Dilemma: Should I not believe any reviewers who talk about cables or just ignore that section of... - Page 95

Quote:

Originally Posted by JadeEast 

I have a hunch that in a way you're trying to approach a phenomenological experience through reductionism (although you've been accused of not being reductionist enough.) I think it may be a dead end. 

I love it! Philosophy! When it comes to composing or performing a piece of music, I don't want to use measurements-- it's about perception all the way.

That doesn't stop music theorists from analyzing things ex post facto. Whether they are analyzing the notes written in the score (what the composer does), or measuring tiny variations in rhythmic performance, lots of folks do that.

A guy named David Cope is working on software that generates tonal compositions:

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/music_box/2010/05/ill_be_bach.html

This doesn't interest me a whole lot because, again, it's all about perception. But a lot can be analyzed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by knucklehead 

FWIW, I suspect that a big part of the problem you are having here is that you are tying up your own theories about your perceptions up with your perceptions themselves.

 

If I understand, this is a good point. The mechanism underlying the perception may be quite surprising and we need to be open.

I'm just giving examples of where to start. And where other people have done work. Manfred Clynes does great work, although, as I said, I think he's too much in a hurry to call the problem "solved."

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 


Compression applied in the mixing stage and attenuated frequency response around the range of the attack of the instrument would dull the rhythmic quality of music. Since we can't do anything about compression, the logical culpret is frequency response.

It seems like you are not thinking about the whole system. We can do something about compression, and we can experiment with its relation to rhythmic quality.

And you know this how? Don't you think we need to get some data before drawing conclusions?

EDIT: maybe this will help. What we need is a measurement that will group examples of rhythmic quality by similarity. Declaring it is dynamics and frequency balance helps us how?

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 

I watched a monkey at the zoo sit in the corner of his cage and quietly shock mothers of small children once.

Did you avert your eyes?

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 

I've said this twice in this thread already, but I'll say it again. Mike's "rhythmic quality" is related to dynamics and the frequency balance around the attack of the rhythmic instruments. Digital audio is locked to speed, so it isn't speed fluctuations.
Compression applied in the mixing stage and attenuated frequency response around the range of the attack of the instrument would dull the rhythmic quality of music. Since we can't do anything about compression, the logical culpret is frequency response.

In my experience phase distortion (from computer latency/jitter) in unbuffered digital transport/DAC setups can significantly affect the rhythmic qualities of the music playback, at least in my experience with the [asynchronous] JKSPDIF USB to SPDIF converter.  My experience is not so black and white with analog components, other than when using balanced amplifiers in single ended mode, which as I understand it halves the corner frequency and has a noticeable influence on the transient response, and also with my HE-6 headphone being driven by different amplifiers where some simply headphone amplifiers can't deliver adequate bass drive/impact, but neither of these last two examples has anything much to do with cables (unless the cable has excessive reactive impedace eg. because it is shielded and fairly long, or [possibly] has significant [read: excessive] imbalance between capacitance and inductance (eg. widely spaced conductors, too many conductors etc.)

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 

You've got no sense of scale there. Rhythm in music is to jitter as an ant is to the planet Jupiter. In the grand scheme of things, a picosecond and a half a second are light years apart.

I didn't use back of envelope calculations to hear the differences, and also latency variations in a Windows computer can typically be around 15 us under normal conditions.  As for cabling reactive impedance and [same] amplifier single ended/balanced differences again I do not have the magnitude differences in front of me to discuss them, and I do not have the proper equipment to level match between setups, so you may take those observations with a grain of salt.  The digital side of things is much easier to DBT though as level matching is not necessary, and may well just be pointing to how poor a fairly standard windows computer is as a music server, and the necessity for a hardware buffer in the USB transport.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 

You've got no sense of scale there. Rhythm in music is to jitter as an ant is to the planet Jupiter. In the grand scheme of things, a picosecond and a half a second are light years apart.

Just being picky, but you've got the analogy reversed.

Anyway, my interest in rhythmic quality can be investigated quite well with various microphones and speakers... no need to get into controversial subjects about the audibility of jitter or whatever. I would want to pick a digital source and DAC that makes everyone happy but otherwise leave it fixed during the experiments.

OK, I'll bite.  What are these various "microphones and speakers?"  Don't be coy.  You've no problem with spamming the board with your "theories,"  why do you suddenly get shy when people ask you what the wonderful gear is that your training and sixth sense have allowed you to pick out? 
 

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlindInOneEar 

OK, I'll bite.  What are these various "microphones and speakers?"  Don't be coy.  You've no problem with spamming the board with your "theories,"  why do you suddenly get shy when people ask you what the wonderful gear is that your training and sixth sense have allowed you to pick out? 
 

dude, you are very edgy and hostile.

And you still aren't answering the question.  What are these wonderful "microphones and speakers?"