[cel4145]

Oh - compared to music heard live, to live mic feed, I should not be able to tell - instantly - which recorder is better ?

I have no idea if you are talking about the recording electronics or the mic.

But yes. If measurements indicate two devices may have inaudible levels of distortion, you should put your hubris aside.

 

[KeithEmo]

It's not someone else's job to prove that the theory is NOT correct. It is the job of the person proposing the theory to prove that it IS correct.

And just because the theory hasn't been disproved doesn't give it any greater chance of it being correct.

You can sit churning out theories until the cows come home. They don't mean SQUAT until someone actually shows them to be correct.

Tthat's all the "high end" has to offer. A huge pile of rotting, unsubstantiated theories. But that's ok, because theories alone are enough to impress those the industry is trying to sell product to. It's disgusting.

se

 
I honestly can't imagine where you learned that....
 
In science class, what we learned was that science was a process....
 
1) you make observations
2) you discuss your observations and come up with a theory to explain them
3) you devise and run experiments to test those theories
4) either the experiments confirm your theories or not
5) if not, then you modify your theories based on your results
6) then you run new experiments to test your new theories
(basically repeat until the results of your experiments agree with the results your theories predicted)
 
I've NEVER seen a science book that claimed science consisted of "deciding something" - then ignoring any observations that seem to disagree with it.
 
And, in real-world science, it is often NOT the person or group that first comes up with a theory that ends up running the experiments (although it also often is).

 

[StanD]

  Well, I can not stash a real piece of hardware into a computer , click the mouse and miraclously it will turn up in the home of anyone interested to listen ?
 
I  present the easiest way to hear the differences among 44.1/16 and better resolutiuon(s)  - and if this is for you tangential diversion, fine with me.
 
I do not advocate the five figures DACs - but not $50 ones either. 

I will agree with you about the pricing of DACs, however, will not agree with you about the limits of human perception. Enough testing has been done over and over about the myths surrounding hires.

 

[analogsurviver]

  LOL
that link to the Korg website [features 1] is for sure seriously making a point there :
quote:
[The AudioGate software uses the power of the computer to perform the calculations necessary for D/A conversion, as opposed to slower external hardware. This allows for ideal processing, retaining the audio’s original quality.]
 
Further down at bottom it shows a specially developed headphone for 1DS-DAC products with a link the headphone company
and here the appropriate snake oil :

http://phonon-inc.com/portfolio/phonon-liquid/?lang=en
 
I didn't see any ABX evidence that is does work as advertised:

Interesting - I NEVER saw any advertisement(s) on the Korg Audiogate website ( selections on the PC ? ) . Nt for any headphones - and certainly not for contact treatment products.
 
BTW - contact treatment stuff comes from military - they can hardly risk a glitch in electrical transmissions - as quite a few pilots of then new fly by wire system incorporated in the then new F-16 had to pay for that experience with - life... 
 
There were software, etc, glitches too - but plain old loss of contact did bring a certain percentage of them down too.

 

[Steve Eddy]

Hmmmmmm.  Let's see. I've actually compared how the Lyr and the Asgard sound - and I say they sound different.

How many times do I have to remind you that this is the Sound Science forum?

What, did you take a wrong turn at Albuquerque and think you ended up a one of the DBT-Free forums here?

That's right, there are other forums here where you can say whatever you want without anyone pestering you to actually substantiate your claims. But in Sound Science, it's precisely the opposite. Such claims demand that they be substantiated.

I'm not quite to the point of believing that you're just too thick to understand this. So I have to ask, why do you keep doing it?

The manufacturer says they sound different.

So? Their claim is just as unsubstantiated as yours. But unlike you, they're not making that claim here in the Sound Science forum. You are.

Virtually everyone I know who owns either, but has auditioned both, agrees that they sound different.

And everyone, not "virtually everyone," but literally every one of those people were human beings. And while we don't know everything, one thing we do know, and gave for a very long time, is that human subjective perceptions are embarrassingly unreliable when it comes to things like this. That's why, when measurements don't show any obvious flaws that are within know audible thresholds, we need to use adequate controls to separate fact from fiction. Or to put it a better way, separate fact from simply being human

Yet you, who don't even claim to have actually heard either one, "just know" that they "can't possibly" sound different based on the specs (which neither one of us has confirmed anyway).

Now you're just flat out lying about me. I'm not even going to be so kind as to call it being disingenuous. You're a flat out liar. I never said any such thing. Not literally or figuratively.

All I did was poke some fun at your claim that the Lyr was rolled off in the high end when it specs out to 500 kHz.

That's really impressive.... but it's getting to be a bit boring.

What's impressive is your lying about someone and then sarcastically saying "That's really impressive."

Perhaps it's not really rolled off - and it's some other sort of "psychoacoustic effect" - or perhaps their specs are just wrong (I didn't measure it).

Or perhaps you're just human and your subjective perceptions aren't nearly what your vanity and ego would lead you to believe that they are.

se

 

[Steve Eddy]

I've NEVER seen a science book that claimed science consisted of "deciding something" - then ignoring any observations that seem to disagree with it.

Nothing was decided. At least not on my part and that was my post you are replying to. The "deciding something" is only part of your fevered imagination which no doubt caused you to flat out lie previously about what I have said.

I'm sorry to say, but you are not an honorable person. Get lost.

se

 

[KeithEmo]

   
Hey Keith, do you know what the output impedance on those is?

 
They use the TI TPA6130A2 amplifier - and there is a 4.7 ohm "safety resistor" in series with the output for each channel.
I suspect that the output impedance of the chip itself is low enough that, for all practical purposes, the 4.7 ohms of the series resistor is the output impedance.

 

[maverickronin]

  They use the TI TPA6130A2 amplifier - and there is a 4.7 ohm "safety resistor" in series with the output for each channel.
I suspect that the output impedance of the chip itself is low enough that, for all practical purposes, the 4.7 ohms of the series resistor is the output impedance.

 
That's too bad.  4.7 ohms is too high for most BA IEMs...

 

[StanD]

   
They use the TI TPA6130A2 amplifier - and there is a 4.7 ohm "safety resistor" in series with the output for each channel.
I suspect that the output impedance of the chip itself is low enough that, for all practical purposes, the 4.7 ohms of the series resistor is the output impedance.

Which side of that resistor is the negative feedback taken from? Or is all of that cooked into the chip?

 

[KeithEmo]

How many times do I have to remind you that this is the Sound Science forum?

What, did you take a wrong turn at Albuquerque and think you ended up a one of the DBT-Free forums here?

That's right, there are other forums here where you can say whatever you want without anyone pestering you to actually substantiate your claims. But in Sound Science, it's precisely the opposite. Such claims demand that they be substantiated.

I'm not quite to the point of believing that you're just too thick to understand this. So I have to ask, why do you keep doing it?
So? Their claim is just as unsubstantiated as yours. But unlike you, they're not making that claim here in the Sound Science forum. You are.
And everyone, not "virtually everyone," but literally every one of those people were human beings. And while we don't know everything, one thing we do know, and gave for a very long time, is that human subjective perceptions are embarrassingly unreliable when it comes to things like this. That's why, when measurements don't show any obvious flaws that are within know audible thresholds, we need to use adequate controls to separate fact from fiction. Or to put it a better way, separate fact from simply being human
Now you're just flat out lying about me. I'm not even going to be so kind as to call it being disingenuous. You're a flat out liar. I never said any such thing. Not literally or figuratively.

All I did was poke some fun at your claim that the Lyr was rolled off in the high end when it specs out to 500 kHz.
What's impressive is your lying about someone and then sarcastically saying "That's really impressive."
Or perhaps you're just human and your subjective perceptions aren't nearly what your vanity and ego would lead you to believe that they are.

se

 
I don't know - perhaps we are from different planets.
 
Where I come from, when there are a whole bunch of observations that say one thing, and none that contradict it, we generally start out with a theory based on the observations being correct - at which point we figure out a theory to explain those observations - and then see about proving or disproving it. Just because a certain methodology is subject to doubt by no means suggests that any results based on it are necessarily wrong. Personally, I would welcome any observations from anyone who had actually heard a Lyr and an Asgard, and had the opportunity to compare them, under any circumstances, as the basis of a discussion, which could then lead to a theory, which could then be tested. You're the one who seems to think that any such discussion would be "a waste of time" or "unscientific" somehow.
 
I agree that the idea that the Lyr sounds the way it does is based on a simply high-frequency roll off sounds doubtful.... so I'd love to hear other theories that we might test. 
 
However, my point stands - this forum is supposed to be about science.....
Which includes observations, and discussions, and experiments, and discussions of experiments....
It is not limited to discussion of things that have already been theorized, tested, and proven by experiment.

 

[KeithEmo]

  To be fair, the required SPL to hear <20Hz is pretty high, and not very many people have transducers that can cleanly output 100+dB of 15Hz. Also, nearly all amps and DACs are flat down to the single digit Hz anyways, so it doesn't particularly matter that much whether hearing extends to 20 or 12 (except for the transducer requirement - it's quite difficult to get high output levels of 12Hz, as I said).

 
I agree entirely, and I personally consider using "20 Hz to 20 kHz" as "the practical limitation of human hearing" to be perfectly reasonable.
 
I really just wanted to point out that, just because something is "widely accepted", doesn't mean that it is necessarily true - nor that we can safely ignore any observation that it appears to contradict. Since ringing in a DAC, by definition, consists of output signal that occurs when no input is present, whether it is audible or not becomes a matter of how effectively it is masked by the desired signal, which falls under the topic of psychoacoustics, which is far from "well understood" or "a done deal".

 

[KeithEmo]

   
That's too bad.  4.7 ohms is too high for most BA IEMs...

 
I would agree that 4.7 ohms is a bit high to rule out any possibility of interaction between the output of the amp and the IEMs. I've heard it through quite a few different headphones, and it seems to do pretty well with all of them, but the output drive is also limited to +/- 5V, which limits you to relatively efficient headphones in general. The DAC itself sounds really good, both through its own headphone amp of an external one. I've only heard it personally through one pair of IEMs, and it did sound quite nice, and was also surprisingly quiet. (These were "prototype" IEMs, with one dynamic driver and one BA per ear, and I don't know their efficiency - or much else about them.)
 
Anyone who wants more output drive, or a lower output impedance, would probably want to get the Big EGo and use it with their own separate headphone amp. (Although I would still try it by itself first - you might be surprised.)

 

[uchihaitachi]

Could somebody recommend me a good book to read about the science behind audio?

 

[analogsurviver]

  Could somebody recommend me a good book to read about the science behind audio?

Good starting point : http://www.scribd.com/doc/44298994/Leo-L-Beranek-Acoustics#scribd

 

[AudioBear]

I am not over-joyed at the superfluous negativity from both of you but the dialog is an excellent opportunity to review some basic critical thinking skills and the methodology of science.   Let me ask both of you to comment on the following.
 
Occam's razor says among competing hypotheses that predict equally well, the one with the fewest assumptions should be selected (to test first).  How does each of your positions stack up against the razor?
 
As a practical matter, it's often the case that we test several hypotheses and often pick the easiest or least expensive or least time consuming first for obvious but illogical reasons.  My question to you both is:
 
1.  what are all the reasonable available hypotheses that explain the facts available to us?
 
2.  which has the least assumptions?
 
3.  How can we test it?
 
Let's stick to the logical analysis of the phenomenon at hand, I really don't care which planet either of you comes from.