Lesson One: Off-Axis Response

When a high-performance speaker system is placed in an automotive environment, we hear the direct (shortest path) and reflected (longer path) sounds, such as resonances and reverberations. The two sounds are processed by the brain as one sound, and this influences our perception of height, width, and depth of soundstage, as well as rearward ambience. For this reason, the off-axis radiation pattern of any speaker in a vehicular environment has a significant influence on how natural the music sounds.

The lesson to learn here is that most mobile audio sound systems benefit greatly from having the front stage speakers at least partially “off-axis.” Off-axis means that the speakers are not pointing at you, but rather at some angle less than 90 degrees away from you.

Continue to Lesson Two

 

Hybrid Audio Technologies Specifications and Parameters Spreadsheet (Google Sheets)Advanced System Installation — Lesson One: Off-Axis Response — Lesson Two: Equalization of Pathlength DifferencesLesson Three: The Effect of HRTF, ITD, and IIDLesson Four: Point-SourcingLesson Five: ReferenceMounting Baffle ConsiderationsCrossoversTime CorrectionAcoustic TreatmentAcoustic TreatmentConclusion