Introducing the New HiFi Miser Forum-As discussed by Andre Marc

[DaveC]

Works for you, but then the restaurant ends up closing down and the owners don't understand why. Something honest criticism could have prevented.

Yes, it's the way it's done and the intent the criticism is given with.

That's why I said imagine the designer is a close friend, if he made a mistake you'd want to make sure it's pointed out but you wouldn't do it in a way that assumes he's an idiot and use that in an attempt to make yourself look better.

Some of this is basic courtesy, but engineers are not known for their social skills I guess. Myself included.

 

[Andre Marc]

Since when is it required that an audio reviewer have a degree in electrical engineering? Personally, If I wanted to read about electrical engineering, I would subscribe to a periodical that specialized in that field. The idea that one has to bolster the findings of an audio reviewer with technical support, is IMHO, simply a side line to the most important factor. That is---what does the darn piece of gear under review sound like to a listener who has a modicum of understanding what the sound of the 'real'/ 'live' instrument sounds like.
To be frank, ( BTW, is he still a member here, LOL)-- I would much rather read a review from a person who has ZERO technical ability., but has had some exposure to musicians and their instruments, than to a 'geek' who has never played any instrument or been near the 'live' experience...just IMHO.

Not a single writer on Stereophile has an audio engineering degree save for John Atkinson. I know of none on the TAS staff, save for Robert Harley.

 

[Andre Marc]

Yes, it's the way it's done and the intent the criticism is given with.

That's why I said imagine the designer is a close friend, if he made a mistake you'd want to make sure it's pointed out but you wouldn't do it in a way that assumes he's an idiot and use that in an attempt to make yourself look better.

Some of this is basic courtesy, but engineers are not known for their social skills I guess. Myself included.

It also not yours or anyone else's job to keep people in business. The market and a sort of weeding out process will decide who stays open and who
stays closed.

The ONLY exception is if the public welfare is at stake. Dangerous products, etc. Then higher powers than the market must step in.
I've never heard of death by preamp.

 

[DaveyF]

Works for you, but then the restaurant ends up closing down and the owners don't understand why. Something honest criticism could have prevented.

If you look online, reading the various reviews of anything...including restaurant performance, how many times do you see a 'perfect' score? There is always someone who has a 'gripe' about something! The question becomes whether that one ( ten...you name the #) reviewer has a LEGITIMATE point.

 

[DaveyF]

Not a single writer on Stereophile has an audio engineering degree save for John Atkinson. I know of none on the TAS staff, save for Robert Harley.

And why should they???

 

[Andre Marc]

If you look online, reading the various reviews of anything...including restaurant performance, how many times do you see a 'perfect' score? There is always someone who has a 'gripe' about something! The question becomes whether that one ( ten...you name the #) reviewer has a LEGITIMATE point.

NOT to mention paid shills on Yelp et al.. AND paid detractors.

 

[Andre Marc]

And why should they???

EXACTLY!! It goes back to my old thread Davey..folks having no confidence in their ability to listen. After all, audio does require one to listen, unless I have it all wrong LOL.

 

[Blizzard]

It also not yours or anyone else's job to keep people in business. The market and a sort of weeding out process will decide who stays open and who
stays closed.

The ONLY exception is if the public welfare is at stake. Dangerous products, etc. Then higher powers than the market must step in.
I've never heard of death by preamp.

I guess in the end all that matters is if the owner is happy. Even if there is a design flaw, if it's not known to the owner, and he likes how it sounds, that's all that matters. They say "ignorance is bliss" for a reason.

If there was a hair in your food and you munched it down without knowing, then what was the harm?

 

[Andre Marc]

I guess in the end all that matters is if the owner is happy. Even if there is a design flaw, if it's not known to the owner, and he likes how it sounds, that's all that matters. They say "ignorance is bliss" for a reason.

Quit your job, put your shingle out there, and become a consultant. I am not kidding. Put your money where you mouth is.
Service all the less than perfect designs out there by offering solutions.

 

[amirm]

Honest criticism yes. But was the flurry of criticism honest in this case? It was an assault. No questions were asked before the criticisms were so voluntarily expressed. And when an explanation was posted, it was ignored.

Not at all. This was my reply to the explanation from the designer:

Thank you Andre for reaching out to him. He scores a big point with me for caring to write a response. Kudos to manufacturers who take the time to do that.

Alas, you asked him the wrong question. Everything he is mentioning is on record here and not the issue at hand. This is the issue as posted in the first reply:

Heat sinks on the BOTTOM of the amplifier!!!???

Insane. EVERYTHING inside the chassis will reach the same temperature as the output devices. Life-span of every electrolytic caps will be compromised. Bad idea.

As I noted and others agreed, the amp does have oversized heatsinks so we are not concerned about the transistors dying. But rather the elevated temps shortening the life of electrolytic caps. Here is a sample graph showing the lifetime versus temperature:

As you see, there is an exponential drop in lifetime of such capacitors based on temp. It should make intuitive sense as what causes them to go bad is the electrolytic drying out and any liquid evaporates more and more as you increase temps.

Anyway, I am still wondering if the amp lived up to the tag line you gave it for the thread title. You said in your original post that you will be testing it with maggies. Last time I did an amp shoot out with them (going back to 1980s) my friend had a Bryston amp with similar power to this unit. I brought over my Carver receiver with 200 watts and Class H and it substantially increased the dynamic range and bass out of his maggies. So I am curious how with less than half as much power you managed to get them to perform to their potential.

What amp did you compare them to? Have you tested them against much cheaper mass market amps? Any class D amps in its price range or even lower? I don't know what to do with your one and only statement that they were "amazing."

So it was not ignored and actually welcomed and acknowledged. It was just the case that the right issue regarding caps was not communicated to him by Andre so he gave the answer to a concern which we did not raise.

 

[DaveyF]

EXACTLY!! It goes back to my old thread Davey..folks having no confidence in their ability to listen. After all, audio does require one to listen, unless I have it all wrong LOL.

Nope, you have it 100% right.
I recently had an informative discussion with a manufacturer's rep ( I won't be disclosing names here). The rep was upset because he had submitted his product to a reviewer with a lot of technical knowledge, but lacking in the following areas..1) his room was poorly set up and not optimized at all for sound, 2) His ancillary gear was far from resolving and nowhere near the SOTA. The reviewer gave the piece in question a 'luke warm' review for SQ. The rep was upset because he knew of the fact that the reviewer was not going to be able to really put his piece through its paces, and because he also realized that the reviewer's "luke warm" review was in the reviewer's mind a rave! However, the technical merits of the piece in question were highly lauded....which meant nothing to the rep; and rightly so IMO.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

to me the standard should be how one communicates face to face. if you go to an audio show, or local audio club meeting, or visit someone's home.......and a new product is being presented, how would that typically go? what would you say to someone who was talking about it? would you start out skeptical and look for flaws, and make a strong case for those perceived issues, or would you attempt to connect with it and understand it first? would common courtesy inhibit any initial strong criticism?

if your reaction face to face is different than how it is behind a keyboard then we just view things differently.

I guess it's reasonable that our on-line character differs from our face-to-face character sometimes. but to me that is sad.

I certainly know curmudgeons who are outwardly negative on most everything. I can tell you I don't look to spend much time with them.

I like to learn stuff, and seek the truth. interpreting my posts in this thread as somehow being afraid to learn simply misses my points. being a community means being communal. I suppose we all have our own ideas on what that means.

 

[amirm]

You're creating a false dichotomy, I specifically said criticisms shouldn't be disallowed, but they should be more thoughtful than what happened with the redgum amp. Some jumped to false conclusions based on the unorthodox design and placement of the heat sinks, implying the designer had no clue that amps generate heat or what to do about it.

Sorry no. I fully acknowledged the oversized heatsink in post #4. Yes, the very first set of posts:

Is this end of the world? No. They funded these amps through Indigogo to buy the heatsink casting. In there they say they are about 15 pounds each. Given the modest power output, it is not going to cook that much so will probably last a while.

I researched the company, found their indigogo page, read through it, got the data and realized this is not as serious of a problem as it may have seemed.

BTW, we are critiquing the design, not the designer. Designers routinely do stupid things because they have to, not be cause they don't know better. Tell someone to build a speaker for $200 and they will make decisions that they would not make if you gave them a $2,000 budget. Whether it was for looks, ease of handing off the design to China, etc., he made a choice to put the heatsink upside down.

People assume he didn't understand electrolytic caps are sensitive to heat. This is kind of ridiculous, and also implies the person doing the criticizing is more knowledgeable than the designer himself, which is also a ridiculous assumption.

We can only go by what he has produced. We can't jump into his head. And what he has produced has large filter caps upside down with their vent facing the heatsink. Maybe he knows more than us, or maybe he doesn't. That doesn't matter. What matters is that if I bring in 10 audio designers from high-end community I assure you that 9 out of 10 if not 10 out of 10 would cringe and heavily criticise the design.

I think the difference is someone who questions the design hoping to learn vs someone who criticizes the design from the POV of a self-appointed "expert".

I asked and ask again, why do you think we are not qualified to make such comments? Here is the qualification of the other member that started this:

I have more than 40 years' experience in designing, building, modifying and servicing audio equipment. Many of my mods have been incorporated into hardware by large, internationally significant manufacturers over the years. I call dumb design when I see it. Putting the heat sinks under the electronics is bad design. Pure and simple. So, not an "armchair engineer", but someone with some runs on the board.

I also have experience with Redgum products. I hasten to add, only with their fan cooled ones though. They were sensible, if simple designs (I hate the twin volume pots, but I like the redgum front panel). Their (Aussie built) products are reliable and different. Personally, I don't care for them, but I recognise that a personal opinion is just that - a personal opinion. Others may have a different view, which is why focus solely on the poorly thought out thermal aspect of the design. Also, as mentioned, I have not heard the model in question. It may be different to all the other Redgum amps I've measured/heard.

Is he qualified to make a statement about how you do or do not put a heatsink in an amplifier? Let's have this answer please and don't keep exaggerating what happened in that thread.

 

[microstrip]

Just to give an example of how misleading can be conclusions on simplified knowledge I am going to present a picture from the data sheet of the same capacitors as the one shown before.

If we do not have the complete factual data and use the complete de-rating equations we risk fighting wind mills. There are similar figures for over voltage (this means using a 50V capacitor at 12V) . Probably the guilty capacitor will outlast other components in the amplifier ...

 

[Blizzard]

Quit your job, put your shingle out there, and become a consultant. I am not kidding. Put your money where you mouth is.
Service all the less than perfect designs out there by offering solutions.

I don't have a job. I've been working full time on audio gear since January. Just on the DAC stage at the moment. It's looking like chipless DSD with 100% discrete components in the signal path is going to be the winner. For amplification, Hypex Ncore output stages, with discrete Class A input stages.

 

[Whatmore]

Out of interest, and sticking to the HiFi Miser theme, I reckon an amp that can drive 2 Ohm loads and costs as little as the Redgum would certainly qualify


Thoughts?

 

[Blizzard]

If you look online, reading the various reviews of anything...including restaurant performance, how many times do you see a 'perfect' score? There is always someone who has a 'gripe' about something! The question becomes whether that one ( ten...you name the #) reviewer has a LEGITIMATE point.

Yes but you usually find when the majority gives great feedback, there's a higher probability that the food will be good.

 

[Blizzard]

Out of interest, and sticking to the HiFi Miser theme, I reckon an amp that can drive 2 Ohm loads and costs as little as the Redgum would certainly qualify


Thoughts?

Acoustic imagery Atsah 500's are probably the best deal in audio amplification period at $1000 a piece as far as known commercial designs go. I can say this with confidence having the same parts they use in my possession for 6 months.

http://www.acousticimagery.com

I compared them paired with my Resonessence Mirus with a Devialet 400 setup, and it put it to absolute shame.

 

[nc42acc]

Which Hypex Ncore modules are they using?

Acoustic imagery Atsah 500's are probably the best deal in audio amplification period at $1000 a piece as far as known commercial designs go. I can say this with confidence having the same parts they use in my possession for 6 months.

http://www.acousticimagery.com

I compared them paired with my Resonessence Mirus with a Devialet 400 setup, and it put it to absolute shame.

 

[zztop7]

Murder

One day when there are wiretaps on all our phones, I will be charged with Murder - "Agent was killed with boredom."
zz.

I've never heard of death by preamp.