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Post by Priapulus on May 16, 2014 20:51:57 GMT -5
For my music, I bought an xsp-1 preamp and xpa-2, because that gear has the reputation of being extremely accurate; basically an amplified straight wire, without any colouration. Apparently purist audiophiles want to hear the music, not the amplifier; they even spurn tone controls as corrupting.
On the other hand, I'm about to buy (hopefully) the mythical xmc-1 movie processor, because it has Dirac Live™ 7.2 room correction and built-in 11-channel parametric EQ, that allow you to dramatically alter the sound of the music, to correct for room anomalies, or to satisfy your own taste. But these "corrections" would be seen as distortions to some audiophiles.
So which is right, keeping the signal pure or "correcting" it? Should "Raiders of the Lost Ark" be corrected, but not Bach fugues? Is there a different philosophy for movies and music? What gives? I notice that some people here really like room correction, others turn it off.
Sincerely /blair |
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Post by deltadube on May 16, 2014 20:57:18 GMT -5
imho room correction software is for movies not 2 channel stereo..
but adding room treatments the old fashion way via bass traps, absorbers and diffusors is awesome way to make your room sound great...
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 16, 2014 21:10:58 GMT -5
I think when it comes to 2 channel music the purist wants as little processing of the signal as possible. Music is different than theater. Theater is more about effect. With many speakers you need some processing for set up.
For two channel even the best systems will needs some equalization which is processing whether if be digital or analog. With a dedicated two channel set up a lot of the work can be accomplished with speaker positioning and equipment which can get you a good set up. Equalization and fancy processing will maybe help you get the last bit out of your system. In the end you will always need to add your own adjustments on top of any adjustments arrived at by a processor.
I saw the Dirac Demonstration and found the difference with Dirac on vs. off to be dramatic. Is created a wider sound stage and you were not aware of two speakers just music in the 3rd dimension. Now what would it be long on an extended listening on vs. off who knows. The time correction may be more important than the frequency equalization. Really it is just the modern equivalent of Carver's Sonic Holography or Polk's SDA system with the interconnecting wire.
I have heard Carver's Sonic Holography and it was some of the best audio I have heard.
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Post by novisnick on May 16, 2014 22:11:53 GMT -5
imho room correction software is for movies not 2 channel stereo.. but adding room treatments the old fashion way via bass traps, absorbers and diffusors is awesome way to make your room sound great... I agree with you, the artist and engineer have produced the music and sound just the way they intended for you to hear it, I'm not so sure that I know better then the artist as to what they wish to present to the listener, would you take a painting by a world class artist and add a color that you think it needs?  It then becomes something different. HT is very different, more sound sources to work together, ( 11.4 ) I need to coordinate the speakers for best results that the sound mixer and producer intended. A lot more reflection to deal with. Without some type of correction (coordination) of the sound it would be a true mess. With HT it is imperative that you know where the sound is coming from to match the picture on the screen and not the one in your head that you visualize listening to music. This is all purely my opinion and preference in my sound, you are more then welcome to disagree. Peace, Nick |
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Post by rcohen on May 16, 2014 22:30:03 GMT -5
I have been using Dirac Live for the past few weeks and I love what it is doing for music, as well as HT.
When you switch it on and off, it's obvious that it's removing coloration, not adding.
It all depends on the target curve. It is also possible to make target curves that add coloration and hurt the sound.
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Post by geebo on May 16, 2014 22:37:43 GMT -5
It's whatever you prefer when listening. Don't worry about what you should do according to someone else. The beauty of the XMC-1 is that it will have a hot rodded analog section, Dirac, and multi band PEQ. You can choose your poison! It's whatever puts the biggest smile on your face.  |
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Post by mauriceminor on May 16, 2014 23:37:09 GMT -5
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Post by flak on May 20, 2014 7:50:06 GMT -5
For my music, I bought an xsp-1 preamp and xpa-2, because that gear has the reputation of being extremely accurate; basically an amplified straight wire, without any colouration. Apparently purist audiophiles want to hear the music, not the amplifier; they even spurn tone controls as corrupting.
On the other hand, I'm about to buy (hopefully) the mythical xmc-1 movie processor, because it has Dirac Live™ 7.2 room correction and built-in 11-channel parametric EQ, that allow you to dramatically alter the sound of the music, to correct for room anomalies, or to satisfy your own taste. But these "corrections" would be seen as distortions to some audiophiles.
So which is right, keeping the signal pure or "correcting" it? Should "Raiders of the Lost Ark" be corrected, but not Bach fugues? Is there a different philosophy for movies and music? What gives? I notice that some people here really like room correction, others turn it off.
Sincerely /blair Hello Blair, Placing a speaker in a room IS a filter... and filters can introduce time shifts (an equal phase shift for all frequencies) or phase shifts. The speaker position, the listening position and the room "decide" what this filter will look like. Moving the listening position, even slightly, will change this filter. To handle this it is possible to add another filter to even out the frequency response of the "speaker + room filter", in the process possibly introducing even more phase shifts. (these are the traditional minimum or linear phase filters) However, it is possible to add a third filter, an all pass filter, that is, a filter with flat frequency response that only introduces phase shifts to cancel the phase shifts introduced by the "speaker+room" The net result is then several phase shifts in series, but (in theory) a linear phase and a time shift (due to the phase shifts). At this point a frequency response AND a phase compensation has been performed by Dirac Live, or to see it in another way, the impulse response has been corrected. b.t.w. that is the reason why you cannot correct for everything using a traditional minimum phase EQ... Leaving tech aspects aside you may be interested in the following evaluation of Dirac Live in a multichannel configuration from an audiophile's point of view: www.stereophile.com/content/music-round-66Ciao, Flavio |
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Post by cd on May 20, 2014 9:14:38 GMT -5
Flavio is spot-on. The room already acts as a tone control and phase shifter and on and on. And this is true whether the signal originates from a 2-channel music track or a multi-channel movie track. If the room correction system is doing a proper job, and it would seem that Dirac is among the better RC systems, it serves to mitigate these un-wanted signal aberrations, thus providing one with a sound that approaches what the engineer originally intended.
And let's face it, most folks don't have a clue about how to properly setup their speakers and the room in which they are playing. 9 times out of 10, your system will sound much better when using something like Dirac to correct the sound you hear...
CD
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Post by milsap195 on May 20, 2014 9:22:19 GMT -5
So is it recommended to use the room correction for two channel?
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Post by cd on May 20, 2014 10:25:29 GMT -5
Milsap wondered: "So is it recommended to use the room correction for two channel?"
Absolutely. Remember. the very first room correction systems were two channel only - and cost in excess of $10,000. And bear in mind that many, if not most, 2 channel systems are constrained from "proper" speaker placement due to aesthetics (the dreaded WAF), room construction anomalies, and such. You will most likely hear improvement even when you are using only 2 channels. And, since every RCS I've ever seen allows for a processing bypass, why not go ahead and use it to see if it improves the sound of your system? I'm betting it does...
CD
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Post by GreenKiwi on May 20, 2014 12:08:47 GMT -5
I'd have to say that purist comments like "the artist and engineer have produced the music and sound just the way they intended for you to hear it and you should never touch it" is ONLY acceptable in one instance, that you are listening on the same system that the record was mastered/voiced on. (or the follow on, it's multichannel, so it's ok to use room correction, but never touch a stereo signal.)
As soon as you change the listening environment, all you can hope to do is recreate an experience that most closely replicates the environment that they were listening to. This is compounded by the fact that I would imagine that many recordings get mixed/remixed/voiced in different environments. Once you agree with that, then it's just mechanics... and room correction is room correction, whether it it physical, moving speakers, adding traps, putting in a rug... or in the audio path, via analog filters (treble/base adjustments) or digitally.
Then it just becomes a question of whether they work or not, not whether or not you should apply them. And the most important factor is that they work in particular room you are listening in.
Just my $0.02 (or less)
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Post by moko on May 20, 2014 13:05:28 GMT -5
i believe a proper room treatment will give much more impact compared to just heavily depends on room correction. can room correction reduce some echoes in a room ?
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Post by cd on May 20, 2014 13:16:42 GMT -5
No, room correction cannot remove "slap echo" from a room. IMHO, it is assumed that anyone who uses room correction has a modicum of common sense when it comes to the setup of their system in the room. Room correction systems *can* mitigate the peaks and nulls caused by standing waves, but they cannot completely fix all of a room's problems.
Basically, if by proper placement of furniture, wall hangings, and rugs you can reduce (*not* eliminate) the reflectivity of the walls, ceiling, and floor, the room correction system will mostly take care of the rest of the room's problems....
CD
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Post by Bonzo on May 20, 2014 17:30:11 GMT -5
And if you really like the sound, you can save money by not buying an Oppo 105 or Emotiva ERC-3 or external DAC because spending the extra coin for their great analog sound is basically pointless. Any transport with digital output will do the trick.
Problem arises for vinyl junkies because these systems add an ADC which must happen before any correction takes place, then also adds DAC conversion back. Only you can tell in your room and your system which sounds better.
But I can say that I think for just about every single review of a receiver I have seen in Sound & Vision and Home Theater Magazine since these sort of systems started coming out (about 2005ish), the reviewers almost always turn them off in preference to the sound without them turned on. Not always, but almost always, like easily 9 out of 10 or more.
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DYohn
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Post by DYohn on May 20, 2014 18:56:39 GMT -5
As a friend of mine once said, "Proper room treatments allow you to hear less of your room and more of your system." Room correction can be great for EQ of loudspeaker frequency response issues and for adjusting channel time delays for proper phase alignment of the test tones. But IMO it can do nothing to correct a bad room. Only acoustic treatments can help that, and even they can only do so much. I say the best thing you can possibly do is have your room tested and get some proper absorption and diffusion treatments installed, then set up your system the best you can given the limitations of room geometry and apply room correction for EQ and timing adjustments. Bottom line: enjoy the music. |
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Post by flak on May 21, 2014 4:27:42 GMT -5
As a friend of mine once said, "Proper room treatments allow you to hear less of your room and more of your system." Room correction can be great for EQ of loudspeaker frequency response issues and for adjusting channel time delays for proper phase alignment of the test tones. But IMO it can do nothing to correct a bad room. Only acoustic treatments can help that, and even they can only do so much. I say the best thing you can possibly do is have your room tested and get some proper absorption and diffusion treatments installed, then set up your system the best you can given the limitations of room geometry and apply room correction for EQ and timing adjustments. Bottom line: enjoy the music. In my opinion it is important to focus on the fact that many different digital room correction solutions are labeled "Room Correction" but the performance is very different also. Because of different required processing hardware and licensing fees you can have low cost solutions as well as high performance ones which are sophisticated like the XMC-1 but more expensive and difficult to implement. Just as an example you can read this thread about the new Onkyo releases which have been criticized (I don't know them so I do not take a stance) for changing to a lower cost alternative instead of changing to a higher performance one: www.hometheatershack.com/forums/home-theater-audio-video-news/76194-onkyo-announces-tx-nr737-tx-nr838-av-receivers.htmlAs a result the actual performance (and cost obviously) of a Datasat RS20i is very different from an Onkyo NR838 but they both feature "Room Correction" From my admittedly biased point of view there is no doubt that Dirac Live can do much to correct a bad room and both the measurements on one side and the listening tests from audiophile listeners like Stereophile's Kal Rubinson on the other side do confirm this: www.stereophile.com/content/music-round-66Ciao, Flavio |
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Post by drtrey3 on May 21, 2014 10:25:39 GMT -5
I think it depends on your room and speaker placement options. Before we had triplets, I had a room just for two channel audio! I measured the speakers distance, used computational programs to minimize placement problems, and even had my wife hold the tape measure from my nose to the speakers. 8) Oh, and there were corner traps in the ceiling corners and all kinds of great stuff! It sounded great, but was a little lonely.
Now my setup is downstairs and typically used for Minecraft videos or House Hunter International, it is an L shaped room, the speakers are equidistant from the back wall only and if I even try to float the idea of room treatments the wife get's that look in her eye that makes me shut up. So now, I use digital room correction. Usually, my turntable is in another room. But when I brought it into the front room, I occasionally used the correction which involved 24bit 48 digital. On some records, like Heroes by Bowie, it really helped. On the others, it really was different but not better.
Having said all that, I am sure that part of the reason for my skepticism was due to some vinyl purity neurons in my brain. I would love to be free of them, but there they are, like Victorian funsuckers!
Trey
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It then becomes something different.
