"Exzcellent sounding" depends on taste. Analog that does not accurately represent brass bite, for example, is not for me. I just can't live with a 'polite' sound. But if you can live with the extra softness and roundness of tone that less than SOTA analog offers, or even crave it, then all the good things that a decent turntable can do, great rhythm & timing and good tonal density among them, can indeed sum up to "excellent sound". It's just not for me. I need a believable portrayal of the natural hardness of many unamplified instruments, brass among them. I'm too used to good rendtiion of that aspect of sound from better digital that I could look past it on less than SOTA analog.
OMG. My whole love for Analog is because of the reproduction of brass (and violins)! And I have been listening to LSO perform Mahler on a regular basis (not to mention Bruckner, or having heard Dudamel's big trombone section stand up towards the end of Wagner's Valkyrie blowing them in my face).
Bill is a first trombonist, you can ask him. From what you are writing, I think you need to investigate analog more, buy 5 LPs, then go around to different analog rigs. No need to look at Madfloyd's expensive one, look at some cheap ones. There will be some boring ones, sure.
"Excellent sounding" depends on taste. Analog that does not accurately represent brass bite, for example, is not for me. I just can't live with a 'polite' sound.... less than SOTA analog.
vinyl reproduction remains a moving target, even at any so called SOTA level. And here is the kicker ... if your turntable is truly "sota", then rip it and let the rest of the world appreciate ...
It's no attack. I'm just pointing something out that's extremely important when it comes to DSD. A 1 bit DSD stream is extremely jitter sensitive. A TCXO that has a 10hz phase noise spec of -65Dbc +-30% is unacceptable for any DAC over $200 as far as I'm concerned. Let alone the sensitive DSD clocking in a $20000 DAC.
If the performance that many of us are currently experiencing / have experienced with the GG including a pro recording engineer on this very site is attainable with such a poor clock, I can only surmise the following:
> the GG must be absolutely extraordinary outside of the amanero interface
> that jitter is overhyped in terms of the overall bigger picture as to how a DAC will sound especially since Bruce B owns gear with monumentally good clocks yet still thinks that the GG "is the one to beat" for dsd
> that if you are right about the USB interface (and I am hoping so much that you are) ~$90 (for a new USB board) could make the GG far ahead of everything out there
Again if correct - I would like to see the option for an external clock input on the GG so for those of us so inclined, experimentation with a low femto second clock would be possible.
"Excellent sounding" depends on taste. Analog that does not accurately represent brass bite, for example, is not for me. I just can't live with a 'polite' sound. But if you can live with the extra softness and roundness of tone that less than SOTA analog offers, or even crave it, then all the good things that a decent turntable can do, great rhythm & timing and good tonal density among them, can indeed sum up to "excellent sound". It's just not for me. I need a believable portrayal of the natural hardness of many unamplified instruments, including brass. I'm too used to good rendition of that aspect of sound from better digital that I could look past it on less than SOTA analog.
If you have extensively investigated room acoustics , you will soon realise that everything is ultimately user taste based , the mere fact you do not correct to flat but a user defined target curve , which is anything but flat , means that final reproduction is what satisfies the user.
No one really has to justify their choices , your personal taste in sound reproduction whether analog or digital and your music choice is inviolate..
My maxim is that its my money and my ears I have to satisfy .. damn the rest ...
Do you find this even with trombone, euphonium, tuba, French Horn? I kind of know what you mean with trumpet especially in "blatty" jazz passages with sf passages.
If you have extensively investigated room acoustics , you will soon realise that everything is ultimately user taste based , the mere fact you do not correct to flat but a user defined target curve , which is anything but flat , means that final reproduction is what satisfies the user.
No one really has to justify their choices , your personal taste in sound reproduction whether analog or digital and your music choice is inviolate..
My maxim is that its my money and my ears I have to satisfy .. damn the rest ...
Exactly. Trumpet is the one that can be edgy, but tuba and trombone have so much thickness and depth, their lower frequencies are also tough for so many speakers to reproduce.
Exactly. Trumpet is the one that can be edgy, but tuba and trombone have so much thickness and depth, their lower frequencies are also tough for so many speakers to reproduce.
The very nature of the tessitura of an instrument defines the ability to sound edgy due to the area of the frequency response that it operates AND that the ear is sensitive.
Finally the French horn, because the bell actually fires away from the listener and that the hand partially rests in it, removes glare. My brother is a French Horn player so grown up with that sound
Do you find this even with trombone, euphonium, tuba, French Horn? I kind of know what you mean with trumpet especially in "blatty" jazz passages with sf passages.
Exactly. Trumpet is the one that can be edgy, but tuba and trombone have so much thickness and depth, their lower frequencies are also tough for so many speakers to reproduce.
If you refer to edgy as 'piercing' then you are right that trumpet is the one instrument that can have this character, depending on acoustics and distance. Yet I have heard hardness of sound also from trombone and French horn.
As for the lower body of tuba and trombone being tough to reproduce I agree. I have to smile when my own minimonitors can do that better than some systems with large speakers that I have heard…brings me to the idea of playing a tuba passage on my system for a guest this afternoon, thanks for the reminder
If you refer to edgy as 'piercing' then you are right that trumpet is the one instrument that can have this character, depending on acoustics and distance. Yet I have heard hardness of sound also from trombone and French horn.
As for the lower body of tuba and trombone being tough to reproduce I agree. I have to smile when my own minimonitors can do that better than some systems with large speakers that I have heard...
It is absolutely true that you can get a trombone to sound "edgy" just not so often as trumpet - horn the same but even harder because of the reason I described in the other post.
Like I said in the other post, the tessitura of an instrument determines this since they operate in different parts of the frequency response where our ears are sensitive.
E.g. It is impossible to get "edgy" with a deep bass note from an organ or double bass or even bottom end of piano.
Tell you another edgy instrument but this time from the woodwind - piccolo! Again - right in the sensitive part of our hearing. Actually drives me nuts on the Tchaikovsky pizzicato movement from symphony number 4.
Tell you another edgy instrument but this time from the woodwind - piccolo! Again - right in the sensitive part of our hearing. Actually drives me nuts on the Tchaikovsky pizzicato movement from symphony number 4.
It is absolutely true that you can get a trombone to sound "edgy" just not so often as trumpet - horn the same but even harder because of the reason I described in the other post.
Like I said in the other post, the tessitura of an instrument determines this since they operate in different parts of the frequency response where our ears are sensitive.
E.g. It is impossible to get "edgy" with a deep bass note from an organ or double bass or even bottom end of piano.
Again, while the discussion here was good for clarification, and I have learned from your obvious expertise on brass sound, I think it's partially just semantics here. Hardness of sound doesn't necessarily mean 'edgy' or 'piercing' sound like from trumpet; I hear hardness also from trombone and horn, again depending on acoustics etc. I guess I took the term 'edgy' from Johnny and applied it too indiscriminately to what I wanted to describe.
Tell you another edgy instrument but this time from the woodwind - piccolo! Again - right in the sensitive part of our hearing. Actually drives me nuts on the Tchaikovsky pizzicato movement from symphony number 4.
Yes, and the interesting thing is that when you hear piercing sound from woodwinds (I've heard it live from clarinet too, for example) and you think your room acoustics resonate with it, giving you that feeling of pressure in your ear, that 'ringing' may actually be on the recording! At least I have heard that 'ringing' of acoustics also live, in a medium sized concert hall, with obviously much more spacious acoustics than a living room.
So when I hear that, I don't necessarily right away blame my system/room for it, even though in some cases that may indeed be the culprit.
Related to this, I will reiterate my opinion that I am suspicious of systems that always sound polite and 'inoffensive', no matter what.
