Bright Speaker Sound

Nelson57

I often see comments referring to speakers as having a "Bright" sound. Being new to the home theater hobby I am looking to understand what that term means, and how does "bright" sound. Can someone please describe for me what is meant by bright when referring to speaker sound?

steveinaz

"Bright" usually implies an emphasis in the midrange and/or treble. In a perfect world, speakers would reproduce bass, midrange, and treble in a linear fashion, true to the original recording, with no emphasis on a particular spectrum--not so easy to accomplish in the real world.

Willow

Originally posted by Nelson57
I often see comments referring to speakers as having a "Bright" sound. Being new to the home theater hobby I am looking to understand what that term means, and how does "bright" sound. Can someone please describe for me what is meant by bright when referring to speaker sound?

Please keep in mind that what sounds bright to one might sound ok, good or great to someone else.

danger boy

bright is when your ears start to bleed from to much high end frequencies.

I used to have a pair of KLH towers that were so bright. i had to get rid of them. no matter what i did to "tame" the brightness. it was to much... and my ears would become fatigued after about 30 to 60 minutes of listening.

Nelson57

This forum is great. Thanks for the responses. Now I know what to listen for.

George Grand

Grab any Klipsch speakers, and drive them with a solid-state amp. The epitome of bright. JBL's are a close second, being just about impossible to get acoustic instruments to sound natural instead of electrified. Especially those stone terrible JBL Century 100's that they sold a million of during the 70's. Good for rock and not much else.

My ears are 52 years old, and roll off pretty good at the top-end. If my ears say bright, it's bright.

George Grand (of the Jersey Grands)

SomeDood

Bright is the result of matching highly revealing speakers with entry level DVD players and recievers. This could also be called "grainy", "glarey" and/or "harsh". Bright is ususally describing the upper frequencies, such as cymbals, guitar solos and any other instrument that involves the upper frequencies. Cheaper, and poorly designed speakers are also a source of brightness. Metal tweeters are ususally associated to cause brightness, this is not universal , though. Ive heard metal speakers using metal tweeters that sounded great.

Nelson57

Does setting the speakers to either Large or Small through the receiver have an impact on brightness?

lomic

No, large and small setting only effects lower frequencies. Your speakers should have a crossover setting in the reciever, this is where low-frequency information stops being sent to your speakers, and starts being sent to the subwoofer.

Small means this crossover is in effect, Large means the crossover is not in effect... so on Large your speakers will be recieving all the low-frequency sound that is on the track your're listening to.

Nelson57

Thanks Iomic, I appreciate the response and that makes alot of sense.

danger boy

Nelson57, what kind of receiver are you using ? some are known to be brighter than others.

TheReaper

Originally posted by Nelson57
Does setting the speakers to either Large or Small through the receiver have an impact on brightness?

Depending on your system, it can. If your ears can localize frequencies below the crossover to the speaker, or if your subwoofer isn't fully filling in.

I have my crossover set at 60hz, because to me, that sounds the best on my setup. As I move the crossover higher and higher above that, to 80hz, 100hz, 120hz. The brighter my center channel speaker sounds (which is set to small).

Nelson57

Hello Danger boy, I am using an Onkyo 602 receiver, T90es Front L/R, CS1 Center, Fxi30 side surrounds, Monitor 50sas rear surrounds, HSU STF-2 and Velodyne CHT-10 Subwoofers.

I have seen comments on some receivers being brighter than others, but I don't understand how that happens. I simply assumed power is power, and brightness was more of a speaker issue than a receiver issue.

danger boy

Nelson57,

brightness can be a speaker issue...as it was for me at one time. But the source.. ie: receiver, CD player, can also be the problem for brightness.

Speaker wire and RCA interconnects can also show some brightness or can amplify the brightness from the source.

I've never owned an Onkyo. but I have heard in here that they sometimes tend to be on the bright side with Polk speakers. Not sure if that is your case or not. Do you have your treble set to center? flat?

Does your system sound bright to you with your set up? You appear to have a very nice set up of Polk speakers. Which most Polk speaker are not considered bright. So if you do have a brightness problem.. I"m guessing it's either the Onkyo or cables.

One more thing i just thought of. Do you have your speakers bi wired? WHen I firest bi wired my front speakers.. they were slightly bright. If yours are not bi wired then that's not the case.

heiney9

Hello,

Let's not forget one of the more obvious sources of brightness, the recording itself. I don't think anyone has touched on this in this thread. Most of today's pop recordings are really horrible. Obviously the more revealling your system the more "annoying" those sources of music sound.

Don't kid yourself, there are very few current pop recordings that are recorded with the audiophile in mind. They compress the **** out of the recording and then add a treble boost and a mid-bass boost so it sounds good in the car and on a portable. I know when I find a well recorded cd, especially a pop cd, I'm usually pretty excited bceause it's that much more pleasureable to listen to. There are artisits I love but won't listen to because of the crappy recording, Lenny Kravitz comes to mind. Many others too.

MP3's are an audiophile nightmare. If this turns out to be the future of music we are in deep trouble. DVD-A and SACD are not going to save music unless they start utilizing the format to it's fullest. So many of the current titles are really only slightly better sounding than redbook cd's. They haven't really done anything but manipulate the original recording.

Heiney9

danger boy

welcome Heiney9,

yeah. it's depressing how many decently recoreded CD's are put out these days. Have you ever listened to a MFSL CD. Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab used to put out these gold CD's that sounded really, really good. Hear one of those and you'll understand what potential CD's have. but never reach.

Al

P.S. I'd even be willing to pay more for a CD, if i knew it was going to sound better.

heiney9

MFSL discs are great. I was disappointed years ago when they stopped producing them. Sellers on e-bay get a premium for those discs. I agree, if I knew a particular disc was going to sound great I'd pay more for it. I often joke with my brother about the music industry putting out 2 versions of a recording. One for audiophiles and one for those who just don't care as much about recording quality. I know....wishful thinking on my part. I think technology has hurt the recording process in this respect.

jimed1

I agree with the bad recording theory. I have lots of cds that sound better in my car because of this. The one's that sound the best to me at home are ususally the light jazz type like Lou Ritenhour (spelling?), Fourplay, and a few others. Most of the pop music does not sound good at home.

outlander

I agree a lot of the CD’s coming out lately sound like crap. I know this is a little off subject but there is a couple of newer CD’s that really have a great sound. Both are by Mark Knopfler “Shangri-La and Sailing to Philadelphia". If your looking for decent recordings to show off your decent system I highly recommend both. If your system sounds bright with these CD's you really have problem.
O

Nelson57

Thanks for all of the responses, I have learned alot. Another question! If Onkyo is known to be on the bright side with Polk speakers, what would some of you recommend.

I use my system for 99% Home Theater. I enjoy the system, but it seems when the HT hobby bug bites you, you wonder how you can tweak and upgrade to enhance your experience.

I didn't find my system to be overly bright now that I understand what it means. But I would be interested in the opinion of those who are using similiar speakers as to what receivers they use, and how the sound might compare to Onkyo.

SomeDood

Not familiar with Polk speakers, but i do own a Onkyo tx-8511, and at one time had it in my main system.

I was using Ascend Acoustics CBM-170 speakers with it.

After living with this combination for awhile, i decided the sound could be improved with a better amp. So i bought an Cambrdige AZUR 540a, which was a MAJOR improvement in sound quality. The cambrdige was much smoother, much more musical and much more powerful sounding.

If Polk speakers tend to sound a little bright, then something like Cambrdige might be worth checking out, as their sound seems to be on the warmer side of neutral.

btw the Cambridge was only $50 more than the Onkyo but sounded much better. Im sure they make a HT reciever that would fit your needs.

TN_Polk_Lover

I'm listening to Ray Charles "Genius Loves Company" right now through an Adcom Pre-Amp, Yamaha Power Amp, Polk RTi70's. Speaker cable is Monster, don't remember the exact model but its the one with a clear outer insulation and the pair of stranded conductors are twisted. The conductors appear to be about 12 or 14 gauge. Interconnects are a new set of Audioquest Sidewinders that I just got a few days ago.

All tone controls are defeated. I'm trying to always listen "au naturel" now and avoid adding any bass boost.

To me it all sounds fantastic, but everyone says that the RTi line of speakers are "bright" and that Yamaha's tend to be "bright" and I have read that Adcom tends to be "forward" which I think means a little hot in the midrange.

So, I wonder if it is a matter of personal preference, or do our ears work differently from each other's (maybe the way our brains process what our ears are sending?).

I guess that the goal is that everything sounds the same as it would in person, but that is very hard to determine as suggested in previous posts about how so many popular CD's are equalized or processed to sound a certain way, so there is no guarantee that your source isn't "bright" or "dull" to begin with.

One way would be to listen to a Telarc classical recording. Telarc supposedly does most of their stuff with a minimum of microphones recorded straight to digital with no intervening compression or equalization. Most of the time on the CD liner notes, they will say exactly what equipment was used and if any thing extra was done / not done to the sound. But, then, you would have to go to the venue where it was recorded and become familiar how the real instruments sound in person.

Wow! this hobby can become expensive, can't it?

Anyway, some people say that if your system is too "bright" that you will quickly fatigue of listening to it. I could listen to my system for hours and hours and not get tired of it, so it must not be too bright for me.

SomeDood

nt

danger boy

it's true we all do hear sounds differently. I guess what would be fatiguing to your ears would be considered bright. Whether that is coming from the source or the speakers.... you'll know it.

Most every part of a system can add or subtrack brightness.. finding the right and somewhat neutral balance is what we all try to achieve. It's not always easy. Swapping out amps, cables, sources, speakers, and speaker placements all require a lot of work and patience and $$ some times.

Overall though.... i have never known any Polk speaker to be considered bright to alot of people. Yes the tri lam tweeter may not be as smooth as the silk dome.. but is it overly bright? I don't think so.. harsh sometimes maybe.. but not overly bright.

TN_Polk_Lover

Do my RTi70's have the tri-lam or the silk? I have the ones with the blue midrange/woofer cones. The tweeters are gray colored, but look like woven fabric that has been painted with gray paint. If I gently touch them, they feel soft and cone easily deflects with a slight finger pressure. So I assume that they are the silk?

Thanks for you help.

danger boy

your RTi70's have the silk polymer composite tweeter.

the RTXXi line has the tri lam tweeter.

PhillyDan1969

I recently replaced my old Yamaha RXV-992 with the Denon AVR 3805 to push my Polks. The dealer at Tweeter told me that the Yamaha RXV-2500 would combine to create a warmer sound with my Polks than the Denon but that seemed to be the exact opposite of everything I have read on the internet. Is Denon considered to be a "bright" reciever???

Nelson57

PhillyDan1969, how do your polks sound with the Denon?

I am wondering from the experience of the forum members do they find one brand of receiver that seems to work best with Polks over another.

PhillyDan1969

I like the way movies sound with the Denon on my Polks but I haven't yet done much with music. I am about to purchase a Denon 2200 universal dvd player and then I will have a better answer for you when it comes to music.