Hi Unsound,
so easy to get mis-taken, eish.
That link of yours just made my computer (that thing in front of me) get hang up, get stuck, is what happened. So I could not look at the page contents.
What I understand, that this product is well regarded by you and not in any way causing 'emotional unease' during longer listening --- have I got that right?
Some audio folks seem to be 'VC hardened', don't get rattled no more when out of 'natural' context sound-biting(pun intended) is produced by a speaker. Like rim-shots, trumpets, a singer sitting right in your lap, I'm sure your must have heard some of that. Take all of that with some heavy overdose of 'immediacy' and hyper-reality (the microphone ear) and you'll be emotionally exhausted in no time.
Can of course blame it on screwy mastering, shown up by an excellent system... and it can be that, no doubt. But if a speaker is behaving this way as a matter of course, then a change of software will not make any difference at all.
I still ‘feel’ that there is a connection to a hyped-up presentation and resulting physical/emotional unease. It is most often the speaker that grabs your by it’s presentation immediately, that after say ½ hour tires you out somehow ---- information overload? I think so, because in nature this just does not happen that way, nature is more kind to you and your ears (unless in a war situation). It does not pepper you with ‘low-level’ overemphasised detail, it gives you some time to integrate what's going on ---- and so does what's called MUSIC.
Only in some very reverby room you would get this kind of experience, detail-overload, the wrong AMPLITUDE. In a speaker of this nature this is of course FAR more subtle, it works kind of behind your immediate perception. That’s why it takes at least a while to work on you. Like subliminal add-pics they tried out in the movies, can’t see them but they affect you. So it seems is the micro roller-coaster of a loose cannon amplitude response. The worse the speaker's REALNESS the less this matters, the better the it’s REALNESS, THERENESS, the more it ‘startles’ and somehow affects you after a short while. If your senses are sufficiently blunted or ‘adjusted’ your brain will of course tune it out --- but it's work for the brain to do this balancing act ---- and this makes for a kind of exhaustion, sometimes even aggression.
Funny, we must have only VERY fine, or very many not so fine transducers about, that this has not been more noticed.
Greetings,
Axel
PS: I really don’t want to make a ‘new’ problem where none exists, so let’s all then agree to have minimum 1st order designs and all else SUCKS? |
Unsound,
I think you have a very good point.
We, all of us, do have at least slightly different 'sensitivities' including our ears, good point.
But is it only me, around here, that gets the impulse to 'flee' from a room where some -odd- sounding system plays?
Come to think of it, some commentator/reviewer had to remark after the last RMAF: If it sounds (from OUTSIDE the room) that some live event is going on in there -- then I'll go in and listen. Nothing scary here, methinks.
It this quality of powerful 'emotional unease' that bugs me and I'm trying to put a handle on it.
A phase & time aligned BOSE clock radio is not going to do it, right?
It is with absolute certainty some Hi-End gear, that seems more a weapon of mass-destruction -to the nervous system- and not some benign transistor radio. If you know what I mean. But I have to concede, that some folks like bungee-jumping and I really don't.
Still, should you design a speaker all-out for time and phase and trade off proper amplitude behaviour as some folks seem to see fit?
Because THAT doesn't matter, 'cause you can't hear it? Maybe, if it sells, I guess.
Still leaves me unsettled, 'cause it's a bit like selling an X for a Y, or?
Of course everyone can build their own 'evolution' Hi-End, though a bit of awareness was never a bad thing, I think.
Axel
PS: got to bite my tongue not to mention names :-) |
Really?
is it my lack of awareness then?
Since the two goals always seem 'somewhat' opposed to say the least.
The more corrections, the more you 'screw-up' the phase AND the time coherence.
Every added component causes more time / phase issues. Fix the impedance, mess-up the other parameter(s). Every padding resistors screws with it, EVERY component does, even the WIRE, right?
That being said, it's the main argument why flat 6dB roll-offs are the ONLY gate to audio-time-phase-heaven --- and to heck with the rest.
I'd be glad to learn something new about it, -- what a relieve it'd be.
Been thinking about Mrtennis' comments also, i.e. that it's all in the ear/mind of the listener (my simple paraphrasing...)
Now that's the sort of relativism that makes just about everything OK. Leaves zero for any constructive criticism, just too dang save, I think.
Go listen to some 'crappy' sound, --- sorry must be you got the wrong attitude man, hallo!
Still waiting for some 'lost soul' that also gets the 'willies' listening to SOME super-duper-hyper Hi-End gear asking himself WHY that should be.
The emperor’s cloths come to mind a bit, is it really all that relative?
Thank you for sharing,
Axel |
Unsound,
that example of yours hangs up my box...
Somebody don't like us talking about them, methinks.
Now, was that a good or a not so good example?
Thanks,
Axel |
Hi Jabo,
hey man you got a point!
Spend 100 - 200 Grand (on a speaker alone) is more frightening than ANY listening can get. (And mostly if the wife didn't know!)
Well said, keep it coming.
Axel |
Detlof, thank you!
A very good contribution and showing some VERY clear and profound insight into this subject. You mentioned the goose bumps --- right, right on!
But now, PLEASE goose bumps where the music intended it, and NOT ad-hock by a lacking amplitude 'management' in favour of all the other parameters as some designs seem to have gone.
Thanks,
Axel |
Unsound,
I was being fastidious again I guess, dang.
In fact I happen to agree with you COMPLETELY i.e. just do not try to get too 'pure' and too hung-up on insertion losses, all in favour of this ULIMATE transparency / immediacy goal.
We are on the same page here, and your preference of transducer supports this, so far as I recall their sound.
Thanks,
Axel |
Gawdbless,
and I wish you a good dentist to take care of you!
And thanks for your deep insight, always like some weighty contribution (-:
Unsound,
I have tried that 'clipped' link version of Thiel, it also bombs.
I think they want to get some cookies installed and I don't let them. My system don’t like that marketing stuff, neither do I.
But in any way, it looks like that's it for me.
If Wilson, van der Steen, von Schweikert, Hansen, Krell and company is giving me the 'willies' I guess it must the blerry set-up, either in my own head, or in the listening room -- or both.
Your 1st order info is not right, because 1st order = 6dB slope and only one (I repeat ONE) coil or cap will do that. All else is some other 'magic'.
So, 1st order will give you that one and only 90 deg. phase shift with the two drivers involved, and that happens to cancel out (by vector addition) to 0 deg. phase shift -- in the maths at least, and mostly as it is hoped for in the air.
Sit 10' away and all should integrate, so much for the good theory. Amplitude is not part of the 'minimalist package'.
The superior openness is achieved my minimum insertion loss (and like hell that ain't the Thiels either, I know their PCB too) and incidentally neither are the Dunlevy's, which have more stuff on the x-over boards then you'd like to know.
The Green Mountain Audio, seem plenty closer to the pure teaching of 1st order, but that's a completely different story, also I've not heard them --- so no fright-flight there. Now look at their stuff and you'll see it looks nowhere near like those Thiels, and the others I mentioned. Their chief know a-plenty about this here subject, he's freighteningly knowledgable. At least some freight her too...
So nobody got much of a clue in the line of what these speakers x-over do and why they do it, and why some a them give me (only me?) a heart(head)burn. I guess at least we had a good go at it, including Gawdless and his dentist theory.
Greetings,
Axel |
Thank you Cdc,
somebody with some sense -- and no dentist fears as it seems.
That “greater than live” - I keep calling it ‘hyper-reality’, seems to cause some of the fright-flight response.
And my question was, IS THAT WHERE IT'S AT?
It obviously IS, for all this AV stuff, but music to relax or foot-tap, boogie --- too jig the heck out of you?
Mozart's apocalypse now? Always bearing in mind the type of alignmnet compromise that’s going that way, as explained on top.
Greetings,
Axel |
Hi,
I think we are getting something here, now we are talking about "spooky", very good.
Now spooky can be 'nice' spooky, or 'frightening' spooky, right? You of course one can now argue, that it's in the mind of the listener, and who can disagree.
I was trying to figure, if that is not just ONLY a 'Jungian' kind of over-sensitivity, but a genuine something that is caused by an alignment trade-off. Linearity sacrificed in favour of just getting this 'spooky' quality.
One thing comes to mind here, and that is a 'general' tendency of 'bad' dispersion behaviour in favour of a VERY squeezed sweet-spot with great 'spooky' quality.
So some of it could be due, by not listening in this very narrowly defined sweet-spot i.e. a more casual type of listening?
In this case, every where else we have some very serious comb-filtering going on --- now what is that, other than some serious amplitude roller-coaster?
The all-time unavoidable trade-off, for superior transparency and immediacy?
Like: no roller-coaster no superior transparency, etc?
The answer might really just be: personal preference... but something tells me that's too simple, too relativistic.
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
AXEL |
Thanks Mapman,
I'll go do that and let you know tomorrow. Let's see what comes about.
Good suggestion, practical, jolly good.
Axel
PS: I do hope I have a 'good one' --- but just checked only have 1,4,5,8,9,10, ALL CD which sucks actually.
The 8th could drive me from a room though, do you know that? |
Hi Dan_ed
let's see..
>>> These are the details of the music that I want my system/speakers to render --IF-- they are indeed in the recording.<<<
You put it right there: IF! --- they are indeed in the recording.
I concede they ARE NOT, and are made-up by an amplitude response issue.
Certain parts get over- and others under-cooked ---- but not necessarily, immediately or grossly obvious.
It turns out comb-filtering is not THAT obvious as I understand, else there'd be fewer of these type of alignments about.
>>> The anechoic figures published by speaker manufacturers or the in room response? <<<
To keep it quite short: anechoic figures.
However, the worse your dispersion pattern, the smaller your sweet-spot, the WORSE your in-room response, the more tricky to get "acceptable" in-room results.
Unless you are "hardened" to this kind of deviation... e.g. do not negatively respond.
Thank you for your valuable input,
Axel |
Why,
anyone other than English speaking around?
I have not the slightest problem, which of course doesn't mean you don't have one, since you bring it up.
Want us to communicate in Dutch, or French?
What do you suggest?
You see, a lot of these threads get started, and then twisted or high-jacked into ‘what-not’ other subject(s).
You just might give us some credit to stick with the subject matter and not degenerate into medical conditions, or dentist's fears -- the way I see it.
If you don't follow it too comfortably i.e. pushed out of your comfort zone? Well why not ask, - perhaps?
Axel
PS: ??? |
Mapman
you are on the waive-lenght, methinks.
Shops are closed now, but I will make the effort to go see if I can find it tomorrow. Any suggestion as to conductor/orchestra, it would be rather interesting, since there can be powerfully differnt reditions. I have e.g. # 1 Bruno Walter with Columbia LP. # 1 with Zubin Metha with the Los Angeles LP, and # 1 Eliahu Inbal (Israeli)with the Frankfurt Radio Sym. CD Denon.
I also just see: Fourth Movement Text from Friedrich Nietzsche's: Also sprach Zarathustra'
Well I say, I let you know how it went.
I did try his: "Das Lied von der Erde..." but I dare say it's a bit too lyrical for me.
Thanks,
Axel |
Thank you Ggavetti for your input.
I think you said it very well, but I do feel in no way to have a different 'take' as such. What you describe is IMO the result of a particular 'design preference'.
The detail you mention, somehow brought to the fore so it becomes unnaturally dominant, is caused by something.
It is NOT just superior 'clarity', it's some form of unnatural 'emphasis', so at least is my understanding.
The rest I go on about, is trying to get to the bottom of THAT question. I absolutely think it is an alignment related thing --- but I do not mind to learn that I am wrong with this.
Greetings,
Axel |
Mrtennis
right you are, yet there is a common theme, we are NOT that different after all. People 'start' get 'startled' and if for SOME reason this keeps going on in the wrong place (phase) and time (timing) it starts to make you edgy and uncomfortable rather than getting drawn into the music, yes?
Why, this would happen is really the question. My notion this far is a 'bad' dispersion pattern, in true Hi-End often the trade-off in favour of reduced insertion losses, or simply put a more 'basic' crossover design, and look no further then 1st order, with only one component per slope at its minimal 'best'. It will produce stacks of lobbing (call it comb-filtering at its best :-) and thereby produce an unpredictable, call it 'wonky' in-room response, call it amplitude distortion, right?
As with all things Audio, I agree, that's what some folks are looking for, to give you that extra 'kick', if it works for you. In my case, I'm more prone to get a freak-on if piano starts to sound like a cembalo, a violin, like a cello and a male singer like a woman or visa versa. I kind of overstate it somewhat to get this point across...
All this may not be the case at all, IF (say it again IF) you sit nicely in the sweet spot ---- where ever that is!? You can make it up then, as you move some this a way, or some that a way… have a cembalo here, make it a piano there, honky-tonk when you dare to stand up, etc.
Greetings,
Axel |
Hi Mapman,
can't argue with that now, can one? So you take a recording you know and THEN go listen to this on a system such as I'm on about and see what happens.
Can't 'blame' the software for it then, can you?
There are ways to take the sw out of the equation --- it's why we listen too OUR reference recordings to make sense about what's what.
Axel |
When I said "There is still more to it that I know..."
We are talking about music (mostly, I hope...) and how odd, the matter of harmonics has not been brought up at ALL this far?!
There is this quality of 'jarring' in sound. I would relate that to an unsettling, unnerving kind of discomfort experienced.
If the proper / real / natural harmonics are not correctly reproduced, what will happen?
Even-order harmonics and their overemphasis (distortion!)seem to be of far lesser import and are often experienced as even desirable/pleasant (tube gear).
Odd-order quite to the contrary.
Too much odd-order emphasis might just render the same piece of music more or less disturbing / unsettling / frightening, or?
Food for thought.
Axel |
Howdy,
McKillRoy is watching... There are some really good contributions, I think. Not even the usual sort of bickering :-)
Folks are loosening up and let it flow, that's really good because music and what reproduces music is a lot about that.
We are of course still essentially talking about sound Quality.
Quality of reproduction, also of the software that makes it do what ever it is.
There was some questioning of sw quality itself, and how that plays into it all. So let me give you a recording (CD, so sorry) Cassandra Wilson "Blue Light 'Til Dawn"
Any hands showing who has not listened to that? ------ can't see any.
Any hands showing who does not own it? ----- well, a few here and there.
But I'm sure we know all about it, so I’m not being too esoteric here, great.
Now, would that recording be able to unsettle you?
(Frighten is a bit strong I guess, but you get the idea...)
Will it be possibly boring? (hell, it surely ain't everyone’s taste in music, or?)
Now, to tell you my take.
I used to find it kind of ODD, pretty resolved (what do I know, using 961 Burmester), but all in all actually never managed to listen through the hole piece in one session, if I ever did. My apologies to you who just love it to bits, not me, but that's not the point I'm getting at.
So lately some changes have been implemented to my crossover, that thing that does this 'alignment' I keep grinding on.
Now it gets very close to be unsettling, I'm not joking please!
There is constantly 'stuff' going on there, it starts slowly but surely work me up.
I don't think Dave Brubeck "Time Out" will do that, neither "Jazz at the Pawn Shop"
Yeah, I mention these 'cause everybody and his cousin knows these.
That would make it a shut and closed case for Nilthepill's well perceived input.
Even that 1st order stuff, most nobody got into.
Why, because my box is 2nd order (Linkwitz-Riley).... over-engineered, yes?!
So, go change some components and get spooked?!
You tell me. Right now it looks like I’m on my next learning curve here.
Now I go have a smoke and think about what happening here.
It sucks to be wrong... but I guess that's what learning is all about.
Thanks for sharing,
Axel |
Thanks Detlof,
come to think about it, this phenomena is NOT just reserved to speakers alone.
I had even some tube pre-amp do this, differential design using 6H30 you might know.
No power amp ever, they can just get boring or annoying, but never with any class A designs. They just kill me in summer with their heat, giving me heat-exhaustion...
I had it with some interconnects RCA and XLR, some producing truly 'spooky' effects, which I could only explain with some weird phase shifting.
Never really with speaker cables either, closed-in yes, too much glare yes, but not this uneasy stuff.
I also had it with some CD player using a tube in the output, made in China...
As to speakers, as I also mentioned earlier, some VERY pricy items. Two or three in my own listening room and I couldn't wait to have them removed, gave me the willies.
It is this background that made me inquire, to see how other folks are faring in this regard.
Greetings,
Axel |
Hi Detlof
I think I'm fully with you, and it is what I, or some other contributor, might have earlier on described as "goose bump" factor.
All composers mentioned (all of my own choice) only make real SENCE if that happens. That is just great!
Maybe all you guys have these marvellous transducers and systems --- should I be jealous?
The stuff I'm on about is somehow UNRELATED to the original intend of the music. You will be able to hear that difference, - I can.
In a life performance a real blast, rattle and shake is creating 'good' fear, a kind of aw, for lack of a better word.
But some highly resolving systems give you a kind of unnatural, unrelated, unease -- as if something is not RIGHT. People refer to something sounding RIGHT, so there is the opposite too.
Axel |
Hi all,
looks like that thread is also done for, finished... Cross-over arguments been beaten to hell in some other places, and harmonics --- which, ahh what?!
But, thank you for sharing...
Axel
PS: still too frightened (not again!) to look into that 'cables' thread. Talking about elitist, whow. Maybe tomorrow :-) |
Thanks Detlof,
gives me comfort to have someone not restricted by some 'correctness', which as you mention appears to be more part of perception than I might have appreciated.
That's quite SOMETHING!
Like try argue with the crowd about Mozart and chamber-music, while they want to listen to rap... on a boom-box? (in overstated terms, yes. Lest we create a storm).
Wrong time wrong place for sure.
Are we ‘Falling Down’ soon?
I hope not :-)
Greetings,
Axel |
Hi Mrtennis,
I think you are so close!
It actually depends completely on the "consonant or dissonant" quality of your cables ---.
:-)
Axel |
Hi Atmasphere,
you guys selling "frightening" or "relaxing" speakers to each other?
Flat impedance 'curves', ha!? Lines please!! Straight!
300B to go with the deal, so to scare the hell outa ya :-)
Cheers,
Axel |
Hi Detlof,
I had a most interesting discussion on the subject to day with a speaker designer, call him 'elitist'. I guess he wouldn't mind to be called that, good for him :-)
He knows EXACTLY what this is all about, and he immediately said: Only a speaker that does MOST EVERYTHING extremely well, can cause this sort of problem -- it is a phasing/timing related issue and mostly becomes 'unpleasant' uneasy, unsettling, all the stuff I been going on about, if massed instruments e.g. full orchestra and such are played.
He said a lot more, but I'll keep it short lest I be remanded of pushing some agenda.
Makes me feel like I talk about UFOs the way some folks have never heard such...
Greetings,
Axel
There you go |
Hi Atmasphere
having learned a lesson from Jeff Roland?
I think you have a point not doing both. Look at Krell, I think he is trying this again, and the results are at least questionable to some folks... (include me).
I do not know "M-derived crossovers" have you some more explanation on this?
Also having looked at a Dunlavy XO first-order, yes? If that is correct, it beats a 4-order Revel in number of components!? This would disprove the 1st-order 'story' about minimal insertion losses, I say. (But that is just by the by)
Thanks,
Axel |
Hi Detlof
to answer your questions the man is listens to both, digital and analogue. (and prefers analogue, as I do also)
His analogue is a Transrotor Z3, with the Transfig. Orpheus (L), and a Allen Wright phono/pre-amp with a special stepped attenuator, plus pass monos, etc.
CD drive with a Cullen modded PS Audio DL III.
Not a bad front end I think, in answer to some other questions re. front-end quality and influence on the sound. I mean this now 101 audio, but so why not.
As for the Nilthepill take, ---- 300B comment? Blaming? All due to upstream components? not learning my lesson?
I don't quite get your idea for all this negative talk. If it serves you, if it gets you relieve, then be our guest :-)
Axel |
Hi all,
I see where we have gone off track. The phase/time alignment is just GREAT!
The problem seems, IF IT IS LOST during replay i.e. moving in and out of it due to high SPL plus a complex signal. It is the phase/time alignment that gets the speaker close to extremely good reproduction in the first place --- BUT for how much below the pass band (and given shallow roll-off 1st order) can some of these designs maintain it?
My man tells me, the challenge is down to at least -50dB! or even better. Now if the speaker does most everything very exceptionally well, it's a bit like a good dancer that has just stumbled.
If it happens repeatedly it becomes pretty uncomfortable to behold.
Would that make some kind of sense?
Greetings,
Axel |
Hi Johnk
you say:
>>> Proper systems will allow one to listen for most all day without feeling like you’ve had enough. <<<
This incidentally was one of my points earlier on, when I quoted a dealer saying, that 1/2 hour leaves him mostly emotionally exhausted... (he is a Wilson dealer, still is).
He found this to be quite normal I thought.
Now speaking for myself I love to listen for VERY long times. Getting emotionally exhausted is NOT what I'm looking for!
In fact it was the background of this enquiry to find out what quality of sound it is, that gets you exhausted = lots and lots of little starts (= frights?), rather than more relaxed or at ease.
I should concede, that even a speaker and front-end that does most everything very well, can get too much after some number of hours (even your butt will tell you it's enough, ha, ha).
Next:
>>> I prefer dynamics much SPL while drivers are at ease <<<
The key here is "at-ease". If anything in the system gets ill-at-ease i.e. strained, it can be felt and it creates unease.
Obvious amounts of distortion are just that, but there can be more subtle things at work --- and a constant moving in and out of phase and time would just be such a thing. 'Bad' phasing that I thought to hear once from a VERY pricy interconnect is quite something to behold, it sort of warps listening space, very objectionable at first --- then it seems your brain adjusts to it and its not such a sure thing anymore. But if it is 'wrong', your brain has to work a lot more to make an adjustment, constantly.
An example comes to mind, when you try to have a conversation in a rather echoic room, but also in an anechoic room. Both are stressful even though you will adjust after a while.
Lastly this brings up the issue: How much can we get used to a 'wrong' system?!
If we do, we then would have a problem listening to a 'right' one?!
There is some support for this, in that only, little step by little step, can we adjust from this position, rather than by a big jump.
Now if I imagine, (sorry to use poor Mr. Wilson once more) to put a MAXX in place of my 961 in my listening room ---- it sure as hell would freak me out! And that's not by only looking at it --- which of course would help.
So much for now.
Thanks,
Axel |
Hi Mrtennis
you say:
>>> don't confuse the startle effect with fear.<<<
I guess you should not have the meaning of these words confused, and that's very good.
But the question is a bit more delicate actually. What makes the difference between the one and the other?
If I am totally immersed into the music and some one 'creeps' up on me and thereby 'intrudes' into my 'Meta-space' (this self created imagined one, eyes closed usually) it can freak the hell out of me, right?
So what's in a different state of awareness, a start at best, is now a full blown FRIGHT, I have jumped when this happened! It's like some invasion into this day-dream like listening state. So I guess we are much more vulnerable to some 'wrong' stuff if we 'open up'.
Food for thought, I say.
Axel
PS: This better NOT happen to you listening to 'elevator' music --- and even more so while in an elevator :-) |
Hi Detlof
I think you are right there at it. In fact when I read your lines - I get goose bumps. That is what I would call GOOD FRIGHT.
Now you are in the midst of it, and something 'breaks' that transcendence, I had also called it daydream like -- then what?
Momentary emotional upset, disturbance, a start (I have not called it fright, but that's what it actually is when it happens).
Now take a system that is somehow good enough to take you there, but then starts to 'trip and stumble';;;;
Some speaker/sytems in my experience do that, and then I might just rather be with the little more 'average dancer' then the one that get me lost in his performance and keeps making me unsettled by some 'out of choreography' moves.
I have used that dancer example again if you forgive me, it seemed to have struck a chord in some earlier mentioning.
So, that 'average dancer' it that little 'lesser' system that makes fewer 'noticable mistakes' but is less 'brilliant'. Where as the other system can 'blow you way' momentarily, but keeps on upsetting you...
(Like a sexy woman with a bad habit :-)
You see, in my experience systems do not get just better and better. The better they get, the more pronounced they bring forth even smaller mistakes, make them more noticable so to speak.
I hope this is not getting too poetic, yet even in poesy you could have the same effect. Some brilliant lines, then a sudden jolt, something missing the mark.
So you just might like the more 'relaxing' less taxing one (I think I do), or the more 'brilliant' one that keeps on putting you off?
Greetings,
Axel
PS: nothing is perfect, not even the better... |
Hi Mrtennis
you say:
>>> philosophy has anything to do with the subject <<<
Music is about LIFE, so it happens to be with Philosophy! That just by the by, therefore I of course you would not get my applause...
I've been using some similes here, which must have escaped your attention? And I have only done that, since it is NOTHING MEASURABLE we are talking about. Uless you have some fright or relexatation 'Richter scale' handy that I have not yet heard about. If so, let's have it please.
Now, if you feel, that if it can't be measured, it is not a subject for enquiry, than so be it.
I'm NOT going to open THAT can, it's too old and what's in there stinks by now --- big time.
:-)
Axel |
Sorry I should have put your whole front of sentence i.e.
>>> **i don't think** philosophy has anything to do with the subject <<<
It does make some difference I guess :-)
Cheers
Axel
PS: Excuse the previous entries typo, but you still won't have my applause :-) |
Hi Detlof
you are the man, - go for the sexy and scary.
I guess you have a point, and who would want to argue :-).
I have to admit that I myself follow the path of 'tweaks' in search of higher attainment of 'quality' of sound also. But as soon as it slips of that narrow ledge between 'right' and 'wrong' I've no issue to do some back-tracking also.
I currently busy 'trying' to get some more 'energy storage' out of my cross-over. The most advanced 'tweak' as yet.
I have mentioned the 'measurement situation' in some earlier posts and how experiment always precedes technical explanation (science...) and the value of facts, and how facts seldom tell the hole truth (since we seldom if EVER seem to have ALL the facts...)
I mention this, because I had made a mistake in switching one cap incorrectly, quite major i.e. a 220uF in place of a 47uF. So instead of having 220uF + 47uF I wound up with 47uF + 47uF (parallel). The cleaner the treble got (some more fixes, resistors) the more one could tell something to be wrong.
I found my error and fixed it, so far so good. Now we went back to PSPICE and modelled the error to see the effect --------- if we wouldn't have know if was a wrong value, no way to pick it up in each and every one of the three graphs. So much for measurements, beware! (The caps where part of a mid-range RCL).
Greetings,
Axel
PS: That faulty XO just ticked me off, (like a girl with a BAD habit...) |
Hi,
looks like break-time, pop-corn and drinks. To hell with all that quality (of sound) stuff.
Lets' all beat up Mr. T, he is intransigent... and needs it sterilized ------- so WHAT, I ask?
Grinding in all his logical/rational thing and being rather illogical going about it, how funny, how human. Behold, that's a nice person, his not perfect. Don't be so nasty with him, goodness me.
I guess there are more sterilized Hi-Fi Corp. sounds out there then this dang Hi-End stuff. So the majority wins, in the real world, --- it's democratic :-)
Greetings,
Axel
PS: I'm not sarcastic and I must thank Mr. T for contributing his opinion(s) --- it's what this here is all about. Thanks you. |
Hi Mrtennis,
>>> these peaks are not relaxing, but not frightening either. <<<
Bet your bottom dollar that they can be --- the more everything else is right i.e. immediacy, phase, time, dynamic depth or sound floor.
What I'm saying is, for a more 'average' speaker this is no issue, since it makes enough other mistakes so as not to be able to 'startle' (frighten... I know real man don't get frightened only sisies) with some well recorded material almost constantly.
If you have not had the experience it may be pretty hard to accept, that this is what's going on. Those 'nasties' you mention >> 1000 to say 4000 hz << are then much more 'hidden' with the general 'first impression' of rather impressive reproduction.
There where some of these at the RMAF and inevitably in the most HIGHEST ranks, and with the absolute best?! front-ends!
So we are talking serious HiEnd, forget HiFi, and never mind MidFi, that stuff gets just plain anoying (when it does). If things get THAT REAL, and THEN there's some 'funnies' going on in the amplitude (what else can it be?) THAT's when this effect is present, it can chase you from the room, at least that's what happens with me.
Greetings,
Axel |
Hi all,
thanks for the kind reflections and feed back. Not easy to get stuff like this across, without being perceived a bit ‘cuckoo?”
I could name (but of course won't) some much banded about brands in this here circle that have this particular property of causing, let’s call it ‘emotional unease’. (Not my idea of music I have to admit)
I also did not talk about frightening MUSIC --- I said frightening SOUND!
Of course the sound MAKES the music, I hope this is not just semantics.
The quality of this type of 'alignments' seems to be having too much REAL UN-REALNESS.
I never, repeat NEVER, experience such at a live event. So it is not lack of decay as suggested, that just makes everything dead and dry, and pointy in the face --- no. What I try to get at, is this incredibly well responding alignment, which then starts to confront you with almost subliminal false, UN-REAL detail, and I have only one explanation, which is this blend of a 'jumpy' amplitude behaviour coupled with a fantastically real reproduction quality, some sort of contradiction it sound, but it is not.
It is just a different, much more subliminal kind of distortion when it occurs. Why should the sound of a violin make you jump? Even percussions, ever get jumped at like that in a live situation? No, unless in some nightmare, or when some totally unexpected something (a robber) goes for you --- the breaking twig, the ‘unrelated’ sound-bite in the setting.
So the next issue, hasn’t it come up already? Would be immediacy, yeah, that seems to have something to it. The ear does not listen like a microphone, now get that 100% micro info at great immediacy WITH a jumped-up amplitude ---- this all happens so fast you can’t really hear it, but it effects your nervous system all the same.
So this incredibly well produced, in phase, in time, sound information then also contains some subtle but nasty amplitude-over-accentuations and it is that, which is actually more perceived than consciously heard.
It this, that makes you somehow uneasy after a pretty short time (maybe not every one, and maybe just what's needed, hurray... not me obviously).
So this GREAT speaker does something, somehow unpleasant, can’t say what --- but it’s not for you. It sort of scares you, sounds stupid, but that’s what it is.
I had of these in my room and they would make me almost sick, kind of aggressive (frightened) in a very short interval. Now some folks may know what I talk about, then the Audio-Doctor comes and tells you, if you listen long enough you’ll like them….
Like: Doctor this medicine does me no good, -- nah just take it long enough and you’ll be really fine.
Not for me, really not for me. If it tastes bad it is bad. If it makes me feel… you know then.
Ok, there you are.
Axel |
Hello Unsound,
"VC hardened" mean you're just don't get that jumpy anymore by little tiny scary (out of the envelope) sounds, you have build a sort of mental armour.
May not being politically correct, but what other starkly, jumpy, un-nerving experience with minutely unsettling sounds would you suggest.
After all we ARE talking about some type of 'fright response'! You can get hardened to that, i.e. no more fright... Does that make some sort of sense.
>>> I'm having a hard time following you and I'm not sure when and where your being sarcastic, if your being sarcastic at all <<<
My language might be sometimes a bit 'off colour' to you, call it unduly facetious. Sorry, but it's NEVER meant to be an affront, just a bit too playful?
US sensitivities seem sometimes in the way to even call 'a spade a shovel' so my experience, I spend some years in your country...
>>> Perhaps your unease can sometimes be blamed on amplitude problems and sometimes perhaps not <<<
I would underwrite that, my inquiry is all about that, since I do not go out and say that's all there is to it. If it was that, thank you, case closed, end of discussion.
What I have brought up is:
1) not that easy to convey
2) not that easy to acknowledge
3) not that easy to pinpoint, as to what is the source, or it's exact cause (if there is one only)
I have my listening experience(s), and amplitude inconsistencies in the presents of otherwise overwhelming clarity, phase and time coherence seems to be it.
There might be another culprit --- but actually I can't see it, else I would not have started to ask the question.
I tried Thiel's site, and again it keeps 'hanging up' my laptop (that 'box' of mine, OK). I scheme you are NOT an IT person and some appears like foreign jargon at times? Sorry I'll try and do better.
So please tell me, does Thiel claim to do 1st order?
If you'll tell me YES, I'll get a fit! Since I happen to know what his crossovers look like.
Remember the definition of 1st order: ONE (and only one) component per XO slope in the signal-path.
So if Thiel is something other (steeper or mixed slopes), I guess he does not qualify to be an issue, because he's put enough components in his XO to ensure to have NO amplitude irregularities, I say.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
Thiels tend to be a bit on the bright side in some settings but I think they are not the 'scary' kind of HiEnd item.
Greetings,
Axel |
All right then,
dan_ed, this might answer your question, and I hope at least be a bit more fair to Unsound with his 'quip':
>>> Axe[l], Perhaps we [have] a language problem here, both receptively and expressively. <<<
Actually Unsound is right, after having thought a while about it.
What I have done here, is to take essentially a speaker designer's "alignment design choice"-conflict to the congregation of the listeners.
It gives me a first hand notion what Phaedrus in "Zen and Motorcycle Maintenance" did when he asked his students to write a QUALITY essays, but since QUALITY is not really definable, they got very uneasy, up-set, don't know what is it I'm supposed to, say or do.
I'm getting some of this type of feed-back. There might be some that don't know this Classic by Robert M. Pirsig and feel yet even more, hm - out of it, - for lack of a better expression.
Please, this is not some wacky game here, it was the genuine attempt to see what comes up from this forum, with regard to the QUALITY of either 'frightening' or rather 'relaxing' sound.
As it seems, and quite rightly so I guess, there is just no definitive answer ---- and so the designer has to follow what he feels is best for him/her, and live with the consequence of this decision. (Go bust if it was wrong)
Thank you for sharing, and your interest I thought it was of some value, and I hope not only just for myself.
Many thanks,
Axel
PS: If are intersted to have some more back ground on the Zen ..., and Prisig check out this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_M._Pirsig |
Hi,
I just try to answer some inputs here.
>>> it's not the equipment, it's our fears--irrational or real.<<<
Well, then it IS OUR OWN EQUIPMENT, it's the major part of the audio chain, no? :-)
>>> it's all in your mind. if i listen to the sound of a thunder storm on a stereo <<<
Not true! (for me anyway) I don't know where you live, but in my part of the world if there are thunderstorms you DO KNOW it is going on, yet every thunder-clap preceded by a lightning-strike, going on over some period time, to make sure some 30min - 1hr, it will truly get VERY unnerving and not only for the dog!
Yeah, it's "our equipment, it's our fears--irrational or real."
We do have responses and as mentioned some time earlier can get 'hardened' i.e. don't jump and screem, but unsettling it will remain.
As to the other query about x-over change, equipment etc.
The change of ONE resistor in the resonance compensation circuit of the tweeter managed to move C. Wilson rendition from ~ mixed/odd to unsettling of sorts.
First R = 5R6 Kiwame 5watt, its replacement = 5R6 MRA5 (Mills 5watt)
Now you tell me! The circuit is notching a ~ 15kHz tweeter resonance.
What front end to my ears?
I said CD, so: ML309S, ML326S, PassLabs X350.5, Burmester 961 -- the room.
Analogue: SME 10, SME V, vdH Silver Hybrid, Fidelity Research XF-1 type M, ML326S phono-modules
(chain working in differential i.e. XLR, both analogue and digital)
I hope that has answered most of it.
Thanks for your inputs,
Axel
PS: Trying to work on that fright-thing still --- I do prefer the most detailed and beautiful sound to draw me into the music, and just NOT having my nerves rattled about. There is still more to that I know... |
Hi Mrtennis
I hear what you say, but maybe it misses a fine point here. We do get attracted to things that can be unsettling, or frightening ---- until it gets too much, or until we realise/notice what is happening to our emotion. Not such a cut and dried affair as you like to have it.
Your approach is totally RATIONAL, but humans are not only rational!
Ever noticed in the presence of a VERY attractive woman, you are attracted and uneasy all at once, even scared...
It is that sort of irrational response that some people like to ignore away --- but these responses are there with us never the less.
Greeting,
Axel
PS: I get he idea that you might like what Ayn rand in “Atlas shrugged” had to say. “The theme of Atlas Shrugged is the morality of rational self-interest”.
If it does not ring a bell, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_Shrugged |
Hi all,
I'm pleased we've giving up fighting this 'issue' -- very happy, I say.
For some perspective I might mention my system used --- can't really ask my designer man, too busy dreaming up 'bleeding edge' stuff.
So here goes:
ML 390S, ML 326S with phono-modules, Fidelity Research XF-1 type M, PassLabs X350.5, Burmester 961 Mk3, SME-10 with V arm and Ortofon Windfeld cart. Cables are an assortment of Straight-Wire (Serenade RCA), home-brew (XLR), and vdH Silver Hybrid.
In all fairness a 961 just can't do 'scale' neither my smallish listening room ~ 30m^2. Quite open it is though to other areas. I do have pretty good 'room lock' which helps.
I think the one other MOST important item, other than phase/time is just some sizeable membrane area to get some 'SCALE'.
Hard to get carried away (good or bad) without SCALE, what say you?
Only if e.g. a singer starts to appear "life size" can it get frightening, goose-bumpy kind of stuff. A smaller system has a much harder time to fool your imagination - my experience this far, even if like a Kharma 3.2.2 or ~ Avalon Indra, too small I guess. As nice and clean and, and, as they sound. Some smaller Vandy got close --- alas a 'tripping' dancer as soon as it gets too busy.
Thank you for sharing,
Axel
PS: I'll try to find that: "Thin Red Line soundtrack" Track 3 so I can see what gives :-) |
Holy mo!
you guys been busy kicking your cans about.
Well, and so why not --- feels more close to ‘frightening’ than ‘relaxing’ quality for sure.
Now to that “semantics” bit:
i.e. “The study or science of meaning in language…”
OK, is somebody saying he doesn't understand the discourse, it’s meaning in language?
No problem, ask a QUESTION! ---- do not state a deconstructive opinion, as it will not answer, but rather just create more confusion.
Also:
“the meaning or the interpretation of a word, sentence, or other language form
connotation, definition, denotation, exegetics, explanation, explication, exposition, glossology, interpretation, semiology, semiotics, significs, symbiology, symbolism”
Hey, Mister! You sure want to burden our friendly exchange with all of THAT?!?
And lastly for all those that are familiar with Gottlieb Frege: (there are some fans of his out there, I know :-)
“For those in the logical tradition of semantics, modern semantics begins with Frege. In 'On Sense and Reference' Frege asked a deceptively simple question: how is it that a statement of the form 'a = b' can be informative, whereas a statement of the form 'a = a', being a truth of logic, can be known a priori?”
Right, I guess we might reconsider to keep that for some other thread? ----
Hell, and that was again an opinion! Can’t have that now, can’t we?!
Best regards,
Axel
PS: We might manage to get back to our friendly exchange of 'notions of import' (opinions?) Let's see... |
