Message to golden-eared audiophiles posting at ASR for the first time...

[killdozzer]

Not all of us! I EQ mine flat as a board. Can't stand it any other way.

And that's why we like you!!! (and hate you...)

 

[Deleted member 21219]

He even messaged me with some bizarre questions.

Me, too. He wasn't exceptionally rational, either.

Jim

 

[Bridges]

All DACs sound the same if the measurements indicate that they should and if they aren't broken.

OK

 

[antcollinet]

To be fair…nobody lasts to the end of an endless thread…

I sort of meant to the end of the thread as it existed as I was reading. In other words....

oh, never mind.

 

[killdozzer]

This troll is here in bad faith. Ignore him.

Is your avatar from Silent Hill?

 

[egellings]

What about science that backs up some of this subjectivity? I'm sure there must be some science out there backing that up. My cable change on my subwoofer was and still is very audible, volumes the same (on AVR), same songs, same gain on the subwoofer. This new cable is shielded to high frequencies and I have 2mW/m2 1.8ghz signals at the cable from the cell tower near me, that's already billions of times higher than normal natural background microwave levels, I believe QED when they talk about micro timing caused by RFI. It's not just about the cable, it's also how the cable serves the components it's attached to.

Weird, yes, it's like they want to be robots. I really do think ASR has many of them. They can do what they want, but dismissing subjectivity like some religious cult is indeed bonkers in itself.

I'm not extreme, I don't dismiss measurements, I will search hard to find measurements that back up my subjective experiences, if there is no proof after hard searching... it will make me wonder... but maybe there's no measurements for it yet. Of course, I'm against kidding myself as well.

For me, audio science is interesting, when it confirms subjectivity.

The cable change's effect was most likely caused by an identifiable source of interference. One cable's design allowed the interference, likely RF in nature, into the system, possibly causing component misbehavior that resulted in a change in sound quality. The other cable may have blocked the interfering signal due to a difference in its design, and no component misbehavior due to RF intrusion occurred, resulting in no change in the sound quality. So any change in sound quality was not due to any magical difference in the cables. If both cables were auditioned in an RFI-free setting, such as a screen room, the S.Q. differences would disappear. The only way a cable would affect S.Q. would be through differences in R, L and C of the cable. It's just engineering, not wizardry.

 

[killdozzer]

My 2 cents (and we do have them now, they're just called eurocents)...

Soooo... My two eurocents regarding Mr. Piggy is that the only contribution to the whole "you're not scientific because you don't value what I value" position is the key-hole-ear which is in fact coloring. But, somehow, and maybe it's just me, I thought there's little you can do with your ears. I mean, we're not about to start cutting our lobes or what to tune 14k cables

It seems obvious to me that since your ears are a given, you can measure the equipment. Furthermore, precisely for that reason - our listening apparatus coloring sound, you should make the equipment as neutral as possible, right...? Right? Is there some logic in that or have I been on my own for far too long? This is how I see it:

- you take your coloring ears to a live performance and you like what you hear
- you buy coloring equipment and it's far from the lie performance
- but you buy neutral
- you treat room
- you mend the room modes and the rest
- the sound comes as faithful as possible
- your coloring ears skew it a little bit
- it came close (closest) to what you liked the first time you heard it

No?

 

[kemmler3D]

Yes I agree. There's no magical property in wire or connectors.

What I obviously wasn't clear about is that I was talking about the degradation over time of electrical contacts due to humidity, contamination etc. There is plenty of scientific research in this area (mainly to do with degradation of switching contacts) and lots of measurements.

In a large studio with hundreds of patch cables and "break" sockets, contamination over longish periods can lead to noise and faults. This is quite common, and often a re-plug fixes the issue for a further period, but if not, cleaning the contacts resolved the problem. The point I was making above is - this effect would be difficult to setup as an experiment outside of a lab where contamination can be controlled. The change in resistance, and any semi-conduction impact is likely to require sensitive measurement gear and no-one has the time or patience to do this.

Many of us here assume that reported cable sound differences are due to cognitive biases or placebo. But I also think that there's a beneficial consequence of just unplugging the first cable and plugging in the second. A proper experiment would have three facets: 1) a test with the current cables in after being undisturbed for several months; 2) a test with the same cables after contact cleaning or just re-plugging; 3) a test with the new cables. Skipping the 2nd test is where the process is flawed.

I've read somewhere that this phenomenon is behind a lot, maybe most of "veils lifted" from cable upgrades. It's not that the cable was actually any better, it's that you finally broke up the (audibly harmful) layer of oxidation by moving your cables for the first time in 8 years.

 

[kemmler3D]

My 2 cents (and we do have them now, they're just called eurocents)...

Soooo... My two eurocents regarding Mr. Piggy is that the only contribution to the whole "you're not scientific because you don't value what I value" position is the key-hole-ear which is in fact coloring. But, somehow, and maybe it's just me, I thought there's little you can do with your ears. I mean, we're not about to start cutting our lobes or what to tune 14k cables

It seems obvious to me that since your ears are a given, you can measure the equipment. Furthermore, precisely for that reason - our listening apparatus coloring sound, you should make the equipment as neutral as possible, right...? Right? Is there some logic in that or have I been on my own for far too long? This is how I see it:

- you take your coloring ears to a live performance and you like what you hear
- you buy coloring equipment and it's far from the lie performance
- but you buy neutral
- you treat room
- you mend the room modes and the rest
- the sound comes as faithful as possible
- your coloring ears skew it a little bit
- it came close (closest) to what you liked the first time you heard it

No?

Yeah, you would really think that would be obvious, right?

Whatever you hear through your own ear holes is neutral to you, by definition.

So you can't usually compensate for your ears by using non-neutral speakers or amps or whatever. One man's neutral speaker is another man's... also neutral speaker.

Headphones are another story.

"When you see the color red, does it look the same as my red?" Who knows, but you can't do anything about it by wearing tinted eyeglasses.

 

[egellings]

My 2 cents (and we do have them now, they're just called eurocents)...

Soooo... My two eurocents regarding Mr. Piggy is that the only contribution to the whole "you're not scientific because you don't value what I value" position is the key-hole-ear which is in fact coloring. But, somehow, and maybe it's just me, I thought there's little you can do with your ears. I mean, we're not about to start cutting our lobes or what to tune 14k cables

It seems obvious to me that since your ears are a given, you can measure the equipment. Furthermore, precisely for that reason - our listening apparatus coloring sound, you should make the equipment as neutral as possible, right...? Right? Is there some logic in that or have I been on my own for far too long? This is how I see it:

- you take your coloring ears to a live performance and you like what you hear
- you buy coloring equipment and it's far from the lie performance
- but you buy neutral
- you treat room
- you mend the room modes and the rest
- the sound comes as faithful as possible
- your coloring ears skew it a little bit
- it came close (closest) to what you liked the first time you heard it

No?

Makes sense to me. Human hearing in any individual is highly variable due to effects of mood, health, comfort level, buzz level, if any, and who knows what else.

 

[Sal1950]

… and usually the next troll isn’t far behind…. Let’s see

We have a few that never go away.
We know who they are.

Many of us here assume that reported cable sound differences are due to cognitive biases or placebo. But I also think that there's a beneficial consequence of just unplugging the first cable and plugging in the second.

That's a very solid and good point! I specially hate low signal level RCA connectors for their flimsy design.
The one thing I'd like to change in my system is to one of the pro locking style.
And that still wouldn't cover the possibility of degraded connections due to corrosion etc over time.
Many many years back I tried some contact enhancing materials, can't remember the name,
but in the end they would dry into a gooey mess.
The only real current option is to manually go thru and clean each one every so often.
With 7.2.4 channels of audio to attend to, not a project I relish.
Cheers

 

[MattHooper]

A not unreasonable position to take killdozer!

However, to quibble...

It seems obvious to me that since your ears are a given, you can measure the equipment. Furthermore, precisely for that reason - our listening apparatus coloring sound, you should make the equipment as neutral as possible, right...? Right? Is there some logic in that or have I been on my own for far too long? This is how I see it:

- you take your coloring ears to a live performance and you like what you hear
- you buy coloring equipment and it's far from the lie performance

If you mean that "it's far from the live performance" in the sense that any stereo reproduction will be far from the live performance, I'd generally agree.

If you mean instead that BECAUSE of some equipment adding coloration that THEREFORE it will depart even further than the live performance, then that is
debatable. That's because, as we know, plenty of colorations are often added via the process of recording and mixing such performances. And therefore
correcting for those colorations could involve altering the reproduction in some way (which will be adding a beneficial coloration).

If I take a stereo track of a live performance and with my AVR upmix it to surround in my home theater, that is a heavy coloration, a departure from the original recording, yet it can sound more convincingly like being at the live event due to the immersion. In principle any number of added colorations can "correct" for
deficiencies in the recording process.

Or you can take an omni speaker like the MBLs (which I owned). Some claim that spraying the sound omnidirectionally is a form of coloration of the original recording, even if some find it "pleasant." Yet some find this replicates certain aspects of "real sound" better than many highly directional speakers. (Less "head in a vice" effect in listening, the sound seeming more free of the speakers, appearing to exist in more "real space" in the room...)

And since reproduced sound almost always departs from live sound, and is compromised, it can depend on what a listener focuses on that can make the difference.

I've "massaged" my system to reproduce certain qualities I hear in live sound, and so it tends to sound more convincing to me on that count (certainly not indistinguishable from live of course, but certain features are more in that direction, to my ears).

- but you buy neutral
- you treat room
- you mend the room modes and the rest
- the sound comes as faithful as possible
- your coloring ears skew it a little bit
- it came close (closest) to what you liked the first time you heard it

No?

Could be. Depends. See above.

 

[egellings]

A not unreasonable position to take killdozer!

However, to quibble...



If you mean that "it's far from the live performance" in the sense that any stereo reproduction will be far from the live performance, I'd generally agree.

If you mean instead that BECAUSE of some equipment adding coloration that THEREFORE it will depart even further than the live performance, then that is
debatable. That's because, as we know, plenty of colorations are often added via the process of recording and mixing such performances. And therefore
correcting for those colorations could involve altering the reproduction in some way (which will be adding a beneficial coloration).

If I take a stereo track of a live performance and with my AVR upmix it to surround in my home theater, that is a heavy coloration, a departure from the original recording, yet it can sound more convincingly like being at the live event due to the immersion. In principle any number of added colorations can "correct" for
deficiencies in the recording process.

Or you can take an omni speaker like the MBLs (which I owned). Some claim that spraying the sound omnidirectionally is a form of coloration of the original recording, even if some find it "pleasant." Yet some find this replicates certain aspects of "real sound" better than many highly directional speakers. (Less "head in a vice" effect in listening, the sound seeming more free of the speakers, appearing to exist in more "real space" in the room...)

And since reproduced sound almost always departs from live sound, and is compromised, it can depend on what a listener focuses on that can make the difference.

I've "massaged" my system to reproduce certain qualities I hear in live sound, and so it tends to sound more convincing to me on that count (certainly not indistinguishable from live of course, but certain features are more in that direction, to my ears).




Could be. Depends. See above.

Do you have the MBL Radial Shtrahler (sp?) speakers?

 

[MattHooper]

Do you have the MBL Radial Shtrahler (sp?) speakers?

Yes I owned the stand mounted MBL 121 Radialstrahler speakers.

(Which have since been replaced in their line-up with two newer stand mount models: the smaller 126 and the larger 120).

 

[Doodski]

We have a few that never go away.
We know who they are.


That's a very solid and good point! I specially hate low signal level RCA connectors for their flimsy design.
The one thing I'd like to change in my system is to one of the pro locking style.
And that still wouldn't cover the possibility of degraded connections due to corrosion etc over time.
Many many years back I tried some contact enhancing materials, can't remember the name,
but in the end they would dry into a gooey mess.
The only real current option is to manually go thru and clean each one every so often.
With 7.2.4 channels of audio to attend to, not a project I relish.
Cheers

You could try carbon conductive grease. A tiny amount of it is all that's required. I knew guys that where using it around the late 90s and they had good success.

 

[Sal1950]

If you mean that "it's far from the live performance" in the sense that any stereo reproduction will be far from the live performance, I'd generally agree.

The circle of confusion. LOL

When we speak to this issue of "live" sound we do have to add in the fact that the vast majority of the recordings
we listen to were never designed to sound like a live event reproduced in the home.
Only the rare few classical and jazz releases were recorded live, with minimal miking, with the real intention of that.
What we have are studio recordings designed to sound like whatever the artist and engineering team wanted them to.

 

[killdozzer]

The circle of confusion. LOL

When we speak to this issue of "live" sound we do have to add in the fact that the vast majority of the recordings
we listen to were never designed to sound like a live event reproduced in the home.
Only the rare few classical and jazz releases were recorded live, with minimal miking, with the real intention of that.
What we have are studio recordings designed to sound like whatever the artist and engineering team wanted them to.

But it changes nothing. Our Hooper merely excels at being wrong. He aims to harness arguments and reasoning to serve some of his arbitrary subjective feelings and make them weigh as much as facts do. It's impossible. That's chasing rainbows.

I gave the example of live music, but take any recording you want; some guys did it with their equipment and their ears, it can be Nosaj Thing, nothing live about it. What do you think, can you come close to what they made in their studio the same way I described with removing variables or by adding variables?

See? It doesn't change that much. BTW, I'm one of those who doesn't think live performance or acoustic instruments are the blueprint for anything, most of my music is artificial. I just gave an example.

 

[sergeauckland]

The circle of confusion. LOL

When we speak to this issue of "live" sound we do have to add in the fact that the vast majority of the recordings
we listen to were never designed to sound like a live event reproduced in the home.
Only the rare few classical and jazz releases were recorded live, with minimal miking, with the real intention of that.
What we have are studio recordings designed to sound like whatever the artist and engineering team wanted them to.

When a recording is done in different studios, at different times, with none of the musicians ever playing together, there is no 'performance' to be recorded. The 'performance' is entirely created artificially. A very few recordings, like the Jazz At The Pawnshop series were actually recorded live, straight to stereo (Nagra recorder)

Orchestral recordings, notably Decca, were done as a full orchestra and with only a few microphones. Everything else since the invention of multi-track recorders has been assembled from individual recordings. Even highly regarded 'purist' classical recordings have been assembled from many different takes. One exception are Nimbus, who claim to use the edit to save a special preformance, not to creat one.

Consequently, trying to recreate a 'live' experience at home is pretty much futile as few recordings have ever been made that way.

S.

 

[krabapple]

I think the idea is try to recreate the experience of the studio monitoring of the final mastered mix.

Good luck with that.

 

[krabapple]

But that just demonstrates a placebo effect, but not what the auditory bounties are when there really is a difference.

I think you are being too dismissive. The phenomenon demonstrated by such a 'phantom switch' test has huge implications for audio evaluation.


But 'just' demonstrating that the 'placebo effect' results in an all but impossible belief here, doesn't seem to faze radical audio subjectivists. They simply dismiss it as something that they don't do.

I believe Floyd Toole did such tests but I have not read his text thoroughly, so I will not comment on the results. There are levels where one with good hearing can distinguish audio quality from one recording or device verses another.

Yes, these are called 'just noticeable differences' , they are standard part of psychoacoustics data independent of Floyd Toole, and they're beside my point. No one denies that audio gear can sound different.