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Thread: RAAL vs. Beryllium Dome

  1. #51
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    Nov 2005
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    Default Re: RAAL vs. Beryllium Dome

    Quote Originally Posted by RicardoJoa View Post
    Even if you have two speaker with flat response, therere still people who gonna prefer one over the other. We are humans not machines. Even intrustments arent created equally. If someone ask you, how is undistorted music sound like? What would you asnwer? Barometer, would be our ears.
    Do you have a barometer to pick your perfect colone?
    Well the barometer if we're listening speakers producing sounds would be the real sounds... Trouble is speakers don't know anything about the real sounds, all they know about is the signal they're fed which they convert to soundwaves... So all they can do well is convert this signal to what we interpret as sounds/music... And if a recording is flawed in a way where for instance it lacks bass, and a speaker emphasizes bass which makes the recording sound better, although this does make this recording better, the speaker isn't better per say that a speaker that doesn't... It's actually worst!

    Anyhow, undistorted music as you've said would be a real sounds; violin playing or a real person singing, orchestra, etc. But the trouble is you're always dependent on the recording. Maybe a recording lacks a bit of high end and the harmonics of a guitar and seem lacking on speaker A, but sounds more lifelike on speaker B because it introduces its own harmonics, which you might interpret as the real guitar sound... Or as Curtis mentioned, sibilance... How do you know the exact amount on a recording and how it should exactly sound on speakers? Hard to say... I guess you'd have to hear the exact amount from a system you know is pretty damn near perfect, but again, what system is?

    Even high end headphones have FR all over the place...
    2000$ Fostex headphones: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/fostex-th-900.php
    1700$ Ultrasone: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/...-palladium.php
    1700$ Grados: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/grado-ps1000.php
    1500$ Sennheiser HD800: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/...ser-hd-800.php

    Even someone stating that any of these reference headphones are his reference might have listening prejudice... And again, if say real piano or violin, voice, etc. is your reference, then when trying to evaluate speakers, you have to be damn sure that your recording is a good one and contains accurate rendering of the instruments, because otherwise you'll more than likely never hear what you think you should be hearing...

    lol

    Anyhow, maybe I'm making things more complicated than they are. It's just that evaluating speakers by ear is hard IMHO. I hear people all of the time evaluating cd players, amplifiers, cables, etc., at shows and it's pretty silly often to hear the comments people make. Hell, I probably make equally silly comments about audio and must make many people cringe

    Just hearing speakers, you're 1/2 listening to the room and 1/2 the speakers... Hell, make that 75% the room and 25% the speakers. Moving the speakers a couple of inches front/left/right/back changes the sound, moving the angle of the speakers changes the sound, having some absorbent material on the sides to kill the 1st reflection point makes a big difference. Move the listening position and again the sound changes. So whatever you're listening to, you're listening to the room/placement/speaker combination. And even then, actually, you're listening to a recording... Not a real violin created by speakers making music in your room...

    Good measurements are made in an anechoic room removes the room variable... So again, the ears/brain are just so flawed to evaluate speakers... lol I know it sounds silly but measurements usually don't lie nor are they biased, make mistakes, etc... I know in the end "how it sounds" is what matters, but measurements are usually a better indication of sound quality than a subjective personal opinion. I know that for example, when I want to check out something about a speaker and head to stereophile, I click on a speaker review, and don't even bother to read the review itself, I just go to measurements and just go by that...

    Having said that, measurements aren't perfect either, and some speakers like large electrostatics measure very poorly and sound amazing.. Or open baffle or such speaker types, hard to measure, often look bad on paper but great in room... Same for some large speakers like Wilsons or Verity Audio for instance... They have 'bad' measurements (frequency response) yet for some reason sound very good in person... Guess again it's distortion. They can play loud and clean and this offsets the FR...
    Last edited by GirgleMirt; 08-15-2012 at 08:17 PM.

  2. #52
    Join Date
    Aug 2011
    Posts
    134

    Default Re: RAAL vs. Beryllium Dome

    [
    Even high end headphones have FR all over the place...
    2000$ Fostex headphones: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/fostex-th-900.php
    1700$ Ultrasone: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/...-palladium.php
    1700$ Grados: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/grado-ps1000.php
    1500$ Sennheiser HD800: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/...ser-hd-800.php

    Reason for headphone FR being all over the place is because the human ear canal amplifies certain frequencies and if they tuned the headphone to be "flat" it would not sound flat...that is the reason why the responses on paper are not flat, not because the engineering sucks.

  3. #53
    Join Date
    Nov 2005
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    Default Re: RAAL vs. Beryllium Dome

    Quote Originally Posted by parimento1 View Post
    [
    Even high end headphones have FR all over the place...
    2000$ Fostex headphones: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/fostex-th-900.php
    1700$ Ultrasone: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/...-palladium.php
    1700$ Grados: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/grado-ps1000.php
    1500$ Sennheiser HD800: http://www.headphone.com/headphones/...ser-hd-800.php

    Reason for headphone FR being all over the place is because the human ear canal amplifies certain frequencies and if they tuned the headphone to be "flat" it would not sound flat...that is the reason why the responses on paper are not flat, not because the engineering sucks.
    http://graphs.headphone.com/graphCompare.php?graphType=0&graphID[]=863&graphID[]=3841&graphID[]=2501&graphID[]=2151

    If they had the same FR to compensate for the human ear canal, they'd all have the same FR, but there's almost 10dB variance between the headphones given their respective FR curve... So which ever you use as a reference, you'll end up with different references!

    Take Grados, 8000hz is 10dB higher than 1000hz, and 300hz is 2dB higher than 1000... Compare with Senns, where 8000hz is 2dB higher than 1000hz and 300hz is 6dB higher... Or again 1000hz vs 2000hz, 2dB difference for Grados, vs big downhill for the Sennheisers; like a 5dB dip...

    Or are you saying they'd all sound exactly the same (perfectly flat) to you?
    Last edited by GirgleMirt; 08-16-2012 at 09:34 AM.

  4. #54
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    Aug 2011
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    134

    Default Re: RAAL vs. Beryllium Dome

    You are exactly right..."neutral" frequency response is subjective. I just meant to point out why the FR is not a straight line in headphones.



    Quote Originally Posted by GirgleMirt View Post
    http://graphs.headphone.com/graphCompare.php?graphType=0&graphID[]=863&graphID[]=3841&graphID[]=2501&graphID[]=2151

    If they had the same FR to compensate for the human ear canal, they'd all have the same FR, but there's almost 10dB variance between the headphones given their respective FR curve... So which ever you use as a reference, you'll end up with different references!

    Take Grados, 8000hz is 10dB higher than 1000hz, and 300hz is 2dB higher than 1000... Compare with Senns, where 8000hz is 2dB higher than 1000hz and 300hz is 6dB higher... Or again 1000 vs 2000, 2dB for Grados, vs big downhill for the Sennheisers; like a a 5dB dip...

    Or are you saying they'd all sound exactly the same; perfectly flat, to you?

  5. #55
    Join Date
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    Default Re: RAAL vs. Beryllium Dome

    Quote Originally Posted by parimento1 View Post
    You are exactly right..."neutral" frequency response is subjective. I just meant to point out why the FR is not a straight line in headphones.
    hehe, so I think we go back to measurements as the only 'objective' barometer. But nah, I was thinking back, and comparing some speakers, 25% speakers and 75% room is way too much.. Actually it's correct when you're not familiar to the room and not familiar with the speaker positioning.. (valid for instance when you go to trade shows or audio shows). But I guess in your own room, with your own placement experimentation and all, then you can hear more of the speaker and less of the room.. Or at least have an idea of what the room does and what the speakers do... something not possible if you're in a show for instance.

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