Digital Props Part II

[mep]

I don't think that Tim nor Tom said that analog sounded better than digital in general.

You are absolutely right, they didn’t say that. Nor did I infer they did. I was making a general statement about people on this forum who have proclaimed in the past that analog distortions help analog sound good.

Distortions? I used reel-to-reel tape for some years and LPs for over 35 years. The everyday flaws of LP playback seemed very real to me.

What flaws outside of surface noise are you referring to? What components made up your LP playback system (table, arm, cartridge, and phono section)?

Perfect harmony? Were you listening to Buddhist chants? Bill

The perfect harmony bit was a joke Bill.

 

[fas42]

Stretching this technical accuracy vs inaccuracy but "feels like real music" bit...lets take a photo of someone we know extremely well (which somehow does not really look like them at all...bad angle, weird light, wrong expression...we've all seen this)...and compare it to a caricature which is EXACTLY that person and captures the mood, the personality, the expression. Clearly the photo is "real" and the caricature totally "wrong". Is that an extreme example of what happens when technical distortions are perceived as more "real" than perfectly measured performance?

I'm no techie...but just curious as to what others may think of an extreme analogy.

I like your point, many appealing analogue systems probably veer a little too far at times down the caricature road. Myles will probably be upset with me saying this, but as I responded to Roger, part of the appeal of analogue tape masters is that there is a decent level of "nice" compression there from the word go, partly because the engineers wanted to make sure nothing was lost, and partly because of the tape saturation characteristics. Digital needs zero such compression, and, horror of horrors, I bet someone with some decent such skills could easily turn a "sterile" digital master into perfectly mimicing an analogue tape master totally in the audio workstation, never touching a tape deck, and fool everyone ...

Frank

 

[fas42]

Yes, I enjoy the sing song effect, the chorus effect, that the SET brings to the table. But, then again, I ain't afraid to change the sound to my satisfaction as is well known by now. The SET can not go as loud as the SS amps, but I can and have driven my SET into a load resistor then driven the SS amps with it, and of course, captured a good deal of the SET sound (although not quite as dynamic, due to the SS amps handling of the low bass and in addition for the higher up frequencies the firmer grip on the speaker movement).

I recommend you obtain a SET amp so you can change gears once in a while. Its fun dude.

Tom

I like it, Tom, nothing like using an expensive amplifier purely as a tone control, as you say! To go a step further, how about this: hook the SET to a real, appropriate speaker, completely deaden the sound of that speaker by sticking it in a soundproof environment, and take the feed from the speaker terminals into your good quality SS setup. Voila! Perfect SET sound, with vastly improved volume range ...

Frank

 

[Bruce B]

I bet someone with some decent such skills could easily turn a "sterile" digital master into perfectly mimicing an analogue tape master totally in the audio workstation, never touching a tape deck, and fool everyone ...
Frank

That's what "Tape Emulation" and "Harmonic emulation" plugins are for...

 

[fas42]

That's what "Tape Emulation" and "Harmonic emulation" plugins are for...

And how good are they? For example, if another engineer without your knowledge applied that to a master you were not familiar with, would you be fooled?

Frank

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Tim,
Unhappily it is not as simple as that, as most of us do not share your views about the audiophile imagination of detail and spaciousness. And yes, the language is sometimes inappropriate because we can not find better ways to explain our perceptions.

Oh I get that you don't share my views, micro, but it is as simple as that in the realist's discussion, because while my views, or more importantly, what I hear is just my opinion, it also happens to be backed up by almost all of the available measurements, evidence and objective testing anyone has ever been able to show me. Though I'm open to any serious data supporting the superior performance of analog over digital, I have yet to see it.

IMHO, most of time the key issue should be related to the masking effect and perception - no recording system is completely free of distortions, and some of them do a better job masking the unnatural distortions that we perceive as disagreeable and spoil our listening pleasure.

So what are we talking about then? Masking distortions you've deemed to be unnatural with distortions that you rather like? Because transparency - the relative lack of distortion - does not mask. You're making my case. And my listening pleasure, by the way, is just fine.

BTW, when discussing digital people should refer to what type they are referring to : CD , some type of HiRez, DSD or 2x DSD.

I rarely listen to disks, but for the sake of this discussion, I'm perfectly happy to stick to Redbook and compare that to analog. I'm confident that the digital baseline out-performs analog. Show me something more than your opinions or impressions. I'm anxious to learn.

Tim

 

[Orb]

Mark, try this idea.

Let's change up your statement with just one word (SET, that is a single ended triode amplifier, for the newbies),

So, explain away your technical reason why a couple of the most respected systems ,as heard by many on WBF, on this site uses highly euphonic SET amplification.

You certainly are not going to tell me it is accurate to the recording.....

I quote you with one word changed: I always love it when people explain away how good SET sounds by saying that it's due to the 5,299 distortions (or pick your own number, I lost count) that it adds to the sound that somehow all blend together in perfect harmony

It does add to the sound, the word we usually use to describe additions to the audio signal is distortion, and yes, they can and do make stuff "sound" better to many. It aint all that hard to understand IMO, but I come from the starting point that plain old stereo just struggles like hell to try to get us to some sort of an illusion (primarily imaging and depth), to start with.


Tom

I think the use of distortion making music sound better with regards to tube amps is generalising what is happening, but I appreciate there are a few that you hint at that do have higher levels.
But there are also example of very popular tube amps that have excellent distortion values, just checked two off the top of my head and those being MC275 and ARC Ref110 - both on their 4ohm taps and loadings up to 4ohms (still very good up to 3ohms).
The measurements are under 1% and mostly around 0.1 to 0.3%.

If wanting to remove the complexity of watts/impedance then how one explains the enjoyment of reference level SOTA tube preamps, had this discussion with Ethan and again their measurements are exceptional.
Distortion is not one of the factors when considering some of the SOTA tube power and pre amps.

I just feel it is not possible to justify the statement that distortion is why listeners enjoy tube products as it is too general and the model is broken by the tube products that have very good measurements.
If the statement cannot be applied to all tube products and listeners' preferences, then it means the statement is incorrect or needs greater investigation and clarification.

Cheers
Orb

 

[microstrip]

Yes, I enjoy the sing song effect, the chorus effect, that the SET brings to the table. (...)
Tom

Tom,

Although I do not own a SET amplifier I have listened to a few very good SET systems, and I can assure you that the SET brings to the table much more than that. Considering that the SET amplifiers are just equalizers due the impedance of the tube amplifier or an even harmonic adder is a misconception. Surely we know of poorly designed SETs that are just that and much worst, but a few bad apples don not make a bad harvest.

SETs are not my current preference, but I have listened to great sound reproduction using them. And I understand why people like them and why it makes their audio musical experience an happy experience.

 

[microstrip]

(...) But it all leads back to the weaknesses of stereo as a illusion maker to start with. (...)
Tom

Great sentence! You are 100% correct. F. Toole wrote some very interesting things about it - and considered that the salvation would be multichannel

 

[fas42]

The measurements are under 1% and mostly around 0.1 to 0.3%.

A lot of literature, and my experience and gut feeling is that 0.1 to 0.01% is the key band of performance to go for, and the higher the frequency the more critical it is to really, really meet those spec's. Anything better than this, like 0.0001%, is just game playing. 10% at bass frequencies is not a problem really, but once you hit the midrange and treble driver with more than that level of tonal enhancement it's definitely going to be audible. To make this exercise easy to understand, or to relate it to something everyone is familiar with: cassette tape noise. The bane of this was always the higher frequency hiss, it was always easy to hear this "distortion" unless steps had been taken. And there was a magic number people were always chasing, trying to get the signal to noise to be better than 60dB, say. And what does the latter translate to: 0.1% "abberation"; 0.01% means 80dB down, now we're really safe, even the very best R2R's can't hit this mark.

So to say a tube amp doesn't colour the sound, you need to be hitting those figures ...

Frank

 

[Old Listener]

I was making a general statement about people on this forum who have proclaimed in the past that analog distortions help analog sound good.

My memory:

I've seen quite a few speculations that some people like a dose of second order harmonic distortion. The people making the speculations don't usually say "I'm addicted to that added distortion."

What flaws outside of surface noise are you referring to?

Some everyday flaws

Compromised frequency response to fit the limitations of the lathe, the final LP and the range of turntables and cartridges on which LP might be played,
gross distortion in peaks,
Constant surface noise,
loud clicks and pops at specific locations,
static which produced directly audible results and attracted dust,
warped records,
locked grooves,
off center holes,
sensitivity to vibration,
the difficulty of getting rid of hum and noise even with a relatively high output MM cartridge.

Messing with the turntable, arm and cartridge to get it set up right didn't appeal to me either. Cleaning records didn't make listening to music any better either.
Flaws in pressings made some great performances unlistenable.

Some examples of flaws that mattered a lot:

A recording of the Beethoven Archduke Piano trio by the Stern-Istomin-Rose trio got rave reviews so i bought a copy. It had a bad flaw in the first couple of minutes that made it unlistenable. I returned that copy to the store and got another. Same flaw. I never got to listen to that LP because the entire production run in the stores at that time had the same flaw. The CD sounds great. I just wish that I had been listening to that performance for 35-40 years rather than 15 years.

My very favorite performance of the Beethoven Violin Concerto was by Grumiaux and Galliera on Philips. The LP had a very warm sound by the surface noise was so high that the LP no more than 10-15 dB of dynamic range. The CD doesn't have the extreme warmth but it has normal dynamic range. Much nicer to listen to.

The Fruebeck de Burgos recording of the de Falla: Three Cornered hat on EMI remains my overwhelming favorite for that work. The LP had gross distortion at the beginning where a chorus shouts. The remastered CD from around 2001 is free of that distortion and sounds cleaner throughout.

The Fruebeck de Burgos recording of Orff's Carmina Burana on an EMI LP had gross distortion in peaks through the performance. The remastered CD from 2001 is free of these distortions.

An RCA LP of the best Glenn Miller numbers had such wow and flutter that I could not stand to listen to it. The CD does not have the same flaws. (This material originated on 78s so this wasn't a question of fidelity. Just competence which you could not rely on in the LP era.)

What components made up your LP playback system (table, arm, cartridge, and phono section)?

Turntables - a cheap Garrard, a Thorens TD-150 with stock arm and then with a fancy arm, a Sony PS-1800 turntable.

Cartridges - ? to start, a Grado somewhere in the sequence, a Shure M-91, an ADC XLM (?) (roughly a Shure V-15 II equivalent), some kind of Audio Technica.

Phono stages - Dynaco SCA 35, JBL SA-600 or 660, Yamaha receiver, PS Audio 4.6 pre-amp.

There may have been more in each category.

The perfect harmony bit was a joke Bill.

And so was my response.

Bill

 

[Old Listener]

Hi Bill,
You sure know your recordings.

Thanks. Does that mean that my taste matches yours?

Stereo Review and High Fidelity gave me some great recommendations for classical music recordings back in the late 60s though the mid 70s. It is great to keep enjoying those finds from 40 years ago.

My wife knew a lot about big band swing music from the 30s and 40s and early jazz up to be-bop. Broadway musicals and Broadway standards too. It is convenient to have an in-house music reviewer.

The Fruebeck de Burgos recording of de Falla's el Amor Brujo on Decca is another favorite from LP days.

Bill

 

[RBFC]

de Burgos' version of Asturias will probably never be matched. The brass punctuations are some of the most exciting moments in all of recorded music.

Lee

 

[fas42]

As examples of things to worry about, I've mentioned cell or mobile phones, the HT is still affected. Yet another, mentioned some time ago are remotes. Yes, those indispensible sidekicks of daily activity spew out in some manner nasties that audio doesn't like, and my system at the moment is still knocked for a sixer when one is too close. I may be the only person in the universe that suffers this, but then again, I may not!

Easy enough to test: gather every single remote in the house to near the audio, and pull the batteries of every single one of one. YMMV ...

Frank

 

[garylkoh]

But it is a very good album either way, isn't it Gary?

Yes, it's a very good album, and one on my frequent play list. I learned about Arcade Fire on WBF

 

[Old Listener]

de Burgos' version of Asturias will probably never be matched. The brass punctuations are some of the most exciting moments in all of recorded music.

Thanks for the reminder. I listened just now. Wonderful music.

Fruebeck de Burgos was on a hot streak for a decade.

His recording of the Haydn Creation oratorio is a first choice for me too.

Bill

 

[garylkoh]

Gary was it a success?

Only time will tell, but it was much slower this year than last year. After all the overseas distributors and dealers who came through last year, may be it was just us, but I didn't meet a single new prospective new dealer or distributor. However, there were a lot of potential end-customers.

 

[garylkoh]

The Fruebeck de Burgos recording of de Falla's el Amor Brujo on Decca is another favorite from LP days.

de Burgos' version of Asturias will probably never be matched. The brass punctuations are some of the most exciting moments in all of recorded music.

For those readers without LP systems, these two on the FIM label are fabulous examples of how good digital can be, and might be an example of why the discussion on this thread seems to be winding nowhere.

Until we absolutely know that the master is the same for both CD and LP, there can be no basis for comparison. I don't think that Winston ever takes the original tape and simply transfers it to digital for CD - he remasters it.

 

[mauidan]

de Burgos' version of Asturias will probably never be matched. The brass punctuations are some of the most exciting moments in all of recorded music.

Lee

And to support these statements, you've listened to every recording that has ever been made? ;-)

 

[Orb]

A lot of literature, and my experience and gut feeling is that 0.1 to 0.01% is the key band of performance to go for, and the higher the frequency the more critical it is to really, really meet those spec's. Anything better than this, like 0.0001%, is just game playing. 10% at bass frequencies is not a problem really, but once you hit the midrange and treble driver with more than that level of tonal enhancement it's definitely going to be audible. To make this exercise easy to understand, or to relate it to something everyone is familiar with: cassette tape noise. The bane of this was always the higher frequency hiss, it was always easy to hear this "distortion" unless steps had been taken. And there was a magic number people were always chasing, trying to get the signal to noise to be better than 60dB, say. And what does the latter translate to: 0.1% "abberation"; 0.01% means 80dB down, now we're really safe, even the very best R2R's can't hit this mark.

So to say a tube amp doesn't colour the sound, you need to be hitting those figures ...

Frank

Then what about the solid state amps that also hit those figures of 0.1 to 0.3 Frank?
BTW those figures I gave are real figures against frequency range and also power via each of the taps.

But more importantly, what about tube preamps that do have excellent measurements and are accepted as being in the elite group.
Distortion can only be considered if it works for all relevant scenarios in ones statement - yours now expanding that to coloration.
Cheers
Orb