Speakers that Disappear

[Nikhil]

That is just stereo imaging, and it's simple: all-other-things-being-equal, if the voice is coming at us with equal volume from each speaker, it will appear to be in the middle. Possibly, with an effort of will, one can overcome the illusion, but it is not easy, because stereo simply takes advantage of how our ears work.

The illusion of stereo is amazingly simple ...and amazingly wonderful. None of us would be on this forum without it.

Thad stereo imaging is relatively simple and easy to achieve. It does however give you a sense of what we would like to achieve but is not quite the same thing. In my discussions with others on this, speakers that disappear do just that but not only when you are in sweet spot between the two boxes. The sound tends to "emanate" from a large sound stage that's thrown up all around the system. There a 3D aspect in terms of spatial arrangement of the sound. Sound staging aside - the speakers tend not to call attention to themselves and hence disappear.

... at least that's my theoretical understanding of it (until I get the good fortune of experiencing it).

 

[Staxxx]

This has been my experience too... and the cost of the speakers does not have much to do with it. More important are room acoustics and speaker placement. Most people don't play enough with speaker placement i.e. move them around till they begin to sound different/better. I am fortunate to have a geeky friend with such knowledge and I've learned from him how speaker placement has an affect on imaging, depth and even sound perception... and with the right placement and provided room acoustics are not a hindrance most speakers will disappear with the right placement.

:lol: I probably spend more time moving around my system and tweaking it than selecting it in the first place :lol:

 

[avidyarthy]

Thad stereo imaging is relatively simple and easy to achieve. It does however give you a sense of what we would like to achieve but is not quite the same thing. In my discussions with others on this, speakers that disappear do just that but not only when you are in sweet spot between the two boxes. The sound tends to "emanate" from a large sound stage that's thrown up all around the system. There a 3D aspect in terms of spatial arrangement of the sound. Sound staging aside - the speakers tend not to call attention to themselves and hence disappear.

... at least that's my theoretical understanding of it (until I get the good fortune of experiencing it).

Have 'only' come across one such system till now ... just once ... at the JBL Showroom at Kalkaji, South Delhi ... 2 years ago.

It was a JBL-make big bookshelf, with a large horn tweeter and a big mid-woofer (can't recollect the model name), with a Mark Levinson power amp and a Yamaha CDp. I was standing less than 2 feet away from the speakers, but still could only get the sound from all over and not the boxes right in front of me. It was an absolute 3D imaging.

Whatever speakers I have come across till now, none had this kind of sound-throw. At a mere 2 feet away, have always been able to detect the compressed energy emanating from the boxes. Yes, on moving away further from the speakers, most of the well-placed and good combinations have disappeared on above-average recordings.

 

[2chFreak]

Agree...I too have never heard this phenomenon. When the volume is increased, the intensity or loudness increases keeping the size of the image same.

when the intensity increases, so does image size. Would to like to hear a rendition of a solo voice as big as a 30 Ft stage ? If the answer is no, then you need to adjust the volume levels so that the solo voice renders like a single voice in the center of the stage.

Magnification is another name for Image adjustment or in audio - the Volume Knob

 

[Staxxx]

Have 'only' come across one such system till now ... just once ... at the JBL Showroom at Kalkaji, South Delhi ... 2 years ago.

It was a JBL-make big bookshelf, with a large horn tweeter and a big mid-woofer (can't recollect the model name), with a Mark Levinson power amp and a Yamaha CDp. I was standing less than 2 feet away from the speakers, but still could only get the sound from all over and not the boxes right in front of me. It was an absolute 3D imaging.

Whatever speakers I have come across till now, none had this kind of sound-throw. At a mere 2 feet away, have always been able to detect the compressed energy emanating from the boxes. Yes, on moving away further from the speakers, most of the well-placed and good combinations have disappeared on above-average recordings.

It is interesting and strange that you had this experience with such near-field listening. Usually one needs to be at least as far away as the speakers are apart (this is a gross generalisation before anyone beats me up) to experience a good soundstage. However, some speakers are exceptional in near field listening..other designed to be listened a little further away to allow the time alignment of the drivers to actually have a chance.

 

[2chFreak]

I never knew that the 'size' of the instrument will increase when you raise the volume. . .

Awesome! What kind if amp are we talking about?

any good thoroughbred amp. Your own amp too.

 

[Dr.Bass]

I have very little expertise to comment on this phenomenon "technically" however I have done a lot of work on getting this in my room at different locations and on different speakers.

My take away was simple. Given that both speakers of a stereo pair are closely matched and are placed equidistant from the listener the only factor that decides the disappearing act is how sensitive is it to the room acoustics. For example:

1. Arrest all the reflections using some acoustic material on the walls, floor and ceiling, the speaker disappears. What happens to music thereafter, we will discuss later.

2. Place the speaker far away from the walls, the speaker mostly disappears. The disappearing improves if the ceiling is higher and the floor is carpeted. Basically the speaker is away from all room boundaries.

3. There are speakers which are designed to be closer to the walls, they use the walls to achieve the desired frequency response, they easily disappear.

In my room, the speaker which disappeared most obviously was a Rs.45k Dynaudio Audience 52. It was paired with a cheap Nad 321 CDP and a decent Plinius amp. No other speaker could achieve such effortless disappearing since then, even though other speakers were much better engineered. With the 52 it just didnt matter where in the room is it kept, or whether the toe in is similar between the two speakers or whether the listener is equidistant. When I am in the center the image is more precise, thats about it. The speaker was so designed that it has minimal interaction with the room.

I have heard more precise imaging and disappearing acts in other systems and I have tried to analyse those systems whenever I could. Invariably it was one of the three factors I have listed above. As an experiment please try to put the speaker grills on and listen, possibly the disappearing act would improve (only because the wave form is a little more diffused and hence reflections are less sharp).

 

[iaudio]

With good source material and a optimum placement, a decent pair of budget speakers can disappear and create a soundstage where the sounds seem to be coming from in between, in front of, behind and and beyond the extremes of the two speakers.
I feel the recording and placement are the most significant factors here. Source, amp and speakers should be good, but they are not the game changers, imho.

My system does that...er used to! But ofcourse, it works only if I sit in the sweetspot or nearaby!
!

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

please try to put the speaker grills on and listen, possibly the disappearing act would improve.

I thought of a joke about putting curtains in front of the speakers ...then I realised it wouldn't be a joke at all. Our brains combine all the information they get to make the picture of reality inside our heads. That solo voice in between my PC monitors is an effective illusion, but if I am not just listening to audio, but also watching video, and my brain can see a guy's lips moving, the illusion is reinforced a hundred times.

So, subject to the various practical considerations mentioned, we have a stereo illusion that works, however, it can be weakened or strengthened by other clues. If we included an audio-transparent curtain in our setup, like some of the home-theatre people do, it would probably change our perception --- but there are speakers that look as good as they sound and it would be a damn shame to hide them!

 

[malvai]

when the intensity increases, so does image size. Would to like to hear a rendition of a solo voice as big as a 30 Ft stage ? If the answer is no, then you need to adjust the volume levels so that the solo voice renders like a single voice in the center of the stage.

Magnification is another name for Image adjustment or in audio - the Volume Knob

what I find is a phenomena that is quite different... let me give an example...

A 100 watt bulb, lit through a 'regulator'... like a volume knob. it is giving very dim light as the intensity on the knob is low... we increase the intensity so the bulb glows a lot more... we see more of the room being illuminated... then we increase the intensity and the more and more details of the room are seen...

but NEVER does the size of the bulb change... nor the size of the room!

in musical terms, i hear more detail... the soundstage gets more solid... but the instruments certainly do not seem enlarged!

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Not to be forgotten: one of the prime rules of psychoacoustics:

Unless already too loud, louder always sounds better.
​

Given the loudness curve of human hearing, turning the volume up means we will, proportionally, hear more at the higher and lower ends, so the sound of an instrument, particular one with a big frequency range, is certainly going to get fuller. Fuller might give some the impression of bigger.

 

[malvai]

Not to be forgotten: one of the prime rules of psychoacoustics:

Unless already too loud, louder always sounds better.
​

Given the loudness curve of human hearing, turning the volume up means we will, proportionally, hear more at the higher and lower ends, so the sound of an instrument, particular one with a big frequency range, is certainly going to get fuller. Fuller might give some the impression of bigger.

that too! And fuller isn't bigger... imho!

 

[2chFreak]

what I find is a phenomena that is quite different... let me give an example...

A 100 watt bulb, lit through a 'regulator'... like a volume knob. it is giving very dim light as the intensity on the knob is low... we increase the intensity so the bulb glows a lot more... we see more of the room being illuminated... then we increase the intensity and the more and more details of the room are seen...

but NEVER does the size of the bulb change... nor the size of the room!

in musical terms, i hear more detail... the soundstage gets more solid... but the instruments certainly do not seem enlarged!

Let me Try again ..


Consider 3 artists playing on a stage, Sax on the Left, Guitar in the Centre & Piano on the Right.

When you set the listening level intensity correctly, you will see the images as below :

Now, if you GROSSLY set the intensity waaaayyy too Loud, each of the instrument's image will start to overlap over one another, smearing the sharp image and diluting the overall image clarity as below :

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

If you "grossly" overdo the volume, you are moving into distortion land, and anything can happen.

 

[Staxxx]

In my system, I have to confess that when the volume is increased the instruments are louder but I certainly do not get the smearing effect that you refer to, unless it is turned up to the point of distortion (and the speakers are not capable of dealing with this level of amplified signal). However, on the other side, I do feel that if it is too soft that sometimes it feels like the instrument is not realistic. I like therefore to put my volume at what I call a "lifelike" level, which the neighbors are about to find out. And believe me a solo piano at a realistic level is quite loud and certainly full

 

[malvai]

@2ChFreak...

i am simply saying that the instruments do not seem larger when the volume is increased... they sound more defined... fulsome... one gets more inflection of detail etc...

the instruments in my chain are very defined... or as defined as the recording engineer allowed them to... i get extremely good detail, air, and space between each instrument even at low volumes... on increasing volume they just seem more breathtaking... their 'size' does not increase!

and no... even at fairly loud levels they do not seem to 'merge'... i have not played my gear at deafening levels yet, so can't say what will happen at those levels... but up to the 1 o'clock mark (enuff to get the people from floors 1,2,3,4,5 & 6) come down and enquire if we re having a party (i live on the ground floor)...

 

[longshanks]

@2ChFreak...

i am simply saying that the instruments do not seem larger when the volume is increased...

They should sound lager because we are amplifying sound and that means it is bound to sound bigger than the actual instrument when heard live with no amplification involved.

I don't think a live person singing without any amplification or a mic will sound the same as singing through a mic which feeds a large amplifier connected to a speaker, the second method is bound be sounding larger than the actual human's real voice.

I could be totally wrong here but i have experienced this phenomenon like 2chFreak

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

i am simply saying that the instruments do not seem larger when the volume is increased... they sound more defined... fulsome... one gets more inflection of detail etc...

Certainly. I believe that this comes under the rule that I quoted above.

It is a side issue, but part of my hifi quest is speakers that sound good at lower volumes. The trouble is that a great part of the problem with low levels is in the design of the human ear, rather than the speaker. This is particularly true as we age and loose higher-frequency hearing.

(This is a sore point with me since seeing the ENT man yesterday and taking a hearing test. My hearing is far worse than last time, and far worse than I thought. Unfortunately they don't seem to make hifi hearing aids)

 

[2chFreak]

what I discussed and demonstrated are amongst the things you're taught in a good music school when you go there to learn an instrument.

Its funny & absurd how it doesn't reflect or catch on with the so many audiophiles here.

 

[Staxxx]

what I discussed and demonstrated are amongst the things you're taught in a good music school when you go there to learn an instrument.

Its funny & absurd how it doesn't reflect or catch on with the so many audiophiles here.

Hmmm I have done my Trinity College ATCL (Teacher's diploma) on the piano....but look, I think I know what you are getting at. Of course volume makes a difference, and I believe the point is that you can lose that holographic effect if the volume is too low or too high - but these are the extremes of normal listening levels.
If you play ten instruments loudly, you get ten loud instruments - like in an orchestral tutti for example...however very good speakers are still able to maintain each instrument's positioning and detail within the soundstage. This is why I said in one of my primary posts that for that level of audio you definitely have to pay for it!