I just like to say; after Janemann's first comment towards recording as an art, yes, I agree. However...
"People who question whether they hear audio improvements or not, should probably refrain from commenting on people who do." is a valid statement, IMHO. And... "Assuming you are talking about unamplified acoustical music, I would say the ultimate goal for hi-end reproduction should be to make it sound real. If not, what is the meaning of high fidility reproduction? Surely we can not recreate "being there" but there is no reason for not trying to make it sound the same or at least believable." has tremendous merit towards the classic goals hear (pun inteded).
The age old "are you feeling like you are there" or "do you feel like they are hear"(sorry), is apparently what is being argued. But Jan, are you willing to share all the discrepecies of our/your equipment with the difficiencies of the engineer or producer, or their equipment?
Then what goes in, should come out, logic I believe is what we are after. Isn't it 😀
"People who question whether they hear audio improvements or not, should probably refrain from commenting on people who do." is a valid statement, IMHO. And... "Assuming you are talking about unamplified acoustical music, I would say the ultimate goal for hi-end reproduction should be to make it sound real. If not, what is the meaning of high fidility reproduction? Surely we can not recreate "being there" but there is no reason for not trying to make it sound the same or at least believable." has tremendous merit towards the classic goals hear (pun inteded).
The age old "are you feeling like you are there" or "do you feel like they are hear"(sorry), is apparently what is being argued. But Jan, are you willing to share all the discrepecies of our/your equipment with the difficiencies of the engineer or producer, or their equipment?
Then what goes in, should come out, logic I believe is what we are after. Isn't it 😀
Hermanv, I once got caught in thinking that a real violin was playing in another room. I was at a hi fi show in San Francisco when I heard the sound of this solo violin. I said to myself that this was a REAL violin, and I was pretty sure that I could not be fooled, as I was once married to a violinist and worked at a classical music institute for a few years, and had studied the subject of differences in violins.
Instead, I found it was MY Levinson JC-2 preamp, playing through Dick Sequerra's ribbon tweeters. I was surprised and I congratulated Dick Sequerra at the time. He said that my preamp (at the time) was the best MONO preamp that he had ever heard. This lead me to research why it was not the best STEREO preamp as well. That is how we achieve progress.
Instead, I found it was MY Levinson JC-2 preamp, playing through Dick Sequerra's ribbon tweeters. I was surprised and I congratulated Dick Sequerra at the time. He said that my preamp (at the time) was the best MONO preamp that he had ever heard. This lead me to research why it was not the best STEREO preamp as well. That is how we achieve progress.
My system is probably not up to the quality of the one you heard, but it too does quite well on human solos or single instruments, specially stringed ones.
It's this taste of first class reproduction that drives me to want more. Once heard the illusion is captivating.
It's this taste of first class reproduction that drives me to want more. Once heard the illusion is captivating.
Wavebourn, I agree with you about PA sound, even at folk concerts. It really hurts to see electronic sound reproduction added just to have a few more seats covered with a minimum sound level.
I recently attended such a folk festival, and now I think I would rather watch folk performances on TV when available and use records or FM reproduction for the absolutely best sound quality. What you are doing in you home, with your live performances, must be a continuous reminder to you of the compromises made to acoustic music reproduction on a frequent basis.
One of my goals is to open the minds of the PA designers (like I once was) to put in the extra effort to make the best quality sound reproduction, not just loudness or weight reduction, etc.
I recently attended such a folk festival, and now I think I would rather watch folk performances on TV when available and use records or FM reproduction for the absolutely best sound quality. What you are doing in you home, with your live performances, must be a continuous reminder to you of the compromises made to acoustic music reproduction on a frequent basis.
One of my goals is to open the minds of the PA designers (like I once was) to put in the extra effort to make the best quality sound reproduction, not just loudness or weight reduction, etc.
I was at one of those performances, and it was a sobering reminder of how poorly most systems do, even for small-scale stuff (this was a solo singer with piano accompaniment). It seems almost impossible for speakers to get the human voice right.
john curl said:
My pair disappeared in a move. Didn't Dick make a ribbon full range that was unshippable by air due to the magnetic disturbances?
Listen to the PA system at any airport to learn that people will accept incredibly mangled sound as adequate. Or cell phones, talk about awful sound (and I once worked for Nokia).SY said:
I still know one custom design patterned after Dick Sequerra's full range unit that is in the Boston area, unless it has been disassembled. It was good, but replaced by electrostatic speakers.
SY said:
Yes, and that were the best speakers and microphones I ever made! All available space around the stage was filled with damping materials.
Imagine what happens when stock devices are used...
Back in 70'th when I participated in a TV contest they recorded all participants in studio thoroughly recording several versions, then taught us to open mouses listening to own records, then in a hall filled with thousand of listeners we pretended as if perform alive. People thought it was a live performance. The sound was great. Nobody was making big mistakes. No imbalance and other usual mess when singers and bands were swapped on a stage.
My goal is to build such a PA system that allows to amplify a live performance close to studio quality, but I still far from this goal, SY can tell... However, without direct comparison of live gorgeous voice of Sergey Zadvorny and the same voice through microphones it would be easy to say that "The system sounds real"... Diana Krall on a record sounded "real"; after the concert I put CD with Garry Karr playing Amati violin accompanied with Swiss organ in a great temple; people were impressed by "Live Sound", but they could not compare because no live sound was available for comparison.
So, the question is still open: what sounds better, live performance or a record...
syn08 said:
Maybe if the tests were more dynamic, like audio?
what about 1 cycle on-one off?
continue to 20 cycles on-one off.
I respect your efforts, but you really didn't test much.
G.Kleinschmidt said:
I don't think most wine fanciers would put up a concerted, blinkered, career-long protest against DB testing.
i doubt they'd accept the ABX test method either.
They often do something to eliminate taste in their mouth, rather than quickly switching.
About live performance - amplified rock or another music is never any reference.
Acoustical, unamplified instruments are, and philharmonic orchestra is a goal that technology would never bring to our homes - it is simply impossible.
Acoustical, unamplified instruments are, and philharmonic orchestra is a goal that technology would never bring to our homes - it is simply impossible.
janneman said:
If the goal is reproduction of audio, and not the full experience, then a sensory deprivation tank can be used to compare live with reproduced.
hermanv said:
The criteria for such PA sound is usually different.
cost being a major factor.
Same with cell phones.
I wish I knew how true this is, everyone accepts it as gospel but BMW cars are anything but cheap, yet sell quite well. Over the service life of a PA system is the cost differential all that significant? I'll stick with airports, how does the cost of better sound compare with 48,000 gallons of aviation fuel (that's one fill up of one Boeing 747)?myhrrhleine said:
I think cell phones cost about $7.00 in parts, people pay dearly for larger LCD screens on their phones, but no one knows what is the acceptance criteria of cost for better sound. There is additional network cost (more bandwidth) but as you must know the cost per bandwidth bit drops amazingly and does so quickly. Today it's probably one or two percent of cost when cell phones were introduced.myhrrhleine said:
In my years of telephony design, I never saw a study, it was just assumed that lowest cost was mandatory. The actual incremental cost of better electronics is small for high volume products. Better grounding, ground plane PCB (2 layer) better Op-Amps, film as opposed to ceramic caps in the signal path actually add very little to cost and provide good sound quality benefits. Mainly the designer has to give a damn.
Wavebourn said:
I think that is a personal judgement. They sound different. What is better is what you like better. Apples and pliers.
Jan Didden
myhrrhleine said:
Reproduction of the full experience is a physical impossibility. For now 😉
Jan Didden
hermanv said:
PA is usually airport, not flyer/carrier.
besides, many carriers now charge for a can of pop
marketing folks say bad sound will sell.
hermanv said:
Very true. Why thousand of listeners paying real money for tickets can not get the sound quality that one audiophile at home can?
I hope performers will recognize soon the difference so my PA systems will be in demand...
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