Closer to reality, less "pleasant"?

[Patrik Floding]

I have abandoned (or I'm trying to) sounding "good" as a major criteria for judging amps!

Reasons:

1/
My listening room is far from optimal. The best system may not sound good in my room.

2/
My source equipment is not optimal, as far as I know.

3/
My speakers may have been voiced with less than perfect power amps, and/or other components choosen by varying preferences.

Example: The amp sounds "too bright" when listning from the sweet spot. Well.. how do I know that this is not correct, and I'm used to recessed sound, and/or have room aucostics that are unpleasant for the correct sound?

What are my criteria then?

1/ Life-like dynamics. "Slam". Dynamic contrast.

2/ Transparency and separation. Ease of following everything going on in the recording.

3/ Legibility of lyrics. Every word should be possible to understand, even when the music is loud and dense.

4/ Non-fatigue. If 2 and 3 is satisfied, generally fatigue is not a problem.

If the above criteria are met I believe the system will generally sound good -even if the sound in the sweet spot is a little bright, or a bit off in some other way. (Also, listening from other rooms is a good check on some aspects of sound quality, I think.)

I'd be very interested in your opinions!

Regards

[destroyer X]

I could not find the answer.

I will be following your thread to see if someone has found the solution.

If people behave honestly, not trying to fool us... they will say nothing...no one has these answers.

Many good folks have tried to discover too.... i know one that has all DIY amplifiers offered into this wide world we have... he also have bougth all important brands....he found nothing... the answer is "I don't know".

The guy i am talking about decide to tweak speakers...this way... every amplifier will be good (after adjustment) to every room and every taste... the solution he found was not the real answer..but he found the way to face the subject.

Others are turning themselves desperate...some of them are givin up... selling their amplifiers and searching Plastzillas into the local shops... the Super or Hiper Markets..... one of those "Carrefour" or "Wall Mart".

Some others decide do not evaluate anymore... then they have inserted those earphones into their ears and goes walking listening Ipod...

ahahahah...what a shame!

regards,

Carlos

.................................................. ..................................................

Man!.... this thread can be very interesting to have fun.... some "complicators" may enter to talk about the Sigma, Beta and Andromeda from the sound reverberations into human toe nail.

regards,

Carlos

[Patrik Floding]

Hi Carlos!

I'm mostly interested in what criteria others use!
As long as measuring methods are as far away from revealing sound quality as they seem to be at the moment we are at the mercy of various subjective homebrew test!

Edit: You added some intersting things to your reply! I'll reply to that later!

Regards

[lineup]

there are two major ways here
I see many people at our forum
they use both ways .. because they belief in their own ways

1. my system should sound good .. pleasing
when you can enjoy your listening .. everything is right
no matter if signal in is different from signal out
we can say this group looks on audio systems as Musical Instruments
where they play with the smusic source in harmony

2. my system should be faithful to the source
what comes in comes out = high fidelity =fi-fi
because only then I can really hear the music by the producer/recorder
a soud system should only amplifiy and add nothing
because a playback system should not be one Instrument and change the souce
not change the artwork and add to the music

[Patrik Floding]

Originally posted by lineup
there are two major ways here
I see many people at our forum
they use both ways .. because they belief in their own ways

1. my system should sound good .. pleasing
when you can enjoy your listening .. everything is right
no matter if signal in is different from signal out
we can say this group looks on audio systems as Musical Instruments
where they play with the smusic source in harmony

2. my system should be faithful to the source
what comes in comes out = high fidelity =fi-fi
because only then I can really hear the music by the producer/recorder
a soud system should only amplifiy and add nothing
because a playback system should not be one Instrument and change the souce
not change the artwork and add to the music

Hi lineup!

The problem with #1 is that the "system" includes the room, the recordings, and all the other used hifi components that are not currently under "review". That's a large number of unknown variables! This is why I decided to forget about this way of reaching the goal!

The problem with #2 is deciding what is "faithful", which is what I'm trying to narrow down in a way that is not leading me astray.

Regards

[lineup]

yeah, you are right
there are unsolved issues for both ways

now, in group #2 we have some,

that thinks everything is alright, if I have 0.0001% THD, compared to CD out,
at the output terminals for Speakers

there are a many years of inventions, before
the CD signals reach my ears with less than 0.01 %THD
----------


group #1
how about music that is composed to sound bad, unpleasant
on one audiophile system this music will sound good

which is opposite to the intention

and who wants to feel good and enjoy at every minute?
if you can not ever feel dis-harmony
how can you know what true harmony is

[jacco vermeulen]

Easy answer : assemble several dozens of EUVL's discrete opamps and build yourself an active EQ tone control.

[Patrik Floding]

Originally posted by jacco vermeulen
Easy answer : assemble several dozens of EUVL's discrete opamps and build yourself an active EQ tone control.

Hi Jacco!

I used to use a sophisticated room correction system. I abandoned it since I thought the many convertion steps robbed the music of something.
Also, EQ will never restore lost dynamics or transparency. I think EQ can have a place once a system is "perfect" in all other regards.

Regards

[darkfenriz]

Originally posted by Patrik Floding

The problem with #2 is deciding what is "faithful", which is what I'm trying to narrow down in a way that is not leading me astray.

Try different music of various genres. If different music and different production/mastering CDs have something in common this is certainly a shade of system distortions.
The better the system (and every its component), the more vividly heavy metal sounds unlike classical music and vice versa.

[Patrik Floding]

Originally posted by lineup
yeah, you are right
there are unsolved issues for both ways

now, in group #2 we have some,

that thinks everything is alright, if I have 0.0001% THD, compared to CD out,
at the output terminals for Speakers

there are a many years of inventions, before
the CD signals reach my ears with less than 0.01 %THD

I think those advocating trusting the numbers tend to forget that those numbers are arrived at using a very simple and very specific testing method. You are quite right as well in talking about what reaches your ears!

Originally posted by lineup
----------


group #1
how about music that is composed to sound bad, unpleasant
on one audiophile system this music will sound good

which is opposite to the intention

and who wants to feel good and enjoy at every minute?
if you can not ever feel dis-harmony
how can you know what true harmony is

Yes, if everything sounds "pleasant" then the system is probably not very faithful. Especially considering the many mixings that seems to have been done by people with obvious hearing damage.