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Two audio components no one really talks about

1. The room

2. Your hearing

First the room. I have bookshelf speakers in the living room with a sub and I love the sound it all creates (won’t go into detail about specs, not the point here). It’s beautiful and I love it. Then I have a system in the basement and the sound is completely different. The living room gives an open and spacious sound and moving the same system to the basement gives it a focused and not spacious sound. The tones and detail is good just not as grand a sound as in the LR. Secondly, the sound was horrible in the basement until I put the speakers against the long wall. My point is the same system in two rooms sounds completely different and a choosing a different wall made a monumental difference but still can’t match an open room. I’m a Vandersteen owner (basement system) and i know all about speaker positioning and optimization. There has got to be diminishing returns on a sound system when your room is limited in what it can do with the acoustics. 
 

Hearing. I recently had a hearing test and found I had hearing loss (a couple of decibels) in the mid frequencies (low and high were fine) and that it wasn’t due to age or damage but rather something I was born with. So what I hear and what you hear is different. I’m sure most of us have variations in our frequency responses. So when someone gives their endorsement on a amp or speaker or whatever, that sounds good to them and might not sound good to you. There is something to be said for tonal adjustments and for me in the 1kHz range. The point here is you need to decide what sounds good to you and you might not like that component someone swears is the best. 
 

I’m always amazed and the amount of money people drop on systems and maybe they don’t need to spend that much money due to limitations mentioned above. 
 

It’s not a fun topic but you have to admit there could be a lot you can do with the room to make the sound better. But maybe there is nothing you can do and no amount of money on equipment will change that. 

doogabayne
ghdprentice's avatar
ghdprentice
9,467 posts
 

Rooms are important and frequently discussed here. I lucked out and my audio room is amazingly good (see my userID). I was really lucky more so than good. We can probably lend a hand helping you tweak your systems if you show your systems under your ID.

Virtually all of us have very compromised hearing in comparison to our spouses. Women have much better hearing. I always bring my partner along when auditioning components. She can’t describe a single aspect of sound quality like I can… but can hear much better. She hates anything brittle, digital, noisy, or with high frequency distortion.

Anyway, most of us have some hearing impairment of some kind. But unless it is very substantial, it just doesn’t mater. A better system sounds like a much better system. Sounds like your hearing is outstanding… from an overall perspective. Forget about it. Enjoy the music, choose components that sound good to you.

rlj
76 posts
 

"Women hear differently from men."  .... Art Dudley

http://www.enjoythemusic.com/listener/v7no4/editorial.htm

 

theaudioamp
221 posts
 

Rooms are frequently discussed on audio forums I assume this one is no different, but no one ever accused philes of being good listeners.

Big room, reflections farther from the side, feels spacious. Small rooms, reflections arriving close enough to main sound, more focused. If you want spacious, put a 2nd pair of speakers closer but along the wall (wider angle to you) and feed them a delayed version of the main signal (get rid of the bass). If that is starting to sound like one of those spatial modes on your home theater AVR, it is. It is fake, but so is your spacious setup. If that is your enjoyment, then make the most of it.

The first rule of phile club is no one talks about wasted money. Of course most of the money spent is a waste due to limitations mentioned. You are not supposed to say it out loud, no more than you are supposed to say a lot of the money is spent on very expensive single function equalizers. They often come packaged looking just like other pieces of audio equipment.

 

walkup's avatar
walkup
7 posts
 

Spot on observation! I think those guys at Audio Science Review ignore the fact that we all hear different as our our rooms different, so with these many varying permutations and combinations science plays only a small roll in what we hear!

asvjerry's avatar
asvjerry
5,194 posts
 

Dealing with one's listening environ will likely be the most difficult challenge one will face, since the answer will either ask for a new purpose-built one or treatments that one's significant other will hate in most cases....

Dealing with your ears will require aids or headphones dialed into your personal response curve.

Your grey matter and how it responds will need a 'sea change' or a hammer.

Good luck with either or all....*L*

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