Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Sibilance

Sanity tip:

Click SolidState's name next to his post and choose View profile.
On his profile page, click Ignore this user.

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Why would we want to see that?

Oh yeah. Jalapeno flavored popcorn!

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened.

Sir Winston Churchill
British politician (1874 - 1965)

If your receiver comes with Audyssey, you can run the calibration and select the 'Audyssey' curve (default for most receivers IIRC) as it rolls off the upper range frequencies.

Icehawk-
Since you say that "I notice the sibilance on a wide variety of cable programming and also notice it when watching DVDs. I notice it less with music" I would agree with Alan that what you're likely hearing is compression artifacting from your cable provider.

Does your Outlaw allow for EQ on an input-by-input basis? Or, is it possible that your remote allows for easy changing of EQ? If so, it might be easy to just leave the EQ "on" for most of your viewing, but easily take the EQ out for music listening.

Finally, if you can EQ the speakers independently, you could always tweak the center only as it likely comes into play much more with TV viewing than music CDs.

It's an unfo

He did indeed post that and ah, he'll leave soon enough, once he applies some of his intelligence to his behavior, and then finds that some "truths" apply to him.

Until then, enjoy! ...or...ignore!

Swap out the cable box. I have found I need to replace the box (HD DVR) once every year or two. As mass-produced rental equipment I find they just fail constantly. Sound issues, check. HDMI failure, check. Component color flickering, check. Before you go nuts, just run by and get a new box. If it does not help, at least you got a newer toy and can move down the signal path.

SolidState,

I found your quote from Winston Churchill quite apropos. The question is; are you going to begin to accept the truth or are you going to hurry off? The comb filtering you are talking about is in fact a measurement artifact that at worst is not audible and at best is something two ears and a brain quite like. You could start to enlighten yourself by reading "Comb Filtering -- Popular Misconceptions" in our May '09 Axiom AudioFile newsletter:

http://www.axiomaudio.com/archives/may2009.html#feature

If you find comb filtering to be a problem, why are you listening in stereo or multi-channel? You would need to listen to everything in mono to avoid this artifact. To put an even finer point on it; even if you could hear this artifact it would manifest itself in a cancellation of higher frequencies; less high frequency information would not equal more sibilance. Comb filtering measured with a microphone never adds information.

At Axiom we do not produce new models for the sake of having something new. We prefer to continuously improve the models we have, which produces much better results for our customers’ listening experiences. Besides the plethora of improvements we have made to our various models over the past decade we have also introduced the EP500, EP600, EP400, EP800, A1400, Audiobytes, the entire W series, the entire T series, and more. Just another truth for you to either accept or hurry off about.

To sum up: Comb filtering is a measurement artifact of stereo listening. It's always occurring, and our brain and ears ignore the combing effects that are easily measured by a microphone. A brain and two ears are not a microphone. Our research at Axiom and that of many world authorities show that comb filtering is not detrimental to accurate loudspeaker sound reproduction; at worst, it’s irrelevant, at best it actually adds a pleasurable element of spaciousness to stereo and surround sound.

Alan Lofft

Alan, let me applaud you for even acknowledging a fellow who has so been as rude and ignorant as this shmuck has been to you and your company. That really shows how much class you have.

Now if only Solid State could show an ounce of class and quite beating his 'comb-filtering/crossover cap/laws of diminishing returns' drum he likes so much we'd all be better off. I have a VP150... I've never experienced any problems with sibilance. If the design of the VP150 is so obviously bad then why would someone so 'informed' ever let his uncle buy one in the first place?

Bravo, Alan! Bravo!