Yes, that's my little trick, as well. Olufsen is a good way of weeding. But there weren't many hits, and I thought w.e. could point us in the right direction! Did find this, which is a nice solution:

11-02-08: Docmark
Not laughing here either. I run Toslink (Audioquest) out of my desktop Mac into a Benchmark DAC1, then Audioquest Sky interconnects, then to a pair of Bang & Olufsen BeoLab 3 speakers & and a BeoLab 2 subwoofer. Awesome sound.
Docmark (Threads | Answers)

Well that's not very true. Active loudspeaker manufacturers ATC and Adam Audio are using quite fanciful drivers for their loudspeakers to great effect. Better drivers can only make an already outstanding active loudspeaker better. There's no correcting a driver's waterfall or distortion response though DSP or equalization. Besides I am talking about the older Beolabs which uses some really nasty drivers. A better driver can take way more power and heavy equalization that B&O habitually applies to their loudspeakers. Everyone knows that a driver with a bigger magnet and voice coil assembly produces lesser distortion at high volumes, and of course can produce deeper bass and clearer highs. Active drive can make cheap drivers sing and it can make high end drivers sing even better. 

Try typing in Beolab. That gives the most threads. 

I've been told there is a new Sub on the way, not to replace BeoLab 2 but as a second option. It's reportedly revolutionary in the way it delivers bass and shaped like a flower. Can be wall mounted too!

I have to say that while WE may be factually inerrant, I couldn't care less about any of the "upgrades" he discusses. The brands he cites and ones like them trade on these tidbits of innovation and appeal to a demographic so finite it makes B&O look like McDonalds. Many exotic brands produce so few units that it's impossible to even audition a working pair where Bang & Olufsen has recently celebrated the production of their half-millionth pair of BeoLab 8000s. I suppose that both points of view being volleyed here are "true" to their respective audiences, but I have to say that Soundproof is far more representative of our general feelings. 

Your a sales-Man Trip.

we are the buyers!

Sure, Koning, but I think that Soundproof has been making very well reasoned points throughout this thread as to where "upgrades" are most helpful and where they're merely superfluous alterations. My point was not that upgrades should cease, but that the direction that the "audiophile point of view" represented by WE is not really the way we should be going. 

I bet that if a poll was taken as to who'd rather have upgraded voice coils in the BeoLab 8000 or an acoustic lens that raises out of the top when the speaker is taken out of standby we'd see my point illustrated. I think we can also guess which would drive greater sales.

soundproof:

With acoustic lenses in front, you don't need a centre speaker!

 

Are you serious? I have BL5 in a surround setup with my Avant as a centre speaker. It works ok, but could have been better. I am considering buying a BV7 with BL7-4, but the 7-4 speaker makes the set a bit too tall for my wall (I have two paintings over the TV that can´t be moved).

Buying a BV7-40 with bluray and without the speaker, would make it possible to wall mount it a few centimeters lower, and that probably should solve it. The BL 7-2 is not an option, as I´m not happy with the looks of it.

How will the BL5 know that they also are the center channel. Won´t the general sound quality suffer from this?

thavn:

 

soundproof:

With acoustic lenses in front, you don't need a centre speaker!

 

Are you serious? I have BL5 in a surround setup with my Avant as a centre speaker. It works ok, but could have been better. I am considering buying a BV7 with BL7-4, but the 7-4 speaker makes the set a bit too tall for my wall (I have two paintings over the TV that can´t be moved).

Buying a BV7-40 with bluray and without the speaker, would make it possible to wall mount it a few centimeters lower, and that probably should solve it. The BL 7-2 is not an option, as I´m not happy with the looks of it.

How will the BL5 know that they also are the center channel. Won´t the general sound quality suffer from this?

 

 

I think soundproof was just so awestruck by the Beolab5s' soundstaging capabilities that he felt that adding a centre channel is unnecessary that's all. A centre channel will definitely boost the sound quality of a surround setup since all surround movie soundtracks are mastered with one, that is unless you have centre channels built in both the left and the right channels like a Goldmund setup. 

TripEnglish:

I have to say that while WE may be factually inerrant, I couldn't care less about any of the "upgrades" he discusses. The brands he cites and ones like them trade on these tidbits of innovation and appeal to a demographic so finite it makes B&O look like McDonalds. Many exotic brands produce so few units that it's impossible to even audition a working pair where Bang & Olufsen has recently celebrated the production of their half-millionth pair of BeoLab 8000s. I suppose that both points of view being volleyed here are "true" to their respective audiences, but I have to say that Soundproof is far more representative of our general feelings. 

Eww.... Acoustic lenses raising out of the Beolab8000s? That will be pure bad taste. I was merely suggesting that given a limited budget, the upgrade should be apportioned to better quality drivers than to build in acoustic lenses behind the speaker grills of the Beolab8000s. Who would have thought of building a mechanism to support all the cheap looking mechanical effects of acoustic lenses raising out of the speakers?

thavn writes: Are you serious? I have BL5 in a surround setup with my Avant as a centre speaker. It works ok, but could have been better. I am considering buying a BV7 with BL7-4, but the 7-4 speaker makes the set a bit too tall for my wall (I have two paintings over the TV that can´t be moved).

I am completely serious. I believe B&O missed an incredible opportunity here. Better processors (faster and more accurate) are making processing audio for surround much simpler, delivering better results.

Unfortunately, B&O surround setups in tv's, media players and the BeoSystem 3 do not allow for assigning the centre channel signal to the front L/R channels, which means that in order to experience the brilliance of the phantom centre that can be generated by acoustic lenses, one has to use a processor from another brand. I have tried various surround processors and pre-amps, and with excellent results. I would really not accept a compromise here, and have absolutely no impression that I am getting a compromised centre channel with my BL5s creating a phantom centre.

The centre channel speaker is an eyesore and a bother - ideally it should be behind the screen (which it is in cinemas), but we end up either having it too low or too high, and if you have a movie screen dropping down, you get a potential additional bother. Which is why I feel that B&O could have played a better hand here - it would have been a major selling point for acoustic lenses. It's really worth trying out!

w.e - there's no need to sit and imagine whether I have been awestruck or not. I have spent too much of my life in movie mixing facilities to ever want to compromise on the centre channel. I have used phantom centres before I bought the BL5, but never with as excellent a result. You should try it. As my friends are active moviemakers, both working with directing, shooting and sound editing movies, you can take their word for the result achieved.

One great advantage of the BL5s is that the offset problem experienced with traditional speakers disappears - that is, having a phantom centre can be ideal for the person sitting in the centre, but the people on the sides can be listening to their speaker, without getting a fill-in from an actual centre speaker. But with the BL5s, because of the acoustic lenses, you do not get this offset effect.

Try it before you knock it.

(And check out B&O and micromovements before you trash Trip's notion as to acoustic lens placement on the BL8000s. Some have dreamt of the lens on the BL9s pivoting into a hidden-away position, also to avoid dust on the dome, and to avoid damage from curious kiddy fingers. Would have been neat.)

The centre channel mix at the cinema can quite easily be mixed into the output from the main speakers creating a 'phantom' centre channel. I'm not sure how Goldmund can 'build in a centre to both the left and right channels', isn't that just called mixing the signals together?

The idea of the lenses rising from the 8000s specifically is just not going to happen. They would place the lens above the listening position, anyways. However, Soundproof is correct that the idea of a lens folding away is not out of the question. I know for a fact that an upcoming speaker concept incorporates this. Magical motion is one of the core design principals of B&O. If it's good enough for a dashboard it's certainly good enough for my living room and the chances of something being done tastelessly in a B&O product is fairly slim (unless it also carries a Samsung logo).

Many brands that carry the audiophile stamp of approval offer a phantom centre option on their processors.

To be precise - movies are mixed with a centre channel speaker (placed behind the screen). 85% of the audio in the centre channel is dialogue, the rest is deliberate bleed-in from sounds generated through L/R. If you can assign the centre channel, you 'll be surprised to discover that just about all dialogue disappears when you switch this channel off, either at the speaker, or through the processor.

Because of the lateral, and wider dispersion of the acoustic lenses, they make it possible to create an excellent phantom centre - however, it isn't perfect, compared to a centre channel speaker placed behind a projection screen. But since most of us have flatscreens and can't place a speaker in front of those (nor behind), we end up placing the centre speaker either below or above the screen. This is not the mixing position for this channel, and leads to a separation between the mouth on the screen and the source of the sound, in many cases a very noticeable separation, that is bothersome. This wouldn't happen if your centre channel was behind the screen, as it is in movie theatres, where the screens are perforated in order to let this sound through to the audience.

My BL5s are just high enough for the large acoustic lens to be at mouth level of the actors on the screen, and the phantom centre generated is therefore perfectly situated, giving me the illusion that the voices are coming from the mouths of the actors, and not from above or below the screen. That's good.

I have measured the sound pressure level (SPL) from the phantom centre, using a surround setup calibration kit and my dB-gauge. My phantom centre channel is 1,5dB lower than the calibration signal as measured through Left and Right BL5s. That is so little as to not be noticeable. Ideally, I should be able to dial up the centre channel signal 1dB, that would then give me a perfectly balanced SPL through Left - Centre - Right channels. But again, the discrepancy is so small as to be insignificant, but I'm a Virgo, and I tend to niggle over details.

There is one issue with using a phantom centre, and I touched upon it above: that you get an offset effect, if you're not directly in the centre when watching. But with the acoustic lenses this is not as noticeable, and combined with the better mouth-as-source effect described above, I feel an opportunity was missed here by B&O. (With an actual centre channel speaker, you will not feel that the Right speaker is dominating the audio, and pulling it to the right if you're sitting to the right of centre watching, as you can with a phantom centre channel - and that's a disadvantage, if very noticeable.)

Well, a lot of words! Cheers. 

TripEnglish:

The idea of the lenses rising from the 8000s specifically is just not going to happen. They would place the lens above the listening position, anyways. However, Soundproof is correct that the idea of a lens folding away is not out of the question. I know for a fact that an upcoming speaker concept incorporates this. Magical motion is one of the core design principals of B&O. If it's good enough for a dashboard it's certainly good enough for my living room and the chances of something being done tastelessly in a B&O product is fairly slim (unless it also carries a Samsung logo).

Hey this has become a great thread, i love what you and soundproof bring to the conversation here. Fact or at least a fair & realistic view.

And all that business about the phantom centre channel sounds awesome to me! Plus it means that's one less item cluttering up the room and the power outlets!

TripEnglish:

The idea of the lenses rising from the 8000s specifically is just not going to happen. They would place the lens above the listening position, anyways. However, Soundproof is correct that the idea of a lens folding away is not out of the question. I know for a fact that an upcoming speaker concept incorporates this. Magical motion is one of the core design principals of B&O. If it's good enough for a dashboard it's certainly good enough for my living room and the chances of something being done tastelessly in a B&O product is fairly slim (unless it also carries a Samsung logo).

The only acceptable place for a lens on the 8000's is in the "cone" at the bottom - it would truly then be an organ pipe, after all those years of trying

btw - on a more serious not, we've all assumed to date that the lens needs to be visible. While this may be preferable from a marketing point of view I don't think it is functionally essential. If necessary a lens could be fitted internally in a re-engineered 8000 without spoiling the design. However as Trip says, it's just not going to happen.

Puncher:

The only acceptable place for a lens on the 8000's is in the "cone" at the bottom - it would truly then be an organ pipe, after all those years of trying

soundproof:

Many brands that carry the audiophile stamp of approval offer a phantom centre option on their processors.

I have no problems believing that this will work just fine (not counting the offset problem) - people have been listening to mono recordings on stereo systems for that long... Does the "phantom centre" processing actually do anything else than add half of the centre channel to L and R each?

@Mika - you write: Does the "phantom centre" processing actually do anything else than add half of the centre channel to L and R each?

It depends upon the processor. Let's discount those that create false surround from a 2-channel signal (Pro Logic, etc), and only focus on the processors or option with true surround channeling. That is, there are dedicated signals, separate for each channel, in a 5.1 or 7.1 setup. Ideally, you'd want to have a source speaker for each of those signals, properly placed around the listening area, and properly calibrated.

In many cases the centre signal is  simply processed and shared between the L and R front speakers. Some processors apply cheap processing algorithms and others have more sophisticated algorithms and circuits for analyzing the sound before it is sent to the speakers (among other things to avoid noise-cancelling effects.) But you don't need a very expensive processor to get very good results. (Dirty secret of most surround processing manufacturers is that they are using the same OEM components and presenting them in new wrappings).

It is comparable to selecting No Sub-Woofer, and then having that low frequency (LFE) signal sent to the front speakers, if they are equipped to handle LFE. My BL5s do not need an additional sub-woofer, and the LFE-signal is therefore also sent to them. As I have two sub-woofers with those speakers, I get a 5.2 effect in the room, with a very solid low frequency throb, when required.

Back to the phantom centre. A stereo perspective is actually a phantom image. There is no singer in the middle of the living room, nor a drummer to her right and a piano player on her left. All those source-points are phantom images, created through two speakers; the same with the phantom centre - in that case, a signal intended for a centre speaker has been split to be shared by the front speakers, the signal reassembles itself in the air, so to speak, and becomes a phantom centre sourced sound. In sophisticated mixing of the dialogue, the sound editors can balance the source of the sound, engaging the L or R front speakers, in taking the dialogue to the right or left of centre - they can touch a pen to a screen where a mouth is, and the mixer will then automatically assign portions of the signal to the centre channel and one of the front speakers, in order to assist the effect that the sound is coming from a point off exact centre. Using a phantom centre does not alter this effect. In fact, I'm having fun pin-pointing the source of dialogue with my eyes closed, or asking my friends to do the same, with the phantom centre active.

Taking this idea further, I suppose we could "phantomize" even more, and create the complete surround athmosphere with four - or perhaps just three - speakers... of course, they should all be full range and would have tight positioning contstraints.

With modern Digital Signal Processing, this kind of projection of the signal is definitely possible. You've probably seen the soundbars that some claim can create "full surround" from one point in the room, usually from a sound bar lying underneath the television. They'll often also use Q-sound effects to project sounds into the room.
Quite a few dislike having a lot of speakers around the place, making this attractive. It's an inferior solution, though, as the origin of surround sound channels in particular will come from the wrong place - not from the sides or rear of the viewer, but from the front, through a heavily processed signal.

Here's Philips Sound Bar: http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/08/philips-soundbar-hts8100-to-simulate-surround-sound-in-one-speak/

In the setup we're discussing, since the front L/R speakers are in front of you, they are in the correct place relative to the centre channel, and are therefore able to generate the phantom image without additional trickery.

With DSP, you can actually create a moving sweetspot, using four speakers only. Let's say you have a sensor in your shirt pocket, which tells your audio system where you are and in what direction your head is pointed - the DSP circuitry can then calculate what portion of the signal to send to which speakers and let you walk about inside a perfectly aligned and balanced sweetspot ... But doing the same with just two speakers is not possible, and it does require some heavy processing.

tournedos:

Taking this idea further, I suppose we could "phantomize" even more, and create the complete surround athmosphere with four - or perhaps just three - speakers... of course, they should all be full range and would have tight positioning contstraints.

Bose??? 2 speakers and sub

Directreflection system

koning:

Bose??? 2 speakers and sub

Directreflection system

The name Bose always makes me think of the black telephone booths hanging from the club's ceiling that make your ears bleed

Seriously, I was thinking of two fronts and two rears (or just one rear), with no additional trickery apart from panning the "phantom" sound source to the direction that it is in the original surround soundscape.

How long do you think it will take before they expect us to install a ceiling channel as well?

soundproof:

With modern Digital Signal Processing, this kind of projection of the signal is definitely possible. You've probably seen the soundbars that some claim can create "full surround" from one point in the room, usually from a sound bar lying underneath the television. They'll often also use Q-sound effects to project sounds into the room.
Quite a few dislike having a lot of speakers around the place, making this attractive. It's an inferior solution, though, as the origin of surround sound channels in particular will come from the wrong place - not from the sides or rear of the viewer, but from the front, through a heavily processed signal.

Here's Philips Sound Bar: http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/08/philips-soundbar-hts8100-to-simulate-surround-sound-in-one-speak/

In the setup we're discussing, since the front L/R speakers are in front of you, they are in the correct place relative to the centre channel, and are therefore able to generate the phantom image without additional trickery.

With DSP, you can actually create a moving sweetspot, using four speakers only. Let's say you have a sensor in your shirt pocket, which tells your audio system where you are and in what direction your head is pointed - the DSP circuitry can then calculate what portion of the signal to send to which speakers and let you walk about inside a perfectly aligned and balanced sweetspot ... But doing the same with just two speakers is not possible, and it does require some heavy processing.

 

I've been told correct me if it isn't true, that this would end up in incorrect fase behaviour.

Trip- I know for a fact that an upcoming speaker concept incorporates this

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