Capacitors--whom to trust?

[Quince]

On the one hand we have Walt Jung's article:
http://waltjung.org/PDFs/Picking_Capacitors_1.pdf
http://waltjung.org/PDFs/Picking_Capacitors_2.pdf

However, it is at great odds with Rod Elliot's article in many points, such as the magnitude of audible effects caused by dielectric absorption, paralleling electrolytics with films, and so on:
http://sound.westhost.com/articles/capacitors.htm

So, which one is right?

Then we have this capacitor distortion page, and I'm trying to figure out what the graphs are actually showing, as I can't read the Japanese:
http://fnt-www.ss.titech.ac.jp/~haji...istortion/cap/

Any ideas?

[janneman]

Originally posted by Quince
On the one hand we have Walt Jung's article:
http://waltjung.org/PDFs/Picking_Capacitors_1.pdf
http://waltjung.org/PDFs/Picking_Capacitors_2.pdf

However, it is at great odds with Rod Elliot's article in many points, such as the magnitude of audible effects caused by dielectric absorption, paralleling electrolytics with films, and so on:
http://sound.westhost.com/articles/capacitors.htm

So, which one is right?

Then we have this capacitor distortion page, and I'm trying to figure out what the graphs are actually showing, as I can't read the Japanese:
http://fnt-www.ss.titech.ac.jp/~haji...istortion/cap/

Any ideas?

One criterium:

Which tests etc are repeatable, controlled, and consistent, and will give the same resuts next year as this year?

Jan Didden

[AndrewT]

I would put more trust in Walt than Rod.

[jcx]

But you have to consider the company Walt was keeping for that article

Rod has occasionally gone overboard and made simply wrong statements on his site in his enthusiasm for "debunking" audiophile claims

But I found Rod's capacitor page overall very good at sticking to clear engineering based explanations

Rod's presentation of the linear model of dielectric adsorption is consistent with Bob Pease' "capacitor Soakage" article

http://www.national.com/rap/Applicat...570,28,00.html

Cyril Bateman's "Capacitor Sound" series in Electronics and Wireless World made high resolution measurements of distortion in many capacitor types and should supercede the Marsh/Jung article - if you believe that measurable distortion explains subjective capacitor "sound"

[Salas]

Get a generic 1uf polyester cap and feed your cd signal to your preamp through it. Then bypass it with a wire. And listen again. You will be forming your own opinion.

[janneman]

Originally posted by salas
Get a generic 1uf polyester cap and feed your cd signal to your preamp through it. Then bypass it with a wire. And listen again. You will be forming your own opinion.

Better yet, let some else do the bypassing. And not tell you. That's rational research!

Jan Didden

[Salas]

A/B testing gives some negative psychological charge to my experience. Pressing the brain to hear a difference quickly, it may very well not relax and give a quick and dirty 'all sounds the same' answer just to get rid of the sonic lusting owner.

[pooge]

There's no requirement that the switching has to take place quickly. Put it on one, listen as long as you like, then switch and listen as long as you like. The important thing is that you don't know what's playing, and conditions are the same.

[Juergen Knoop]

Hi,
there must be something missing.
If the modell of DA is correct, than it could only introduce linear distortion. The effects on amplitude and phase, should show up on measurements.
If there are none inside the audio band, than DA is not audible.
So whats wrong?
Regards

[Salas]

Thats the proper way, taking time, getting to relax, just not knowing what is on. System steady and known. Music steady and known.