I hear in reviews about amps that some have a large vertical sound stage. What is a vertical sound stage exactly? I feel like I know a horizontal sound stage, the separation of instruments and vocals. But I am not sure what exactly is meant by a 'large vertical sound stage'
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What is a vertical sound stage?
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JSmith
Master Contributor
In the strictest sense, there isn't one when it comes to stereo or mono recordings because the sources are at the same height. But the perceived height of the soundstage can change depending on the room and radiation pattern of the speakers.
JSmith
Master Contributor
How to Measure Amplifier Sound Stage Capability?
All else in a system being equal, sound stage length, width, depth and volume has varied greatly among different amplifiers. Listening to my Rogue Audio Cronus Magnum ii and then plugging in my NAD c356bee you notice a startingly collapsed sound stage, a wall sized aquarium shrink to the size...
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JSmith
MaxwellsEq
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There is only relative intensity and phase between channels stored in a stereo (Greek for "solid") recording. So it appears that the soundstage should not have height. However, a simple two microphone recording of a concert hall will capture different reverberation signals at different times for walls, floor and ceiling of the venue. When people talk about image height they may be discussing the recreation of a sense of 3D space of the recording.
As others have said, an amplifier should not affect this.
As others have said, an amplifier should not affect this.
Hi,
I'm tuning DIY multiway speakers and stereo image height can be varied with listening distance. Also, listening height affects. In general relation of early vertical reflections to direct sound affects perception of phantom image height. Also, if I spread physical spacing between "ways" vertical image can be spread out in frequency. I can adjust the spread with adjusting timing between ways and listen very carefully at close distance. Spreading means lows could be localized at different height than highs. When everything is fine then everything is pretty much is nailed to same height, I think. When electronics and speakers do not alter it you'd hear what ever is on the recording, and how your early reflections affect. Hopefully you'd get an image that feels natural to you.
Following reasoning is based on my current experience, explained above:
if an amplifier does something to "vertical image", there is issue with it's frequency / phase response. Or, the reviewer changed listening position and attributed the change in perception falsely to the amplifier. Could be both, or something else.
Logically I would ignore the remark in the review as meaningless information if there is no measurements of the device, or accurate information about the listening situation and understanding how it might affect and how it relates to my listening situation, is it relevant to me or not.
I can speculate, that when there is some "issue", like strong early reflections, or phase mismatch with speaker crossover or something, amplifier altering phase information, multiple things combined, the image could get more spread vertically and is audible listened close enough. Not a good thing in my book as based on observations explained above I think it means phase information of recording is lost/changed, which means less accurate reproduction to me. If you listen far enough, I'd bet you wouldn't hear the difference.
But, you might like it and have it already that way! Listening opposite side of a normal living room would have such strong influence from room early reflections to perceived sound there is much less difference with any off this, at least I would not perceive any difference at all with phase and thus image. I mean, sitting opposite side of my living room I can adjust delay of my tweeters and not hear any difference what so ever, other than slight change in frequency response. It's the same blurry blob image until tweeters are distinct second sound past some 15ms or something like that. Listening close up to speakers it seems to be possible to hear difference in image by adjusting relative distance/phase of things.
Also, marketing is everywhere, do not take any reviews too seriously or you end up transfering money because of some marketing department wants you to, not because you as individual made a good choise that benefits your goal.
Even if the reviewer was true and the amplifier affects the vertical image exactly like described in the review, you'd need to know if its relevant to you and whether you like it or not.
Do not take my description of it without experimenting by yourself and finding what is it that you fancy. Have fun listening your stereo!
edit. since stereo image is illusion from two sound sources playing same sound, any differences between left and right channels of an amplifier would have some effect on the illusion.
I'm tuning DIY multiway speakers and stereo image height can be varied with listening distance. Also, listening height affects. In general relation of early vertical reflections to direct sound affects perception of phantom image height. Also, if I spread physical spacing between "ways" vertical image can be spread out in frequency. I can adjust the spread with adjusting timing between ways and listen very carefully at close distance. Spreading means lows could be localized at different height than highs. When everything is fine then everything is pretty much is nailed to same height, I think. When electronics and speakers do not alter it you'd hear what ever is on the recording, and how your early reflections affect. Hopefully you'd get an image that feels natural to you.
Following reasoning is based on my current experience, explained above:
if an amplifier does something to "vertical image", there is issue with it's frequency / phase response. Or, the reviewer changed listening position and attributed the change in perception falsely to the amplifier. Could be both, or something else.
Logically I would ignore the remark in the review as meaningless information if there is no measurements of the device, or accurate information about the listening situation and understanding how it might affect and how it relates to my listening situation, is it relevant to me or not.
I can speculate, that when there is some "issue", like strong early reflections, or phase mismatch with speaker crossover or something, amplifier altering phase information, multiple things combined, the image could get more spread vertically and is audible listened close enough. Not a good thing in my book as based on observations explained above I think it means phase information of recording is lost/changed, which means less accurate reproduction to me. If you listen far enough, I'd bet you wouldn't hear the difference.
But, you might like it and have it already that way! Listening opposite side of a normal living room would have such strong influence from room early reflections to perceived sound there is much less difference with any off this, at least I would not perceive any difference at all with phase and thus image. I mean, sitting opposite side of my living room I can adjust delay of my tweeters and not hear any difference what so ever, other than slight change in frequency response. It's the same blurry blob image until tweeters are distinct second sound past some 15ms or something like that. Listening close up to speakers it seems to be possible to hear difference in image by adjusting relative distance/phase of things.
Also, marketing is everywhere, do not take any reviews too seriously or you end up transfering money because of some marketing department wants you to, not because you as individual made a good choise that benefits your goal.
Even if the reviewer was true and the amplifier affects the vertical image exactly like described in the review, you'd need to know if its relevant to you and whether you like it or not.
Do not take my description of it without experimenting by yourself and finding what is it that you fancy. Have fun listening your stereo!
edit. since stereo image is illusion from two sound sources playing same sound, any differences between left and right channels of an amplifier would have some effect on the illusion.
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Ricardus
Addicted to Fun and Learning
I've mixed more than a few records, and I can set an instrument's place in the mix anywhere in the L-R spectrum. I can make it sound far away with reverb or delay. I can make it louder or softer. But there is no fader on the console for height.
mhardy6647
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I think this dog may be on one...
Sounds like reviewer nonsense. Whose reviews?
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I've experienced different soundstage heights - most noticeable in how tall or short the vocalist seems to be - and it's always clearly about the speakers, not the amp. (Of course it's also about the recordings - I'm talking about different perceived height when playing the same recording with different speakers.)
My B&W 705s generally put the singer at the height of their tweeters, which with the speakers on stands was more or less at my listening position height, so maybe 42 inches or so?. My Infinity Kappa 9s put the perceived singer's height noticeably higher, maybe 50-55 inches or so, more or less at the height of the tweeters- I had to look up slightly to meet the imaginary eyes of where it sounded like the singer would be vertically. My Genelec 8351s generally put the singer in between, maybe 48 inches, which is noticeably above where their tweeters (and concentric mids) are. I have to look up ever so slightly to fully "meet the singer's eyes."
I have to admit, I have no earthly idea how soundstage height gets to be wherever it is. The Kappas are 5 feet tall so it makes intuitive sense that they put out a taller image. But their built-in floor stands also tilt the entire speaker back a bit, so it could be that tilt rather than their height that does the trick. As for the Genelecs and the B&Ws, I really have no idea why the Genelecs put out a slightly taller image than the 705s, given that their midranges are at similar heights and the 705s' tweeters are several inches higher.
My B&W 705s generally put the singer at the height of their tweeters, which with the speakers on stands was more or less at my listening position height, so maybe 42 inches or so?. My Infinity Kappa 9s put the perceived singer's height noticeably higher, maybe 50-55 inches or so, more or less at the height of the tweeters- I had to look up slightly to meet the imaginary eyes of where it sounded like the singer would be vertically. My Genelec 8351s generally put the singer in between, maybe 48 inches, which is noticeably above where their tweeters (and concentric mids) are. I have to look up ever so slightly to fully "meet the singer's eyes."
I have to admit, I have no earthly idea how soundstage height gets to be wherever it is. The Kappas are 5 feet tall so it makes intuitive sense that they put out a taller image. But their built-in floor stands also tilt the entire speaker back a bit, so it could be that tilt rather than their height that does the trick. As for the Genelecs and the B&Ws, I really have no idea why the Genelecs put out a slightly taller image than the 705s, given that their midranges are at similar heights and the 705s' tweeters are several inches higher.
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I fully agree!
Nevertheless, this is an interesting thread, since I have my super-tweeters in very unique physical positioning/alignment (position #5 in the below photo) for which I have briefly discussed in terms of, a kind of, "quasi-vertical (or pseudo-vertical?) sound staging/imaging"; please refer to my post here #27 on my project thread.
In the position #5, WO (woofer) and SQ (midrange-squawker) are "sandwiched" by TW (tweeter) and ST (super-tweeter), and the high-Fq sound is coming not from point sources but (as if) coming from a big face/surface covering all the "NS-1000+outer round space", I feel.
I wrote there;
>Our ears are located left and right of our head, and hence we are rather sensitive for left-right sound image/allocation. On the other hand, our ears and brain would be relatively gullible with up-and-down sound staging, I assume. I think that my unique physical alignment (positioning) of super-tweeters at under the main SPs, together with the upper tweeters, would give pseud-coaxial sound staging if complete time alignment has been achieved like in my setup (please refer to my summary post here), where tweeter and super-tweeter sing together higher than about 8 kHz.
>
>In any way, I would like to suggest those who using super-tweeters to at least try/test the positioning so that super-tweeter and tweeter would sandwich the woofer and squawker from up and down.
BTW, after establishment of 0.1 msec precision time alignment all over the SP drivers (of course also between L and R), I have wonderful sound stage/image with amazing disappearance of speakers as shared here;
- Not only the precision (0.1 msec level) time alignment over all the SP drivers but also SP facing directions and sound-deadening space behind the SPs plus behind our listening position would be critically important for effective (perfect?) disappearance of speakers: #687
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Curvature
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Auditory height perception is due to spectral notches primarily between 4-8kHz.
With 2 channel, some height effect is due to these notches in the recording or due to room interaction. Don't imagine you can manipulate this by switching amplifiers or other gear.
There is work being done to understand vertical image spread and placement in a multichannel context using perceptual bands.
In normal situations horizontal localization is accurate to 1-5 degrees or so, while vertical is around 15-30 degrees.
With 2 channel, some height effect is due to these notches in the recording or due to room interaction. Don't imagine you can manipulate this by switching amplifiers or other gear.
There is work being done to understand vertical image spread and placement in a multichannel context using perceptual bands.
In normal situations horizontal localization is accurate to 1-5 degrees or so, while vertical is around 15-30 degrees.
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