Tippy

So let me get this straight; the goal of an audiophile is to get the most accurate reproduction of live sound as possible and reproduce the instruments natural sound?

Sound quality (home) and live sound (concert) are two totally different things. Natural sound of an instrument is totally impossible!!!!

Why this makes no sense to me:

1. Loudspeakers usually just have one goal; to be loud!
2. Instruments once electronically picked-up or mic'd sound totally different.

Points from 1 and 2 above:

1. Loudspeakers have to reproduce extremely high SPL's throughout the frequency range. But they can't; they shoot for a strong mid-range reproduction (where the high SPL's come from!!!) that would sound like crap in a home setting. Even a loudspeaker enclosure with 18" woofers more than likely can't even hit below say 80HZ or something around there. You can't reproduce low frequencies loudly - these frequencies are not of concern to a loudspeaker.

2. These people going for natural sound ever picked up just about any instrument and played it? An electric guitar sounds very quiet and one dimensional. All of the guitars sound is processed over and over again through electronics. The sound coming from a guitar amp is not even remotely close to the natural sound of an umamped guitar. You get my point, I will not go on about different instruments and human voice but come on.

It makes no sense when I keep reading the phrase from manufacturers (or people for that matter), "it reproduces accurately the live sound" or "it reproduces the instruments natural sound".

To the former quote, so your sound equipment sounds like **** then???

To the latter quote, you cannot reproduce the natural sound because from the beginning, it has been altered to turn the instruments sound electronically!!!!

Ken D

Is it?

Tippy

It's what I keep reading over and over again....

Tippy

I should add:

Audiophiles spend tons of money on speakers, cables, and acoustically accurate rooms to duplicate the sound of a live concert?

Live sound uses harsh sounding loudspeakers with hard surfaced walls (unless it's in an amphitheater) making for horrible sounds.

Totally opposite.

Why try to duplicate that? Just buy some loudspeakers for your listening room and make sure the walls have no sound absorption.

Voila!

Studio sound reproduction is the goal, not live music reproduction.

MDeBoard

Sounds like you've been going to the wrong concerts.

A.Wayne

Flappy ? .....

cobalt

Are you serious?

I invite you over for a listening session. My friends and I do this once every so many months. if you are looking for low frequencies then you need a minimum size room. Low ceiling and narrow rooms will hurt their reproduction due to the size of the wave. Although reproduction well below 80hz is easily and commonly achieved. It is not only the accurate reproduction of the musical instrument and vocals as much as it is about the openness around each instrument so they don't cancel each other out. The sound stage placing the instruments broadly over a large area and the subtle resonances and sounds in the background.

If you have not experienced a system that has convinced you that you are listening to live music than you haven't lived. I recommend searching out a quality high end shop and listening for yourself. If they are worth anything they should have something that should convince you that you are hearing something very close to live music which is easily obtainable from 2 speakers and quality electronics without anything but the music being apparent.

So when talking non electric instruments like a piano or guitar. My neighbor is a world class pianist. She has a grand piano in her living room and in her opinion a piano played by someone like Diana Krall on my system to her ears sounds almost indistinguishable to a real piano and piano is the hardest of all instruments to produce accurately. I have also listened to her play in her home and I have to agree the sound emanating from my speakers is quite close to the real deal.

One other point is my system sounds nearly as good at as little as 1/3 a watt as it does at 40+ with peaks upwards of 240. You don't have the same sound stage at lower volumes but clarity and tonal quality does not suffer.

Also live or studio you want to hear what it sounds like no matter how it sounded originally. So if the concert sounded a bit off than it should sound that way too. There are many recordings that were purposely off by design from a studio recording. The goal is to achieve what the artist intended you to hear.

aeshultz

You need to get out to better concerts. Ever heard an acoustic guitar (that is - unamplified)? Would you like to hear that reproduced in your living room? You can.
And if you think that "Live sound uses harsh sounding loudspeakers", well, you've been going to some bad sounding shows. I'd invite you to listen to the Meyers Milo line array that I work with each week, for one example.
Sheesh.

Tippy

I think you missed my point. When I say loudspeakers, I am not talking home speakers (which I still don't understand how they get that name), but PA loudspeakers for live music.

My little PA has loudspeakers with 15"s with horns driven by 700 watts. I would not like to replicate their sound at home.......my lowly 12" Infinity HT sub can extend lower in frequencies.

My dads past 50,000 watt 4-18"s, 8-10"s, 4-horns PA playing inside of a box shaped dance hall would not be a sound I would want to reproduce in my home.

That is my point.

The other point is just about any instrument unamplified in it's natural state does not sound anything close to what it sounds amped except for maybe pianos.

Tippy

From Meyers website, "MILO contains three dedicated very-high frequency transducers that extend its operating range to 18 kHz".

They don't hit 20 kHz. My point. Loudspeakers for PA's don't reproduce the range home stereos do and audiophiles expect.

My confusion on trying to capture "live" sound.

Oh, here is another data point for the Milos, "65 Hz - 17.5 kHz ±4 dB" operating range. <------ I wasn't too far off here when I said 80 Hz in my original post.

You cannot produce 20Hz for instance loudly........

And yes, I've been around music all my life. Having a natural sounding acoustic guitar never sounds as good to me as one with a pick-up and amplified. And I've played many brands so brand is not the reason.

cobalt

Yes went right over my head. Loudspeakers to me was always a generic term Home speakers fall under.

So if I get you correctly if you take an instrument requiring amplification like an electric guitar and play it without amplification it doesn't sound anything like it would amplified.

I think we all understood that.

So I might be a bit dense but what is your point then.

The point of my home system is to reproduce whatever sound was intended by the artist. That includes some lp's that are purposely distorted. Roxy music, the cars, Joe Jackson's first lp's and several other bands of that era played with this and as the system gets better you can hear what they are trying to do, however if your system is not quite as accurate it sounds distorted and harsh.

The reason I mentioned piano is because Piano is the hardest instrument to get accurate. The tonal quality covers all frequencies from low to high meaning it needs to be accurate from all drivers at once.

Tippy

Loudspeaker as a name for home speakers doesn't make sense (even though that what the home speaker crowd calls them) b/c since the time I was very little, PA speakers were called that - it's what I am used to. Only recently, since I have been looking into high-priced speakers have I heard this term. Home speakers are not trying to cover the "public", just a small room; hence my confusion on why they would be called it in the first place.

Anyways, please do not tell me an unamplified electric guitar sounds exactly the same as an amped one?!?!

Pickups (the thing that takes the vibrations from the strings and turns the signal electric) for guitars change the tone of the guitar greatly and vastly. Hell, one brand from another sound totally different.

That is 100% wrong.


There is a reason people buy into the $5,000 cables for their systems........it is all coming together.....

odurandina

the audience in a live concert reduces signal to noise values, while creating a good sound dampener. unfortunately, the walls of arenas create horrible echoes. luckily, many outdoor venues have better sound.

the function of audio equipment is to act as a time delay device to transport you to the original soundstage or produced recording. (see my last post on the loudspeaker thread), and change nothing, even if the original recording suffers the effects of a poor sound stage, and overdriven equipment.

aeshultz

OK- so you know what MILOs are - good starting point. Have you ever heard a properly setup system?
I'm just using these as a rebuttal of your "all live systems sound crappy" point. No- all live systems "that you have heard" sound crappy. We're not talking about your band's garage system or your dad's rock n' roll system.
There are many different venues and many ways to reproduce sound - experience will show you some of that.

savowood

Alan (et al)

I wouldn't get into this discussion too deeply. It's not a discussion where you have any hope of swaying the person.

Yes, the MILO is a fantastic system. Meyer makes some amazing stuff for live and studio. I've been designing, installing, and touring with Meyer systems since the early 90s. My first choice in the studio is a pair of Meyer HD-1 monitors. And as you probably know, the 8" low range driver produces down to 32 Hz very accurately.

A quick and dirty resume...

5 gold records
6 films
7 world tours
500+ episodes of prime time network television

I've been around the business and made my mark. I've had this conversation too many times, and from experience, there's no chance you'll make a difference in this person's opinion.

The basic problem here is the proliferation of low quality systems. I love using the JBL Eon for just a loud, fill the space with sound, damn the quality, spend as little as possible type installation. The Mackie that looks just like it is also a good option. I think there's also an EV clone. The average club owner doesn't care about quality. They want loud. JBL does loud well. Meyer uses JBL drivers, although they're modified. JBL as anyone in the business can tell you is known as "Junky But Loud".

People like us who know how to make a good sound reinforcement system are horribly hamstrung by the lazy/cheap club owner who just gets the loudest cheapest thing they can afford.

So, put the keyboard down and back away slowly. LOL