Magico Q7:" most impressive product in 23 years of TAS reviews" (R. Harley)

[MylesBAstor]

Hi

In many things designing is that. Working on known principles to reach a product that satisfies the customer. If it were that you plug a few numbers and get a result we would not need designer for anything be it car, a plane or a pen. And indeed there are poor planes, poor pens, poor designs. .
I would expect the same for acoustics. Why I am pointing is that it is not a chance game. The way I have seen repeated here. No. if I have a room designed by people with excellent knowledge in acoustics and room designs, some are on this WBF e'g Keith Yates, Terry Montlick, Nyal Melior or Ethan Winer, etc it is likely to be a good room, extraordinary? I don't know, may depends. It simply won't be luck.

As for looking at a room and deciding if it is good or not. This is true but as in anything in life there are room that anyone with a modicum of information about acoustics would suspect of not sounding good. Of not being optimal.
Someone here suggested that the room response be known. That would be a start. a reviewer room, especially those reviewers of SOTA equipment should be known in intimate details. It is our rights to question the quality of a room and to suspect it, it seems to me that is the duty of the reviewers to assuage our suspicions.

Where in the East Coast USA can I audition the Q7?

The Magico dealers on the East Coast that come to mind are Overture Audio (Delaware), Ears Nova (NYC) and Goodwins (Boston). Not sure who has the Q7 but would be shocked if Overture and Goodwins don't have a pair. Ears Nova had the small Magicos but seem to be more slanted toward Rockport. Peter/Ack would know about Goodwins.

 

[microstrip]

microstrip

I was about to reply with a glib answer. You don't deserve that. You are one serious audiophile, studious, ardent and somewhat indoctrinated but enthusiastic. I respect that. I am similar in some ways. Not all.
As an engineer I know very well that any design depends on the individual designers. There are various philosophies to achieve the same results; often they differ so much as to think they aren't from the same disciplin. Take cars, a Toyota engine clearly sounds different from a Nissan' their ways to approach engine designs is also different yet they both make cars, I like Toyotas some people prefer other cars. Same with Audio or Acoustics. Different designers see things differently and results may be to your liking or not.. Not a chance game, not a low rate of success with a good designer, if you go alone. Your chance of success lessens. I believe there is a vast difference between informed and knowledgeable. I consider myself informed about acoustics,not a professional, not knowledgeable. AThis frames my disagreement about the low rate of success that you , now, call luck. Do I have statistics ? No! Do you?

As for summarizing the principles. No. Not necessary, seems to be a gotcha. I will not go there

Frantz,

I have learned that when you start an answer analyzing the poster, it means you will ignore the essence of the post and will move to Toyota, BMW or anything you have experience and write interesting things, that are no way related to main question of the post. IMHO your analogy between the car industry and small room acoustics does not add anything to the main question - the principles.

And yes, I have statistics about listening rooms and treatments. Not enough or systematically organized to present them in an explicit way, but enough to support my private opinion. Also, as it will involve directly people I will not discuss it. Anyway, it seems we are now too far from the central questions for me - the success rate and the famous principles.

Nice to know you like Toyota's. Although now it is very rarely used, my old Avensis is still in perfect condition. Never needed a serious service in thirteen years, except for one inexpensive heating resistance.

 

[RBFC]

We have formulas that calculate room modes based on dimensions. It's "typical" that we deal with the first reflection points. It's "typical" that we sit equidistant from both speakers. So, there are some rules and guidelines that have fairly universal advocacy. I would wonder if any acoustician would offer a design like the room in question as a starting point, or is this a case of "making a space work and getting lucky"?

Lee

 

[FrantzM]

Frantz,

I have learned that when you start an answer analyzing the poster, it means you will ignore the essence of the post and will move to Toyota, BMW or anything you have experience and write interesting things, that are no way related to main question of the post. IMHO your analogy between the car industry and small room acoustics does not add anything to the main question - the principles.

And yes, I have statistics about listening rooms and treatments. Not enough or systematically organized to present them in an explicit way, but enough to support my private opinion. Also, as it will involve directly people I will not discuss it. Anyway, it seems we are now too far from the central questions for me - the success rate and the famous principles.

Nice to know you like Toyota's. Although now it is very rarely used, my old Avensis is still in perfect condition. Never needed a serious service in thirteen years, except for one inexpensive heating resistance.

Originally Posted by microstrip
No one is saying it is a chance game. But the probability of success seems to be low, its why people refer to luck. I would not consider that small room acoustics for stereo reproduction that we have solid principles. I researched the subject during some time and I found that the divergences between known experts are very large. And the best of them are naturally more interested in their business and customers than publishing principles, most of their work in proprietary. And even people who share similar ideas diverge a lot on the implementation.

Some people try to extrapolate the solid principles of large room acoustics to sound reproduction, a very different affair, but what most do is adapting the existing tools to help them, relying mainly on their empirical expertise - something we sometimes like to call an "art". All IMHO.

BTW, you refer that there are principles. Are you able to summarize them for us?
microstrip


My reply:
I was about to reply with a glib answer. You don't deserve that. You are one serious audiophile, studious, ardent and somewhat indoctrinated but enthusiastic. I respect that. I am similar in some ways. Not all.
As an engineer I know very well that any design depends on the individual designers. There are various philosophies to achieve the same results; often they differ so much as to think they aren't from the same disciplin. Take cars, a Toyota engine clearly sounds different from a Nissan' their ways to approach engine designs is also different yet they both make cars, I like Toyotas some people prefer other cars. Same with Audio or Acoustics. Different designers see things differently and results may be to your liking or not.. Not a chance game, not a low rate of success with a good designer, if you go alone.. Your chance of success lessens. I believe there is a vast difference between informed and knowledgeable. I consider myself informed about acoustics,not a professional, not knowledgeable. AThis frames my disagreement about the low rate of success that you , now, call luck. Do I have statistics ? No! Do you?

As for summarizing the principles. No. Not necessary, seems to be a gotcha. I will not go there

Not much I can add. I think you did get my points. If you think that isn't the answer you wanted . Fine . I am done either way.

 

[microstrip]

(...) Not much I can add. I think you did get my points. If you think that isn't the answer you wanted . Fine . I am done either way.

Frantz,

Yes, I did get your points and no, isn't the answer I expected ... My main question was on the specifics of sound reproduction in small/medium rooms, not car or generic engineering. In these last aspect we agree most of the time.

 

[NorthStar]

-- Well, some of us (most of us), we can look at room's pictures and tell the overall acoustical characteristics. ...You can call that a mix of experience, knowledge, and luck.

It is the same with women; on the outside the level of physical attraction is personal, but it don't tell the personal spiritual inside value.

 

[microstrip]

We have formulas that calculate room modes based on dimensions. It's "typical" that we deal with the first reflection points. It's "typical" that we sit equidistant from both speakers. So, there are some rules and guidelines that have fairly universal advocacy. I would wonder if any acoustician would offer a design like the room in question as a starting point, or is this a case of "making a space work and getting lucky"?

Lee

Lee,

Yes, we have formulas for everything. And small letters saying that the formulas are mostly valid if you place the speakers in the corners and that "dealing" with the first reflections can mean absorb, diffuse or reflect. Happily the equidistant rule seems universal.

Read F. Toole opinion about the many formulas for optimum room dimensions: All of them differ, at least subtly, in their guidance. Driven by the apparently undeniable logic of the arguments, information from these studies has been incorporated into international standards for listening rooms and continues to be cited by numerous acoustical consultants as an important starting point in listening room design. (...) Cox et al. (2004b) found good agreement between modeled and real room frequency responses of a stereo pair of loudspeakers below about 125 Hz, but they ended their investigation by concluding that “there does not appear to be one set of magical dimensions or positions that significantly surpass all others in performance.”

Even considering symmetry, I could see that the best sound in the world according to our administrator Steve has a fireplace and a window in the right side. I can not see the left side, but I doubt it was a second fireplace in the left side. And David Wilson refers in the X-2 manual that L-shaped rooms usually offer the best environment for speaker setup. Also, quoting Toole again, most visually symmetrical rooms are not acoustically symmetrical.

My main point is that without listening there, we can only speculate about RH listening room. And surely if the room is successful, it was a case of being lucky. Lucky man...

 

[rbbert]

We have formulas that calculate room modes based on dimensions. It's "typical" that we deal with the first reflection points. It's "typical" that we sit equidistant from both speakers. So, there are some rules and guidelines that have fairly universal advocacy. I would wonder if any acoustician would offer a design like the room in question as a starting point, or is this a case of "making a space work and getting lucky"?

Lee

Didn't Amir recently start a thread which suggested treating (in any way) first reflection points is a mistake, that our ears expect reflections in order to reconstruct a realistic soundfield?

And check out Peter Moncrief's listening rooms at http://www.iar-80.com/; both speakers and listening position are asymmetrically placed (and he feels that is important enough to call attention to it)

 

[NorthStar]

-- I believe that each recording (even single song, tune) requires its own acoustic to perform at their very best.

The day that we can do that with light speed automatic adjustment, and with total confidence, that'll be the day! :b
Right now, let's be happy with each one's own personal best, & with today's latest technologies.

Man, I'd love to own a pair of those Magico Q7s!

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[RBFC]

Didn't Amir recently start a thread which suggested treating (in any way) first reflection points is a mistake, that our ears expect reflections in order to reconstruct a realistic soundfield?

And check out Peter Moncrief's listening rooms at http://www.iar-80.com/; both speakers and listening position are asymmetrically placed (and he feels that is important enough to call attention to it)

Treating the first reflection has traditionally been with absorption. Diffusion is seeming to be a better choice these days. I've heard the positions about assymetrical placement, etc. and there will always be multiple approaches, won't there!???

Lee

 

[NorthStar]

-- My best guess: five years from now, with new remastered music recordings, we'll need different room's acoustic treatments. And in ten years, different ones again, and so on.

...All directly related to the music recording's own acoustics themselves.