Re: Many op-amps
If the recording still sounds very good after having been through dozens of cheap op-amps, can't it still sound very good after passing through one more cheap op-amp (in your CD player or pre-amp)?
And yes it is an old argument. It doesn't go away because audiophiles don't have a credible explanation why things matter so much on the smaller (playback) side of the signal chain but don't matter nearly as much on the bigger (recording) side of the chain.
I agree completely! I'm just trying to say that many (if not most) recordings that audiophiles consider to sound very good have passed through a great many op-amps some claim sound terrible. There's a conflict there.carlosfm said:
If the recording still sounds very good after having been through dozens of cheap op-amps, can't it still sound very good after passing through one more cheap op-amp (in your CD player or pre-amp)?
And yes it is an old argument. It doesn't go away because audiophiles don't have a credible explanation why things matter so much on the smaller (playback) side of the signal chain but don't matter nearly as much on the bigger (recording) side of the chain.
Are my wife ears....better than mine??
I' m surprised, if that was true, why there are so few women audiophile??
Strange, a friend of mine (also member of this forum) as been at this demonstration at the Portuguese distribuitor (Transon) and they told me that the sound was nothing special...
One more case of subjectivism...in who must i believe??? in you or him??
That's the problem of subjetivism!!
One man ceeling is another man floor!!
I' m surprised, if that was true, why there are so few women audiophile??
Strange, a friend of mine (also member of this forum) as been at this demonstration at the Portuguese distribuitor (Transon) and they told me that the sound was nothing special...
One more case of subjectivism...in who must i believe??? in you or him??
That's the problem of subjetivism!!
One man ceeling is another man floor!!
Re: Hearing And Listening Skills.
By far, I've been MOST consistent about suggesting people remove psychological bias in their listening so they can really trust their ears. What's negative about that?mrfeedback said:
I've never questioned women's hearing. Not once. I only questioned their motives for making casual comments. If you want to have them participate in some blind listening, it may well be they can hear things many men cannot. But taking a non-audiophile spouse's casual comments as she walks into a room as "proof" new op-amps made the sound better is a pretty big stretch when people have a hard time hearing differences of a much greater magnitude under much better conditions. I'm assuming here that both the new and old op-amps were working well enough to assure reasonably low distortion, flat frequency response, etc.mrfeedback said:
Well if that's the case, I'm in good company--the editors of Stereophile included (the Carver blind tests) and the people who own and work at high-end dealers (the Sunshine challenge and my own experiences). Besides, all I'm advocating is that people judge equipment by what THEY can hear with their own ears once you remove they psychological bias of knowing what they're listening to. So my hearing skills don't matter.mrfeedback said:
Candid Blind Camera
An episode of the Candid Camera TV show did a fake wine tasting where they had four filled wine glasses in front of four different bottles of wine. They had various subjects come in to taste each of the four and offer their comments and opinions. They all gave very different descriptions of each one, and were disbelieving when told afterwards that all four glasses were poured from the same bottle!
Yeah, it's wine, not audio, but it shows the incredible psychological bias us humans display in subjective matters. It's hard to argue something very similar does not happen when listening to amplifiers.
The above example strongly suggests if we took the same amplifier circuitry (say a Gainclone if you like) and "hid" it in four different high-end large well known chassis and let a group of GoldenEars audition them under whatever non-blind conditions they wanted, I have no doubt they'd all hear plenty of differences between them.
I'd further suggest their opinions would align around the external appearance of the amplifier. If one chassis was from a Pass XA series amp, I'm sure the comments would lean towards what the community praises (and/or dislikes) about Pass amps, etc.
Finally, I'd suggest if you conducted this test blind, all the perceived differences would indeed disappear because there were none to begin with! Think about it.
You never gave me the link SY, but it appears you had something like this in mind back in December (i.e. the "Tube-O-Later")?
An episode of the Candid Camera TV show did a fake wine tasting where they had four filled wine glasses in front of four different bottles of wine. They had various subjects come in to taste each of the four and offer their comments and opinions. They all gave very different descriptions of each one, and were disbelieving when told afterwards that all four glasses were poured from the same bottle!
Yeah, it's wine, not audio, but it shows the incredible psychological bias us humans display in subjective matters. It's hard to argue something very similar does not happen when listening to amplifiers.
The above example strongly suggests if we took the same amplifier circuitry (say a Gainclone if you like) and "hid" it in four different high-end large well known chassis and let a group of GoldenEars audition them under whatever non-blind conditions they wanted, I have no doubt they'd all hear plenty of differences between them.
I'd further suggest their opinions would align around the external appearance of the amplifier. If one chassis was from a Pass XA series amp, I'm sure the comments would lean towards what the community praises (and/or dislikes) about Pass amps, etc.
Finally, I'd suggest if you conducted this test blind, all the perceived differences would indeed disappear because there were none to begin with! Think about it.
You never gave me the link SY, but it appears you had something like this in mind back in December (i.e. the "Tube-O-Later")?
I'm missing the context. Something like what? Hiding "good" and "bad" components in a box with a switch, which randomly chooses "good" and "bad"? That's still something I want to do, assuming I can get someone to donate those expensive high-fashion parts and connectors (I have the switch and I can afford "bad" components).
But I'm not sending that box to Fred, he knows what to measure. This gimmick is for a listening test.
Christer asked:
SY,
since I think it is relevant to this thread, has anything happened
to the experiment you and dorkus were planning before
Christmas?
And you responded in this post:
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=150381#post150381
My impression was you were planning to use Radio Shack parts inside a fancy looking box or something like that and see how many GoldenEars would think it sounded wonderful but I'm just guessing? Is there a previous thread on this? In what forum?
SY,
since I think it is relevant to this thread, has anything happened
to the experiment you and dorkus were planning before
Christmas?
And you responded in this post:
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=150381#post150381
My impression was you were planning to use Radio Shack parts inside a fancy looking box or something like that and see how many GoldenEars would think it sounded wonderful but I'm just guessing? Is there a previous thread on this? In what forum?
Re: Good attitude.
....i agree......
cheers.
Fantastic said:Hi Mikek,
Before I close this topic I should add that your attitude is healthy.
You must inquire about what others perceive about you either by asking or by observing how they respond to you. That way you could possibly bypass the'veil' of your own bias about yourself. That way you can understand what you really are - something very difficult to do and sometimes very difficult to accept !
Like they say - can you recognise the person you see in the mirror ? Not as simple as it looks.
A word of caution - always remember that getting an opinion is easy - getting a ( relatively ) unbiased honest one is tough.
....i agree......
cheers.
Ah, OK, that clears it up. The experiment I propose goes like this:
Inside a sealed box, there's a switch (very high quality) and two pairs of high pass filters, with the corner frequency being rather low (like 10 Hz). One pair is made from cooking-grade components, steel leads, low price, too easy to get and pay for to be any good, but measurably OK. Call it "Radio Shack," if you like. The other pair is super-duper fashion-audio parts, preferably hand-made by Japanese monks and carrying an enormous price tag. treated with magic goop, if available. The two are checked to make sure that the transfer functions are tolerably close, with the Radio Shack stuff trimmed if necessary.
The switch has, say, 20 positions. Position 1 is Radio Shack. Position 2 is Japanese Zen Master. The other positions are randomly wired to one or the other, with a key sheet kept by a neutral party (I suggested Nelson Pass, but he wisely stayed far, far away form that discussion). The box is sent to someone who firmly believes that he can hear the difference between Zen and Radio Shack. He can pick any 10 of the switch positions and take as long as he likes to decide which are Radio Shack and which are Zen. He can do it any way he wants except measuring. Alone, with his wife, with his audiogeek buddies, whatever.
He returns the box to me and sends his list of guesses to the score-keeper. The score keeper will provide me with the raw score and I can then send the box to the next victim. If overall, the scores are random, that's an interesting piece of data. If one person scores significatly above chance, the test is repeated with the remaining 10 positions. If that same person scores significantly above chance again, it's pretty probable that there is audibility and that we're not dealing with so-called "lucky coins."
Inside a sealed box, there's a switch (very high quality) and two pairs of high pass filters, with the corner frequency being rather low (like 10 Hz). One pair is made from cooking-grade components, steel leads, low price, too easy to get and pay for to be any good, but measurably OK. Call it "Radio Shack," if you like. The other pair is super-duper fashion-audio parts, preferably hand-made by Japanese monks and carrying an enormous price tag. treated with magic goop, if available. The two are checked to make sure that the transfer functions are tolerably close, with the Radio Shack stuff trimmed if necessary.
The switch has, say, 20 positions. Position 1 is Radio Shack. Position 2 is Japanese Zen Master. The other positions are randomly wired to one or the other, with a key sheet kept by a neutral party (I suggested Nelson Pass, but he wisely stayed far, far away form that discussion). The box is sent to someone who firmly believes that he can hear the difference between Zen and Radio Shack. He can pick any 10 of the switch positions and take as long as he likes to decide which are Radio Shack and which are Zen. He can do it any way he wants except measuring. Alone, with his wife, with his audiogeek buddies, whatever.
He returns the box to me and sends his list of guesses to the score-keeper. The score keeper will provide me with the raw score and I can then send the box to the next victim. If overall, the scores are random, that's an interesting piece of data. If one person scores significatly above chance, the test is repeated with the remaining 10 positions. If that same person scores significantly above chance again, it's pretty probable that there is audibility and that we're not dealing with so-called "lucky coins."
It's not just audio!
I just had a conversation with a colleague who'd been to the east coast for a conference, and it sounded very familiar. She works on classroom discourse (how students and teachers talk to each other, and how that affects education) and at this conference there was a huge fight between two camps, call them the quants and the quals. The quants record and transcribe student/teacher interactions, count the number of times relevant linguistic things happen, and do statistical analyses to show what's going on. This is in contrast to the quals, who instead work from in depth case studies and their own experience as teachers.
The quals say the quants are missing the point: language is much too rich and complex to be reduced to a few numbers. The quants on the other hand argue that the quals can always come up with anecdotal evidence to "prove" whatever they want.
Apparently the fights between these camps are getting pretty ugly (by scientific standards). The field used to be all quals (it's only recently that computers have gotten powerful enough for quantitative linguistics to be possible) and they resent the quants coming in and challenging their authority. And on their side, the quants enjoy being iconoclasts and sometimes fail to recognize the depth of wisdom and experience that the quals bring to the table.
Any of this remind you of anyone?
I just had a conversation with a colleague who'd been to the east coast for a conference, and it sounded very familiar. She works on classroom discourse (how students and teachers talk to each other, and how that affects education) and at this conference there was a huge fight between two camps, call them the quants and the quals. The quants record and transcribe student/teacher interactions, count the number of times relevant linguistic things happen, and do statistical analyses to show what's going on. This is in contrast to the quals, who instead work from in depth case studies and their own experience as teachers.
The quals say the quants are missing the point: language is much too rich and complex to be reduced to a few numbers. The quants on the other hand argue that the quals can always come up with anecdotal evidence to "prove" whatever they want.
Apparently the fights between these camps are getting pretty ugly (by scientific standards). The field used to be all quals (it's only recently that computers have gotten powerful enough for quantitative linguistics to be possible) and they resent the quants coming in and challenging their authority. And on their side, the quants enjoy being iconoclasts and sometimes fail to recognize the depth of wisdom and experience that the quals bring to the table.
Any of this remind you of anyone?
Switches and capacitors.
And do you think some might suggest the switch, no matter how high quality, would mask their difficulty in determining which switch positions are which? This certainly happens in the ABX comparisons that use an ABX switcher (although they're very high quality relays instead of switches).
You may also run into widespread refusal to even take the challenge among the true GoldenEars. Again, same thing happens with blind equipment or cable challenges. Your method, however, has the advantage they can't blame time pressure or "testing stress" if they accept the challenge and don't do well.
That would be an interesting experiment! Of course, some might want to take apart the box so it would have be "tamper proof"SY said:
And do you think some might suggest the switch, no matter how high quality, would mask their difficulty in determining which switch positions are which? This certainly happens in the ABX comparisons that use an ABX switcher (although they're very high quality relays instead of switches).
You may also run into widespread refusal to even take the challenge among the true GoldenEars. Again, same thing happens with blind equipment or cable challenges. Your method, however, has the advantage they can't blame time pressure or "testing stress" if they accept the challenge and don't do well.
Re: It's not just audio!
For the wine lovers here, it's no different than blind wine tasting which is still entirely subjective. That's certainly different from sending the wine off to a chemistry lab for analysis and basing your conclusions on those results.
All that said, blind listening obviously cannot replace sighted listening. It's only another tool to be added to the audiophile's toolbox. My main point here has been to try and convey it can be a very eye and ear opening tool--even used just once.
It depends on what you're comparing. If you're talking about analytical measurement with instruments versus listening, I agree with you. If you're talking about sighted (biased) listening versus blind (unbiased) listening, It's not very analogous. Both of the latter are subjective in nature, one is just under controlled conditions that remove the psychological bias.Rob M said:The quants record and transcribe student/teacher interactions, count the number of times relevant linguistic things happen, and do statistical analyses to show what's going on. This is in contrast to the quals, who instead work from in depth case studies and their own experience as teachers....
Any of this remind you of anyone?
For the wine lovers here, it's no different than blind wine tasting which is still entirely subjective. That's certainly different from sending the wine off to a chemistry lab for analysis and basing your conclusions on those results.
All that said, blind listening obviously cannot replace sighted listening. It's only another tool to be added to the audiophile's toolbox. My main point here has been to try and convey it can be a very eye and ear opening tool--even used just once.
Re: Switches and capacitors.
In theory, yes, one has to take all kinds of precautions. But this is a simple test, and hopefully, the people participating are honest and (my own criterion) are people who are actually amateurs, in the original sense of the word. Elementary tamper-resistant measures should be sufficient; if I were sending it to Uri Geller, I might be considerably more elaborate. And I'd ask The Amazing Randi for advice (one more plug: everybody, RUN out and buy a copy of Randi's Amazing book, "Flim-Flam"). I will also avoid sending the box to people who are likely to try measurements- that's a cheat that I'm not sure how to overcome without using at least two active buffers and some means of thermal stabilization.
No doubt, especially if the test gives a null result. But if these "huge" differences are smaller than the degradation of a pair of high-quality switch contacts, anyone who is convincable will be convinced. Believe me, I have personal experience in that regard.
Several people here who claim to be able to hear these differences have volunteered. I bet Peter will, too. I sincerely admire them for their open-minded approach and their willingness to put their beliefs to a fair test.
nw_avphile said:
That would be an interesting experiment! Of course, some might want to take apart the box so it would have be "tamper proof"
In theory, yes, one has to take all kinds of precautions. But this is a simple test, and hopefully, the people participating are honest and (my own criterion) are people who are actually amateurs, in the original sense of the word. Elementary tamper-resistant measures should be sufficient; if I were sending it to Uri Geller, I might be considerably more elaborate. And I'd ask The Amazing Randi for advice (one more plug: everybody, RUN out and buy a copy of Randi's Amazing book, "Flim-Flam"). I will also avoid sending the box to people who are likely to try measurements- that's a cheat that I'm not sure how to overcome without using at least two active buffers and some means of thermal stabilization.
No doubt, especially if the test gives a null result. But if these "huge" differences are smaller than the degradation of a pair of high-quality switch contacts, anyone who is convincable will be convinced. Believe me, I have personal experience in that regard.
Several people here who claim to be able to hear these differences have volunteered. I bet Peter will, too. I sincerely admire them for their open-minded approach and their willingness to put their beliefs to a fair test.
>if we took the same amplifier circuitry and "hid" it in four different high-end large well known chassis and let a group of GoldenEars audition them under whatever non-blind conditions they wanted, I have no doubt they'd all hear plenty of differences between them. I'd further suggest their opinions would align around the external appearance of the amplifier.<
As a manufacturer, I normally use the reverse procedure, which is to put a variety of circuitry into the same chassis designs.
jonathan carr
As a manufacturer, I normally use the reverse procedure, which is to put a variety of circuitry into the same chassis designs.
jonathan carr
Re: GLOOPS...
Anyone want to buy a 220w/ch Borbely/nw_avphile mosfet hybrid cheap? It's a very musical amplifier, stunning 3-dimensional deep and wide soundstage, ethereal highs, tube-like midrange, enough bass slam to make your neighbors envious, it sounds far better than 90% of power amps out there!
They're still in that amp (I think?), but it's had a lonely life sitting in the corner for a while now. It needs a good home...fdegrove said:Haven't changed them yet for something less wondercrappy?
Anyone want to buy a 220w/ch Borbely/nw_avphile mosfet hybrid cheap? It's a very musical amplifier, stunning 3-dimensional deep and wide soundstage, ethereal highs, tube-like midrange, enough bass slam to make your neighbors envious, it sounds far better than 90% of power amps out there!
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