Kvalsvoll

This is how it looks up front in Room2 now. Had the photographer visiting some days ago, to take photos of the new subwoofers, and we snapped this picture. It is interesting to notice what is in the media console - rather, what is not. There are only two things left - an amplifier, and the retired cd-player. The cd-player is connected, but never used. This is what has been removed: - Preamplifier - Exotic class-A output stage (25W, lots of heat, no global feedback yet still distortion below noise floor, exotic output devices, single stage input and voltage gain). - A NAS with separate dedicated wireless router. - SOTA CD-player can also be considered removed, as it is never used. This is a picture of todays dilemma in state-of-the-art audio. The very nice, expensive items of yesterday is rendered obsolete. The new configuration destroys the traditional old-style hifi-setup on all parameters except for two - price and looks. It is not very expensive, and it does not look very expensive and sophisticated. The sound is much better, convenience of operation is much better, it takes up a lot less space, it has functionality such as dsp in the amplifier that makes it possible to integrate the bass-system properly. The current system consist of a laptop computer connected to the local network streaming from the server or the net, a cheap amplifier with dsp, dsp amplifiers for the bass system. This system is guaranteed sonically transparent up to the terminals on the main speakers.

@SME, I buy all music I know I want to hear often, everything on local disks is the only way to go. In a world where companies sees shorter lifetimes, you never know when your streaming service shuts down, and all the music is gone. Why doesn't Bandcamp work? At least you can buy and download? Tidal requires a Win pc, and it is only a coincidence that i have one in Room2 - I bought a small, white laptop because I wanted a white one, and later realize it is not possible to get linux on it. Chesky has good sound, I have some if it. I also see you like Infected Mushroom - though that is something quite different. If you have any more listening impressions, I am reading.

NEW playlist: The Demo Tracks - Advanced: Moving into more advanced territory, with music that requires more both from you as a listener and your sound system. https://tidal.com/playlist/4337c9a0-0405-48db-94ac-7dfd5fe6e46c # Title Artist Album Time 1 Poppkorn Jøkleba Jøkleba! / Nu Jøk? 3:20 2 Shopenhauer Jøkleba Jøkleba! / Nu Jøk? 3:47 3 All Through the Night Emancipator Safe In the Steep Cliffs 4:33 4 Rattlesnakes Emancipator Safe In the Steep Cliffs 4:10 5 Kleine Dreigroschenmusik (Arr. for Chamber Ensemble) - VII. Cannon Song: Charleston-Tempo Chicago Pro Musica Medinah Sessions 2:20 6 Shamanimal (Live at Satellit Café) Hadouk Trio Utopies 7:10 7 The Golden Striker The Modern Jazz Quartet No Sun In Venice 3:41 8 Vals (En Vivo) Puente Celeste En Vivo en Cafe Vinilo 3:56 9 Buey (En Vivo) Puente Celeste En Vivo en Cafe Vinilo 7:58 10 Taquito Militar La Segunda Será Una Noche 3:35 11 La Roca La Segunda Será Una Noche 5:06 12 Ascent Lyle Mays Lyle Mays 6:59 13 Flowmotion Vestbo Trio Flowmotion 4:19 14 I Love Paris (Live) The Hot Sardines Live At Joe's Pub 5:17 15 Rainfall Daniel Herskedal Slow Eastbound Train 3:37 16 There Are Three Things You Cannot Hide Love Smoke and a Man Riding on a Camel Daniel Herskedal The Roc 5:01 17 Pink Froid Infected Mushroom Converting Vegetarians II 7:40 18 We the Dub Yore Salmonella Dub Dub for Straights (1993 Sessions) 3:44 19 Dirt Bikes And Street Vendors The Flashbulb Soundtrack to a Vacant Life 1:55 20 Swollen Trees The Flashbulb Soundtrack to a Vacant Life 2:28 21 Rose Hierarchy The Flashbulb Nothing Is Real

Tidal playlist "The Demo Tracks Part 1": Description Assorted demo tracks, put together from the collection built while listening to Tidal in the Kvålsvoll Design Room2. This is the "popular" list - music which is easy to like. Some of these tracks are often played in showrooms and exhibitions. This is not a selection of productions with exceptional technical qualities, rather examples of diversity and variation both musically and in sound style. Some have obvious flaws - if your sound system is good, it will still present the music. Tracks on playlist 1 How It Feels (Album Version) Sophie Zelmani 2 Ticket To The World Ayo 3 Cocaine Eric Clapton 4 Tin Pan Alley (AKA Roughest Place in Town) Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble 5 Summertime (Alternate Take) Janis Joplin 6 Trampled Underfoot Vanessa Fernandez 7 When the Levee Breaks Vanessa Fernandez 8 Here I Am Now Steve Gadd 9 Be Brave My Brightest Diamond 10 Train Song Holly Cole 11 Little Things India.Arie 12 Us and Them Anne Bisson 13 I Miss My Love Anne Bisson 14 Island On An Endless Plane The Flashbulb 15 Four Women Malia 16 As Time Goes By Viktoria Tolstoy 17 Get Lucky Daft Punk 18 Royals Lorde 19 Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (Live in Atlanta) Sara Bareilles 20 September in Montreal Anne Bisson 21 Stay Yello 22 Everything I Need (Album Version) Keb'Mo' 23 Le vent souffle encore Vincent Bélanger, Anne Bisson

@SME - what music do you like, perhaps you have some examples from your own collection? I listened to the tracks you describe, to try to get a better understanding of what you mean. First, in the Moderate Cinema, then in Room2. Paying attention to the properties you describe. What I do notice is that the highs has a characteristic sound - the tonality is colored. like the frequency response at higher freqs has large deviations, and the level is a little loud. I listened to several Flashbulb albums, and find that they all have this sound to them, more or less. I certainly do not think you experience this because your system has some fault, it is likely more neutral than any "high-end" system tuned by matching cables. Measurements don't tell the whole story, they are difficult to interpret an so on it goes, but a mic and rew is actually the most powerful tool we have, and used properly it results in more neutral sound, and usually better sound. And yes - the 2 systems here sound different, I would say very different - even though a simple frequency response chart shows quite similar curves. I did not find the trumpet to be harsh or strange. Now I listened at -30dB - it is very late, but tonal character tends to be quite similar regardless of volume, it just gets louder when you turn it up. And eventually it gets too loud - does not matter much how clean it sounds, when the ears overload. Some other Flashbulb albums (www.bandcamp.com if they are not on tidal): Reunion: Dynamic and powerful sound. Try "God Is Speaking". Kirlian Selections: Quite similar in sound, but perhaps more diverse and melodic. Try "Kirlian Selections III" - guitar quite close, violin to the left, deeper and further away. Soundtrack to a vacant life: Rougher, less refined sound, note full frequency range. Try "Forbidden tracks". But for judging sound quality, this may not be the best choice of music, especially if you do not know the music from before. Something like Vanessa Fernandez - Use Me has better overall sound quality, and there are less strange sounds and instruments that we really can not know how is supposed to sound. Flashbulb is because I like the music, and also the characteristic sound - it is not supposed to sound like Vanessa Fernandez.. Did you see the Tidal playlists I published? Perhaps I could post the list in text format, so that it is possible to see without using Tidal.

Reading this (above) makes me happy. SME builds, measures, makes adjustments, attention to details that surely can not make any difference - but it does. Then he - SME - describes the amazing sound, well, what does he know that all the others don't.. And the proof is in hearing and experiencing yourself. As lowerFE did. When you focus on the parts that are important for sound quality, and fix it, you actually get results that matters.

New functionality in REW - clarity plot. Example from current system in Room2 - F2 main speakers + 2x V80 and 2x V6030 bass system.

Just wanted to mention a side-effect of having a true full-range system, something the typical data-bass reader can relate to; You sit down in the carefully located listening chair, put on some quite ordinary music - jazz with vocal, acoustic instruments, perhaps some classical with a small string quartet ensemble. Sounds nice, the ears warm up a little, and you increase the volume slightly, usually end up keeping it at 0dB. Then - suddenly, out of nowhere, this string quartet makes the whole world kind of shift as a very powerful pulse of ulf noise makes your heart stop. You don't really hear it, you feel the air blast and the movement . Like in a well-done action movie - except that in the movie, it is expected, appropriate and part of what makes the experience better - and you are don't get scared. It is obvious that not only movie production studios lack low frequency reproduction capability, music studios have the same limitations, and they don't need it either for the string quartet. Except when someone stomps the floor, or touches the microphone housing, and a microphone picks up this and creates an earthquake on the sound track. If the recording is processed full-range, and no one checks for sub-20hz noise using a spectrum analyzer, this will go unnoticed. Until I play it on my system. At 0dB. Lots of recordings have ulf noise that is audible, and some have these occasional potential heart-attack inducing monster transients.

Good, I assume it works, then. If you don't have Tidal, you can still see the tracks, and find the music elsewhere. I will create more playlists, with more narrow selections for the experts. A sub-bass list should be suitable for data-bass audience.

Created a playlist in Tidal: https://tidal.com/playlist/c52e3fda-6905-49e4-9509-930e706105da Well, does it work? Does the playlist show up, and can you play from it?

I often listen to music from the old days, and I still rediscover albums I once enjoyed, decades ago. Though I have no exact memory of the sound back then, I do realize it sounds very different on the new systems. But is it better, is it a better experience? The difference is so huge, that the exact memory of the acoustic event is not needed. Dynamics is far better, bass is far better, soundstage and clarity and insight into the recording is in a different league. How can I know? Because I can hear details and sounds that i did not know was there, differences between productions, realism. But still, I also remember certain aspects of the sound from back then, that may actually have been better. The sound was warmer, had more body and fullness in the lower midrange, vocal was softer. It certainly would be interesting to be able to compare, to be able to hear if this is real, or just something that I have created in my own imagination. I have a few friends which have heard both - the old, and now the new sound. They tend to conclude that the new sound is so much better, it is like a different game. And they are not just being polite, I know them too well, they would tell me right away if what they hear does not please. The old systems also did not get quite the same type of comments and interest, so there is definitely something going on. The difference is speakers and acoustics. Playback and electronics have improved, but that part was quite good, even though audible differences surely exist between the digital computer playback compared to the old vinyl rig. This is also possible to compare directly, as I have made vinyl rips using the exact same rig, so the old vinyl can be played, or compared to a digital version - the vinyl sounds great, but this is not where the new sound comes from, it sounds quite similar. It all ends up as differences in decay and reflection patterns - the new sound has much faster decay with a very dead initial gap, more later reflections that create life. This is of course not magic, it is a result of the radiation pattern of the speakers and room acoustics. A smoother sound is the result of more early reflections. Can this be desired, in some situations? It smooths things out, masks a little bit, so the brain can fill in what is missing, and create something that was never there on the recording.

I read through this article from 1982, and find that it largely covers what we know today about hearing, all was known back then. There are some things left out, such as the fact we can hear well below 20hz, and perception also depends on tactile information from skin and body resonances. The article concludes - "Future" - that performance of sound reproduction systems matches our hearing performance quite well, though improvements can be done, and that the big remaining challenges are related to acoustics and localization. The technical limitations of 1982's equipment has now been overcome - we have can have full dynamic range, no audible distortion, no noise. Back then, there were very real audible differences between amplifiers, tape machines, vinyl playback. Those differences live on in our day in the high-end world, but they are no longer part of psychoacoustics, it is pure psychology. Recent advancements in audio reproduction has been seen particularly in the reproduction of lower frequencies - full range systems with response well below 20hz, and full dynamic range exceeding 120dB, with awareness to tactile sensory effects. A big, capable bass system really makes a difference. Awareness and knowledge about acoustics has improved how well a 3D-rendering of an event can be reproduced faithfully and realistic. But here, we still have to choose what we can have. It has yet not been achieved to be able to reproduce an event so that it sounds realistic with correct rendering of scene and room from the recording, when you move around in the listening room. With directive patterns and early reflections removed it all falls apart when you move away from the sweetspot, or if you choose wide radiation in a lively room the whole scene is diffuse and does not render each object precisely regardless of position.

Perhaps you could quote some of the content from this article, just to get the discussion going.

I get "server not found", and, of course - that's because I have amazonaws blocked in the firewall. Does this document have a name, perhaps I can find it elsewere?

Masvis of Piety Of Ashes:

Level is pushed quite hard on this album, and on some tracks it clips, very easy to hear when you have a system with high resolution. I really can not know whether this was intentional, he uses different distortions and added noise as part of the artistic impression. On Soundtrack To A Vacant Life he uses distortions, noise and bandwidth limitation on some tracks, to create a special sound. I found the pumping quite annoying on one of the tracks, I believe this is intentional, it is supposed to sound like that. We can like it or not. I don't find the sound on this album to be harsh, part from the obvious clipping it sounds more like smooth and soft. Many newer releases actually can sound a bit harsh, at least noticeable when switching between albums in a session. This can be because they wanted this sound, or simply a result of too much limiter, which will cause distortion. Compare say Yello - Stay to any typical jazz with vocal recording, Stay sounds more harsh, distorted, not smooth. I often find it quite easy to listen "through" obvious faults in a recording, because they stand out as separate sound not part of the music itself. Recordings and productions have faults, and I have found it is easier to ignore faults in a system that reveals everything with clarity, as opposed to a system that tries to mask and cover up. This album is not very loud compared to other things out there, master at 0dB works fine, actually required to get the full effect of the bass. Bandcamp delivers flac lossless, so that's a non-issue.

Lots of REAL sub bass on Piety Of Ashes. Leaves: Starlight:

This is why we have sound systems: Easily album of the year. Each Flashbulb album has its own characteristic sound - both musically, and how it sounds. Within this framework of sound, there is diversity and contrast, exploring the limits of our perception of sound. Elements in the sound appear all across a huge, wide soundscape, with clarity and precision that makes you see textures and patterns in 3 dimensions. Music like this is one reason why spending big money on sound makes sense because it pays off in great experiences. https://theflashbulb.bandcamp.com/album/piety-of-ashes

@SME no wonder it worked better with headphones, because it is the phase difference between the l-r channels that places the sound, and in a typical room this phase difference is disturbed by room reflections. This is also why it works only in one location, when you move the head you also change the phase between the 2 channels. Physical properties of our head and ears reveal how we can determine position of a sound source. A sound from one side reaches one ear first, the sound continues to travel around the head and reaches the other ear. The psychoacoustic perception mechanism in the brain interprets the time difference to determine where the sound comes from. At very high frequencies it is mostly level difference detection, in midrange it is phase, and at very low frequencies we can not hear direction because the phase difference is too small to be detected. Then we can also understand why we can not really hear height or whether a sound comes from directly behind or front. But how come we perceive to hear both height and distance and size of sounds? Height can be perceived if the sound object moves, because the frequency response of the ear changes with vertical direction. Sound stage, depth and so on are complex. Location of sounds is helped greatly from reflections, and here the resulting sound we perceive is a combination of the sound from the sound sources on the recording, the reflections from this source on the recording, and the reflections we get when we play this through speakers in a room. Now we can easily hear if the sound comes from behind. Transient sounds are much easier to place, because the hearing mechanism detects the time difference between the first sound and reflections, and uses this to get an idea of where the sound came from.

Tested movie multichannel in Room2 on the 2-ch system - quite good, only there is one huge drawback. Purpose is to play multich movie on a 2ch system, and still enjoy surround sound. How I did this: Send full 7.1 on hdmi from the computer, select Movie mode on the processor, select Virtual on the processor. The processor then maps the surround channels from the input signal to the 2 front channels, so that sound from sides and back appears to come from sides and back, played using only the 2 FL FR speakers. Test it using the 7.1 channel check clips from dolby or dts, if it works the surround channels will appear somewhere at the sides and back, more or less. This of course requires that you run a AV-processor/receiver on the 2-ch system. And it works, surround sound is immersive and quite decent, though not comparable to a good multich setup, the surround images are much less precise, and in Room2 it does not work so well for sounds behind lp. Tested this on some of the atmos tracks, and movies. The drawback? Very small sweetspot, if you move your head the whole thing collapses. So this is a one-person-only solution, that you can use if you don't want to mount surround speakers. And to truly enjoy a movie, it is preferable to have some sort of screen to show the picture in front of you, which I do not have in Room2.

Found them on Tidal, not my type of music, but always worth checking out what others like too. To me, the last album had better sound, they are all quite loud and sounds best at lower playback volumes.

I have some of the DL clips from a few years back, they are great. I assume he just put up 2 mics, not the usual ones used for music recording, but full frequency-range, recorded, and that's it. If you have a capable enough reproduction system, you will hear the actual event. If you have limited headroom, it will not be anything special at all. Sound effects in movies are usually very different - they are dynamically compressed, peak limited, and too often high-pass filtered. Often they are colored by eq to make it sound "better" on equipment with limited low frequency extension. All this processing allows for louder and more powerful sound when speakers have limited headroom, but unfortunately all realism is gone. Youtube-clips can be fine, if for nothing else to preview music before you decide to buy it. And quality is very variable, you have to search for usable quality clips. Some have quite decent quality, but still everything is limited to the 125k aac compression. I mostly use Tidal nowadays, easy to find music, and quality is not an issue.

Today I listened to some albums I found yesterday, when it was too late to play at realistic volume. First some brass-band music, that I would normally never listen to. But the experience makes it so captivating, I just have to listen to one more track. Is it like the real thing? Honestly, how can I know. The individual instruments are here, placed on a scene in front of me, inside a room much larger and with very different acoustics from the Room2 I am physically sitting in. The recording renders instruments and room from the recording in a way that does not sound like it comes from 2 small speakers. So, this must be a very spectacular recording, with very special qualities? Fact is, most recordings share many of those properties - individual instruments rendered with true physical size, lots of space and room from the recording. They are different - tonal balance, clarity, dynamics, bass character, room, instrument image. The presentation takes on the character from the recording. Why is it so. Room acoustics and speakers. The radiation pattern of the speakers and the acoustic treatment in Room2 together makes this. Early reflections are suppressed across most of the audible frequency range, while later reflected energy is allowed to contribute. It is the removal of early reflections that creates the clarity and separation, while the later reflections contributes to amplify the room information from the recording. To be able to move on, to improve things further, this is a starting point. How long does the ISD-gap need to be, is it enough to suppress reflections below around -35dB within the gap, what about frequency range for the gap? Do we need horns? How large horns do we need? What radiation pattern should we choose? What about the reflected energy after the ISD - how strong, how fast should the decay be? Then there is transient response. We often call it dynamics, but that is strictly not the same as being able to reproduce percussive instruments with realism. This is where, in my experience, all typical hifi-speakers fail most. A bigger speaker, with more capacity and more directivity control, with drivers that has much better transient response, is in a different league. In this context - how do we compare and rate speakers. How can we set up a controlled (which implies at least blind) listening test to evaluate and compare speakers. It may be necessary to do tests focused on a very small subset of properties, so that a complete evaluation needs several listening tests, which then after can be combined to make some kind of overall measure of sound quality.

The Room2 is a test and demo room, but it is also where I listen to music most. So I want to share with you what music I played in a short listening session this evening, music examples are something I always find very interesting and useful, so perhaps someone finds inspiration for new things to listen to. I suspect many of you have never heard about none of these. 1. Voices of Music - La Folia. The long 10 min one, with the dancers. The F2 speakers allow for a little louder master (-3dB) than you would experience in a live performance for this sort of music, but that makes the realism better, especially when the dancers stomp the scene floor - the recording is full-frequency-range, so you actually feel the scene floor moving. 2. Voices of Music - La Folia. A different version. 3. Flashbulb - Piety of Ashes. New release, only one track available as preview. Excellent, this is something quite different from the baroque ensembles. Master 0dB. 4. Flashbulb - Soundtrack To A Vacant Life, tracks 4, 5, 6. Excellent music, excellent production. This is electronic music, with a complex and detailed sound landscape. Bass is physical and tight. Master 0dB. 5. Jøkleba - Jøkleba! Nu jøk - Girl, Firefly. Jazz. Very dynamic recording, heavy and tight punch from the large drum, trumpet so present and rendered with such clarity you can see the fingerprints on the brass. Master +3dB. 6. Daniel Herskedal - The Roc - 07 The Afrit, and 08 There Are Three Things You Cannot Hide; Love, Smoke And A Man Riding On A Camel. Jazz. Herskedal experiments with his tuba and creates a musical journey. Again - bass is physical, and the drums has this realism you otherwise only get at a live concert. Master +3dB. 7. Hadouk Trio - Utopies, Shamanimal Live. Jazz. Here the V80 horns excel in rendering the deep, powerful bass tones. Master +3dB. 8. Jøkleba - Jøkleba! Nu jøk - 16 - Schopenhauer. One last jazz track. Master up to +6dB for a truly visceral experience on this relaxing masterpiece. The music can be found on Bandcamp and Tidal. Voices of Music on youtube unfortunately, make sure to get the best possible quality on the audio stream. Current equipment in Room2: F2 main speakers and 2x V80 compact horn bass-system.

Different subwoofers up front gives a different result. Swapping the V80 units for very small V6 shows no significant reduction in velocity when the sound source now is half the size acoustically. The difference in response (spl) and velocity are mostly caused by different location of the sub units, and the smaller ones roll of much earlier. At louder spl levels it is obvious there will be a difference where the larger V80 has the advantage, but the V80 system also sounds better at low volume. Having a large system makes sense even if the capacity is never put to use.