sdclc126 said:
Fortunately such extremes don't happen in audio - we just end up spending more money than (we later discover) we needed to. Or before we've spent our money we come here and find that not only can we spend less but we can get the kind of performance we thought was forever beyound our reach to boot. That may be one of the BEST functions of this forum - it certainly has been for me.
Yeah, I see mag. review and forums as particularly complimentary in this respect.
The reviewer says the Lavardin is a great amp..
Do other think so? Other reviewers *and* others on various forums who have heard it?
It all helps you to confirm or deny spending the time required to find out for your self. If it gets the "thumbs up" and its locally available to be heard - then it might be worth the time for a listen.
THEN you question value..
..and thats usually about the time you head back to DIYAudio.
Well, here is the part I had a hard time with -
"Mating a $7500 integrated amplifier to $289 or $400 a pair loudspeakers might seem insane, but there was method in my madness. Take for example the Celestion F30 loudspeakers (photo left). Part of the new Celestion “design-it-in England, manufacture-it-in-China” regime, the $400 F30, when coupled with conventional amplifiers, sounds like a sorry ghost of the grand old Celestion tradition. An upper-midrange/low-treble peak, which I had assumed was a sonic result of the metal tweeter resonance point, ruined an otherwise fairly decent speaker
To say that its performance with the Lavardin IT was transmogrified is a supreme understatement. The peaky treble was gone, transformed into an extended and artful accuracy and delicacy. The bass articulation and bandwidth flowered, the speaker took on an articulate rhythmic suavity that it had never showed signs of previously. The resolution increased to where a casual listener actually thought the speaker cost $10,000."
I just doubt the difference is that extreme. And when he mentions a casual listener thought the $400 speaker cost $10K, who is he referring to? And was the $10K guess just a - guess? And based on what - other $10K speakers this phantom casual listener has heard? It doesn't seem "meaningful" to me (sorry just had to get that word in there). I just don't think there's much real information in that sort of statement.
Not to mention some of the cheesy subjective language - "articulate rhythmic suavity" makes me want to vomit.
To be fair, and based on your first post Scott, there may certainly be merit to this amplifier's capabilities, if "a massive (LOTs of current) and well regulated power supply" and "a chunky inductor right after rectifier" make a significant difference to what goes into the speaker. I'm just saying that the reviewer's claims seem to be rather stretched to me and I'm naturally skeptical. An amplifier alone making a $400 speaker sound like a $10K speaker, assuming the $10K is well designed and built (not all are) seems just a bit far fetched.
"Mating a $7500 integrated amplifier to $289 or $400 a pair loudspeakers might seem insane, but there was method in my madness. Take for example the Celestion F30 loudspeakers (photo left). Part of the new Celestion “design-it-in England, manufacture-it-in-China” regime, the $400 F30, when coupled with conventional amplifiers, sounds like a sorry ghost of the grand old Celestion tradition. An upper-midrange/low-treble peak, which I had assumed was a sonic result of the metal tweeter resonance point, ruined an otherwise fairly decent speaker
To say that its performance with the Lavardin IT was transmogrified is a supreme understatement. The peaky treble was gone, transformed into an extended and artful accuracy and delicacy. The bass articulation and bandwidth flowered, the speaker took on an articulate rhythmic suavity that it had never showed signs of previously. The resolution increased to where a casual listener actually thought the speaker cost $10,000."
I just doubt the difference is that extreme. And when he mentions a casual listener thought the $400 speaker cost $10K, who is he referring to? And was the $10K guess just a - guess? And based on what - other $10K speakers this phantom casual listener has heard? It doesn't seem "meaningful" to me (sorry just had to get that word in there). I just don't think there's much real information in that sort of statement.
Not to mention some of the cheesy subjective language - "articulate rhythmic suavity" makes me want to vomit.
To be fair, and based on your first post Scott, there may certainly be merit to this amplifier's capabilities, if "a massive (LOTs of current) and well regulated power supply" and "a chunky inductor right after rectifier" make a significant difference to what goes into the speaker. I'm just saying that the reviewer's claims seem to be rather stretched to me and I'm naturally skeptical. An amplifier alone making a $400 speaker sound like a $10K speaker, assuming the $10K is well designed and built (not all are) seems just a bit far fetched.
sdclc126 said:
Hey, its cheesy language that sells!
I mean, just how many times can you say detailed, or *more* detailed. I think the subtext to the second hand review is:
The novice is a novice (with not a lot of experience): so caveat.. BUT he/she did think that it sounded a *much* better and that this surprised the novice.
Thats all I got out of it.
I don't know perhaps I've picked up "internal editing" over the years.
BTW, what I've heard more or less over a number of experiences is largely related to perceptual freq. balance.
Most large amplifiers (or rather amplifiers with good large power supplies) - *seem* to extend the low freq. response (though not actually to any great extent), by increasing the dampening of the driver near its resonance. Perceptually speaking - increasing the lower freq. response tends to DECREASE the upper freq. response.
Put all that together and that isn't far off from what the reviewer and novice were trying to describe.
BTW, this is (to my hearing) more noticeable with bass reflex loudspeakers.
"Most large amplifiers (or rather amplifiers with good large power supplies) - *seem* to extend the low freq. response (though not actually to any great extent), by increasing the dampening of the driver near its resonance. Perceptually speaking - increasing the lower freq. response tends to DECREASE the upper freq. response."
Hmmm...sounds sorta like baffle step compensation.
Hmmm...sounds sorta like baffle step compensation.
the thing that I 'took exception to' was a well designed amplifier should, by definition, be flat in it's frequency response. And as we know, most amplifiers are a hell of a lot flatter than any speaker on the market.
As such I find it actually impossible that when coupled with a speaker that supposedly has a serious and extremely audible frequency response anomaly that the combined end result is an audibly flat or benign combination. So which is it, the accurate fantastic amp as claimed (but the 'proof' of correcting the speaker gives lie to that claim) or the speaker (presumably panned in an earlier review?) is actually fantastic value for money cause it is pretty well worth ten thousand pounds for only 400 (personally I doubt a 'mere' amp can make that much difference)
Scott (was it, if not my apologies) feels that there would be very few people who take a review as gospel, well admittedly gospel is a strong word in this context, but to the average Joe Blow spending money in hi-end audio, most if not all of their thoughts and 'knowledge' comes from the un-examined and rarely challenged audio myths that are perpetuated, often by reviews like this.
I mean we here on DIY and similar are in the vanishingly small minority...I presume/ Wonder what the actual stats are? Just had a thought after typing that, if indeed we are the small minority, and there seems to be a healthy enough population here and on other similar forums (admittedly with a lot of common members), then we can get some idea of the actual size of the entire audio market! From that angle, yes, there is a lot of money in the worldwide market ain't there! and again, from that angle we can see (given the whole purpose of these reviews being to shift product) why we come across such hyperbole and frankly, at times, complete untruths.
And I feel the statement we've been discussing can be shown to be a complete fabrication. Given the common laws in other sections of society regarding 'truth in advertising' I wonder how something like this can be gotten away with? Sure it's only audio and no lives are at stake, but there are laws against deception and fraudulently obtaining money by deception aren't there??
And it's these types of trivial statements tossed off in the (almost) secure knowledge that it will rarely be challenged that leads to danceable cables or whatever, and firmly entrenches the validity to many that completely unsupervised or controlled listening impressions are paramount and that due to our ears being the 'most sublimely sensitive measuring instrument' in the known universe that they can never be fooled or questioned.
Witness yet another 70 odd pages of large differences in competently well designed cables.
just for the record, I don't believe that all amps sound the same, or that necessarily all cables and interconnects sound the same (any difference being easily explained), but I do feel that the differences commonly described are vastly exagerrated. Floyd Toole I think described the phenomenon. We tend to use descriptors that appropriately describe the differences between very different speakers say (and we can all agree very different speakers can sound, well, very different). However, we tend to use the same arsenal of descriptors for the differences between increasingly less different components, so on down the chain till we are using vast, massive, WOW! danceable, umpteen dissappearing veils etc for things like speaker cables!
sdclc, I agree about the dbt's you outlined, and a) the need for them-especially when dealing with small differences and b) the failings of many of them, and the difficulty of doing a reasonably stringent one in audio.
If say any of us here wished to do a reasonably well controlled test at home, with or without friends, what steps could we take to control the worst excesses and problems outlined by you earlier?? I mean for example it would be hard for me and a few mates to have thirty people doing it properly. each for a reasonable time in the sweetspot!! arrggghhh.
As such I find it actually impossible that when coupled with a speaker that supposedly has a serious and extremely audible frequency response anomaly that the combined end result is an audibly flat or benign combination. So which is it, the accurate fantastic amp as claimed (but the 'proof' of correcting the speaker gives lie to that claim) or the speaker (presumably panned in an earlier review?) is actually fantastic value for money cause it is pretty well worth ten thousand pounds for only 400 (personally I doubt a 'mere' amp can make that much difference)
Scott (was it, if not my apologies) feels that there would be very few people who take a review as gospel, well admittedly gospel is a strong word in this context, but to the average Joe Blow spending money in hi-end audio, most if not all of their thoughts and 'knowledge' comes from the un-examined and rarely challenged audio myths that are perpetuated, often by reviews like this.
I mean we here on DIY and similar are in the vanishingly small minority...I presume/ Wonder what the actual stats are? Just had a thought after typing that, if indeed we are the small minority, and there seems to be a healthy enough population here and on other similar forums (admittedly with a lot of common members), then we can get some idea of the actual size of the entire audio market! From that angle, yes, there is a lot of money in the worldwide market ain't there! and again, from that angle we can see (given the whole purpose of these reviews being to shift product) why we come across such hyperbole and frankly, at times, complete untruths.
And I feel the statement we've been discussing can be shown to be a complete fabrication. Given the common laws in other sections of society regarding 'truth in advertising' I wonder how something like this can be gotten away with? Sure it's only audio and no lives are at stake, but there are laws against deception and fraudulently obtaining money by deception aren't there??
And it's these types of trivial statements tossed off in the (almost) secure knowledge that it will rarely be challenged that leads to danceable cables or whatever, and firmly entrenches the validity to many that completely unsupervised or controlled listening impressions are paramount and that due to our ears being the 'most sublimely sensitive measuring instrument' in the known universe that they can never be fooled or questioned.
Witness yet another 70 odd pages of large differences in competently well designed cables.
just for the record, I don't believe that all amps sound the same, or that necessarily all cables and interconnects sound the same (any difference being easily explained), but I do feel that the differences commonly described are vastly exagerrated. Floyd Toole I think described the phenomenon. We tend to use descriptors that appropriately describe the differences between very different speakers say (and we can all agree very different speakers can sound, well, very different). However, we tend to use the same arsenal of descriptors for the differences between increasingly less different components, so on down the chain till we are using vast, massive, WOW! danceable, umpteen dissappearing veils etc for things like speaker cables!
sdclc, I agree about the dbt's you outlined, and a) the need for them-especially when dealing with small differences and b) the failings of many of them, and the difficulty of doing a reasonably stringent one in audio.
If say any of us here wished to do a reasonably well controlled test at home, with or without friends, what steps could we take to control the worst excesses and problems outlined by you earlier?? I mean for example it would be hard for me and a few mates to have thirty people doing it properly. each for a reasonable time in the sweetspot!! arrggghhh.
Hey Scott, that is actually a very good point you made. I have no experience with amps particularly doing this (I presume you would at least have a competent amp that has enough power that it doesn't clip, and enough power supply to handle the speakers) but the point you make about the perceptual response to changing the bass I've found to be very true indeed.ScottG said:
I use a deqx and so changing the relative FR balance of the system is trivially easy, so changes in the bass region are simple to do.
the result however is that a change in the bass does indeed alter the perceived balance of the mids and highs, even if absolutely no change at all is made in those areas.
Yet back to his description, (and this is where the analogy falls apart) when I do this at home, I'm changing a very smooth and flat FR in the higher frequencies, NOT a system with a supposedly 'horrid' upper mid/trebel peak or resonance, I can't see how changing the bass would remove that aberration.
Was a good point though, agree completely with it.
terry j said:
Yeah it was me.. well, sort of.
So you think the average customer takes what the reviewer says as mostly correct and simply makes a purchase based on that? (..is that correct, or semi-correct?)
If thats the case then I have NEVER come across "Joe Blow".
Every customer I've seen and talked to at various *dealers*
who have gone to listen to a piece of equipment based on a review ultimately make there purchase after hearing not only the equipment under review, but also other equipment (including their own). This isn't to say that some "superiority bias" hasn't set-in because of the review, but rather that the review was by no means the determining factor for ultimately making the purchase (or simply preference).The only time I've see someone "taking it on faith" - is *not* from a reviewer, but rather from a dealer/installer.. and virtually always from someone who doesn't read such reviews and is only interested in "casual" listening. And this.. actually happens a lot. Now there may be some second-hand "faith" going on here..
ScottG said:
Semi correct!!
I too doubt that they take it as gospel and run out and buy it, if so then there would indeed be a large trade on the net!
No IIRC I said I feel what happens is that the audio myths are created and perpetuated by articles such as this, not necessarily that they run out and buy it. And I do believe it a myth or an untruth that an amp can magically correct the FR of a speaker.
And for the most part, the sales guys in the audio store (sure there will be exceptions) get all their data and myths from publications like these or from press release....which are more marketing copy than actual truth.
This is the beauty of neural signal processing. In fact I'm listening cheap and crap speakers/amplifier and I claim it's better than any of the products out there It has more rounded bass and transparency. Who needs measurements btw. ... now if only I have the skill to market my system at $7500
It has more rounded bass and transparency. Who needs measurements btw. ... now if only I have the skill to market my system at $7500 gainphile said:This is the beauty of neural signal processing. In fact I'm listening cheap and crap speakers/amplifier and I claim it's better than any of the products out there
If you want to sell your system at $7500 then "The Appearence" is the other half of the story.
ScottG said:
I've heard this effect myself. My brother's 2-ways respond to this. Replace his NAD 30 watt integrated amp with a 100 watt or more SS powerhouse amp and you swear it goes an octave lower. I suspect the bass is cleaner so it has more impact and sounds more extended when it's really just tighter.
There actually is subjectivity in statistical significance. Often, or traditionally, a probability level (alpha) is compared to where the sample result falls in the sampling distribution (p-value), and if a sample's p-value is smaller than the alpha level, then the sample result is statistically significant. But setting the alpha level is subjective -- a convention is 0.05, but there is nothing magic about this number. Is 0.049 that much different than 0.051? Under the traditional approach, the former is significant, the other isn't. An investigator can simply report the sample's p-value and let the reader decide (and the trend is towards this). Reporting p-values is more informative and flexible, but of course each reader makes their own subjective judgment about it.
The bell curve example quoted above contains a misconception. It is those sample results that are far into a tail of the sampling distribution (less likely to occur) that are more statistically significant, not the ones that are towards the middle.
On to a more positive subject ---
I find the sound testing with humans quite intriguing and a potentially good compliment to the instrument tests. After all, humans listen to music, not machines.
In theory, a reasonably good (now there's a subjective phrase) should be possible. Keeping the producers out of the interpretation aspect and making the data public are two ways to alleviate the problems that the drug companies run into, for example. An enterprising graduate student could do some testing given some loaned equipment and some funding. The tough parts of this is coming up with a question(s) that has enough interest to encourage funding and defining a population of test subjects to choose from that would be acceptable to those interested in the question.
terry j said:
Not only that.. but they have a built-in incentive to *believe* that marketing.
After all, who wants to sell an inferior product for a given price? As a result there is that *need* to believe the product is superior in several respects, and so many will extol the marketable "advances" that the product "has".
The same can also happen with someone who has already purchased the product.. OR has *committed* to purchasing the product. Own it or not - there is that *need* to have "made (or intend to make) the smart purchase".
terry j said:
Ah, now who is buying into a myth?
What precisely is a competently designed power supply for an amplifier? Is it simply a power supply that provides an set amount of power so that the amplifier doesn't clip for a nominal output and impedance?
Moreover, is the potential for an amplifier to clip (or not) particularly related to the effect that I suggested, and that Caferacer has also commented on (as seen below)?
As to the mid/treble peak.. remember that the midbass driver of budget speaker (and all traditional loudspeakers) is not the only driver to have a fundamental resonance. The tweeter and its "tuned" resonance may also be effected in a similar manner to the midbass driver(s). Damping the response of the tweeters primary resonance may well dampen to some extent secondary resonances. And of course there may be a myriad of other reasons for this effect - measurable ones (..it is of course just speculation on my part).
..and to Caferacer's post:
Caferacer said:
Mon Graci for a confirmation (..sometimes I can sound like I'm just blowing so much smoke up people's ....
)I think subjectivity is a red herring. It can be overcome.
Harman has done a lot of controlled testing. Speakers on a revolving platform behind a screen, etc. Their researchers publish a lot in JAES
Their broad conclusion is is that experienced and inexperienced listeners do tend to prefer the same qualities in reproduced sound. It just takes the inexperienced listener longer to set his preference.
http://www.linkwitzlab.com/Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers in Small Rooms.doc
What Harman does with its info is possibly not what a DIYer or audio fanatic would do with it. They have to sell product at certain margins. Whether Harmon is making the right long term decisions in a business sense in choosing their various products' characteristics is probably up for debate but that's an entirely different topic.
Harman has done a lot of controlled testing. Speakers on a revolving platform behind a screen, etc. Their researchers publish a lot in JAES
Their broad conclusion is is that experienced and inexperienced listeners do tend to prefer the same qualities in reproduced sound. It just takes the inexperienced listener longer to set his preference.
http://www.linkwitzlab.com/Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers in Small Rooms.doc
What Harman does with its info is possibly not what a DIYer or audio fanatic would do with it. They have to sell product at certain margins. Whether Harmon is making the right long term decisions in a business sense in choosing their various products' characteristics is probably up for debate but that's an entirely different topic.
That is beyond the pale, it is so bad, they should be reported to some legal agency.
Is it fraudulent deliberate deception of readers? Or is the reviewer either tripping on bad drugs or simply a moron?
Ugh ~ I'm probably breaking rules by using bad words and calling somebody nasty names, but, it must be done. I like looking at that magazine when I'm at Barnes & Noble, though, I knew it was not to be taken too seriously or trusted much, now, I feel like picking up a sheet of dried vomit would be less offensive.
Is it fraudulent deliberate deception of readers? Or is the reviewer either tripping on bad drugs or simply a moron?
Ugh ~ I'm probably breaking rules by using bad words and calling somebody nasty names, but, it must be done. I like looking at that magazine when I'm at Barnes & Noble, though, I knew it was not to be taken too seriously or trusted much, now, I feel like picking up a sheet of dried vomit would be less offensive.
critofur said:That is beyond the pale, it is so bad, they should be reported to some legal agency.
Is it fraudulent deliberate deception of readers? Or is the reviewer either tripping on bad drugs or simply a moron?
Ugh ~ I'm probably breaking rules by using bad words and calling somebody nasty names, but, it must be done. I like looking at that magazine when I'm at Barnes & Noble, though, I knew it was not to be taken too seriously or trusted much, now, I feel like picking up a sheet of dried vomit would be less offensive.
Unfortunately, with paid reviewers, versed in Mills and Boon style literature, rather than audio, what else can be expected !!
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