I will give an example of the LISTENER ENVELOPMENT concept and acoustical experience (LEV) for any audio system to test yourself...
It take a great control of the room to hear this :
Threepenny opera of Kurt Weill with Lotte Lenya 1958 version :
https://www.amazon.com/Weill-Threepenny-Opera-Kurt/dp/B0000026HI/ref=pd_sbs_2?pd_rd_w=6koxC&pf_r...listen side no 15, The procurer ballad, 4minute 38 seconds:
In my room the male voice sound in my left ear like with an headphone, same for the feminine voice singing in my right ear at the same moment, the 2 voices seems coming from behind me, opposite to the speakers location and the orchestra seems in front of me behind the actual speakers location, at 8 feet distance, filling all my front wall between the speakers but the sound coming from behind the wall that is behind them.... i have also the impression of 2 other virtual speakers behind me on each side of my ears.... Like if there are 4 speakers in my room... There are many sides of this cd that give the same effect not only this 15th side...But this one is particularly spectacular...You will undestand why i trashed my 7 headphones in a drawer and will never bought none other....
This is in my regular sitting position...
It is no more true in nearfield listening... On this same side the 2 voices seems now coming with the orchestra and no more separately from the orchestra, in opposite direction, like in my regular listening position....In near listening the sound seems a "bit" more detailed but is less livelier or less natural and sound exactly like in an headphone but better with my speakers/room... Passive and active room controls work EVEN for near listening,but at a lesser degree for sure but work very audibly also, contrary to a false popular misunderstanding of the way the extraordinary speed of sound cross the room and affect it, in relation with the 80 milliseconds of critical analysis time treatment from the brain to make sense of these wavefronts travelling near 80 times per second in my room...Each wavefront is a bunch of frequencies travelling together and coming from slightly different pressure zones of the room meet in each ears differently for the brain timing analysis...
It is an example of ACTIVE room control of the "listener envelopment" factor called LEV
Listener envelopment ...LEV is the degree to which the reverberant sound, of the first main 2 wavefronts coming from the right and left speakers to the 2 ears directly but also indirectly from early and late reflections encounter themselves for each one of the ears and seems to surround the
listener—to come from all directions, thanks to the active controls of the Helmholtz method...
This listener envelopment factor in relation with the source width factor (ASW) put you on the scene of the past recording live event and make you able to live anew the live event like the recording engineer choice of microphones and location choices of these same microphones make it possible, it is a specific perspective take on the real event created by the engineer because the real event CANNOT be reproduced exactly but could be recreated FROM this perspective if your room is well controlled...
The original event is not only in your room now, but you are actually there also....All recording are not on the same level of 3 dimensionnality it is the reason i choose this recording for a clear example....
With this example you will understand that nevermind the price an electronic design cannot make miracle in spite of the room lacks.... The room on the other hand CAN MAKE MIRACLE with any relatively good piece of gear able to do a decent job...
Gear are replaceable, rooms are not.....
Usual electronic design of dac or amplifier and even of speakers cannot replace the room nor compensate for the lack of controls in the room zone pressures and reflections....
We will need A.I. for that job....In the years coming tough...
