‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

‘CHAOS SPEAKER
TECHNOLOGY' AND ITS
APLICATIONS.

BY MATTHEW WOOD
NEWAUDIO PTY LTD
2001

Matthew Wood
Page 1 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

‘CHAOS SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY' AND ITS

APLICATIONS.
BY MATTHEW WOOD
NEWAUDIO PTY LTD
2001

Abstract
This report will discuss how “CHAOS” loudspeaker technology,
described by Joseph Hayes, is changing the benchmark for high
fidelity sound reproduction in a wide range of applications. These
range from recording studios, theatres, houses of worship and even
your own living room.
Contents:
Introduction.
The studio; A Model Environment.
CHAOS Speaker Technology.

Introduction:
For a long time the bastions of good listening environments have
been concert halls and recording studios. We have built these critical
listening environments at great expense, in order to fully enjoy the
subtle nuances of music of all types. Unfortunately most of us can’t
pop down to the local concert hall to hear our favorite band or have a
recording studio in which to listen to our CD collection. In most
applications of loudspeaker used in the acoustic environment the
outcome is usually fairly ordinary to say the least.
In order to explain how CHAOS speakers can change this state of
affairs we will examine how the acoustics of a hypothetical studio
work and then more fully describe some CHAOS speakers and their
uses.

Matthew Wood
Page 2 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

The Studio
A model Environment
To help to explain how ‘CHAOS’ speakers work, we will discuss how
sound behaves in a hypothetical studio.
Nearly all recorded music these days is recorded
stereophonically; that is the signal is recorded on two tracks
being left & right. This is in order to provide a spatial dimension
to the music. This stereo ‘image’ relies on the fact that we
perceive sound not only in terms of intensity and pitch, but
also on subtle time information.
When a sound leaves the speaker in our studio, it propagates
through the air in a spherical wave front at the speed of sound.
We hear the sound as that wave front passes us. Soon after
hearing this initial direct sound, we start to hear the sound that
has been reflected off the surfaces of our room. This continues
for some time until all the infinite reflections have been
absorbed.

Fig1. A simplified time\energy diagram for our studio. Note

the gap between the direct sound and the first reflection. This is of
primary importance in the perception of room size.

Matthew Wood
Page 3 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

The important thing to note here is that the time at which

these reflections arrive gives us information about the size and
reflectivity or absorption of the environment we are in. The initial
delay between the direct sound and the first reflection to reach the
ear gives us information about the size of the space we are in. The
bigger the space the longer the initial time delay. The following
reflections help us locate the initial source in relation to the rest of
the room and also give us a picture about the surface texture of the
room. Just think of the sound of your bathroom with its confined
space and hard surfaces as compared to your more spacious lounge
room with it’s soft furnishings and curtains, and you can see that
we gather a lot of information about the space around us just by
hearing.
It turns out that sounds heard within 30 milliseconds of the
direct sound are indistinguishable from the direct sound. Later
reflections are perceived as echoes. Interestingly most directional
information is derived from reflections arriving between around 764
microseconds and 30 milliseconds after the direct sound. This is
known as the ‘Haas’ effect.
This means that for the early reflection information contained
in a recording to be clearly perceived by the listener the recorded
sound must dominate the first 30 milliseconds between the direct
sound and any reflections created by the listening environment.
When this is achieved stereo sound seems to crystallize into a clear
picture and you hear ‘through’ your local environment to that of the
recorded environment.
Illustrated on the next page is a simple diagram of how this
has been achieved in a hypothetical studio environment (fig 2.).
Absorbent areas, creating a reflection free zone, suppress early
reflections coming from in front of the listener. Reflections from the
back wall are diffused by special paneling known as a ‘Quadratic
Residue Diffuser’ (see fig 3). The reflected diffused sound from this
wall is heard after the critical 30 milliseconds. The purpose of the
diffuser is to ensure that the reflected sound does not create any
‘ghost’ sources behind the listener and that the returning sound is
not coloured by any frequencies that might otherwise be selectively
reflected by the wall.

Matthew Wood
Page 4 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

Fig 2. Note that not all sound is absorbed, but any reflections
reach the listener after 30mS.

Matthew Wood
Page 5 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

Fig 3. Typical profile of a Quadratic Residue Diffuser. It

should be noted that in a standard application this pattern would be
repeated over an entire wall area with the slats running vertically as
in the front view.

Fig 4. This plot shows relative sound energy reflecting from a wall
(dashed lines) and from a Quadratic Residue Reflector. Note the
broad spread of sound from the QRD as compared to the plain wall.

Matthew Wood
Page 6 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

The ‘Quadratic Residue Diffuser’ usually takes the form of a

series of slats arranged so that their edges form a series of wells
with a precise ratio of depths. The sound reflected from a surface
such as this has almost equal energy radiating in all directions and
is said to have “zero auto correlation”. That means the reflected
sound has no discernable pattern, or its CHAOS, the perfect form of
diffusion.
The CHAOS Speaker Technology.
The ‘Spatial One’ loudspeaker by Newaudio & Video is an
example of a ‘CHAOS’ speaker. It takes the idea of using a
quadratic residue diffuser and turns it on its head.

Fig 5. Above is a profile of a ‘Spatial One’ speaker. The black

component on the sloping surface is the modified QRD. The sound
radiates from the tweeter in the headstock of the unit and strikes
the diffuser, which is aligned at 45 degrees to the front of the
speaker. The diffuse sound is then reflected forward and into the
room.
By diffusing the sound at the source you effectively dominate
the crucial first 30 milliseconds of the time/energy diagram with
your signal. The reflector on a ‘Spatial One’ loudspeaker takes what
once was a clearly defined wave front of sound and smears it out in
time. By this manipulation of the Haas effect, it fools your brain into

Matthew Wood
Page 7 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

giving priority to the signal source and not to your immediate

environment.
This means that by merely using a speaker system like this
you have immediately improved the general acoustic environment
for no extra cost. This is an extremely powerful benefit of the
system as the passive nature of the design means that the speakers
themselves are already competitively priced against normal
speakers, which provide no such benefit.
By dominating the room acoustic ‘CHAOS’ speakers bring high
fidelity sound to a range of environments that have not until now
even been considered. It is not necessary to build an environment
costing many thousands of dollars for the purpose of critical
listening. The passive nature of the system means that
implementation does not require excessive infrastructure beyond
that of a standard PA system.
This is good news for businesses looking for an edge. A
restaurant or club with such a system has a powerful tool at their
disposal. Because of the intrinsic clarity of ‘CHAOS’ speakers, even
passive listening is improved. Because background music is easier
to hear clearly, lower levels are required for a given ambience
making conversation less of a strain. Patrons would definitely realize
the difference and soon become accustomed to the higher standard
and return often (hopefully with a friend).
For houses of worship where speech intelligibility is foremost
in an often echoic environment, ‘CHAOS’ sound systems easily
provide clear crisp sound to all corners. Their ability to overcome
room acoustics means that fewer speakers are required as
compared to traditional distributed sound systems to achieve the
same coverage. This not only reduces complexity but also gives an
immediate cost benefit in installation and maintenance.
In theatre and cinemas the system comes into its own. The
ability of ‘CHAOS’ to recreate subtle ambience is perfectly suited to
the movie sound track and surround sound systems. The lack of
reliance on specially designed acoustic features allows broad usage
throughout many different room types. As such, chains of cinemas
could enjoy not only markets of scale for their PA products, but also
a simplified inventory due to the simple and modular nature of
‘CHAOS SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY’.
From their home in recording studios to your lounge room
‘CHAOS SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY’ are setting new standards in sound
reproduction technology. In the process they are bringing quality

Matthew Wood
Page 8 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

high fidelity sound to a wider range of users than ever before. The
synthesis of technology that is ‘CHAOS SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY’ has
been long overdue but now that it has arrived it represents a new
era in sound reproduction.

Fig 6 A polar plot of sound energy from a ‘Spatial One’

speaker. Note the similarity between this and the reflection pattern
of a Quadratic Residue Diffuser
.

Matthew Wood
Page 9 April 2001
‘CHAOS' SPEAKER TECHNOLOGY AND ITS APLICATIONS.

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING.

The Expansion of Electronic signals back into Acoustic Space –
an Introduction to FSS
Joseph Hayes
Paper presented to the 99th convention of the Acoustic Society
of America 1996
Illustrations in figures 1-4 are from
Acoustics and Psycoacoustics
David M Howard & James Angus
Oxford, Focal Press 1996
Acoustics for Engineers
J.D. Turner & A.J. Pretlove
Macmillan 1991
Audio Technology Fundamentals
Alan A Cohen
H.W. Sams, Indianapolis USA 1989
M.H. Schroeder
Binaural dissimilarity and optimum ceilings for concert halls:
More lateral sound Diffusion.
JASA 65, 958-963, 1979
HTTP:\WWW.NEWAUDIO.COM.AU

Matthew Wood
Page 10 April 2001