I feel strongly about the general notion of transparency above 90dB SINAD, but then again, there is that "what if", regardless of how irrational it might be. I decided to go with the lowest denominator and ended up with AV-10 for that and several other reasons. Think it was worth 5K I paid as it brought me a peace of mind, which is priceless...
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Seeking for confirmation; stick to Denon AVC-X4700h of step up to Marantz SR8015
- Thread starter Brambo67
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Same here, the likes of the best spec'ed and measured AV10, AVM90, potentially A1H/A10H/C30, RZ70 are imo well worth the higher price, but not the likes of the C40/50, MRX740, NADT778, as those are only worth the higher price based on myths and hearsay imoo.
ban25
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It's worth putting SINAD in perspective. Suppose the ambient noise floor in your house is 35 dB. Now assume you're playing something on your system with a peak of 85 dB. If your system has high enough distortion to produce a 3rd-order harmonic 50 dB below the fundamental, then that is at the same level as your in-house ambient.
90 dB SINAD is a pissing contest. So is 80, and even 70. I agree with peng that 65 is probably the limit of what I could reasonably detect, and only then if it was noise dominated (i.e. tweeter hissing during quiet passages).
Don't make the mistake of confusing High End with High Fidelity or High Performance.Nobody knows what is "high end" anymore and how much better it sounds than the rest. Depending on your listening habits etc. perhaps a second sub could improve the experience even more
High End is the term used by Stereophile and the rest to describe very expensive gear.
No matter how bad Mr. Atkinson measures a component under test, it will always be High End if it costs six digits.
??? So if a product is totally quiet but creates 10% distortion @ 1,000hz, I wouldn't be able to hear it if my room has a noise level of 40 or 50db?
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60 dB SINAD is 0.1%, no?
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ban25
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Good catch, correct 10% would be 20 dB SINAD -- not quite guitar distortion pedal level.60 dB SINAD is 0.1%, no?
Audio Calculators
Audio Calculators. How loud will my stereo play? How much power do I need? Conversions from % to dB. Conversions between Volts and dBu, and much more.
Good catch, correct 10% would be 20 dB SINAD -- not quite guitar distortion pedal level.
"barely" ? Hummm
ban25
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Absolutely it proves my point even more! Your example raises the harmonic up 20 dB over ambient. That's a big stretch, especially when arguing that you need equipment that delivers 90 dB SINAD (or 80 or 70 or 60).
So then we should request that manufacturers design equipment with 50 SINAD and save couple of cents on the DACs? Or this is purely academic point?
I try to buy above 90 which is generally what is now available from major AVR/AVP brands, but do have some older gear with 80dB SINAD that obviously performs very transparent and is not on the replacement list until it dies natural death.
I try to buy above 90 which is generally what is now available from major AVR/AVP brands, but do have some older gear with 80dB SINAD that obviously performs very transparent and is not on the replacement list until it dies natural death.
I would take a guess that:
a) Manufacturers know very well SINAD, unless noise dominated in an extreme way, does not correlate well with perceived sound quality by most AVP/AVR users, let alone separates audiophile users.
b) They also know most users are not very technically oriented, most don't know how to interpret the detailed DAC specs on datasheets either, even if they see them, and in most cases they don't see them, and/or have no interests in those things, it's just too much work for them.
So, manufacturers might just focus more (rightfully in most cases I guess) on things that potential buyers would focus on, things like power output, power consumption, dac brand, example: many do know/think ESS Sabre stuffs are good, not know that it depends on the specific modes such that there ESS dac chips that has lower specs than TI, AKM, Wolfson or vice versa, as DAC manufacturers do offer at least several chips, at different specs and price points for their customers to choose from. They might also face marketing conditions that would force them to choose specific parts such as DAC, OPA ICs (chips) based on prices, unit price for those ICs are very sensitive to sales volume, among other factors so their prices would fluctuate. For example, there seem to have no good reason for D+M, Onkyo, to choose the PCM5100 series DAC ICs based on the much lower specs, but it might be possible that there were offered irresistible prices at the time, when TI knows full well that due to the shortage of the AKM ICs, it was a great opportunity for them to off load their inventory of those ICs (the PCM5100/5101/5102 that might be close to their retirement age lol.
In my opinion, there may or may not be any point chasing higher SINAD that is higher than a certain point, and that's why a few years ago, I would not have suggested anyone to choose something like a Marantz SR7012 or 7013 over the Denon AVR-X4400 or X4500H for use as AVP, knowing full well the Denon models had 25-30 dB higher SINAD on the test benches if the premium for going with the Marantz were $500 more based on list price, but at several points on the time line, I almost bought a SR7012, 7013 just for back up to my X4400H, because they were on sale at price level significantly lower than that of the AVR-X4500H!! Reason is, the Marantz models were measured at 75-76 dB SINAD, same as the AV7705 AVP, and you look at the FFT, you can see clearly that the make up of the 75 dB total are mainly the 3rd and 5th harmonics and the 5th barely exceeds -90 dB with noise included at that point, so in this example I wouldn't be concerned about hearing distortions, and if I do, I might not be offended by it at all, some people even enjoyed that little bit of salt and pepper.
So, to me, the reasons I would/might still chase SINAD (only to a point) are the following:
a) Higher SINAD is a reasonably reliable indicator that the product is engineered well, for example, we have to give D+M the credit, that they manage to implement the TI DAC IC, with SINAD specs of 93 dB, to achieve high SINAD in the range 87 to 93 dB on the ASR test bench for the X3800H through Cinema 40.
b) Anthem AVM90 is probably the only one at the time of launch that utilized the flagship (not now but back then) ESS Sabre DAC IC, namely the very expensive ES9038Pro used in many separate desktop DACs that Amir had measured over the years, that thing's SINAD spec is a truly whopping 122 dB and DNR of 132 dB (best conditions)!! Yet, on the benches it only achieved about 103 dB, so no one can claim logically that the AVM90's >2X the price of the AVM70 can be justified on the much raved claims (see fans on that thousand page AVM70/90 thread on AVSF) that the 90 sounded so much better because of the better parts and circuitry used in the 90 over the 70.
The above two examples (there are many of course those are just easy picks) show smart shoppers might need to dive in a little deeper, if they are to decide on whether to pay more for the SINAD, but is sort of irrelevant if one don't care much about SINAD as in that case just go with features, aesthetic, perceived reliability, after sales support and obviously, price.
c) Lastly, if the unit under consideration has the needed features, and the price is right but SINAD is below say, 75 dB, then regardless of 65 dB might be transparent enough, I would still avoid the product because I don't like the feeling of not understanding why such a product cannot do better than 75 dB SINAD. One argument against the product could be, if it does rather poorly, or say unimpressively in that one metric, what other negatives would there be on this product overall? I don't know the answer but I think it is a fair question.
d) This is actually relative to c) above, that is, if SINAD is 75 dB on Amir's test bench, we must take a look of the other metrics he tested/measured, such as IMD and frequency dependency because the 75 dB is for testing at 1 kHz, so at 5-7.5 kHz, SINAD might be as low as 65 dB or even 60 dB, and we all know that if THD+N is bad, IMD might also take a hit because the two are related. In a sense, we need some sort of buffer, or headroom?
Now, AV10 and AVM90 owners like you, would not have to be concerned about any of my points above, that for just this reason, it is well worth the high $ you guys pay. You can just sit back and enjoy your gear, knowing that they are transparent and will sound great as long as the source you play are well recorded and mastered. Anyone who try to convince you that his/her gear wound better would just be their opinions, likely based on not doing their listening in apples to apples comparisons.
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Agreed on all points Dr. Peng and thanks for elaborate perspective. I think we have beat SINAD to death on this and other forums.
Now back to wheels and tires as that is my immediate need - and drooling over CES announcements. We are lucky that audio is so mature. Display technology is moving so fast and lots of temptations on that front - every year.
Now back to wheels and tires as that is my immediate need - and drooling over CES announcements. We are lucky that audio is so mature. Display technology is moving so fast and lots of temptations on that front - every year.
ban25
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96 Gbps with HDMI 2.2!
Wow, finally!
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Pfooh… didn’t anticipate my initial request to lead to such interesting conversations. I belief, like I said earlier, subjective opinion on how something sounds to me is perhaps more important than any (lab) measurement. Just today I saw ‘offers’ on our national ‘Market place’ (Marktplaats.nl) for RCA cables etc. way north of € 3.000,00 for a set of two cables… I mean… € 3.000,00??? I belief this justifies investing ‘a few thousand’ (if you are ‘good’ for it of course) in a proper AVR. I cannot really imagine hearing any difference between such expensive cables vs. more ‘normal’ ones. But apparently there are people able to hear the difference and, more important, willing to pay such amounts. Even putting the cables on balanced cable holders etc.
At the end of the day investing this amount into equipment is justified as they have the means to do so and in the meantime it gets them to their desired level of listening experience. For me everything said above is true. It justifies my investment in a new AVR, knowing I probably will not buy an 8K TV set. I will most probably be playing with Audyssey and Dirac until I find the best setup and then forget about it for years and move on to new hobbies. I’ll post any new thoughts once it makes sense.
At the end of the day investing this amount into equipment is justified as they have the means to do so and in the meantime it gets them to their desired level of listening experience. For me everything said above is true. It justifies my investment in a new AVR, knowing I probably will not buy an 8K TV set. I will most probably be playing with Audyssey and Dirac until I find the best setup and then forget about it for years and move on to new hobbies. I’ll post any new thoughts once it makes sense.
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Sooner than expected I'm going to add some thoughts... I'm not an AV of HiFi specialist, probably more like enthusiast as you can learn from my postings. Still, I spent the past few evenings together with my better half, watching some Dolby Atmos series through Netflix, so by far not the best possible experience. I was able to demonstrate to her some 'immersive audio' scenes both through Audyssey as well as Dirac. I assume the 'only thing' both do is filtering frequenties per speaker, correct distances between the hearing position(s) (close together on the couch ) and so on. The 'effects' are being taken care of by Dolby's algorithms. The difference in 'immersiveness' is very noticeable however. The supporting background music, cars driving from left to right and disappearing behind us, birds chirping...
Audyssey seems to struggle always with our main seating position in the room as the couch is 3,5 mtrs from the screen with the back against the wall. So the surround speakers are in front of us and the rear surround right next to us. Dirac is doing a much better job here and it makes sitting there, instead of in the middle of the room, much easier. Of course I'm not 'A-B'-ing all the time but that also isn't necessary either to enjoy what Dirac is bringing to my living room, which now is showing a little more home theater characteristics. So growing happier on the purchase every day so far.
) and so on. The 'effects' are being taken care of by Dolby's algorithms. The difference in 'immersiveness' is very noticeable however. The supporting background music, cars driving from left to right and disappearing behind us, birds chirping...Audyssey seems to struggle always with our main seating position in the room as the couch is 3,5 mtrs from the screen with the back against the wall. So the surround speakers are in front of us and the rear surround right next to us. Dirac is doing a much better job here and it makes sitting there, instead of in the middle of the room, much easier. Of course I'm not 'A-B'-ing all the time but that also isn't necessary either to enjoy what Dirac is bringing to my living room, which now is showing a little more home theater characteristics. So growing happier on the purchase every day so far.
There are various cable measurements on this site showing that there is no difference between the normal cables and these massively expensive cables. If you are planning to keep cables for long time, IMO they should be well constructed and insulated and connectors should also be well made. This is not the cheapest category of cables, but definitively not "audiophile" category. You simply pay for the well engineered and produced cable and spread that over 20 or more years to come.
There is really not much 8K native content out there and likely won't be for years. If that becomes available and there are no major changes in the Atmos/DTS world (and HDCP), you would still be able to use the current 4K AVR to beam the sound from display back to the AVR via eARC while the 8K source device would be connected to the 8K TV. With new HDMI 2.2 specs, current AVRs are already outdated, mostly for gamers, but again, eARC should work for the sound based on the current standards.
From memory, Audy recommendation is to have MLP at least 60cm from the wall. This is how their algorithm works and gets (somewhat) confused with the reflections coming from the back wall so quickly in case distance is shorter, or wall is just behind. Not Dirac expert but think they have similar recommendation (as that comes from the audio theory). Dirac could be handling this better though.
For surround positioning, side surrounds should be 90-110 degrees to MLP, not in front of MLP (which is less than 90 degrees). Back surrounds should be 135-150 degrees to MLP, not on the side (which is much more than current 90 degrees). While this is interesting setup and I wonder how it sounds, ideally one should keep to the recommendations to get the intended soundstage. Perhaps in this case you could use only side surrounds and get front wide speakers which you could place some 1-1.3 M from the fronts?