Hello,
Last week I boyught Audio Video magazine in Poland and read article about YBA Initial CD player. Author of the article wrote something strange to me - he said that after opening the player he had noticed, that interior of the CD had looked just like HarmanHardon HD750, which is 5 times chipper than YBA.
So, I began to think: how many times we (customers) are betrayed and how many times we lie to ourselves (that we hear the DIFFERENCE). Do we really hear the Difference between 5% resistors and 1% resistors, FETs and bipolars, golden plated connectors and not goldenplated, feedback resistor very close to LM's or not etc. ?
I've lately built gainclone and I'm not sure, that if I had used 1% resistors or polipropylene capacitors, the sound would be better.
I think that it is very important: DO NOT LIE TO YOURSELF.
I'm interested if anyone of you think about it.
Last week I boyught Audio Video magazine in Poland and read article about YBA Initial CD player. Author of the article wrote something strange to me - he said that after opening the player he had noticed, that interior of the CD had looked just like HarmanHardon HD750, which is 5 times chipper than YBA.
So, I began to think: how many times we (customers) are betrayed and how many times we lie to ourselves (that we hear the DIFFERENCE). Do we really hear the Difference between 5% resistors and 1% resistors, FETs and bipolars, golden plated connectors and not goldenplated, feedback resistor very close to LM's or not etc. ?
I've lately built gainclone and I'm not sure, that if I had used 1% resistors or polipropylene capacitors, the sound would be better.
I think that it is very important: DO NOT LIE TO YOURSELF.
I'm interested if anyone of you think about it.
Sure, my opinion is: A lot of "tweaks" aren't 'listenable' (don't know the right word, 'audible'?). If you don't believe it: Try it. Build the same thing 2 times, one with good and expensive components, the other with 'standard' components. Then do a 'blind' listening test and guess at which unit you are currently listening.
I could write more, but I don't know all the technical terms.
so long
karahara
I could write more, but I don't know all the technical terms.
so long
karahara
I think that besides the psycho accoustic effects (like when bose found that one of the main variables in sound perception that influenced how the speaker was rated was the price paid for the speaker....) is that when the humitidy and air pressure change in the house, it changes the sound somewhat. That is why people believe that mods that shouldnt really have any impact have alot of impact, and why you have people spending $500 on a volume controll knob.
orkaniusz said:
Does that mean anything?
Does that mean they sound the same?
On the 80's almost every CDP from the smaller brands was a modified Philips.
I'm modding a Pioneer DV-575 and it still looks like a Pioneer inside.
The thing is, it's now playing much better than in original form and it could be sold by 10x more money.
Rebranded with a fancy name.
Re: Re: Lies about our gainclones
Interesting Carlos, I own a 656A and purchased it for its sonics and relatively good dacs. What are you changing?
By the way, your snubberized layout functions also very well with 4* 4700uf at the boards (of course you need to do the snubber cirquit 4 times except bleeders) Now playing Joe Jackson
Orkaniusz: Dont't buy anything where you can't hear the difference. I played a lot with silver speaker wires but could hear any difference with OFC copper. So.. everything might have its merrits but if they are of 0 value to you than don't use em.
carlosfm said:
Does that mean anything?
Does that mean they sound the same?
On the 80's almost every CDP from the smaller brands was a modified Philips.
I'm modding a Pioneer DV-575 and it still looks like a Pioneer inside.
The thing is, it's now playing much better than in original form and it could be sold by 10x more money.
Rebranded with a fancy name.
Interesting Carlos, I own a 656A and purchased it for its sonics and relatively good dacs. What are you changing?
By the way, your snubberized layout functions also very well with 4* 4700uf at the boards (of course you need to do the snubber cirquit 4 times except bleeders) Now playing Joe Jackson
Orkaniusz: Dont't buy anything where you can't hear the difference. I played a lot with silver speaker wires but could hear any difference with OFC copper. So.. everything might have its merrits but if they are of 0 value to you than don't use em.
Re: Re: Re: Lies about our gainclones
That's a different player/circuit, and each one demands different things. What works here doesn't work there, and so on...
You don't need the 4 snubbers.
I like Joe Jackson.
A member e-mailed me some days ago saying he was astonished about the improvement the snubber made on his amp.
He was listening to Beck, and then Jeff Buckley.
If you guys are back enjoying good music in an impulsive way when you improve your gear I'm very happy.
indoubt said:
That's a different player/circuit, and each one demands different things. What works here doesn't work there, and so on...
indoubt said:By the way, your snubberized layout functions also very well with 4* 4700uf at the boards (of course you need to do the snubber cirquit 4 times except bleeders) Now playing Joe Jackson
You don't need the 4 snubbers.
I like Joe Jackson.
A member e-mailed me some days ago saying he was astonished about the improvement the snubber made on his amp.
He was listening to Beck, and then Jeff Buckley.
If you guys are back enjoying good music in an impulsive way when you improve your gear I'm very happy.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Lies about our gainclones
That would be me... I think
Carlos was kind enough to help me implement the snubber circuit into a kit I bought that uses 3300uF Nichicon's. Before the snubber caps it sounded like a boom box with bass boosters switched on and lots of other unpleasant nasties. Boomy, bloomy, whatever you like to call it
Afterwards it was as if someone had told the rest of the musicians to come out from behind a brick wall and if the bassist didn't tighten up his act in a big way he'd get a kick in the pants. The 'group' are playing together now and the amp is great with a synergy that wasn't otherwise present before the tweak!
Thanks Carlos
carlosfm said:
A member e-mailed me some days ago saying he was astonished about the improvement the snubber made on his amp.
He was listening to Beck, and then Jeff Buckley.
If you guys are back enjoying good music in an impulsive way when you improve your gear I'm very happy.
That would be me... I think
Carlos was kind enough to help me implement the snubber circuit into a kit I bought that uses 3300uF Nichicon's. Before the snubber caps it sounded like a boom box with bass boosters switched on and lots of other unpleasant nasties. Boomy, bloomy, whatever you like to call it
Afterwards it was as if someone had told the rest of the musicians to come out from behind a brick wall and if the bassist didn't tighten up his act in a big way he'd get a kick in the pants. The 'group' are playing together now and the amp is great with a synergy that wasn't otherwise present before the tweak!
Thanks Carlos
phase_accurate said:
It works fine, I upgraded the firmware and it seems quicker to recognize any type of disc.
It's very fast indeed.
It plays SACD directly (I've chosen SACD 2-channels by default), CD too and DVD-A too, but some DVD-A's have menus... although on some you just have to hit <enter>.
To change between the SACD and CD layer you need the TV.
I didn't fully explore the remote control but I don't think it's possible without the on-screen menu.
For now I know the insides better than the outsides.
Oh, it sounds like C R A P in original form, as expected for the price.
quote:
Originally posted by Chris8sirhC
(like when bose found that one of the main variables in sound perception that influenced how the speaker was rated was the price paid for the speaker....)
LOL! i never knew that! so bose actually has a scientific "reason" for ripping people off
Hi,
That's nothing new. For instance, the VP for Engineering at Harman International gives the same message, but more diplomatically:
http://www.harman.com/wp/pdf/AudioScience.pdf
Go down to the section titled "Blind vs Sighted testing - Seeing is believing"
Actually, I don't think that it is ripping people off as you say. They (Bose) don't hide anything or lie as far as I can see. They explain direct-reflecting concepts and that is what they sell. Contrary to some other salesmen that outright tell nonsense knowingly and want you to believe in magic to say it nice.
Jan Didden
Originally posted by Chris8sirhC
(like when bose found that one of the main variables in sound perception that influenced how the speaker was rated was the price paid for the speaker....)
LOL! i never knew that! so bose actually has a scientific "reason" for ripping people off
Hi,
That's nothing new. For instance, the VP for Engineering at Harman International gives the same message, but more diplomatically:
http://www.harman.com/wp/pdf/AudioScience.pdf
Go down to the section titled "Blind vs Sighted testing - Seeing is believing"
Actually, I don't think that it is ripping people off as you say. They (Bose) don't hide anything or lie as far as I can see. They explain direct-reflecting concepts and that is what they sell. Contrary to some other salesmen that outright tell nonsense knowingly and want you to believe in magic to say it nice.
Jan Didden
Re: Re: Re: Re: Lies about our gainclones
You don't need the 4 snubbers.
Well, as I use the larger caps on the original 1500uF locations and as the snubbers need to be closer to the chips as the large caps they are very near the chip pins, hence I used 4. Otherwise the snubber cirquit would be very close to one chip and very far from the other. The improvement is there. It is difficult to check whether the mids and highs have detoriated but to my opinion they are as clean and sweet as before.
Again: thanks for sharing.
You don't need the 4 snubbers.
Well, as I use the larger caps on the original 1500uF locations and as the snubbers need to be closer to the chips as the large caps they are very near the chip pins, hence I used 4. Otherwise the snubber cirquit would be very close to one chip and very far from the other. The improvement is there. It is difficult to check whether the mids and highs have detoriated but to my opinion they are as clean and sweet as before.
Again: thanks for sharing.
Thanks for your replies. My favourite is:
Thank you, phn.
I'm going to prepare some kind of a list of my beliefs in my Audio Religion (Maybe I am "Loosing my religion"? )
And, of course, a list of things I do not believe.
My opinion for now is: There are good (honest) and bad (dishonest) manufacturers of audio components. Unfortunatelly, often we won't be able to distinguish. There are real factors of good sound and there are craps. I 'm often not able to distinguish.
Thank you, phn.
I'm going to prepare some kind of a list of my beliefs in my Audio Religion (Maybe I am "Loosing my religion"?
)And, of course, a list of things I do not believe.
My opinion for now is: There are good (honest) and bad (dishonest) manufacturers of audio components. Unfortunatelly, often we won't be able to distinguish. There are real factors of good sound and there are craps. I 'm often not able to distinguish.
carlmart said:
If you ask Pioneer, they will send you a CD, free of charge.
If you use google, like I do, you can find the necessary file on the net, record a cd-rw and upgrade the player.
You don't connect the player anywhere, you just put the CD and press Play.
carlmart said:
No.
And I didn't bother with that (yet).
I'm an audio kind of guy.
The firmware is essentially the "operating system" of the CD player. Upgrading it can change all kinds of things really, from interface to actual preformance. There are usually change logs that come with a firmware upgrade describing what the differences will be.
Carlos:
I know that this is probably just something you've learned over years of tinkering with electronics, but when you get a particular device (ie. a CD player) and you want to improve it's preformance, where do you start? I've got an SACD player that I'd be interested in tweaking (Philips DVD-763SA). I'm familiar with electronics, but I'm not sure about where specifically to start looking to increase it's preformance. I would only be interested in mods that would unquestionably improve preformance (ie. not upgrading all caps to black gate, etc). Do I need the schematics to start with?
Thanks and sorry for this thread hi-jacking...
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