[ciphercomplete]

  I hear a difference, but I'm not convinced every track in a song is recorded with the same polarity. For example, the vocal track may have been recorded with reverse polarity with respect to the guitar track, and/or percussion... you end up only being able to switch the polarity on the resulting "master" of all the tracks at once, so I guess listening and making a determination of what sounds best is about the only way...

Which is why I gave up on the whole polarity thing once someone told me about this.  Its a nice option to have though I guess.

 

[artur9]

  I hear a difference, but I'm not convinced every track in a song is recorded with the same polarity. 

 
I mentioned this before but seems apropos because of your comment.
 
from http://audiophilereview.com/cables/the-luck-of-the-xlr.html 6th paragraph.

The same sort of thing could (and often did) occur when a differently-wired piece of outside gear (an equalizer, for example, or some other sort of signal processor - even a reverb device) was applied to one or more, but not all, of the tracks in the mix, that one (or those) track(s) could be out of phase with the rest of the recording, and it was possible that nothing could ever be done to fix it.

 

[mikoss]

   
I mentioned this before but seems apropos because of your comment.
 
from http://audiophilereview.com/cables/the-luck-of-the-xlr.html 6th paragraph.

So it seems it would come down to listening and see which polarity people prefer... I also have no idea how people come up with the 90% of CD's being in reverse polarity figure... I guess it depends which labels they collect, or which CD's. I personally think that figure is way, way, way too high for my music. I saw it on a site describing polarity... ahh right, here it is. This is referring to the CD player itself, so the transport switching the polarity. Since I assume very few people are using transports with the Yggy, we're in the 8%?

 

[sheldaze]

Can anyone describe a specific sound, heard in music, which one could focus on for polarity? It just seems odd to state this one sounds better and that one sounds worse. It could be - I just have trouble with that concept.
 
I'm also a little afraid to hit the button, and get obsessed about something else, when I'm already quite happy with the sound 

 

 

[Torq]

It's possible/probable my understanding is off the mark ...
 
For headphones and speakers, unless the transducers have a displacement bias, absolute phase/polarity shouldn't matter.
 
For speakers, sounds played on both channels simultaneously but out of phase/polarity, would tend to cancel each other out.
 
That's very simplistic, and possibly entirely wrong (Scotch and Bourbon AND a 5-day-run-in-Yggdrasil tonight) ...

 

[yfei]

  I hear a difference, but I'm not convinced every track in a song is recorded with the same polarity. For example, the vocal track may have been recorded with reverse polarity with respect to the guitar track, and/or percussion... you end up only being able to switch the polarity on the resulting "master" of all the tracks at once, so I guess listening and making a determination of what sounds best is about the only way...

I agree some songs are really difficult to distinguish the difference, probably tracks inside the song got messed up. 

 

[funch]

  I'm also a little afraid to hit the button, and get obsessed about something else, when I'm already quite happy with the sound 

 

 
Yes, if you hit 'the button' and cross over to the dark side of the polarity, you will never find your way back. 

 

[Torq]

Very short commentary for now ...
 
My Yggy has been powered up for five full days now ... and I am suddenly aware of a marked improvement in reproduction.  Detail, spaciousness and emotion took a major jump sometime between Sunday evening and tonight.  It was incredibly impressive when first powered on and cold ... 
 
Detailed impressions will follow later in the week when I've had some real time to listen.
 
However, this is, I think, the first time I've heard any major change in any of my various music systems over the last 25 years that was attributable solely to time.  I've had this level of visceral emotional reaction to music using a good vinyl replay setup before, and with my Linn Akurate/DS gear, but not on this level with headphones and CD-rips.
 
Tonight is going to be a Mary Black/Tracy Chapman/Tanita Tikaram marathon (with appropriate Island malts) ...
 
...
 
16/44.1 Red Book > nMP > Roon > Optical > Yggdrasil > AQ Colorado (balanced) > Ragnarok > LCD 2.2c

 

[johnjen]

Can anyone describe a specific sound, heard in music, which one could focus on for polarity? It just seems odd to state this one sounds better and that one sounds worse. It could be - I just have trouble with that concept.

I'm also a little afraid to hit the button, and get obsessed about something else, when I'm already quite happy with the sound

My usual test for polarity is to pay attention the very lowest octave(s).
Especially the sub-sonic region which is felt and heard.

This assumes that your system is capable of reproducing these frequencies, and that the music you use to test for this still actually has these lowest frequencies.
Lots of music has had its very bottom end chopped off.

And these lobotomized tracks, are almost impossible to tell which phase is 'correct', so in those cases it really doesn't seem to matter.

But when a track does have these lowest frequencies and the system is capable of properly presenting them, then the results are wonderful, and are not just noticeable in the bass.

JJ

 

[johnjen]

It's possible/probable my understanding is off the mark ...

For headphones and speakers, unless the transducers have a displacement bias, absolute phase/polarity shouldn't matter.

For speakers, sounds played on both channels simultaneously but out of phase/polarity, would tend to cancel each other out.

That's very simplistic, and possibly entirely wrong (Scotch and Bourbon AND a 5-day-run-in-Yggdrasil tonight) ...

Our hearing is capable of noticing a positive (compression) wave front from a negative (rarefied) wave front.
And we can tell when that big drum gets whacked if the initial wave form is 'correct' or not.

I hear this as an extension in the FR response to percussive impacts which reach downward, sometimes to below 20Hz.

Like when they whack those big 6' drums used in orchestras, and pipe organs where they use two pedals to create a difference subharmonic, as but 2 examples.

Sometimes standing waves can be created within the acoustic space using continuous notes that 'play off' each other in a similar way.

The trick is to find music that truly still has these lowest octaves remaining and hasn't had them removed during the recording process, in order to hear this for yourself.

JJ

 

[sheldaze]

   
Yes, if you hit 'the button' and cross over to the dark side of the polarity, you will never find your way back. 

I did

 
Just made it back! In all seriousness though, I was PM'ing and listening to a specific song where the button makes it sound like night and day. It is an acoustic mix of a single instrument and multiple female/male singers, in a small space with lots of echos off the walls of the original recording space. I thought the song was from the Baroque era, but is supposedly from Portugal in the 17th century. I will need to listen to more

 

[sheldaze]

My usual test for polarity is to pay attention the very lowest octave(s).
Especially the sub-sonic region which is felt and heard.

This assumes that your system is capable of reproducing these frequencies, and that the music you use to test for this still actually has these lowest frequencies.
Lots of music has had its very bottom end chopped off.

And these lobotomized tracks, are almost impossible to tell which phase is 'correct', so in those cases it really doesn't seem to matter.

But when a track does have these lowest frequencies and the system is capable of properly presenting them, then the results are wonderful, and are not just noticeable in the bass.

JJ

Sorry I did not use the multi-quote, because I saw this after my post. So would it be a solid assumption that both the highest and lowest frequencies are where we find the phase to be most audible?

 

[jcx]

there's no "high frequency" human hearing phase sensitivity - auditory neuron phase locking goes away above a few kHz - no pattern in the neuron firing vs soundwave phase can be seen above 4 kHz
 
so human hearing phase sensitivity falls to nothing by the top of "upper midrange"
 
 
low bass is also likely problematic when most commercial music is mixed for speakers and rooms - and rooms are modal, have distinct resonances and associated phase shift below a few hundred Hz
 
what you hear in headphones can be more "accurate" In the low bass but likely was already confused by recording studio room and then monitor speaker and room interaction during mastering: http://seanolive.blogspot.com/2009/10/audios-circle-of-confusion.html

 

[jfoxvol]

  there's no "high frequency" human hearing phase sensitivity - auditory neuron phase locking goes away above a few kHz - no pattern in the neuron firing vs soundwave phase can be seen above 4 kHz
 
so human hearing phase sensitivity falls to nothing by the top of "upper midrange"
 
 
low bass is also likely problematic when most commercial music is mixed for speakers and rooms - and rooms are modal, have distinct resonances and associated phase shift below a few hundred Hz
 
what you hear in headphones can be more "accurate" In the low bass but likely was already confused by recording studio room and then monitor speaker and room interaction during mastering: http://seanolive.blogspot.com/2009/10/audios-circle-of-confusion.html

Yeah but try telling that to guys with super tweeters in their systems.  How can you even tell it's on....><

 

[AtomikPi]

My usual test for polarity is to pay attention the very lowest octave(s).
Especially the sub-sonic region which is felt and heard.

This assumes that your system is capable of reproducing these frequencies, and that the music you use to test for this still actually has these lowest frequencies.
Lots of music has had its very bottom end chopped off.

And these lobotomized tracks, are almost impossible to tell which phase is 'correct', so in those cases it really doesn't seem to matter.

But when a track does have these lowest frequencies and the system is capable of properly presenting them, then the results are wonderful, and are not just noticeable in the bass.

JJ

In numerical terms, which frequencies are you talking about? I notice many recordings are EQ'ed to have little content below 30-40 hz, certainly under 20 hz. (Of course, many recordings aren't mic'ed in a way that allows much even below 80hz.) It's saddening, though, because 20-40hz is a really important range and one which most of my transducers are capable of reproducing.
 
I've also heard that content below 20 hz serves to due little other than stress your drivers. When I play <20hz test tones through my subwoofer, I just get a bizarre and unsettling vibration.