Testing audiophile claims and myths

[Ryokan]

I use the term grainy to sometimes describe ba timbre.

 

[2leftears]

I am a lens-nut of a kind myself: I pay a lot of attention to what camera lenses are used in movies etc. I prefer wide lenses over long lenses, but both have their place and should be used creatively/effectively. Wide lenses make the picture have visual depth and in case of handheld camera the visuality more stable and calm. Long lenses and shaky camera creates restless visuality that becomes tiring to my eyes fast. Long lenses create easily "train station" effect and movie makers should be careful about that and if such effect is wanted/needed/beneficial in a certain scene of the movie. In all, I want the lenses (and camera angles/movements) chosen carefully to support the feel of the scenes and make the movie a pleasant/interesting visual experience.

This is OT, but don't get me started on fast panning camera action. I much prefer slower cinematography with longer static-camera cuts and slow pans, in which the actors are given a stage in which to actually, you know, "act". I prefer the works of Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, David Lynch etc. who don't rely on creating a story through thousands of 500 millisecond jump-cuts edited together, but rather use very well executed static and/or slow camera panning a lot of the time. But that's just my preference.

 

[bigshot]

I use the term grainy to sometimes describe ba timbre.

Musical instruments should have timbre, but audio components shouldn’t. They should have fidelity without coloration.

 

[71 dB]

This is OT, but don't get me started on fast panning camera action. I much prefer slower cinematography with longer static-camera cuts and slow pans, in which the actors are given a stage in which to actually, you know, "act". I prefer the works of Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, David Lynch etc. who don't rely on creating a story through thousands of 500 millisecond jump-cuts edited together, but rather use very well executed static and/or slow camera panning a lot of the time. But that's just my preference.

Fast cuts are okay, if there is a reason for them and they are only used shortly here and there. Fast cuts tend to be a problem of newer movies. In general the use of camera has gone downhill* in mainstream movies since around mid 90s, but there are outliers. A lot of newer movies are unwatchable for me because of how camera is used and now much cuts there are. Even bad/mediocre movies of the 70s and 80s have most of the time significantly better camera work. Fast panning/shaky handheld camera portrays well chaos (if the movie contains such scenes), but it has to be balanced out with slower camera action in other kind of scenes. I like David Lynch a lot (especially Mulholland Drive). My favorite director is Steven Spielberg who I consider the greatest camera user in the history of cinema.

* I don't think it is so much about the lack of talent, but what studios find marketable. Mainstream audience understand nothing about how camera can be used to tell the story visually, so why bother when shaky camera and fast cuts create the illusion of an entertaining movie? Only visually literate viewers notice the problem...

 

[Ryokan]

Musical instruments should have timbre, but audio components shouldn’t. They should have fidelity without coloration.

By ba timbre I mean identifying that the sound is coming from a ba as it's not smooth.

 

[bigshot]

I guess you’re saying it’s the musical instrument being recorded, not the playback device.

 

[castleofargh]

I guess you’re saying it’s the musical instrument being recorded, not the playback device.

It's a playback instrument. This is the audiophile's entire philosophy, where you finalize the album at home.
I'm not sure BA drivers are necessary not smooth, and as it's now the third and different use for grainy sound, I officially decide that I don't like that word in audio.

 

[colonelkernel8]

It's a playback instrument. This is the audiophile's entire philosophy, where you finalize the album at home.
I'm not sure BA drivers are necessary not smooth, and as it's now the third and different use for grainy sound, I officially decide that I don't like that word in audio.

How do you even quantify “graininess”? That seems to defy explanation.

 

[2leftears]

How do you even quantify “graininess”? That seems to defy explanation.

Maybe adopt the sandpaper grit grading scale: P80, P120, P240, P320, P1000, P1200 etc...

Or would that be the grittiness?

 

[bigshot]

I think all this confusion would be solved if audiophiles fully grasped the concept of fidelity instead of resorting to subjective descriptions of quality of sound.

 

[colonelkernel8]

I think all this confusion would be solved if audiophiles fully grasped the concept of fidelity instead of resorting to subjective descriptions of quality of sound.

No no. I need to discuss the weight of the lows, the sparkle of the treble and the unctuousness of the mids. Hey bigshot, it’s been a while.

 

[bigshot]

Nice to see old faces back in town!

 

[Elegiac]

For 'grain' I've adopted the definition that I've read elsewhere, based on shared experience. On the Fidelio X2HR, the treble measures as very uneven, with lots of little jagged bits and peaks. It has a coarse sound, and an edge to it. Like lots of little flecks of white noise in there. It's not detail-texture, it's just... grain.

 

[colonelkernel8]

For 'grain' I've adopted the definition that I've read elsewhere, based on shared experience. On the Fidelio X2HR, the treble measures as very uneven, with lots of little jagged bits and peaks. It has a coarse sound, and an edge to it. Like lots of little flecks of white noise in there. It's not detail-texture, it's just... grain.

So maybe a harmonic vibration issue with the housing perhaps? But just one common enough that it manifests in largely the same way across many different headphones.

 

[bigshot]

Most midrange headphones are wiggly above 10kHz. And most midrange headphones vary a lot from copy to copy in that range.