Still hear them unsighted?
Keith
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Shootout - Superb Measuring cheap DAC against hi-end DAC - measuring tool - the "ears"
- Thread starter snapcrackle
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Keith
Well as a noise and vibration specialist and hifi enthusiast for 50 years I have had the opportunity to try the very best isolation contemporarily available on several bits of kit, though not recently since the lessons I learned over the years were confirmed time and time again and I see no need to repeat them any more.
It is a long story so I'll summarise.
When I was working on turntables I discovered that without extremely good isolation there is a lot of spurious pickup (Like a solid plinth TT using isolating grommets and sitting on a big solid "rigid" oak bench picked up buses driving by 4 floors down and the other side of the car park.
Almost no record players are sufficiently well isolated to -not- pick up and broadcast extraneous sound, and even if well isolated may still pick up airborne vibration. OTOH I quite like the effect, it is a bit of added reverb. When I bought the first house big enough to have the TT and electronics in one room and speakers and me in another the sound was not as enjoyable, a bit flat, to my disappointment and surprise.
I have tried expensive supports, in fact still use them since I own them and they look nice, they made no difference (I don't use any valve equipment).
For years I have used Goldmund equipment, and they are obsessed with mechanical grounding and all their higher end stuff has it.
I have tried the electronics grounded as advised and mounted on a rack and hear no difference, though, I must say, having kit designed to mount one on top of the other with grounding posts going top to bottom makes it easy and attractive and compact, but very expensive to make. I had a stack with monoblock, monoblock, DAC, Preamp, CD transport and it only took up the floor area of one amp rather than a whole wall!
My speakers are "mechanically grounded" but since they weigh 130kg each and the stand has this integrated I have never tried without. I would rather expect it to make a difference though.
I am pretty sure if you tried a level matched blind comparison the differences you hear would disappear. Try getting a friend to lift a component off the best support you own whilst you listen. Don't look to see what they are doing and don't touch the volume control.
Easy to do and a big money saver
This is an excellent and probably under-appreciated element in comparing digital v. vinyl! A little reverb via the cartridge is (for some) a nice sprinkling of pixie dust, isn't it? You're initial impression was that it was "flat"; I wonder if over time you'd begin to appreciate the precision?
I imagine there must be some science on this published someplace.
Did you notice if there is a difference with an old-timey dust cover or not?
I worked in the field for a couple of years. I was mainly measuring and trying to minimise spurious vibration being picked up by the cartridge.
Having a flimsy dust cover attached potentially adds something spurious open or closed but it depends on the design.
Nothing is rigid over the full range of audible frequencies. Anything causing vibration where the pickup arm is mounted on the plinth, for example, will be transmitted to the headshell at frequencies where the arm remains stiff and come out of the output since the "stator" part of the transducer isn't static.
There is a lot more.
I get exasperated (still after 45 years) when quasi-static thinking is applied to the dynamic system which is a record player. Particularly "rigid".
One of the most shocking things I ever heard personally was when I placed a midi Rotes amp (200 watts) on the shelf of a Monaco shelf stand. The sound improved so much it shocks you as it literally sounds louder not only more clear.
I'm on the big tube monoblock side now but that was a reinforcement of my journey appreciating the value of true isolation. If I don't have my tube mono blocks tended to, they don't sound anywhere as good. It just is the way it is. Not trying to fight science in any way.
At this point, there's plenty of science although I don't appreciate it beyond my ears and a basic understanding of the vertical and horizontal playing a factor. My experience with turntables is close to nil so I can't factor it in but I'd imagine there's as great or greater sensitivity in comparison to tube equipment.
While we don't realize that noise on both planes has deleterious effects on sound, it does.
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snapcrackle
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- #107
I'm always listening to my equipment unsighted (apart from the speakers) - the racks are quite literally not visible from my listening position.
OP
snapcrackle
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- #108
I fully appreciate and value your experience - but I have no doubts about the improvements I am hearing and therefore I can't save my money which is a big shame. I really really would like to spend that money elsewhere, I mean nearly £900 for Hi-Fi furniture! I really wouldn't bother if I thought I didn't hear a difference! It's my hobby - I can't take chances in using substandard supports if it possibly means I'm not hearing my equipment at its best.
I will add that I am using a couple of DACs that are very sensitive to placement (as is proving to me the case) - one such being a vintage Arcam Black Box 1 - I do like the sound of this old rustic vintage DAC which I'm sure won't measure well - point is, it's easily affected by placement and it's not a valve amp or a turntable - it's also sensitive to the quality of the transport it hooks up to.
solderdude
Grand Contributor
What Keith really asks is if you KNOW what device is playing, not whether you can actually see it.
And in case of the rack how do you know it improves sound as a blind comparison is not possible.
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Uh huh...
Did you try getting a friend to lift it off the rack whilst you listen?
I am pretty sure you won't hear the difference, even on the black box.
I have done this experiment several times over the last 30 years and not once did the person continue to hear the difference they were completely sure they heard before when I lifted the box off their rack when they weren't watching me.
The placebo effect is very strong.
Simple experiment:
While a turntable is playing, tap on it. Hear the tap in your speakers? Most likely. So how a turntable is mounted can make a significant difference.
While a digital component is playing, tap on it. Hear the tap in your speakers? If yes, your digital component is broken. Fix it or get a new one. If no, then mounting is (as it actually is) totally irrelevant and perceived sonic changes are your human brain doing what human brains do, fooling you.
Personally, I like when my brain fools me, that's why magicians are so much fun to watch. But I'm realistic about whether or not that rabbit really turned into a goldfish.
While a turntable is playing, tap on it. Hear the tap in your speakers? Most likely. So how a turntable is mounted can make a significant difference.
While a digital component is playing, tap on it. Hear the tap in your speakers? If yes, your digital component is broken. Fix it or get a new one. If no, then mounting is (as it actually is) totally irrelevant and perceived sonic changes are your human brain doing what human brains do, fooling you.
Personally, I like when my brain fools me, that's why magicians are so much fun to watch. But I'm realistic about whether or not that rabbit really turned into a goldfish.
A tap worked with tubes, but not sure about other resonances. I suppose you could test using a sweep while connected to an analyzer. This would be a good test for @amirm or anyone else with the time. I’m not yet convinced SS microphonics is a fantasy. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/1032708
I do not have a single solid state component that shows any signs whatsoever of microphonics. Perhaps they exist, but that would be a red flag to me that the designer is not competent.
Serious question: how do you know? This link is kind of an extreme case, but shows that it’s not impossible. I’m using it just because it’s credible. Not audible. https://accelconf.web.cern.ch/accelconf/p01/PAPERS/MPPH157.PDF
Having tapped on a lot of components over the years to check for microphonics.
Please refer to my post 114. An interesting thread: https://www.edaboard.com/showthread.php?5789-What-is-Microphonics
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I did. No need for a fancy test when a simple screening test doesn't indicate anything to look for.
solderdude
Grand Contributor
In my years of being A/V repair guy I did a LOT of tapping (with the back of a screwdriver) on PCB's and parts. It is a good way to find bad solder joints and dodgy connections/connectors.
A device that operates normally does not response even when hammering on it to see if there is something dodgy on the PCB.
My experiences mirror that of SIY (and others)... Vinyl and tubes are the parts that are microphonic (and a microphone of course) and other mechanical things such as motors, CD mechanisms etc.
A device that operates normally does not response even when hammering on it to see if there is something dodgy on the PCB.
My experiences mirror that of SIY (and others)... Vinyl and tubes are the parts that are microphonic (and a microphone of course) and other mechanical things such as motors, CD mechanisms etc.
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