What you are saying is still incorrect and denotes a total lack of understanding of IMD and distortions in general. You cannot expect anybody to engage and spend time and effort to clarify this for you, in particular because you are not actually interested to hear the truth or to learn something new; you are only looking for arguments to support your psychoacoustic FUD.
Let me try to simplify it - if a speaker receives a pure two tone signal 4KHz + 5KHz, it will create IMD sum & diff products based on these signals
If a speaker receives these pure 4 +5KHz tones + the IMD sum & diff products created in the amplifier, it will create additional IMD at the speaker based on the sum & diff tones in this signal (you know they are 1KHz & 9KHz tones plus the others).
What is incorrect about this? Asking questions is not looking for arguments but you did make a statement that "electronics IMD can be safely ignored if it is much lower than the speaker IMD" & I asked on what basis you make this claim?
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The Benchmark products are promoted on the basis of producing orders of magnitude less of all distortions than any speaker or headphone. It is a fact that there are many amplifiers and DAC's that do the same. In many cases there is nothing to mask. Mark's missing reverb tails, for instance, have nothing to do with the conventional understanding of distortion.
Sure there are amplifiers that have very low IMD & that is what I posted when I referenced Bruno's post on ASR - the very low IMD in the audio band is one of the major factors that Bruno seems to put down to the relaxed & natural sound being reported for the Purifi amp
He differs somewhat from the Benchmark approach used in the AHB2 amp which attaches a lot of importance to IMD products > 20KHz
Based on Bruno's post I was asking some questions about IMD as the basis for this sound - ScottJ asked about speaker IMD Vs amp IMD
I can see how what I said could result in Mark's reverb tails not being as clearly defined as if there was no hash caused by IMD
I quoted Linkwitz comments about IMD in speakers resulting in a a sort of hash around quiet sounds, particularly when playing complex music.
I find the lifting of this hash occurs when better playback electronics are employed - lower IMD?
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There is always some audible distortion in all reproduction systems, IME, so potentially something to mask, at least so far. I saw what you said about visiting old AMD engineer friends, and finding them still very convinced about what people can and can't possibly hear. However, they are very intelligent people, and as always (and on both sides of any controversial issue), the very intelligent are good thinking up long lists of very smart reasons why they are right, and why other people have to be wrong. However, smart people thinking up reasons is no substitute for fresh research to find out where the disagreements really come from. This is nothing new, by the way. Profound disagreement happens in other sophisticated fields too.
From my perspective neither most audiophiles, nor smart ADI engineers relying on typical modeling of weakly nonlinear systems and or relying on old and limited psychoacoustic research are right. Similarly, I know they think I am not right. No point arguing about it here, since we will never settle the disagreement that way. We should raise funding for research on the so-called 5% (for want of a better name), or talk about something else.
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I agree with all you say except for the highlighted text - I don't think we should self-censor just because it may cause discomfort in others (even ad-hom attacks from them). If something strikes you or me or anybody as interesting & it happens to challenge 'received wisdom' I don't see why it shouldn't be discussed? Asking questions is the first step in advancing science - why should it be any different for audio science?
I would love to see some rigor applied to that number. It is of course multi-dimensional, what about the "5%" that prefer one phase or the other of 2nd harmonic distortion. I find it ironic for the Pass Labs approach to be mentioned recently when only a few weeks ago Dick sort of damned it with faint praise.
BTW, I think this 5% is a red herring
All people can recognize good sound reproduction when they hear it.
They may not care about it enough to want it in their home or car or whatever for many reasons - it may be that 5% is talking about people who do care enough to want the best reproduced sound a sit connects them to the music in a more natural & interesting way.
But saying that 5% of the population hear something that 95% don't is simply a rehash of the golden ears myth.
yes, people can train or be trained in identifying certain distortions with more alacrity than most people but again that is a learned skill, not an inherently different hearing acuity
All people can recognize good sound reproduction when they hear it.
They may not care about it enough to want it in their home or car or whatever for many reasons - it may be that 5% is talking about people who do care enough to want the best reproduced sound a sit connects them to the music in a more natural & interesting way.
But saying that 5% of the population hear something that 95% don't is simply a rehash of the golden ears myth.
yes, people can train or be trained in identifying certain distortions with more alacrity than most people but again that is a learned skill, not an inherently different hearing acuity
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Most of what is criticized here as unimportant is still important to serious audio designers, like me. I KNOW that digital isn't yet good enough, just by listening to it. What is with the rest of you? Are you completely happy with your $99 CD player? If so, just leave the rest of us alone, as we want to improve designs, not keep the status quo. I don't care if it is 5% or just 1%, I KNOW that many people love hi end audio and spend a great deal of their time either building great listening systems or better yet, actively working to improve virtually all parts of the audio system. They just won't contribute here, because you 'critics' are just too darn 'nasty'. So let the people who continue to care, talk between themselves, so that they can further improve their understanding about how to improve audio quality. Parroting the HK crowd just shows that you have read the wrong articles and books.
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I would need - insert the usual 1000 pages of literature on perceptual testing - to be followed before even considering that a well executed $300 DAC would be preferred over something like the Benchmark by any (to be determined) percentage of the listening public.
I hope you are not implying that all people can be trained to prefer anything in particular. "Good" sound reproduction is a totally individual subjective entity.
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I don't find anything about it ironic. That particular type of sound is not for me, but it can be adjusted by listening, so can much more subtle types of distortion. Since some of us will hear some it at least some of time, may as well try to make the last little bit as tolerable as possible.
Totally agree.
I mentioned very low IMD quoting an amp designer, Bruno Putzeys, & his new amp modules & hoping to open a discussion about it but instead I get abuse from the usual members & accused of just wanting an argument (such a laughable level of deflection & projection)
Huh?
Its probably going to happen, and soon. The catch is that the dac isn't really $300. Its a $200 dac and $4,000 computer feeding it to make it work. The real price is closer to $4,200, but the good news is that the computer can be used for other tasks too.
Is that what ScottW was saying - that a $300 well executed DAC will not be preferred to a Benchmark DAC?
I read his post about 6 times & still couldn't get the meaning of it.
But if that is what he was saying, did he not say in the past that an iPhone or Android phone DAC was all that was needed? Am I mixing him up with somebody else who posted this?
The usual response, establishing a threshold of sensitivity to any particular stimulus requires an established protocol does it not? To establish the percentage of the population at large that can distinguish between say a Benchmark3 and a given well executed DAC at a $300 price point requires controlled testing, something you post on frequently. Do you play dumb every time I make a statement like this for a reason?
Nah, I tried reading it again but still can't grasp what you are saying
Of course not & that's a strange way to read what I wrote - maybe "what we have here is a failure to communicate"
YouTube
You jump to aggressive at the drop of a hat, Scott - cool it, please
I see what has your back up now & I don't really want to get into the controlled listening debate - it's too boring at this stage & all viewpoints have already been expressed.
I'm talking about people know good sound reproduction when they hear it - I don't think there's a 5% of golden eared 'special' people. There may be only 5% who care about great sound, I don't know?
Sorry if I get antsy when you call some people (including me) snakeoil salesmen without any evidence & won't apologize or bring the evidence
Sorry, that my nature is to fight back when I'm attacked but I'm trying to cool it now so I won't answer you further on this or your other accusations - all for the sake of civility
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