Which means that every one in any topographical area will perceive differently, is there any point in having specifications at all. I would think some one living in the Himalayas would need a monster amp to try and move the few air molecules and a few 32" speakers. I notice now that most decent product specification mention that the product is specified at 20 deg C and at sea level. Well that makes selecting a product a tedious exercise if you live in a different climate and altitude.
EDIT: the manufacturer should include derating curves with his equipment. 🤔
EDIT: the manufacturer should include derating curves with his equipment. 🤔
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To the guy with Rogers LS3/5a speakers, take all clocks, watches and cellphones out of the room then tell me you can’t hear that.
Are those effect boxes actually made for "hifi" or "audiophiles" or "home audio?" Making such things has been discussed very informally on diyaudio, but I don't read the magazines and am not familiar with the market. I'd think the naming and marketing would need to be carefully worded, as a "vacuum valve amp emulation" or "harmonic restoration system."
I did read the hifi magazines in college (late 1970s) and I mostly recall the one or two articles discussing music production in the studio with the use of EQ and compression and such. There was a "big controversy" over the then-new Aphex Aural Exciter, a distortion unit used to "brighten up" vocals. People were upset that such a thing to actually GENERATE harmonic distortion existed in recording studios (of course ignoring electric guitars, guitar amps and their many effects). I remember having the Eagles album "The Long Run" which stated in the credits "This album was NOT produced using the Aphex Aural Exciter."
These days you just purchase and install a software emulation of whatever you need. The sound of a specific brand of guitar? Yours for $29.99.
You mention the Aphex Aural Exciter - a bit more at $ 39.99. There are even tube amp emulators for specific well-known vintage amps, and I'm told they actually sound just as the amps do.
So you get yourself a high quality, transparent (there it is!) system and set it to your taste with plugins.
Works like a charm, everybody wins.
Edit: here's a few graphs for the Exciter from my measurements for a presentation I did on a unit.
Jan
You mention the Aphex Aural Exciter - a bit more at $ 39.99. There are even tube amp emulators for specific well-known vintage amps, and I'm told they actually sound just as the amps do.
So you get yourself a high quality, transparent (there it is!) system and set it to your taste with plugins.
Works like a charm, everybody wins.
Edit: here's a few graphs for the Exciter from my measurements for a presentation I did on a unit.
Jan
Attachments
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Thirty years ago, I had my heart set on a song. And whenever I was in the mood, I turned on the radio and it played. I had a hunch back then. But as the years went by, my inside started to get noisy and scratching until I collapsed, completely exhausted. I was lucky to discover the cause: cell phone expansion. I'm one of the most electro-sensitive people. Now I also know why I listened to the radio back then;-)
Effect devices don't help if you don't even have any arguments for setting up loudspeakers. And if you know a little about audio, then you don't need effect devices;-)
If you deliberately want to distort tones and sounds, I don't begrudge you these stories. If you want clean sound, you can only go the way "cleanness".
Effect devices don't help if you don't even have any arguments for setting up loudspeakers. And if you know a little about audio, then you don't need effect devices;-)
If you deliberately want to distort tones and sounds, I don't begrudge you these stories. If you want clean sound, you can only go the way "cleanness".
This sounds a little above my pay grade Jan. Can I buy a cheap Chinese amp and this emulator to turn it into a Big MacIntosch with B&W 800s. If that was true the hi-fi industry is f**cked.
It's actually not that hard to make something sound like a MacIntosh since most of their sound characteristics comes from the output transformer. To make it sound exactly the same, however, is.
No idea how much it costs: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/mcintosh-ap1-audio-player/id411263894
Although it looks like it is only emulating the looks, not the sound.
Or try this: https://www.looperman.com/free-musi...ion-plugins-instruments-software-pc-mac-linux
Jan
Although it looks like it is only emulating the looks, not the sound.
Or try this: https://www.looperman.com/free-musi...ion-plugins-instruments-software-pc-mac-linux
Jan
There are rock bands going on tour with the Quad Cortex and other brands of guitar amp emulators (they're all "DSP in a box") and running them straight into the mixers/monitors and PA, saving all the tonnage of transporting those big heavy tube amps and speaker cabinets. There's probably a growing market for life-size cardboard cutouts of Marshall full stacks for the back of the stage.
But yes, everything recording is in the DAW nowadays.
I was specifically wondering if there's any "consumer" stuff, like:
But yes, everything recording is in the DAW nowadays.
I was specifically wondering if there's any "consumer" stuff, like:
I haven't heard them but there's allegedly some good, moderately priced Class D/PWM amps which would be very good to be driven by amp and speaker emulators. They're all for guitar amps and cabs, but I can imagine such things redesigned for "hifi" amps and sold to a younger market and a 20-something saying "Listen, dad/granddad, I got a new stereo and it sounds just like your McIntosh system!" So dad humors the kid and gives it a listen, then becomes visibly upset that it DOES sound a lot like the system he spent decades and thousands of dollars putting together.
It’s only for a little while, long enough to AB - first listen with the Rolex, then without the Rolex in the room, if needed repeat.
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benb, the people that design those boxes can tell if they sound like the real thing and in DIY audio no one can even tell if something is distorted. That does not say much for DIY enthusiasts. Buy an emulator for 29 bucks and have anything you like. Besides are there emulations for vehicles, I would like my car to look, feel, sound and behave just like a Bugatti Veron for 29 bucks. I believe if it is fake it is fake.
I think you are shortchanging diy-ers. I don't know if you can, but certainly you (and I) are not the calibration points.
Professional sound engineers can pinpoint character, shortcomings and strong points of equipment very good, thank you.
I personally know experienced designers that do not design equipment to be clean and transparent but give it the 'errors' if I may call it that, that people want.
A very simple way to emulate certain equipment in hardware is to include a signal transformer with variable (over)loading. You're halfway there.
Jan
Malcolm Hawksford discussed current-drive vs speaker HD back in the 80's. Maybe a DSP system could be used so the input signal preempts the output current down to the mA or uA, so as to fake a different output impedance by dead-reckoning the speaker voltages.
But it all seems very messy and likely to have problems. Kind-of like those FIR filters that attempt to produce a perfectly flat speaker response, but fail to take into account non-linear distortion.
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FIR filters have no trouble to make your speaker response ruler flat. That's what they are used for.
FIR filters cannot fix harmonic distortion, they are not equipped for it.
How can any filter fix HD?? You have very confusing ideas.
And BTW, it's not Malcolm & Hawksford. The man's name is Malcolm Hawksford.
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://linearaudio.net/sites/linearaudio.net/files/2022-12/Hawksford_Part1.pdf
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://linearaudio.net/sites/linearaudio.net/files/2022-12/Hawksford_Part2.pdf
As he said:
MH: Is it that clear? But it is true. My first amplifiers were tube-based, of course, and I still have a certain fondness for them. Most were simple, first-order circuits, with some pleasant coloration usually added by self-induced microphonics and vibrations. Different manufacturers using different tubes even with similar circuits show up different issues, but they err benignly, so to speak. It is very seldom that a tube amplifier’s sound can’t be enjoyed despite its technical limitations; the errors tend to be quite musical.
Jan
FIR filters cannot fix harmonic distortion, they are not equipped for it.
How can any filter fix HD?? You have very confusing ideas.
And BTW, it's not Malcolm & Hawksford. The man's name is Malcolm Hawksford.
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://linearaudio.net/sites/linearaudio.net/files/2022-12/Hawksford_Part1.pdf
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://linearaudio.net/sites/linearaudio.net/files/2022-12/Hawksford_Part2.pdf
As he said:
MH: Is it that clear? But it is true. My first amplifiers were tube-based, of course, and I still have a certain fondness for them. Most were simple, first-order circuits, with some pleasant coloration usually added by self-induced microphonics and vibrations. Different manufacturers using different tubes even with similar circuits show up different issues, but they err benignly, so to speak. It is very seldom that a tube amplifier’s sound can’t be enjoyed despite its technical limitations; the errors tend to be quite musical.
Jan
My bad, fixed.
As for FIR filters, the response could be shaped so it follows the voltages at the speaker terminals as if it were unplugged. That way the speaker "thinks" it sees a high resistance, but it's actually a cleverly controlled voltage amplifier with DSP. However, a price would be that some of the FR dips and peaks would be baked in, and trying to smooth them out would increase HD again.
I've no idea what this means, hopefully someone who understands it can educate me.
Are you suggesting to feed the filter with the output voltage?
Are you not mixing time- and frequency domain? A filter modifies a frequency response, I don't know how it can follow a voltage waveform.
There are, of course, well-known methods to make the speaker 'think' it is fed from a high resistance, if that is your concern.
Current drive comes to mind.
Jan
FIR filters got one big disadvantage compared to IIR filters in fidelity, they have a pre-ring to the initial signal. If you want perfection, FIR fixes some things but bring a drawback with it too.