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Question about car SQ tweeters


Ractis
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Neutral Newbie

So a couple weeks back my installer was listening to my setup, and he told me my highs are quite not there, there are missing high frequencies. Another installer had told me similar, he said my tweeters cannot reach >14Khz, and I got the same comment from another bro who listend to my car during the one MCF meetup I attended (I was using some PC speakers then, but sorta tuned to my liking)

 

Then I had the chance to listen to a couple of competition-ready setup at my installer, also a couple of bro's setup during one MCF meetup i attended. Indeed the tweeters in these car setups have much more powerful sounding high frequencies compared to mine.

 

In a good way, they may be described as airy, detailed, open and fast. In a bad way, they may be viewed as aggressive, raw, grating and fatigueing. I could even say these setups seem to make studio recorded tracks sound like unplugged/live versions!

 

Now I am referencing my own car setup with my quite good headphone rig at home (de-jittered digital input into outboard DAC, dedicated headphone amp, on a few studio quality headphonese etc.) and I do feel that my car high frequency sounds right. I even tested my car and headphone setup with some test-tones. Highs are all there and no probs at all (and in the process I found out that my right ear can hear up to 16.5Khz, left ear can hear up to 17khz)

 

Here is my dilema: on one hand, I always thought headphones usually best recording reference, but on the other hand these overly bright setups use high-end equipment and are winning car SQ competitions.

 

So my question is, does anyone here share the same feeling that high-end car setups have overly bright tweeters? Especially for bros with high-end home-audio setups, are these cars giving an accurate presentation of the recording? Or is it because after a few years into car audio the owners start losing their hearing for high frequencies and keep tuning them higher and higher?

 

Appreciate any comments, though I hope I do not get a lot of 'to each his own preference' replies. I know that, so come on and give me your opinionated replies!

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yo bro,

 

sorry cant help u, but i would like to listen to ur car one day, u've got some interesting toys in ur car, would love to hear what u have in ur "back doors".. heheh.. those u cant get locally eh.. heheh..

 

aniway, good question u asked. lets see wat the gurus say..

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Car acoustics play a big role in high freq response, especially when cancellation is but a norm. I have to agree with you that my home audio's highs are not as bright as the car though...This could probably be due to road noise generated while on the drive. I dun agree that high freq should be exagerated in car. Setups that are aligned to competition, I think, aren't suited for daily leisure listening.

 

So long as you are comfy with your setup, there is nothing wrong with it. wink.gif

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Installers will always say that something can be improved ...

 

Others will always have something different from your set-up ...

 

There is no end to ICE nirvana. Either your wallet gives up first, or you continue to 'improve' your set-up ...

 

Who cares if 'high-end cars have overly bright tweeters'? May be you r right that they've burnt-out their high freq hearing ...

 

But so what?

 

Ultimately the driver decides on what he wants (including those who want to have overly bright tweeters or have bigger budgets). No point discussing as long as the driver knows when to be happy (when driver is not happy, he will 'upgade' until he does!).

 

Imagine this discussion:

You: high end car owners can't hear high freq properly ...

High-end car owner: sour grapes! you can't afford the expensive tweeters!

 

[laugh]

Edited by Anakin
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Neutral Newbie

hmm headshok... have we met?

how did you know about the toys in my car?

and you've been checking out my rear doors? O_o

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haha

 

no lah.. a frend of mine bought a set of seas spkrs from u recently, he was tellin me abt the 2 spkrs u have in ur rear doors. heheh..

 

for 6.5" spkrs, they have massive surrounds! and beefy too!hehe

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hmm... if I may, the gulf between competiton and daily pleasure listening... isn't that always going to be there simply because competition, as in all "try-to-be-objective" tests, is based on a set of man-determined rules.

 

Just look at a close example: exams... They are used today so widely to determine a young person's "worth", but would the A grader definitely be a grade A employee, citizen, friend, husband, wife? Not necessarily, right? Same with sound lor...

 

Myself am still relatively new to ice, I like non-bright setups [laugh] in fact, I like bass a lot, and tune to 'enhance' that, feels shiok even for jazz pieces, but a friend did remind me once that would i really feel that strong a bass response if i were at the actual performance? ouch, probably not.. So anyway... it is possible that for our own preference, we would have tuned the set up in a way that deviated from what is the accurate presentation of the recording... but hey, i like leh... [laugh][laugh]

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Neutral Newbie

i share your overall "feeling".

 

but since i am not into any other kind of hifi, and i dun even have headphones, i have nothing to go by. except that the music i hear coming out should try to be realistic.

 

some points brought out by other bros are:

quite a number like it bright in our group. it was mentioned that this makes it sound like a "live" recording, just as you have mentioned. i dont go for pop concerts but if my memory serves me right, live jazz isn't bright. i don't remember being irritated by bright hi-hats or the sibiliance of the vocals at all at live jazz performances. u hear the highs but they're at the right volume/level so you know it exists but it doesn't hurt.

 

when u talk about orchestral pieces, since the orchestra tends to be a distance away, if i remember correctly they don't hurt either. which was one of the points brought up too - when things are bright, it seems very nearby. u lose highs faster with distance, if i'm not wrong. bass travels.

 

i suppose u can't really compare with live performances at pubs/discos cos most of them are bright, and they're probably bright because they might not be tuned correctly. i guess the audience "likes" that kind of sound.

 

when i play the drums, my ears are like 1 metre away from the hi-hat and cymbals, and my ears don't hurt either. so why should it "hurt" when it goes thru mikes and comes out of big JBL speakers. from my current understanding, these bright sounds might actually be not quite a natural representation. these bright metal sounds, when unamplified, sound natural but may not sound like u're in a disco or pop concert where the "distortion" thru the PA system makes it the sound people are used to.

 

but i really might be wrong, just sharing my thoughts.

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Neutral Newbie

i was on the airplane listening to airplane sound with their little headphones ...

then i was wondering, really, a set of headphones, no matter how good, is not the gold standard by which to judge SQ. a good home stereo set is the proper way.

 

some reasons are:

1. the benchmark should be the most common way u listen to music. and that is, not wearing something on your head, but just sitting and listening.

2. in a home stereo system, imagine just pure left channel sound. this left channel sound is perceived by BOTH ears, with a delay involved and other preceptible reflections. in a headphone system, it's only perceived by ONE ear. this creates quite a different soundstage. left channel sound on a headphone would end up sounding on your left, rather than on your front-left. therefore isolating each channel purely to one ear isn't getting the same soundstage as letting both ears receive sound from both sides.

3. i've never played with good headphones before but i doubt if it can properly reproduce low bass to be any form of benchmark. u'll need a home set for that.

 

no meh?

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Personally, I think a good SQ tweeter should not be so bright until it causes you fatigue.

 

A good tweeter should be able to reach the high frequencies effortlessly and reproduce good details. Its ability to be crossed at lower ie 1k hz is bonus to folks who are running 2 way systems.

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Neutral Newbie

hey hyun bro,

 

1. yup you're right, there is definitely a difference in imagin and soundstage when using headphones vs using normal speakers.

 

2. there is a 'crossfeed' function to which helps to simulate a normal listening condition. This function is found on headphone amps or can be done digitally (ie using foobar on PC)

 

3. good headphones can actually reach down to 20hz, but of course we wont get the feeling of air compression/vibration like what big subwoofers do, just a much smaller scale restricted to within our ears

 

As for the good points of headphones, it is a lot less prone to room/reflection/background noise colourations.

 

I guess as long as we know the differences and limitations, headphones can be a quite a good tool for critical evaluation of a soundtrack

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