The most important parameter of all: overall system integrity

[Don Hills]

And if you do place the microphones where the audience is, you get an unsatisfactory recording. It is quite enlightening to listen to a performance from a good audience position, while recording from this position and then progressively closer to the performance. Then you later play back the recordings and pick the one that sounds most like what you heard live. You'll be surprised to see how close the microphones had to be to get the "live" sound. (When I got my first tape recorder, in my teens, I tried this with piano in a hall. It was a useful lesson.)

 

[watchnerd]

And if you do place the microphones where the audience is, you get an unsatisfactory recording. It is quite enlightening to listen to a performance from a good audience position, while recording from this position and then progressively closer to the performance. Then you later play back the recordings and pick the one that sounds most like what you heard live. You'll be surprised to see how close the microphones had to be to get the "live" sound. (When I got my first tape recorder, in my teens, I tried this with piano in a hall. It was a useful lesson.)

I do the same experiment now with an iPhone and a Shure Motiv MV88 cardioid.

 

[Blumlein 88]

And if you do place the microphones where the audience is, you get an unsatisfactory recording. It is quite enlightening to listen to a performance from a good audience position, while recording from this position and then progressively closer to the performance. Then you later play back the recordings and pick the one that sounds most like what you heard live. You'll be surprised to see how close the microphones had to be to get the "live" sound. (When I got my first tape recorder, in my teens, I tried this with piano in a hall. It was a useful lesson.)

Same experience I have had recording. Some of it seems to be that from audience position mics seem to pick up more echo or room sound than you hear with your ears. Moving closer rebalances that over what the mics hear it seems to me.

 

[watchnerd]

Same experience I have had recording. Some of it seems to be that from audience position mics seem to pick up more echo or room sound than you hear with your ears. Moving closer rebalances that over what the mics hear it seems to me.

Correct.

I've also tried binaural mid- to far-field orchestral recordings using an AKG dummy head. It doesn't solve the problem (although the same technique works great for chamber music).

 

[fas42]

A better thread to post this on, ... on WBF in the thread "Members' Gallery > ack's system - end of round 1", from post #211 on, a familiar description of a system getting into the "zone". Note that was achieved by focusing on the power supply of the DAC, which leads, as a number of people comment on, to a reduction of those noise factors which is crucial for getting the best from digital based systems.

A latest post on that thread, lending more light on what he's listening to - a key part:

Last night I was at a live unamplified jazz gathering in a small venue, where a friend of mine plays the drums - she has a set at home as well, and I've played with it a number of times over the years. Last night, I had the pleasure to "test" again drums and alto sax. The dynamics and treble extension of cymbals from up close - as the microphone captures it - is just staggering. But instead of marveling at how good live is, I was marveling at how well Spectral does all this at home, and I don't have super-speakers. More than that, how good the typical tube recording electronics must be, the behavior of which [the device, not necessarily the circuits], as Al said before, Spectral is trying to mimic in the solid state domain - namely, extremely wide bandwidth, linearity, phase correctness, extension, incredible speed and settling times, un-electronic - but with a lot more power, current and control.

 

[watchnerd]

A latest post on that thread, lending more light on what he's listening to - a key part:

I don't understand what the big deal is....

Yeah, cymbals are notoriously had to record and play back. They're even worse to lossy codecs.

This is pretty well-known stuff....

 

[fas42]

I don't understand what the big deal is....

Yeah, cymbals are notoriously had to record and play back. They're even worse to lossy codecs.

This is pretty well-known stuff....

The big deal is that the system has to get this right. As an example, that Status Quo track - can you get it to playback at realistic levels, with the sound of the cymbals fully intact? I tried dozens of systems, which all failed dismally - the sound is on the recording, but can you hear it reproduced well?

 

[watchnerd]

The big deal is that the system has to get this right. As an example, that Status Quo track - can you get it to playback at realistic levels, with the sound of the cymbals fully intact? I tried dozens of systems, which all failed dismally - the sound is on the recording, but can you hear it reproduced well?

Again -- reproducing cymbals is hard. We know this.

Getting a system to do it well is no mean feat. But it can be done, it's not impossible.

But we already knew this, so, again, what have we learned?

 

[fas42]

Why I pointed to that thread was because the member tweaked a crucial part of the playback chain, being the DAC, a well respected model that's out there - via substantial changes to the power supply to the unit. This caused a substantial upgrade to the SQ, while the speakers, MLs in fact, were not touched; he did something very similar to the style of modifications I do - which for me led to the quality of recorded cymbals being reproduced well.

This is all part of the process of improving system integrity - which is what the thread is about.

 

[watchnerd]

Why I pointed to that thread was because the member tweaked a crucial part of the playback chain, being the DAC, a well respected model that's out there - via substantial changes to the power supply to the unit. This caused a substantial upgrade to the SQ, while the speakers, MLs in fact, were not touched; he did something very similar to the style of modifications I do - which for me led to the quality of recorded cymbals being reproduced well.

This is all part of the process of improving system integrity - which is what the thread is about.

I didn't see anything about a DAC in what you quoted.

If you're going to make references to threads on other sites, can you please post a link?

 

[fas42]

The last post in the thread I pointed to here, http://audiosciencereview.com/forum...erall-system-integrity.892/page-11#post-33708. For technical reasons it's difficult for me to get a clean link to that website, to post here.

 

[watchnerd]

The last post in the thread I pointed to here, http://audiosciencereview.com/forum...erall-system-integrity.892/page-11#post-33708. For technical reasons it's difficult for me to get a clean link to that website, to post here.

I really don't have time to wade through pages of stuff, especially on that site. Can you summarize what he did to his DAC since you're claiming it aligns with your methods?

 

[fas42]

Altered the smoothing capacity array on several power supplies - initially had extra capacitance in parallel with the original capacitors, but they were running hot, for some, still unknown reason; they were removed for some slight further improvement. The change in type, capacitance, and the method of installing them altered the audible behaviour very significantly - this would be because the noise sitting on the voltage rails has altered in level and spectrum - and apparently was enough to tip the quality into a higher bracket.

 

[Don Hills]

Altered the smoothing capacity array on several power supplies - initially had extra capacitance in parallel with the original capacitors, but they were running hot, for some, still unknown reason; they were removed for some slight further improvement. The change in type, capacitance, and the method of installing them altered the audible behaviour very significantly - this would be because the noise sitting on the voltage rails has altered in level and spectrum - and apparently was enough to tip the quality into a higher bracket.

That's another example of people messing with things they don't understand. If there's enough noise on the power supply to heat up the smoothing capacitors (high ripple current), it's either faulty or very badly designed. Please tell us the make and model so we can avoid it. And if there's that much noise, it's not surprising that changing the capacitors would make an audible difference.

 

[fas42]

The Berkley Alpha, first series. This is held in high regard amongst many - why the capacitors were getting hot makes no sense, they were Panasonic FM series, and it appears they are legit parts. Low ESR, excellent ripple current rating, good reputation, no associated parts in the power supply were even significantly warm - as yet I haven't seen an explanation that fits. My guesses are an unlikely couple of faulty parts, or resonant impedance peaks caused by an unfortunate choice of bypassing capacitors.

 

[fas42]

RogerD from here just posted an Iphone6 YouTube clip of his current system showing all the signs of a competent system in its stride; you may recall he focuses strongly, very strongly on eliminating noise factors in his rig - he literally has a web of grounding cables set up to help him achieve this goal ...

 

[Purité Audio]

A network of cables, acting as aerials ... great idea.
Keith

 

[fas42]

The proof's in the pudding ... I've done lots of whacky things over the years, exploring what gives me the results I want - including lots of extra wiring. Once the mechanisms causing problems are fully understood then a nice, compact organisation of the system will be possible - the all-in-one boxes like the Kii are an excellent approach.

 

[watchnerd]

RogerD from here just posted an Iphone6 YouTube clip of his current system showing all the signs of a competent system in its stride; you may recall he focuses strongly, very strongly on eliminating noise factors in his rig - he literally has a web of grounding cables set up to help him achieve this goal ...

If this is the level of...I'll be charitable and say "tweaking"...that is required these days to meet the definition of "audiophile", then I no longer qualify.

 

[RogerD]

If this is the level of...I'll be charitable and say "tweaking"...that is required these days to meet the definition of "audiophile", then I no longer qualify.

One thing for sure ignorant assh@@@ are on every audio forum.