More 'Audiophile' bullsh*t

[Crackie]

gizlaroc said:

And every hifi brand puts there on sonic signature on kit, if they didn't why would you buy theirs and not someone elses?

Hifi is finding kit you enjoy listening too.


Of course there is more they can do to get more info off the source, and loads can be done to clean up digital files, but they still put their sound on hardware.

I don't agree that every hi-fi brand puts their sonic signature on kit; there will always be some signature of some kind because nothing is perfect but I don't think all companies 'voice' their products. There are and have been companies that aimed for absolute fidelity instead of a specific signature; these purist companies often eschew the misleading marketing nonsense that this thread is about and have more laudable motives imho.

[Crackie]

EggsBenedict said:

.... and this is the whole essence of the Hi-Fi debate. The phrase Hi-Fi is short for High Fidelity - so Hi-Fi should be a highly faithful reproduction of the source. Any system that puts something there that wasn't in the source, or emphasises any part of it at the expense of another is undesirable, hence that 'minimal path' philosophy that meant the death of tone controls on amplifiers (or at least 'good' ones) - essentially the more circuitry you had in the box, the more chance of introducing some taint or distortion.

However, there's the rub - how did the source sound, and how do you know how close you are to it? Well, you don't have the source, so everyone just relies on it 'sounding better'. I suppose the closest you could get is attending some concert where a recording was being made, and then listening to that recording via your HiFi. Even then - it's never going to be the same - being there watching live with thousands of others conjures a much different emotional repsonse to music than sitting in a room with the stereo on.

I agree it is hard to know how the source sounded...........Very few companies even attempt to recreate a live performance in real rooms but VMPS Audio and some of the other braver companies have been prepared to subject their products to the ultimate scrutiny. How accurately can a recording/playback system recreate a musical event in the very room it was performed in ? http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=76191.0

I think John Dunlavy ( Dunlavy Audio Labs ) and Brian Cheney ( VMPS ) were two purists who aimed at ultimate accuracy. Sadly these two great engineers are now dead and I can't think of any companies who do live versus recorded now.

Edited by Crackie on Monday 6th October 13:56

[EggsBenedict]

^^ AFAICS, the rest of the equipment was studio stuff, right? Behringer? So not your massively expensive high end kit (and yes, I know that everything's relative).

I would say that it's not odd that there wasn't specific mention of the power cables ;-)

[TonyRPH]

Crackie said:

I don't agree that every hi-fi brand puts their sonic signature on kit; there will always be some signature of some kind because nothing is perfect but I don't think all companies 'voice' their products. There are and have been companies that aimed for absolute fidelity instead of a specific signature; these purist companies often eschew the misleading marketing nonsense that this thread is about and have more laudable motives imho.

At least one leading speaker designer has admitted to 'voicing' speakers to give them a particular sonic signature.

Naim kit seems to have a 'house sound' too.

Naturally other components / cables will influence the sound as well.

I'm currently reading Bob Cordell's "Designing Audio Power Amplifiers" book - and there is a very interesting chapter on cables (speaker cables in particular) and how they interact with the rest of the system.

[EggsBenedict]

^^^ That's interesting. Does it say bell push cable is fine?

I wonder as I have DNM cable on all my kit, and it wasn't cheap! But now I've read that it's all bks and you could use bits of string and expect it to sound OK (or something).

I'm more sceptical now (probably something to do with disposable income reducing from growing up and having kids),...

[gizlaroc]

Crackie said:

I think John Dunlavy ( Dunlavy Audio Labs ) and Brian Cheney ( VMPS ) were two purists who aimed at ultimate accuracy. Sadly these two great engineers are now dead and I can't think of any companies who do live versus recorded now.

I used Dunlavy speakers before going to Meridian DSPs, and they were extremely revealing of kit changes.

I found an old pic of them the other day....


That must have been nearly 10 years ago looking at the room and the kit.


I agree some companies do try and go for an uncoloured sound, but that is the minority imho.

Even Ayre have switch on their CD players to choose between accurate and 'nice' sounding.

[TonyRPH]

EggsBenedict said:

^^^ That's interesting. Does it say bell push cable is fine?

I wonder as I have DNM cable on all my kit, and it wasn't cheap! But now I've read that it's all bks and you could use bits of string and expect it to sound OK (or something).

I'm more sceptical now (probably something to do with disposable income reducing from growing up and having kids),...

I assume you're referring to my post about Bob Cordell's book. (the thread rolled over to the next page for me).

He explains how cables can act as an antenna, and how the effects of this can be minimised using a "Zobel" network at the speaker end (most amplifiers have a Zobel network on the output too).

He also illustrates a model of an average cable, showing all the predicted parameters and so on. Very techie.

It all makes sense (to me at least) in terms of how speaker cables can affect the sound.

It's a science.

I hope I haven't opened another can of worms in the great cable debate now.

[Jon1967x]

TonyRPH said:

Jon1967x said:

Iirc cd doesn't include error correction <snip>

Yes it does. Reed–Solomon error correction

Wiki said:

Reed–Solomon codes have since found important applications from deep-space communication to consumer electronics. They are prominently used in consumer electronics such as CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray Discs, in data transmission technologies such as DSL and WiMAX, in broadcast systems such as DVB and ATSC, and in computer applications such as RAID 6 systems.

I stand corrected although Reed-Solomon is not fool proof - for a debate and to save having it here...

http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/eac-101.1535...

[TonyRPH]

Jon1967x said:

I stand corrected although Reed-Solomon is not fool proof - for a debate and to save having it here...

http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/eac-101.1535...

Not foolproof no, but probably good enough for all but the most badly scratched CD.

[NDA]

NinjaPower said:

NDA said:

These days I doubt I could hear the difference between a live band in my living room and an MP3 playing through Sonos - such is the appalling tinnitus I have to hear through.

Was the tinnitus as a result of years of listening at volume or just something else?

Years of shooting without ear defenders when I was in my 20's. My own fault.

[TonyRPH]

For the first time in ages I was glancing through a What HiFi magazine and just read the biggest load of crap ever in the 'Sound Advice' pages.

A reader wrote in with the following question:

Reader said:

I've noticed that most hi-fi cables have arrows indicating which way they should be connected. Does this really make a difference?

What Hi-Fi said:

In a word, yes.
First, there's the construction: the conductor process (the way in which the metal is drawn) and shielding can affect the signal flow from the moment the cable is built.

Then there's burning in: start using a cable and it will become more conductive in the direction of signal flow, while more resistant in the opposite direction, and this can affect sound performance.

If a manufacturer has gone to the effort to recommend a cable be used in one direction, you're probably best to do just that. If not, you could test both ways to see which sounds best, but once you've decided, try to stick to it.

My emphasis above.

I would love to know how a piece of wire can become more conductive "in the direction of signal flow", whilst becoming more resistant (or less conductive to signal flow in the opposite direction, because in all my years of working with electricity and electronics, I have yet to witness this unique phenomenon.

I think that next time my multimeter or oscilloscope appears to be giving spurious readings, I shall reverse the test leads to correct it.

But for the multimeter, should I reverse just the (+) lead, the (-) lead or both? I wonder which lead will be providing the greatest resistance to signal / voltage flow in a specific direction? If I only reverse a single lead, might this cause a cancellation of voltage I wonder?

[OldSkoolRS]

To me that seems to be describing the action of a diode (or at least partially as a diode 'blocks' the flow completely in one direction). Since diodes are sometimes used in guitar effects pedals to create a 'fuzz' sound it doesn't sound to me like something you'd want if you were after a 'pure' hifi sound anyway, though I have to confess I'm a cable cynic anyway (and yes I have tried different ones over the years to no effect at least in my opinion on my system).

[Crackie]

The electrons must get confused by the alternating current nature of the music signal.......the arrows on cables show them, and the snake oil, which way to flow.

[scorp]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7ERMu825m4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12GHUf8DOPs

Pretty much the opinions you would expect.

[TonyRPH]

I should just add that I am aware of certain cables being manufactured as 'directional' - due to the placement of passive components in the cable, particularly those with LC / RC / RLC networks at one end (usually the speaker end).

I think the cables from MIT (amongst others) fit this criteria.

Apart from that, wire is wire, surely!

[jmorgan]

Don't you have to balance the way the cable is with respect up and down? Doesn't like long treks up and they speed up going down.

[MrLizard]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

I also have an 809 - the Audyssey does EQ all the channels but only to a specific point or points in the room, you need to set it up yourself using the supplied microphone and sit in the place where you listen/watch stuff the most. Works well with most stuff but it isn't fool proof, if you never set it up right then you wont lose anything, if you did then i suspect it might sound slightly different, whether better or worse would be in the pudding - must admit i thought the Audyssey was also proprietary

not sure that helps...

[Mr2Mike]

TonyRPH said:

I assume you're referring to my post about Bob Cordell's book. (the thread rolled over to the next page for me).

He explains how cables can act as an antenna, and how the effects of this can be minimised using a "Zobel" network at the speaker end (most amplifiers have a Zobel network on the output too).

He also illustrates a model of an average cable, showing all the predicted parameters and so on. Very techie.

It all makes sense (to me at least) in terms of how speaker cables can affect the sound.

It's a science.

I hope I haven't opened another can of worms in the great cable debate now.

Zobel networks are used with speakers purely to make the speakers impedance more constant over the frequency range to improve stability, as seen by the amplifier. The impedance of a typical figure of 8 speaker cable is not going to change appreciably over the audio frequency range, certainly orders of magnitude less than the drivers and crossover networks, so a Zobel network isn't used to correct cable effects.

Edited by Mr2Mike on Monday 20th October 12:14

[JustinP1]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Apparently, or so I read, Audyssey was dropped because of the processing drain. The Onkyo processor could not run Atmos with it at the same time.

Onkyo are pushing out Atmos firmware at the mo.

I thought the old EQ system was great. Not just for the EQ facility but the speaker distance and relative speaker volume automation. I've had an 809 and now the 5010 and I'd say it's improved both, and I've used them in two quite difficult room scenarios.

[probedb]

jmorgan said:

Don't you have to balance the way the cable is with respect up and down? Doesn't like long treks up and they speed up going down.

This is true and God help you if you put any sharp kinks in the cable, the electrons have a huge crash if they're going too fast into the corner and that ruins the sound.