Home Propeller Head Plaza

Technical and scientific discussion of amps, cables and other topics.

RE: That clears up a lot!

Okay, okay . I should have known better than to cast aspersions on ESLs around here.

Yes, many of them can play loud enough for me, but a peak level of 115 dB SPL at the monitoring chair does not, I'm afraid, come close to many people's requirements (nor is that level sustainable by any ESL I know down into the chest-pounding dance-club bass range; YMMV). Sometimes it's necessary to reveal how much skin there is in a kick-drum sound to a room full of noisy, pharmaceutically impaired musicians.

You say no one should need levels like this. You may also say they do much hearing damage, especially to the poor mixing engineers who are in there all day. If you said those things I would agree, but it wouldn't change the nature of the market.

You asked about level matching with pink noise. It's necessary to do this to less than 0.1 dB, which is much harder with a time-variant source. The pitfall you cite with non-flat devices certainly exists. But, partly because it's fast, easy and repeatable, my tendency has always been to use 1 kHz and let the rest of the spectrum do what it will. If the device is non-flat by more than a couple of tenths of a dB over a couple of octaves or more, you're gonna hear it whatever you decide about the level match. That was very true for my power amp test from 1991, as you can see from the graphs. It's at http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/features/651/the-ampspeaker-interface.html

-- E. Brad


This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors:
  Amplified Parts  


Follow Ups Full Thread
Follow Ups
  • RE: That clears up a lot! - EBradMeyer 09/24/0713:31:28 09/24/07 (0)

FAQ

Post a Message!

Forgot Password?
Moniker (Username):
Password (Optional):
  Remember my Moniker & Password  (What's this?)    Eat Me
E-Mail (Optional):
Subject:
Message:   (Posts are subject to Content Rules)
Optional Link URL:
Optional Link Title:
Optional Image URL:
Upload Image:
E-mail Replies:  Automagically notify you when someone responds.