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   Home » Audio For Dummies ™ » Two channels (tweeter and woofer) = a miserable evil? (13 posts, 1 page)
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01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,238
Joined on 05-28-2004
Post #: 1
Post ID: 27872
Reply to: 27872
Two channels (tweeter and woofer) = a miserable evil?
I wonder why any of the Two Channels playback loudspeakers that I have heard are not able to play complex symphonic music with… complexity. Even at the level of “Absolute Sounds” it fails.

"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
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Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,697
Joined on 10-12-2006
Post #: 2
Post ID: 27873
Reply to: 27872
Even in DPoLS?
Most playbacks I hear do not do "it" for me, and this includes most high-energy systems, including variations of surround. Do we listen for what we want to hear? What we want to hear guides our system development. Perhaps once we actually hear "better", the more complicated hi-fi becomes the new basis for our expectations? I only heard elements of what I wanted before I did my last round of changes, tweaking things I dragged into the house to my own taste. My friend Mark moved away, and he is setting up his giant system in a new house now. He has said he will compromise sound to keep a nice view while he listens, if it comes to that, because losing the view would make his listening experience worse, even if it "sounded better". I get that.

Paul S
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,238
Joined on 05-28-2004
Post #: 3
Post ID: 27874
Reply to: 27873
Can DPoLS overcome the 2ch-problem?
Paul, this is the most interesting question ever was asked at this site in my view. From the theory (which does not exist) I would yeas yes, but I have no practical experience of proving it. It would be very interesting to discuss it with Stirling Trayle as in my view he is the only know to me public person who is approaching DPoLS closest.

"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,697
Joined on 10-12-2006
Post #: 4
Post ID: 27876
Reply to: 27874
A Matter of Degree?
Here I am again with the idea that any topology might be made to sound better or worse by "degrees". As I have shared, I have a hard time with the idea that DPoLS alone can totally cancel out/obviate all topological differences and/or limitations, but if it does, then it must mean stereo vs. multi-channel (or mono...) becomes moot, as well. And, if so, why focus ones efforts on anything but achieving DPoLS? Talk about Bang for the Buck! I have made it my own business to try to get complex Music from a 2-channel system, even though I was getting "sonic benefits" from a center channel before I dropped that approach, because I could not see/hear a topological path forward that did not significantly compromise my main, stereo channels, and I never figured out how to get past that. For now, I have a lot of viable sonic information available to me via tweaked, powerful stereo that encourages me to listen to and involve myself closely with Big Complex Music, not to mention it also brings me "more" from any Music I want to listen to. Does this mean I am "close to DPoLS", if there is such a thing? I can understand the idea of getting more from a given topology, but I have no idea if or how DPoLS "overcomes topological limitations". If to speak in terms of negatives, a poorly implemented multi-channel system sounds at least as bad as any poorly implemented stereo system. Can there be better or worse implementations of either genre? I say yes, of course. I await the summary judgement of DPoLS with bated breath.

Paul S
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
JJ Triode
Posts 101
Joined on 09-12-2007
Post #: 5
Post ID: 27877
Reply to: 27876
Request for clarification
Before we go any deeper into this, let's be clear whether "2 channels" means left and right, or tweeter and woofer. Paul seems to be talking about the former, Romy the latter.
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,697
Joined on 10-12-2006
Post #: 6
Post ID: 27878
Reply to: 27877
Good Catch
Good catch, John. We do know (because he told us) that Romy likes his stereo with extra harmonics and DSP "random phase" rear channel injection. Still, if we are comparing audible results, Romy's non-theory seems to declare that DPoLS obliterates what might be achieved by topological differences, obviating the question.

Best regards,
Paul S
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,238
Joined on 05-28-2004
Post #: 7
Post ID: 27881
Reply to: 27877
Good point.
 JJ Triode wrote:
Before we go any deeper into this, let's be clear whether "2 channels" means left and right, or tweeter and woofer. Paul seems to be talking about the former, Romy the latter.

Good point, JJ, it was not clear indeed I was talking about the tweeter and woofer.

"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,697
Joined on 10-12-2006
Post #: 8
Post ID: 27883
Reply to: 27872
Are you including Rebel ++?
I see Rebel ++ is now woofer, "tweeter" and "super-tweeter", so a 3-way. Does this do big, complex Music as well as Macondo? I tried many combinations of amps and drivers before deciding on a particular 4-way as the "least complicated" speaker I thought would work, based on my experience, based on my hopes and expectations.

Paul S
01-09-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,238
Joined on 05-28-2004
Post #: 9
Post ID: 27884
Reply to: 27883
Yes, very much so.
Yes, it is very much included Rebel++, in fogs the whole idea very much drive from performance of her. It is obviously not the first loud speaker two very loud speakers that I heard. I intentionally do not connect with us now as I would like to teach her how to sign properly with the two channels. This is not strictly to channels but two channels Plus go to education from a corner card and it sounds to me as good as the best two channel speakers that I heard. Furthermore, it's driven by exceptionally capable electronics. And believe me, it produce absolutely amazing sound. However, large-scale symphonic music, really takes its apart and it is not even in the same scale of sounds compared to my Macondo. I do not think that the topologically possible to produce more capable 2 channel speaker and it's still does not work out for large scale music. It is communicative, but it is truly failed at so many levels of absolute sounds assessments. Kind of puzzling...

"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
01-10-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,697
Joined on 10-12-2006
Post #: 10
Post ID: 27885
Reply to: 27884
Starting at the Level of Absolute Sound
It does seem like most speaker/amp combinations either do not present "enough", or they "present the wrong things", or they "present things wrongly" as far as delivering Big Music. Not sure which problem is worse, but even the good-sounding 2-driver speakers just seem to "fall short" with Big Stuff, IMO, and I have not heard an exception to this, either. Not to give a free pass to big speakers, as my experience also indicates that "more drivers" is only part of a solution for Big Music. Plenty of bad-sounding big speakers out there! This made finding big amps for big speakers a real chore, since I didn't have either when I started looking. Mistakes and dead ends wasted a lot of time, not to mention they were/are expensive! Could it be that "the right drivers" in "the right configuration" might make for a 2-way that can excel with Big Music? I don't know that it could not; I'd love to hear about it.

Paul S
01-10-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Amir
Iran Tehran
Posts 364
Joined on 02-11-2009
Post #: 11
Post ID: 27886
Reply to: 27885
Very interesting subject
This is very interesting to know what will happen to all aspects of sound and also to our reaction to music when the speakers are in DPOLS.I will ask Stirling about this subject soon.


www.amiraudio.com, www.hifi.ir
01-10-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,238
Joined on 05-28-2004
Post #: 12
Post ID: 27887
Reply to: 27872
Sensible audio: why 2 channels acoustic system is always bad.


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
01-11-2025 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,697
Joined on 10-12-2006
Post #: 13
Post ID: 27888
Reply to: 27887
The Sound of One Hand Clapping
It is easy enough to hear what is going on with speaker drivers if one listens to them while they are trying to play Big Music. If we think of snapping one’s fingers, then clapping, then a crowd clapping, I think we have an apt metaphor for one or two-driver speakers. Starting with the old-style, good-sounding drivers, they ultimately struggle to put out enough coherent energy to make “enough” convincing sound for Big Music, and this is particularly true if they are asked to play a wide range of frequencies at the levels we are talking about. It seems that the cost of efficiency with these drivers is that at some point they are effectively “too sensitive”, with a very sudden rise of audible distortion, to the point of unintelligibility.  This is exacerbated by the fact that most amps also fail to deliver their best when they are stressed, which they typically are with Big Music, especially with large drivers. Of course, this only compounds audible problems as drivers strain to put out “all that information”. To make a real discussion of this requires a much wider viewpoint, and a more free-wheeling and inclusive discussion, since the roots of the problems we deal with here also concern more complex loudspeaker systems.
 
 
Paul S
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