2 Speakers are better than 5.1?

[mandrix]

Interesting stuff.
In my room by necessity my surrounds are at about 90*, else the surround back speakers would be non existent. (no room). The best I could do was to have the surrounds equidistant from the MLP.
My setup is far from anyone's imagination of ideal. If it weren't for good room correction it would be far worse though.
If I could eliminate a doorway and a tall piece of furniture...well nothing to do about the doorway, placed at the corner of the room where my fronts reside. Just my front Top speakers I've moved several times now. I bet my house framing loves me punching lag bolts into it. lol.

 

[stoopid]

Sonic holography is next-generation stereo, plain and simple.

It is hard to set up, but once working correctly it presents a stereo image that stretches beyond the speakers, placing each instrument in the front hemisphere array where it was placed in the mix. It really works and makes stereo into almost-surround. For example, a guitar placed in the far left in the mix would be at about 10 o'clock for the listener, and, if mixed louder, closer to the listener, too.

The photo I have attached is really how the system sounds, with each "x" denoting an instrument location. You can turn your head to "look" at an instrument, and it stays in its location in space. I have an ATMOS set up, but I often like the HD stereo version of the material better in sonic holography.

To gain a feel for what it would sound like, sit in your listening chair and listen to something with headphones. Close your eyes and note the location of each instrument. Then, imagine what it would be like if the instrument was in the same location in space, but coming from the speakers. It's that simple.

Cons: it can take weeks to get the speakers positioned correctly based on room design, and you have to be in a fixed listening position.

Pros: it will reveal your entire stereo collection in a new and exciting way, and costs nothing: a C-9 stand-alone sonic hologram generator goes for less than $200 on eBay.

And Bob Carver is releasing a new, upgraded stand-alone sonic hologram generator in the next couple of months.

This can be achieved with a low budget (ie -- using equipment we already own) and properly engineered surround mixes, and doesn't require precision speaker placement for playback for the effect to be achieved. And we have the option of enjoying movies with the family on the same equipment. Most of the 3D stereo/surround effect modeling included in our amps even do a passible job expanding the sound field using a 2 channel source. I'm personally not a fan of these and listen to stereo as a 2.1 experience, and reserve surround playback for things actually mixed for surround. It's cool and all, but IMHO more practical solutions exist.

But thinking beyond today, the idea of projecting sound into a room without the need for any speaker location considerations or even surround speakers is likely the path forward. There's been substantial advancements in those phantom ('virtual') surround solutions, and if there's the will to continue development and adoption by the greater public, then there's no reason to think it can't be perfected and replace all our dinosaur 5.1 and 11.1.6 setups. If something sounds good and it's affordable, I'll be the first to jump ship.

 

[mandrix]

This can be achieved with a low budget (ie -- using equipment we already own) and properly engineered surround mixes, and doesn't require precision speaker placement for playback for the effect to be achieved. And we have the option of enjoying movies with the family on the same equipment. Most of the 3D stereo/surround effect modeling included in our amps even do a passible job expanding the sound field. I'm personally not a fan of these and listen to stereo as a 2.1 experience, and reserve surround playback for things actually mixed for surround. It's cool and all, but IMHO more practical solutions exist.

But thinking beyond today, the idea of projecting sound into a room without the need for any speaker location considerations or even surround speakers is likely the path forward. There's been substantial advancements in those phantom ('virtual') surround solutions, and if there's the will to continue development and adoption by the greater public, then there's no reason to think it can't be perfected and replace all our dinosaur 5.1 and 11.1.6 setups. If something sounds good and it's affordable, I'll be the first to jump ship.

Don't tell the guys on the AVSForum. You would have to drag them away from their custom built subs screaming and kicking!
Interesting though, and who knows what the future will bring.

 

[stoopid]

Don't tell the guys on the AVSForum. You would have to drag them away from their custom built subs screaming and kicking!
Interesting though, and who knows what the future will bring.

They'll be able to keep their subs, that won't likely change, but the remaining frequencies and sound field can all be 'easily' projected. I mean, this already exists as a "today" technology, but the few better sounding solutions are expensive and are still not IMO where they need to be for someone like me to replace what I have. But maybe by time my current amp dies and I'm facing needing new equipment, the market might be different.

 

[stoopid]

Example of the future. These don't sound good enough yet to replace what I have, but with time and atmos support I can see this being viable at the same price point. I'll likely be using 5.1 until I go with something like this in order to have atmos, I don't see ever adding more speakers in our living room or buying a new atmos compatible amp. It's only when atmos is an afterthought in an existing solution like this will it end up being something I have. Samsung HW-B650

 

[mandrix]

Example of the future. These don't sound good enough yet to replace what I have, but with time and atmos support I can see this being viable at the same price point. I'll likely be using 5.1 until I go with something like this in order to have atmos, I don't see ever adding more speakers in our living room or buying a new atmos compatible amp. Samsung HW-B650

Well Sir I would be the last tell you what works for you.
On the AVR side of things, I'm not sure I'll ever buy another one, and instead go with a pre/pro as there are several Atmos capable. As a fellow QQ'r pointed out, good quality stereo amps (Adcom, etc) can be found on Ebay and such these days that aren't priced too bad.

EDIT: meant to say there are several pre/pro's Atmos capable that aren't priced to the moon.

 

[stoopid]

Well Sir I would be the last tell you what works for you.
On the AVR side of things, I'm not sure I'll ever buy another one, and instead go with a pre/pro as there are several Atmos capable. As a fellow QQ'r pointed out, good quality stereo amps (Adcom, etc) can be found on Ebay and such these days that aren't priced too bad.

EDIT: meant to say there are several pre/pro's Atmos capable that aren't priced to the moon.

What I linked to would replace everything but the bluray/dvd player in most people's living rooms. Heck, some people will just stream all their content online. If these virtual surround solutions continue to improve as they have in recent years, this will be the defacto means at which surround is produced and it may even give the surround format the bump it's been searching for all this time. Imagine if this is all people needed, two things to plug in instead of a maze of speaker wire or glitchy wireless speakers, complicated amps, physical media players, etc? The adopt rate would be implied -- everyone would just have 'surround' and even casual music listeners could partake. Maybe I understated how obviously foundational this move is going to end up being. How we ingest music and movies is going through a seismic transformation, and it won't be long until it works for everyone from novice to snooty audiophiles. This tech is the very thing the surround community has been wishing for to grow the segment.

 

[mandrix]

What I linked to would replace everything but the bluray/dvd player in most people's living rooms. Heck, some people will just stream all their content online. If these virtual surround solutions continue to improve as they have in recent years, this will be the defacto means at which surround is produced and it may even give the surround format the bump it's been searching for all this time. Imagine if this is all people needed, two things to plug in instead of a maze of speaker wire or glitchy wireless speakers, complicated amps, physical media players, etc? The adopt rate would be implied -- everyone would just have 'surround' and even casual music listeners could partake. Maybe I understated how obviously foundational this move is going to end up being. How we ingest music and movies is going through a seismic transformation, and it won't be long until it works for everyone from novice to snooty audiophiles. This tech is the very thing the surround community has been wishing for to grow the segment.

Not sold on the idea yet. We'll see.

 

[jimfisheye]

Example of the future. These don't sound good enough yet to replace what I have, but with time and atmos support I can see this being viable at the same price point. I'll likely be using 5.1 until I go with something like this in order to have atmos, I don't see ever adding more speakers in our living room or buying a new atmos compatible amp. It's only when atmos is an afterthought in an existing solution like this will it end up being something I have. Samsung HW-B650

You would need to have perfectly acoustically reflective walls and ceiling to ricochet sound off for the faux surround effect to approach the sound of a speaker system. The soundbar literally ricochets the surround and height channels off the walls and ceiling from little speakers in the sides and top!

Quite effective for crude movie soundtracks with center dialog and occasional surround fx that go "zing" across the room. I'd honestly recommend them for movie watchers. This will always be mutilating for music. Having perfectly acoustically reflective walls and ceiling - besides that being impossible - would be counter to a sound system. It would sound like you are in an "infinity" cave! Soundbars will always be a niche product for movie soundtracks. That they can decode the Atmos encoding is a moot point when they can't deliver it.

You can't make an acoustically reflective surface that only makes a single perfect reflection and then turns into a dampener - and has magical memory to remember sound elements that have already reflected once. That's what you'd need to do to use a soundbar for music.

 

[Sal1950]

I was thinking about that recently. Would make a great candidate for an Atmos remix!

I would think that since the last BluRay release had a DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 soundtrack,
enough would be there to do a Atmos remix. I'm betting it won't be long till Disney does a
4K mix in Atmos.

 

[Sal1950]

But thinking beyond today, the idea of projecting sound into a room without the need for any speaker location considerations or even surround speakers is likely the path forward. There's been substantial advancements in those phantom ('virtual') surround solutions, and if there's the will to continue development and adoption by the greater public, then there's no reason to think it can't be perfected and replace all our dinosaur 5.1 and 11.1.6 setups. If something sounds good and it's affordable, I'll be the first to jump ship.

If these virtual surround solutions continue to improve as they have in recent years, this will be the defacto means at which surround is produced and it may even give the surround format the bump it's been searching for all this time.

It already has for Joe Sixpack. The included software with many of the latest soundbars can achieve some amazing stuff when everything is just right..
BUT, For dedicated immersive audio enthusiest like ourself's, I don't see it ever replacing a dedicated
surround speaker layout for a few decades, if ever.

 

[stoopid]

You would need to have perfectly acoustically reflective walls and ceiling to ricochet sound off for the faux surround effect to approach the sound of a speaker system. The soundbar literally ricochets the surround and height channels off the walls and ceiling from little speakers in the sides and top!

Quite effective for crude movie soundtracks with center dialog and occasional surround fx that go "zing" across the room. I'd honestly recommend them for movie watchers. This will always be mutilating for music. Having perfectly acoustically reflective walls and ceiling - besides that being impossible - would be counter to a sound system. It would sound like you are in an "infinity" cave! Soundbars will always be a niche product for movie soundtracks. That they can decode the Atmos encoding is a moot point when they can't deliver it.

You can't make an acoustically reflective surface that only makes a single perfect reflection and then turns into a dampener - and has magical memory to remember sound elements that have already reflected once. That's what you'd need to do to use a soundbar for music.

The idea would be to calibrate similar to how amps do it now, put the mic at the seating position and let the computer do the work. Could even upload results to AI and have it spit out the 'solution'. With multiple drivers in the sound bar pointed in different directions can certainly come close, even today.

I'd never say never, there's plenty of things we take for granted that didn't exist 10, 20, 30 years ago. Time will tell if this delivers as a complete solution or just languishes in its current state as a knockoff surround "better than nothing" option. But technology seems to have a way of compensating in ways unimaginable by us mere mortals.

I'm hardly an optimistic person by nature but when it comes to iteration improvements over time, well just look at a cell phone for example of what can be accomplished when there's willingness and widespread adoption.

 

[chucky3042]

Actually one of the best surround sound experiences I have ever had was in the crowd scenes in Groundhog Day with 2 of my earlier giant electrostatic speakers ( I am working on it's successor). Just stereo but " I was there" and there was no way any sound was coming out of those speakers!

 

[Scytales]

Stereo was invented by Alan Blumlein whilst working for EMI. He made the first stereo disc and demonstration film in 1931 (which you can see on the EMI Archive website).

And as soon as the beginning of the 30s, at Bell Labs, W. Snow went multichannel stereo (in 3 channels at the time) with a different recording technique than the one designed by Blumlein. See the republication of his test results from 1934 in the August 1957 issue of Audio, page 20 of the printed document : https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-All-Audio/Archive-Audio/50s/Audio-1957-Aug.pdf

A fascinating article, especially considering its age!

 

[Guy Robinson]

I have been quite happy with my 7.1 system. It's a compromise between 5.1 and Atmos. Because I have the surrounds right beside where I am sitting and 5 feet up the wall angled downwards and the back speakers in the back also 5 feet up the wall the effect is quite amazing.

 

[mandrix]

All I can tell you guys is what many of you already know.
I was early into Quad in the 70's. I knew it was going to sound good before I bought it and I was right. My friends were mostly unimpressed.
Then 5.1, then almost by accident into 5.1.2, now 7.1.4. Well I say "now" but my 7.1.4 AVR is being replaced by Onkyo and I'm back to 5.1.2.

I don't have deep pockets, and no doubt some of you have speakers that would blow mine away.
But I'm pretty content with what I have at this point, and don't see some affordable magic tech replacing speakers anytime soon. If it happens, well I'm all for tech improving our music listening and I won't say it will never happen.
Just don't see it happening anytime soon. JMHO. I have said, and will always say, whatever works for you is good.

 

[Owen Smith]

I would think that since the last BluRay release had a DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 soundtrack,
enough would be there to do a Atmos remix. I'm betting it won't be long till Disney does a
4K mix in Atmos.

The basic audio fidelity of Fantasia is a bit dodgy, as is easy to hear. The problem is in the 1950s it was transferred from Fantasound which used a second 35mm film with additional optical soundtracks, to 35mm 4 track magnetic. The sound was transferred across a road on telephone wires because they couldn't get the two sets of equipment any closer, and there was considerable high frequency loss on the telephone wires. Skip forward 40 years and a huge amount of work was done in the late 1990s to recover the audio from a fairly beat up 4 track magnetic print. It's been cleaned up more digitally since. But if only we could go back to a Fantasound 35mm soundtrack print we'd gain a lot of fidelity. Probably wouldn't even need equipment to play it direct, just scan it in 4K or similar and then process it on a computer.

 

[mandrix]

The basic audio fidelity of Fantasia is a bit dodgy, as is easy to hear. The problem is in the 1950s it was transferred from Fantasound which used a second 35mm film with additional optical soundtracks, to 35mm 4 track magnetic. The sound was transferred across a road on telephone wires because they couldn't get the two sets of equipment any closer, and there was considerable high frequency loss on the telephone wires. Skip forward 40 years and a huge amount of work was done in the late 1990s to recover the audio from a fairly beat up 4 track magnetic print. It's been cleaned up more digitally since. But if only we could go back to a Fantasound 35mm soundtrack print we'd gain a lot of fidelity. Probably wouldn't even need equipment to play it direct, just scan it in 4K or similar and then process it on a computer.

Owen, you're a fount of information!

 

[jimfisheye]

I don't have deep pockets either

All I can tell you guys is what many of you already know.
I was early into Quad in the 70's. I knew it was going to sound good before I bought it and I was right. My friends were mostly unimpressed.
Then 5.1, then almost by accident into 5.1.2, now 7.1.4. Well I say "now" but my 7.1.4 AVR is being replaced by Onkyo and I'm back to 5.1.2.

I don't have deep pockets, and no doubt some of you have speakers that would blow mine away.
...

Friends always seemed impressed but apparently not enough to set themselves up. I have 1 friend who has had 5.1 for a decade now and one other who just recently took the plunge. He had a pair of Dynaudio 6" powered and a Mackie sub. He shopped 2nd hand to get 9 more and we set up for 7.1.4.

I don't have deep pockets either! More of a scavenger with expensive tastes. I'm not sporting 12 mono block amps and B&W or Adams speakers here! I think I did well scaring up the AR9 speakers. All 2nd hand. The amp I grabbed for the 6 new channels when I suddenly decided to expand from 5.1 to 7.1.4 is a Rane MA 6S. Someone had it and didn't need it and I refurbished a computer for them.

My other amps are Crown Powerbase from my small/med PA system. The surround system is their 2nd job.

Everything is pretty calibrated and dialed in! Scavenged all the same.

 

[Owen Smith]

Owen, you're a fount of information!

I can bore for Britain at the Olympic games on the subject of Fantasia. I have it on deluxe boxset NTSC laserdisc (never been able to play it), deluxe boxset PAL VHS, the region 1 (to get DTS audio) Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 DVD boxset (which has an extras disc that never made it to blu ray), and the UK Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 blu ray boxset. If it comes out on 4K I'll buy it despite not having a 4K TV.