Random observations from your day

[Genesis]

Marjorie Taylor Greene really needs to shut up

[DirtDawg]

Open baffle theatre design was very common in the 50s, I believe, when they first started equipping cinemas with 4-channel magnetic sound.

And now that I think of it, I've seen a few older theatres where they would embed surround woofers in the back wall panels. Nothing behind them except for the concrete walls. Not a brilliant solution. They had 80 Volt signals.

Maybe I did not make myself as clear as I meant to.
In a small room using near field listening practices, it is the direct energy from the drivers that you want and eliminating some cancellations from some of the almost omnidirectional low frequency patterns common with boxed enclosure types is desirable. In order to minimize many problems inherent in all rooms, but more prevalent and difficult to manage in smaller rooms, the dipole seems to have an advantage.

The typical bi-cardiod propagation pattern of a dipole system eliminates much of the side to side energy forced into the room. My idea (adapted from Blumlein) of adding a second and then a third plane of bi-cardiod propagation seems to befuddle the typical room modes, resulting in a much smoother low frequency response.

I am not gaining any low frequency energy, except for the fact that I am using a greater moving area for propagation. I am also not causing further massive drops, holes, fortified peaks or anomalies in the system, but rather adding more than one plane pattern has smoothed out the various peaks and dips by a fair margin and brought up clarity at the same time.
I am not onto anything new here, just adapting the existing "science" to my small room in a way that seems to work for me. 

Often in smaller venues (12,000 to 15,000 seats) when I was still doing sound reinforcement, I would blast two or more large folded horn bass cabinets from each side directly across the stage "Out Of Phase" from the rest of the house system in order to help eliminate some low frequency smearing or feedback problems.
It works.
I learned all that shit in the '80s, mainly from attending JBL's "schools" and seminars intended to help people know how to use their gear to advantage.

My idea is to just keep this same effect working on a smaller scale in my small room.

The beauty of a dipole system allows the drivers to do the work themselves without the need to populate the listening room with as many bass traps and low frequency diffusion panels, which have to be huge to work well, even in the high bass ranges.
 
I moved some my bass traps to the floor/wall junction directly behind my speakers and it is enough. I am using about half of the traps I started with and even decreased the absorption I had at first as well.
Still have some added diffusion on a large flat wall, though.

[Genesis]

Ever since I left Walmart, my one co-worker said they missed me

She was also on my council of Marias because when I used to work there, there were about 12 Marias on staff.

[Charlotte Quin]

I took a little drive south today because I read about this bushwalking track online, so I went to check it out. It's 7km one way but I only intended to walk to the first 4WD beach access at the 2km mark and then walk back.
Well, once the gravel fire trail ended do you think I found where the walking track went from there?? I ended up in some weird swampy sand flat with no prominent walking track in sight. Lucky the area was sandwiched between the beach and the main road (and I could hear both) so I had bearings to find my way back.
Worse thing was this was supposed to be a council owned walking track! You'd think it'd be better marked and signposted!

[renaeden]

^I'm glad you didn't get lost. And I hope you didn't get muddy feet.

[Charlotte Quin]

^ Wet sandy feet more like it lol. It's a strange silver white sand with Melaleuca stained puddles. I guess it would be a natural storm water channel, and I assume the water runs to the beach as a little creek (didn't see the beach).
Whatever, that's what I get for trying to find somewhere new to walk lol.

[renaeden]

Well if an opportunity comes up to communicate with the council, you know what to complain about. I wish you lived here, there's heaps of walking trails, some alongside the beach.

[odeon]

@Dawg I don't have anything to counter your arguments with. As a matter of fact, I don't think I fully understand them.

All in all, I'm pretty sure your experiences surpass mine. I do like reading about them, though.

[DirtDawg]

Odeon, I did not think we were arguing, rather sharing ideas that generally interest us both.

My experience in theater is mostly from historical papers and trying to understand things from "the beginning," because it was major theaters competing with each other that began the fundamentals of sound reinforcement.
Your experience in theater is a bit more hands on than mine.

I could set up for a major concert in the old days and it took all day to get it all ready, but it would take more than a whole week to try to explain what I was doing simply from experience. That was my area for a long time.

As far as open baffle reproduction, I have been "playing" with that for over twenty five years. I have found some things that work and many more that do not work well. The more I learn about dipole propagation, the more I find that it has all been done before and mostly "math'ed out" quite clearly.
I'm just using the concepts for my own room.


We're not arguing, pal!

[Genesis]

I can't stay awake... no matter how hard I try. Maybe after I sort out my pills for the week I'll go get ready? Yeah, I'll do that

[odeon]

Odeon, I did not think we were arguing, rather sharing ideas that generally interest us both.

My experience in theater is mostly from historical papers and trying to understand things from "the beginning," because it was major theaters competing with each other that began the fundamentals of sound reinforcement.
Your experience in theater is a bit more hands on than mine.

I could set up for a major concert in the old days and it took all day to get it all ready, but it would take more than a whole week to try to explain what I was doing simply from experience. That was my area for a long time.

As far as open baffle reproduction, I have been "playing" with that for over twenty five years. I have found some things that work and many more that do not work well. The more I learn about dipole propagation, the more I find that it has all been done before and mostly "math'ed out" quite clearly.
I'm just using the concepts for my own room.


We're not arguing, pal!

Never thought we wre.

Quite the contrary. I always enjoy our chats, and I always learn from you when we're discussing sound-related stuff.

[rock hound]

Walmart purchasing and the warehouses are totally clueless as to what we REALLY need and have space for.  Xmas candy is already flooding in!   

[Genesis]

My cat is a fan of Dog Food -_-

[odeon]

I bought a  Google Pixel 6 Pro last year. Supposedly the best camera on a phone ever, or so they said at the time, which suited me fine because the camera quality is one of my main criteria when picking a new device.

I was quite happy. Still am. The phone produces amazingly good images.

So, last week, Google released the follow-up phone, the 7 Pro. I noticed in the news, and I was curious to see what had changed, so one of the early reviews caught my eye. It was comparing the 6 Pro to the 7 Pro, since the former is still available, and the author wondered if last year's model was good enough since it's bound to be cheaper. Well, he wrote, if you just need a phone for your day-to-day stuff and (why not?) an occasional photo, then go for the 6 Pro.

But if you like taking pictures with your phone, he added, the 7 Pro is the one you want. The 6 Pro is good enough for basic photography, but that's basically it.



I don't buy this for a second. The phone is very much an incremental update, and pretty much every other review confirms this. Sure, they've learned a few things, but if you got the older one, don't bother. It'll be fine.

Guessing the reviewer in question didn't actually test anything. He just glanced through the marketing materials.

But this raises a larger issue. When did the market change from buying a new one when your old one fails to a yearly thing where not just the manufacturer but the supposedly neutral reviewers both think replacing your old phone every year or two is recommended and close to the objective truth?

Hardware-wise, there's already a limit to the endurance of "older" smartphones. Two or three years, maybe four, and your old device is dying. Its battery can't take it anymore, and the technology is getting close to outdated so the manufacturer no longer supports it with new software. Five and your bank will tell you that your phone is no longer safe to use.

I get it. Everything changes. Another article caught my eye the other day. A 20-yo desktop computer hailed as "future-proof" at the time was examined. Could it be updated? No, was the short-and-to-the-point answer. Everything has changed since then. Yes, technically, you can replace the motherboard and everything attached to it, but what's left then?

So, a final piece of news: there's this "Framework" laptop that you can supposedly upgrade and rebuild for years. Everything about it is replaceable, so it's not just open-source software and BIOS, you can rebuild it! The thing caught my eye on FB or maybe LinkedIn. It looks good enough, but having owned a number of laptops in my time, I remain sceptical.

It all makes me wonder: what's a reasonable cycle with technology? When does it make sense to replace the mobile or the laptop?

(If you simply want the latest every year and can afford it, then don't bother answering.)

[Parts]

So much road work around here,  detours everywhere its making me crazy