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The magic of small speakers

Good article and good to see the 6dB (not 3dB) increase in SPL of two speakers in the room confirmed, as discussed in another thread.
 
"A common and pervasive myth about
loudspeakers goes thus: it is impossible to produce
low frequency bass in a small room."
No-one here, or anywhere else IME, has made such an absolute statement. Not a good start to the article.
 
@Keith: I measured my room and it is treated with acoustic stuff. Reverberation time is right for music and very close to studio conditions (I used acourate software in the past for measurements). You can see some pics of my room here: http://www.pinkfishmedia.net/forum/showpost.php?p=2840855&postcount=552
But the system complete has changed.

@TonyL: I see it like you, to dry bass is absolutely unnatural with acoustic instruments like drums and contrabass for example.
 
IceG said:
I too agree. My daytime system (music & radio in a home office) uses small Meridian DSPs, my evening system (music and film in a dedicated listening room) uses large Meridian DSPs.

The small ones provide amazing sound staging and detail with articulate if quiet bass. The large ones do presence and bass power with some loss of image and detail. The timbre (tonal quality) is similar.

Horses for courses.
Click to expand...
A perfect and satisfying answer !
 
My large speakers do detail, timbre, dynamics, scale, weight and timing better than any small speaker I've heard. Small speakers excel at 3D imaging.

I can live without the latter.
 
darrenyeats said:
"A common and pervasive myth about
loudspeakers goes thus: it is impossible to produce
low frequency bass in a small room."
No-one here, or anywhere else IME, has made such an absolute statement. Not a good start to the article.
Click to expand...

The article wasnt writen in response to this thread. It does however explain the physics and debunks the 1/4 wavelength notion.
I quite surprised when people wave 'physics' about then ignore it when the explanation is presented to them.
 
Tony L said:
PS To put it in simplistic terms; you may well be getting a good impression of weight and the harmonics of a deep note, so you can hear it, but you are not getting the fundamental as the room can't physically hold the wavelength. To put it another way try taking a 12" ruler and putting it into a 4" box. Doesn't fit. If you fold it in three you have three four inch rulers, which are a rather different thing! 20Hz is 17m!
Click to expand...

OK, there, someone did say it.
 
merlin said:
My large speakers do detail, timbre, dynamics, scale, weight and timing better than any small speaker I've heard. Small speakers excel at 3D imaging.

I can live without the latter.
Click to expand...

This is my experience too - I run ESL63s. They image, but I am always amazed at the imaging when I plonk small speakers in my listening room instead (most recently a few hours ago with Royds). However, the quality & sheer wall of sound created by the ESLs is far more to my liking. It is worth noting that my system is tuned around stuff that allows the ESLs to image, more than for example sheer dynamic range.

Richard
 
Am I committing a cardinal sin? I'm using a pair of Martyn Miles (of this parish) ls3/5a rebuilds with all digital front end and class D mono blocs. For such a small speaker bass is remarkable and the imaging is lovely. No, of course they don't move air like a biggie but I don't miss it, a lovely sound in isolation.
 
cooky1257 said:
The article wasnt writen in response to this thread. It does however explain the physics and debunks the 1/4 wavelength notion.
I quite surprised when people wave 'physics' about then ignore it when the explanation is presented to them.
Click to expand...

As I point out upthread the math contained within the paper is sadly way over my knowledge level (I sagged off school!) so all I have to go on is the text, which after reading it three times now doesn't seem to say what you are implying it is saying. In both the mic test example and later (obviously for in car entertainment) speaker examples it seems to be describing a similar situation to headphones where the soundwave is for want of a better word isobarically coupled to the ear, i.e. a very tightly controlled pressure-loading and it then highlights many caveats such as the room has to be perfectly sealed, you can't use a ported speaker to achieve this etc etc. As I read it the article seems to be describing a phenomenon that is pretty much only relevant to car audio, and reading the small print only a car with the windows tightly shut!
 
It's amazing when listening at decent volume how the bass improves with my NS1000x when I close my door into the open hallway... . You can instantly feel the room pressurise and everything just sounds so much better. This was very much more noticeable when using the Yamaha B-2 which has the grunt to control the drivers properly. I had PMC TB2s in here before and they didn't fill the room so well.
 
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