Can we hear high-res audio files as being superior to Red Book standard CD (16/44)?
And are measurements a corroboration of our listening assessments?
* AVS/AIX High-Resolution Audio Test: Ready, Set, Go! - AVS Forum
** High-Resolution Audio Listening Event at CE Week 2014 - AVS Forum
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About the latest adventures in speaker's designs?
- Measurements: http://www.soundstagenetwork.com/in...&catid=77:loudspeaker-measurements&Itemid=153.
- Review: http://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/equipment-reviews/657-magico-s5-loudspeakers
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If playing the same quality music master/recording from one of the best recording engineer in the music bizz over an ultra high-resolution two-channel stereo sound system, and then over another one that is more humble and very good hi-fi, ...what is the exact level of joy/ecstasy does the same listener experience for the same quality music recording from each system? ...In percentage; from zero to one hundred percent. Again, from the exact same listener, and in the exact same room, and at almost the same listener position (slightly different in accounting for the different loudspeakers positioning, for optimal performance).
And! With minimal room treatments, and!...without any DSP and DRC and EQ used.
Then! With DSP, DRC and EQ used at optimum settings? ...Using a top-notch calibrated mic or mics, measuring dedicated laptop, REW, other top-notch measuring professional processes, etc....Plus with reasonable (sufficient) amount of room acoustic treatments; bass traps, absorbing panels, reflective lenses, ...and vibration/noise eliminator devices. ...Including power chords, stillpoints, interconnects, speaker wires, solid audio stands, and all that audio jazz.
And are measurements a corroboration of our listening assessments?
* AVS/AIX High-Resolution Audio Test: Ready, Set, Go! - AVS Forum
** High-Resolution Audio Listening Event at CE Week 2014 - AVS Forum
____________
About the latest adventures in speaker's designs?
- Measurements: http://www.soundstagenetwork.com/in...&catid=77:loudspeaker-measurements&Itemid=153.
- Review: http://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/equipment-reviews/657-magico-s5-loudspeakers
____________
If playing the same quality music master/recording from one of the best recording engineer in the music bizz over an ultra high-resolution two-channel stereo sound system, and then over another one that is more humble and very good hi-fi, ...what is the exact level of joy/ecstasy does the same listener experience for the same quality music recording from each system? ...In percentage; from zero to one hundred percent. Again, from the exact same listener, and in the exact same room, and at almost the same listener position (slightly different in accounting for the different loudspeakers positioning, for optimal performance).
And! With minimal room treatments, and!...without any DSP and DRC and EQ used.
Then! With DSP, DRC and EQ used at optimum settings? ...Using a top-notch calibrated mic or mics, measuring dedicated laptop, REW, other top-notch measuring professional processes, etc....Plus with reasonable (sufficient) amount of room acoustic treatments; bass traps, absorbing panels, reflective lenses, ...and vibration/noise eliminator devices. ...Including power chords, stillpoints, interconnects, speaker wires, solid audio stands, and all that audio jazz.
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Umm, depends on the listener and his/her priorities. I think you would need to put the listener into a PET scanner to get anything close to objectifiable information.
If your listener had invested hours of work in accomplishing the performance the ecstasy peak would be far higher as the project advances. His bored neighbor waiting for the next world cup match may barely notice a difference and would register far higher when offered a beer.
If your listener had invested hours of work in accomplishing the performance the ecstasy peak would be far higher as the project advances. His bored neighbor waiting for the next world cup match may barely notice a difference and would register far higher when offered a beer.
I am tempted to say that outside a few large cities there are not so many chances to hear excellent live performances. BUT when I spent time on Long Island and went to the Big Apple (NY) looking for music... like blues and jazz.... I was shocked how hard it was to find. I went to Carnegie and same thing.... for a city of 10 million, it wasnt full and almost forgotten by the masses. There just doesnt seem to be as much interest in music unless heavily promoted by dancing and fireworks and fake life style videos. Same can be said for most of the Arts, I am afraid.
I do audio electronics because I care and like music. So much that I want to hear music all the time... better if it was real, though. Second best is to sound real.
-Richard
I do audio electronics because I care and like music. So much that I want to hear music all the time... better if it was real, though. Second best is to sound real.
-Richard
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Be careful- a tourists perspective may be less than comprehensive. I'm sure there are lots of music performances in New York any given night, just not in downtown Manhattan.
Even in the Berkeley/Oakland area there are lots of opportunities to see everything from Rock to Jazz to full on Symphonic/Opera to early music on original instruments in spaces the size of your living room (for something you could almost realistically reproduce). And today's musicians are really very good. Thinking that the only good musicians are in the big cities really is not true. Good local talent is always looking for an audience.
Grass Valley doesn't have quite the variety available but still more than none and Sacramento is not that far.
Even in the Berkeley/Oakland area there are lots of opportunities to see everything from Rock to Jazz to full on Symphonic/Opera to early music on original instruments in spaces the size of your living room (for something you could almost realistically reproduce). And today's musicians are really very good. Thinking that the only good musicians are in the big cities really is not true. Good local talent is always looking for an audience.
Grass Valley doesn't have quite the variety available but still more than none and Sacramento is not that far.
Because, there is a vast treasure house of sound experiences stored in the media archives, which when reproduced at their best can easily outdo what the live experience gives. I remember after first managing to get convincing sound, and exploring the possibilties for some time, going to a Sydney Opera House recital by a quite accomplished pianist, sitting in just an average seat, and thinking, "What's so special about this?" Well, apart from the sense of occasion, the atmosphere, not much really! The piano was just OK, nothing especially wrong about it, and the playing - but it didn't have the impact, the intensity I was getting from listening to something similar at home.
A live brass band at 20 paces is harder to do, but certainly achievable - pretty damn good for a fake!
And finally, there are albums which are amazing creations of sound, which would be totally impossible to do live for an individual listener: these are often the 'difficult' recordings people have, which highlight the inadequacies of the playback system. Once the latter issues are solved these recordings can start to breathe, and the listener is taken to remarkable places ...
Besides which living pianist can deliver the combination of sheer intensity and poignant lyricism of Sviatoslav Richter? Or which conductor nowadays can inspire the Leningrad Phil into a passionate frenzy the way Mravrinsky did of old? ... WTG Frank you're on a roll
No. I was staying with Sallie Reynolds who lived on Long Island and knew what was what and where in NY. There's not much nightly music outside of bars and small crummy places... like Chicago's blues bars. I went to a local performance recently --- two world class women from L.A. who were invited (to their horror) to nearby Georgetown to perform on piano. They were all decked out in formal attire/gowns and then had to play in a dirty 1800's falling apart dump with no acoustics at all.... pianos out of tune. Folding chairs brought in for everyone to sit on. And the announcer comes out in blue jeans. Last time I was in that building it had a boxing ring in the middle of the room. Sad all the way around. Grass valley has not been much better. You are lucky to live in a large metro area where the arts are alive and well. I miss the Bay Area... Greek Theater et al.
[Folsom and Davis have a couple nice venues]
Not enough real good places for the rest of the country either. And I'll never see Yo Yo Ma out here. So, the rest of us have audio and LP and CD and HD downloads and try to hear a good performance in our homes as often as we like. Love of music that sounds real at home is a pleasure for many... it is for me.
-RM
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I agree with Demian's last post above (#13426).
But then I also agree with Richard's just above post.
* I guess it all depends if you can find the true talented artists near by where you live without taking the ferry or the helicopter.
...And @ the right venues, of course.
It's live outside, or it's live @ home.
But then I also agree with Richard's just above post.
* I guess it all depends if you can find the true talented artists near by where you live without taking the ferry or the helicopter.
...And @ the right venues, of course.
It's live outside, or it's live @ home.
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Street festivals are about as good a way as any of getting the live experience, we just had one recently up the road - lots of drums, literally dozens of them at times, just a few feet away - no pathetic PA mangling their sound ... someone, save us from typical audiophile "bass", please!
Bob, they haven't done a very good job with those A and B versions; I tried the Torme sample, it's probably the most complex example - and they're obviously different, in the hearing - one's markedly degraded. I haven't looked at what's going on inside the files yet, will be curious to see what they've mucked up ...
Ignorance and vanity, often a deadly combination.
To far too many "audiophiles", it's all about the equipment and very little about the musical content.
They read in some wonder mag that X capacitors are good, they run out and buy them and install them without even thinking what might they do, and are often disaapointed when they they do not get a revelation.
They have no inkling of an idea just how hard it is to get it just right, they seem to think you guys (the designers) just slap 'em together overnight. They are ignorant and superficial.
And they are vain. They think that by changing one or two components they can skip classes and move on from Hi Fi to the pinnacles of High End. Hah, you can't fool THEM, they know your game and they will outsmart you.
Two notes on these general rules.
Their notion of changing a component or two is richly subsidized by industry ads, which suggest the idea without stating it explicitly. Vague claims, but they sure do sound good to a novice.
The second thing is that on VERY rare occasions, changing just one component can make an unbelieavable difference. In all my audio life, that has happened to me exactly once. When I was refreshing my H/K integrated amp from 1993, along the way I changed the volume pot, throwing out that junk H/K seems to love and installing a standard ALPS Blue pot. I was flabbergasted at the difference it made to the sound, in my wildest dreams I could never dream that much up. From a moody, relatively bland sound, it changed to open and very spacious sound, literally jumping up by two classes.
I realize that this was a clear fluke and a very rare event, but many see it as a general rule. Use better parts will usually produce a positive difference, but never before or after such a big difference. However, I do not attribute this to my prowess and vision, but rather to the fact that H/K was saving money in the wrong place.
People today want much for little, they have neither the knowledge nor the patience to search thoroughly, they want it all in one go. And it's almost never that simple.
Dejan, I do see it somewhat as a general rule, but in the opposite sense to how most would view it. From my POV, that HK was a decent amp, with a major flaw - and it required someone like yourself to track it down, whether accidently, or by steadily going through the unit, considering every area. Most times with gear there will still be another flaw, of similar magnitude, so the impact will be far less impressive - but if it happens to be the last major one then there can be such a revelation,
. My approach is find each such flaw, one after the after, until the 'good sound' emerges - as I believe it always will. The "skill" is in knowing where the right places to look are - which I would agree is not easily learnt.
I would like to hear a working Fetlington done this way in an amp.... fet driving speaker up to some level where bjt comes in.
THx-RNMarsh
The only design problem I see is setting the 0R1. If outrageously lucky thing would be if VAS compensation could be low. BD746/6 look very possible.
To be honest what goes before is not something I get excited about. That's a bit like the ECU of an engine. The pistons are my focus. Before you say it ECU is critical. I would say we are not short of ECU's.
Actually Frank, with H/K it's usually very easy. Using hindsight, I think their product planning goes something like this:
"Hey George, we need pots. Find the cheapest on the market, then buy cheaper still."
You're right, the H/K 6550 IS a very good amp on its own. It's a SEPP 50/70W into 8/4 Ohms, global NFB just 17 dB but still pretty wideband, out to 270 kHz. Oddly enough, it seems to use a rather solid 400 VA or so transformer, unusually big for its class, I suppose a carry-over from volume purchasing for more powerful models, or some such.
It was always good to listen to, but now it is an outright joy to use.
"Hey George, we need pots. Find the cheapest on the market, then buy cheaper still."
You're right, the H/K 6550 IS a very good amp on its own. It's a SEPP 50/70W into 8/4 Ohms, global NFB just 17 dB but still pretty wideband, out to 270 kHz. Oddly enough, it seems to use a rather solid 400 VA or so transformer, unusually big for its class, I suppose a carry-over from volume purchasing for more powerful models, or some such.
It was always good to listen to, but now it is an outright joy to use.
Ah-ha!! Bigger transformer "than necessary" - excellent first step!
I remember looong time ago, talking to a fridge repair chappie - he said, there was always an optimum fridge to get for reliability: the smallest one that used a certain sized, standard compressor - the biggest fridge that used that particular motor, steer well clear of it!
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Frank, this is a completely different, and totally incomparable, matter. All else being equal, an amp can only benefit from a larger transformer. The end result should be a rock steady power supply, which bodes well for the sound reproduced.
With fridges, you have compressors, which are specified to work within a certain range. If one uses a stronger compressor than one should, the end result could be that the compressor cuts in and out wildly because it has say one half of the air volume it was made for. That is understandable. If your car is specified for say 195 R15 55 tyres, while you may be able to actually fit in say 235 R 15 tyres which can hold twice those standard issue tyres, but will be significantly wider and will start robbing the engine of power. End result is a more slouchy car drive, even if the road holding is way better.
With fridges, you have compressors, which are specified to work within a certain range. If one uses a stronger compressor than one should, the end result could be that the compressor cuts in and out wildly because it has say one half of the air volume it was made for. That is understandable. If your car is specified for say 195 R15 55 tyres, while you may be able to actually fit in say 235 R 15 tyres which can hold twice those standard issue tyres, but will be significantly wider and will start robbing the engine of power. End result is a more slouchy car drive, even if the road holding is way better.
Bob, they haven't done a very good job with those A and B versions; I tried the Torme sample, it's probably the most complex example - and they're obviously different, in the hearing - one's markedly degraded. I haven't looked at what's going on inside the files yet, will be curious to see what they've mucked up ...
Yes Frank, that first link is an incomplete essay; not revealing anything much at all.
* The second link is much better in its degree of intelligence, and rewarding information. That's the one I recommend to you.
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