Using PA Speakers In A Home "Audiophile" Application!

But @yoyoyaya is there any (lower priced) studio monitor that puts the PA energy into music playback? They seem tangential to the goals here.
Seems OP is hoping to save money and get a more live experience but the trouble might come from studio-recorded (mastered) music lacking the dynamics of live music. After all, the idea to use PA in home would probably be based on how good it sounds with live music, right?

I’ve read of Crown amps driving in-home hifi speakers to the owner’s taste, but not the reverse PA-hifi match.

The variable to consider for PA speakers in-home is not just how they are designed for power-over-fidelity, but what you’d be playing through them. You’ve heard PA speakers play live music, which is generally less dynamically compressed than highly manicured recorded studio music in pretty much any genre.
 

Have you listened to studio music on any PA kit? In my anecdotal take, I always thought the recorded popular tracks played while the techs set up the stage before a band sounded, well, very much less-than-great even before live shows that were fantastic. So the potential difference in compression (or other elements) between live vs. recorded music is likely no small factor in predicting how PA will work in-home.

deep_333 OP

446 posts

01-11-2024 at 10:08am 

@yoyoyaya ​​@benanders

I have used a fair amount of studio monitors at home over the years, nearfield and midfield (Neumann, Yamaha, Genelec, etc). They have never come anywhere close to what I recently experienced on this PA rig man. Some tracks from ’Ozzy Osbourne - No More Tears’ were playing at this venue, an album I know all too well and have played many a time in my current high end rigs. It is a studio mastered album, of course, which would have gone through its fair share of "compression", as you all have noted above. But, what I heard at this venue was just visceral, raw and mind boggling. It felt like Ozzy and Zakk Wylde were piercing through the core of ya..."Moving air" (as Levinson notes in his video), is an understatement...
 

@deep_333  - good points of clarification. Thank you.
Speakers x room? Size/potential of both (plus the power kit). I’m hazarding the guess that Ozzy playback venue was not much like a living room or bedroom. Most venues are unlike most dedicated listening rooms, too, as I cannot think of a commercial venue for live music built the same as a typical residence. Not just size - wall/floor/ceiling composition, furnishings, (audience?) etc.

If you can replicate those factors (speakers x room x extras) and the rest of the playback chain in your home, then maybe the answer is yes. If you cannot, then you’re wanting something different than what your OP queries.

If the real question is “How do I make music playback in my home like music playback I heard in a PA-equipped venue?” then you already know the ingredients. If you can’t change the room to match, though, then you might have to think about speaker x room parameters (among other things) much more extensively.

I took a less conventional approach in speakers x room based on similar interests to what you describe, and think it worked out. But I also don’t use PA kit and I don’t live in a studs/drywall residence, so YMMV 😅

 

phusis

1,060 posts

01-12-2024 at 06:54am 
 

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The question could be raised whether the design goals for a pro application make sense for use in a home setting, but to me the most important takeaway is whether there are any obvious impediments to stand in the way for proper integration here. Designing a product more strictly from the basis of functionality to me is both meaningful and beneficial in a home setting, not to mention honest and "what you see is what you get." Lastly and not least: if it sounds great, it sounds great - irrespective of whatever the hell. 
 

B & I emphases in the above quote = mine.

Up to now it seemed unecessary to bring up DSP, which is almost invariably a part of how modern Pro Audio functions. Hearing PA speakers in situ means what you see is not everything that you hear / get. This should generally apply to both smaller local and largest scale tour kit, but perhaps I’m mistaken?

Increasing numbers of studio speakers (actives) and small / multichannel home audio devices (power’eds) do similar. Only hifi speaker models for “traditional” home stereo seem to remain largely hung up on the purely passive approach.

PA playback of the nature OP seems to seek may well be:

To DSP or not to DSP - that is the [relevant] question. 😉