The May clubnight of the Wellington Audio Club of which I have been a member for around 15 years, consisted of a talk and demonstration of the PAS system by myself, with the assistance of some good friends who perform as MOJO. The latest club newsletter is attached as a totally independant review.
OK, I cannot attach a PDF file so will try plan B.
I will post this now and come back with a link to the newsletter which I will post somewhere else.
Man, my geekness blows me away.(if it works)


Like a lot of us I know enough to be dangerous, so we now move to plan C

This message has been edited. Last edited by: IanHB,

OK
Now we have the A team on the job, I will be rescued quite soon.
Thanks to Alan and ST for your assistance guys.

The Interconnect
Newsletter of the Wellington Audio Club, Inc., June 2005
review by Colin Smith

STUNNING NEW TECHNOLOGY

This month the club was treated to a riveting demonstration of new technology which looks set to bring about a long-overdue revolution in sound reinforcement, particularly where an audience is listening to live music.
Ian Hull-Brown, New Zealand agent for the Bose Personalised Amplification System (PAS for short), was our presenter. Ian told us that Bose has been developing the above for ten years. He brought along a complete setup for us to audition. We were given an interesting resume of the reasons for the design goals which make Bose PAS the way forward in sound reinforcement. The parts which make up the system, and how they work, are:

POWER STAND
This is the bottom unit and it is placed on the floor. It contains three 250W (into four ohms) power amplifiers; EQ presets for electric and acoustic guitars, keyboards, wind and string instruments, and vocal mike; also all connecting sockets for inputs and outputs. Plus it is a docking station (a space-age phrase worthy to describe this equipment) for the speaker tower, which plugs directly into the top of the Power Stand. (Nifty!) The crossover is set at 120Hz for the vertical array amps and the bass module amp, which can also be separately adjusted to roll off at 120Hz or 180Hz for upper-bass lift.

CYLINDRICAL RADIATOR
(Or CR) A loudspeaker, actually two speakers (not for stereo, Homer) which plug in, one on top of the other, to give a vertical array. This array contains 24 drivers and, judging by its weight (thirteen kilograms), contains a healthy quantity of magnets.
The cylindrical radiator design gives many advantages over traditional separate monitor/PA speaker setups:
(a) PA sound radiates out in a cone-shaped beam. Listeners close to the speakers are deafened by the volume and brightness of the sound. The rest of the audience hear less and less of both the further away they sit. Those at the back and sides of the hall hear a dull boomy sound because of the treble attenuation and reflections, mainly in the bass area, from walls and ceiling. Maybe those sitting near the sound techs console will hear something like the intended mix and volume level. But even then, if the controls are set by someone suffering from deafness (not unusual), an inferior listening experience is guaranteed, which is not what the performers want. The performers have no hands-on control over the live mix. They just hope the audience is getting the same sound that they the performers are hearing.
The CR speaker demonstrated convincingly that musicians can now tailor all aspects of the sort of sound they want their audience to hear. The CR sound energy pattern is quite different to PA, covering a wider and flatter field.
Overall energy, particularly treble energy, is more constant from in front of the speaker right to the back of the hall. The new speaker can, and should, be behind the musicians, who are then able to hear what they and their fellow performers on stage are doing, and also what their individual volume level is within the ensemble, as well as the total overall loudness. AT LAST they can practise modulating their dynamics in unison as an ensemble. For the audience, the icing on the cake is that if each musician has his/her own PAS located right behind him/her, the audience will be able to WATCH AND HEAR that particular musician instead of as now PA wall of sound with no clue as to source except visual.
(b) As noted before, normally, some PA speaker energy reflects off the ceiling, adding to out-of-phase effects and messing-up the sound. The CR produces a more phase-coherent sound within its wide horizontal energy field. Little or none of that energy gets to the ceiling, so no longer will ceiling reflections add to and muddy that which is heard.
(c) Any venue that is known to have poor acoustics should now sound much clearer if the performers use a PAS.

BASS MODULE
This module plugs into the Power Stand and can be placed anywhere handy. The unit looks almost laughably small, but smallness is ideal for all performing artists who have to travel and then pack in and out for every gig. Later, when we had a listen, there were no complaints about lack of bass or bass quality.

REMOTE CONTROL
This remote plugs into and controls the Power Stand. It has a long connecting cable which enables a musician holding the remote to adjust EQ, volume for two input channels, and a system volume. The great strength of this arrangement is that a musician can make adjustments to all technical aspects of the band’s sound ON THE FLY and judge directly from the CR adjacent what he/she and the audience is hearing! Superb.

THE PERFORMANCE
When Ian had finished setting up the PAS, in a matter of minutes, not hours like a PA system, it all looked extremely neat, nothing like the usual wiring spaghetti. The CR looked elegant and added a classy atmosphere to the band’s presentation. Yes, we even had Mojo (Grant, Chris, Nick and Jeremy) perform for us.
Nick tried out some guitar presets which mimic the sound made by some well known brands. He obviously enjoyed using the presets which gave variety to his own instrument’s sound, and we were treated to some fine musicianship.
Grant experimented with two different microphones. We seemed to agree that the Share 87 gave better sibilants. The other mike he tried was unnaturally penetrating on sibilants but could come into its own when used at a noisy venue.
Chris teamed up with Nick and Grant and they played and sang together, making adjustments to the sound as they went along.
Once satisfied with the sound they were producing, the band played Peaceful Easy Feeling, and it was good to know that they knew what we were hearing was what they wanted us to hear.

During the demonstration, the club’s sound level meter was carried around the room to check what, if any, deviation there was in loudness. There were no noticeable changes in readings.
To demonstrate the claimed spectral balance of 45Hz-16kHz, Nick played some pre-recorded test tracks of pop music. They sounded OK, when taking into account the mono reproduction of pieces that we are used to hearing in stereo.
Nick concluded the evening by talking for a while on far-ranging topics centring around the technical aspects of live music.

CONCLUSION
A system which gives good clean sound to an entire audience, that is under the control of the musicians, that is easy to transport, sets up in minutes, packs up in minutes, is modular, has instrument presets, has on-the-fly EQ and levels for the players by the players, costs not much more than a bottom-end hi-fi home stereo setup, etc, etc! Frankly, amazing stuff. If I were younger I would buy one just to play with at home.

THE DOWNSIDE
1. I haven’t got a big enough room.
2. Not suitable for very large halls and
stadiums . . . YET!

A ton of thanks to Ian, Nick, Grant,
Chris and Jeremy for making this a great
night • Colin Smith

Hi Ian,

Thanks for sharing this (and Alan for making it possible).

Ian, can you tell us more about the Wellington Audio Review Club?

quote:

costs not much more than a bottom-end hi-fi home stereo setup,

suggests that this might be a group of 'high-end' audiophiles?

The Wellington Audio Club is indeed a group of Audiophiles. "High-end", we like to think of ourselves as High-end but I could not possibly comment on that.
The club in its early days was the Wellington Hi Fi club with many of the members building their own amplifiers and speaker enclosures as NZ had import restrictions and the state of the art equipment was just not available.
There are a few of those fellows left and infact the April clubnight was a presentation of a pair of home built valve amplifiers.
We have done all the usual stuff that such a group does, with double blind tests of valve against solid state amps,$300 interconnects against $10 version etc.
We have good support from the local manufactures and get to hear some of the new products before release.
I get to present about once a year and always try to extend the boundries.
One of mine they still talk about was a live verses recorded evening where I had some live muso`s which we recorded and then played back, comparing the difference if any. The doubling of the acoustic was an interesting phenomenon that I had not thought of, that taught me a lesson.
There is always some thing to be learned and I can bore people to death talking audio.
I always enjoy the company of those as nutty about audio as myself.

Let's get these nutty audio guys to report back on the effectiveness of those $300 power cords.

Seriously though, I haven't quite figured out what an "interconnect" is. The cabling? The connectors on the ends of the cables?

Also:

quote:

The doubling of the acoustic was an interesting phenomenon that I had not thought of, that taught me a lesson.

A-B'ing live vs pre-record? Singing along with the pre-record? Multi-tracking an acoustic guitar? I'm confused.

(Two countries separated by a common language...)

Interconnect:
Cable connecting two pieces of equipment[pre-amp to amp; cd player to pre-amp ect.]
Live vs. recorded:
Having a musican play while recording at same time then playback recording through high quality audio system being judged[reviewed]to see how accurate it sounds against the original[live].

They can help with power cords most likley.
I'll bet most high high quality recording studio's use upgraded power cords and interconnects and digital cords also.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by NEBADON2000:
Interconnect:
Cable connecting two pieces of equipment[pre-amp to amp; cd player to pre-amp ect.]

Thanks for that NEBADON2000, that is exactly what my definition would be. And YES good ones do make a difference to the sound.

The doubling of the acoustic.
I have been thinking that may need some explanation, so fasten your seat belts and return your seats to an upright position with your tray table folded and away we shall go.

The purpose of my demonstration was as a number of the activites of this club, to help members to CALIBRATE their ears, so as to better enjoy the listening experience.
My idea was to take a live musician and at the same time as we listened, to record the performance and then play that back to hear if there was any appreciable difference.
We were not so much concerned with the hardware,
that was simply used as a means to the end of hearing the recording.
Ideally it should be as transparent as possible.
It all worked fine and various comments came forth about listening distances and recording distances and all sorts of other interesting stuff.
I explained how various microphones at different positions and angles would change textures and we explored some different tecniques and positions.
Hang in there, not long now
Acoustic doubling is only my term to describe the phenomenon we now come to. At Last!

If you record say a Martin D35 in a normal room
then along with the guitar sound you also record the room sound.
The room effects the sound to a larger or smaller degree depending on the mic placment, the reverberation, the spectral response of the space and many other factors.
So now we come to replay the recording,
IN THE SAME SPACE.
As we listen, the room parameters are again added to the signal for a second time.
Are you still with me.
So if there is a room resonence at 783hz then the effect of that is doubled as compared to a recording made in an acousticly flat studio.
If we then recorded our D35 replay using a microphone at some distance from the loudspeaker
we would again double the effect.
Right about here is where I start to get out of my depth, so I will bail out now and view with interest any responces.
I was thinking some time in the middle of the night, what a blast for me it is to be posting on this site in such company. I have been a BOSE believer for over 30 years. Thank you all.