HiFi Choice from the UK used to have a complete reasonably priced system in every issue, right at the front of the magazine. Something one of their staff had assembled and thought sounded relatively complete for that price. Sometimes it was quite low in price and sometimes more ambitious pricewise but at least they attempted to give guidance this way.
Does Everything Make a Difference?
- Thread starter Ron Resnick
- Start date
I have a dedicated *battery powered* Sony Sport Walkman CD player with vintage Sony v700 headphones. There are no power cords, no AC power, large speaker cables, interconnects, fuses, capacitor banks - i.e., things that produce noise and distortion. I also do not have to contend with room acoustic anomalies, obviously.
I have a phalanx of tweaks to elevate the sound quality - treated CDs, treated CD player, my own products and others. I recently incorporated the *acoustic* version of Schumann frequency into my listening routine. I isolate my iPad (through which I play the 7.83 Hz tone from YouTube) from seismic type vibes on a nifty sub 2 Hz iso stand.
I also have quite a number of PWB Electronics stuff that address issues “outside the system” per se that affect the sound. Things that go bump in the night?
So, once you eliminate the noise and distortion (inherent in larger systems) you wind up with a very pure signal - a signal that contains the dimensionality information.
No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher’s dirty looks.
Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica
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I almost shared this too. At least one, and I think maybe two, of the UK based trade magazines did always have a section on systems. My memory is from 40 years ago when I would pick up such magazines at the news stand a few times a year.
Of course the recommendations were often predictable. Linn, Rega, Naim, NAD, KEF, Dynavector, Decca, Audio Technica, …
The goal was to get your toes tapping and make you do your best Thelonius Monk impression (by getting up off your seat and doing a little dance).
I enjoyed their Monty Python style humor too … I remember one April issue where they recommended “disused railroad rails” as speaker cables.
I think "diatribe" is an unfair characterization. And since when did discussion of Placebo become a third rail? I don't believe he's violated the TOS.
For the record, I disagree with some of his viewpoints, but believe alternate viewpoints can be intellectually stimulating. The alternative is a safe space for GroupThink -- no thanks!
If someone finds his posts intolerable, the ignore button will save them future anguish!
Ron, if I can press you for a couple of answers.
My Apple headphone dongle is essentially transparent. Do you know why?
Let's hook you up with a bunch of sensors in your head, put on headphones and play Pink Floyd's The Wall. Do you think we can reconstruct the music from your brain activity?
I think Tom is right. How many times do we have to plow all of this very old ground? Every time another guy steps up to argue that we’re all fooling ourselves, many rise to the bait. It looks like a highly evolved chatbot learning from the interactions.
The main flaw in the thinking is always ignored. This is a stochastic set, not a deterministic set. It cannot be resolved with deterministic arguments.
The reason it is stochastic is because we do not all hear, or evaluate what we hear, alike. There is no way around this.
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Yes, I found it too boring to mingle into the discussion this time. Same ole, same ole.
Sure!
1) What is an Apple headphone dongle? Do you mean you are inserting for purposes of comparison an in-line patch cable which is not required and trying to determine if inserting the superfluous in-line patch cable diminishes transparency?
2) "Essentially" transparent suggests that it is not perfectly transparent.
3) It is possible that a headphone is not a sufficiently high resolution device in the first place to be able to discern subtle differences in transparency?
Sorry, but I know nothing about neurology or brain activity or the sensitivity and fidelity of sensors. But I suspect the answer would be no, as I doubt the brain activity would substitute for a digital audio recorder and playback device.
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By no small coincidence I’ve been using Schumann frequency as part of my routine listening through headphones to CDs. The isochronic Schumann frequency I found on YouTube played my iPad mimics the real Schumann frequency, an electromagnetic 7.83 Hz whereas the iPad delivers the acoustic version of 7.83 Hz.
I place the iPad on a small sub-2 Hz spring and mass iso system. With the Schumann frequency playing a few feet away, the soundstage through my headphones can be ten or twenty feet out in front of me, nice stable image, like electrostatics. I first got the soundstage to move out beyond the headphones just a couple of months ago, yipee!
The music is faster, more dynamic, more air, much more *dimensionality.* The belief is the artificial Schumann wave replenishes the real EM wave which has been degraded for a long time by modern technology/industry. Originally during evolution humans naturally used the Schumann signal as a pilot wave to synchronizing the brain‘s neurons. The neurons in the brain are synchronized, and the two hemispheres are synchronized with each other. The brain functions better that way, better focus, better, information processing, better sensory perception. A twenty minute warm-up is also part of my routine. The volume of the 7.83 Hz tone doesn’t have to be very loud. The real EM 7.83 Hz signal is only on the order of 100 microvolts.
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Thanks Ron.
The Apple headphone dongle is what you plug into an iPhone then plug in headphones to listen to music.
Essentially transparent is a SINAD just above the resolution of a CD. My dongle has a SINAD of 99. I can still hear noises and differences at this level of resolution. So, anything that that has a SINAD of 99 or less I am going to believe you can hear differences without any evidence.
Now go to audio equipment that is at the limits of our ability to reliably measure it. That would be the for example the Okto Research Stereo DAC or the SMSL D400ES. If you say you can hear differences, I'm going to need extraordinary evidence to support that.
I am using AKG K731 headphones and I believe these headphones measure well enough to hear subtle differences in transparency.
There has been a successful experiment where people's brain waves have been able to reproduce Pink Floyd's The Wall, so I think we know enough about how a sound wave gets into the ear how it is processed by the brain for the purposes of high-performance audio.
Stephen
A couple of questions?
— are you using only headphones or speakers also?
— If using speakers, it would be interesting to see if a video with and without the Schumann frequency could be perceived over the recording.
— Do you actually hear the tone out of your iPad speaker or is it subsonic? For me, that would definitely distract from hearing the music!
Thanks
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Like clockwork, here you go. From PLOS (Public Library of Science) published August 15, 2023.
Music can be reconstructed from human auditory cortex activity using nonlinear decoding models
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3002176
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Headphones only but it works for speakers, too, the only issue is the iPad should be exactly 3 feet from listener, on the floor or table is OK. even at relative modest YouTube volume it might be audible. But not too intrusive.
I demo’d this technique on a big speaker system recently and the tone was a little distracting if you’re being very analytical and you demand absolute silence. In reality it’s not very loud at all, street noise would be louder. The Acoustic Revive and most other similar devices generate electromagnetic waves so they aren’t audible. Having said that there are many Youtube videos of Schumann frequency, some are more effective than others.
The 7.83 Hz signal itself is not audible, but higher frequencies are audible. They generally use two higher frequency tones with difference of 7.83 Hz. You can listen to the tone for 20 minutes on Headphones which is a more powerful way to listen or in the clear using binaural beat or isochronic versions. The effect wears off after a couple hours, not too bad. I find the sound is better if you play the tone while listening. There’s some disagreement which is better, isochronic or binaural beats for headphones, but I prefer isochronic.
wil: -
— more detail on your sub 2hz spring and mass for your ipad?
I use 4 small springs with spring rate of about 10 lbs/in each. Then load the plate on top of springs with mass 10 to 20 lbs, I use two layers with springs in between, ceramic tile 10x10 then springs, then mass load with shallow Pyrex glass bowls and clear crystal paperweights, keep mass *low profile* so the system doesn’t get top heavy. When the top plate is loaded bound the top plate up and down so you get about 2-3 Hz rate of *smooth* up and down motion. My iso platform is about 18x10 inches and 18 inches high, including the supporting aluminum structure I found somewhere. If you pay close attention to low mass profile, weight distribution and smooth up and down motion you can get below 2 Hz, but don’t try this at home, kids, stay in school.
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My current short list of tweaks for headphone optimization, I can proudly say I have an outside the headphones soundstage that’s up to ten or twenty feet out in front and all around me.
1. Play Schumann 7.83 Hz streamed from YouTube (isochronic tone) 15 minutes prior to listening.iPad at distance of 3 feet. synchronize the neurons!
2. play Schumann 7.83 Hz while listening with headphones. Distance of iPad 3 feet.
3. CD Purity CD spray to reduce effects of polycarbonate porosity. Polycarbonate is only about 91% transparent. Also reduces laser scattering.
4. 3 strips of 3M Super 88 tape 1.5” long and cut in half lengthwise on label side of CD, radially. For disc stability.
5. All CDs twice quasi cryo‘d QC’d in freezer 2x48 hours.
6. Demag/Destatic CD prior to playing - rotate disc with thumb of one hand whilst holding demag steady over totaling disc with other hand, rotate disc 3 times. Also rotate CD perpendicular to demag to get the outer edge… better safe than sorry.
Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica
Not too chicken to change Y Y
1. Play Schumann 7.83 Hz streamed from YouTube (isochronic tone) 15 minutes prior to listening.iPad at distance of 3 feet. synchronize the neurons!
2. play Schumann 7.83 Hz while listening with headphones. Distance of iPad 3 feet.
3. CD Purity CD spray to reduce effects of polycarbonate porosity. Polycarbonate is only about 91% transparent. Also reduces laser scattering.
4. 3 strips of 3M Super 88 tape 1.5” long and cut in half lengthwise on label side of CD, radially. For disc stability.
5. All CDs twice quasi cryo‘d QC’d in freezer 2x48 hours.
6. Demag/Destatic CD prior to playing - rotate disc with thumb of one hand whilst holding demag steady over totaling disc with other hand, rotate disc 3 times. Also rotate CD perpendicular to demag to get the outer edge… better safe than sorry.
Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica
Not too chicken to change Y Y
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Actually it has very little to do with BeOtis’s. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. It’s classical physics and quantum mechanics, with a dash of psychophysics thrown in.
from Encyclopedia Britannia,
Psychophysics embraces the study of the subjective aspects of sensation in terms of objective stimulus energies. One of the oldest and most classical approaches to the study of sensation, psychophysics includes the study of people’s reports of their sensations when they are stimulated: of their ability, for example, to match tones of equal loudness, to detect stimulus differences, and to estimate sensory magnitude or intensity under conditions of controlled stimulation. Psychophysical research continues as an active enterprise particularly among modern psychologists.
The old philosophical notion that the mind is a clean slate or tablet (tabula rasa) until “written on” by impressions from the senses no longer seems fully tenable; infants, for example, show inborn (innate) ways of sensing or perceiving at birth. In its modern form, the problem of learned versus innate factors in sensory experience is studied in terms of the extent to which the genetically determined structure and function of sense organs and braindepend upon stimulation and experience for their proper maturation. Sensory deprivation in an infant’s early life is increasingly being documented as detrimental to the full flowering of mature perceptual and intellectualfunctions. Since this sort of evidence may lend some support to the notion of the tabula rasa, modern researchers give credence both to nativistic (based on heredity) and empiricistic (based on learning) interpretations of human sensory function (see also learning theory).
from Encyclopedia Britannia,
Psychophysics embraces the study of the subjective aspects of sensation in terms of objective stimulus energies. One of the oldest and most classical approaches to the study of sensation, psychophysics includes the study of people’s reports of their sensations when they are stimulated: of their ability, for example, to match tones of equal loudness, to detect stimulus differences, and to estimate sensory magnitude or intensity under conditions of controlled stimulation. Psychophysical research continues as an active enterprise particularly among modern psychologists.
The old philosophical notion that the mind is a clean slate or tablet (tabula rasa) until “written on” by impressions from the senses no longer seems fully tenable; infants, for example, show inborn (innate) ways of sensing or perceiving at birth. In its modern form, the problem of learned versus innate factors in sensory experience is studied in terms of the extent to which the genetically determined structure and function of sense organs and braindepend upon stimulation and experience for their proper maturation. Sensory deprivation in an infant’s early life is increasingly being documented as detrimental to the full flowering of mature perceptual and intellectualfunctions. Since this sort of evidence may lend some support to the notion of the tabula rasa, modern researchers give credence both to nativistic (based on heredity) and empiricistic (based on learning) interpretations of human sensory function (see also learning theory).
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3. CD Purity CD spray to reduce effects of polycarbonate porosity. Polycarbonate is only about 91% transparent. Also reduces laser scattering.Sounds very Belt-ish
R: You may try Essence of music digital spray, by far the best I tested. Mandatory. Reduce bi refringence.
I tried so many brands, only 2 were very effective with no drawbacks and Essence is by far the best.
4. 3 strips of 3M Super 88 tape 1.5” long and cut in half lengthwise on label side of CD, radially
R: This is almost like Harmonix CD sheet. In fact I tested many things like that and the sound is different, not better (at least on the very best transport like Playback Designs, Goldmund and JMF Audio 3.7). Also strip can induce harmonics vibrations at H1 and H3 because they will unbalance the CD. Strips are most about damping and could add a bit inertia but at the cost of increased unbalanced rotation. All this could also depend on the gap of the center hole of a CD/SACD. As I tooled my CD with AUDIODESK systems CD improver, I reduce unbalance (and laser unwanted reflection) but sometimes CD or SACD are clearly unbalanced (less musicality and could induce rotation noise even in precise machines).
5. All CDs twice quasi cryo‘d QC’d in freezer 2x48 hours.
R: I tried freezing and do not hear any difference. I will try 2x48h. Cryology is very interesting to remove constrained in metallurgy, it's well known. I studied that at university. However, cryology is I think, done at much lesser temp than -18°C.
6. Demag/Destatic CD prior to playing - rotate disc with thumb of one hand whilst holding demag steady over totaling disc with other hand, rotate disc 3 times. Also rotate CD perpendicular to demag to get the outer edge… better safe than sorry.
R: Demag is mandatory and I much prefer magnets than AC demag. Static, yes, may be the most important with CD laser side optical treatment. I use Nordost Eco 3x on the label side and Furutech Destat III on the laser side. DS Audio desert is said by one of my customer to be better.
Best
Philippe
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