I'm sure I could experience a power cable's 'sound' without having a prior opinion about it. So your claim looks to falter. You also claim its 'not possible' yet I can think of a way they can potentially affect the amp's sound. So it seems to me you're mistaking 'not possible within what I know about amps and electronic systems in general' for 'not possible in any way, shape or form'.
Nope, or I'd not have disagreed.
E-MU 0404 USB is first sound device I bought with analog and digital I/O. Loopback measurements make confirmation of bit perfect playback easy. First thing I do when starting a set of measurements, and often last measurements. Also I often make back to back duplicate measurements when speaker testing. After several years of regular use I started getting seemingly random and inexpiable glitches. The problem seemed to disappear when I swapped USB cable. But it came back and with increasing occurrence. Root cause was damaged contact in USB connector of the E-MU. In tracking it down live measurements glitched more often then loopback. Working hypothesis is that loose contact was buzzing with sound.
Barleywater, what is also useful is to look which channel is best and use that with measurements, there are differences between the channels with mine.
Totally? I simply based my statement to my blind listening test experience...
I consider at least 3 things to make up a "resolution": (1) The shape of waveform (2) The dynamics (3) The bandwidth.
Redbook CD is limited by its sampling rate (44k1) and bitrate (16-bit), vinyl is limited by the physical construction of the needle and the medium.
(1) When an analog is encoded into digital, the precision of the decoding is determined by the bitrate. Is 16-bit sufficient? You decide. Is 16-bit sounds similar to 24-bit? You decide.
(2) Is 16-bit sufficient to construct real music dynamics? Of course NOT. At least we need to do oversampling. And like I said before, upsampling brings another issue:
Does vinyl have better dynamic than 16-bit? Depends on how much noise that can be removed. If we can bring the noise down (which is possible) the dynamic range will be better than 16-bit.
(3) When 44k1 sampling rate is used, more or less 22kHz is the maximum we can get from Redbook CD. Does the existence of signal above 22kHz affect "resolution"? IMO, Yes. Many instruments have overtones above 22kHz. But this is very debatable, especially when we have different ears.
Please note, my opinion is simply based on Pavel Macura (PMA) files in his listening test thread where he gave 2 files (1.wav and a.wav), one from CD and another from vinyl. As far as these 2 files are concerned, I could say with high certainty that the vinyl clip has MORE RESOLUTION, sound-wise. They didn't come from the same master unfortunately (to be expected), but you can hear how CD has higher "noise floor" than vinyl!
I would look around there have been many technical discussion where the comparative resolutions and dynamic range have been discuss, CD wins out on all counts.....
That's what a blind test is designed to approximate. It's the whole point of it.
No, not possible as in "it's not possible for me to walk barefooted on the surface of the sun". There's a reason why the residual-current circuit breakers in house installations were redesigned to react on square waves. Mains electricity is horribly dirty, and it doesn't get any cleaner by running through a bit of high quality cable. Besides, adding a few meters of OFC copper or silver in series with the miles and miles of cheap copper and aluminium, that makes the grid, results in no difference whatsoever.
It doesn't look like you disagree. We describe the exact same thing.
The only difference I see, is that you seem to claim that you have the ability to experience something without having an opinion about it. But nobody has that ability, not without resorting to a blind test.
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CD with 44k1 16-bit? Cannot be done without oversampling, can it?
My point to the poster I was responding to was that with CD we can get the best of both world, by paying attention to the filter (when better dynamic range is what we want). This HF "noise"/"distortion"/"artifacts" is what makes CD sounds "digital" while vinyl sounds "analog" (IMHO). Not because vinyl has noise, peak, wow and flutter as many would suggest...
As your mind is clearly made up - you have a strong opinion in relation to this matter and are convinced you're right, I'm out of this one. If you were open to learning then it might be worth continuing.
You presented it the best way possible here..
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Do people really think we use Lp players because we want to hear noise and wow and flutter? Rather shallow thinking, if you do..
If we claim LP playback as outdated technology because of it's inherent problems, then we should also place Horns waveguides and tube amps into the same category.. Horns for diffraction noise floor and Tube amps for High distortions etc.. Both of these technologies reduces the resolution of the original signal and creates weird and wonderful special effects..
I've seen my share of audiophiles that completely diss the Lp and say CD is much superior and guess what other gear they're using.. Horns and tubes..
Seeing these guys trying all kinds of new gear, cables, cd players, new tubes, different tube amps etc etc, I could conclude that the hyper clear sound of cd sounds the best while listening through all of that other noise.. But to add, I think the masking is always bothering them and they're struggling to try and reduce it.. Take a good SS amp and well designed speakers with diffraction control, play good LP through this and Viola, I have something much better,😀, than the CD/TUBE/HORN system
IME, people who say they hear an improvement with a power cable are not magically hearing something special or different in they're head, they are simply hyper focusing on particular characteristics and this creates false thoughts of sounding better..
I've learned to differentiate this phenomenon from a real change in the sound😀
I've learned to differentiate this phenomenon from a real change in the sound😀
I wouldn't know. I've never read a piece of philosophical literature (on purpose).
But I always seem to be drawn to discussions about how human interact with technology, so maybe I should start reading some 🙂
I'm very much open to learning. As long as the lessons don't involve mysticism or fairy tales.
That's actually a much more feasible theory than mine 🙂
Well, as you point out, they do belong in the same category, but they do also all apparently defy the concept of outdated technology.
The way I see it the quality of audio seems to be a sum of precision reproduction and pleasing coloring. The problem with digital audio is, that it's coloring is not pleasing, and therefore it relies solely on precision reproduction to achieve high quality. It's much easier for analog audio to achieve high quality, since it can "spice up" a not-so-precise reproduction with some pleasing coloring.
So, analog audio has been technically outdated for a long time, but it has (or had?) a large head start in terms of quality.
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I did an experiment last night that is more directly related to the topic of the thread; a comparison of my turntable chain to my (current) digital chain.
Turn table chain:
- Eagles - Eagles (1972, Asylum) "good" condition
- Audio Technica AT-122EP
- Technics SL-10
- RJM VSPS w/AD8599
Digital Chain:
- Eagles - Eagles (1972) 24/192 - "HD Tracks"
- Asus EeePC
- MPD configured with hw: output (confirmed bit-perfect with simple commands)
- CM6631A USB-to-I2S
- ES9023-based I2S DAC
Both chains plug into separate inputs of my modified HLLY AMK-II pre-amp (main volume control chip has been replaced with PGA2311, caps in signal path replaced with genuine WIMA, etc.).
The pre-amp feeds my "Wiener" TPA3118 (gmarsh group buy) amplifier, and I can easily do A/B comparisons by switch inputs with my remote. Volume levels are very, very close (by chance).
I basically just queued the album and dropped the needle at the same time as I touched the "play" button on the MPDroid client on my tablet.
Overall, they both sound very, very good. I would even say "excellent" (but this is all subjective, of course. They are different, but it sounds more like an EQ difference than anything else. The vinyl chain has an ever-so-slightly hotter upper mid-range and top end, but the rest of the spectrum is basically indiscernible between the two chains.
I would not say one has "more detail" than the other. I would also not say that one sounds any more (or less) "analog" than the other. Imaging and sound stage are pretty-much on par.
Notes:
- I chose this music because I am intimately familiar with it.
- I usually don't buy HD Tracks stuff. I wanted to see what all the fuss is about, so I bought something I am very familiar with.
- I repeated this test with a 16/44.1 digital rip and results were the same.
Turn table chain:
- Eagles - Eagles (1972, Asylum) "good" condition
- Audio Technica AT-122EP
- Technics SL-10
- RJM VSPS w/AD8599
Digital Chain:
- Eagles - Eagles (1972) 24/192 - "HD Tracks"
- Asus EeePC
- MPD configured with hw: output (confirmed bit-perfect with simple commands)
- CM6631A USB-to-I2S
- ES9023-based I2S DAC
Both chains plug into separate inputs of my modified HLLY AMK-II pre-amp (main volume control chip has been replaced with PGA2311, caps in signal path replaced with genuine WIMA, etc.).
The pre-amp feeds my "Wiener" TPA3118 (gmarsh group buy) amplifier, and I can easily do A/B comparisons by switch inputs with my remote. Volume levels are very, very close (by chance).
I basically just queued the album and dropped the needle at the same time as I touched the "play" button on the MPDroid client on my tablet.
Overall, they both sound very, very good. I would even say "excellent" (but this is all subjective, of course. They are different, but it sounds more like an EQ difference than anything else. The vinyl chain has an ever-so-slightly hotter upper mid-range and top end, but the rest of the spectrum is basically indiscernible between the two chains.
I would not say one has "more detail" than the other. I would also not say that one sounds any more (or less) "analog" than the other. Imaging and sound stage are pretty-much on par.
Notes:
- I chose this music because I am intimately familiar with it.
- I usually don't buy HD Tracks stuff. I wanted to see what all the fuss is about, so I bought something I am very familiar with.
- I repeated this test with a 16/44.1 digital rip and results were the same.
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Can you figure out a way to switch without you knowing what you are listening to? Maybe have someone on the control do mute select A unmute, mute select B unmute, mute select x unvute?
Yes. I certainly could and should do so. However, the particular piece of vinyl that I chose is not "perfect" so the odd click or pop would give it away.
I do have a pristine Verve release of Astrud Gilberto's "The Shadow of Your Smile", so perhaps I need to find a digital version of it and use that as the test material of a "blind" test.
The results would tell me whether the slightly hotter upper-mid and top end of the vinyl chain is due to the Eagles vinyl itself, or something in the chain. I suspect that this difference is due (at least in part) to the RIAA curve of the RJM VSPS, but I could be wrong.
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Some time ago, I did a similar comparison, but using the same vinyl for both halves of the test. I recorded several albums digitally, and compared the sound of my recordings with a fresh needle drop. Blind. Level matched.
Guess what? No audible difference..........
I could not tell one from the other at all.
Guess what? No audible difference..........
I could not tell one from the other at all.
That is very helpful, thanks. My emu is getting old and tired with scratchy pots, and I suppose most second hands will not be much better. Is there something currently on the market on par?
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