MartinLogan Renaissance 15A Speaker Measurements and Room Influence

[Sonnie Parker]

We hope to fully review these speakers (MartinLogan Renaissance 15A) at my home during our July GTG (with Wayne and Dennis present). These measurements may be something we use at that time to help with the review.

I also have a pair of Revel F328Be speakers, which are considered by many in the industry to be some of the most neutral sounding speakers available. So it will interesting to see how these two speakers compare in measurements and in subjective listening.

Here are some quasi-anechoic and perhaps regular close range measurements from other reviews...

From Stereophile's review: https://www.stereophile.com/content...-renaissance-esl-15a-loudspeaker-measurements

From Absolute Sounds review: https://www.absolutesounds.com/pdf/main/press/HFN_0117_Ren_4web.pdf

Review from Hi Fi World: https://oslohificenter.no/hoyttaler...Product-ExternalReviews.OHC-PageLink-FileLink

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Now on to some of my personal measurements in my own room. Obviously it is difficult to get direct sound measurements in a room, especially as small as my room, but let just look at some measurements.

I am mainly concerned with the panel at 300Hz (xover point) and above. The lower end is crossed over to the subs at 50Hz and all of that can be easily corrected with filters.

At 1 Meter mid-panel high (45" from floor), here is what we see in REW and Audiolense using TTD.

REW smoothing at 1/6 octave... 1 Meter

Audiolense ... 1 Meter

 

[Sonnie Parker]

The above measurements in post #2 are with absorption panels on the front wall to try to help with minimal reflections.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Now I will do 2 meters and also some listening position measurements with the absorption panels on the front wall.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

REW smoothing at 1/6 octave... 2 Meter (green)... overlay with 1 meter

Audiolense 2 Meter (do not know how to overlay)

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Front wall absorption measurements at MLP

Main listening position at 8.25 feet or 2.51 meters... and roughly 15° off-axis with the toe-in and angle to the MLP. Again... mainly focusing on 300Hz and up for the panel.

REW

Overlay

Audiolense

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Front wall without any acoustic treatment at MLP

Main listening position at 8.25 feet or 2.51 meters... and roughly 15° off-axis with the toe-in and angle to the MLP. Again... mainly focusing on 300Hz and up for the panel.

REW

Overlay ... not much difference in response between absorption and no treatment

Audiolense

No Treatment

Front wall absorption

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Now the diffusion panels are installed and these are measurements from the MLP again.

REW

Overlay vs Absorption - most significant difference in response is in the 2-3kHz range.

Audiolense

Diffision

Absorption

 

[Sonnie Parker]

I'm certainly no expert at reading the Audiolense TTD graph, but from what I can tell, the response is much smoother with diffusion than it is absorption.

What other charts should I look at in REW to perhaps see differences?

 

[Sonnie Parker]

I will have to redo these measurements as I did not have the settings correct for the UMIK-2.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Not sure what's causing the hump up high... perhaps the UMIK-2. I may compare them tomorrow to make sure I have the correct firmware. I just received it last week, so I assumed it would be up to date.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

I compared them and they are correct... I suspect something else is going on, but not sure what it is yet. When there is no correct, the response graph follows the measured response in Dirac, but when doing the full correction, even though it shows a roll-off up high, it is measuring it as if there is a boost.

Here are the ETC comparisons between absorption vs diffusion... although I have no idea if this really tell us one is better than the other.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

I think I have a bad UMIK-2 ... or bad calibration file... even after the firmware update, I am getting two different Dirac measurements between the two using their respective cal files. It's mainly the bottom and top end, which is where the mic cal affects the response the most.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Here is the comparison between Dirac <600Hz and Full using the UMIK-1

TTD filtered in Audiolense for each...

 

[ddude003]

Wow @Sonnie that is a lot of work... Despite the issues with that mic, what do your ears tell you? What do you like better? Front wall without any acoustic treatment at MLP, Front wall with acoustic absorption at MLP or Front wall with acoustic diffusion at MLP??? I know its not a double blind test... I wonder what you hear and feel...

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Wow @Sonnie that is a lot of work... Despite the issues with that mic, what do your ears tell you? What do you like better? Front wall without any acoustic treatment at MLP, Front wall with acoustic absorption at MLP or Front wall with acoustic diffusion at MLP??? I know its not a double blind test... I wonder what you hear and feel...

I like it... but I also liked it before. I think it's perhaps slightly better, but it's hard to say for sure. If I had to pick between the three, I'd say diffusion since it's the last thing I've done and it sounds good. lol After all, the audio masters say it's supposed to be better for dipoles, so my mind is supposed be thinking that way. But really... I don't know. If I were double blind tested there is no telling which I would choose. The way I did it with so much time in between listening, it's difficult to say what might be better and why.

There's another part of this in play too... Dirac at <600Hz vs Dirac full that I've been accustomed to for years. At first, the Dirac at <600Hz was too harsh/bright to me, but full did seem to make it too dull, as well. On different songs I was going back and forth and one preset would sound better than the other depending on the song. Today I decided to rerun Dirac and bump up the area below 600Hz about 3dB or so to help offset some of the harsh/bright sound I was hearing, and so far it's worked. The <600Hz is sounded really good and actually better than the full Dirac.

 

[pratul]

the graphs look awesome but like ddude asked I am also interested in hearing about what your ears tell you.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

the graphs look awesome but like ddude asked I am also interested in hearing about what your ears tell you.

See post just before this one.

 

[pratul]

I compared them and they are correct... I suspect something else is going on, but not sure what it is yet. When there is no correct, the response graph follows the measured response in Dirac, but when doing the full correction, even though it shows a roll-off up high, it is measuring it as if there is a boost.

Here are the ETC comparisons between absorption vs diffusion... although I have no idea if this really tell us one is better than the other.

View attachment 40381

Still learning to read REW but based on what I have read your ETC looks awesome. Early reflections are almost non existent. Your system must sound amazing.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Still learning to read REW but based on what I have read your ETC looks awesome. Early reflections are almost non existent. Your system must sound amazing.

It's not something I've ever experimented with much... just getting my feet wet here.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Here is the impulse measurement of what I have been listening too tonight.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

 

[JStewart]

I think I have a bad UMIK-2 ... or bad calibration file... even after the firmware update, I am getting two different Dirac measurements between the two using their respective cal files. It's mainly the bottom and top end, which is where the mic cal affects the response the most.

Here's a couple of posts from @AustinJerry that may help:

Dirac Live

Note: As of March 30, 2023 this thread returns from an actively maintained online resource to a regular discussion thread. Additional resources can be found at Dirac Live v2 & v3, for example "How to set speaker levels" and "How to choose crossover points". Official Dirac support is available...

www.avsforum.com

Dirac Live

Note: As of March 30, 2023 this thread returns from an actively maintained online resource to a regular discussion thread. Additional resources can be found at Dirac Live v2 & v3, for example "How to set speaker levels" and "How to choose crossover points". Official Dirac support is available...

www.avsforum.com

Today I decided to rerun Dirac and bump up the area below 500Hz about 3dB or so to help offset some of the harsh/bright sound I was hearing, and so far it's worked. The <500Hz is sounded really good and actually better than the full Dirac.

I have a simple excel worksheet to calculate a raised/lowered target curve from an existing one. Its useful to match levels like you did. It will also calculate a "Dirac" like straight line slope based on dB per Octave. Just need to copy/paste the results into a Target Curve Text File which can be done at Dirac's import target curve step.

excel files can't be attached so here's a link if you could still use it:

Error

1drv.ms

I like it... but I also liked it before. I think it's perhaps slightly better, but it's hard to say for sure. If I had to pick between the three, I'd say diffusion since it's the last thing I've done and it sounds good. lol After all, the audio masters say it's supposed to be better for dipoles, so my mind is supposed be thinking that way. But really... I don't know. If I were double blind tested there is no telling which I would choose. The way I did it with so much time in between listening, it's difficult to say what might be better and why.

Very fair.

I've also experimented with 1st reflection absorption, corner tri-traps and even put panels in front of the projector screen to hear the effect. REW spl and waterfall measurements showed basically no change when there clearly was one. Whether one way or the other was better, who knows. The more Toole I read the more I'm thinking not sweat the room acoustic details. Well maybe not so much anyway.

Your diffuser panels look awesome. That's reason enough to have 'em IMHO.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

Thanks for the info... I decided to post about the UMIK-2 vs UMIK-1 here in this thread, to keep it with it's own thread: https://www.avnirvana.com/threads/umik-1-vs-umik-2.8397/

 

[ddude003]

So, @Sonnie, are you done with two or are you going to put two more in there somewhere? I wonder what percent of coverage you have in absorbers verses diffusers verses bare wall space verses square miles of electrostatic panels...

Back of the envelope calculations show you have 3,391 sq inches of electrostatic panels… Umm... That is 23.5 sq feet...