I don't believe cables make a difference, any input?

[tnargs]

Originally posted by Andre Visser
Originally posted by tnargs
fredex said brain, not ears. And he was right. Subjeckylandhydetevists are having a little trouble with this. Every time someone says the brain is doing it they say "see! see! I told you the ears are incredible!"

I can't see how the two can be separated, they function as one. In fact, I believe our ears detect much more than the brain normally "reveal" to us (hope it make sense). Eg. a blind person with "abnormal" hearing abilities still have the same ears, it is the brain (through training) that process more of the information.

They are two separate things connected by a cable... kind of like a mic connected to a dsp unit that varies its dsp settings depending on what it picks up through a camera (it's a "subjectivist dsp unit. ) ... and the blind person's experience is like having the camera shut off, which frees up some of the dsp's memory to read the mic input at higher sampling speed and resolution.

[Andre Visser]

Originally posted by tnargs
They are two separate things connected by a cable... kind of like a mic connected to a dsp unit that varies its dsp settings depending on what it picks up through a camera (it's a "subjectivist dsp unit. ) ... and the blind person's experience is like having the camera shut off, which frees up some of the dsp's memory to read the mic input at higher sampling speed and resolution.

Yip, something like that, that's the reason why I listen with closed eyes to free up resources in my asp.

[jneutron]

Originally posted by nickmckinney
[B]Laminations were considered and rejected for cost. Its hard enough selling these drivers as is. If someone is willing to pay we are willing to make them, we do custom runs of everything.

Yah, I guess the lamination NRE is a killer. I wonder if there is much savings to have standard lamination plates made and machined later to size..

Originally posted by nickmckinney
[B]We have tested with 1008, 1010, and A36 steels and found around 2% variance in motor strength and in the final product we couldn't find a difference to be honest.

Ah.. In my apps, 2% is unacceptable. Last project, the vendor subbed a different melt halfway through, and we ended up putting 1 mil thick shims on 11 thousand pound magnets in order to equilize all the magnets.

Originally posted by nickmckinney
[B] We have used American supplied steel, Chinese supplied steel, and now its a combination of both. Some things the Chinese can do that the Americans can't anymore without extremely large purchases.
As for the inductance I have measured it at all possible voice coil locations and found it tracked near the same no matter where it was located..

Well heck, ya put that copper sleeve in, whaddya expect??

Nice design.

Cheers, John

[jneutron]

Originally posted by KSTR
[B]John,
Even with no reverberant field there is a big difference between any combination of two sources forming a phantom sources and a real source. If you were to look at the eardrum signals (with ear-channel miniature mics) there woulnd't be much correlation, both in time and spectral domains.

Agreed. That is why it is useless to use mic's within the ears, or even a pair of mikes at ear spacing. Considering only first arrivals (all four*), it takes a heck of a lot of processing to try to duplicate what the brain does naturally..

First arrivals* for a mono signal..
1. left reaches left, right reaches right..image is centered. this is headphone as well as listening with a septum to prevent crosstalk.
2. Left reaches right, right reaches left..this is enough information for each ear to image the speakers directly (two), as well as a direction inverted imaging. Luckily, we tend to ignore the last three images, but I certainly agree they are confounders.

My test uses the human "processer" to really duplicate as best as possible, the placement of an image. The goal in stereo is to pretend the speakers aren't there at all, so one should try to achieve that, no?

Originally posted by KSTR
And what I meant with "engineering tricks" is then stuff like this: If you want a center phantom that is localized "below the horizon" you need to apply some processing (not only simple EQ) to produce a situation that tricks our brains into percieving the wanted effect. Same with depth positioning, etc... The problem and the art is to use these tricks (for lack of a better name, I'm german after all) wisely and in an artful way -- creating that perfect illusion were are after (and which is strongly individual, that is my firm belief). Cheap and too obvoius tricks don't work for long term satisfaction, there I fully agree.
- Klaus

I didn't mean it in a bad way. When I said "fail", I mean that the recording engineer has not been given the tools to work with that eliminate the need for special talents. So I consider it a failure of engineering...it's just my way of thinking...

Originally posted by AJinFLA
[B]Hi John. You've lost me here. How is the stimulus in a blind test at the home of superlistener A, listening to cd/LP X, any different from the stimulus from cd/LP X being played by superlistener A, during normal psychogenic listening sessions?

If you consider that humans adjust to stimulus changes in a user transparent fashion, then how would one compare subtle changes in the system...if the measurement tool adjusts without telling us?

If one really is interested in comparing cables, human adjustment capability must certainly be considered, not ignored.

Tinkering is entirely acceptable. But in itself, does not advance SOTA. When tinkering produces good results, the reasons MUST be investigated, analyzed, and reported. This was in essence, the "beef" I had with John Curl. However, I can certainly understand his attitude, as he makes a living in audio, and the better his edge, the better off he is..I cannot blame him..

Originally posted by fredex
I may not be understanding you. The stimulus I was thinking of is the sound field in the ABX-DBTing room. What do we have to adapt to for the purpose of the tests ?

The purpose of the abx/dbt testing is to find small changes using humans as the test instrument. Since we adapt to alterations in stimulus (this case being localization parameters), we must consider our adaptation..

Using a synthetic, not found in nature stimulus for audibility is not a good thing..

Cheers, John

[Jakob2]

@ jneutron,

Considering only first arrivals (all four*), it takes a heck of a lot of processing to try to duplicate what the brain does naturally..

One could argue, that our brain is detecting time differences between the arivals at both ears, and so, it there is no time difference it draws the conclusion that the sound source must be in front of us.

Not so much processing power needed so far it seems at a first glance.
But our brain is able to do the same analyzing routine for numerous sound sources at the same time and for threedimensional spaces.

So if we consider several instruments located in front of us but next to each other spanning for example 120 degress we are able to pinpoint to each source and if we add an instrument distance right in front of us our brain is still able to seperate this from the others and to tell us it´s right in front of us, but at a greater distance.

And still listening in a reverberand space does enhance our ability to do so.

Regarding additional test setups, suggested by you and KSTR, i´d have some doubts at least in the beginning.
As we are holistic systems it is sometimes difficult to predict what our reactions to alterations will be.
And the transferability of results to considerations about `normal listening`would become problematic.
(The old rule of testing- the more controlled the less the practicability of the results)

As the claim in our cable discussion is " it´s possible to hear differences after exchanging (for example) the interconnects" (all safeguarding included i.e. measurement, differences, hearing thresholds and so on) in a given setup, the first step has to be succesfull listening tests in _this_ setup.

Everything else would be helpful in better analyzing and understanding of the underlying working principles later on, if the audibility is proved.
Just for the discussion in the hifidelity reproduction scheme, in general the suggested experiments would be very interesting.

[jneutron]

Originally posted by Jakob2
[B]
One could argue, that our brain is detecting time differences between the arivals at both ears, and so, it there is no time difference it draws the conclusion that the sound source must be in front of us.

Yes. For the first arrival, and the direction inverted, the virtual is center. The alternates due to crosstalk, seem to be ignored.

Originally posted by Jakob2
[B]Regarding additional test setups, suggested by you and KSTR, i´d have some doubts at least in the beginning.

No prob..

Originally posted by Jakob2
[B]As we are holistic systems it is sometimes difficult to predict what our reactions to alterations will be.

Difficult to predict? You are a master of understatement.

Originally posted by Jakob2
[B]And the transferability of results to considerations about `normal listening`would become problematic.
(The old rule of testing- the more controlled the less the practicability of the results)

Agreed and agreed. You sound like my old statistics prof..

My points within the thread regarding audibility testing..

1. How do we account for human ability to adapt transparently to a subtle change in localization parameters.
2. Why do we use synthetic artificial, not seen in nature signals to test what humans can detect? No ITD..
3. Given purely synthetic stimulus to create an artificial source image, what level of changes are humans sensitive to specifically with respect to a real source. With the third speaker generating the real source, and two generating the artificial image, what artifacts within the artificial image system will alter the image w/r to the real one.
4. How tight do we have to control the artifacts of #3?

Originally posted by Jakob2
[B]As the claim in our cable discussion is " it´s possible to hear differences after exchanging (for example) the interconnects" (all safeguarding included i.e. measurement, differences, hearing thresholds and so on) in a given setup, the first step has to be succesfull listening tests in _this_ setup.

I still point out the confounder......human adaptation.


Assume one has created a test signal which can fool the subject into believing the center speaker (offset some arbitrary angle) is creating the sound. If we then rapidly switch between the derived image to the real speaker, will we notice an adaptation time constant?

If we use simple panning to derive the virtual image, is adaptation the same time constant?

If we drop in some ITD, then pan that to get the virtual, is the adaptation the same, different, no change.

If we find the correct mix of ITD and IID to eliminate any adaptation, THEN we use that mix and the CUT (cables under test) to determine if the cables cause the systems to diverge.

Cheers, John

[AJinFLA]

Originally posted by Andy Graddon

Yeah, I agree.. there are too many people making snide remarks.
I always assume when people do that, or start yelling, they are not thinking rationally, or objectively
and..........
it reminds me too much of my Ex
Lock 'er up Cal !! I mean the thread .......

Ok Andy, we'll put you down as "Did No Measurements Whatsoever" (in your own system, in your own home) while listening and "Hearing differences with cables that measure the same". So now it's up to Andre, Rabbitz, AnalogSa, etc.
Gentlemen?? Your cable measurements please???

Lock the thread? Uncomfortable with the discussion Andy? How about not reading it and allowing those who wish to discuss to continue? Is anyone forcing you to listen to the blasphemy of the heretics?

cheers,

AJ

[Andre Visser]

Originally posted by AJinFLA
Ok Andy, we'll put you down as "Did No Measurements Whatsoever" (in your own system, in your own home) while listening and "Hearing differences with cables that measure the same". So now it's up to Andre, Rabbitz, AnalogSa, etc.
Gentlemen?? Your cable measurements please???

AJ, I have not measured for LCR differences between cables, what's the use, I can't change it anyhow without making it shorter.

What are the chances of finding two different cables with the same LCR measurements anyway? Then wire diameter is also important, in the end every cable is a compromise.

André

[fredex]

Originally posted by jneutron
[edit] The purpose of the abx/dbt testing is to find small changes using humans as the test instrument. [edit]

Thanks. My understanding of your position may have improved. I thought the purpose of abx-dbt testing is to establish the 'audibility' of small changes not to establish whether they exist or not. As you say we adapt transparently, so even if there is a change we might not hear it. So it would seem obvious you can't use human ears as a test instrument to establish whether a small change exists.

cheers

[Alan Hope]

**************************
DOUBLE BLIND TEST RESULTS
**************************

Ok guys, I've just done the DBT.

2 ICs used, 1 copper (VdH D102III), 1 silver (Glasshouse kit 1)
Randomisation by coin toss, test run by my 13yr old daughter across 3 rooms (one listening room, one waiting room for me, another for her) - ie we did not see each other at any point during the test.
Amp volume same throughout.
System as sig.

Music: studio recorded pop - Lenny Kravitz, listening for:
Overall clarity, freq balance, guitar harmonic structure, sibilance, percussion dynamics, mid-bass tone and evenness.

20 tests, same part of same two tracks each time.
I attempted to identify each cable.

RESULTS

Null hypothesis = 10/20
Test cables correctly identified = 5/20.
(On tests: 5,7,17,18,19)

So rather muddy water - I expected either a null or a positive result.

If analysed as identifying audible DIFFERENCES between cables then it was statistically significant (two tailed p=0.0414) ie this was not a chance result.

But if looked at as an audiophile identifying silver/copper differences with confidence then it was a failure. I thought I could hear the generally described differences attributed to silver (lean but extended bass, slightly raised treble, smooth but detailed highs).
I can't.

I consistently mis-identified the cables. Not randomly but wrongly.

Interesting - and irritating!