Re: [ARSCLIST] Mostly for laughs

["Steven C. Barr(x)" <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "phillip holmes" <insuranceman@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Absolutely.  And I totally agree that actually building a listening room 
> can be prohibitively expensive.  Improvements are easily made with small 
> adjustments.  Too many people find some formula to use, set their 
> listening room up and never listen to the results.  I've had epiphanies 
> from moving the speakers a few inches.  The sound would come into focus 
> or a bass problem would be ameliorated.  There's a lot of trial and 
> error that you can't predict.  If you just go by room dimensions, you 
> may be wrong.  Take into account what else is in the room (big 
> sofas-metal chairs), what the walls are made of (plaster or concrete is 
> a big plus over traditional drywall), what the floors are made of 
> (concrete VS wood) and on and on.  I've noticed that many people are 
> looking for different results.  Their ideal sound can be radically 
> different from the next guy's.  For instance, I prefer to listen 
> somewhere a little further out than "near-field", but not far enough out 
> where the room's sound will be easily detected.  I've heard systems 
> where the guy sat in a sofa placed against the back wall and the 
> speakers were 15' away on the opposite wall.  I couldn't stand it.  You 
> had to turn it up too loud for the speakers to overcome the sound of the 
> room.  If he moved his chair out from the back wall and his speakers in 
> from the front wall, he could've used 1/4 the power (less compression 
> and distortion) and had, IMO, much better fidelity.  So maybe some of us 
> hear these things in radically different ways.  I still haven't been to 
> the orchestra and heard a good stereo image.  In some ways, the mediocre 
> recordings from Columbia more closely resemble the sound at the cheap 
> seats.  If only they could hang me from the ceiling like I was a microphone.
> 
Actually, the average "recording listener" usually doesn't do anything
to improve the acoustics of his "listening parlour"...in fact, he/she/it
doesn't even have the slightest idea what could/should be done! They
buy a bunch of expensive gear...buy "special crystalline-reoriented"
cables for numerous dollars (hey, there's a business idea for me!)
to connect it all up...and, to them, it sounds good (Hey, it HAS to...
look at what it cost them!)...

Steven C. Barr