[Kentajalli]

I seem to remember reading that the eye adjusts the lens focus 300 times a second (although humans are unaware of this on a concious level).
Does the ear/brain system perform a similar check/reset many times a second? Just thinking that it may influence how the ear/brain can rapidly detect transients.

of course it does!
how fast, don't know.
if I am not mistaken it is the basis of Psychoacoustics .
that's how lossy compression systems work.
they try to fool the ear/brain .

 

[Jawed]

Yes it's a pulse array DAC in the ADC feedback loop - with a latency of just two or three master clock cycles - the whole ADC runs from 104MHz, so there is no significant delay to worry about.

I've been thinking about the signal produced by the forward path of Davina. In theory it's N-bit delta, where the coding represents positive, negative and 0 delta values.

For the pulse array to work you feed it with a single-ended coding, e.g. in DAVE you use a coding for values 0 to 20 to feed the pulse array - derived from 6-bit samples, running at 104MHz.

So it seems like you have to convert the positive/negative delta output from the forward path into a single-ended pulse array constant-switching coding. Is that right?

Presumably you can do this solely with a noise shaper/encoder combination. So it's a similar architecture to DAVE, but the input for the feedback loop is not PCM, it's N-bit delta.

 

[Rob Watts]

The pulse array modulator module's input is 2's complement regular PCM - analogue 0 is digital 0 - this then gets converted to give 10 elements on, 10 off. It has to be regular PCM so that it can be filtered and decimated. The same process happens with the DACs too. Within the pulse array modulator module, 2's complement is converted to offset binary, as it's easier to do it with just positive numbers.

 

[Christer]

The pulse array modulator module's input is 2's complement regular PCM - analogue 0 is digital 0 - this then gets converted to give 10 elements on, 10 off. It has to be regular PCM so that it can be filtered and decimated. The same process happens with the DACs too. Within the pulse array modulator module, 2's complement is converted to offset binary, as it's easier to do it with just positive numbers.

Hmm,, I can certainly not say that I understand what you and Jawed are discussing here. This is way beyond my understanding of how digital audio recording works.
But I am looking forward to hopefully getting to hear some test recordings made with the prototype ADC at different resolutions.
And if you record your new piano which I hope you will do,I have a couple of technically very easy to play short pieces to recommend.
Remembering that you like Arvo Pärt, there is a short but tonally rich little piano piece by him called "Für Alina" and another short piece by Eric Satie "Gymnopedie no1".
Happy New Year CC
PS I have not played an LP for months. Qutest/HMS together are simply so good that my LPs are just collecting dust these days.

 

[Rob Watts]

Yes I really like Arvo Pärt, and I know both of those pieces. I am not sure my son may be up to playing Für Alina, as he has only being playing keyboard and now piano for a year. Nonetheless, I plan to record from it, as it gives a repeatable reference point - live from reproduced!

Happy New Year to all. Let's hope things get back to normal next year...

 

[Jawed]

The pulse array modulator module's input is 2's complement regular PCM - analogue 0 is digital 0 - this then gets converted to give 10 elements on, 10 off. It has to be regular PCM so that it can be filtered and decimated. The same process happens with the DACs too. Within the pulse array modulator module, 2's complement is converted to offset binary, as it's easier to do it with just positive numbers.

Aha, so the delta output at 104MHz is converted to PCM at 104MHz and then it's split:

1. filtered to feed the pulse array modulator
2. decimated for output

Happy New Year Rob!

 

[Currawong]

Happy New Year Rob and Everyone.

The mention of vinyl brought something to mind: I just got in a pair of the new DCA Stealth for review. Given that they are the headphone equivalent of Chord's products -- designed to remove as much distortion as possible, the way they deliver music is very raw. I'm sure it will be too raw for many people. Much as Rob talks about how some people prefer their music presented with a degree of distortion, Dan had pretty much the same thing to say when I talked to him about the Stealth design. Like Chord gear, the Stealth can require some time for one's brain to acclimatise. I'm sure Rob would like them.

 

[Christer]

Happy New Year Rob and Everyone.

The mention of vinyl brought something to mind: I just got in a pair of the new DCA Stealth for review. Given that they are the headphone equivalent of Chord's products -- designed to remove as much distortion as possible, the way they deliver music is very raw. I'm sure it will be too raw for many people. Much as Rob talks about how some people prefer their music presented with a degree of distortion, Dan had pretty much the same thing to say when I talked to him about the Stealth design. Like Chord gear, the Stealth can require some time for one's brain to acclimatise. I'm sure Rob would like them.

Yes it will indeed be interesting to audition the Stealth. But as good as Dan´s earlier closed headphones were for their size and prices ,his open electrostatic ones were even better ie lower colouration/distortion to me.
I have yet to audition a closed headphone that does not sound a a wee bit coloured and closed in compared to comparable open ones.
All other closed ones I have heard have audible compromises with acoustic instrument music irrespective of price.

A bit like many wooden box speakers which also suffer from "boxiness" and colouration with several crossover points or even multiple drivers in parallel in the same frq range. Where one driver takes over gradually from another, there are unfortunately often audible problems involved.

And when you and other reviewers keep talking about the need to acclimimatise? to sound that is lower in distortion and closer to real live acoustic music I do NOT agree.

If the sound of live unamplified music is one´s reference point there should NOT be any need to acclimatise to a HI FI product that gets closer to that than others do.
On the contrary it should make one able to enjoy well recorded music better.
It should come as a relief.

Whenever I audition a product that I need to adjust to, I hear that as deviation from how things can and should sound and not desirable.

Good as they are with Mscaler involved, even Rob´s products still leave things to be desired and it will be equally interesting to hear how much closer to the real live sound of acoustic instruments Mscaler X and Davina recordings will bring his dacs.

Cheers and Happy New Year CC

 

[kennyb123]

If the sound of live unamplified music is one´s reference point there should NOT be any need to acclimatise to a HI FI product that gets closer to that than others do.
On the contrary it should make one able to enjoy well recorded music better.
It should come as a relief.

Exactly

 

[Kentajalli]

And when you and other reviewers keep talking about the need to acclimimatise? to sound that is lower in distortion and closer to real live acoustic music I do NOT agree.

If the sound of live unamplified music is one´s reference point there should NOT be any need to acclimatise to a HI FI product that gets closer to that than others do.
On the contrary it should make one able to enjoy well recorded music better.
It should come as a relief.

I may be wrong but I think the point is that, some people's only ref. for sound quality is what they have heard through the years in Hifi systems! and not live music and concerts.
Regular Hifi systems of the past 30-40 years has had certain distortions and colourations that to some (who don't know any different) is a ref. sound.
These people even miss it, if presented with true live-like music reproduction, they wouldn't even recognise it.
Pretty much they don't know it if it smacks them on the face.
However those concert and specially live music club goers, immediately zoon in to better equipments, and it is a relief to them.

 

[Currawong]

@Christer
Basically what Kentajalli said. The most reference most people have is NOT live music, but headphones and audio gear that has a deliberate coloration, distortion or other issues. That is why I mentioned the need to acclimatise. Most people are not like yourself who has had different experiences. Headphones that are designed to be tonally correct and accurate, such as the LCD-5 and Stealth (albeit with different sonic goals) are outliers. Of those two headphones, the listening experience with either is unlike other products from their respective companies.

 

[kennyb123]

I may be wrong but I think the point is that, some people's only ref. for sound quality is what they have heard through the years in Hifi systems! and not live music and concerts.
Regular Hifi systems of the past 30-40 years has had certain distortions and colourations that to some (who don't know any different) is a ref. sound.
These people even miss it, if presented with true live-like music reproduction, they wouldn't even recognise it.
Pretty much they don't know it if it smacks them on the face.
However those concert and specially live music club goers, immediately zoon in to better equipments, and it is a relief to them.

I honestly think that this hypothesis is wrong because our senses can’t help but reacting in a profoundly positive way when we hear or see or taste something magical.

An allergy to dairy has forced me to avoid milk or butter. But despite my best efforts at restaurants to order dairy-free, occasionally butter or milk makes it into my dish or drink inadvertently. The first thing I notice is how much better the taste is than what I’m accustomed to, so I make the mistake of gobbling a bit more down than I should. So despite years of non-dairy substitutes, my sense of taste doesn’t lose it’s ability to appreciate what clearly tastes better. I think it’s the same way with sound.

This assertion that some people prefer the sound of distortion may have some truth to it, but the wording isn’t fair. What everyone prefers is for their music to sound good to them. They’ll sometimes make choices that seem suboptimal but it’s because they have no other means at their disposal or lack the knowledge to make things better. We can be snobs and look down on things like vinyl and tubes, but it’s not at all fair to do that as we can’t know what tradeoff decisions that person had to make to arrive at that point. I think we should instead accept that maybe these individuals made the best choice they could within their means and given their understanding. Often suboptimal choices lead to other suboptimal choices to counter the harm done, but we’ve all done that because that’s what life is about.

 

[jarnopp]

I honestly think that this hypothesis is wrong because our senses can’t help but reacting in a profoundly positive way when we hear or see or taste something magical.

An allergy to dairy has forced me to avoid milk or butter. But despite my best efforts at restaurants to order dairy-free, occasionally butter or milk makes it into my dish or drink inadvertently. The first thing I notice is how much better the taste is than what I’m accustomed to, so I make the mistake of gobbling a bit more down than I should. So despite years of non-dairy substitutes, my sense of taste doesn’t lose it’s ability to appreciate what clearly tastes better. I think it’s the same way with sound.

This assertion that some people prefer the sound of distortion may have some truth to it, but the wording isn’t fair. What everyone prefers is for their music to sound good to them. They’ll sometimes make choices that seem suboptimal but it’s because they have no other means at their disposal or lack the knowledge to make things better. We can be snobs and look down on things like vinyl and tubes, but it’s not at all fair to do that as we can’t know what tradeoff decisions that person had to make to arrive at that point. I think we should instead accept that maybe these individuals made the best choice they could within their means and given their understanding. Often suboptimal choices lead to other suboptimal choices to counter the harm done, but we’ve all done that because that’s what life is about.

This debate brings this old article to mind:
https://www.stereophile.com/content/carver-challenge

I’m not sure what the implication is, other than we want the lowest distortion, most faithful reproduction of a known source (live, unamplified in a given space is a good example), but we can also have preferences for particular spaces/presentations. Ultimately, I think the more faithful and transparent reproduction will be the most lastingly satisfying, but I respect others’ different preferences.

 

[Kentajalli]

I honestly think that this hypothesis is wrong because our senses can’t help but reacting in a profoundly positive way when we hear or see or taste something magical.

An allergy to dairy has forced me to avoid milk or butter. But despite my best efforts at restaurants to order dairy-free, occasionally butter or milk makes it into my dish or drink inadvertently. The first thing I notice is how much better the taste is than what I’m accustomed to, so I make the mistake of gobbling a bit more down than I should. So despite years of non-dairy substitutes, my sense of taste doesn’t lose it’s ability to appreciate what clearly tastes better. I think it’s the same way with sound.

This assertion that some people prefer the sound of distortion may have some truth to it, but the wording isn’t fair. What everyone prefers is for their music to sound good to them. They’ll sometimes make choices that seem suboptimal but it’s because they have no other means at their disposal or lack the knowledge to make things better. We can be snobs and look down on things like vinyl and tubes, but it’s not at all fair to do that as we can’t know what tradeoff decisions that person had to make to arrive at that point. I think we should instead accept that maybe these individuals made the best choice they could within their means and given their understanding. Often suboptimal choices lead to other suboptimal choices to counter the harm done, but we’ve all done that because that’s what life is about.

This issue can go on forever, so I try to keep it short.
Milk is not the correct analogy . As babies we all have had milk and designed to have a taste for it - so later in life we might miss it when taken away or given alternatives such as oat milk .
I think "someone's Mom 's cooking"is more apt.
what if your mom added a little Cinnamon to your omelette , every time she made it while you were growing up?
for the rest of your life, having an omelette without it, just wouldn't taste right, to you at least!

 

[Christer]

@Christer
Basically what Kentajalli said. The most reference most people have is NOT live music, but headphones and audio gear that has a deliberate coloration, distortion or other issues. That is why I mentioned the need to acclimatise. Most people are not like yourself who has had different experiences. Headphones that are designed to be tonally correct and accurate, such as the LCD-5 and Stealth (albeit with different sonic goals) are outliers. Of those two headphones, the listening experience with either is unlike other products from their respective companies.

Hmm ,
thanks for the clarification. But,you surprise me again when saying that both LCD5 and Stealth aim to be "tonally correct and accurate" (albeit with different sonic goals)??? I fail to understand what you mean by that?
With my reference material if aiming for the same two criteria they should sound VERY similar, NOT different.

Regarding LCD and complex densely scored symphonic material their former top model LCD4 which is the only LCD headphone I have auditioned,to me exhibited clearly audible colourations and limitations and is a headphone I would not choose for optimal tonal accuracy with symphonic music.
How would you say their new LCD 5 sounds compared to Stealth or whichever headphones you rate as the most neutral and transparent with the reference point I am using?
Cheers CC