Jimbos Audio ramblings

[brian2957]

Merry Christmas guys, hope santa brings you some room measurement gear

[Barry]

No need - I already have a good pair of ears.

But Merry Christmas nonetheless.

[Jimbo]

Merry Christmas to you all.

[Gazjam]

Good to know I am not the only one who has experimented with toe- in Gary. I have done this before in the past but never focussed on it until the other night where I found the new room configurations affected the sound set up considerably.

I have soft dome tweeters which are also a tad beamy so I think we have probably had similar issues.

My speakers are now set up with very little toe-in. Is this where you ended up?

Actually,
that’s where my speakers started off!

Realised I was losing some treble definition and imaging with the midrange dome and AMT tweeter pretty much parallel with the back wall.
Lived with that since I first installed the speakers, never gave it a thought.

It was when I did the old trick of cupping my hands around my ears, (more directly focussing the sound) I heard improved treble and sound staging.
Put that down to the narrowness of focus of the AMT tweeter and midrange dome of the speakers?

Playing with toe-in, pointing the speakers at a point just behind my head made the sound snap into life.
Theres a trade off though, too much toe-in and I lost soundstage depth, so the trick was to find the sweet spot.

Possible speaker cable change coming, will revisit dialling in the speakers then, but very happy with the music just from angling in the speakers a bit.

[Jimbo]

Actually,
that’s where my speakers started off!

Realised I was losing some treble definition and imaging with the midrange dome and AMT tweeter pretty much parallel with the back wall.
Lived with that since I first installed the speakers, never gave it a thought.

It was when I did the old trick of cupping my hands around my ears, (more directly focussing the sound) I heard improved treble and sound staging.
Put that down to the narrowness of focus of the AMT tweeter and midrange dome of the speakers?

Playing with toe-in, pointing the speakers at a point just behind my head made the sound snap into life.
Theres a trade off though, too much toe-in and I lost soundstage depth, so the trick was to find the sweet spot.

Possible speaker cable change coming, will revisit dialling in the speakers then, but very happy with the music just from angling in the speakers a bit.

Great to get your experiences with toe-in . I will post picture of the angle mine ended up at later.

[Jimbo]

Speakers now at very shallow angle.

1A5F45E3-8241-4E59-8910-678FF463A4BD by , on Flickr

[Jimbo]

After last few nights toe -in shenanigans I had a good think about what was going on regarding speaker placement and toe-in and I have now come to a few conclusions which may or may not be correct but I like to try and analyse what and how something happens.

I know that a speakers response to toe in is mainly determined with tweeter positioning and high frequencies. Some speakers have a wide dispersion tweeter where as others are more focussed and need to be in line with the listeners ear to produce their best in terms of detail and stereo imaging. This accounts for why some speakers don’t need much if any toe in and others require more. Bass and midrange are also affected but not too the same degree as the treble regarding acoustic information.

Tweeters HF information is affected by reflection, dispersion and direct sound. This subsequently means the information produced by a tweeter is received by the ear from a multitude of directions. So just moving the speaker a little will effect what you hear significantly depending on what is being reflected and what is hitting your ear directly. The materials the HF hits will also change the speed and nature of the sound hitting your ear.

Out of all this reflected, dispersed and direct frequency chaos you are then presented with critical sound clues in regards imaging and detail and from this you build a sonic picture of what you are listening to. But part of this information wanders into more subtle areas such as tonal quality and shading and soundstage ambience and positioning of vocalists and instruments.

What I believe was happening as I toe in and out my speakers was very much like a camera focussing in on a subject where you had choices of what you focussed on and to a minor extend what became Bokeh? Smearing of certain frequencies brought about different results. Either a more detailed but narrower picture and less tonal quality or where I finished last night with wide, deep transparent soundstage and lovely tonal quality and layering and not least great imaging and detail.

All of this I think is fairly haphazard as it would be very difficult to remove everything from your room and then bring piece by piece back in and evaluate its effect on the sound as you did it. You have to make the best of what you have in terms of your room / acoustic environment and try and fit all of the pieces of the puzzle together to get the best sound.

Moving an ornament on the mantelpiece could make a difference!


Analysing the frequency range and its effects in a room will tell you what those frequencies are hitting the microphone and what is being accentuated or lost but I don’t believe this is good enough to replicate what your own hearing perceives from the position you sit in.

Does RW tell you about tonal shading, acoustic ambience, imaging and so forth. NO. It tells you about bass frequency response, room nodes and general FR. Your ears will tell you if it sounds right.

[Gazjam]

Ears always

[Macca]

REW is really only useful for seeing what is going on in the low frequencies it won't give you much clue as to the rest.

[Wakefield Turntables]

I suppose using REW is useful for some things but I'm afraid I agree with Jim. I'm happy just to bodge along (not that Jim does), it actually makes the hobby fun and I've learned never to trust measurements anyway. I'm afraid it's whatever sounds best to my ears "is best", irrespective of measurements.