you are rearranging the words and their meanings in your head so to be able to disagree with me more readily
yawn, you win, completely and utterly win the game of irrelevant volleying. clearly all you need to be able to do is infer the meaning of words to make them meaningful, how can I possibly win such an argument...
Counter Culture:
Can you please respond correctly and thoughtfully to my post?
I'm curious to hear exactly what it is you're so worked up about. The short, snide remarks aren't helping with that.
A while back you said:
The problem is, that's exactly what I'm doing, so there's no need to get all worked up!
What I'm asking of you though, is to present this "evidence" you've got that shows what is and isn't audible or important.
I'm not aware of any conclusive tests or data on this topic, and I'm honestly curious. I do know that there are general guidelines for good design practice that usually have to do with the minimum desirable criteria, but I'm not aware of any scientifically rigorous testing that shows what the limits of human hearing are as they pertain to the questions I asked in my previous post.
Regards,
Owen
Can you please respond correctly and thoughtfully to my post?
I'm curious to hear exactly what it is you're so worked up about. The short, snide remarks aren't helping with that.
A while back you said:
The problem is, that's exactly what I'm doing, so there's no need to get all worked up!
What I'm asking of you though, is to present this "evidence" you've got that shows what is and isn't audible or important.
I'm not aware of any conclusive tests or data on this topic, and I'm honestly curious. I do know that there are general guidelines for good design practice that usually have to do with the minimum desirable criteria, but I'm not aware of any scientifically rigorous testing that shows what the limits of human hearing are as they pertain to the questions I asked in my previous post.
Regards,
Owen
Owen
I have no problem with the very large majority of what you are saying, but when you made the remark I quoted in post #42, you stepped over the line.
Anybody contemplating the purchase of an amplifier can make the intellectual leap for themselves, the last thing they need is you attempting to stir up their emotions in an arena already clouded with sharp practice.
Stick to extolling the superlative technical performance of your amplifier and stay away from suggesting that amplifiers with poorer specifications may sound worse. You'll be better respected for it.
I have no problem with the very large majority of what you are saying, but when you made the remark I quoted in post #42, you stepped over the line.
Anybody contemplating the purchase of an amplifier can make the intellectual leap for themselves, the last thing they need is you attempting to stir up their emotions in an arena already clouded with sharp practice.
Stick to extolling the superlative technical performance of your amplifier and stay away from suggesting that amplifiers with poorer specifications may sound worse. You'll be better respected for it.
counter culture:
I fully appreciate what you're saying, and I do generally agree with you, but I still feel like you've taken that statement way out of context, and painted me in a bad light as a result.
I have never (and will never) say that anything I've ever built sounds better than something else by virtue of the fact that it measures better. All I offer is an honest, repeatable, and scientifically accurate set of measurements for the designs I've done. People can draw their own conclusions.
As I've said several times, I intentionally avoid statements like that because they are opinion and not fact. The audio industry is already rife with opinion and very short on fact, which is a situation I wish would improve.
It very clearly does not. No part of that sentence makes any statement about what is or isn't audible.
No. That is not the intent of that statement. I wouldn't even call that a reasonable inference.
What you can infer from that sentence is exactly what it says... that it's wrong to make statements of fact about something without any factual proof to back it up, regardless of whether you err on the "skeptical" side, or the "everything is audible" side.
Hopefully that clarifies things and we can put this to bed.
Regards,
Owen
I fully appreciate what you're saying, and I do generally agree with you, but I still feel like you've taken that statement way out of context, and painted me in a bad light as a result.
I have never (and will never) say that anything I've ever built sounds better than something else by virtue of the fact that it measures better. All I offer is an honest, repeatable, and scientifically accurate set of measurements for the designs I've done. People can draw their own conclusions.
As I've said several times, I intentionally avoid statements like that because they are opinion and not fact. The audio industry is already rife with opinion and very short on fact, which is a situation I wish would improve.
It very clearly does not. No part of that sentence makes any statement about what is or isn't audible.
No. That is not the intent of that statement. I wouldn't even call that a reasonable inference.
What you can infer from that sentence is exactly what it says... that it's wrong to make statements of fact about something without any factual proof to back it up, regardless of whether you err on the "skeptical" side, or the "everything is audible" side.
Hopefully that clarifies things and we can put this to bed.
Regards,
Owen
LOL... IIRC, Rocket Scientist specified a 'more relaxed' 80dB threshold as being 'Good Enough' in his blog. One of the referenced studies had 100dB as being the upper limit with 80-100dB being a grey area...
I like what RS has done with the O2/ODAC and hope more people pick up the baton he's given us... However, I'm personally more comfortable using an amp that doesn't sit on some theoretical boundary, but performs beyond it. opc's design's do this and without incurring a massive premium on cost.
RS is big on his car analogies, so here's my interpretation:
If the O2 is the Porsche 911 of headphone amps, then 'The Wire' is a stripped down & tuned track version...
Regards
Paul
I like what RS has done with the O2/ODAC and hope more people pick up the baton he's given us... However, I'm personally more comfortable using an amp that doesn't sit on some theoretical boundary, but performs beyond it. opc's design's do this and without incurring a massive premium on cost.
RS is big on his car analogies, so here's my interpretation:
If the O2 is the Porsche 911 of headphone amps, then 'The Wire' is a stripped down & tuned track version...
Regards
Paul
People can infer anything if they try hard enough.
For example, being very interested in finding the exact thresholds of audibility of various parameters, I inferred from your posts that you actually had solid scientific proof and exact numbers at hand.
It was Owen's follow-up which helped clarify that you, like the rest of us, don't really know exactly what said thresholds are (or if they even exist). Ah, well, the excitement was good while it lasted!
The only way to protect yourself from people misinterpreting your posts (be it because of personal biases, reading comprehension issues or whatever) is to refrain from posting anything. But I'm sure this forum would be poorer if Owen (or any other designer, for that matter), would do that, or even start self-censoring his posts, limiting his contribution to "rounded", politically-correct, keep-everyone-happy comments. Let's leave that to reviewers.
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oh nos, more troubling, meaningful, well argued and in depth inference like yours? how could he possibly cope...
you better watch it Owen, vague assertions like these ruin careers...
get a grip counter culture, i'm not even sure you know what your weak point is and you have completely avoided the questions, thus we can presume you concede all these points. you have only illustrated that you either have a very poor command of the English language, or are deliberately trolling.
you seem to be having great difficulty with the concept... Owen is simply stating that he does not have iron clad answers to all of these and he_most likely unlike_you, has made serious efforts to find these boundaries for himself and knows how difficult proper testing of this nature is. thus he cannot and will not rule out 100% what he does not know 100% based on the trials he involved himself with, let alone place a definite (and somewhat low) ceiling on the perceptive powers of all the people; everywhere, with little or no personal experience of such testing methods; which seems your preferred position....
its perfectly reasonable and honest, as opposed to ruling something out 100% based on preconceptions and bias based on other peoples research, albeit 'objective' preconceptions and bias
all he can do is do the very best he can, without imposing personal limits on what is 'good enough' of course this still more than qualifies as 'good enough'. This removes even the subjective and less than certain judgement of what is 'good enough' altogether.
you better watch it Owen, vague assertions like these ruin careers...
get a grip counter culture, i'm not even sure you know what your weak point is and you have completely avoided the questions, thus we can presume you concede all these points. you have only illustrated that you either have a very poor command of the English language, or are deliberately trolling.
you seem to be having great difficulty with the concept... Owen is simply stating that he does not have iron clad answers to all of these and he_most likely unlike_you, has made serious efforts to find these boundaries for himself and knows how difficult proper testing of this nature is. thus he cannot and will not rule out 100% what he does not know 100% based on the trials he involved himself with, let alone place a definite (and somewhat low) ceiling on the perceptive powers of all the people; everywhere, with little or no personal experience of such testing methods; which seems your preferred position....
its perfectly reasonable and honest, as opposed to ruling something out 100% based on preconceptions and bias based on other peoples research, albeit 'objective' preconceptions and bias
all he can do is do the very best he can, without imposing personal limits on what is 'good enough' of course this still more than qualifies as 'good enough'. This removes even the subjective and less than certain judgement of what is 'good enough' altogether.
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I's like to comment on the issue of reader inference. Clear communication is a two sided activity. It invloves the clarity, specificity, and context of information provided by the writer, but also, as was suggested by Shaman, the reading comprehension, biases, etc. of the reciever. The possibility of mis-communication is aways present, especially is this sort of casual forum. Our various contemporaneous comments and postings here are necessarily brief, sometimes even mysterious. For many here, english is not their first language. I suggest, therefore, that no one should expect peer review, or even article grade grade commentary.
Should anyone finds some particular comment unclear, then they should seek clarification from the writer, with their mind open to the possibility that they are mistaken in their initially inferred. That's easy enough, isn't it? I find the notion that it's fully incumbent on the writer to ensure there's no possibility for mistaken inference impractical, perhaps, impossible. An online forum such as this enables nearly real-time dialog for obtaining any desired additional information. The threat that comments which are not written so as to preclude any possibility of mistaken inferences by readers will be pounced on with criticism strikes me as not constructive, at best.
Should anyone finds some particular comment unclear, then they should seek clarification from the writer, with their mind open to the possibility that they are mistaken in their initially inferred. That's easy enough, isn't it? I find the notion that it's fully incumbent on the writer to ensure there's no possibility for mistaken inference impractical, perhaps, impossible. An online forum such as this enables nearly real-time dialog for obtaining any desired additional information. The threat that comments which are not written so as to preclude any possibility of mistaken inferences by readers will be pounced on with criticism strikes me as not constructive, at best.
No need to be particularly sorry, it's an entertaining read.
What NwAvGuy did was showing that verification of performance is a key factor in getting the most from your parts. Which essentially equates to negative feedback during development. It is also the part that most DIYers struggle with for obvious reasons (a good audio analyzer isn't cheap, for one). He showed that good engineering makes a good product, not so much fancy parts. Though obviously fancy parts may be used to come up with an even better product if the same care is taken. You're just moving further and further up the diminishing returns curve.
It is ridiculous that even the existence of a "good enough" threshold for hearing had to be debated at length in this day and age. After all, a simple thought experiment should make this clear: Assume you are playing back just the distortion that a component adds, and that it ends up entirely under your hearing threshold (IOW, you're not hearing a peep). How are you expecting to hear it in the presence of the signal?
In real life, the auditory system is even worse. It's not extremely linear to begin with, and shows funny effects such as masking. It just doesn't produce much of any higher-order distortion and thus potentially has a chance of capturing that produced by electronics, at least down to ATH as outlined above. (I played around with harmonics added to a 440 Hz sine once, and found I could still detect the presence of 7th and 8th at -70 dBr, if at fairly high volume.)
Now let's see whether anyone actually comes up with something that betters or equals the O2 and ODAC in every respect. Should be quite doable amp wise, considering the current driving capabilities and noise levels of the lowly 4556 compared to a fancy opamp + buffer combination. Whether anyone is going to bother to adhere to the same kind of standards is another question...
What NwAvGuy did was showing that verification of performance is a key factor in getting the most from your parts. Which essentially equates to negative feedback during development. It is also the part that most DIYers struggle with for obvious reasons (a good audio analyzer isn't cheap, for one). He showed that good engineering makes a good product, not so much fancy parts. Though obviously fancy parts may be used to come up with an even better product if the same care is taken. You're just moving further and further up the diminishing returns curve.
It is ridiculous that even the existence of a "good enough" threshold for hearing had to be debated at length in this day and age. After all, a simple thought experiment should make this clear: Assume you are playing back just the distortion that a component adds, and that it ends up entirely under your hearing threshold (IOW, you're not hearing a peep). How are you expecting to hear it in the presence of the signal?
In real life, the auditory system is even worse. It's not extremely linear to begin with, and shows funny effects such as masking. It just doesn't produce much of any higher-order distortion and thus potentially has a chance of capturing that produced by electronics, at least down to ATH as outlined above. (I played around with harmonics added to a 440 Hz sine once, and found I could still detect the presence of 7th and 8th at -70 dBr, if at fairly high volume.)
Now let's see whether anyone actually comes up with something that betters or equals the O2 and ODAC in every respect. Should be quite doable amp wise, considering the current driving capabilities and noise levels of the lowly 4556 compared to a fancy opamp + buffer combination. Whether anyone is going to bother to adhere to the same kind of standards is another question...
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