Thank you for demonstrating what ugly and boorish snobbery looks like. Given that's an audible null hypothesis based on (essentially) a null electrical measurement, can you remotely refute it? And anecdote doesn't count. How much would you expect two pieces of hardware to sound different when the differences are easily below -80 db?
Effects box may be used derisively/dismissively by those who assert signal purity is the path to enlightenment, or it can be exactly what it's called, an effects box. Lot's of them used to tune the sound here, there and everywhere. I haven't read an assertion in this thread that that an LDR *is* necessarily an effects box, but simply that resistor ladders and potentiometers, if not pathological in components or application, are sufficiently neutral (very very linear) that any audible difference between a LDR and a potentiometer (and making the assumption that the pot/LDR impedances are similar and not differently loading up/downstream equipment) must mean that the LDR is affecting the sound. And for us amateurs who don't do controlled testing, it's going to be hard saying that there *is* a notable difference in gear because the very act of modifying our gear and the fallibility of memory mean that before/after comparison cannot be generalized. It's impossible to falsify.
There's nothing wrong with liking the sound of something. I'm glad you enjoy it! Goodness graciousness, I hope we're past the point of caring if other people's preferences are different, even if we have such esteemed responses as the one above yours. We're in this for ultimately our own sake, no? It'd be nice to know if an LDR *is* acting as an effects box so one can make a deliberate choice to use it/not use it based on that very effect. You're just reading the language of people used to thinking in terms of deliberate and refutable decisions.
Last edited:
Very few, if any owners of LDR attenuators, dislike them.
As well as my LDR, I own two active pre's, a Pioneer Spec 1 , and a Quad 44
which get used about 5% of the day for FM radio. The other 95% of the listening
day and night is via LDR, because they just sound better.
Cheers / Chris
Who said that the distortion has "a materially adverse effect on the quality of the audio as perceived by listeners"? It certainly has "a materially adverse effect on the quality of the audio" signal, but this is clearly being perceived by some listeners as an advantage. Hence we have no need to invoke some mystical but otherwise unknown effect of the "unique conductive material" in an LDR.CaptainWatt said:
You agree that LDRs distort. We agree that LDRs don't distort much. It is therefore unsurprising that the small amount of distortion is not recognised as such but may be perceived as some sort of improvement.
Yes.
All I see is a persistent statement of the truth, which is persistently denied by others. Some people don't like having their views challenged, and perceive any correction as a personal attack.
It is as though someone who likes a particular type of cake gets upset when someone else points out that it has an unusually high amount of sugar in it and so perhaps the person likes sugar? The cake lover claims that this cake has only a tiny extra amount of sugar and it is not this he likes but some other mystery ingredient which the cake includes. The cook admits that he has added no extra ingredient, and admits that the cake does contain some extra sugar, yet the cake eaters still persist in their belief that the cake has something extra.
Yes, if they are competently designed (the vast majority). This assumes, of course, ears-only evaluation, no peeking.
I design my tube circuits to have low distortion, low noise, and low source impedance. Surprisingly, they sound just like competently designed solid state circuits. I don't claim any magical qualities to them, they merely make small signals larger and allow me to raise and lower the volume.
My rationale is "fun", not magic or pseudo-scientific twaddle.
Hi guys,
I am not a guru in audio engineering. I just did a test:
I connected an LDR attenuator between my CD and my amplifier and I didn’t notice any sound degradation.
Compared to a preamp with opa627 and a DCB1, I found the LDR to be the most transparent preamp.
FYI my system is: Esoteric K-03 -> Viva Solista MK3 -> Sonus Faber Amati Anniversario.
I am not a guru in audio engineering. I just did a test:
I connected an LDR attenuator between my CD and my amplifier and I didn’t notice any sound degradation.
Compared to a preamp with opa627 and a DCB1, I found the LDR to be the most transparent preamp.
FYI my system is: Esoteric K-03 -> Viva Solista MK3 -> Sonus Faber Amati Anniversario.
Last edited:
What leads you to believe that the distortion is perceived at all, let alone that it may be preferred? You seem to be assuming it's audible to most and preferred by some but produce no evidence for your hypothesis or, perhaps more accurately, your guess. It's a common fallacy that you can measure the impact of signal distortion on human perception with a THD meter. Extremes aside, you can't.
It's not that humans like or don't like a little distortion, it's that some types of distortion we (unless unusually perceptive and/or trained) simply do not hear because that's the way perception works and some types we jolly well do hear however much that admittedly awkward fact may leave electronic engineers floundering.
Perception evolved, for obvious reasons, to be most sensitive to discontinuity, not to continuity. I'm not in the least surprised that a little harmonic distortion, though it might send your THD meter off scale, doesn't bother perfectly competent listeners whereas other, apparently imperceptible, events that no meter is ever going to catch are perceived even if only subliminally. (Again, see that Nelson Pass paper on NFB where he looks at distortions in the time domain.)
I'd wager that LDRs, despite their slightly higher harmonic distortion, somewhere have less of other forms of non-linear distortion esp when measured in circuit. To ignore the odd report here or there is not unreasonable but to belittle hundreds of such reports as the rantings of (to quote) the "deluded" is, with respect to the chap who said it, not scientifically convincing.
As an EE pal of mine put it (I'd mentioned this spat): "I think LDR's are probably better than pots for several reasons. The main one being no wiper contact . . . as I've mentioned, they used to use them [LDRs] in the video faders where I worked and video is at least as cranky as audio. Not so much when you are just watching Bonanza but if you critically eyeball a direct video feed on a wide bandwidth monitor you can perceive all sorts of distortions, especially if you know what to look for."
That's not, of course, evidence of anything much except an open mind but I find it interesting that his take is on the same lines as LDR stalwart George's.
Replying to "Experts do not need to listen to music through LDRs to be certain of their conclusions and therefore aren't interested in doing so", you replied "Yes". Wow. Thanks for that - I've never read the empirical being so clearly eschewed from an engineering POV.
Yup. Seems to be the case.
And I am pleased that you are happy. No one will grumble that you prefer that setup.
Well "tone control" was mentioned in post #3 and why is it a damnation? If someone likes tube amps because they modify the bass response of their favorite speakers I have no problem with that. They might even have a whole mystical belief system around tubes until someone demonstrates a small series resistor on a SS amp gives them the same experience.
If folks want to insist LDR distortion means nothing at all without testing the hypothesis I guess simply asking is a waste of time. I wouldn't bet the farm on CdS having some undiscovered wunder-properties.
But it has been stated on this thread time and again that LDR distortion is the determinant of why some prefer them to other VC techniques. That's the untested hypothesis.
An (in this thread, explicit) corollary of that hypothesis is that those who express a preference for LDRs are "deluded". It's probably too fatuous an hypothesis to merit testing but suspect others may disagree. Whatever, it is unarguably an hypothesis.
Anecdotal reports from users of their preference for LDR devices are not an hypothesis, they're data. OK, not very robust data but data nonetheless. I don't recall any of those offering up their experiences claiming they were anything other than subjective reports.
You probably didn't mean that.
Obviously you don't know Scott. And the history behind that. Google: The Carver challenge.
Edit: try this: http://www.stereophile.com/content/carver-challenge#LQaKveTgBGqOSCaT.97
jan
Last edited:
If people change one thing and claim that something sounds different, then either something else changed (whether electronic or neurological) or that one change made the difference. The former isn't necessarily out of the question, nor are they mutually exclusive.
I wish "deluded" didn't carry such baggage, but as you well know (given our prior exchange), how we perceive/ingest the world around us is pretty variable both in a person and between people. Given the laundry list of confounding variables and perhaps different standards for what we can call "data", I have to disagree that these anecdotes are anything but that.
So now it is about 'believe'? That's fine with me but I thought we had a technical discussion.
But, agreed, your believe is your personal thing and that is irrelevant to the rest of us.
Jan
I don't know what defects a TVC control has so can't comment. A plain old potentiometer or stepped attenuator and amp/buffer designed by a competent engineer, used as intended, will be audibly transparent regardless of the types of active devices chosen. This assumes that the sonic comparisons are done ears-only.