Gary:
I knew someone who had IRS Vs and no midbass. The walls of his room just wouldn't support those frequencies
Weirdest sound too. Great low and upper bass and no midbass 
Can a speaker "overpower" a room?
- Thread starter FrantzM
- Start date
Gary:
I knew someone who had IRS Vs and no midbass. The walls of his room just wouldn't support those frequencies
Weirdest sound too. Great low and upper bass and no midbass 
We agree, except for the phone booth part. The situation I described above can easily happen in a normal American living room or den from the pre McMansion era. I would go so far as to say that if you have speakers that put the tweeters/mids significantly above ear level and room conditions dictate that the ideal seating position is less than 12-15 feet back, you may very well have a problem. And I don't think everyone here agrees on that, but that's fine.
Tim
An even scarier thought: a roomful of Tims ...When this subject comes up, I always feel like I've walked into a roomful of Franks.
Audiophiles confuse me.
Tim
Merry Christmas, all ...
Frank
An even scarier thought: a roomful of Tims ...
Merry Christmas, all ...
Frank
That even frightens me, Frank.
Tim
Gary:
I knew someone who had IRS Vs and no midbass. The walls of his room just wouldn't support those frequencies
With most of the four-column speakers, that can also be a symptom of an inappropriate relationship between the four columns. There's cancellation going on at some specific wavelength measured between the woofer columns and the walls or the midrange. It is always a challenge to integrate because if I recall correctly, the high-pass on the midrange is 6dB/octave and the low-pass on the woofers is 12dB/octave.
Hi
I have had the opportunity to experience very closely the Genesis II and the IRS V. Three (yes count this three) of my best friends had Gen II, another had the gen 5 and one acquaintance had the IRS V. The "array" of EMIM in the IRS V did not go as low as the Ribbon in the Genesis as far as I remember. There was always IMO in the case of the IRS V a clear trade-off between mid-bass and low bass. The lack of mid-bass power, definition and articulation was compensated by the superior bass and low-bass rerpoduction of the woofer columns. The situation was vastly ameliorated in the Gen II and frankly, I found that the Gen 5 was better than both the Gen 1 and Gen II in term of mid-bass articulation and, yes, power. Properly set-up the Gen 5 was more agile in the mid-bass than both... I haven't heard the last version of the Gen II, 1 and 5. I am told that the I in particular takes no back seat to any speaker in the mid-bass department .... Lets not talk about low bass where my recollection of it was that it was: awesome, beyond any comparison to any single speaker system I have heard to this day ...
I have had the opportunity to experience very closely the Genesis II and the IRS V. Three (yes count this three) of my best friends had Gen II, another had the gen 5 and one acquaintance had the IRS V. The "array" of EMIM in the IRS V did not go as low as the Ribbon in the Genesis as far as I remember. There was always IMO in the case of the IRS V a clear trade-off between mid-bass and low bass. The lack of mid-bass power, definition and articulation was compensated by the superior bass and low-bass rerpoduction of the woofer columns. The situation was vastly ameliorated in the Gen II and frankly, I found that the Gen 5 was better than both the Gen 1 and Gen II in term of mid-bass articulation and, yes, power. Properly set-up the Gen 5 was more agile in the mid-bass than both... I haven't heard the last version of the Gen II, 1 and 5. I am told that the I in particular takes no back seat to any speaker in the mid-bass department .... Lets not talk about low bass where my recollection of it was that it was: awesome, beyond any comparison to any single speaker system I have heard to this day ...
Going back to the 1st post of the thread.....Yes, a speaker can overload a room quite easily in some cases. In my experience, you do not ever want this to happen, it masks too much of the detail and extension you paid so dearly to hear in the first place. While speaker placement and gear can make a dramatic improvement, along with volume control, it may just be something as simple as an interconnect.
Allow me to explain. I have a pair of Tyler Acoustic Signature Series speakers that most folks would think that they would easily overload the room. Well they did and for years, it was tamed by the volume knob. No amount of speaker adjustments, tweaking or furniture moving did the trick and I already had spikes. Honestly, I thought that it was just the room acoustics/size/shape that was causing it and that I just had to put up with it until I built another listening room or we moved.
I was very pleasantly surprised lately when I moved up the ladder with regards to a Transparent interconnect. Went from the Music Link Plus to the Music Link Ultra between my Dodd pre and the Musical Fidelity amplifier. The very first thing I noticed was a lower extension I hadn't heard so prevalent before. I immediately turned off the subs, only to find out that the rig actually sounded better without them and that they could still dig as low with more visceral impact, weight, speed and all out authority. One thing was missing though...
That was the overloading of the room. Where the speakers use to start overloading [recording dependent] at 8:00 to 9:00, they have no overloading characteristics until you reach a volume level approaching concert levels now. It makes listening more pleasurable because the spectrum of available volumes were greatly increased due to the loss of the overponderance of the mid bass and bass registers. It really is amazing how much the overloading of a room masks what your system might have the potential to do.
While this may not be the case for everybody, it was the case in my house with the rig I currently own and enjoy tremendously. I'll put it to you this way, I was so pleased with the end result as to what hits my ears now, I have purchased a Transparent Reference IC for that spot and another one will be installed soon between the CDP and the Dodd.
I guess what I'm trying to say is yes, a speaker can overload a room. Unfortunately, in my experience, this happens more often than it should but it may not be a speaker in relation to room size, it may just be an equipment or synergy issue that's causing the overload. Just food for thought
Allow me to explain. I have a pair of Tyler Acoustic Signature Series speakers that most folks would think that they would easily overload the room. Well they did and for years, it was tamed by the volume knob. No amount of speaker adjustments, tweaking or furniture moving did the trick and I already had spikes. Honestly, I thought that it was just the room acoustics/size/shape that was causing it and that I just had to put up with it until I built another listening room or we moved.
I was very pleasantly surprised lately when I moved up the ladder with regards to a Transparent interconnect. Went from the Music Link Plus to the Music Link Ultra between my Dodd pre and the Musical Fidelity amplifier. The very first thing I noticed was a lower extension I hadn't heard so prevalent before. I immediately turned off the subs, only to find out that the rig actually sounded better without them and that they could still dig as low with more visceral impact, weight, speed and all out authority. One thing was missing though...
That was the overloading of the room. Where the speakers use to start overloading [recording dependent] at 8:00 to 9:00, they have no overloading characteristics until you reach a volume level approaching concert levels now. It makes listening more pleasurable because the spectrum of available volumes were greatly increased due to the loss of the overponderance of the mid bass and bass registers. It really is amazing how much the overloading of a room masks what your system might have the potential to do.
While this may not be the case for everybody, it was the case in my house with the rig I currently own and enjoy tremendously. I'll put it to you this way, I was so pleased with the end result as to what hits my ears now, I have purchased a Transparent Reference IC for that spot and another one will be installed soon between the CDP and the Dodd.
I guess what I'm trying to say is yes, a speaker can overload a room. Unfortunately, in my experience, this happens more often than it should but it may not be a speaker in relation to room size, it may just be an equipment or synergy issue that's causing the overload. Just food for thought
Treitz3,
Welcome to the WBF forum.
I was very interested by your post, as I went through a similar experience using Transparent Reference some years ago - at that time I had my Wilson watt/puppy V - conrad-johnson system in a 15 square meters room and using the Transparent cables I managed to listen at reasonably loud levels without "shouting". One recording that I remember particularly well that could benefit from these cables was the Cantata Domino. The loud choir parts could be listened at almost realistic level without shouting.
I pick one sentence of Bobby Owsinski when describing quality large monitor speakers for mastering purposes: Large monitors with a lot of power behind them are not for loud playback, but for clean and detailed, distortion-free level. These monitors never sound loud; they just get bigger and bigger sounding and yet reveal every nuance of the music.
.
Yes, that's exactly what a correctly functioning system achieves: it doesn't sound "loud" as you up the volume control, the effect is that the sound just becomes more intense. This is also easily picked when you go outside the house, for example; it then doesn't sound like a hifi system wound up to boisterous levels, but rather that the "real" thing is happening inside ...
If there is an element of "shouting" in the sound then to me this is the classic signature of audible distortion being generated within the components of the setup: it's not room overloading, but a weakness in the system that has to be found and sorted out. Having done this this over and over again, using those symptoms as markers of the fact that the system is not optimised, is how I've progressed. I've never yet fiddled within anything in the room that's not part of the audio playback, because to me that's locking the door after the horse's bolted.
Frank
And welcome from me too. What you're saying is not just food for thought, but the truth, IMO. There are so many ways to describe audio playback not working correctly, and room overloading is just one of them. In essence, your ear/brain gives up trying to sort out the good sound from the unwanted sound, extra distortion, and your mind overloads, not the room. But give your head the right food -- clean reproduced sound -- and it can take quite staggering levels of sound without discomfort.
Frank
Only if it can can go through the door! I was recently offered a pair of German Physics "The Gaudi" for a reduced price, but found they would "overload" my entrance.
Operating principle 3 way speaker with a 3 way active crossover and 360° surround radiation using the
DDD Bending Wave Converter
Drivers 4 x Titanium DDD drivers, 4 x 12 inch sub-woofers, 8 x 6 inch woofers 4 x Carbon DDD drivers
4 x 12 inch sub-woofers, 8 x 6 inch woofers
Dimensions 1,300mm W x 2,100mm H x 925 - 955mm D, 51.2" W x 82.7" H x 36.4 - 37.6" D
Weight (depends on model) 720kg, 1584lbs
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"Can a speaker "overpower" a room?"
Experience with Teledyne Acoustic Research AR9 in rooms up to 400 square feet and 4000 cubic feet is that it can. It is a most peculiar experience. The speaker's sound seems to somehow dominate the room. It may be due to its powerful bass that can extend through equalization flat to below audibility with practically no distortion. Not only can it shake the room up, rattle the windows (once accidently to nearly shattering them all), and excite every room resonance, it also frees up the 8" lower midrange because it doesn't have to reproduce the lowest tones. Crossover is at 200 hz. That driver is used as the woofer/midrange in the AR4/4X two way systems. Careful equalization prevents this overpowering from happening. Naturally the speaker will handle whatever is thrown at it with ease up to deafening volume. Redesign of its treble using an array of a dozen tweeters allows it to recreate all audible frequenies without the slightest hint of compression or strain.
Experience with Teledyne Acoustic Research AR9 in rooms up to 400 square feet and 4000 cubic feet is that it can. It is a most peculiar experience. The speaker's sound seems to somehow dominate the room. It may be due to its powerful bass that can extend through equalization flat to below audibility with practically no distortion. Not only can it shake the room up, rattle the windows (once accidently to nearly shattering them all), and excite every room resonance, it also frees up the 8" lower midrange because it doesn't have to reproduce the lowest tones. Crossover is at 200 hz. That driver is used as the woofer/midrange in the AR4/4X two way systems. Careful equalization prevents this overpowering from happening. Naturally the speaker will handle whatever is thrown at it with ease up to deafening volume. Redesign of its treble using an array of a dozen tweeters allows it to recreate all audible frequenies without the slightest hint of compression or strain.
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