Best music for testing PRaT

Best music for testing PRaT?

Classical music, preferrably Baroque. If you're not headbanging to it then the kit is crap.

Andrew

 

Ah yeah - but not everyone has the money or neighbours to allow one to do bass "right".

If you're on the drugs that make sense of Trout Mask Replica, you'll not worry if the system can make sense of it or not. I just don't "get" that album - I really must give it another go.

What you say re driver/bass/air makes sense. I guess Naim stuff is voiced a little so the emphasis is on the upper bass, but I quite like that since I've never had a system that does really deep bass.

 

I absolutely agree with that, but what I am trying to understand is whether there are folks who even with money and the isolated detached house still aspire to a bass light system? Taking Naim as an example the expensive kit still adheres to the same philosophy - I'm not knocking Naim owners I'm just trying to understand the objectives of the PRaT concept regards trying to purposefully avoid lower frequencies in the pursuit of their "sound".

 

Greg - because, IME, almost no "full frequency" speakers are, (a) actually full frequency; (b) any good to listen to for any length of time. Truly good full frequency speakers are rare as hen's teeth and hellaciously expensive.

-- Ian

 

I reckon solo piano is pretty good for testing at least the timing of a piece - some of the stuff on Tori Amos' Boys for Pele (although most of the music on this one's a bit weird for me!) would be good, as would something like "The entertainer".

 

I'm not arguing for the pursuit of full-frequency or nothing, rather trying to understand the avoidance of the deeper frequencies. Surely this isn't high fidelity reproduction regardless of how much detail there is in the upper frequencies?

 

IMO, and many others Antonio, they will. It's only that elusive Prat that suffers, and we are usually talking of frequencies below say 30hz. But to give you an idea, JBL voice their large monitors with a -3db point around 45hz, as do ATC with theirs. In JBl's case, it is simply because the Japs find deep bass ruins the timing, something that does make sense when you consider the room size and it's resonances and resulting behavior in the time domain (smearing).

The idea that it's all about distortion with subs is of course open to debate, an idea put forward by a velodyne dealer a couple of years ago I believe. I may be wrong, usually am, but I would have thought that the smearing caused by the room is far more noticeable, one of the reasons that many complain that Velodynes simply are not musical.

 

Because, IMO, losing the lowest octave or two of bass is generally the least musically compromised compromise, and all hi-fi is compromise.

-- Ian

 

Ian - though I share some of your musical tastes, I think, as is the case with so many of these discussions, our musical preferences play a massive part in our system objectives. In my case, amongst other styles/genres, I am trying to reproduce certain genres of music which suffer enormously if the lower octaves are not supported (at least as far as I can support them for my budget).

 

The ATC 100s 'cut off' at 36 Hz, although I don't know what this actually means. Was playing some dub nonsense last night, and the room was shaking. You can't really hear these low frequencies, but you feel them.

They are a lot of fun, but they don't impart much of a musical message. Most information is in the midrange, and this is the most important area for a system to sound 'right', in me humble.

'PRAT' means lack of bass overhang.

 

Re: "slowing down the music"

That's because of the brains perception of "spaces" between notes. As a drummer you get taught to realise that fast rolls, complicated patterns are actually played slower than they sound. People always think the drummer is playing quicker than he really is. This is becase if all the notes are evenly spaced, (irrespective of BPM/notes being played 32s/16s etc), then the time between notes is the maximum it can be, so the sticking is slower.

If a system time smears the notes it's being fed, then the distance between notes becomes shorter. Or, if the system has overhang, (overhang - due to resonances predominantly), then the note will sound for longer than it should. This actually decreases the "spaces" between notes and actually leads to the perception that the music is being played quicker than it is.

GTM

 

...if the system has overhang, (overhang - due to resonances predominantly), then the note will sound for longer than it should.

This is where supports can help. Good post.

 

Usually this means that the level at which the speakers are producing half power, (referenced to 1khz usually), is at that frequency. Also known as the -3db point. If the measurement is (semi) anechoic, then the actual in room extension will be a fair bit lower. If the speaker is a "closed box" then there will be considerable extention down in to the 20hz with such a cut off frequency as 36hz.

A speaker with such extension is certainly far lower than the vast majority, and depending on the level they're played at (very loud is possible I'd guess with ATCs) then there is likely to be considerable energy below 30hz in the room if the music contains it. So it doesn't surprise me that the room can shake.


GTM

 

Re: "slowing down the music"

Make that two. It's exactly my experience, too. Confused sound makes for more stress, more stress is felt as faster music - my lay man's explanation.

 

All supports James, or just some? In any case, I think the resonances GTM was referring to were of the speaker/room interaction type and nothing that any support, no matter how miraculous, would solve.

Michael.

 

Undoubtedly true, but I listen to a *lot* of reggae. And I'd still rather lose a bit of low bass than not.

I've heard very few full range speakers that don't, on occasion, sound deeply ponderous. The few that don't are all IME very expensive.

-- Ian

 

Ho ho! Just some. Speaker cabinet resonances are quite important, I feel. Tanais Fox put this very elegantly as 'the speaker is at war with its own frequencies'.

 

Sufficiently inert cabinets don't resonate.

 

Merlin as I understood it everything on earth reasonates.

 

Slightly anal point of fact alert - the frequency range defining an octave is such that the top note has double the fundamental frequency of the bottom. Therefore, the "lowest octave" of bass as it is generally understood is 20Hz - 40Hz, which is everything below the bass guitar range. If we lost the bottom two octaves of bass and started at 80Hz you basically wouldn't be able to hear the bottom two strings of a bass guitar, and I don't think anyone's advocating that