Soundstage Reproduction and Scale: Does Speaker Size Matter?

[DasguteOhr]

I wasn't questioning that those speakers fill the room. I was questioning whether electronic music (as in your DCD example) has a scale in size. The music may be created with various phase 'tricks' to create 'musical objects in space' but it has no actual ambience or recorded ambient cues to tell us about its scale. Versus, say, an orchestra or a string quartet -- acoustic music in a physical context -- where the reproduction of that context (or not) gives us a sense of 'scale in reality'.

With autotune or Q sound exsample roger waters there's a lot that can be done psychoacoustically, don't think you can define exactly whether the room image is right, maybe with a live concert recording.
I think you can see an orchestra where there are violinists, timpani or brass instruments. but the realistic size does not work at home with two sound sources.
String quartet or a jazz trio will probably work well at home, the distance between the instruments will probably fit in with the distance between the speakers, depending on the size. good recordings sound like you're sitting in a jazz club, i think it's a success in terms of spatial imaging.
my opinion about it.

 

[andromedaaudio]

Music that scales the most ime is electronic house like Tiesto .
That fills the whole space .
Bass foundation / extension/ membrane surface is what determines scale

 

[DasguteOhr]

Ever heard Joachim’s very special Cherubin loudspeakers? They were able to create a huge soundstage.

No never heared cerubin or kronos system. I only hear medea three manger 120hz-35khz and 3 active woofer 22hz 120hz.
since the sound is radiated in three directions, the result is a halographic soundstage. amazing when you hear it the first time. Year 1997 i was speechless was demonstrated with forsell cd/dac and convergent pre/ amps. Panzerholz housing 21 layers heavy


With this song from ichu in the 90s this was the case
at every hi-fi fair

 

[Alrainbow]

Read this helps really to get a amazing soundstage, if you can do in your room.

Installation guide for loudspeakers by Joachim Gerhard - Suesskind Audio

Joachim Gerhard has put more than 50 years of experience with loudspeakers into this set-up method in order to achieve the best possible sound.

suesskindaudio.de

Thanks I’ll print and read tomorrow
does he discuss a line source type no tow in straight across
? ty

 

[Alrainbow]

Music that scales the most ime is electronic house like Tiesto .
That fills the whole space .
Bass foundation / extension/ membrane surface is what determines scale

I thought scale was small to large in loudness while maintaining placement

 

[microstrip]

I've heard many of his Audio Physic speakers in near field and soundstageing (is that a word?) has always been his forte. A key was the narrow baffle. Though not as narraow a baffle, the Caldera was very cool. I owned a pair of Avanit Century in Birds-Eye maple, circa 2000.

Yes, they had great soundstage. I have owned the Audio Physic Kronos for some time and now this pair belongs to a good friend, I still listen to them occasionally. The Kronos had an extremely realistic soundstage and a fabulous smooth and detailed midrange, coupled to layered space and energy. The active bass amplifiers were the week part, we replaced them with a PS Audio P200 with great success.

In fact, it was the shown system that made me a dCS aficionado - although only much later I could afford a dCS system.

 

[morricab]

No never heared cerubin or kronos system. I only hear medea three manger 120hz-35khz and 3 active woofer 22hz 120hz.
since the sound is radiated in three directions, the result is a halographic soundstage. amazing when you hear it the first time. Year 1997 i was speechless was demonstrated with forsell cd/dac and convergent pre/ amps. Panzerholz housing 21 layers heavy
View attachment 98828

With this song from ichu in the 90s this was the case
at every hi-fi fair

Mangers sound coherent but they are quite compressed when it comes to dynamics. As a result, after a while they start to sound boring.

 

[morricab]

Yes, they had great soundstage. I have owned the Audio Physic Kronos for some time and now this pair belongs to a good friend, I still listen to them occasionally. The Kronos had an extremely realistic soundstage and a fabulous smooth and detailed midrange, coupled to layered space and energy. The active bass amplifiers were the week part, we replaced them with a PS Audio P200 with great success.

In fact, it was the shown system that made me a dCS aficionado - although only much later I could afford a dCS system.

View attachment 98831

Sadly, never liked the Audio Physic speakers...sounded more like typical hifi to me....

 

[DasguteOhr]

Mangers sound coherent but they are quite compressed when it comes to dynamics. As a result, after a while they start to sound boring.

strange, i only know of one loudspeaker that delivers such an impulse response. it even delivers square-wave signals dynamic is her thing. the speaker is usually the brake on impulses, the amplifiers are always faster
whether you like the sound is always a matter of taste. some like horns, others electrostatic speakers...etc

 

[morricab]

strange, i only know of one loudspeaker that delivers such an impulse response. it even delivers square-wave signals dynamic is her thing. the speaker is usually the brake on impulses, the amplifiers are always fasterView attachment 98843

Not talking about impulse and time/phase coherence...talking about dynamic compression...

 

[DasguteOhr]

Not talking about impulse and time/phase coherence...talking about dynamic compression...

Ok is not db monster like a b&w 800 that brings you 120db at the listening position, but 100db is enough for me until then, it doesn't do anything conspicuous, very openly transparent, doesn't appear constricted. If you're ever in northern Germany, you're welcome to listen to a friend have them. You are invited. just send me a pm.

 

[morricab]

Ok is not db monster like a b&w 800 that brings you 120db at the listening position, but 100db is enough for me until then, it doesn't do anything conspicuous, very openly transparent, doesn't appear constricted. If you're ever in northern Germany, you're welcome to listen to a friend have them. You are invited. just send me a pm.View attachment 98844

I have heard lots of Manger and/or other brands using Manger drivers and never found them interesting beyond a few minutes listen.

 

[Robh3606]

The big boys win in this case but the little brothers do a damn fine job. Comparing DIY passive M2 and JBL 308 Mk 2 with trickle down waveguide technology. The 308's seem to sound better when used as designed for near field. The larger waveguide works better in a larger space.

 

[Folsom]

Sadly Ked is the only one with half a clue here.

The room and speaker interaction . You can have a single driver speaker that is 7’ tall, means nothing.

The smaller the driver the wider the dispersion. Some of these larger speakers have bigger drivers for their given frequency range so they interact less with the room than a smaller driver would. But with ample room it fades. The size of the drivers and the shape of the enclosure starts to play a role as well. The MM7’s are super smooth and curved so they take full advantage of all the music playing backwards towards the back wall without diffracting it a lot, so you get a very clean reflection back forward that assists a lot with soundstage. It can be very impressive.

These speakers with smaller drivers that are tall aren’t much different than a short one except in pure SPL capabilities. The vertical response is different but the horizontal looks about the same. Sometimes they just have more comb filtering.

Tube vs solid state is a better predictor of soundstage size you might get than speaker size. I’ve heard big line arrays give a small presentation. I was surprised then, not knowing much better. Then I’ve heard fieldcoil 2 ways project something so big it was just silly and bad.

 

[Audiocrack]

Sadly Ked is the only one with half a clue here.

The room and speaker interaction . You can have a single driver speaker that is 7’ tall, means nothing.

The smaller the driver the wider the dispersion. Some of these larger speakers have bigger drivers for their given frequency range so they interact less with the room than a smaller driver would. But with ample room it fades. The size of the drivers and the shape of the enclosure starts to play a role as well. The MM7’s are super smooth and curved so they take full advantage of all the music playing backwards towards the back wall without diffracting it a lot, so you get a very clean reflection back forward that assists a lot with soundstage. It can be very impressive.

These speakers with smaller drivers that are tall aren’t much different than a short one except in pure SPL capabilities. The vertical response is different but the horizontal looks about the same. Sometimes they just have more comb filtering.

Tube vs solid state is a better predictor of soundstage size you might get than speaker size. I’ve heard big line arrays give a small presentation. I was surprised then, not knowing much better. Then I’ve heard fieldcoil 2 ways project something so big it was just silly and bad.

So reassuring to read that (at least) one person on WBF understands it all and another - Kedar - is half way there.

 

[exupgh12]

soundstage (wide and high) is the interaction of the room and speakers.
Does speaker or driver size matter? yes, you need to pressurize the room, also you need to consider where you are placing the speakers in the room (close to side walls, far from the rear wall...etc).
Therefore we are talking about the two, factors of the soundstage wide and high are what you can get with given speakers in a given room.

 

[morricab]

soundstage (wide and high) is the interaction of the room and speakers.
Does speaker or driver size matter? yes, you need to pressurize the room, also you need to consider where you are placing the speakers in the room (close to side walls, far from the rear wall...etc).
Therefore we are talking about the two, factors of the soundstage wide and high are what you can get with given speakers in a given room.

Soundstage is much much more than the interaction of speakers with the room…power, cabling and electronics all play a critical role in getting space and dimensionality of images. The ambience on a recording that defines the limits of spatial reproduction depends much more on the signal chain than the speakers or room I would argue.
I can take your perfect speaker in a perfectly treated room and utterly destroy spatial depth and image dimensionality with poor choice of electronics, cables and especially dirty power.
Conversely, I can take mediocre speakers in an average untreated room and with careful choices in power, cables and electronics get very good spatial recreation.

 

[Hear Here]

I can take your perfect speaker in a perfectly treated room and utterly destroy spatial depth and image dimensionality with poor choice of electronics, cables and especially dirty power.

Couldn't disagree more.

Electronics are important but not as much as the matching of speakers to room - by a big margin. Cables, particularly power cables make very small differences. I use regular Belden 19364 and I defy any more costly cable to improve the sound from a good audio system. How can they - what's the physics?

 

[exupgh12]

Soundstage is much much more than the interaction of speakers with the room…power, cabling and electronics all play a critical role in getting space and dimensionality of images. The ambience on a recording that defines the limits of spatial reproduction depends much more on the signal chain than the speakers or room I would argue.
I can take your perfect speaker in a perfectly treated room and utterly destroy spatial depth and image dimensionality with poor choice of electronics, cables and especially dirty power.
Conversely, I can take mediocre speakers in an average untreated room and with careful choices in power, cables and electronics get very good spatial recreation.

In the case of using the same two systems and placing them in two different rooms you'll get different results, even in two different placements in the same room you'll get different results.

All the manipulations on the signal are done by the room, be it the walls, the ceiling, the materials or the devil knows what.

The room performs hundreds of manipulations on the sound at any given moment. the room chews and stirs the sound and makes it sound completely different everywhere.

 

[RCanelas]

Certainly soudstage and scale of a stereo system can be said to depend exclusivelly on the impulse response and dispersion pattern of the loudspeakers and the properties of boundaries of the envoironment they sit in.
I can't conceive of electronics so poorly performant they would dramatically affect the spatial presentation of an otherwise good setup. I can imagine electronics affecting other aspects of the presentation, more related to the spectral balance part: tonality, detail, ambiance retreival, clarity, distortion profile. But something that would introduce the necessary phase shifts required to colapse the spatial presentation would be beyond deficient.