In some situations sine wave testing and multitone testing is more strenuous than a musical signal. A musical signal is ever changing and it goes from simple waveforms to more complex waveforms but at the end of the day a musical waveform can be represented by a instantaneous value plotted on a X-Y graph using the complex number system or as job operators just like a sine wave can be. The design of the circuitry and the parameters of that circuitry can reproduce musical waveforms or sine waves as we know. The difference is in what distortions and changes to the energy is induced onto that waveform and that's generally referred to as the linearity. The linearity being the change from the input to the output with the best scenario being no change at all to the electrical energy. The difficulty in measuring the musical waveform linearity is that there is no known original standardized value that can be used to reference to the output and therefore measure the linearity of the circuit. The metering of that process is at this time from what I know not practical and is not a process that is even available.Can we estimate how much further distortion might rise with a particularly complex passage of music?
Because music is comprised of ever changing sine waves that combine that means the distortion(s) can be more or less than that number you used. Meaning the linearity of the waveform can be better or worse than a multitone spec'd number or even a musical signal.If we have DACs that can frequently clear 120dB in multitone testing today, would music maybe knock it down a few more dB? 10? 20?
When a circuit design is layed out and implemented the end result is a circuit that is designed for any instantaneous value of energy and in this case between the limits of your hearing range as a example. A designer can't design for a multitone test with the expectation that the musical linearity would be worse than the multitone linearity. It's just not possible because if a circuit can do multitone energy then it can do musical energy and vice versa. Because multitone is a steady combination of waveforms and because Fourier Transform Theory details the end signal is comprised of all the waveforms and odd and even order harmonics then in some ways a multitone test can be more difficult for a circuit to process just like a musical signal may be less difficult to process or more difficult depending on what energy it is comprised of. To think that the energy is different in a musical signal compared to a multitone test signal is to go against the Fourier Transform Theory and other theories that are proven. Energy is energy and in this case musical energy is not easier or more difficult energy to process it is just a ever changing energy and a multitone is a steady rate of energy that can be measured in a steady state that is between the limits of your hearing range. It's all energy and the circuitry just processes the energy and the designer just designs for the energy bandwidth that is being processed. To look for other non-linearities for the energy as if musical energy is different than multitone energy is looking for stuff that simply doesn't exist. This is pretty complex stuff and I've attempted to simplify and shorten as much as possible and I am not a master of the subject.manufacturers optimizing gear for benchmarks, not for music.
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