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narrow and wide baffles and imaging

According to all the "professional" audio reviews that I've read over the last several years, narrow baffles are crucial to creating that so-desired pin-point imaging.

However, over the last few weeks, I've had the opportunity to audition Harbeth 40.2, Spendor Classic 100, Audio Note AN-E, and Devore O/93.  None of these had deficient imaging; indeed I would go so far as to say that it was good to very good.

So, what gives?  I'm forced to conclude that modern designs, 95% of which espouse the narrow baffle, are driven by aesthetic/cosmetic considerations, rather than acoustical ones, and the baffle~imaging canard is just an ex post facto justification.

I can understand the desire to build speakers that fit into small rooms, are relatively unobtrusive, and might pass the SAF test, but it seems a bit much to add on the idea that they're essentially the only ones that will do imaging correctly.



128x128twoleftears
tomic601's avatar
tomic601
2,164 posts
 
one of the reasons i like to own several speakers w widely divergent design philosophy but from competent designers....


josh358
225 posts
 
Yes, the IRS V had a very large baffle. But Arnie Nudell, physicist that he was, curved it back to minimize the effects of diffraction.

Also, the note that the mids and tweeters are right next to one another, producing something close to a coherent line, and they covered a wide frequency range, with only the deep bass, which is hard to localize, produced by the separate woofer towers. By comparison, line sources like Maggies or Apogees have more separation between the drivers, smearing the image laterally.

Paradoxically, it’s the wide baffle of the IRS that makes the extended frequency range of the line possible, by better supporting the bass.

The problem that I had with the imaging of the IRS Betas that my friend had was that each frequency range came from a different height. Maybe his listening seat was too close, but it used to drive me crazy. Very cool plasma tweeters, by the way!

prof
1,741 posts
 
one of the reasons i like to own several speakers w widely divergent design philosophy but from competent designers....



Same here.


I own Thiel and love the first order/time/phase coherence aspect of the design.


But I also enjoy owning diverging designs.  Right now I have speakers from Waveform (very "NRC" in approach),  Spendor, Hales, and most divergent...MBL Radialstrahler speakers.


No speaker  I've ever heard "does everything" for me, and I like the things one speaker may do that another doesn't.   Also helps with not getting bored. 
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kosst_amojan
2,095 posts
 
Typically when someone describes a baffle the presumption is that it's a flat slab. Nobody presumes that they're wildly sculpted things like the IRS V or the LS50. The problem with giant flat baffles is that the do have an edge somewhere, and that edge is going to do bad things. Curving the baffle is an interesting and effective way of mitigating that edge diffraction effect. Those who really think giant baffles with big, sharp corners image well make me curious as to what they're hearing. The behavior of waves rolling off of a surface isn't a matter of speculation or opinion. It's something you can measure, and it has been measured, and the measurements make it completely clear that large baffles that terminate in anything resembling a corner diffract waves just like independent sources of sound. So while a huge baffle may solve some issues with making the drivers behave well in some aspect, it's pointless because you're creating another very audible time delayed artifact pouring off the corners of the box. No matter how you cut the cake, big baffles aren't good if they're anything resembling flat with corners. 
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