Is High End Audio Gear Worth the Money?

[morricab]

In my opinion, 3-D imaging is insufficient for producing presence. It is necessary, but insufficient. For a good sense of presence, I also want to hear a sense of energy expanding into the room, convincing dynamics, proper scale, and sufficient loudness. Tone and timbre must also be good.

For me, presence is a more holistic quality where many individual attributes are necessary and must come together. Basically, when the listener imagines he is in the presence of the musicians, a level of believability has been achieved and the system is capable of presenting a sense of realism.

Next time just throw in the kitchen sink to your explanation…

 

[microstrip]

(...) Disagree. Sound changes depending on distance and this is easily captured by a recording or added to it by the folks doing the recording.

Yes, know since long. It is why people and scholars say that the stereo 3D image is not real - it depends on added artificial tonal cues to create an illusion of distance, as you say bellow. Simple physics vectors.

Stereo imaging does have it's limitations but these are overstated by proponents of multichannel and the fact stereo recordings do in fact contain cues as to distances that are capable of producing a 3-D soundstage are often disregarded. Many times they are disregarded because the person has had no real experience of a system that is capable of presenting such a soundstage.

No, they are disregarded because they are not predictable and depend on too many specific circumstances. Real life, including the debates in this forum and the often elitist audiophile speech are proof of it.

The reason is the soundstage is a result of the complete system which includes and requires every aspect of the system to be optimized, including such things as cables and AC power quality that often are disregarded.

Yes, but if something depends on specific power cables or extraordinary conditions it can be considered intrinsic of a format. Just MHO

This is more an issue with ignorance of what stereo is capable of

Yes, I know others also said it and explained it much better than you and me.

combined with am ignorance of psychoacoustics

Here I deeply disagree with you - some of them know more about stereo psychoacoustics than you seem to imagine.

and a bias towards multichannel.

Surely - it creates a more real and predictable 3D, they are biased towards it. But perhaps not as enjoyable as stereo to us, stereo lovers.

 

[Al M.]

Dear @Rexp and @godofwealth,

IMHO, there is no real 3D imaging in most of the music we listen to—no stage depth either. Almost all modern music is recorded using multi-mic setups, with microphones placed very close to each instrument.

There are exceptions, such as classical recordings from the ’50s and early ’60s made with just two or three microphones positioned above the conductor’s head, or some very early mono recordings made with a single mic. Another rare exception is Ken Christianson’s “True Stereo” recordings for the Naim label. But for the vast majority of music, close-miking dominates.

In many cases, the 3D image or stage depth people talk about is actually a product of the listening room’s reverberations and reflections—and the placement of the speakers. These spatial cues aren’t captured by the microphones to begin with. Put on a pair of proper headphones and you’ll notice how that artificial 3D image vanishes. It’s just room echo.

Systems that rely on this kind of artificially produced imaging often struggle to reproduce electronic tracks or synth pop with strong bass and high BPM. Why? Because the artificial “3D image” continues to linger even after the actual signal has stopped and a new one has started. These setups simply can’t handle electronic, pop, or most rock music at high levels.

You don’t have to like that kind of music—but it’s great for testing. For example, play Billie Jean from Thriller. If you can clearly follow every note of the synth bass and all the details are crisp and distinct, then your system’s doing fine.

IMHO it’s better to focus on how realistic the instruments sound, how lifelike the sound in general, does it keep you continue listening or not when evaluating an audio setup instead of descriptions like 3D image.

While you have received a lot of pushback here, I will partially agree with you -- partially.

There was a time, after my electronics had gotten better, but my room had not yet, where every recording in my room had "depth". My audiophile friends loved the effect at the time, I hated it. It put me at exaggerated distance from the music and I knew it was not real.

The reason for the "depth" was, as you say, excessive room reverberation, reflections and 'echo'.

So you completely have a point here.

Once I fixed the problem, I achieved great spatial depth where the information actually appears to be recorded, and direct or more direct sounding recordings became just that. Now I am at a point where my system achieves great variation in spatial depth and hall/recording venue information -- as it should be.

***

Where I now diverge from your opinion as where everyone so far does.

There are lots of recordings with actual spatial depth and in many cases I think it is real. Yes, modern recordings are multi-miked, but in classical recordings there is also hall reverb overlay on the overall sound, and as a result spatial information is often correct. When, for example, in an orchestral recording a flute sounds midstage and brass sounds in the back of the stage, while other instruments like strings sound much more upfront, this corresponds with what I am hearing in the concert hall when sitting relatively close to the orchestra. And it is often recorded as such. Sure, you'll find the occasional orchestral multi-miked recording where the brass is at the front, which is typically wrong, but this is an exception more than it is the rule.

Do I suspect there are still some artifacts in my system/room where the listening room falsifies information and there are elements in the spatial presentation that are not actually on the recording? Sure. Yet by and large, I do think the spatial presentation is actually encoded in the recording.

 

[PeterA]

Next time just throw in the kitchen sink to your explanation…

My point is that 3-D and presence are not synonymous, IMO. An awful lot has to be right with one’s system for the listener to feel as though he is in the presence of the musicians.

One important factor is the ability to play at a volume that corresponds with the scale and size of the presentation as created by the mic placement and the information on the recording.

A sense of presence is an illusion that is easily broken when things are off.

 

[hopkins]

One important factor is the ability to play at a volume that corresponds with the scale and size of the presentation as created by the mic placement and the information on the recording.

I don't see how volume has anything to do with it, and why volume should "match" mic placement. The volume at which you play will simply define what dynamic range you will hear given your room's ambient noise.

 

[tima]

Lot's of, ahem, viewpoints, on imaging and presence.

I suspect the varying opinions come from the fact that the stereo image is not between your speakers, it is between your ears. We seem to have a built-in or evolved ability to geo-locate sound around us -- probably as a survival mechanism. But where we locate a sound is not the same as knowing what causes the sound. I speculate that to which we attribute a sound is based on our experience -- and there we are each unique although common experience can yield similar results.

If, for example, you know classical orchestral music and attend live performances, you have that experience to accompany listening to a stereo reproduction of an orchestra. Maybe seeing an orchestra play on TV or even appear on an album cover may lead to visualizing an orchestra when you play your stereo. But from the live experience or even the 2-D experience, as some maintain, there is no 3-D imaging in the concert hall, with your eyes closed. -- at least not for me.

If you claim to have 3-D imaging while listening to your stereo that would seem to be your own product and dependent on your experience. What specific image(s) do you have? If the image is actually (objectively) on the recording presumably you'd see the image of Jascha Heifetz in your mind's eye/ear and not see Fritz Kreisler when hearing a Heifetz violin concerto when you've never seen either of them? If he turns while playing, do you see the back of his 3-D head? Do you have the 3-D image of a kettle drum if you've never seen one?

Depth and presence are different from 3-D imaging. Depth, so I speculate, comes more from geo-location. In a recent review I describe choristers standing on risers, rows that are behind and higher than those in front. Back and sidewall reflections in the concert hall are on the record in terms of time arrival. I have a sense of energy moving off of its sources/performers into the space around them, rising above them. Coupled with depth, this to me is presence, energy in a space -- what I call the sense of an orchestra in a hall.

 

[morricab]

Lot's of, ahem, viewpoints, on imaging and presence.

I suspect the varying opinions come from the fact that the stereo image is not between your speakers, it is between your ears. We seem to have a built-in or evolved ability to geo-locate sound around us -- probably as a survival mechanism. But where we locate a sound is not the same as knowing what causes the sound. I speculate that to which we attribute a sound is based on our experience -- and there we are each unique although common experience can yield similar results.

If, for example, you know classical orchestral music and attend live performances, you have that experience to accompany listening to a stereo reproduction of an orchestra. Maybe seeing an orchestra play on TV or even appear on an album cover may lead to visualizing an orchestra when you play your stereo. But from the live experience or even the 2-D experience, as some maintain, there is no 3-D imaging in the concert hall, with your eyes closed. -- at least not for me.

If you claim to have 3-D imaging while listening to your stereo that would seem to be your own product and dependent on your experience. What specific image(s) do you have? If the image is actually (objectively) on the recording presumably you'd see the image of Jascha Heifetz in your mind's eye/ear and not see Fritz Kreisler when hearing a Heifetz violin concerto when you've never seen either of them? If he turns while playing, do you see the back of his 3-D head? Do you have the 3-D image of a kettle drum if you've never seen one?

Depth and presence are different from 3-D imaging. Depth, so I speculate, comes more from geo-location. In a recent review I describe choristers standing on risers, rows that are behind and higher than those in front. Back and sidewall reflections in the concert hall are on the record in terms of time arrival. I have a sense of energy moving off of its sources/performers into the space around them, rising above them. Coupled with depth, this to me is presence, energy in a space -- what I call the sense of an orchestra in a hall.

You say that there is no 3D imaging in a concert hall with your eyes closed...really? You of course in live music have a 3D image right in front of your eyes...visually. You mean to tell me that when you then close your eyes you cannot "see" images based on hearing? I can do so rather easily.

The beauty of the human brain is its ability to fill in the gaps. You talk about survival and hearing the location of a sound but not knowing it's cause. That is not to say that you cannot easily guess what could be causing the sound. For musical instruments, it is easy to distinguish instruments and know the cause AND I think you can generate a mental image of the instrument from the dispersion pattern of that instrument as well. How it throws out sound is as unique as it's tonal characteristics and this affects your mental construct of that instrument in its totality.

3D imaging from a stereo is by design of both the equipment and the recordings. All sounds you hear as music are your own product and constructed in your brain. Imaging is not different from timbre recognition in that regard. However, the Information needed for your brain to make this reconstruction is in the recording by design...if your system doesn't give you the signals correctly, then your mental image reconstruction will suffer. There is no image, per se, on the recording but the frequency and phase information that your brain needs to build it is there.

This argument about Heifetz and Kreisler is somewhat silly. It is obviously not a music video but that doesn't mean you can't have a 3D, in-the-room violin image from those recordings (maybe those are the best examples of recordings given they are at best early stereo...although good mono also has a 3D image). If he turns you don't "see" the back of his head but you might get the mental image of the violin turning because the way it radiates sound is not symmetrical and this will lead to tone and phase shifts you will hear as a violin turning. You don't visualize the person at all because they are not what is making sound.

Depth is somewhat different from presence but 3D imaging is an essential component to presence. You won't get so much presence on a big orchestral recording because they are generally much further from the audience...unless you sit front and center. A better example is a string quartet, which can be portrayed as "They are here" and most orchestral done right is more "you are there". A good recent example is from Munich. I got to hear a live string quartet (Goldmund Quartet) playing in the Goldmund room. The space was not large and so the players were close and sonically it was very present. You could easily locate each player visually and sonically (eyes closed too) and the sound was forward and warm (they played on all old instruments from early 1700s). It was embarrassingly good and poor Goldmund stereo sounded horrible by comparison. I bought one of their LPs and thankfully it is well recorded. One my system at home much of the warmth, presence (including 3D imaging of the instruments in their own space) and dynamics are well reproduced. Is it as intense as the live? No but better than I had hoped because of the good recording. When those guys played live in the room, there was no soundstage depth to speak of because they were right there but their lateral positioning was easily discerned and instruments were in their own space...like I later heard on the recording.

Sense of a orchestra in a hall is fine but there should be some ability to locate specific instruments, particularly woodwinds and percussion, in that space with some sense of the volume the sound of that instrument occupies...at least for better recordings.

 

[Young Skywalker]

Lot's of, ahem, viewpoints, on imaging and presence.

I suspect the varying opinions come from the fact that the stereo image is not between your speakers, it is between your ears. We seem to have a built-in or evolved ability to geo-locate sound around us -- probably as a survival mechanism. But where we locate a sound is not the same as knowing what causes the sound. I speculate that to which we attribute a sound is based on our experience -- and there we are each unique although common experience can yield similar results.

If, for example, you know classical orchestral music and attend live performances, you have that experience to accompany listening to a stereo reproduction of an orchestra. Maybe seeing an orchestra play on TV or even appear on an album cover may lead to visualizing an orchestra when you play your stereo. But from the live experience or even the 2-D experience, as some maintain, there is no 3-D imaging in the concert hall, with your eyes closed. -- at least not for me.

If you claim to have 3-D imaging while listening to your stereo that would seem to be your own product and dependent on your experience. What specific image(s) do you have? If the image is actually (objectively) on the recording presumably you'd see the image of Jascha Heifetz in your mind's eye/ear and not see Fritz Kreisler when hearing a Heifetz violin concerto when you've never seen either of them? If he turns while playing, do you see the back of his 3-D head? Do you have the 3-D image of a kettle drum if you've never seen one?

Depth and presence are different from 3-D imaging. Depth, so I speculate, comes more from geo-location. In a recent review I describe choristers standing on risers, rows that are behind and higher than those in front. Back and sidewall reflections in the concert hall are on the record in terms of time arrival. I have a sense of energy moving off of its sources/performers into the space around them, rising above them. Coupled with depth, this to me is presence, energy in a space -- what I call the sense of an orchestra in a hall.

I can absolutely locate (with eyes closed) on both the width and depth plane, the location of a particular instrument within a live symphony orchestra… from my typical seating location (around row R and close to dead centre). Are those images three-dimensional? I guess that depends on what one means by the term. What I do know is that my audio system presents images in a very similar way to what I hear live, recording permitting.

 

[tima]

Are those images three-dimensional? I guess that depends on what one means by the term. What I do know is that my audio system presents images in a very similar way to what I hear live, recording permitting.

What do you mean by three-dimensional ?

edit: I believe location / locating is different from imaging.

 

[tima]

The beauty of the human brain is its ability to fill in the gaps.

You're making my point. Exactly what gets 'filled-in' is based on your experience and no one elses. Your fill-in is not on the recording, it's in your head. Quite different from the concert hall where an external reality causes your images through your eyes.

I do think it is odd that your image is of a dis-embodied instrument. We have different experiences though I've never had that one.

 

[hopkins]

When you attend a live events, you don't necessarily pay attention to presence/location because you don't need to - you have visual clues, and you are just enjoying the music without consideration for these aspects.

However, if you ever wear ear plugs at a loud event, you may notice, when you close your eyes, that everything seems to be more "2 dimensional" and it is much harder to locate soloists on stage.

 

[Young Skywalker]

What do you mean by three-dimensional ?

edit: I believe location / locating is different from imaging.

I mean that it is perceptual. We know that instruments propagate sound waves in multiple directions (although I never bought into the idea that a loudspeaker ought to mimic this for high fidelity playback of recordings). Thus, reflections in the concert hall create a halo around an instrument, adding to its dimensionality with its direct sound gradually blending with the reflected sound field and the sound from nearby instruments.

 

[morricab]

You're making my point. Exactly what gets 'filled-in' is based on your experience and no one elses. Your fill-in is not on the recording, it's in your head. Quite different from the concert hall where an external reality causes your images through your eyes.

I do think it is odd that your image is of a dis-embodied instrument. We have different experiences though I've never had that one.

No, the fill in happens automatically because of the encoded information on the recording. It is not a conscious effort to hear it.

You mean to tell me that you "see" Heifetz in your room with that violin when there is presence/imaging in the recording? What about people you don't really know what they look like? So, of course it is an instrument floating in space and that is not a problem because we all subconsciously know that there is a human (for now at least) attached to it. The visualization comes from sonic cues and other than a moan from Keith Jarret you don't get those human sounds from a recording...except a singer of course. But, even with a singer you are visualizing a head but probably not a whole person because that is still the domain of live. Maybe in the future there will be a hologram projection that allows you to have a more immersive 3D experience and no longer relying only on sonic cues from stereo or surround sound.

 

[Amir]

Image is different to soundstage so 3D image is different to depth or any other parameters of soundstage.

In good room and proper speaker position even cheap stereo systems like $500 panasonic can give you good soundstage but only good playback systems can give you 3D image.

 

[microstrip]

I don't see how volume has anything to do with it, and why volume should "match" mic placement. The volume at which you play will simply define what dynamic range you will hear given your room's ambient noise.

IMO it does - our ears perceive the "hidden cues" in stereo that create the pseudo 3D if their are played within some limited range. Good recording engineers create a recording expecting an optimal listening level. Peter Walker of Quad has referred to it in his writings.

 

[microstrip]

(...) I suspect the varying opinions come from the fact that the stereo image is not between your speakers, it is between your ears.

As long as you consider our brain is between the ears you are correct!

We seem to have a built-in or evolved ability to geo-locate sound around us -- probably as a survival mechanism.

Yes, scholars wrote a lot about it.

But where we locate a sound is not the same as knowing what causes the sound. I speculate that to which we attribute a sound is based on our experience -- and there we are each unique although common experience can yield similar results.

The mechanisms of sound location imply time differences (phase) and tonal modifications for depth and height. Some people say the first are innate and universal, the second is learned by experience and has large variation between people.

If, for example, you know classical orchestral music and attend live performances, you have that experience to accompany listening to a stereo reproduction of an orchestra. Maybe seeing an orchestra play on TV or even appear on an album cover may lead to visualizing an orchestra when you play your stereo. But from the live experience or even the 2-D experience, as some maintain, there is no 3-D imaging in the concert hall, with your eyes closed. -- at least not for me.

By the time you listen to an orchestra first time, the localization mechanisms are formed. Surely, if, for example someone has ear surgery or damage to hearing he has to train again for tonal cues.

If you claim to have 3-D imaging while listening to your stereo that would seem to be your own product and dependent on your experience. What specific image(s) do you have? If the image is actually (objectively) on the recording presumably you'd see the image of Jascha Heifetz in your mind's eye/ear and not see Fritz Kreisler when hearing a Heifetz violin concerto when you've never seen either of them? If he turns while playing, do you see the back of his 3-D head? Do you have the 3-D image of a kettle drum if you've never seen one?

Stereo has no real (physical) 3D imaging. You are now addressing auditory and visual memory - they surely affect how we perceive sound.

Depth and presence are different from 3-D imaging. Depth, so I speculate, comes more from geo-location. In a recent review I describe choristers standing on risers, rows that are behind and higher than those in front. Back and sidewall reflections in the concert hall are on the record in terms of time arrival. I have a sense of energy moving off of its sources/performers into the space around them, rising above them. Coupled with depth, this to me is presence, energy in a space -- what I call the sense of an orchestra in a hall.

Depth in stereo and its connection to psychoacoustics is an well studied subject - IMO there is no need to re-invent the wheel. It involves many factors, but is simple and logical. The same for presence. Oversimplifying the subject or making it confuse does not bring knowledge.

The best source of information on the subject are books and articles teaching sound engineers how to achieve depth and presence or professional audio forums, unfortunately not the audiophile forums.

IMO what you and me (and Peter, BTW) often address as "energy" is much more than what audiophiles typically call presence.

 

[MarkusBarkus]

...one wonders: What do blind audiophiles think of stereo imaging? I wonder too.

 

[hopkins]

IMO it does - our ears perceive the "hidden cues" in stereo that create the pseudo 3D if their are played within some limited range. Good recording engineers create a recording expecting an optimal listening level. Peter Walker of Quad has referred to it in his writings.

If you play music too low, you are going to be missing things and if you play music too loud as well (ear protection mechanism), but I was mot referring to extreme situations...

 

[andromedaaudio]

Perfect natural soundstage .

....Starts with high placed side firing woofers

 

[DasguteOhr]

Perfect natural soundstage .

....Starts with high placed side firing woofers

Not necessarily. You should listen to the new Dali Kore speakers. I'm going out on a limb and saying they're the best normal floor standing speakers in terms of soundstage.