Let me take a moment here to rattle off a few pertinent facts and observations about how we hear. We are extremely good at localizing sounds in the area covered by our field of view. As sound sources go up, down and behind we are less good at localization. We use the high-frequency content of the reflected sounds to help localize the sources of sound and the low-frequency content of reflections to "localize" the boundaries of the room. Phase-locked volleys of early reflections up to approximately 50 ms. after the direct sound are "fused" together into a single perceptual construct. From a psychological point of view, then, a "sound" consists of a bunch of phase-locked early reflections that are integrated by the auditory system, rather than consisting of the single direct emission from the loudspeaker. Filtered early room reflections are more audible as being separate from the integrated sound than those with the same timbre as the direct sound. Filtered reflections from above, below and behind seem to be more disturbing to the localization mechanism than those from the sides. Laterally reflected energy increases the sense of envelopment from music playback - live or recorded. Highly damped and anechoic spaces are unnatural and unmusical places to listen to music in - live or recorded. To go a little further with this, let me briefly consider loudspeakers. All loudspeakers radiate sound in every direction. If we soffit mount them, we constrain the output to a hemisphere, but the total acoustic power output is essentially the same. We tend to concentrate our attention on the axial response of the speaker as a matter of test convenience and simplification. And in fact, the direct sound of the speaker is very important. If there are response problems on axis, it will not be an excellent sounding speaker, period. What is frequently overlooked, also as a matter of engineering convenience, is the off-axis response, the extreme off-axis response and the overall power response of the loudspeaker. Anyone who is used to measuring loudspeakers knows that the performance specification I quoted above (140° horizontal dispersion across the spectrum) is pretty wild. Many have said, "Can't be done."

The correct answer is, "Couldn't be done until now." Those funny looking speakers on the August Mix cover have a horizontal coverage angle of over 180°. All the way up to 16 kHz. the amplitude response is smooth, even at 90° off-axis. This behavior, which we call Panoramic Power Response, is made possible by the use of a device I call an Acoustic Lens, a pair of which you can see sitting on top of the cylindrical woofer section. Panoramic power response is, to be slightly crass, the stuff of other loudspeakers' wet dreams. With this performance capability, the rules of the studio design game change.

Conventional loudspeakers have off-axis response curves that are increasingly rolled off as we move off-axis around the loudspeaker. Worse, because of the different directivity patterns of the individual drivers, most loudspeakers have increasingly lumpy response curves as we move around to the side of the speaker. All of this lumpy low-pass sound is emitted into the room. And yes, we hear it. You better believe we hear it. Just because we've gotten used to it doesn't mean we don't hear it!

Conventional wisdom says that directional loudspeakers and rooms that damp or diffuse early reflections are good. Usually, all that is being done with such a treatment is to add even more low pass filtering to the "lumpy low-pass" reflected sound and to the room tone in general. The loss in high-frequency information particularly hurts the localization of phantom images and phantom reverberance cues, as well as darkening the overall perceived timbre. However, with a loudspeaker that does not have the limitations in its dispersion that conventional speakers suffer from, accurate lateral reflections are maintained, yielding better images, particularly of ambience, and a brighter, more open, more spacious and natural range of timbres.