyone it makes a difference, and you have fast speakers, and the misinformation is spread around, all while typically ignoring the single biggest aspect of what will actually impact sound the most, room treatment and correction.

I forgot to mention, I was addressing what you were stating about gr researches other products based on their cables. Anyways I'm not going to dive into a debate about cables or snakeoil. People buy cables for whichever reason. Their money, their hobby, their setup, shrug. If they think they hear something, it's all fair game as long as they aren't dragging others down by say, way overexaggerating the perceived impact cables have or anything like that, imho.

[Shike]

4 hours ago, Brok3n But who cares? said:

You might've missed a bit in my original post. That's fine, the room should be about 50-60 cubic meters, 1-2.5 ish meters with the speakers around a meter off of the wall, priority is on a soundstage, speakers without especially bright or sibilant voicing. 

Sorry, it seems I did miss it at the front end.  Okay, my recommendation:

• MiniDSP SHD $1,300 (comes with UMIK-1)
• ATI AT522NC $2,300
• Salk Sound SS 7M $5200
• 2x HSU VTF-2 MK5 Subwoofer $1,200

Total: ~$10K

The SHD will act as the brains/processor of the system.  Some important features are:

• DIRAC V3 Room Calibration (arguably best out there)
• True bass management including multi-sub output
• Acts as DAC/Volume Control (and even streamer, though not how I'd use it)
• Balanced output (ATI has balanced inputs as well so that's nice)

Connect the SHD to the ATI AT552NC which uses leading class Hypex modules for amplification, and another two outputs for the two VTF-2 MK5 (multi-sub with independent management provides better bass consistency/coverage if placed properly).  Finally to top it off with fantastic speakers, Dennis Murphy designed Salk Sound SS 7M with a custom veneer.  One could theoretically save some cash and drop to the BMR, but I figure since you don't want to suffer "what if" you might as well get the Accuton midrange in the 7M and call it a day.  Uses quality RAAL ribbon drivers and a custom Scanspeak 7" as well if I'm not mistaken.

 

Stands/Racks/Cables not included.  Part of me wanted to include the Custom Design FS 206 for shits and giggles though as it looks completely over the top . . .

[H713]

There is nothing wrong with wanting to buy a high-end system. I'm not sure the LTT forum is the best place to go asking, but that's beside the point. 

 

I would definitely suggest trying to do some room treatment if you're going to spend that much, however.

 

I gave my recommendation based on my own experiences, but I would strongly suggest demoing whatever speakers you decide on before you buy them.

 

I feel no reason to demo amplifiers, however. Good amplifiers like the HS800 or a Bryston 4B are basically transparent.