Digital correction: Why is there resistance?

[RBFC]

Another added benefit of the correction is the "rediscovery" of many recordings in my collection. I believe that frequency and time domain distortions in loudspeaker playback can synergize or antagonize playback characteristics of certain recordings. For instance, a mid-bass hump in response can be very welcome in listening to certain old rock recordings that were "too lean" in that range, but the same hump makes a piano recording sound bloated and slow. Response abnormalities can either co-exist peacefully or make recordings unpleasant for listening. Overall, room response errors seem to reduce the number of recordings that sound REALLY GOOD on many systems. Another member just posted that some audiophiles continually listen to excerpts from about 20 discs because those are what sound good. That is Stage 4 Audiophile Burnout, with intervention necessary! So, with digital correction, I've found that many of my recordings that were "just OK" are now much more enjoyable. That is the ultimate purpose of this hobby, isn't it?

For the cost, I'd suggest that anybody interested give the Amarra/Dirac playback software a try.

Lee

 

[amirm]

What really matters? The signal that reaches the speaker or the sound that reaches your ears?

Boy, that is a very smart line . Will have to steal it from you.

 

[amirm]

Great thread Lee. I remember my first experience with room correction vividly. I read a review of TacT in some audio magazine and they gave it a rating of 10 out of 10. I didn't recall them hardly or every giving such a rating. The cost was steep: $10,000 (for TCS model reviewed). The reviewer by the way said his room was already optimized but this product literally removed the walls from his room! So I acquired a Tact TCS. Took it home and applied it to my room. It was a bit of a pain to use but boy was I not prepared to hear that level of improvement. I must have sat there and listened to all of my library over again! It was a massive improvement in clarity, bass, etc. I became a believer from then on.

Sadly consumer DRCs often screw up the sound and that can give the technology a bad name.

In my book and that of top acoustic designers, no room is complete without a measurement and EQ of at least bass frequency. Our theater is computer designed and optimized and treated to death with over $20,000 worth of acoustic products. But the processing still adds substantial value.

 

[prerich]

Well a while ago I tried to take edorr's Dirac off his hands - He got it figured out. I'm a supporter of DRC as well as acoustic treatments (thanks Ethan). My room was fairly complicated with a brick fireplace to one side. I used acoustic treatments to fix what I could and then used REW to fix the bass below 200hz. Here's a graph of my current response up to 1khz (it's pretty flat up to 20khz). I don't own the best gear but for me it sounds good to the ears.

 

[edorr]

Well a while ago I tried to take edorr's Dirac off his hands - He got it figured out. I'm a supporter of DRC as well as acoustic treatments (thanks Ethan). My room was fairly complicated with a brick fireplace to one side. I used acoustic treatments to fix what I could and then used REW to fix the bass below 200hz. Here's a graph of my current response up to 1khz (it's pretty flat up to 20khz). I don't own the best gear but for me it sounds good to the ears.

Very timely comment. I just got my server back after 2 months and USB and Lynx are now both working fine. Hopefully I'll get around to doing a Dirac calibration this week end.

 

[Eichenbaum]

Be my guest...

Boy, that is a very smart line . Will have to steal it from you.

 

[Rodney Gold]

What really matters? The signal that reaches the speaker or the sound that reaches your ears?

I would also like to snaffle that line - I will call it Eichenbaums transform ..

 

[audioguy]

Eichenbaums transform ..

Wow! Sounds like the name of a theorem in one of advanced linear programming courses I took about 50 years ago

 

[audioguy]

In my book and that of top acoustic designers, no room is complete without a measurement and EQ of at least bass frequency. Our theater is computer designed and optimized and treated to death with over $20,000 worth of acoustic products. But the processing still adds substantial value.

I became friends many years ago with a guy who wrote music for Janis Joplin (Jerry Ragavoy) and lots of other well known recording artists (Faith Hill, Barry White, Aretha Franklin, B.B King, etc). He had a home recording studio and when I demonstrated the SigTech in his room, his response went something like this: "I have no doubt that what I'm hearing is a more accurate presentation of what's on the recording but it is sooooo different than what I have listened to over the past 40 years, I would have to learn everything all over again." The correction fixed two huge anomalies: a big bounce off the console from his soffit speakers and his console speakers AND the fact that he sat off center.

But I totally agree with you Amir: you probably have one of the vey best designed/engineered/constructed rooms around and yet you still get improvement from room correction. Unfortunately we still have a hobby where most enthusiasts are of the opinion that less is more. But in the case of DRC, that is not the case.

In my SigTech days, I probably demoed our product in over 200 rooms (recording studios [many], dedicated listening rooms, multi purpose rooms, etc). And in all but one place, there was improvement of significant magnitude. The only room where the sound actually got much worse was a room with 3 walls of solid glass !

Given that one can try Dirac out free and if you have a music server, I highly recommend you give it a whirl!

 

[jap]

Just watched the AV Showrooms The Show 2014 Report.

It seems that none of the top rooms mentioned were using DRC.

 

[prerich]

Just watched the AV Showrooms The Show 2014 Report.

It seems that none of the top rooms mentioned were using DRC.

I can't find the 2014 Report only the 2013.

 

[jap]

I can't find the 2014 Report only the 2013.

http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?13542-AV-Showrooms-The-Show-2014-Report

 

[audioarcher]

Just watched the AV Showrooms The Show 2014 Report.

It seems that none of the top rooms mentioned were using DRC.

Not a surprise.

 

[esldude]

Great thread Lee. I remember my first experience with room correction vividly. I read a review of TacT in some audio magazine and they gave it a rating of 10 out of 10. I didn't recall them hardly or every giving such a rating. The cost was steep: $10,000 (for TCS model reviewed). The reviewer by the way said his room was already optimized but this product literally removed the walls from his room! So I acquired a Tact TCS. Took it home and applied it to my room. It was a bit of a pain to use but boy was I not prepared to hear that level of improvement. I must have sat there and listened to all of my library over again! It was a massive improvement in clarity, bass, etc. I became a believer from then on.

Sadly consumer DRCs often screw up the sound and that can give the technology a bad name.

In my book and that of top acoustic designers, no room is complete without a measurement and EQ of at least bass frequency. Our theater is computer designed and optimized and treated to death with over $20,000 worth of acoustic products. But the processing still adds substantial value.

Pretty much the same experience I had. The idea of Room Correction appealed to me. Someone asked my opinion about another correction method, and while researching it (Sigtech I think) ran across Tact which was a more affordable solution at the time. Acquired an RCS 2 (their second gen and more affordable). It was like a revelation. Nothing had ever helped as much as that short of speaker changes. Took it over to a friend's house and he had the same reaction. Neither of us have been without some room correction since. If you ever doubt it, you can bypass it and hear you don't want to go back. You are right though using the Tact was a bear. Tried to get that across to Boz on the phone. Something I don't think he ever came to grips with.

 

[esldude]

Just watched the AV Showrooms The Show 2014 Report.

It seems that none of the top rooms mentioned were using DRC.

I have wondered about this. Just a hypothesis on my part, but I suppose people doing demo of their equipment don't want to give the idea it 'needs correcting'. Though there have been some demo's that used room correction. Seemed a room with Soundlabs did a demo using Tact gear a few years back.

 

[prerich]

Just watched the AV Showrooms The Show 2014 Report.

It seems that none of the top rooms mentioned were using DRC.

The Theta room had DRC (Dirac is in it's new processor). DIRAC had their own area with XTZ speakers, there were probably several others too. The big thing will be a Axpona 2014, I wonder how many are going to use it there? I'm planning on making the long drive (800 miles +) baring severe weather - if a cold front is coming through that time of year - no way am I traveling through Dixie and Traditional Tornado Alley!

 

[prerich]

http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?13542-AV-Showrooms-The-Show-2014-Report

Ok, I see thanks Yes when you mention top rooms - you are looking a purist systems.

 

[prerich]

I have wondered about this. Just a hypothesis on my part, but I suppose people doing demo of their equipment don't want to give the idea it 'needs correcting'. Though there have been some demo's that used room correction. Seemed a room with Soundlabs did a demo using Tact gear a few years back.

Anytime Legacy has a Whisper or Aeris system - they have room correction.

 

[ironmine]

I started using REW about many years ago and nobody could even understand what I was doing. As soon as my friends heard that I was "messing" with the original signal, their interest dropped. Unfortunately, being an audiophile is not synonymous to being smart or being free from faith-based beliefs. Even when they heard the improved sound and acknowledged that it was an improvement, they had no desire to digitally correct the signal for room acoustics. People cannot seem to understand that we do not hear the digital signal itself directly and we do not even hear the sound of the speakers only. What comes to our ears is the COMBINATION of the direct sound waves coming from our speakers AND the sound waves which are reflections from walls, ceiling, floor, etc. We hear the combined sound which is a result of the INTERACTION of the speakers AND the room they are in.

 

[ironmine]

I would like to add that currently I face the same kind of opposition when I tell my audiophile friends that I apply Isone or Redline HRTF algorithms (as VST plugins) to the sound which I listed to in headphones.
http://www.toneboosters.com/tb-isone/
http://www.112db.com/redline/monitor/

And I cannot get how can anyone continue listening to such rigid uncomfortable stereo separation in headphones when all these wonderful advanced crossfeed technologies are so easily available and their improve the sound perception so much...