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New Loudspeaker Eliminates Distortive Influence
fejrskov writes "The Danish audio/video company 'Bang & Olufsen' announced a new loudspeaker which promises to eliminate the bad influence from walls, floors and ceilings on the sound. This is achieved by using two technologies: ALT (Acoustic Lens Technology) uses sound dispersing lenses to make sound travel equally in all directions. ABC (Adaptive Bass Control) involves sliding a tiny microphone out at the base of the speaker, playing a series of test sounds, and adapting the bass according to the measured acoustic response. Each active loudspeaker contains amplifiers for a total of 2500W (!) output using B&O's patented ICEPower concept. The price? Approximately 55.000 Danish kroner (8.000 Euro) each."
I hear they make 'stereo' equipment as well.
Seriously, though. I listened to some very, very expensive B&O speakers in their showroom, and I was astonished at how awful they sounded. No midrange and bass everywhere. Maybe it's just my ears, but it would take a vast improvement for me to ever consider spending that much money on their speakers.
Then I remembered that European countries have the odd habit of using decimal points to seperate thousands rather than commas... blah.
Username taken, please choose another one.
Drug addicts will at least leave you in peace, shooting their arms up in abandoned alleyways and passing out with friends around the bong.
Moreover, when drug addicts throw their money away, they're usually pumping it back into the local economy instead of shipping it off to hardware manufacturers overseas.
Audiophiles, in contrast, aren't content to waste their money in private or among other like-minded individuals. Oh no. They have a compulsive need to prosthelitize about their audiophilia. As if there weren't enough of their kind in this world as it is, they will openly moan and complain about the quality of others' audio equipment and wax on end about the relative merits of whatever their latest hobbyhorse format is over mp3 which is far too lossy or whatever they're bitching this week.
In all my years of knowing dope smokers and heroin addicts, I've never known any to spend half as much time trying to justify the benefits of their drug of choice as audiophiles do about their wares. It just isn't done. Drug addicts are content to enjoy their recreational substances and leave it at that. Audiophiles feel a need to go so much further.
The other day, I was reading about the US Supreme Court's latest court case upholding the constitutionality of religious groups' use of public school space for after-school bible classes. But what I think was left out of the debate was how religious groups are such a small threat when compared to other secular groups. Whereas the liberals would like to bar the Good News club from coming to elementary schools, they would happily and cheerfully admit an audiophilia club. Whereas the Good News club is just trying to save your soul, the audiophiles are both trying to steal your soul and bilk your wallet at the same time. That is the true threat in our society today.
I'm glad someone is finally casting the light of public scrutiny upon this pestilence in our midst. Audiophilia must be banned and criminalized as it has no place in the land of the free and the home of the brave. Our forefathers did not give their lives to found a nation where we could scamper around with our goldplated headphones and 10 megawatt amps in one giant aureal masturbatory frenzy.
Sounds like you need some bumperstickers for the cause!
Here's my first contribution:
Use vials, not tubes!
Jory
Ever notice how the large majority of speaker companies have speakers that look like a box?
Ever wonder why after decades of research they're still a box?
Ever notice that B&O likes to make non-conventional looking stuff and then charges an arm and a leg?
They're selling you functional art at really high prices folks.
If you want speakers that actually sound good, then try an electrostatic or planar speaker. Magnepans aren't a kajillion dollars and are a damned good place to start looking for planars.
That's $4.8 million Canadian
Sad that such a topic shows up on Slashdot without mentioning open source solutions which are cheap to free. Check out Digital Room Correction and BruteFIR for instance.
tcboo
text
Dave
B&O have historically targetted a certain demographic, and done very well by doing so. Namely, the wealthy who want an obviously expensive and gorgeous sound system, but who don't really know or care much about the sound itself. B&O is one of the fashion trend setters for speakers. For example, Sony's chrome metal column home theatre systems were designed to look very similar to one of B&O's older systems.
B&O's spiel on audio lenses, etc. really is a bit of a smokescreen. There's no new technology here, and probably not a particularily good implementation of existing tech. However, it has great packaging, glossy magazine ads, and you can bet your arse those B&O store salespeople are smoooooooth!
Bose is sort of a low end version of B&O. Bose has the most effective and innovative marketing department of any speaker company out there. High margins for dealers, salesperson training, you name it. Watching a bose demo is as entertaining as watching a carnival sideshow. They'll play those little plywood boxes with paper cones through PVC tubing, inside other much larger "Speaker boxes", and a plethora of other gimmichs while gushing about how great they sound. You'd be surprised at what people will believe if they're told to. White Van speaker companies like Dogg Digital or Nuance are but pale imitators of the origional master, Dr.Bose. Truly a master.
While I respect them as highly profitable and effective companies, would I buy B&O or Bose myself? Probably not. When you want better sound for your dollar it is best to go elsewhere.
I see what you mean. I look at rain turning into hail and I immediately say "it's so obvious, it must be... 32 degrees!". Or I look at water in a pan, and when it starts boiling it just screams "212 degreees"! Amazing how well it adapts to daily experiences.
What relevant thing happens at 0 F...? Or at 100 F, for that matter?
The centigrade scale is based on water, which is "just" one of the most common (and arguably the most important) substances on Earth. Do you know what the Farenheit scale is based on? Let me quote from a History site:
"For seven years Fahrenheit worked out an alcohol thermometer scale based on three points. He chose the freezing point of a certain salt-water mixture for zero. He used the freezing point of water for 32 degrees. And body temperature he called 96 degrees.
Why the funny numbers? He originally used a twelve-point scale with zero, four, and twelve for those three benchmarks. Then he put eight gradations in each large division. That's how he got that strange 96 number - it was eight times twelve. Body temperature is actually a tad higher than 96, but it was close. Later, Fahrenheit made mercury thermometers that let him use the boiling point of water instead of human body temperature for the high mark."
But of course, by then the "standard" had been defined, so water now had to boil at the lovely temperature of "212 degrees".
In other words, Farenheit is the way it is because of legacy support (what does that remind me of?). Its "design" was shaped by the equipment's limitations and by totally arbitrary things such as "the freezing point of a certain salt-water mixture".
Just because you're used to something doesn't mean it's "better" and it certainly doesn't mean that whoever invented it spent much time thinking about it. Look at some modern "standards" and you'll see things haven't changed much since 1700.
RMN
~~~
P.S. - If centigrade is "stupid" but Kelvin is "smart", then why did Kelvin adopt the same "size" for the degrees? The only difference between Celsius (centigrade) and Kelvin is that Celsius' zero is based on water and Kelvin uses the absolute zero.