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As long as you enjoy it.My apologies if I took things too far afield.
Not at all ! Sometimes I learn something (if only humility). I do indeed enjoy the depth and intelligence of posts like yours and Fdecks.
I do too. And then I perhaps blasphemicly (word?) leave a little room for the subjectively percieved differences between different systems or pieces of equipment with perhaps comparable specifications.
Just skimmed through this thread but I'm still wondering, does anyone have videos they could share?
Although, I don't know the technical reasons, I have all but one, of the EA VL series transmission line cabinets, sitting in the basement. A VL 108, VL 110, and a VL 208.
Even with the transmission line enclosure, the 108 which I think would have a faster resoponse due to it's smaller cone diameter, doesn't have the low frequency extension of the VL 110.
Where it get's a little foggy is with the VL 208, which has plenty of low frequency response, but still uses two smaller diameter LF drivers, vs the VL 210. The unfortunate
trade off with the transmission line designs, is that they require significantly more power from the amplifier, to achieve those low notes. So, even though they go lower,
in most rooms, either that sound doesn't travel very far, or it just gets in the way. They sound great on the stage standing right in front of them though. Just my take, here's the spec sheet for the VL series.
Ric
Assuming normal hearing, the subjective differences would be about subjective judgments of preference. If you asked the same people to discriminate differences and not make such subjective judgments, you'd find (perhaps, to your surprise) that there would be only modest little inter-individual differences.
As for Rick Wolff's desire for controlled recordings of different cabs, they would likely be of limited use. Here's why:
If the recordings were made in different rooms, then the different cab/room interactions would render the results of little value.
If the recordings were made in the same room, there would still be different interactions resulting from the different dispersion characteristics of the cabs. Furthermore, even if that were not the case, the resonances of a specific room would skew the results in favor of some cabs and against others. That would be especially true if the listener were hearing a recording played in a different environment. If the listener were in the same room as the cabs, then there would be the chance for that listener to "learn the room" and adjust for it. We actually do that all the time.
If the recordings were made in anechoic environment, then they could reveal without bias, for example, the on-axis response of the different cabs. That would also be of limited value because it wouldn't provide any insight to how the cab might behave in a room.
What would be useful would be sophisticated and comprehensive tests of the cabs with meaningful measures. Dr. Floyd Toole has spent a good portion of his career. Anyone interested in the content of this thread would do well to read this very accessible article. Those interested can follow the stream to Toole's complete writings.
It's not likely that such tests will be performed on bass cabs. I don't see the manufacturers paying for those to be done and, frankly, I think most buyers of the cabs don't really care. So, it seems we're left with what we have, which are the shared experiences of players who know what to listen for and can describe what they hear. I think that's actually quite valuable and such experiences are shared here routinely.
+1 Since there's just to many variables to deal with, a decent cabinet paried with decent EQ, is probably the best we can hope for and realistically, the most we can afford. We're kind of at a crossover point, with pickups, amps and cabinets.
There are many good combinations out there, that work quite well in a varitey of rooms and halls. To get a better sound than those devices produce, you have to spend a lot of money, believe me I know this for a fact. I tend to look
at other things when I'm buying new equiptment. My personal belief, is that we're making to many throaway amplifiers, that will be clogging up landfills in ten years, so if I can purchase a pre amp/amp or speaker cabinet, that will last for 20 years,
because it can be repaired, then the difference in cost is worth it, to me. I realize that's just not an option for most players. It's served me well, because right now if my both of Walter Woods amps went down, I could pull out the my Ampeg B-15N(C)
that's over 50 years old, and still sounds great. Imagine, if you will a world where large scale investments had been put forth, in making all concert spaces and clubs acoustically magnificent spaces. So, we as performers rather than hauling around
tons of gear, could just walk in with our instruments and the space would take over to enhance the sound. I can tell you personally that halls like that exist. There just aren't enough of them.
Ric
Ric,
If I have this right you own and use a QSC K8, but recommend the k10. Interested in hearing why...
Until Ric chimes back in, I'll mention (as I did above) that I have been using a 12 inch 'powered speaker' and finding it very satisfactory. I don't know if a powered PA speaker is more 'full range' than a bass amp, but my very inexpensive Harbinger V2112 sounds really good - both with my ply and a Lifeline and with my carved bass with a mic and/or The BAND. I run both thru my EDB-2 pre for impedence matching and tone shaping - although I usually run things pretty flat.
Peter,
I use the QSC K8 on casuals, really small jazz rooms, and as a monitor on concerts where there is FOH support because in those instances having a "pristine" full range sound isn't really necesary. I have another system for important gigs where there is no FOH system. I reccommend the K10 as a "one size fits all setup." It's form/factor is more suited as a single standalone system.
Ric
Ric,
Any thoughts on running a bass into the Fdeck to a Reddi and then into a K10 as a bass rig or running the same Fdeck Reddi to the FOH and then using the K10 as a monitor?
Any thoughts on running a bass into the Fdeck to a Reddi and then into a K10 as a bass rig or running the same Fdeck Reddi to the FOH and then using the K10 as a monitor?
Peter,
Intresting thought, however the FDeck only gives you a 2db gain. It isn't designed to act as a standone pre amp. While it could certianly work with a modern EB that had it's own internal preamp, I wouldn't think it would afford you enough tonal flexibility or volume with a Double Bass, Just my take though.
Ric
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I was thinking to run the XLR out of the Reddi into the wedge. When there is no FOH
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That little room I mentioned is about preference. If I want to make a choice, I have to find out what I prefer.
Yep. But you need to feed the K10 a decent line-out level signal. I use either an EDB-1 or Meek 3Q depending on the gig.
You can also send the desk a signal out of the back of the K10.
To make an example, I would say that if I have to chose between a loudspeaker with at paper cone and one with a plastic cone, even if they measured the same, I would have a subjective difference in my evaluation or preference (perception). I suspect the same could be said about a valve and a transistor in the signal chain.Good to know that's what you meant.
- Nov 24, 2008
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Yes!!
Dr. Floyd Toole has devoted a lifetime of research into "what really matters to the ears" when it comes to loudspeaker design, documenting the correlations between measured response and subjective preference under carefully controlled listening conditions.
Here's a talk he gave at a music school, which might be of interest:
While his talk is about sound reproduction, imo what he has to say is relevant if the goal is a cab that delivers "the 'studio' sound of a really nice bass."
That's not at all the type of preference to which I was referring. Let me explain further. No two real speaker systems of different designs will measure the same (assuming a meaningful set of measures) and no two will sound the same. The ability of normal human listeners to discriminate between them under laboratory conditions would reveal relatively small inter-individual differences. On the other hand, given those real physical differences, different people will prefer the sound of one over the other. Different people will weight the various sonic characteristics differently and so will judge one or the other system to be preferred.
Now, you gave the example of two speakers that measure the same, one with a plastic cone and the other with a paper cone. I'm assuming that, in your example, they are acoustically (physically) identical. Your preference for a paper or plastic cone has nothing to do with sound. That is not preference based on auditory perception at all or based on any sensory perception for that matter. I was limiting my discussion to acoustic measurements and auditory processing and decision-making.
With regard to valves and transistors, the history of all that is littered with bias. When some people know that they are listening to a valve amp (especially one on which they plunked down a bunch of cash), they will come up with all kinds of adjectives to distinguish it from a solid-state amp. I really don't want to go down that rabbit-hole, especially on the internet, but there's good evidence amassed over decades that, given essentially identical measurements within certain tolerances, people cannot distinguish between and have no reliable preference between valve-based and solid-state amps, per se. That is not to say that typical valve-based circuits do not sound different than typical solid-state circuits. They generally do. The vast majority of that difference can be explained by the sometimes-preferred frequency-response anomalies of the valve circuits. In some contexts, such as musical instrument amplification, those frequency-response characteristics are often part and parcel of the artist's sound.
Thanks for this Duke. I'll have to set aside time to watch it. Notice that around 19 minutes in, he talks about "listening through the room." I talked about "learning the room" in my post #86. Much of the evidence for that derives from the primary psychoacoustic literature via laboratory-based experiments quite apart from the types of listening tests that Floyd Toole conducts. It turns out to be quite important. We can largely "subtract out the room" when we are listening in it. Of course, we gotta be in the room to do that and that's why I said that listening to recordings made in another room can be quite misleading.
