Objectivists board room

[upstateguy]

 

   
I think you guys are technically right but you're complicating something that should be very simple.
 
Just curious, is there something wrong with adjusting the EQ until, what ever it is your listening to, sounds good (to you).......  then listen to the music......

 
It must be nice sitting in that char, prognosticating about a simple thing like you are some kind of authority, arguing with and insulting people have have actually gotten their hands dirty...
 

 
Uh-oh, looks like someone's is a little cranky today.
 
In case you don't remember, we've been adjusting the bass and treble on our components by ear since the 50s. 
 
Then we got equalizers.  Complicated things a bit but most of us were able to play around with it and get things to sound pretty good....  just like you did Arny !
 
It was as simple then as it is now. 
 
Maybe not perfect but usually good enough.

 

[cel4145]

Nostalgia for wow, flutter, and tape hiss?

C'mon man, it has Dolby C!

 

[headwhacker]

Nostalgia for wow, flutter, and tape hiss?

 
Their absense today is what makes audio sound "unnatural", "digital", "stripped off of it's soul" etc... 

 

[upstateguy]

 

Agreed that the more intellectual means involving measuring is actually the far easier method.

What's wrong is the suggestion that there's something wrong with people who have actually tried it both ways, and know from personal which one is actually the easier .

I also think there's a difference, too, between

"I played around with my EQ for a couple of hours and found some settings I liked."

AND

"I worked to really smooth the frequency response of my headphones" (or speakers), in the way that Joe Bloggs describes.

 
 
I was just thinking about this so let me ramble a bit.
 
First you decide that AKG, or Sony, or Grado  or whoever, had no idea how to voice a headphone properly and you're not happy with how your pride and joy sounds.
 
So OK, you calibrate your headphones with microphones and calibration CDs until you have a ruler flat FR.
 
Now everyone who listens to music knows that many but not all recordings have the same amount of bass, mid range and treble.  
 
So what do you do with your new ruler flat response when you don't like the recording engineer's idea of how the song should sound?   I guess you EQ by ear to get it to sound the way you want it to sound or just put up with it the way it is.
 
Do you calibrate according to the calibration CDs or to the CD you want to listen to?
 
What about the guys who like tubes?  Do you want to EQ away the tube sound?
 
What about amps that have a high Z out of 120 ohms like the Beyerdynamic amp?  Do you want to EQ away the bass increase you get from increased impedance?
 
If you have more that one amp, which one do you calibrate for, or do you calibrate each one?  What if you have more than one headphone?  Do you calibrate each headphone for each amp you have?  And should you calibrate to the music your listening to or to a calibration CD?
 
I listen a lot to internet radio and not all of the high bit rate channels I frequent stream the same EQ.  Radio Paradise, for instance streams in 192mp3, 192ogg, 128aac and if you know where to find it, 320aac.  As discussed on the channel forum, the AAC has a little more bass than the other two.  Now what, calibrate it away or calibrate the others up?
 
Or do you just leave the headphone alone, play the music, and adjust it by ear as needed?

 

[analogsurviver]

 I agree that, ultimataly, digital recorders are better than cassette. I agree that even CD-R beats any cassette for wow and flutter - and that is the greatest drawback for the cassette.
 
However, when used "with every bell and whistle imaginable", cassette will, EASILY, beat CD-R  in dynamic range - specially when recording live, where sometimes peaks exceeding + 10 dB ref anything available at the rehearsal are rather frequently encountered. I t will force you to record with say 12 dB lower gain when recording digital, effectively cutting the resolution ultimately achievable by 2 bits. And, say anything you want, IT IS AUDIBLE LOSS OF QUALITY - and would, absolutely no question about it, loose compared to a parallel cassette recording of the highest calibre. Provided music is not entirely based on speed stability - wow and flutter from cassette is totally unacceptable say in recording of a choir, whereas it would scintillate in recording of a percussion group. Another drawback of the cassette is the tape itself - or its sensitivity. It is NOT constant - same input level is modulated by this, making sounds differ, on momentary random basis, in amplitude. And it IS the main point why Sony Metal Master tape was/is undisputed king of cassette tape - because its constant output puts anything else within metal (type IV ) tapes to shame. Just check how it is made - and the price(s) of what little remains floating in the NOS market. It was/is, no question about it, THE most expensive tape ever available - but equally true is that it is worth every cent. The only tape with comparable constant output I am familiar with is a rather obscure Type II tape - with , compared to the top Sony, abysmally low MOL and hence limited dynamic range.
 
HiRez recorders have, finally, put an end to the cassette - say about 10 years ago. However, a good tape in a WMD-6C is most certainly capable of making a recording that will generally exceed what is available on most labels - audiophile ones included. Although there were/are better cassette recorders than WMD-6C, they aren't numerous...
 
You can check what was possible with cassette in 1985 - Keith Jarrett recorded an entire album to cassette at his home : 
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirits_(Keith_Jarrett_album)

 

[castleofargh]

 

 

Agreed that the more intellectual means involving measuring is actually the far easier method.

What's wrong is the suggestion that there's something wrong with people who have actually tried it both ways, and know from personal which one is actually the easier .

I also think there's a difference, too, between

"I played around with my EQ for a couple of hours and found some settings I liked."

AND

"I worked to really smooth the frequency response of my headphones" (or speakers), in the way that Joe Bloggs describes.

 
 
I was just thinking about this so let me ramble a bit.
 
First you decide that AKG, or Sony, or Grado  or whoever, had no idea how to voice a headphone properly and you're not happy with how your pride and joy sounds.
 
So OK, you calibrate your headphones with microphones and calibration CDs until you have a ruler flat FR.
 
Now everyone who listens to music knows that many but not all recordings have the same amount of bass, mid range and treble.  
 
So what do you do with your new ruler flat response when you don't like the recording engineer's idea of how the song should sound?   I guess you EQ by ear to get it to sound the way you want it to sound or just put up with it the way it is.
 
Do you calibrate according to the calibration CDs or to the CD you want to listen to?
 
What about the guys who like tubes?  Do you want to EQ away the tube sound?
 
What about amps that have a high Z out of 120 ohms like the Beyerdynamic amp?  Do you want to EQ away the bass increase you get from increased impedance?
 
If you have more that one amp, which one do you calibrate for, or do you calibrate each one?  What if you have more than one headphone?  Do you calibrate each headphone for each amp you have?  And should you calibrate to the music your listening to or to a calibration CD?
 
I listen a lot to internet radio and not all of the high bit rate channels I frequent stream the same EQ.  Radio Paradise, for instance streams in 192mp3, 192ogg, 128aac and if you know where to find it, 320aac.  As discussed on the channel forum, the AAC has a little more bass than the other two.  Now what, calibrate it away or calibrate the others up?
 
Or do you just leave the headphone alone, play the music, and adjust it by ear as needed?

you're looking too much into it, no headphone is flat, not because manufacturers have stupid tastes, but because it's not so easy to do. changing the frequency response (and many other stuff) on a digital level is way easier and with a lot less counter effects than doing it on electrical, mechanical or acoustic level(and having to keep control on all of them into one device). then your ears and your tastes may make you wish for further adjustments. EQ can do that.
or you really like the sound of a source and wish you could come pretty close to it with another source, EQ can help for that.
it's a solution not one more problem in the audio chain. if you think you need to change your EQ between songs, then most likely without EQ you would change headphones instead. the need doesn't go away once you have removed EQ from the system. if you didn't have the problem before EQ, you still don't have it. and if you did, EQ is a rapid way to change a signature.
I have µSD cards with an EQ included in the encoding of the songs for 3 of my most used IEMs, as it happens I didn't try to get the same sound out of the 3 IEMs, to me it wouldn't make any sense and I would then only use one at all times. I just changed them all just a little to remove something that annoyed me, or to compensate the change in signature from my 4ohm sony that ironically made my xba-c10 (a sony IEM) to sound too bright for my taste.
it's really a solution and you need it only if you have a problem ^_^.

 

[upstateguy]

 

 

 

Agreed that the more intellectual means involving measuring is actually the far easier method.

What's wrong is the suggestion that there's something wrong with people who have actually tried it both ways, and know from personal which one is actually the easier .

I also think there's a difference, too, between

"I played around with my EQ for a couple of hours and found some settings I liked."

AND

"I worked to really smooth the frequency response of my headphones" (or speakers), in the way that Joe Bloggs describes.

 
 
I was just thinking about this so let me ramble a bit.
 
First you decide that AKG, or Sony, or Grado  or whoever, had no idea how to voice a headphone properly and you're not happy with how your pride and joy sounds.
 
So OK, you calibrate your headphones with microphones and calibration CDs until you have a ruler flat FR.
 
Now everyone who listens to music knows that many but not all recordings have the same amount of bass, mid range and treble.  
 
So what do you do with your new ruler flat response when you don't like the recording engineer's idea of how the song should sound?   I guess you EQ by ear to get it to sound the way you want it to sound or just put up with it the way it is.
 
Do you calibrate according to the calibration CDs or to the CD you want to listen to?
 
What about the guys who like tubes?  Do you want to EQ away the tube sound?
 
What about amps that have a high Z out of 120 ohms like the Beyerdynamic amp?  Do you want to EQ away the bass increase you get from increased impedance?
 
If you have more that one amp, which one do you calibrate for, or do you calibrate each one?  What if you have more than one headphone?  Do you calibrate each headphone for each amp you have?  And should you calibrate to the music your listening to or to a calibration CD?
 
I listen a lot to internet radio and not all of the high bit rate channels I frequent stream the same EQ.  Radio Paradise, for instance streams in 192mp3, 192ogg, 128aac and if you know where to find it, 320aac.  As discussed on the channel forum, the AAC has a little more bass than the other two.  Now what, calibrate it away or calibrate the others up?
 
Or do you just leave the headphone alone, play the music, and adjust it by ear as needed?

you're looking too much into it, no headphone is flat, not because manufacturers have stupid tastes, but because it's not so easy to do. changing the frequency response (and many other stuff) on a digital level is way easier and with a lot less counter effects than doing it on electrical, mechanical or acoustic level(and having to keep control on all of them into one device). then your ears and your tastes may make you wish for further adjustments. EQ can do that.
or you really like the sound of a source and wish you could come pretty close to it with another source, EQ can help for that.
it's a solution not one more problem in the audio chain. if you think you need to change your EQ between songs, then most likely without EQ you would change headphones instead. the need doesn't go away once you have removed EQ from the system. if you didn't have the problem before EQ, you still don't have it. and if you did, EQ is a rapid way to change a signature.
I have µSD cards with an EQ included in the encoding of the songs for 3 of my most used IEMs, as it happens I didn't try to get the same sound out of the 3 IEMs, to me it wouldn't make any sense and I would then only use one at all times. I just changed them all just a little to remove something that annoyed me, or to compensate the change in signature from my 4ohm sony that ironically made my xba-c10 (a sony IEM) to sound too bright for my taste.
it's really a solution and you need it only if you have a problem ^_^.

 
+1   Exactly where I was going with this. 
 
Edit:  flatness is also relative to ear shape.

 

[cel4145]

I was just thinking about this so let me ramble a bit.

First you decide that AKG, or Sony, or Grado  or whoever, had no idea how to voice a headphone properly and you're not happy with how your pride and joy sounds.

So OK, you calibrate your headphones with microphones and calibration CDs until you have a ruler flat FR.

Time to stop right there. A "smooth" frequency response does not necessarily imply a flat frequency response. Have you ever looked at headphone measurements? They quite often have peaks and dips that are rather sharp, that will not create an accurate rendition for some notes with some instruments. And speaking of flat, they definitely never measure linear. My desktop speakers, which are not terribly expensive, measure way more linear down to their tuning point (just a bit more than about +/- 1 db) than any headphone I've ever seen.

After correcting for those issues, which every headphone has, then one might adjust it smoothly after that to desired emphasis levels (bass, mids, treble) for the listener.

Oh, and I don't think AKG, Sony, or Grado makes headphones with custom frequency responses to suit a particular listener's tastes.

 

[cel4145]

Duplicate

 

[cjl]

   I agree that, ultimataly, digital recorders are better than cassette. I agree that even CD-R beats any cassette for wow and flutter - and that is the greatest drawback for the cassette.
 
However, when used "with every bell and whistle imaginable", cassette will, EASILY, beat CD-R  in dynamic range - specially when recording live, where sometimes peaks exceeding + 10 dB ref anything available at the rehearsal are rather frequently encountered. I t will force you to record with say 12 dB lower gain when recording digital, effectively cutting the resolution ultimately achievable by 2 bits. And, say anything you want, IT IS AUDIBLE LOSS OF QUALITY - and would, absolutely no question about it, loose compared to a parallel cassette recording of the highest calibre. Provided music is not entirely based on speed stability - wow and flutter from cassette is totally unacceptable say in recording of a choir, whereas it would scintillate in recording of a percussion group. Another drawback of the cassette is the tape itself - or its sensitivity. It is NOT constant - same input level is modulated by this, making sounds differ, on momentary random basis, in amplitude. And it IS the main point why Sony Metal Master tape was/is undisputed king of cassette tape - because its constant output puts anything else within metal (type IV ) tapes to shame. Just check how it is made - and the price(s) of what little remains floating in the NOS market. It was/is, no question about it, THE most expensive tape ever available - but equally true is that it is worth every cent. The only tape with comparable constant output I am familiar with is a rather obscure Type II tape - with , compared to the top Sony, abysmally low MOL and hence limited dynamic range.
 
HiRez recorders have, finally, put an end to the cassette - say about 10 years ago. However, a good tape in a WMD-6C is most certainly capable of making a recording that will generally exceed what is available on most labels - audiophile ones included. Although there were/are better cassette recorders than WMD-6C, they aren't numerous...
 
You can check what was possible with cassette in 1985 - Keith Jarrett recorded an entire album to cassette at his home : 
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirits_(Keith_Jarrett_album)

Even if you set 0dBFS on the CD equal to +12dBr on the cassette though, the noise floor of the CD will still be lower (in absolute terms), and as a result, the CD will still deliver better dynamic range.

 

[analogsurviver]

  Even if you set 0dBFS on the CD equal to +12dBr on the cassette though, the noise floor of the CD will still be lower (in absolute terms), and as a result, the CD will still deliver better dynamic range.

Not true. If external noise reduction ( Nakamichi High Com II - at least 20 dB less noise), high quality deck (64 dB without noise reduction ) and tape is used, under +12 dBr condition cassette can equal 96 dB of the CD. As such amplitude is in practice only required in bass, there is no tape saturation and resulting excessive distortion/compression. 
 
Cassette is NOT as humble as most might be lead to believe - its greatest trouble is speed stability and not dynamic range.

 

[cjl]

How are you measuring that noise though (and I'd be curious to see a citation for a cassette with noise at -84dB)? Depending on the measurement, and on the type of dither, CDs can reproduce sounds quieter than -96dBFS and not have it get lost in the noise. The actual noise level can be -105dB or lower through most of the frequency range.

 

[analogsurviver]

  How are you measuring that noise though (and I'd be curious to see a citation for a cassette with noise at -84dB)? Depending on the measurement, and on the type of dither, CDs can reproduce sounds quieter than -96dBFS and not have it get lost in the noise. The actual noise level can be -105dB or lower through most of the frequency range.

Any cassette deck/tape combo with S/N of 64 before application of noise reduction. Noise reduction systems could improve that by up to 25 dB ( Sanyo ), but on the grounds of overall SQ I settled down to 20 dB reduction with Nakamichi High Com II, which provides 20 dB+ noise reduction while producing the least artefacts. Together, this makes a 84 dB SNR recorder ref 0 dB. Which is the exact figure quoted for CD-R recorders in recording mode.
 
BASF chrome type II tapes were particularly quiet - and if judiciously used, could achieve greater dynamic range than metal tapes, simply because their noise was so much lower, despite lower MOL. Few cassette decks have electronics quiet enough to take advantage of these low noise tape.
 
About 96 dB is the limit for the cassette, even under the most favourable conditions. And although digital can improve that further as you have described, I do not think that 96 or so dB recorder SNR is going to be an issue in practice.

 

[Exacoustatowner]

   
Their absense today is what makes audio sound "unnatural", "digital", "stripped off of it's soul" etc... 

So true. I miss the extra vibrato added to flute music-I don't hear that with my CD's!

 

[Exacoustatowner]

C'mon man, it has Dolby C!

True, but I had cassette recorders before Dolby B came out, let alone Dolby C! Ah Bookends by Simon and Garfunkel: :Everyone tells me it's all happening' at the Zoo ssssssss I do believe it, I do believe it's true sssssssss…." "Hello Darkness my Old Friend ssssssss…."  Towards the END of my Analog Days, I had the next to the top Nakamichi with Dolby C and was eyeing an outboard DBX compander. I recorded by LP's on to tape for listening (since they sounded better than commercial cassette releases).  Post 1984 I was dubbing CD's onto Metal cassette tape for car use for a year or two. Wow, Hiss, and Flutter were mostly controlled with the best equipment and tape. In the early days nearly all CD's were Classical with only a few pop/rock albums. I went from 30% Classical to 90% Classical listening-and it's still true to this day.
But with my Acoustat Electrostatic speakers, no recording sounded as clean and free of distortion as the CD source. Once I had CD in the Car-the Nakamichi was sold off (1987?) ending my Analog Days/
My first CD player was the Kyocera DA01 with mil spec discrete electronics. I lucked out as it did not share in the sonic pitfalls of some early CD players (to my ears). 
 
  Ssssssssss…. WOW!