SRS Circle Surround II:

[Solar]

Hey I had some great results running my CD's through CS II. Found more alive sound than DPL II and better seperation.

 

[Cai Campbell]

I don't have experience with Circle Surrounds. Sounds intriguing though.

As an aside, what do the "T" and "R" icons mean that are associated with the topics in this forum? I've never seen them before!

 

[QSD-1]

Solar, tell me more about your experiences with CSII, please! Does it support a separate center speaker for stereo input?

In another post I wrote what I would like to hear when using a stereo source.
I am hoping it is achievable. I don't expect every recording to give me the optimum, but my experience has been mostly 3 channel stereo, with both front speakers reproducing the same program with a rather wide, weak center vocalist and good stereo separation behind my head.

Any chance I would like CSII? See below:

My goal would be to start with a stereo signal and end up with the following:

Center vocalist anchored in the center and not 12 feet wide.

Left Front and Right Front that have distinctly different stereo sources.

Strong Rear output when the source is out-of-phase, I don't really care if the rear speakers carry virtually the same signal, just as long as the LF and RF have good stereo.

But...I am looking for more rear output than the typical "Hall" setting that typically seems to reproduce a little echo in the rear speakers and that's it.

I have quite a few discs that seem to have strong out-of-phase material, my QSD-1 regularly routes the backup singers to the rear...I think that's cool!
That's the effect that I want without destroying the front stereo image.

Thanks,
Gary

 

[phydo]

If I remember correctly AQUADAD is the resident guru regarding SRS circle-surround. There was a thread on this several years ago.

Justin

 

[aquadad]

If I remember correctly AQUADAD is the resident guru regarding SRS circle-surround. There was a thread on this several years ago.

Justin

Thanks for the recognition Justin, but before me there was master chief OBBOP who pointed me into the NUREALITY direction.

QSD-1, if you do a search for NUREALITY you will find what you are looking for.

Also, Gerardo (QUADGDIAZ) was over a couple months ago and he must of liked what he heard because a couple of days after his visit he purchased a couple of the NUREALITIES for himself. Maybe he'll chime in with his results.

When a stereo signal is pre-processed through the Nureality and then fed to the SANSUI, the variomatrix feasts on it and you get all the rear channel info you could ever imagine.

When listening to 4 or 5.1 I run the fronts and rears through their own respective NUREALITIES for synthed 5.0 across the front and rear for virtual 11.1 after the center and sub get added into the equation. I then push all this sound through ten individual speakers. Four of the speakers are 3-way and the other six are 2-way. When you sit in the swivel rocker recliner sweet spot you are immersed in a 3-D dome of sound that is loaded with phantoms and none of the sound seems to come from the speakers.

This may not be everyone's cup of tea, but I love it!

 

[solaris]

hey no longer have my CSII amp but i liked it for stereo sources. It had a little more seperation than DPL II I'm not sure if it will do that much more than dpl but found I always used it. the setting were good for keeping the center channel out of the L&R fronts.
http://www.beststuff.com/audiovideo...elivers-ultimate-home-theater-experience.html

 

[QSD-1]

aquadad, you said:

When listening to 4 or 5.1 I run the fronts and rears through their own respective NUREALITIES for synthed 5.0 across the front and rear for virtual 11.1 after the center and sub get added into the equation. I then push all this sound through ten individual speakers. Four of the speakers are 3-way and the other six are 2-way. When you sit in the swivel rocker recliner sweet spot you are immersed in a 3-D dome of sound that is loaded with phantoms and none of the sound seems to come from the speakers.

I am very interested in this, but I guess I need it spelled out. I was under the impression that the NUREALITIES was 2 channels in, 2 channels out. Yes, No?

So where did the 10 sources come from for the 10 speakers?

What plugs into what which plugs into what?

Thanks,
Gary

 

[QSD-1]

Well, aquadad has got me thinking, finally! I guess I'm not as smart as I tell people I am (grin).

Here I am posting:

1. QSD-1 doesn't seem to have enough separation between the front channels and seem to spread the center vocalist between them.

2. 3D 2in-2out enhancers increase the stereo fed to them but reduce the
center signal, especially if the CENTER knob is turned down.

So maybe I am putting 2 and 2 together? Take the front outputs from the QSD-1 and post process them with a 3D enhancer, for instance my Hughes AK-100 with the CENTER knob turned down.

Now I have that front separation that I want (maybe) with only a little problem that the center vocalist is almost gone.

But wait. Maybe there is a way to strip the stereo information away from the mono signal, send the mono signal to a center speaker with a volume control?

Any suggestions?

Not sure how to do this, yet, but the gears are spinnin. For instance, take the raw stereo signal, send it into my other AK-100 with the CENTER knob turned down, sum that output into mono. Subtract that signal from the raw stereo signal mixed to mono. (L+R+C) - (L+R) = C?

Or maybe just buy a HTD 6.1 and sell my pair of QSD-1 and my pair of AK-100?

Gary

 

[aquadad]

I am very interested in this, but I guess I need it spelled out. I was under the impression that the NUREALITIES was 2 channels in, 2 channels out. Yes, No?

So where did the 10 sources come from for the 10 speakers?

What plugs into what which plugs into what?

Thanks,
Gary

Hello Gary,

Yes the NR is 2 in, 2 out. The 2 out are a processed signal that is intended give you a virtual surround sound from two speakers.

When synthing quad from stereo:

I feed all my stereo inputs into a Marantz, integrated, stereo amp that I use as a switchboard for them. From there the signal is sent to an EQ then into the NR for processing. The processed stereo signal is then sent to a Sansui quad receiver where the variomatrix synthesizer (similar to your QSD-1) disects the processed stereo signal into synthesized quad.

When its all said and done the Marantz is driving the four 3-way speakers via it's A & B speaker outputs, and the Sansui is driving the six 2-way speakers via it's A outputs in the front and the A&B outputs in the rear.

When playing a 5.1 source:

In playing DVD-A or SACD etc. the Marantz is used to drive the center and sub channels directly from the player.

A second EQ and NR combo is thrown in for this configuration. The front channels go through one and the rear channels through the other set.(directly from the player) Then the two sets of processed signals are fed into the discrete inputs of the Sansui for playback.

The net result is virtual 5.0 across the front plus virtual 5.0 across the rear plus the center and sub channels for a virtual sum total of 11.1.

 

[Obbop]

Interesting to see others using the NuReality Circle Surround units.

My CD player feeds the NuReality unit then off to the Sansui 9001 receiver then off to four speakers.

I do twiddle the two adjustments on my NuReality unit quite a bit to get that certain "sweet spot" that tickles my innards.

Interestingly, around 20 percent of the music I listen to requires no enhancement from the NuReality unit to achieve a good synthetic surround sound as provided by the VarioMatrix.

Many of my SQ and QS encoded CDs profit from a wee bit of Circle Surround processing.

Here is the page I added to my quad site that tells of my experience with the NuReality unit:

http://www.geocities.com/quadaudio/CircleSurround.html

For the bloke on a budget, the NuReality SRS Circle Surround device may be just whatche needs for synthetic surround Nirvana.

I wonder how well it would work with a sub-par decoder? Is it possible a minimalistic early-years el cheapo decoder could be made to sound much better with a NuReality device?

 

[MidiMagic]

So where did the 10 sources come from for the 10 speakers?

Thanks,
Gary

Where do you get the idea that each speaker needs its own source?

This seems to be a misconception among those who want discrete channels. The speakers are supposed to create a sound field which can locate correctly a sound no matter where it really originates. If it originates between two speakers, then it should sound like it comes from between them.

Those who want discrete sounds want a little puddle of sound at each speaker (discreteness), rather than a continuous field.

 

[stevendive]

Where do you get the idea that each speaker needs its own source?

This seems to be a misconception among those who want discrete channels. The speakers are supposed to create a sound field which can locate correctly a sound no matter where it really originates. If it originates between two speakers, then it should sound like it comes from between them.

Those who want discrete sounds want a little puddle of sound at each speaker (discreteness), rather than a continuous field.

The idea is indeed pretty entrenched that 4 discrete speaker encoding channels are required for quad’s 4 speakers, which, for some people, makes the concept of full directional encoding seem irrelevant or difficult.

With quad, there’s no ‘supposed’ as such; it can only be a sort of stereo pan between 4 speakers, possibly smoothed out using blending, etc, to reduce detenting/cogging effects. Quad in all its forms never adequately records nor reconstructs soundfields, which is exactly what ambisonics and WFS both do pretty well, starting with the mic/virtual mic. As I think you know already, ambisonics encodes direction over 360 degrees, with all directions treated equally, whilst quad encodes loudspeaker feeds.

Way back, Michael Gerzon worked out that it was possible and desirable to decode old fashioned 2 channel stereo in a more natural sounding way than stereo systems can. He found, by theory and much testing that, to create this more realistic than 2 channel/2 loudspeaker stereo, a more satisfactory energy vs frequency distribution across the front stereo sector could be made. Gerzon invented a stereo to B-format encoder/decoder that uses 4 (or more) loudspeakers to recreate the stereo front sector, thus the ‘enhance/superstereo’ option in ambisonic decoders. The ‘width’ option just enables listeners to adjust according to taste.

Incidentally, this enhance option is great for mono as it is almost equivalent, in perception terms, of using a centre single loudspeaker.

Sorry, I rambled a bit. This reply was briefer in my head.