# Reference System Design



## fractile (Mar 15, 2009)

Many here have immense experience over the years; for a newcomer, what should one do to establish a reference setup, beyond room acoustics?


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## marco_ktl (Sep 6, 2009)

fractile said:


> Many here have immense experience over the years; for a newcomer, what should one do to establish a reference setup, beyond room acoustics?


Hi fractile!
I think that is a question with mutiple good answers...
Someone could reply with: go for a monitor setup you trust can deliver optimal translation to all other systems.
Some others could reply: have a reference CD you trust for having the optimal frequency balance so you can calibrate the speakers you have to work on.
And I think there are a dozen better answers out there.
I think it's all subjective. In the end it's a mater of what are you most confortable with and where do you work best. All this comes with trial and error (=experience). So be patient, listen to what all the others are saying, read manuals, take the best out of all that and experiment with different setups and solutions. What will work best for you doesn't necessarily mean it will work best for another. That's why mega-studios are expensive, because they have to adapt to every situation possible... and deliver always 100%.

That's my 2 cents of course!

Cheers,
Marco


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## Sandro Gomes (Jul 8, 2009)

fractile, I agree with Marco.

There will a bunch of right answers to this question.

I gonna tell you the way I do...

Since you are starting now, you need to listen to the sound of other studios and then decide on what monitors you like the most, and choose the one you can afford. 

Having a reference CD is always good, it doesn't need to be the music you like the most, but it has to be a well mixed sound, with all frequencies balanced, so you can evaluate the response of the monitors.

That is what I did, visit other places, talk to people. You gonna listen to a lotta stuff, some you will like some you will discard, every sound guy will have something to say to you about their monitors, listen carefully and then you will form you opinion, just like in a mix, you will get all opinions, put in different tracks and mix them all...

Good Luck


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## tehguit (Jul 19, 2009)

My one piece of advice is know your speakers. Doesn't matter WHAT you get, as long as you know your speakers your mixes can translate. A reference cd is great. Get songs that highlight different things and DO NOT USE MP3s!!!

Listen to the cd everywhere, in the car, headphones, computer speakers, hifi speakers, on your dvd player, but listen to how everything sounds and what is different between each system, then go audition some speakers at a shop, and when you find one that you can hear everything you know you should hear, but you also note what is different about the sound, take them home and learn where the speakers excel and where they fall.


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## PepAX7 (Mar 11, 2008)

You said "Beyond Acoustics" and that's where your problem lies. You can have the worlds perfect loudspeaker.. flat to within .1db.. multi-element phase aligned...etc. Take that box out of the anechoic test facilty and place it in a room, maybe your room, and all bets are off!:sarcastic: That perfect loudspkr has to perform in a box(room) that most likely has a lot of modal problems, etc. You should think about the room being very important. There are home brew/inexpensive solutions to this as well.

I like the idea of your own reference CDs and not mp3s, of course. You really have to be careful of these test CDs though! If you have a reference system at home or studio, with good quality speakers, you will be able to hear the difference in mixing/mastering of these CD's... so choose wisely. It may be CDs that you don't really like but you know sound really good/accurate on a reference system. Ask yourself "does that sound like a real sax... piano... drums?"

I have a few that I use that cover all genres from rock to jazz to big band to fusion to solo piano/guitar and I look at where they were recorded and who mastered them! I know them well and where they will show problems when troubleshooting/sweetening systems.

Solo acoustic piano is thought to be one of the hardest instruments to record and reproduce. Anything by Dave Grusin recorded at Sony Studios is reference stuff to me.:T

Once you decide on speakers, then measure the room with Room EQ Wizard. This will get you into the whole sound of your listening space and, after a few corrections, *you* will become the man with the "reference system.":bigsmile:

Pep


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## fractile (Mar 15, 2009)

Thanks, your general replies help give me better perspective on the big picture. I continually try to improve my theoretical understanding equally with what experienced people have to say; and that along with the experience I gain along the way.

I'll attempt to develop this thread and possibly eventually cover all of the general areas. I skipped over acoustics, since that is being dealt with in the Design|Installation... section. So let's talk a little about monitors, since my eyes were opened when someone mentioned that this can be a neglected, yet obviously important point in the signal chain. This is only my subjective perception, since I have very limited experience with studio production.

A lot of people listen to music on ipod-type personal music devices; then there is the sound system in the automobile that is an expansion into acoustic space; and then if the music is used in a movie or other tele/vision production, the demand for high-fidelity, what is now called high definition goes up even further.

So I think one must strive toward a reference quality monitor system, or resort to a good pair of headphones as a counter-check. I guess that's common knowledge. So what does it take to get a reference-level monitor? Let me describe the process I'm going through this past year and a half; now into a fourth monitor upgrade in this 2010: A Studio Odyssey :sn: I was trying to avoid getting wordy, but I think it might add some good perspective for beginners.

I began almost 1.5 yr ago to work on developing a small independent 'movie' studio, and thought that since it was such a small room [~11x10x9 feet] that small satellite speakers [Klipsch RSX-3's, Infinity PS-10 sub] would work fine. About a month later I went to a LFE demonstration at the AES convention. This was essentially a surround sound 5.0 setup; a full-range [20Hz-20kHz] speaker cabinet ~15 feet [4m?] from each corner and horizontal stack of two front and center. This was in a conference room about 100' x 100' [?1000m^2]. This was a refreshing reminder of how great a sound system can be.

I couldn't fit those 7 foot high [$50k each] speakers in this room, or even see paying $10k for a pair of speakers, so I soon had a pair of Ascend Sierra 1's [6x1]. Great. During this time I also upgraded my Sony receiver [10% distortion] to a Marantz SR-8002.

Also, my focus began to concentrate more on professional sound, since the first thing to ruin a movie is bad sound. I was talking with a dealer on the phone and he recommended Barefoot monitors. It seemed to be a wonderful speaker, so I said ok, then asked what the total cost is, just to double check; he said ~$7400 and I was, what?, I thought he'd said $1000 earlier. So I wound up getting a pair of ProAc Studio 100's. They're another 6x1 [6" woof, 1" Seas soft-dome]. The Ascend and the ProAc have essentially the same tweeter, but the ProAc has paper woofer cones, giving it a much more transparent and effortless response, to my ears, than the plastic-type cones in the Ascend.

As things go, I began to seek that certain something I seemed to be missing. I stacked the Ascend on top of the ProAc, head to head in parallel. This helped the damping factor with the amps [Manley Snapper]. I even got some empty Infinity 3-way minitower boxes to build my own $10k speakers.

Meanwhile, the situation realized the possibility of acquiring the Manley ML-10 monitors I had looked at. In my quest for scientific precision, the concentric full-range pointsource concept stuck in my head. Funny, as I write this the invoice has arrived that they have been shipped, so I should have them by the middle of next week.:R


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## fractile (Mar 15, 2009)

It's good that I get these speakers right now, before I have nailed down the basic acoustic and some structural foundation. I wonder if this should be a DIY thread. I literally keep things in limbo as I go, because the design is ultra low budget when it comes to building. I have some architectural design background, so it's not totally *******.

It would take a new generation of a $10k speaker economy to dislodge this upgrade; and I already think these are 10k or is it 24K :sn:


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## fractile (Mar 15, 2009)

I have posted a transfer of this into DIY: 
"I'm moving this here from the General Tech 101 section; it is a continuation of the Reference System Design thread."


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## jonathanm (Mar 24, 2010)

$10k, $24k, pah, doesn't matter....not much difference eh? :blink:

My only concern is as others have mentioned, whatever you use you need to get used to them, and by constantly changing your setup you're not getting that chance...

I look forward to reading your posts about them though


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## fractile (Mar 15, 2009)

I mentioned the difference between the Ascends and the ProAcs. I have been happy with the ProAcs for about a year now; it's just that they've begun to sound a little 'thin'. It may be because I tend to listen at fairly low level; when I crank it up they really sing; but they are only 100 watt rated, and the Snapper amps can pass some steep transients. From what I understand a woofer needs to be 8 or 10 inches to push enough air and have better tonal balance. The Manley ML-10's are 10" and I read somewhere that they are designed to have balanced tone even at low listening levels. And the ML-10's are rated to 200 watts; I've read that the tubes in the 100W Snappers can actually put out twice the rating. But I've tended to run things at about 1/4, for the ProAcs, and when I turn things up it's like a free concert for the neighborhood. I'll continue this in DIY next week, then move back in the chain to amps, EQ, mixer, etc.


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## maikol (Nov 7, 2008)

fractile said:


> I mentioned the difference between the Ascends and the ProAcs. I have been happy with the ProAcs for about a year now; it's just that they've begun to sound a little 'thin'. It may be because I tend to listen at fairly low level; when I crank it up they really sing; but they are only 100 watt rated, and the Snapper amps can pass some steep transients. From what I understand a woofer needs to be 8 or 10 inches to push enough air and have better tonal balance. The Manley ML-10's are 10" and I read somewhere that they are designed to have balanced tone even at low listening levels. And the ML-10's are rated to 200 watts; I've read that the tubes in the 100W Snappers can actually put out twice the rating. But I've tended to run things at about 1/4, for the ProAcs, and when I turn things up it's like a free concert for the neighborhood. I'll continue this in DIY next week, then move back in the chain to amps, EQ, mixer, etc.


Well, those Proacs do really not make alot of sound under 60Hz. Also, listening to them loud without filtering the extreme low end out can be bad for the woofers (they tend to be fragile).
A lot of the pairs I've seen at friend's places have had their woofers replaced several time.
So, maybe your's have a problem there?

And, I do agree that you need to crank them a bit up to hear them really sing...I'm afraid they need a very good power amp (like one costing more than them...:spend to be able to sing at a moderate level...


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## fractile (Mar 15, 2009)

The specification on the ProAcs is in the 40Hz's low frequency range; on the Manley ML-10 it is 50Hz. It makes me wonder how things are specified, given that the ML-10 has a bigger box and bigger woofer.

I can't say anything bad about the ProAcs, except the time a tweeter went into static noise on a loud piano note, when I had the amp input turned up 1/2. I guess we grow out of speakers.

The ML-10's should be an interesting study as a hybrid continuous horn. From my limited experience I like soft-dome tweeters and sold a Klipsch box with 8" horn-loaded tweeter for its honk. Co-axial may be better, with paper horn/cone.

Speaker design gets complex fast, I think. I like the sound of paper cones. I sounds less like it is shoving sound into my ears. I don't know if the plastic cones is trying to compensate for definition lost in the electronics. "The ML10 offered point source localization combined with absolute time alignment, low distortion and phase coherence." 

I'll see how they work when they arrive in the next day or two; They don't have the 10Hz-30kHz response of the Manley electronics. I have a Rythmik sub for that.


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