Great article on "Analogue Warmth"
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I got into audio because of my love for music, not the other way around, and I have always kept reminding myself of that. I'm quite content with the system I've been able to assemble, although I know full well that it doesn't touch every base of sound reproduction. As such I slowly make upgrades that are within my means, because sound quality is important to me as well.
I'm looking out my window and can see the Rockies in the distance. I'm about an hour to an hour and a half drive from Banff.
I do believe that for many audiophiles the references has come to be what they hear in their systems and others'. Real music is not a s "nice" as many wants it to sound: Violin are strident. Trumpets are edgy , Trombones are throaty and edgy .. A tuba at a few meters is a loud rather hard instrument.. Brass in general are not that sweet, woodwinds OTOH often are.. Violins when massed (lot of them, 2 to 3 still sounds strident) lose some of their hardness... A cymbal crash is a loud, harsh and almost violent musical event. We, audiophiles often take as our reference the more interesting but far from reality reproduced version of many instruments . This is not limited to mid-fi systems , Mega Dollars/Euro Systems regularly commit this sin. Some sounds so syrupy as to make all and any music sounds sweet .. I am certain that Stravinsky never intended the Firebird to be a sweet sounding piece or Skostakovich's his Symphonyy 11 NOT to be a hard, bombastic and violent piece but some systems simply make a very nice presentation of whatever is sent to them and they are congratulated for being sweet, warm and "musical" .. Not life and death so if it floats your boats .. It would be only fair not to call it Realistic.
The better Digital acquit themselves well on most front. To my logic if a medium is transparent enough so as to be indistinguishable when reproducing another then it stands as good or better.
I am firmly in the digital camp, preferably PCM since it allows me DRC/DSP and am a Tidal . Spotify , files playing junkie. That where the music is and that all that counts to me at this stage of my Life. And it sounds good to boot. Tidal is as good as it gets a and its library growing by leaps and bounds... So is Spotify but it is limited to 320 Kbs mp3.. good enough for most purposes but I am an audiophile so I demand more ... Although I (and many of you I am sorry to say) would have a hard time distinguishing 320 Kbs mp3 from the original CD .. I would like to think that my Stax, Hifiman and Audeze headphones driven by Auralic, Woo, Hifiman, Luxman and Berkeley headphones, amps and DACs are resolving "enough"..
Happy Holidays to you all. May be the New Year find us all discussing about Audio but enjoying more music and in good health as well as the Health of our loved ones. Keep safe and Enjoy the Music on whatever format it is available.
Happy New Year People!!
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errr...I don't see any evolution here
So you are the one that's cursed
Couldn't agree more!!!
(Only one exception: while I agree that violins can be strident, that depends on mode of playing and acoustics as well. Often they aren't strident, many times they are indeed.)
For all practical purposes, me too. And I also love my Berkeley DAC.
To you and everyone as well!
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Genuinely what makes a front end SOTA ,price?
As far as I am aware Blizzard is not my lovechild.
Peaceful and Prosperous New Year everyone.
Keith.
One gets the impression price is it. Certainly not any descriptions of how to know SOTA otherwise.
I actually have a big problem with what audio truth is ..
I go to classical , but mainly ballets as my wife is a teacher/dancer/whatever , the orchestra is mostly in the pits. Occasionally do go to our local orchestra's performance , but the venues arent world class
Any other live music I go to is almost invariably amplified by cheap and nasty peavys or the like.. even recently listening to a singer with a pianist and guitarist in a private house , was amplified..
IMHO my system sounds a lot "better" than almost all live to me .. retrieves more detail , you hear the strumming of the double bass and timbre of the instrument , which in the live performance is more of just an amorphous mess...
So all I ask of my system is to involve me more emotionally as I upgrade..simple as that.
My basis for comparison of how my system has improved , or not , apart from the emotional thing , is how I remember how my last system played it.. which may or may not have been correct...that is my reference...
I had a huge collection of physical media , many 1000's of cd's (now ripped) , and when I was into analog the same with records.. these days Im on roon and tidal and really love exploring new stuff or finding nuggets in my collection rather than listening to Eva cassidy for the 567th time... I felt somewhat liberated donating most of it to the local charity org.
What i find amazing with my system as it stands is that often I had to listen to the music a few times before I got into it , nowdays I can appreciate the artists intent and the recording and really enjoy on the first go..
I go to classical , but mainly ballets as my wife is a teacher/dancer/whatever , the orchestra is mostly in the pits. Occasionally do go to our local orchestra's performance , but the venues arent world class
Any other live music I go to is almost invariably amplified by cheap and nasty peavys or the like.. even recently listening to a singer with a pianist and guitarist in a private house , was amplified..
IMHO my system sounds a lot "better" than almost all live to me .. retrieves more detail , you hear the strumming of the double bass and timbre of the instrument , which in the live performance is more of just an amorphous mess...
So all I ask of my system is to involve me more emotionally as I upgrade..simple as that.
My basis for comparison of how my system has improved , or not , apart from the emotional thing , is how I remember how my last system played it.. which may or may not have been correct...that is my reference...
I had a huge collection of physical media , many 1000's of cd's (now ripped) , and when I was into analog the same with records.. these days Im on roon and tidal and really love exploring new stuff or finding nuggets in my collection rather than listening to Eva cassidy for the 567th time... I felt somewhat liberated donating most of it to the local charity org.
What i find amazing with my system as it stands is that often I had to listen to the music a few times before I got into it , nowdays I can appreciate the artists intent and the recording and really enjoy on the first go..
Better words have not been spoken Frantz. I actually wanted to create a new thread on this but since you put it so eloquently, I will tell my story here.
A week ago I heard the worst piano in my life. It sounded dead, lifeless and every other poor adjective you can think of. I could barely listen to it. What was the system? This:
Yup. It was the real deal that sounded this "bad." If this was the reference for real Piano, I am pretty sure all of us will jump from the nearest balcony!
I ask a question earlier if people hear any of the distortions mentioned in the original article. I do. And while I see the pleasing aspects of them, I opt for digital because it lacks those distortions.
There is no question about this. No way can we logically in any form or fashion demonstrate that two parallel recordings with one analog and the other digital, means the former is more faithful. We can measure and demonstrate the analog distortions. My R2R's 80 db signal to noise ratio has no hiding place in that regard. Nor what it does when it fully saturates.
Same to you and thanks for putting a smile on my face with that post.
Of course not. I am sure she knows her iPod sounds better.I trust you didn't communicate that to that young girl playing
BTW, I was there in the mall waiting for my wife finish her shopping. It made for a pleasant half hour while the kids played Christmas music. It was a music teacher association of some sort.
it's not only price. it is getting every piece of the vinyl chain optimized. but you do need to spend 'enough' on each part to have that part not hold the 'whole' back.
more talented participants can sometimes get moderately priced vinyl front ends to perform above their weight class. and some vintage gear sounds great but is not so spendy. so the dollars spent as far as performance is not the whole picture.
turntable, tone arm, cartridge, phono cable, platform, tt weight, phono stage. set-up, clean records, good pressings, good power grid, noise issues resolved, etc, etc.
OTOH a digital front end, particularly with silver discs, is plug and play pretty much. and, of course, the difference between very good, really good, and great digital is not earth shaking because there are not so many variables. with turntables there are very significant steps up in performance as each piece of the puzzle gets improved. it's mind boggling as you see more and more information come from the grooves beyond your previous reference.
in 2002 I bought a Rockport Sirius III turntable and at that time I was astonished how much better it was than anything I had heard up to that time. now 13 years later my reference has moved a couple of magnitudes beyond that point. and it's likely there is still more to come. digital has not yet approached where my analog was in 2002.
steve williams
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Of course not. I am sure she knows her iPod sounds better.
BTW, I was there in the mall waiting for my wife finish her shopping. It made for a pleasant half hour while the kids played Christmas music. It was a music teacher association of some sort.
But in the mind of this sweet little girl I bet she was thrilled to have had the experience. This was a piano on a stone floor in the middle of an open mall. What did you expect? And no I bet she doesn't know her iPod sounds better. Just the way I see it anyway
Hi Amir, the example is just a wrong one to use in this context, if you want to compare a piano go to a live show in the right seat. Live shows some can sound bad, but if you to a few right ones nothing will come close and will teach you much more than Harman tests, and that is not meant to be a dig
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