Do you consider yourself an audiophile?

[Crispy]

so could a microphone / laptop nail the difference in performance between a linn / naim system and an amstrad one?
or between one turntable and another?

It wouldn't say "the treble is more sparkly, the mids wide and soft and the bass crunchy with a hint of mint" because that's all subjective waffle.
Itwill precisely record and compare soundwaves, which is all music is until it gets past the ears.

 

[xenon]

"2 microphones and a laaaap-top."

As an aside anyone done acoustic mirroring with Sound Forge or similar? Whereby you project white and pink noise in a room. Record at various points and use the recordings to build a reverb matching the spacial characteristics of the room? I've never tried but it looked interesting.

 

[gavman]

gentlegreen's electrostatics or my open baffle speakers have a much bigger soundstage than conventional speakers. is this something that can be measured?

 

[ViolentPanda]

Depends if you make them from plywood or gallium-coated Nigerian ebony.

Depends which has the greater density.

Which is why sometimes veneered MDF is a better call than, for example, solid birch.

 

[xenon]

That laptop test should be easy. Use Goldwave, Audacity or what ever. record cold. Then same bit of music once you consider it's all warmed up. Leave the room each time. Compare the soundwaves. Overlay them if you can. There in theory should be no difference and they'll perfectly line up. Presuming you haven't moved the mike, nothing's entered the room etc.

 

[ViolentPanda]

so now you're saying it does no harm to rev or thrash a cold engine?

That's (as I'm sure you know) dependent on what you mean by "rev" or "thrash".

Can I start up my car, get on the road and have it doing 60 within it's 0-60 acceleration time without harm? Of course I fucking can, and doing so is (to use my own words) "pushing it hard".

Same with a solid state system. I can switch it on and then crank up the volume without harm. bear in mind what a volume control actually is, eh?

 

[Crispy]

gentlegreen's electrostatics or my open baffle speakers have a much bigger soundstage than conventional speakers. is this something that can be measured?

Should be, yes. These things are highly critical of listener position, so static microphones would probably be better that human ears at detecting the difference.

The argument for computer analysis is weaker here, however, as reconstruction of stereo sound into a 3D soundscape is doe by the brain, which is not a reliable, repeatable machine.

 

[ViolentPanda]

i haven't blustered about interconnects, in fact i refererred to it as snake oil marketing ruse.
the only difference in what we are saying is you think audiophiles are irrational idiots who believe any pseudo-scientific nonsense. i just think they are people who love good sound reproduction

I don't think that you (or any audiophile) is necessarily an idiot, but I do suspect that many audiophiles are irrational.

Neither have I claimed that audiophiles would "believe any pseudo-scientific nonsense". I've made it clear that I suspect that you'd only believe pseudo-scientific nonsense that pertains to hi-fi when it reinforces your existing set of beliefs regarding audio technology and reproduction.

 

[ViolentPanda]

pre-amp remains switched on 24/7. i'd be surprised if the tiny fluctuations in current can cause any warming during operation, since it remains powered all the time

So, have you considered other variables?

For example, the ingress of cooler or warmer air when the door to your listening room is opened, or changes in atmospheric humidity?

Unless you isolate and rule out the pile of variables that can be found in any listening situation, attributing sound difference and/or cause of sound difference is subjective opinion.

 

[gavman]

That's (as I'm sure you know) dependent on what you mean by "rev" or "thrash".

Can I start up my car, get on the road and have it doing 60 within it's 0-60 acceleration time without harm? Of course I fucking can, and doing so is (to use my own words) "pushing it hard".

Same with a solid state system. I can switch it on and then crank up the volume without harm. bear in mind what a volume control actually is, eh?

any performance engine needs to warm it's oil before it can give it's best. turbos need to be warmed up and cooled back down, whereas v-tec or twin cams only work once the oil is up to temperature.
on a big power turbo car with extra oil coolers, this can take forever. or, in the winter, never happen. so you block off your oil cooler, i've even got an oil heater that i plug in to the mains to reduce damage to the engine- it is undisputed that most damage to conventional engines occurs before the oil gets up to the right temperature. so trying to get close to the manufacturer's 0-60 times straight after turning the key would be very silly indeed
race cars always do a warm-up lap before the start.

 

[ViolentPanda]

when i first came on urban i was thoroughly respectful of everyone. this wasn't reciprocated, and i was upset (flabbergasted) by people's rudeness. so i went away and came back a bit firmer. this has been fairly consistent with the way i have usually dealt with being an outsider- you try to be nice at first, but people just take advantage of what they perceive as weakness and their own strength, relative to mine, in the group dynamic. so you stop caring what people think of you and stick to your guns

Everybody gets treated rudely on Urban, it's par for the course, and being respectful of people who haven't earned your respect will almost always be perceived as weakness or servility. It's not a forum for practicing etiquette, it's a forum of opinionated bastards.

 

[gavman]

Should be, yes. These things are highly critical of listener position, so static microphones would probably be better that human ears at detecting the difference.

The argument for computer analysis is weaker here, however, as reconstruction of stereo sound into a 3D soundscape is doe by the brain, which is not a reliable, repeatable machine.

shit.

 

[gavman]

So, have you considered other variables?

For example, the ingress of cooler or warmer air when the door to your listening room is opened, or changes in atmospheric humidity?

Unless you isolate and rule out the pile of variables that can be found in any listening situation, attributing sound difference and/or cause of sound difference is subjective opinion.

i notice a consistent result based on the passing of time. this isn't determined by in room temperature fluctuations, because it would be non-linear and fluctuate back and forth. it definitely gets better, and stays better until you stop listening

e2a my current amp doesn't appreciably heat the room, unlike previous class a example

 

[Crispy]

shit.

To clarify - it might be hard to say "these speakers have a better soundstage" via computer analysis
There might be an unobvious pattern that appears when correlated with human ratings of the same setups, however, which would allow for reasonably accurate predictions of other systems.

 

[gavman]

you mean we'd have to work out what soundstage 'looks' like?
(in the data?)

that sounds really difficult

 

[ViolentPanda]

yes i do. new speakers / drive units get placed facing each other, two inches apart, and then run at low volume continuously for 24 hours (radio)

See, I can understand this sort of behaviour with acoustic devices, especially stringed instruments. "Breaking in" is an accepted issue. A guitar or violin, environmental factors being equal, will sound different after a year or two of playing than after production, but violins and guitars are reasonably-complex acoustic devices, a speaker box and speakers/crossover aren't. The former is a more or less (even in a TL system) simple baffled or non-baffled box, and the speakers are mechanical devices made of materials only the cones of which are susceptible to modification by vibration over such a short term as 24 hours. It's another case where sonic differences will mainly inhere in the materials used (paper, rubberised paper, kevlar or other materials for the cone, type of magnet in speaker, density of cabinet material), rather than whether you give them 24 hours of radio 3 or (heavens forfend) Classic FM.

 

[stuff_it]

Well yes, we can't all afford kevlar cones and a nice steady temperature for our speakers....

I can't afford to be an audiophile, mind - I know what sounds shit and what sounds good, mind. Years of standing in front of the rig making had gestures to whoever is setting up the equipment has made sure of that.

 

[xenon]

i notice a consistent result based on the passing of time. this isn't determined by in room temperature fluctuations, because it would be non-linear and fluctuate back and forth. it definitely gets better, and stays better until you stop listening

e2a my current amp doesn't appreciably heat the room, unlike previous class a example

Don't forget your perception of sound changes over time. It's why it's good practise to have a break from mixing every few hours or leave and come back a day or 2 later.

 

[gavman]

i'm starting to get my head round this i think.... am i right in thinking that a standard microphone in a fixed position might struggle to tell the difference between the same sound, played from different directions?
that it's not so much the level, but where it comes from? and this would be how we percieve imaging and soundstage? by combining the level with the directional info our ears also provide?

fuck. sorry about all the question marks.

 

[stuff_it]

what piece of equipment would that involve?
i'd love to be able to measure and quantify it, to confirm what my ears are telling me.

^^^lol

 

[gavman]

ok, i'd like to be able to prove to you guys that i'm not an idiot. thats more accurate, perhaps

 

[ViolentPanda]

fair question, but i have had the same pre-amp with two different speaker systems, and it's only the second speakers, with the separate (passive) crossovers, that seem to warm up and improve to the same extent. it's either the passive crossovers, which i can't understand, or the possibility that the speakers affected have a lot more drive units than the ones that aren't. and there is warming of those drive units, in the manner of a bent spoon becoming warm at the bend, that reduces friction / resistance in the drivers. i don't claim to understand, i'm just trying to explain what i observe
i have of course noticed that the magnets of hard used drivers are warm, but since magnets work better cold this can't explain a perceived improvement in sq, can it?

I'm going to mention a few uncontroversial effects that can influence sound, are minor-order, but aren't related to "warming up" in any way.

Coil-winding.
A hand-wound coil, because of the uneven distribution of the coil wire compared to a machine-wound coil, can exert influence.

Ambient temperature and humidity, plus variances in them.

Degradation of components: A "failing" or "ageing" valve or set of valves can provide a more "warmer" sonic experience than brand new ones (one particular company that provided valves for guitar amps used to run their valves for a couple of days flat-out before boxing and shipping. Guitarists consistently rated their valves as the best on the market for a plethora of valve guitar heads and combos).

That's three factors from the top of my head that have been quantified to affect sound and/or the human experience of sound.

 

[Crispy]

i'm starting to get my head round this i think.... am i right in thinking that a standard microphone in a fixed position might struggle to tell the difference between the same sound, played from different directions?
that it's not so much the level, but where it comes from? and this would be how we percieve imaging and soundstage? by combining the level with the directional info our ears also provide?

fuck. sorry about all the question marks.

We perceive the 3D location of sound via several methods:

Relative loudness of a sound in the left and right ears
Phase difference between sounds received in left and right ears
Filtering of sound by the external parts of the ear (crucial for forward/rear differentiation)

You can get latex/silicone ear microphones that accurately reproduce the effects of the ear on sounds, so yes you can record and analyse the effect of location on the sound that reaches the inner ear. However, a regular microphone also has external parts, and a sensor that does not respond to sound in the same way from each direction. So you can very definitely hear a difference in two recordings of the same source with the microphone pointing in different directions. With some calibration, you could even work out which direction the microphone was pointing in, by comparing the recording to the source.

 

[stuff_it]

Use headphones....

 

[ViolentPanda]

any performance engine needs to warm it's oil before it can give it's best. turbos need to be warmed up and cooled back down, whereas v-tec or twin cams only work once the oil is up to temperature.
on a big power turbo car with extra oil coolers, this can take forever. or, in the winter, never happen. so you block off your oil cooler, i've even got an oil heater that i plug in to the mains to reduce damage to the engine- it is undisputed that most damage to conventional engines occurs before the oil gets up to the right temperature. so trying to get close to the manufacturer's 0-60 times straight after turning the key would be very silly indeed
race cars always do a warm-up lap before the start.

And here you go shifting the goalposts in order to preserve your belief-system.

Again.

We weren't talking about "performance cars", "big power turbo cars" or "race cars", we were talking about cars in the generic sense. If you meant to discuss "performance cars" etc, then you should have made that clear from the beginning, not waited until your analogy had been shown to be flawed.

 

[stuff_it]

Has he got valve amps or summat?

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

who said anything about cable?

It's one of the more ludicrous examples of the audiophiles perceived difference in sound when there is none. A microphone does not care about how much you spent on a cable lifts 'interconects' or if your stereo has been on all day.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Has he got valve amps or summat?

Valve pre-amp.

Contrary to common belief though, a valve pre-amp isn't equivalent to a performance car, it's more akin to a Ford Cortina Mk4: Simple technology that's easy to repair and has well-known issues.

 

[stuff_it]

I meant about the warm up. Just for the record if you never switch it off, the valves will last far far longer.

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

ok, i'd like to be able to prove to you guys that i'm not an idiot. thats more accurate, perhaps

You will have to make sure you warm the microphone up first, and the recording devices, or they won't be as accurate.