rgro;540167 Wrote: > I don't usually participate in this forum because, frankly, I'm an utter > and complete idiot when it comes to this sort of stuff. Not sure if this > is OT or if I'm hijacking the thread----my apologies if either are > true. > > But, in reading, a question did come to mind: does all this discussion > imply that for each particular system there is a volume at which one > hears all of the musical detail possible and beyond which you're only > increasing volume and not detail? > > If so, is there a way to empirically discover what that optimal volume > is or does one just determine that by the seat of one's pants? > > From the lay perspective, it'd be nice to know what that sweet spot is > where you're hearing everything possible but not damaging your ears!
Not practically, very loud a heavily compressed music (most modern music) mask it's own details anyway. You don't have a quiet room so 96dB (cd quality) add that to the ambient noise give or take some marginal for hearing down in the noise. I'm not a sound pro so i can't do the math, but it is very loud in fact often to loud, it's not practical in a home. In you will geo deaf in the process. And also the ears distort, you can't hear nuances when playing to loud. But there is another factor, you saw the "loudness curve" this means that the timbre of an instrument changes with volume. I have a record where the producer writes that you should play it on lower volume + this is an very old antique solo guitar this instrument is naturally quiet, it won't sound right to loud. There is of course instrument at the opposite end of the scale. But it all boils down to the mixing session if it's a pop rock recording. What did the sound engineer heard at the time how loud ? or if it is an purely acoustic venue how loud was it at good seat in the saloon ? So it actually depends on the record and you never now for sure. In an ideal world we would have an calibration standard, and well recorded music and metadata that told us to set (uor calibrated stereo) at a certain volume. This is partly implemented in cinemas (if the morons runing it could learn their stuff) you have dolby standards. The producers of the soundtrack knows this so they can place sound precisely at the threshold of hearing or use scare effects with the right impact. But the latest terminator flick showed me that the loudness war have now reached the cinemas :-( For many years now soundtracks have often sounded better than music-CD even if the crappy dolby or dts coding robbs it of some detail. But the underlying production is actually really good in some cases. -- Mnyb -------------------------------------------------------------------- Main hifi: Touch + CIA PS +MeridianG68J and assorted amps SiriuS, Classe'Primare and Dynadio speakers (including a pair of Contour 4 ) Bedroom/Office: Boom Kitchen: SB3 + powered Fostex PM0.4 Miscellaneous use: Radio (with battery) I use a Controller various ir-remotes and a Eee-PC with squeezeplay to control this ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mnyb's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4143 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=77725 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/audiophiles
