[bigshot]

Please do yourself a favor and stop subjecting yourself to us.

 

[Ramblinman]

Skype, gotomeeting, Zoom - whatever you like. Here is the thing. I am not claiming that I am right, or you are right. My issue is not with what you are saying, but I do have an unsettling issue with science vs pseudo science - and this is very dangerous. In this age of social media, and online connectivity everyone claims to be an expert because of personal experiences, so people don't provide evidence, but they provide personal anecdotes. You claimed above that "measurement techniques are imperfect" what studies do you have that back up that claim? are they imperfect, or is it your lack of knowledge how measurements are done, or the limitation of your tools? The inaccuracies exist because of Gravitation, Weak, Electromagnetic, and Strong forces, this is the nature of the universe. We can observe things that human eyes cannot even see (e.g michael morley expirement, special, and general relativity) and people claim without evidence that "our measurements still suck" - OK makes sense, but please provide a paper, a study, anything that will back your claim up. I provided you three things about measurement, that are time tested, and anyone can google them, read about them, and make their own conclusion or try to provide counter evidence.

Again, sound beyond what humans can hear? What is the point?

 

[Ramblinman]

Everything changes over time...
...but does it really "matter"?





I'll have a go at that one.
Have you ever said, about your customers: "They don't know what they want, we tell them what they need." ?

You see, "close to perfect" sound is pretty darn boring.

The customer wants a great experience. Proven by Dr. DRE.
So manufacturers use measurements to build a lovely flat boring amplifier. Then, just like headphones, flavor is added.

Warm, even order distortions are one of those effects. Fun, like a baaaarely detectable echo giving some "air" and "soundstage". Or a simple eq. Give me that bass! Possibly reading a glowing review that says "you gonna be da boss wif dat shiat, bro!"
That in turn set the bias. Its gonna sound awesome no matter what!
-You got glowing tubes. They are even physically warm. Fire. We men love fire. Impresses the ladies aaand the men.
"Is that one of those audiophile tube amplifier thingies, man?"


Anyhow. Tube amps. They sound like sh1t. You are blind. <3

Signed,

the raven

Two possibilities exist here, you have never heard a good tube amp, or you have tin ears. Those are actually the only two possibilities.

 

[Ramblinman]

Two possibilities exist here, you have never heard a good tube amp, or you have tin ears. Those are actually the only two possibilities.

I'll have a go at that one.
Have you ever said, about your customers: "They don't know what they want, we tell them what they need." ?

You see, "close to perfect" sound is pretty darn boring.

The customer wants a great experience. Proven by Dr. DRE.
So manufacturers use measurements to build a lovely flat boring amplifier. Then, just like headphones, flavor is added.

Warm, even order distortions are one of those effects. Fun, like a baaaarely detectable echo giving some "air" and "soundstage". Or a simple eq. Give me that bass! Possibly reading a glowing review that says "you gonna be da boss wif dat shiat, bro!"
That in turn set the bias. Its gonna sound awesome no matter what!
-You got glowing tubes. They are even physically warm. Fire. We men love fire. Impresses the ladies aaand the men.
"Is that one of those audiophile tube amplifier thingies, man?"


Anyhow. Tube amps. They sound like sh1t. You are blind. <3

Signed,

the raven[/QUOTE]

 

[jagwap]

We have microphones capable of capturing sound with audibly perfect sound. We have amps and players that can do that too. And there are headphones and speakers that can do that as well. Now I know what you're going to say next... "If we can record and play back with perfect sound, why doesn't my stereo system sound exactly like the original performance?" Gregorio has answered that question numerous times... it isn't the goal of commercial music to recreate performances, it's to build ideal presentations of performances.

There is a wild card that we can't control in home audio and we can't measure it either... it's space. Recording engineers have no control over whether you want to listen to this music in headphones over your ears, in your compact car, in your living room, or in the middle of the Taj Mahal. The space around sound is as much a part of how music sounds as the sound itself. You can go out and buy headphones and complain that there is something wrong with them because you don't get a vivid soundstage. And you can go out and buy speakers and complain that the sound in your living room isn't exactly the same as the sound in the recording studios. Both those things are true, but they are part of the compromises you make to introduce recorded music into your lifestyle.

If you want to know what the one big spec that we can't measure or control is, I can tell you what that is clearly... it's lifestyle. Everyone has one. It's totally subjective. No one can control it except oneself. I think it's a lot more productive to discuss ways of objectively improving our lifestyles when it comes to music than it is to discuss inaudible levels of jitter. How can we use technology to make music a more important part of our lives? What are the aspects that allow music to be integrated with different kinds of lifestyles? Objectively, what is the best solution for mobile listening? How about in a dedicated listening room? How can we modify the space around the sound to enhance it? How can we apply DSPs to tailor the sound to fit our space? All of these topics would get us a lot closer to audio nirvana than chasing down noise floors at -80dB or distortion that measures two or three or four digits East of the decimal point.

It *is* possible to discuss subjective experience objectively. But if you want to use your subjective experience to tear down objective facts, I'm sorry, you're doing it wrong. It's better to think of objective ways to improve subjective perception. That can range all the way from the tactile nature of the chair you sit in when you listen to the way you arrange the furniture in your room to optimize sound to the fit and clamping on your headphones to make long term listening easier. All of these things involve sound and they involve science, and they can certainly be discussed here in a rational way that could actually help people.

But instead people insist on focusing on gnat hairs' differences and defending solipsist philosophies. We put on white coats and horn rimmed glasses and hold clipboards and talk about things that don't matter...

Well as I disagree with the first paragraph almost entirely. We have made progress, by perfect is still over the horizon. If you had left speakers off that list I would even think you agreed with it, but there is no speaker that is remotely close to perfect.

 

[bigshot]

AUDIBLY perfect. I think if you took a solo violin and recorded it and played it back on the stage of Carnegie Hall on a very good speaker that has been carefully calibrated, you could put a violinist right next to it playing the same thing and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. You would have two violin sounds with the same space wrapped around them. I think that would be identical.

It has to be single source single channel single location though. Once you add space to the recording, it becomes much more difficult.

 

[jagwap]

AUDIBLY perfect. I think if you took a solo violin and recorded it and played it back on the stage of Carnegie Hall on a very good speaker that has been carefully calibrated, you could put a violinist right next to it playing the same thing and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. You would have two violin sounds with the same space wrapped around them. I think that would be identical.

It has to be single source single channel single location though. Once you add space to the recording, it becomes much more difficult.

I think you would be able to tell. Easliy. Also a large hall, with all the reverb, the detail is (pleasingly) blurred. Try it in an anechoic chamber. Then you room factors are minimised. I think it will get more obvious.

Let's take a component this forum cares about: headphones. Nobody can fully agree what even their frequency response should be. Harman seems to have good evidense for what people like, but not necessarily what is neutral or accurate.

Speakers are flawed: cones are used because they are well understood and CHEAP. They are not as good as other more expensive transducers (MBL have better). Their crossovers and geometry cause comb filtering in various directions and large distortions of non steady state signals. Work is being done constantly to improve that. Work wasted?

 

[bigshot]

No one listens to music in an anechoic chamber. But maybe in that. The reason that no one can agree on a curve for headphones is because headphones aren't what most music is designed to be listened to on. There are planar speakers that I think would be perfectly capable of reproducing a solo violin. Space is the tough part along with directionality.

Thomas Edison had what he called "Tone Test" demonstrations that he would put on in vaudeville houses. A singer would come out and start singing. The lights would go off and the singer would continue. The lights would come back on and an Edison diamond disc phonograph was playing the singer's voice and the singer was gone. It was good enough to fool people back then, I'm sure the best of today could do it even better.

 

[Killcomic]

No one listens to music in an anechoic chamber. But maybe in that. The reason that no one can agree on a curve for headphones is because headphones aren't what most music is designed to be listened to on. There are planar speakers that I think would be perfectly capable of reproducing a solo violin. Space is the tough part along with directionality.

Thomas Edison had what he called "Tone Test" demonstrations that he would put on in vaudeville houses. A singer would come out and start singing. The lights would go off and the singer would continue. The lights would come back on and an Edison diamond disc phonograph was playing the singer's voice and the singer was gone. It was good enough to fool people back then, I'm sure the best of today could do it even better.

But don't you know that true audiophiles have magic ears that can determine musicality and quantisation errors at over 96000 cycles per second?

 

[jagwap]

But don't you know that true audiophiles have magic ears that can determine musicality and quantisation errors at over 96000 cycles per second?

You missed a sarcasm opportunity:
It just proves that even early vinyl is better.

 

[bigshot]

But don't you know that true audiophiles have magic ears that can determine musicality and quantisation errors at over 96000 cycles per second?

I'm well aware of that! I'm reminded by yellow highlighter all the time!

 

[gregorio]

[1] Well as I disagree with the first paragraph almost entirely. We have made progress, by perfect is still over the horizon. If you had left speakers off that list I would even think you agreed with it, but there is no speaker that is remotely close to perfect.
I think you would be able to tell. Easliy. [2] Also a large hall, with all the reverb, the detail is (pleasingly) blurred. Try it in an anechoic chamber. Then you room factors are minimised.

1. I believe you are right and also to some extent wrong. We have got mics and other recording and reproduction equipment which is good enough to appear audibly perfect, even though certain parts of the chain, speakers for example (as you pointed out) are not particularly close to perfect. The experiment bigshot hypothesises has actually been done, though I don't remember the details off the top of my head, and the audience couldn't tell the difference. There are several points to address here however:

A. As bigshot mentioned, extremely rarely are we trying to capture the actual sound waves an audience member would hear during a live performance. Although we generally aim for a presentation which sounds like a perfect capture and recreation, to achieve that actually requires creating an illusion of perfection, as actual perfection does not account for human perception at a real, live performance. However, all this only pertains to a very small, niche area of music recordings; most classical music and some examples in other acoustic music genres. With the vast majority of music, even the illusion of an accurate capture is deliberately NOT the goal. Starting with (or at least popularised by) the Beetles in the mid 1960's, the goal changed from trying to make the studio (the recording, editing and mixing processes) as invisible/transparent as possible to the exact opposite, the studio effectively became an active member of the band and in many cases, effectively the most important member of the band. Typically then, even though there are mics which are audibly perfect (or near audibly perfect) we rarely use them! Preferring instead mics which are coloured and, not just coloured mics but coloured mic pre-amps as well and then in the mixing we'll typically add some or a lot of additional distortions (of varying types).
B. Exceedingly rarely do consumers have the speakers or have them setup in a way which would enable them to be "audibly perfect" and, as mentioned in point A, what "audibly perfect" recordings would they play on such a system anyway? In practise, none of this really makes any difference, even to audiophiles. So often I hear audiophiles with apparently great systems, waxing lyrical about how it makes recordings sound real, natural, transparent, etc., when the recordings they're listening to deliberately contain virtually no realism, naturalism or transparency to start with! I could justifiably say they have severely tin ears but that wouldn't be entirely fair, more accurately, they are so accustomed to so many decades of ubiquitous studio illusion, are so inexperienced of the recording/editing/mixing processes and what the instruments/sounds/performances actually sound like, that they have no reference point against which to judge what real, natural or transparent even means!
C. I'd like to think that with my experience and training I would be able to tell the difference in bigshot's hypothetical experiment. I had no involvement in the real experiment, although during my career I've been the live sound engineer for well over 500 performances and during rehearsals and sound checks I've been in situations which resemble such an experiment. And to be honest, I'm not certain in practise that I would be able to tell the difference and even if I could, I don't believe it would be easy. Of course, all this would depend on the exact equipment, setup and other conditions of the test.

2. In a sense you have this backwards and I don't think your test would work or be particularly valid even if it did. The actual sound of an acoustic instrument is highly dependant on reverb, sometimes effectively entirely dependant on reverb and in virtually any situation other than an anechoic chamber (which few musicians have ever experienced), there always is reverb. In other words, reverb is not really something which "blurs the detail", as that detail effectively doesn't exist for anyone listening to the instrument. Instead, it is generally more appropriate to think of reverb as an intrinsic component of the sound which effectively adds detail. Although, as an engineer I am used to thinking of the direct sound and the reverb as two separate things because I can manipulate both somewhat independently. Acoustic instrument musicians themselves though generally don't think of them as separate. And what's more, if you put an acoustic musician in an anechoic chamber and get them to play their instrument, they are typically horrified because the instrument sounds so different to what they expect and they can't get even close to being able to compensate. Classical musicians don't even like playing in normal rooms with somewhat dry acoustics because of the difficulty of trying to compensate, an anechoic chamber really shocks/upsets them! Your test then is effectively: Can you tell the difference between (say) a real french horn which sounds so bizarre it's almost unidentifiable as a french horn and a recording of that french horn which also of course sounds so bizarre it doesn't sound like a real french horn? Even if you could tell that there was a difference, you'd struggle to identify which was the real french horn (because it wouldn't sound like a real french horn) and even if you could identify which was the real one, would such a result actually be relevant to a french horn in any normal environment?

G

 

[jagwap]

1. I believe you are right and also to some extent wrong. We have got mics and other recording and reproduction equipment which is good enough to appear audibly perfect, even though certain parts of the chain, speakers for example (as you pointed out) are not particularly close to perfect. The experiment bigshot hypothesises has actually been done, though I don't remember the details off the top of my head, and the audience couldn't tell the difference. There are several points to address here however:

A. As bigshot mentioned, extremely rarely are we trying to capture the actual sound waves an audience member would hear during a live performance. Although we generally aim for a presentation which sounds like a perfect capture and recreation, to achieve that actually requires creating an illusion of perfection, as actual perfection does not account for human perception at a real, live performance. However, all this only pertains to a very small, niche area of music recordings; most classical music and some examples in other acoustic music genres. With the vast majority of music, even the illusion of an accurate capture is deliberately NOT the goal. Starting with (or at least popularised by) the Beetles in the mid 1960's, the goal changed from trying to make the studio (the recording, editing and mixing processes) as invisible/transparent as possible to the exact opposite, the studio effectively became an active member of the band and in many cases, effectively the most important member of the band. Typically then, even though there are mics which are audibly perfect (or near audibly perfect) we rarely use them! Preferring instead mics which are coloured and, not just coloured mics but coloured mic pre-amps as well and then in the mixing we'll typically add some or a lot of additional distortions (of varying types).
B. Exceedingly rarely do consumers have the speakers or have them setup in a way which would enable them to be "audibly perfect" and, as mentioned in point A, what "audibly perfect" recordings would they play on such a system anyway? In practise, none of this really makes any difference, even to audiophiles. So often I hear audiophiles with apparently great systems, waxing lyrical about how it makes recordings sound real, natural, transparent, etc., when the recordings they're listening to deliberately contain virtually no realism, naturalism or transparency to start with! I could justifiably say they have severely tin ears but that wouldn't be entirely fair, more accurately, they are so accustomed to so many decades of ubiquitous studio illusion, are so inexperienced of the recording/editing/mixing processes and what the instruments/sounds/performances actually sound like, that they have no reference point against which to judge what real, natural or transparent even means!
C. I'd like to think that with my experience and training I would be able to tell the difference in bigshot's hypothetical experiment. I had no involvement in the real experiment, although during my career I've been the live sound engineer for well over 500 performances and during rehearsals and sound checks I've been in situations which resemble such an experiment. And to be honest, I'm not certain in practise that I would be able to tell the difference and even if I could, I don't believe it would be easy. Of course, all this would depend on the exact equipment, setup and other conditions of the test.

2. In a sense you have this backwards and I don't think your test would work or be particularly valid even if it did. The actual sound of an acoustic instrument is highly dependant on reverb, sometimes effectively entirely dependant on reverb and in virtually any situation other than an anechoic chamber (which few musicians have ever experienced), there always is reverb. In other words, reverb is not really something which "blurs the detail", as that detail effectively doesn't exist for anyone listening to the instrument. Instead, it is generally more appropriate to think of reverb as an intrinsic component of the sound which effectively adds detail. Although, as an engineer I am used to thinking of the direct sound and the reverb as two separate things because I can manipulate both somewhat independently. Acoustic instrument musicians themselves though generally don't think of them as separate. And what's more, if you put an acoustic musician in an anechoic chamber and get them to play their instrument, they are typically horrified because the instrument sounds so different to what they expect and they can't get even close to being able to compensate. Classical musicians don't even like playing in normal rooms with somewhat dry acoustics because of the difficulty of trying to compensate, an anechoic chamber really shocks/upsets them! Your test then is effectively: Can you tell the difference between (say) a real french horn which sounds so bizarre it's almost unidentifiable as a french horn and a recording of that french horn which also of course sounds so bizarre it doesn't sound like a real french horn? Even if you could tell that there was a difference, you'd struggle to identify which was the real french horn (because it wouldn't sound like a real french horn) and even if you could identify which was the real one, would such a result actually be relevant to a french horn in any normal environment?

G

G

I'm pleased to say that all sound reasonable.

Agreed an anechoic chamber is perhaps the worst place to listen to music, with the possible exception of a vacuum!

 

[castleofargh]

You're an embarassment, I wanted you to admit there was a greater than 50% probability that the cause of the changes in the data was in fact, driver break in. Look at the people on your side here, castleofargh. You really want to spend time from your life modding these people? Time ticking away?

Why?

to be totally honest, I like none of it. I have been raised on the idea that extremists are always wrong because extremism itself is wrong.
we all think we know something, at the very least all the people posting actively think so. we don't have that many posts from members saying "I don't know, and reserve my opinion for when I'll know more" ^_^
people posting aren't the silent majority, they're people with a strong opinion on a subject. and many will be wrong, and many will go too far trying to promote their views. not much we can do about that. the calm tempered people probably stay the hell away from a topic like this one in the first place. I know I would if I wasn't modo and I'm not even that calm or well tempered. this topic screams entrapment. just the title was picked to watch the world burn.

at the same time, what's happening is perfectly normal for a human(not humane!). we all make do with the information we have. our brain will always try to find a convenient answer even with an incomplete puzzle. it's a greatness, and a flaw at the same time. because once we think we have reached an understanding of a situation, the brain will just go and put a "fact" sticker onto the idea. and now we never again have a reason to doubt or challenge that "fact". why question something when it's true?
that's what we all do all the time. we rely on what we consider true to make sense of every new information. a lot of what we consider true isn't and we end up having different and unique views on things because of it. a big part of being a unique individual lies with our experiences and what we mistakenly hold as true. otherwise we'd all agree on almost anything.

- so there is the pub pillar method. I'm right, he's wrong, how do I ruin his claim? let me repeat my stuff louder every time, that must have worked once.
that's what we all do here(I'm not clean I confess) with close to zero data or evidence of anything. and the Science in Sound Science is having panic attacks.

- and there is the scientific method. we come up with an idea and we all try to disprove it. we don't get mad when somebody challenges the idea, we say thank you for your efforts, and we try to help make a proper case against the idea. maybe suggest a flaw in the critic that needs to be addressed before we can take the idea down for good. because once an idea has been battered down like that, and a lot of tests have been done not to agree with it, but to disprove it, if it's falsifiable and nobody succeeds in properly disproving it, we end up with a very sturdy case in favor of trusting that idea.
it might not mean we'll have a new law of driver break in. not just yet. but at least we have massively increased our confidence(justified this time, not self confidence) that crap is going on.



I don't expect us all to turn into fully fledged scientists overnight, but this section could really benefit from more testing and less empty handed battles we all know are going nowhere unless we do the testing.

 

[sonitus mirus]

to be totally honest, I like none of it. I have been raised on the idea that extremists are always wrong because extremism itself is wrong.
we all think we know something, at the very least all the people posting actively think so. we don't have that many posts from members saying "I don't know, and reserve my opinion for when I'll know more" ^_^
people posting aren't the silent majority, they're people with a strong opinion on a subject. and many will be wrong, and many will go too far trying to promote their views. not much we can do about that. the calm tempered people probably stay the hell away from a topic like this one in the first place. I know I would if I wasn't modo and I'm not even that calm or well tempered. this topic screams entrapment. just the title was picked to watch the world burn.

at the same time, what's happening is perfectly normal for a human(not humane!). we all make do with the information we have. our brain will always try to find a convenient answer even with an incomplete puzzle. it's a greatness, and a flaw at the same time. because once we think we have reached an understanding of a situation, the brain will just go and put a "fact" sticker onto the idea. and now we never again have a reason to doubt or challenge that "fact". why question something when it's true?
that's what we all do all the time. we rely on what we consider true to make sense of every new information. a lot of what we consider true isn't and we end up having different and unique views on things because of it. a big part of being a unique individual lies with our experiences and what we mistakenly hold as true. otherwise we'd all agree on almost anything.

- so there is the pub pillar method. I'm right, he's wrong, how do I ruin his claim? let me repeat my stuff louder every time, that must have worked once.
that's what we all do here(I'm not clean I confess) with close to zero data or evidence of anything. and the Science in Sound Science is having panic attacks.

- and there is the scientific method. we come up with an idea and we all try to disprove it. we don't get mad when somebody challenges the idea, we say thank you for your efforts, and we try to help make a proper case against the idea. maybe suggest a flaw in the critic that needs to be addressed before we can take the idea down for good. because once an idea has been battered down like that, and a lot of tests have been done not to agree with it, but to disprove it, if it's falsifiable and nobody succeeds in properly disproving it, we end up with a very sturdy case in favor of trusting that idea.
it might not mean we'll have a new law of driver break in. not just yet. but at least we have massively increased our confidence(justified this time, not self confidence) that **** is going on.



I don't expect us all to turn into fully fledged scientists overnight, but this section could really benefit from more testing and less empty handed battles we all know are going nowhere unless we do the testing.

The real work begins after a test is completed. The results need to be analyzed and the test probably would need to be updated and eventually repeated by others.