The primary disadvantage is that it will sound bad.
The rear channels are out-of-phase to eliminate imaging. You want a
diffuse soundfield behind you, with no ability to localize sound. If you
wired them in phase, it would sound as if all the surround information
was coming from one place.
If you put the front channels out of phase, you will eliminate all
the imaging up front, and the rather than the effects and dialogue
being localized in their proper position, they will be diffuse and
image poorly.
The whole surround system is a pretty cheesy kludge; the matrixing
concept dates back to the 1950s and puts a lot of restrictions on
source material. As a result, some weird nastiness has to be done in
playback; if there was a true stereo pair behind you, you wouldn't
have this problem.
Geeze, I wish we still had six-track 35mm follow-dubber stuff around
today.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
It seems that wiring the surround speakers out of phase gives
good result. The sound is more spacious. It is especially good for
music not Dolby encoded. Since the surround is the out of phase
component of left and right, so when playing through only two front
speakers, these components are out of phase, so it makes sense to
play them out of phase with surround speakers, too.
Any disadvantage to this approach?
Jun
>> The whole surround system is a pretty cheesy kludge; the matrixing
>> concept dates back to the 1950s and puts a lot of restrictions on
>> source material. As a result, some weird nastiness has to be done in
>> playback; if there was a true stereo pair behind you, you wouldn't
>> have this problem.
Yes, but what about the sides? Although the matixing is a problem,
the BIG problem is the use of pair-wise mixing between pairs of
speakers. Even though Dolby Surround AC-3 does not use matrix
mixing and has complete separation between channels, if the source
material continues to be mixed using the pair-wise mixing style,
Dolby Surround AC-3 will not be able to produce proper imaging.
To understand why pair-wise mixing is a bad idea in surround sound,
please perform the following very simple experiment. Play, in stereo,
a pair-wise mixed CD which had good phantom images (almost all CDs use
this mixing style). Turn your chair through 90 degrees. If you still
hear stable phantom images when both speakers are to one side then you
are a space alien, because humans cannot do this. Pair-wise mixing did
not work in the quadraphonic era and it will not work now with Dolby
Surround AC-3. Such an absolute statement can be made because the way
that humans localise sound has not changed.
If you want to hear why the Ambisonic mixing style is better for
surround sound, repeat the above experiment with a CD that is UHJ
encoded (eg Alan Parsons "Stereotomy", Cowboy Junkies "The Trinity
Session", any recording from Nimbus Records).
Regards,
Martin
E-mail: mle...@omg.unb.ca
WWW: http://www.omg.unb.ca/~mleese/
________________________________________________________________________
Want to know how Ambisonics can improve the sound of your LPs and CDs?
See the Ambisonic Surround Sound FAQ. Details on my WWW Home page.
What do you mean? Wiring front speakers out of phase will sound bad?
Of course everybody know that, and can hear it immediately.
Wiring surround speakers that produce a mono (L-R) signal out of phase
will sound bad? Why?
I think it is good to drive surround speakers out of phase. As I said,
for non Dolby encoded music, the signal that goes to surround is out
of phase meterial in left and right. So when they are played back on
only left and right front speakers, they are out of phase. So play
them out of phase through surround speakers is closest to the
situation when they are played though two channel stereo.
>The rear channels are out-of-phase to eliminate imaging. You want a
>diffuse soundfield behind you, with no ability to localize sound. If you
>wired them in phase, it would sound as if all the surround information
>was coming from one place.
>
>If you put the front channels out of phase, you will eliminate all
>the imaging up front, and the rather than the effects and dialogue
>being localized in their proper position, they will be diffuse and
>image poorly.
>
>The whole surround system is a pretty cheesy kludge; the matrixing
>concept dates back to the 1950s and puts a lot of restrictions on
>source material. As a result, some weird nastiness has to be done in
>playback; if there was a true stereo pair behind you, you wouldn't
>have this problem.
>
> It seems that wiring the surround speakers out of phase gives
> good result. The sound is more spacious.
You mean the sound is more diffused ?
>It is especially good for music not Dolby encoded.
It may be the case, but I don't think it's always true. Un-encoded
source will not have the surround effect. However, in some recordings
containing the "ambience" information, the difference between left and
right channel, the surround effect will be reproduced. Again, this is
not intentional, IMO.
> Since the surround is the out of phase
> component of left and right, so when playing through only two front
> speakers, these components are out of phase, so it makes sense to
> play them out of phase with surround speakers, too.
>
> Any disadvantage to this approach?
>
Sorry to burst your bubbles, But I do not think this make sense!
What you may want to do is to get another pair of surround speakers,
in addition to the existing pair. Yes, I mean 4 speakers in the back :-)
Wire the first pair normally, and the second pair "out of phase" with
respect to the first pair. This means the surround signal intended to be
at the rear left is also available at the rear right AND out of phase,
and the surround signal at the rear right is also available at the rear
left, slightly delayed (out of phase).
Then one would have a really diffused sound field, which can even be
"confused" but you may like it better !
And the above is a theory, at any rate :-)
-Dave
Let me try again, more seriously! How would you wire the surround speakers
to make them "out of phase" with respect to the front???
You'd mean without the Prologic decoder, one can still passively "decode"
the ambience, which is the (L-R) signal, and use some surround speakers
to capture this ambience ???
This means you "cross wire" the surround speakers with respect to the "front"
speakers, to essentially subtract the speaker-level Left to Right and thus
extract the ambience information, IF (only IF) available depending on
the recordings. Cross wiring has been discussed and proven working, as how
a passive decoder works.
Or if you are not sure (afraid of blowing something), get a Dynaco QD-II
passive surround decoder, which essential provides an analog subtraction (L-R)
for the surround channels, an analog addition (L+R) for the Center channel and
a passive filter that roll-off the rears at 7 kHz plus some attenuation
circuit. The Dynaco unit can be connected to your ordinary 2-channel stereo
amp/receiver via speaker-level outputs. (This was my early surround gear)
This means your setup with Prologic receiver/decoder already takes care
of this and will produce the "ambience" (L-R) when the source is not encoded
but somehow has this (L-R) AND Prologic mode is ON.
:> It is especially good for
:> music not Dolby encoded. Since the surround is the out of phase
:> component of left and right,
:> so when playing through only two front
:> speakers, these components are out of phase, so it makes sense to
:> play them out of phase with surround speakers, too.
:>
You lost me here!
-Dave
More diffused if you turn off the front speakers and listen to
surround speakers alone.
More spacious if you listen to both front and surround speakers, when
the surrounds (especially out of phase surrounds) enhance the fronts.
>>It is especially good for music not Dolby encoded.
>
>It may be the case, but I don't think it's always true. Un-encoded
>source will not have the surround effect. However, in some recordings
>containing the "ambience" information, the difference between left and
>right channel, the surround effect will be reproduced. Again, this is
>not intentional, IMO.
>
>> Since the surround is the out of phase
>> component of left and right, so when playing through only two front
>> speakers, these components are out of phase, so it makes sense to
>> play them out of phase with surround speakers, too.
>>
>> Any disadvantage to this approach?
>
>Sorry to burst your bubbles, But I do not think this make sense!
Obviously you didn't understand what I said.
I meant to wire left surround out of phase to right surround.
The out of phase parts of left front (Lf) and right front (Rf) will go
to surround.
If left surround is in phase with right surround, (Lf - Rf) will be
located in the rear center.
If no surround is used, (Lf - Rf) will create an effect of rear side.
It will be on the sides, have more width than with in phase surround
(which is in the center). But it will not be as rear as with surround.
If out of phase surround is used, it will have both more width (sides)
and more depth (rear).
>What you may want to do is to get another pair of surround speakers,
>in addition to the existing pair. Yes, I mean 4 speakers in the back :-)
>
>Wire the first pair normally, and the second pair "out of phase" with
>respect to the first pair.
If the second pair is place right next to the first pair, they will
cancel each other. You will not be able to hear anything, in theory.
:)
>This means the surround signal intended to be
>at the rear left is also available at the rear right AND out of phase,
>and the surround signal at the rear right is also available at the rear
>left, slightly delayed (out of phase).
I don't think this makes any sense. :) Remember we are NOT talking
about stereo discrete surround (like in AC-3), we are talking about
mono surround. Left surround == Right surround.
>jg...@u.washington.edu (Jun Guo) wrote:
>:>
>:> It seems that wiring the surround speakers out of phase gives
>:> good result.
>
>Let me try again, more seriously! How would you wire the surround speakers
>to make them "out of phase" with respect to the front???
No. I didn't mean out of phase compared to the front. (BTW, you can
not achieve this if the surround is delayed.)
I meant between the two surround speakers, they are out of phase to
each other.
>:> It is especially good for
>:> music not Dolby encoded. Since the surround is the out of phase
> It seems that wiring the surround speakers out of phase gives
> good result. The sound is more spacious. It is especially good for
> music not Dolby encoded. Since the surround is the out of phase
> component of left and right, so when playing through only two front
> speakers, these components are out of phase, so it makes sense to
> play them out of phase with surround speakers, too.
>
> Any disadvantage to this approach?
I have also done the same thing on my DPL set-up with good results. The left
rear speaker is wired out of phase with the right rear speaker. After
reading about THX rear channel decorrelation, I began experimenting on my
rear speaker set-up.
First, I used an EQ on the rears since the descriptions of the THX rear
channel processing always mentioned timbre matching (aura-acoustic with
front) and phase shifting. Respectively, these are feature and
characteristic of EQ's. Results were good compared to THX DPL average
set-ups at local hi end stores, but increased noise level from the EQ I
had on hand was too bothersome. I removed the EQ and wired the rear
speakers out of phase, which was a compromise. The reduced localization
made speaker placement much easier.
In general, wiring speakers out of phase produces poor localization,
timbre shifts, and that sucking feeling in the middle of your head. This
can be interpreted as ambience, but usually is perceived as poor sound
quality. In a DPL set-up, the rear speakers produce a small part of the
total sound. Perceived sound quality is mostly determined by the front
speakers. The trade-off between sound quality and ambience begins to
favor wiring the rear speakers out of phase.
Should you wire your rear speakers out of phase? It depends on how
discriminating your system is and how much discrete rear channel
information you are seeking. If you want to hear more than ambience, but
specific sound effects from your rear speakers and have matched speakers,
amplifiers, wires, a good decoder, then do not wire them out of phase.
Keep in mind that most movie soundtracks that were mixed for Dolby
Surround playback in the theaters contain mostly ambient sounds in the
rear channel. Discrete rear channel recordings such as DTS and 70mm
magnetic can contain intelligible off screen cues such as voices, radio
calls, guns cocking, ect.
Your comment regarding non-DPL encoded material is a good argument for
using the DPL mode on the decoder with the rear speakers wired out of
phase. Since the decoded signal sent to the rear channel would have been
out of phase when recorded. The problem is at recording, these signals
would have been out of phase at the microphones which in the playback
system is typically represented by the two front speakers. So the out of
phase signals should be played back by the front speakers to purely
reproduced what was recorded. The obvious difficulty is in multi-driver,
passive crossover speaker systems phase accurate sound reproduction is
impossible.
I all cases, trust your ears. It only takes a minute to switch phase on
one of your rear speakers. Listen to material that you are very
familliar with. If it sounds better, then it is. If you can't tell,
then the difference is insignificant.
|\ /|
( ) - ( )
\ o _ / Thach H. Tran
( " ) th...@slip.net
\ U /
>Hi,
>
> It seems that wiring the surround speakers out of phase gives
>good result. The sound is more spacious. It is especially good for
>music not Dolby encoded. Since the surround is the out of phase
>component of left and right, so when playing through only two front
>speakers, these components are out of phase, so it makes sense to
>play them out of phase with surround speakers, too.
>
> Any disadvantage to this approach?
>
>Jun
I thought they were already put out of phase in the amp. Maybe this is a
different type of surround.
No. With most decoder/amp, they are in phase.
Jun
On Sat, 20 Jan 1996, Andrew N. Carpenter wrote:
> DG Malham <dg...@york.ac.uk> wrote:
>
> >Out-of-phase (or more properly, inverse polarity) sound presented to one
> >speaker of a stereo pair can be almost physically painful - rather like
> >the sort of pressure you get on your eardrum as you ascend or descend in
> >a plane.
>
> These effects occur when speakers are wired out-of-phase with respect
> to each other, right? Can you comment on the effects of simply
> reversing absolute polarity for all the speakers?
>
Well - this opens up a whole can of worms. There is a *lot* of debate
about how audible 'absolute phase' (polarity) is. I think that opinion is
now coming down on the side of it being audible for some people, some of
the time, on some material, under good listening conditions. So, if you
can ensure that the positive going peaks of the acoustic waveform in the
studio/concert hall,wherever are presented as positive going peaks in the
listening environment, then you should do. It won't do any harm and may
well sound better (if by 'better' you mean 'more accurate'). However, how
do you ensure that, if you don't have any control over what goes on in
the recording and record/cassette/CD production side of things? The short
answer is, you don't - you just have to hope. A standard was, if I
remember correctly, proposed by the AES a few years ago - is anyone using
it? I couldn't tell you.
Try reversing the wires to your speakers, to see if things sound
different - but you ideally need it to be done by someone else at random
(or, of course, by an automatic, random system) to avoid psychological
effects. Others who have had the opportunity to work on this may be more
able to tell you what to listen for than I, since I haven't actually done
any listening myself.
Dave
/*****************************************************************************/
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/* Music Technology Group "http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/mustech/welcome.htm" */
/* Department of Music "http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/music/welcome.htm" */
/* The University of York Phone 01904 432448 */
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I tried many other things and settled on what THX uses for decorrleation,
to have the minimum of artifacts but produce a diffuse sound field.
Best regards,
Tomlinson Holman (TH of THX)
TMH Corporation Entertaintment Technology
Internet address: tomh...@aol.com
Web site is at www.tmhlabs.com/tmhlabs
THX is a registered trademark of Lucasfilm Ltd.
TH is not.
Disclaimer; These views do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.
There is another consideration with regard to surround speakers. If all cones
face into the room, then for proper operation, it is imperative that they all be
wired so that a flashlight battery, when connected with the plus terminal of
the battery on the red speaker connector(+) and the minus to the black(-), cause
all cones to move OUT. If this is not done, images will wander, or they won't be
in the right place. Another way to say this is that if your speaker wire has a
polarity mark on it (like a stripe down one of the two wires), make sure that
the marked wire is connected to the red terminal on both the amplifier and the
speaker. If you want to change absolute polarity, you must reverse all of the
speaker connections to all four speaker outputs. The main point here being that
all speakers SHOULD move in the same direction with the same polarity signal
applied.
George Graves
>
I got hold of a CD diskette that presented different tones and tests
to help set up a stereo setup, and to a lesser extent, setup surround.
I found by using this disk that my main front speakers were out of
phase due to the location of my reciever and the middle connections to
a powered sub-woofer. The test for phasing on the main speakers was
performed by playing 3 tones. The first and third tones were louder
than the middle tone if the speakers were in phase. My guess that is
accomplished by choosing frequencies which exemplify the difference.
That is the bass frequencies which make more of a differnce due to the
volume of air moved by the woofer.
This aside, I believe that the phasing of the surrounds is very much
dependant on the placement of the speakers in relation to the seating
area. Also, my decoder has a delay setting for the rear speakers
which would also be affected by the phasing of front to rear.
I am currently running my surround speakers in phase. These speakers
are Bipolar speakers located on the rear wall of the 'theater'.
You can NOT achieve this. Because surround channel is delayed, you can
not control the phase relationship between front and surround
channels.
Jun
The above link may be busy. The additional time loading the graphics and
getting thru to it (due to
heavy net traffic) is sometimes a lengthy and consuming effort. Thus, I
present all of the relevant
text from the HOLOPHONICS Web page below, for your review.
I've designed, applied, remastered and released many; (FreeWare) VAMPS,
NTV and MegaMOD
music files, as; self-booting, auto-load, self-playing JukeBox disks and
as data disks with the NTGS
Player application programs, presenting similar virtual '4D' audio
processing and rendering
technology for IIGS music users to have, listen to and enjoy the vivid
soundscapes and holographic
audio event perceptions, with the addition of binaural audio and panning,
in both the vertical and
horizontal 360 degree sound plains.
Having discussed on several occasions, many virtually identical sound
processing techniques of
mine and of the HOLOPHONICS with Carl Gorman, (the HOLOPHONICS agent and
web site rep.)
voice Tel. (818) 779-1245 and with Hugo Zuccarelli (the inventor and
international patent holder) of
the HOLOPHONICS (4D) recording process, it's become evident that many
individuals simply fail
to understand what such HOLOPHONICS sound processing is all about! It
should be made clear,
that HOLOPHONICS is purely a recording process, independent of any
computer platform, model
or restrains, that might be required for any other soundscape or
dimensional enhancement process.
Mr. Zuccarelli obtained international patents in 1987, has perfected,
presented and applied this
unique HOLOPHONICS (4D) sound recording process, with such notable
recording artists and
groups as; Pink Floyd - Roger Waters and most recently with Peter
Gabriel's Virtual
(HOLOPHONICS - 4D) music presentations at the 'Real World Park', in
Southern California.
A brief explanation (per our discussions on the sound processing and
recording) follows, which
hopefully might make the process a bit more logical and clear, with
understanding it. Sound can be
considered as both an energy and a wave.
Sound is simply another form of energy, one we are used to thinking of as
a wave. But according to
quantum theory it can be viewed as both wave and particle, just as light
can - and at the scale of
atoms it is the particle representation that works best. Sound quanta are
called phonons, and atoms
absorb and release them.
In a solid or liquid, the absorption of a phonon makes an atom vibrate in
its bonds with
neighboring atoms; releasing the phonon allows the atom to relax. The
arrangement of those bonds
determines the frequency of phonons that an atom can absorb. This process
has recently been
scientifically validated using a 'Saser' built by Jean-Yves Prieur and his
colleagues at the University
of Paris-South in Orsay and the Pierre and Marie Curie University, by
collecting, manipulating and
amplifying photons the way a laser does with photons. They used a
procedure to cause piezoelectric
crystals to emit a sound vibration.
Piezoelectric crystals, as well as solids and liquids exist in biological
structures,
especially plentiful within the human ear's structure. Recent findings in
a new research field
known as: Otoacoustics have shown that the ear is a sonic transducer and
transceiver. The human
ear can both; transmit and receive sound
in the ranges, from sub-sonic thru ultra-sonic (2.0 hz thru 51 Khz). The
dominant peak audio
frequency has been calibrated to be around 2500 hz or 2.5 Khz. While most
individuals can't
perceive the sub-sonic or ultra-sonic sounds, the incoming sounds react
with the internal
transmission of sounds (in this broad-band of frequencies). These
transceived sonic reactions are
then transduced to the brain, for processing by the audio cortex.
When properly designed incoming sounds are presented to the human ear, (as
with the recording
processes of HOLOPHONICS), even a mono sound source can present a
soundscape, with a
multitude of sound localization points, (even if they might be termed as
sonic illusions), as a result
of the reactions and sonic heterodyning, thus generated and occurring
within the human ear
structures. Cellular microtubules, are the most likely biological
structures, being carriers, possible
transducers of audio signals and processing event helpers, even within the
brain.
My own research which has resulted in the "015D Graviophonics (tm)"
(ten dimensions from gravity and 5 borrowed from the Hilbert space
according to the Heisenberg's borrowing [also called uncertainty]
principle) shows wave and tidal effects in the viscous cortex
to be vastly more important than piezoelectric effects in the ear
canal. Connected by the intermolecular forces of the neuron
intercell communication sites, the energy associated with these
bonds have a wave-like dual in the quantum picture. I called
these _particle like_ viscous exitations "NEUPHONS (TM)".
(These are spin-1 bosons).
Just like phonons represent the collective behavior
(collective motion rather with non-zero zero point energy)
of the lattice in a solid (after imposing boundary conditions and
quantization), neuphons are our hearing itself. The cortex
lattice (brain cells literally) can exchange (send off or
absorb) neuphons.
But the exciting stuff is the
spin 1/2 "NEUSOR" twister wave which correlate the spin of
the neuron cites using the picture of quantized spin waves.
Being spin waves I can manipulate directly the neusor (tm)
wave with an external-to-the-cortex coil assembly.
The trick is to couple the energy into the neuphon
spectra which is very similar to the system used to
make directional mechanical couplings using asymetric
idler wheels (dipole-dipole is the only one allowed
due to the consrvation of spin criteria).
>Hugo Zuccarelli (the inventor and international patent holder) of
Could we have a patent number on Holophonics please ?
I need to check that I'm not in or entering a position of
patent infringement.
john
Just kidding.
-Pete Woodworth
1 dimension Time
2 dimensions - matched pair recording
1 dimension bullchit
Roger
On Tue, 6 Feb 1996, john 015 wrote:
>
> My own research which has resulted in the "015D Graviophonics (tm)"
> (ten dimensions from gravity and 5 borrowed from the Hilbert space
> according to the Heisenberg's borrowing [also called uncertainty]
> principle) shows wave and tidal effects in the viscous cortex
> to be vastly more important than piezoelectric effects in the ear
> canal. Connected by the intermolecular forces of the neuron
> intercell communication sites, the energy associated with these
> bonds have a wave-like dual in the quantum picture. I called
> these _particle like_ viscous exitations "NEUPHONS (TM)".
> (These are spin-1 bosons).
>
John - based on my research into the validity of judging the validiy of
claims by examining the statistical distribution of long words in
scientific papers, your system rates WAY above any others. Suggest you
patent immediately.;-)
Dave Malham
None of us are particularly interested in what is claimed by those who
have an interest in the system, what we want is independent, peer
reviewed, scientific papers examining the system Your demonstration does
not seem any different to other good binaural systems.
Dave Malham
/*****************************************************************************/
/* Dave Malham "http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/music/dgm.htm" */
/* Music Technology Group "http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/mustech/welcome.htm" */
/* Department of Music "http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/music/welcome.htm" */
/* The University of York Phone 01904 432448 */
/* Heslington Fax 01904 432450 */
/* York YO1 5DD */
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The opinions expressed here are mine and do not necessarilly represent
those of my employer.
Anyone up for sending a copy of this to alt.humor.best-of-usenet?
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// Michael Holl "Now next Friday I didn't have the rent... //
// m-h...@uiuc.edu and out the door I went!" --George Thorogood //
// http://www.students.uiuc.edu/~m-holl/ //
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////