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[00:00:00] Listener Question
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I've got a great question here from Joseph who asks, What process do you use to choose particular brand and models for a situation? The biggest answer is what are you trying to cover in my mind, but is it a matter of a brand preference, experience, or other? All right, excited to answer this. First, we're going to be talking about one of my new favorite subjects, systems thinking, outside of system engineering. Defining the gig, and in the main segment, it's going to be 10 categories for assessing a speaker's performance. Basically, what is the matrix of decision making that I'm going through when weighing all these different things about a speaker, the ecosystem, the client's goals, together to make sure we come out the other side with the right product for the right end goals.
[00:00:42] Systems Thinking Primer
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Okay, so systems thinking. I'm reading a wonderful book on it, and it is called Simple Complexity by William Donaldson, and he has the idea of a hole on, and a hole on is something you have to have, take multiple perspectives around, and it's basically the hole [00:01:00] cannot exist from the parts, and the parts have to have context within the hole. It's like the, the idea of the, the missing the forest for the trees.
If we zoom too in on a part and get overly reductionistic, then we miss the context, but if we just stay high level, we miss some of the finer details that really help give us nuance in any given situation. So if you want to get really nerdy, please dive into that book, but I've just been interested and fascinated by this idea within our industry because, I'm talking about system engineering or making a good sound system, but that exists within the larger audio department and that audio department is RF and in ears and monitors and actually mixing for the house and the audio department exists within the entire production, which is lighting and video and pyro and all that.
And that exists within the context of a show, which has a venue, there's security, there's catering, and then that's just within the entertainment industry as a whole. So we just keep going farther and farther, it's turtles all the way down, but I want to see how we can take [00:02:00] apart this concept a little bit and see each of these 10 different categories that push and pull against each other to come out with the best solution.
So I just want to say that, we, we are always dealing with the best. Rubik's Cube amalgamation of trade offs. And today I want to walk through those trade offs.
[00:02:19] Define the Gig
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But first, let's talk through kind of a four part matrix, if you will, for defining the gig. and with speakers, there, there, it's, it's, it's a two by two grid. So it's either portable versus installed. So does this need to go in a truck and get lugged around from gig to gig? Or is it going to stay permanently somewhere? Whether it's a baseball stadium or, a church or getting, you know, Brought around to do Garth Brooks in an arena or whatever and then the second is outside versus inside, which I just alluded to a little bit if it's going to be outside needs to be IP rated okay with getting rained on versus inside it's going to be Manufactured with the different set of tolerance knowing that's not going to be subject to [00:03:00] the elements.
So those are the options obvious differences, and that usually is dictated by the gig itself, so that's why I'm not including it within these 10 categories. Okay, one more caveat before we jump in. I want to say you're not just buying a product, you are buying a relationship with a company, because this is hopefully a 10 or 15 year investment.
So I want to give some specific shout outs to some companies and people at these companies that have been really good to me over these past few years. I've been doing new design work and first at Scott Pizzo at Fulcrum Acoustic. He's been awesome. He's their lead sales guy. There's Jim Reed at RCF, who's sales and applications.
And there's Merlin Van Veen at Meyersound. from overall education perspective and just a good person helped me get more familiar with Meijer products. So those three gentlemen have been awesome. And there are others at other companies, but those three in particular I've had a lot of contact with and I've really enjoyed their work and how they've helped me get more acclimated to their individual ecosystems at their companies and they make [00:04:00] wonderful products.
So great shout out to them.
[00:04:02] Design & Processing Ecosystem
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Okay, here we go. In no particular order, I've got number one. As far as the categories that I'm thinking through when picking out speakers is the design and processing Ecosystem, which is related to what I just said about each different company and those individuals. So they have an R& D team They have a way of approaching how things should be done So with this more and more manufacturers have their own Proprietary design software because you throw before you throw speakers up in an environment.
You may have a good plan going in So for Meijer, that's MAP3D Fulcrum Acoustic now has Fulcrum 1, JBL now has Venue Synthesis, there's D& B ArrayCalc, there's Elecoustic SoundVision, so all of them are there. There are still some manufacturers who still adjust within EASE, which is a third party platform that you import stuff into, but I don't think it's going to be too long before every single manufacturer has their own little playground, which is a lot of software for me to learn, but it's doable, and it's all the same principles. so [00:05:00] what I want to first ask is with any manufacturer that you're working with or their specific workflow, I want to ask, is their workflow making you more dependent on them or less dependent? So what I mean by that, is I'm really glad that I have this computer in front of me available when I open up SMAART to calculate a discrete Fourier transform 24 times per second so that I don't have to.
So that's using Euler's formula and reducing things the sine ways and running it through giving me visual data. And I'm really, really glad we have computers for that. I think that is leveraging technology in the right way that I do not have to hand calculate the discrete Fourier transform just so I can see a speaker's response.
And so other helpful things when it comes to speaker manufacturers within their softwares is it gives you rigging weights and safety factors, and that's really helpful. It's easy to visualize and see how a rig is performing before you get into the venue and some even let you start the optimization process as far as NREMs and preliminary [00:06:00] delay times or maybe array shading.
You get accurate frequency responses and SPL values in most of them. Some give you more accurate data than others as far as the banding or what planes you're able to see that data at. some even let you see phase response, namely MAT3D. Not a lot of other ones do that, but I like that. I can see that in advance. can also have clear and concise system reports. So most softwares, you can generate something under the generic term of a system report that gives you a complete inventory, all the speakers that you're using, their locations, their rigging weights, their processing, their circuit allocation, if you're using amps.
And that's all really good to have as a handy PDF, or you could print it out or whatever to be able to have when you're giving that design to someone else or you're deploying it yourself. So the, ease at which it displays all the information, how easy it is to get and share. plays into it for sure. and it's also great to have as a general education tool.
If you've been watching my channel, for any amount of time, I, I use a variety of these [00:07:00] softwares to demonstrate underlying principles. And some softwares give me a better ability to do that than others. So, yeah. now that I've talked about what's helpful from a line of manufacturers, here's where I want to have a little bit of caution or some features to be used with care, and that is auto splay or auto filtering of any flavor.
I think they have a place, I think they can give you a helpful starting point, but I don't care, What kind of filter is in it? But if you put your line array at a 20 foot trim height and it's throwing 100 feet, I don't care what Auto Display says, that's a too large of a range ratio for it to overcome.
And that software is not going to tell you, hey, do you have any more trim height? You have to figure out what trim height you can get. I understand there are limits, but do not be fooled into thinking that the autosolvers can just overcome any sort of obstacle. You have to be wise enough to put it in a situation where it can come up with a good suggestion.
And you also have to be able to see in the real world, is it doing that? So I, I'm not [00:08:00] a fan of the controls of what exactly something is doing in your, array or system being unclear, more of a black box. Again. I like that computers can calculate things for us. I'm not saying we have to do everything by hand.
I'm smarter than a lot of these really talented engineers at these companies. But what I don't like is me as the end user, not knowing what's happening under hood and why. And is that ultimately going to get to where I want it to go? I want to see that data. I am the systems engineer. I'm responsible for the outcome.
So I want to be able to see it. So some manufacturers are more forthcoming with that than, than others. Some want you just to rely more on what they thought of in their ecosystem. so just being aware of what's happening is helpful. So to whatever degree you can, investigate that. And also make sure you measure it once you're on site, so you know it's actually happening.
Okay, tie right over. Moving on we have drawing and modeling fluidity with that ecosystem. Is it easy to use? Can you integrate [00:09:00] with other trades? So if you're doing a full install, someone might be doing CAD drawing so you can get those and integrate through DXF or SketchUp, which is helpful versus having to redo everything if it is not interchangeable.
And then DSP integration. So there are three main flows Flavors of this, there's the networked speaker control route, so this is the JBL SRX series where it is all networked together, then you have a computer controlling DSP within each box, similar to RCF's RD NET, or you go the integrated amp route, which is D& B and L Acoustics, among others.
where all the processing was, is within the amps and all the speakers are passive and that acts as like a, a stitched together processor that has everything that, and they all talk to each other over a network and can process things accordingly before pushing it to the speakers. Or you have the separate processor route versus the, built in amps, which is namely Meyer.
So they have their Galaxy processors, which then run over, [00:10:00] either, AVB or analog outs to each speaker and then each speaker already has an amplifier with its built in Processing that makes that speaker sound good in and of itself with some upstream processing making the whole sound good So again coming back to our systems thinking here.
It's the individual speaker within an array, within an entire rig. So again, it's really been a fun idea to play around with. Okay. That was point number one. That was the biggest, I promise we'll move a little bit faster through these other ones.
[00:10:28] Product Flexibility
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But number two is product flexibility. So, we talked about Scott Pizzo, Scott Pizzo at Fulcrum Acoustic.
I'm going to highlight some of their cool stuff is the number one thing I love about their products is that I get multiple coverage patterns at different woofer sizes. So if I need an eight inch versus a 12 inch, 12 versus a 15. In each of those lines, whether it's their CX series or GX or CCX or even DX series, it's multiple woofers on the DX, I get something akin to a 75 by 75, you get a [00:11:00] 120 by 60, you get a 90 by 45, I think a 60 by 45.
And fact check me here, but I like that just because I change woofer size doesn't dictate my coverage size. so I'm not trying to pick on, QSC here. But even with a, a K 12, a K 12 is 75 by 75. If I go up to their 15 inch guy that narrows it to 60 by 60. If I go down to a K eight, that is, one oh, 90 by 90 in the, or, sorry, K 10 is 90 by 90, and the K eight is one 10 by one 10.
And so I understand the engineering reasons why you end up winding things because the crossover changes and woofer size and I get it, but I really like from a design standpoint being able to choose the SPL and woofer size needed and then not worrying about is this going to change my design completely because I'm stuck with a different set of coverage angles.
I also like that with the These from a flexibility standpoint, you can rotate the horns in 45 degree increments. So I have to have to do a funny placement. I can rotate it where I need to go. [00:12:00] And there's also M10 points all over this thing. Those are the circles with the bolts on them that you can rig from.
And they also come with the yokes with most speaker sizes. So they're very flexible in that regard from an install perspective. so moving on to the D& B T Series speakers, I think they're pretty cool is that they can function as a line array and also count them as a point source. And so they, they say they're, have a 35 degree pattern when you put them vertically and rotate the horn to have just put them on a stick or use them as a front fill, or you can throw them up in an array and they can work together.
So I, I know what's usually the big difference between the, the horn and a point source versus line array. A point source uses, constant beam width once you get in the horn. And a line array uses proportional beam width. That means the beam is narrowing the higher you go in frequency. So I'd be very interested to check out some of the polar plots on those speakers since it's functioning both in an array context at and as a point source, but I don't have that data in front of me, but it'd be [00:13:00] interesting experience to run an experiment to run in the future if I get my hands on one of those speakers.
All right, moving on to flexibility with more specific line array. is SPLAY ANGLE GRANULARITY. So, the least granular we have is CONSTANT CURVATURE. So that's your JBL VRX, that's the QSC KLAY 12. they are stuck in the VRX cases, it's 15 degree box with 100 degree, horizontal coverage, and you just put on more boxes the more coverage you need.
So it'll give you 15, 15, 15. We could do a 45 degree composite box, so they can take up a relatively small amount of real estate since it's just moving in a circle, but have a large coverage angle added on very quickly. So that's their advantage. I would not put them in high range ratio situations. AKA the difference between the speaker's throw to front row versus the back row being large.
You need the mechanical differences in split angles to do that. but in some niche circumstances, they are really cool and helpful. So this moves on to the [00:14:00] new, QSC L class arrays. So I, I've had some folks email me about these asking if I've got my hands on one yet. I have not. But one reason I'm somewhat skeptical of them is you only have a 1.
5 degree Theywheat, subs, Volbeat, puls, vol,
flexible transformer, fan, voltage resistor It doesn't turn on for any reason. All of the subs, of course, have to be connected by this switch. How do I install it? shooting literally down, straight down the middle of the road. It was the most common use case for a line array in a small to medium environment.
So I want to give some grace here, but knowing that I can now mechanically articulate the array to get it to have the exact granularity you need. in front to back coverage because I'm only stuck with those three different array angles. So it's kind of in between a constant curvature and a true, more flexible line array.[00:15:00]
So what does a flexible line array look like? So that, first, let's look at Myers Leo box. So this is their flagship dual 15 big boy, and it goes from 0. 5 degrees in splay angle. So really, really, really tight up to five degrees. You may think, wait a minute, that's not really big. Well, Leo is meant to be used in large arena context with up to, you know, a hundred yards or a hundred meters of throw.
So five degrees going that far. Opens up quite a bit. So you have 0.5, it goes to one degree, then opens up to 1.52, then 2.5. and correct me if I'm wrong here, I think that's the increments that goes to 3, 4, 5. so that gives you a very tight amount of granularity in those small PLE angles, which end up being very large over long distances.
So in contrast, Fulcrum Acoustic, their line array, they have just a single product, it's the Dual 8, Dual 8, that is passive cardioid, it starts with 2 degrees, so, versus starting with 5, so it's 2, but it goes all the way up to 16 degrees, so they say [00:16:00] you can use less boxes and cover more ground, cause it goes 2, 4, 6, 8, 16, so you can go all the way up to that with larger splays, so that is a horn that is already has a little bit wider coverage, even though it's proportional beam width, because it's made to go all the way up there.
I think the same is true with the RCF HDL20 series boxes as well. So moving on to the RCF HDL6A, it starts at 1 degree and goes up to 10. So it's kind of in the middle here, but, I'll dog it in a little bit. It goes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 10. So we skip 6, 8, and Granted, most line arrays, you're making larger jumps in the splay as you move towards the bottom of the array because it's the, the, the rate of change in distance as you move closer to the array is increasing, so you may not always need those.
I generally have been able to get very consistent results out of those boxes. But, compared to the JBL SRX906, which is a [00:17:00] competitor product. It starts at one degree, but it goes 12. So this goes in finer granularity, especially at those larger splay angles. And the same is also true with the D and BT series boxes.
granted, I'm not trying to say definitively that one product is better than the other, but these are changes, or differences between these products that I'm taking notice of.
[00:17:24] Linearity At All Volumes
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Okay, number three is that we have linearity at all volumes. So that means when I'm pushing the box hard and maybe up close to where we go into limit, or how loud I'd like to drive this box, it's not sounding vastly different than if I'm driving it at a more reasonable or quiet level.
So, Granted, our ears are going to change, as documented in the Fletcher Munson curve with how sensitive we are in different frequency ranges when at different volumes. So our ears are therefore not linear in that regard, but speakers should be if they are designed well. So that's one of the things [00:18:00] you are paying for with a nice box.
So for instance, Fulcrum Acoustics says in their TQ series that they intentionally put no resistive components in the crossover. that would heat up at higher levels, so it's response remains consistent even at higher levels. So, I know there's different, strategies that other manufacturers, go to make sure that is the case, but that's one specific way Fulcrum is acknowledging that to help make sure that their boxes sound, the same at all volumes.
[00:18:28] Smooth HF Transition Across Nominal Coverage
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Number four, having a smooth high frequency transition across the nominal coverage of the speaker. So speaker is going to be loudest or most linear directly on axis, directly in front of it. But as I move off axis or towards the edge of the speaker's coverage, so let's look at a 90 degree box horizontally.
So I move off at a perfect, you know, a right angle would be the complete coverage, a pizza slice if you will. So I'd move off 45 degrees and that would be the edge of its coverage, which is going to be 6 dB down in the high [00:19:00] frequencies. And so that is usually true for about 1k and up. up depending on the woofer size.
So in general, you can start to see 1k and up start to taper off as you move to the edge of the speaker's coverage. I know this is a very broad rule of thumb. And, what makes a good speaker is that it tapers off equally at all frequencies. This is a very, very thing hard to do, especially when you have multiple horns and coverage patterns within your product line to get every single horn to behave, the same, but it's very possible.
But all that being said, when you move through a horn's pattern, is it able to be smooth? So one of the things with Meyer's new, new ish, Panther rig is that I even heard Bob in a podcast, Bob McCarthy, he looked at the engineering team and looked at the actual polar plots of that horn. And he said, 70 percent of its total horizontal coverage, actually only has a three DB drop off and it's more rapidly towards the side.
So that means it's a very smooth and consistent horn for a [00:20:00] huge part of its horizontal beam width, or when you're within its horizontal coverage. So it's not always a linear move from moving from, through horizontal, drop off in the high frequencies, but I, I'm not, that's kind of a bonus to me that it moves at a nice smooth rate.
I'm just more concerned that all frequencies get equally represented and equally fall off as we move towards the side. So a cheap speaker are not well designed. would have very spurious, what are called lobes or big dips and valleys in the high frequency response, depending where you're at in the horizontal beam of the speaker.
This is not just true for what's happening with, it's in front of the speaker. We could kind of flip this on its head and like what's happening in the low mids behind the speaker. So some speakers are. better at controlling where the sound is going, not just in front of it, but behind. So this could be, the most aggressive techniques you hear or passive or active cardioid techniques to get [00:21:00] rear rejection in the low mids and sometimes the upper mids.
But we also want to look at what's happening on the direct sides and up and above the array because that controls maybe how a low might be coming on stage and causing havoc of feedback or it's how it interacting with the venue. Long story short, the underlying principle here is that we need to direct as much sound as we can at our listeners and not to other places.
And good speaker design helps us do that, that we can trust that when we point the speaker here, most of the sound is getting there within the actual physical limitations of the array.
[00:21:33] Honest SPL Capabilities
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Number five, considering the honest SPL capabilities. There is a new standard out there called AES 75 and it's a complete testing procedure and test signal that you can use that is well documented, clearly laid out to see, hey, can this speaker actually get to the published SPL specs that are out there?
And of course, companies that make power amps or speakers Speakers want to make sure their speakers look competitive when put on a sheet next to other [00:22:00] speakers. So they're going to try and make sure the data looks favorable. So whether that's max SPL or peak SPL or however they want to say it, I want to make sure that's number high because that number is high because people think, Oh, louder speakers are better, which isn't always the case.
How can it get to that published level linearly? Can it sound good over what bandwidth? And, and as I've been able to find, the most comprehensive test to actually do that is the AES 75 test. I do have a video planned to go through that entire process to show you what that looks like, but just know that right now that's the most definitive way to make sure that a speaker, and determined its absolute max SPL.
[00:22:37] Longevity
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Number six is longevity. We'll have two halves to this. The first is durability and the second is R& D cycles. So first with durability is can it withstand the road? Things happen, speaker stands break, people drop it off the back of a truck, things tip over, people pour beer on it, whatever. we need to make sure it can withstand the road.
How about being [00:23:00] outside of a baseball stadium for 15 years? Rain or shine? Is it covered? Is it not? What's the humidity looking like? A speaker that's in Colorado in the Denver Broncos stadium is going to have to function and do very differently than the Florida Gators when the humidity is at like a thousand percent.
So all that being said, knowing the environment it's going to be in and can it withstand it, And so if you're thinking about purchasing a speaker and you know you're within a particular climate or locale, can you ask the manufacturer if they have other installs that are similar within that locale, and how have the speakers held up over time?
This reminds me also of a Meijer rig that was in Kansas City at the International House of Prayer, and if you don't know, it runs 24 hours a day. There is something happening on stage and usually music, within this context 24 hours a day. So that those speakers were therefore on 24 hours a day for I think over a decade before they replaced it and maybe even close to 15 years.
so it was a Meyer rig. I think they've gone now to a JBL system, not because they didn't like the [00:24:00] Meyer. I think they just really liked this JBL one and could get a good, good deal on it. But all that being said, it's cool to know that hey, this was for 365 days a year for 10 or 15 years in use that really speaks to the longevity and investment of that product.
so last thing on longevity is how easy is it to get service or repair and support? So reaching out to the company, what does it look like? Did they send out a tech to you? Do you ship it to them? What's their warranties? All this plays into being able to use this product for a long time. Okay. So the other half of longevity is the R& D cycles.
So what do I mean by that is, what is the average product life cycle for that company? So when a company comes up with a product, they have a big launch and they have an idea of how long is this thing going to be around or for, before we move on to something else. If you're constantly releasing new things and product lines are going away, you're eating that cost, you have to store it.
You have to support a lot of legacy products. So there's a usual time span for the industry in which things are [00:25:00] around. But can you look at that specific company's speakers and know that, Oh, wow, they're, they're still manufacturing this thing. People are still happy with it. And it's still 10 years old.
And granted, you might be able to get a deal on something that is maybe at the end of its life cycle, knowing that it's going to last a long time still. It's not just going to be the newest, shiniest object.
Another way to look at this is, are they releasing useful updates via firmware that you can easily update at or easily implement as a end user? So this could be in the amps, the DSP, obviously not the physical speaker, but the processing behind it. so I think about Fulcrum Acoustic releasing different versions of their FAR filters that they put in front of the speaker that make them sound even better, even though it might be a speaker that's 10 years old.
I actually did this this week with the DX15 in a church. We uploaded the latest, FIR filter. I'm also thinking about this within hardware, there's the, within a studio setting, there's a monitor controller from Lynx called the [00:26:00] Helo. And that thing has been around a while and they constantly push new firmware up to it.
And I think it's really cool that they keep investing in that hardware. So, yeah. because the converters in it still sound amazing just because they're 10 years old or close to 10 years old doesn't mean they're going to age out. They still sound phenomenal, but they keep adding new features and I think it's really cool when manufacturers continue to invest in products and not just drop it in those users that may have it because they want to reap the entirety of that investment and are not just chasing the new shiny thing.
[00:26:27] Aesthetic & EASE of Use/Installation
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Number seven we've got aesthetic and ease of use in installation. so does it come in white? Is the common church question. is, is the product line able to come in a way that's aesthetically pre pleasing? Is it small and compact and incognito? Cause we all know that many venues wish they couldn't see the speakers at all.
So how can you make them nice and small and not in the way or getting in the way of a video wall, is rigging the thing a pain? So when you do have a portable system, is it easy to get up in [00:27:00] the air? Is it intuitive? Is it easy to teach someone else? You don't have to have a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering to be able to put the thing together.
so it's always good to have a demo, get your hands on something and really see what it's like to interact with a product before purchasing.
[00:27:14] Active vs Passive
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Number eight is the difference of it being active or passive. I don't really care from a sound quality standpoint. It's more of a logistical thing. So what does it, what does that mean? So in installation context, it's usually easier to have an amp room or control room that run NL4 or NL2 cable up to the speakers than it is to also run XLR and go up in a power grid.
That's also a little bit easier to service. If you're not having to think about two different places where something might go wrong. Of course, the mechanical components in either are up there in the air, but if you're having to switch out an amp module or maybe an AVB, a card died in a speaker, if most of that is all in the amp room, it's just a little bit easier to service.
passive speakers also have the amps on the ground, so it's less weight in the air. Granted, sometimes because the cable runs are so [00:28:00] long, you do end up taking something like an LA rack for L Acoustics and putting that in the grid, they're running speakers to it. so I, I don't have a dog in a fight either way.
Just before you pull the trigger on it, think, Oh, is it going to be easier for us to have the amp separately? Or do we, are we okay with having, the amps basically built into the speakers in the air? They have the appropriate cabling infrastructure to support it. most of the time it's going to end up meaning the speakers are going to be heavier in the air if they have amps within them, but not Always, it depends on woofer size, topology, so just look at the actual weight of the speaker.
[00:28:32] Do you like the way it sounds?
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And lastly, number 10. Do you like the way that it sounds? I know we've, we've been very brass tacks, up to this point, but at the end of the day, a speaker puts out sound and do you like that the way it sounds? So for instance, one of the reasons why I like my speakers here in my studio is the head type 07s is it has the air motion transformer tweeter.
So it's not a dome tweeter, but I think the way it presents the top end is brilliant. It's very clear. [00:29:00] I feel like It is high def without feeling fatiguing. There are other ribbon type tweeters out there that actually have a lot of distortion in them that I feel that are fatiguing. This is like mainly older Atom products and just know that Head was actually some people from Atom who came from there about eight or nine years ago and started this company and I think did a better job with the technology.
There are plenty of Atom speakers that sound great, I just don't like the older ribbon drivers. But all that being said, The technology they use to present the sound, even if things are at the same frequency response, is going to feel different. so for instance, my headphones here have planar magnetic drivers.
And there's a big ol thing that's, that's moving air. they don't have near as much top end response as this air motion transformer. that's within the head speakers, but the low end feels like it goes down to the center of the earth. so all that being said, There is a specific house curve or typical target out the box which the manufacturer wants you to use.
So for instance, if you owned, if you open [00:30:00] up, SoundVision for L Acoustics and you look at the target curve it wants you to use or wants to normalize the auto filters to, it's a nice tilt starting at 1k that moves all the way up. I personally like the tilt waiting till about 300 hertz before it starts tilting.
So even if I am using an L Acoustics rig, I will override what's the house curve of the system and get it to the tonality that I want out of the rig.
[00:30:24] Key Takeaways
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All right, here's some key takeaways and we will wrap up. I just want to make sure that you know, that you're buying into a 15 year ecosystem, not just an individual product, because if you're going to get support, thinking about.
updates, being able to maybe upgrade or bolster your system with other product lines from that company, you are taking on their way of accomplishing audio. again, it's not, it's not a marriage contract. I don't want to make, I don't want to present it as that serious, but, I would just do look at that purchasing decision through these former 10 lenses that I gave you to make sure that ecosystem is something that you want to get.
into, even [00:31:00] if it might cost you a little bit more or honestly could save you some money. Maybe a different manufacturer has a more budget conscious product that ticks all these boxes, and it may be better for you to use the dollars elsewhere, maybe in sound damping for your church or venue, which is often the case in my, in my case, in what I'm doing with my clients.
so number two, keep your client's goals and outcomes in mind. So this, these products and speakers that we're using have to come to an end goal. Yes. We like using them. Yes. We like to nerd out. Yes. their specific features, directly impact our quality of life, but we also have to couch this within the product.
for the types of goals and gigs that we're going after. Does this product help us get there faster, do a better work or just do it more efficiently? And number three is I would encourage you to look at flexible products versus something that's very niche for a specific type of [00:32:00] show. So product flexibility means you're having to purchase less over all types of speakers, but it can fit different domains.
So again, that's going back to what are your main types of shows that you're going after, what are your client's goals, and making sure you have products that can ebb and flow with those different, ways in which they might be called upon to serve you and your shows.
[00:32:23] Wrapup
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All right, thank you so much for listening.
That was 10 ways to think about, perching a speaker in these different, types of ways we can use system thinking to push and pull on these, dichotomies and trade offs here. that was a question submitted by Joseph. Thank you so much for doing that. You can also submit a question at the link, below produced by mkc.
com slash question and maybe I'll answer it here on the channel. Appreciate your time. Thanks for hanging out with me today and I'll catch you next time.
