Any objective measurements available for Audio Products ( eg Indiq audio)

[Vineethkumar01]

Where are they saying that?

In some thread(s) I see people who have auditioned IndiQ speakers, while posting their overall experiences saying that tweeters will be flush mounted in the upcoming speakers.
I have not confirmed this with anyone. Nor do I care now.

 

[Enkay78]

If you are referring only to FR similarity most of the commercial speakers or monitor speakers measure same. They sound different because of the phase response or impulse response.

I respectfully disagree..

There are very wide range of FR differences.

Reference monitors may be similar measuring.

 

[chander]

Repeating one of my question here - as it seems it got missed or ignored .

There is any reliable way to measure timbre?

Also just to confirm on soundstage - considering it is a very important part of music (atleast for me) - did I understand correctly that no measurement can represent soundstage perception?

 

[arj]

It was

Repeating one of my question here - as it seems it got missed or ignored .

There is any reliable way to measure timbre?

Also just to confirm on soundstage - considering it is a very important part of music (atleast for me) - did I understand correctly that no measurement can represent soundstage perception?

It was attempted to be answered here
The answer is most probably No.,

That is true. as far as I know Timbre ( aka tone quality) cannot be measured directly and since its that quality that differentiates a guitar at 50hz from a banjo at 50 Hz, it is "fundamental".

I would assume some components of it can be measured individually or comparatively ie differences between Fundamental/Overtones and subharmonics from a reference, am not aware of quantification of the same if it does exist..or if it is proprietary to some manufacturers.
...

 

[aeroash]

 

[raghupb]

Repeating one of my question here - as it seems it got missed or ignored .

There is any reliable way to measure timbre?

Also just to confirm on soundstage - considering it is a very important part of music (atleast for me) - did I understand correctly that no measurement can represent soundstage perception?

For timbre, ask a friend who is a musician. They have better sense.
For soundstage, you said it yourself, perception.

Most home audio box speakers can play well enough in a room if properly positioned.

The larger market audience just buys what's out there and what fits their budget and aesthetic sense, room decor. Sound happens anyways.

Cheers,
Raghu

 

[Bloom@83]

Timbre , Tone , FR graphs , accuracy , second order harmonics … all the while listening to dynamically compressed source files streamed over the ether. The irony of it

 

[square_wave]

For timbre, ask a friend who is a musician. They have better sense.

Many speaker designers actually employ musicians during the final stages of speaker voicing.

 

[Analogous]

It was


It was attempted to be answered here
The answer is most probably No.,

If any term used to describe sound is not defined precisely it can not be measured.

This is true of many literary and common terms we use everyday.

The inability to measure timbre objectively does not reduce its value in audiophilia or music.

Many things, feelings, values, opinions can not be measured objectively but are important to us. Science is always playing catch up.

 

[Vineethkumar01]

Repeating one of my question here - as it seems it got missed or ignored .

There is any reliable way to measure timbre?

Also just to confirm on soundstage - considering it is a very important part of music (atleast for me) - did I understand correctly that no measurement can represent soundstage perception?

About Timbre:
I personally have never studied/known of any measurement method that accurately measures timbre. But from whatever I have read, it is a complex auditory attribute which (from the point of view of a loudspeaker trying to reproduce timbre accurately) depends on a number of different factors including the time domain performance of the speaker (impulse response/step response), its frequency domain performance (the on and off-axes responses), compression performance, energy decay and resonances, and because the perceived timbre also depends on an amount of spatial averaging, it will also depend on the room. So, for a Piano to sound like a piano and for a violin to sound like a violin through a speaker, the design engineer needs to have a comprehensive set of accurate measurements. Then a brain and a good set of ears to understand the analyze the spatio-temporal intensity variation across the spectrum.

Here is an insightful video showing the intensity distribution in the time frequency plane when different instruments are played:

Things to note are the harmonic structure when the same note is played on different instruments and their relative intensities, the attack (sudden rise in intensities of certain tones(frequencies)) and decay (slow degradation in the intensity) of the sound. The above details vary from instrument to instrument and thereby make them sound different to our ears.

In fact, because of the complex nature of timbre, the selection of drivers that play the different frequency ranges and even the order of filters employed in crossover needs attention. For example, there has often been discussions about why complementary LR2 (Linkwitz-Riley, 2nd order, acoustic) filters are able to convey sounds of a piano (sounds better) properly compared to complementary LR4 (Linkwitz-Riley, 4th order, acoustic) filters (makes the spinorama looks better) when they are employed in the crossover between the woofer and the mid. Answer was in the difference in time domain performance of these filters.

About Soundstage vs imaging tradeoff

One of the single most important metrics that differentiate between different speakers ability to throw a soundstage while sort of conveying the imaging convincingly is the directivity response of the speaker. higher the directivity, lesser the soundstage and (if the overall acoustic construct/transducers are good enough) better the imaging. There is always a balance between soundstage and imaging that designers try to achieve while designing a loudspeaker. Then comes the room and its treatment.

This is exactly one of the reasons why, for objectively analyzing a loudspeaker, one needs a comprehensive suite of measurements. The often shown as 'be all, end all' "Spinorama" is an incomplete set of data. One needs a lot more to understand more about a loudspeaker's design.

If not interested in all the above theoretrical/measurement related aspects, one can always trust one's ears

 

[keith_correa]

Many speaker designers actually employ musicians during the final stages of speaker voicing.

Yeah, the way Beats were voiced by Dr. Dre [or whatever name it/he goes by these days].

 

[Analogous]

Yeah, the way Beats were voiced by Dr. Dre.

And he laughed all the way to the bank!!! (While others were measuring…)

 

[arj]

If any term used to describe sound is not defined precisely it can not be measured.

This is true of many literary and common terms we use everyday.

The inability to measure timbre objectively does not reduce its value in audiophilia or music.

Many things, feelings, values, opinions can not be measured objectively but are important to us. Science is always playing catch up.

I guess the philosophy of science is to constantly question and finding out something new as we will rarely know everything about anything.

 

[Kannan]

There is always a balance between soundstage and imaging

I am of the opposite view. Taking out the room, phase coherent pair of speakers will produce pin point imaging with the most accurate soundstage as in the mix and correct instrument locations and the space between them.
Out of phase will create a diffused stage with no imaging

 

[Vineethkumar01]

I am of the opposite view. Taking out the room, phase coherent pair of speakers will produce pin point imaging with the most accurate soundstage as in the mix and correct instrument locations and the space between them.
Out of phase will create a diffused stage with no imaging

I don't understand what is difference between our views. By phase coherence, I am assuming the objective is to preserve waveform fidelity at the listening location. While Toole says preserving waveform fidelity is not important, my view is to have as much less distortion as one can in every domain one can, whether it is frequency, phase/time, everything is good, supposedly.
However, in a multiway speaker with spatially separated drive units there is a very narrow region in space where one will be able to achieve time coherence and that requires specialized baffle design and/or smart choice of filters acting on the drivers. Due to the difference in path lengths between the drivers and listening location, time-coherence will not achievable at every point in space surrounding the loudspeaker. Whether it achieves a certain sound stage-imaging balance, I do not know. I am yet to experience it.
However directivity will, in a more straight forward manner, tell about the relative levels and uniformity of on and off axis frequency responses of a driver and therefore determines the region in space which a speaker illuminates with sound. And that is going to determine soundstage aspects for sure.

 

[Analogous]

I am of the opposite view. Taking out the room, phase coherent pair of speakers will produce pin point imaging with the most accurate soundstage as in the mix and correct instrument locations and the space between them.
Out of phase will create a diffused stage with no imaging

I have been trying to achieve this by pulling out my speakers far into the room. This effectively minimises the room effects. My friends joke I sm using my speakers like headphones
But I get direct sound from them, in phase, very good timing of all the parts of the music playing and as you have observed a decent image and soundstage

 

[arj]

My experience with out of phase is slightly disorienting.... Voices seem to come from everywhere / inside my head!!!

 

[raghupb]

My experience with out of phase is slightly disorienting.... Voices seem to come from everywhere / inside my head!!!

Were you out of phase or were the speakers
Cheers,
Raghu

 

[coaltrain]

 

[Hari Iyer]

Repeating one of my question here - as it seems it got missed or ignored .

There is any reliable way to measure timbre?

Also just to confirm on soundstage - considering it is a very important part of music (atleast for me) - did I understand correctly that no measurement can represent soundstage perception?

Timber is a subjective parameter. There is no single measurements that can objectively measure timber. Probably some measurements in time domain viz. Impulse response, step response,, schoders integral to check room reverberation, ETC and envelop ETC may able to guess and pinpoint timber. But challenge is room noise can interfere during measurements and the regression line would not be very accurate. Frequency response measurements can say nothing about timber.

Reference monitors may be similar measuring.

So a JBL and Genelecs should sound same as FR is same. But they sound compltely different due to phase, impulse, step and other time domain properties.