Sound Reproduction

CHAPTER 18

Loudspeakers II: Objective Evaluations

By now it is absolutely obvious that in sound reproduction the room and the loudspeaker are inseparable; they operate as a system. Yet, loudspeakers must be designed as separate devices, so it is necessary to develop measurements and interpretations for those measurements that allow us to anticipate how the loudspeakers are likely to sound in normally reflective rooms.

Chapters 12 and 13 demonstrated several ways in which the room imposes its considerable will at low frequencies. Still, woofers and subwoofers must be measured, just to give us a starting point. The wavelengths at the frequencies of interest are long compared to the dimensions of conventional box loudspeakers and subwoofers, so ...