Loudspeakers have difficulty working
with the electronic signals supplied by
an amplifier. These difficulties cause
such major phase and amplitude dis-
tortion that the sound reproduced by
speaker differs significantly from the
sound produced by the original source.
In the past, these problems proved
unsolvable and were thus delegated to
a position of secondary importance in
audio system design. However, phase
and amplitude integrity is essential to
accurate sound reproduction.
Research shows that the informa-
tion which the listener translates into
the recognizable characteristics of a
live performance are intimately tied into
complex time and amplitude relation-
ships between the fundamental and
harmonic components of a given musi-
cal note or sound. These relationships
define a sound’s “sound.”
When these complex relationships
pass through a speaker, the proper
order is lost. The higher frequencies
are delayed. A lower frequency may
reach the listener’s ear first or perhaps
simultaneously with that of a higher fre-
quency. In some cases, the fundamental
components may be so time-shifted
that they reach the listener’s ear
ahead of some or all of the
harmonic components.
This change in the phase and ampli-
tude relationship on the harmonic and
fundamental frequencies is technically
called “envelope distortion.” The listener
perceives this loss of sound integrity
in the reproduced sound as “muddy”
and “smeared.” In the extreme, it can
become difficult to tell the difference
between musical instruments, for exam-
ple, an oboe and a clarinet.
BBE Sound, Inc. conducted ex-
tensive studies of numerous speaker
systems over a ten year period. With
this knowledge, it became possible to
identify the characteristics of an ideal
speaker and to distill the corrections
necessary to return the fundamental
and harmonic frequency structures to
their correct order. While there are dif-
ferences among various speaker designs
in the magnitude of their correction, the
overall pattern of correction needed is
remarkably consistent.
THE BBE PROCESS — ”WHAT IT IS”
SONIC MA XIMIZER
3
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