I don't think I would ever want to retire, although I guess it could be argued I already did in 1994, when I became strictly a consultant. I don't think I could face a nominal five-day forty-hour work week again, let alone what young people are expected to do in some of the techie places (90 hour work weeks and so forth).Luckily I don't have to worry about that anymore, It's become a hobby interest to try and inform DIY'ers.
...... why some absolutely swear by high priced, technically incompetent products that to all intends and purposes absolutely mutilate the audio, and everything in between, I don't suppose I can do it in the next few minutes.
Jan
I never thought about why others would buy such things. Seems like an important question to some marketing types, though.
But, does it matter here? How so?
-RNM
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The mismatch of the week:
An Ortofon Red MM and an SME309 tonearm. $100 for the cartridge, $2400 for the arm. Maybe a better cartridge would have a lower compliance, and raise the resonant frequency to something more appropriate.
Why is that a mismatch? 9.5g effective mass for the SME doesn't seem bad. 7.2 for the cart and compliance of 20 gives 9Hz. Bang in. The middle of the range.
I don't think I could face a nominal five-day forty-hour work week again, let alone what young people are expected to do in some of the techie places (90 hour work weeks and so forth).
![bullseye :bullseye: :bullseye:](https://files.diyaudio.com/forums/images/smilies/bullseye.gif)
-RM
I never thought about why others would buy such things. Seems like an important question to some marketing types, though.
But, does it matter here? How so?
-RNM
Well, if somebody swears that design xyz is absolutely the best sounding ever made, but at the same time I see droves of people buying design PQR, I wonder. I wonder a lot; enough to spend money and time to find out what the hell is wrong in this picture.
Edit: Dick you have amps in the market place. Do you never wonder why some people buy a Marsh amp, and some others buy Bose?
Jan
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Jan, you asked something along the lines of ' what is the group delay at 20Hz associated with a mechanical cartridge/arm resonance having a peak amplitude of +6dB at 10Hz? '. The answer I calculate is c 4.6mS.In all the humhum about HP GD I ask a simple question, how that jives in the light of cartridge/tonearm resonance at around the same freq. All I get is some flak about linear phase, but no clear answer, one way or another. Rather underwhelming, unfortunately. If I wouldn't know better I might be tempting to think that you guys have no idea either. ;-
At 20Hz in that system, amplitude response of headshell movement to forced stylus motion is c -9dB, phase response c -160 deg.
We all know the sensation of subsonics, the thump in the chest is part of the total experience, and yes its arrival time matters.
I was at Pink Floyd @ the Berlin Reichstag. I filled my ears with Ohropax and
went to the front. I could feel my jeans & clothes moving to the sound of the
music. They had an extra wall of speakers to make sure they could be
listened to in East Berlin on the other side of The Wall, too.
That was some Delicate Sound Of Thunder.
regards, Gerhard
Jan, I must agree that we do not understand each other. I went outside of polite conversation with my question to you, but remember, you accuse me of all sorts of delusion, marketing, etc, along with SY and others. I don't like to be characterized in any way but that I am doing my best, either. So, how about a truce?
A truce? Were we at war? We have differences of opinion, but you know that I am on record expressing my respect for your accomplishments. But if you spout BS I call you on it. First amendment?
I often have the impression that you see criticism on a idea or an opinion as criticism on the man John Curl. That is by no means the case but it does make it harder to communicate.
Jan
I'm not finding a lot of material on the real resolution with 24 bit ADCs, except for the super-slow-dog ones suitable for non-audio use. I thought someone in here would know off the top of her/his head. Do I recall that Grimm was working on an extravagant ADC with assured linearity and absence of missing codes? I might just have dreamt it.
One could use one of those 16 Bit / 160 MSPS ADCs and apply huge amounts of
out-of-band-dither that would be filtered out again without a trace on the digital side.
Half band filters and decimators could bring abt. 10 bits down to audio BW.
OK, there will be some losses, but it should result in a decent audio ADC.
I often have the impression that you see criticism on a idea or an opinion as criticism on the man John Curl. That is by no means the case but it does make it harder to communicate.
Admitting, once in a while, being wrong would also help. Small things, like the Bybee BS, high open loop bandwidth benefits, the audible effects of wire materials, indiscriminate ceramic capacitors scaremongering, to name a few.
They get short changed anyway, nothing to do with vinyl, simply that typical programme material spectrum roughly
follows a 1/f amplitude law. So high frequency content is typically naturally of low amplitude in programme material.
Yes, whatever happened to CD pre-emphasis anyway?
for audio dynamic specs S/N, SFDR, THD, IMD are appropriate - inl and dnl impact those and can give clues too
slow speed ADC for weigh scales are examples of "industrial" application parts, static accuracy specs are important unlike audio
oversampling, dither and averaging don't fix linearity problems seen in the inl plot, only smooth a little the dnl plot
a few 16-20 bit ADC targeted at higher bandwidth than audio, 400ksp - 4 Msps for precision scientific instrumentation and medical imaging are probably usable for audio with specs competing with some flagship audio ADC
averaging/low pass filter S/N improvement needs to be factored in when comparing these fast ADC with audio bandwidth and often A weighted S/N specs for the audio specific chips
so while pre-emphasis made sense, helped early, marginal, audio ADC/DAC it just faded away in practice as hotter mixes became the norm and better ADC/DAC didn't need the help
slow speed ADC for weigh scales are examples of "industrial" application parts, static accuracy specs are important unlike audio
oversampling, dither and averaging don't fix linearity problems seen in the inl plot, only smooth a little the dnl plot
a few 16-20 bit ADC targeted at higher bandwidth than audio, 400ksp - 4 Msps for precision scientific instrumentation and medical imaging are probably usable for audio with specs competing with some flagship audio ADC
averaging/low pass filter S/N improvement needs to be factored in when comparing these fast ADC with audio bandwidth and often A weighted S/N specs for the audio specific chips
I believe once the tracking limitations of vinyl were removed it became common to let more highs through in the mix - particularly with close micing catching highs that never reach an audienceYes, whatever happened to CD pre-emphasis anyway?
so while pre-emphasis made sense, helped early, marginal, audio ADC/DAC it just faded away in practice as hotter mixes became the norm and better ADC/DAC didn't need the help
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@jan.diddenJan, you asked something along the lines of ' what is the group delay at 20Hz associated with a mechanical cartridge/arm resonance having a peak amplitude of +6dB at 10Hz? '. The answer I calculate is c 4.6mS.
At 20Hz in that system, amplitude response of headshell movement to forced stylus motion is c -9dB, phase response c -160 deg.
If instead we look at the effect of the mechanical system on intentional content in the groove at 20Hz, that system would invoke an amplitude lift of +1.7dB, phase shift of c 20 deg, and group delay of c 3.8mS.
The real issue here is that John is very much aware that "silly" things audibly affect the sound, but the hard core engineering types refuse to consider this possible. Having spent decades investigating, experimenting with, getting intensely frustrated by not getting a better handle on things, I'm very much on his side in this matter.
John tries to work his way through this cloud of 'unknowns' by using his experience and hearing; the hard cores latch on to the "you beaut" answer that people's hearing is terribly flawed, completely useless as a metric, and they then sweep everything they haven't an easy answer for under this enormous carpet.
And the cycle continues ...
John tries to work his way through this cloud of 'unknowns' by using his experience and hearing; the hard cores latch on to the "you beaut" answer that people's hearing is terribly flawed, completely useless as a metric, and they then sweep everything they haven't an easy answer for under this enormous carpet.
And the cycle continues ...
The real issue here is that John is very much aware that "silly" things audibly affect the sound, but the hard core engineering types refuse to consider this possible. Having spent decades investigating, experimenting with, getting intensely frustrated by not getting a better handle on things, I'm very much on his side in this matter.
John tries to work his way through this cloud of 'unknowns' by using his experience and hearing; the hard cores latch on to the "you beaut" answer that people's hearing is terribly flawed, completely useless as a metric, and they then sweep everything they haven't an easy answer for under this enormous carpet.
And the cycle continues ...
![bullseye :bullseye: :bullseye:](https://files.diyaudio.com/forums/images/smilies/bullseye.gif)
Well, if somebody swears that design xyz is absolutely the best sounding ever made, but at the same time I see droves of people buying design PQR, I wonder. I wonder a lot; enough to spend money and time to find out what the hell is wrong in this picture.
Edit: Dick you have amps in the market place. Do you never wonder why some people buy a Marsh amp, and some others buy Bose?
Jan
It's all about marketing to the people.... and the buyers listening experience. Bose advertised everywhere with a huge budget to the non-audiophile and non critical, non- experienced listener what is at best described as a table radio quality sound... and I mean that in the worst sense.... All they said was their reproduction sounded like the real thing... over and over. They sell a lot just based on that. But, that was a 'targeted' marketing strategy.
High-End should do so well. In fact, have you seen a Bose in a High-End store? It could be great to demo against with high perf audio vs the Bose as a reason to pay more. high-End needs their own strategy.... which seems to be limited to stereophile et al reviews and adverts. Big time marketing like Bose requires a huge budget for radio, magazines and TV for a long time.
So, No I dont generally wonder why someone doesnt buy my brand. But, I dont try to sell into a mature and saturated market, either.
[politicians have picked up on this Bose strategy also]
THx-RNMarsh
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Richard,
Just try and place a Bose system in a High-end audio store and watch how fast the Bose lawyers are knocking on your door telling you to cease and disist or get caught up in court. That has always been a part of their control over the market and any comparisons to their products, they won't let that happen.
Fas42,
I'm all for doing things to the best of your abilities in whatever it is you do. I agree that many things are just glanced over or ignored by many companies. I think the same way in my speaker designs, looking at all the little details that only a few seem to pay attention to or accept as being factors in making a device as good at you can do. It would be so much simpler to just purchase a cone from one of the manufacturers of paper or plastic cones rather than having to mold my own with my own secret sauce but I know my development is better than most other cones. The little details like you question the other day about why those metal cone bass drivers you were looking at had such high distortion and 2nd harmonics out the behind. I don't think you can make a metal cone driver work over a very wide range, anything over the pistonic range is going to cause major headaches. Just think about the nodal breakup of a metal material, high Q problems for sure.
Just try and place a Bose system in a High-end audio store and watch how fast the Bose lawyers are knocking on your door telling you to cease and disist or get caught up in court. That has always been a part of their control over the market and any comparisons to their products, they won't let that happen.
Fas42,
I'm all for doing things to the best of your abilities in whatever it is you do. I agree that many things are just glanced over or ignored by many companies. I think the same way in my speaker designs, looking at all the little details that only a few seem to pay attention to or accept as being factors in making a device as good at you can do. It would be so much simpler to just purchase a cone from one of the manufacturers of paper or plastic cones rather than having to mold my own with my own secret sauce but I know my development is better than most other cones. The little details like you question the other day about why those metal cone bass drivers you were looking at had such high distortion and 2nd harmonics out the behind. I don't think you can make a metal cone driver work over a very wide range, anything over the pistonic range is going to cause major headaches. Just think about the nodal breakup of a metal material, high Q problems for sure.
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