Live vs. Reproduced?

[terryj]

To answer a couple of further points. There is obviously a very short term memory problem around here: I mentioned many times that FR is not key to the problem. Jumping up and down hysterically and pounding your fist on the table is not going to change the need to understand that I am not fussed about FR, in the same way that users with headphones with dramatically different FR's are not fussed, Tim!!!

that's because you are so blinded by your brilliance and decide on your own peculiar personal definitions, different to about every other person on the planet.

YOU may not give two hoots for the FR, that does not mean no-one else does. That you are unable to grasp that your tiny little three inch drivers having a FR of plus or minus 10 db is NOT a distortion of the input signal just about sums the thread up.

I take that as saying you refuse to do the distortion measurements/FR sweeps of your system?

Ok, show us the measured improvements due to your electrical tweaks.

Oh, I see, they too are simply measured by ear. Cool, no bias there then.

From your point of view it is obviously impossible for 3" speakers to replicate a Marshall even if you drop the volume so that it is equivalent to having the guitar amp 20 miles away. Something piddling obviously can't touch a hairy chested monster, it just ain't got the balls. Sorry, I must have missed reading the tattoo on the side of the Marshall that said that ...

Frank

Ok frank, tell me why U2 simply don't carry around a bunch of your piddly noise boxes? Surely it would be easier to freight and set up.

Your system can truly reproduce the concert experience in your room using these drivers. Ok then, it is only a matter of number vs volume, as per you there is NO other parameter the speakers need to posses.

You are good at working these little mathematical figures back and forward (every body note, that per franks world there is only one spec that tells us anything, db output at 1m) so do the sum and tell us how many three inch piddly boxes U2 need for their next stadium gig.



A serious question of a general nature here...at what point DOES the forum call 'enough'? Genuinely curious.

Can I rabbit on about my own personal discoveries in audio (stuffing a dead rat in the port really helps bring out the full potential of a system), and can I constantly pollute threads with my discovery, start new threads on the same subject every time one gets closed?

All because of the (correct BTW) thought that everyone has the right to express their opinion? How do we marry the two concepts together?? esp when they come into conflict, as here.

I get that it can be difficult....

In the interest of politeness do we suffer the ignorant loudmouth at the dinner party? Especially if that person shows no politeness in return and continually interrupts the talk around them with their singular hobby horse?

A question of social conduct I'd say, interested in seeing the reactions/thoughts of others.

(not really important to me, I hardly ever post, but intrigued by this question of group behaviour)

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Frank, we actually agree on a couple of pretty important things, and this is one of them:

I mentioned many times that FR is not key to the problem. Jumping up and down hysterically and pounding your fist on the table is not going to change the need to understand that I am not fussed about FR, in the same way that users with headphones with dramatically different FR's are not fussed, Tim!!!

No one here has speakers which produce a flat FR in their room, and if they did, they wouldn't like it. Room gain is a fact of life, not just in music reproduction, but in everything we hear. Take it away, listen in an anechoic chamber, and it just sounds unnatural. So we don't treat our rooms quite that much, and our headphones, which don't benefit from rooms, are usually deliberately colored to compensate for their lack of that benefit. So achieving perfectly flat FR, in room, is not the key to creating good sound, if that's the key you're talking about.

Another thing we agree on is that clean electronics are important. I'd even go the next step and say flat FR in electronics is important. Do you want to reproduce the recording to the best of your ability, within your room? Then of course it is important. If that's the goal, why would you allow fidelity to the recording to begin to degrade before it has to, even deliberately, even at the source? I completely fail to understand this point of view.

What we disagree on are a) The importance of the stages involved; you seem to think that recordings and transducers are not at all important, are completely at the will of the electronics. I not only disagree, I think that's upside down. b) The way clean electronics are achieved; you seem to believe that if you tweak (and these are not even substantive changes) a poor system it can transcend its own design. I think clean, accurate electronics are, while not something that is necessarily very expensive, a result of excellent design, and that soldering a mains cable directly to the wall will affect nothing but your psychology.

There are many, many people in this hobby who want to believe that magic rocks or isolation platforms or wall outlets that cost more than a decent bedroom system will transform their experience and take them someplace special. There is more than enough psychology involved in this hobby to let them believe that...for awhile. Then they are on to the next upgrade, the next magic cable, the next tweak. The magic, as you yourself have said, is always illusive. The results are always unmeasurable. The methodologies always fall well short of even questionable. It is always psychology. Always has been, from the first meaningless, unmeasurable tweak. You are one of the most aggrieved victims of the syndrome I have ever met, Frank, and while you have my sympathy, with a bit of guilt I also thank you. This is a discussion board, and you've given us much to discuss. Your rantings from the dark corner of the room have resulted in a lot of real, substantive discussion that I have enjoyed very much and have learned much from. They may have even caused a few of the more normal tweakers to rethink. Keep up the good work.

Tim

PS: in the spirit of "a picture is worth a thousand words," I'd like to introduce my new avatar, a Mac Mini in platform shoes. Let's call him "Pee Wee" for Pee Wee Herman's Big Shoe Dance, shall we?

 

[RBFC]

Folks,

Let's avoid issuing personal attacks. It's not necessary that we agree on anything or everything that individuals post here. If a thread or post isn't in line with your personal viewpoint, then merely don't read it anymore! When you walk through the mall, do you feel obligated to go into every store? No, you choose the ones that interest you. At any rate, nothing Frank says is forcing anyone to abandon their preferences in a system, regardless of how many posts he makes (or anyone else for that matter). The WBF TECHNICAL LIBRARY and expert forums are the sections where more scientifically-proven dissertations can be found.

If we all agreed with every post, and nodded our heads in assent, this forum (and most all forums) would quickly die.

Thanks,

Lee

 

[RogerD]

I would like to thank Frank for putting out some very interesting ideas about sound reproduction capabilities. Whether you agree in some part or disagree,
atleast he has forced some of us to think out of the box and in this hobby that's always a good thing.

 

[Tom Danley]

Frank, what speakers are you / they speaking of (3 inch driver)?

Best,
Tom

 

[Tom Danley]

"I would like to thank Frank for putting out some very interesting ideas about sound reproduction capabilities. Whether you agree in some part or disagree,
atleast he has forced some of us to think out of the box and in this hobby that's always a good thing. "

Not only that but depending what the answer to the above is, he may be describing something real that anyone else would hear but might use different words.

A small full range source can radiate a simple pattern which can make the speaker disappear so far as part of the total image.
Also, a single coherent source radiates a single input event as a single acoustic event, most multi-way speakers spread out an impulse in time vs frequency and while we may not hear "that" discretely, i do believe (spreading a signal out in time) effects the subjective dynamic at a minimum.
Now, that is not to ignore the limitations of the single driver, just that the good ones can produce a very strong stereo image / mono phantom. Remember the Manger bending wave driver and the Quad esl-63 is an attempt to radiate the same simple spherical segment that a small full range driver can radiate. Our Synergy horns at work do this on a much larger scale with a full range constant directivity horn.
You definitely hear the kinds of things that make the patterns that show up in a spherical measurement below as well as the more familiar response etc.
Best,
Tom Danley
Danley Sound Labs

http://www.etcinc.us/tech/nl043_far_field_criteria.pdf

 

[mep]

Tom-If you read back through the thread there are actually pictures posted of Frank's system. It is a small Phillips Home Theater in a Box system. These are two-way speakers Tom-not a single driver.

 

[Tom Danley]

Ah, Thanks, i didn't see that, I didn't look enough. I was thinking maybe he had some little fostex drivers or something (which can sound very good but not very loud).
Best,
Tom

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Yeah, Tom, I'm very aware of the qualities of Fostex, Lowthers, etc. and have asked Frank the same questions in multiple ways to be absolutely sure I understand his assertions. To put it simply, he puts his ear directly in front of, just inches from the piezo "super tweeter" in one of those little Philips speakers and experiences no coherency issues at all, he hears the entire output of the speaker in balance. And this because he has hard-wired connections and tweaked his power supply. I suspect a 3" Fostex strapped to a hole in a piece of plywood would be a major upgrade.

Draw your own conclusions.

Tim

 

[mep]

Mark, I'm sure you've read post http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?3000-Live-vs.-Reproduced&p=45821&viewfull=1#post45821, which was a direct response to a very similar query to this one, from you. The trouble is, it would be quite hard to pick up the impact of the changes I've made on a normal scope, it's not about the normal sagging of voltage and ripple reduction that you normally worry about. Some very significant changes were made in key areas of the power supply functioning, these were key to getting a lot of the results, a lot of what I do is achieved through understanding derived from very precise modelling in Spice programs. Some of what I have done I would put in the category of IP, so I am not going to hand it over for nix. My early experiments with the Perreaux were done using the normal tweaker's way, loads of low ESR caps hooked in everywhere; a repair technician would have a heart attack if he looked inside!! Frank

Ok Frank. In this post you inferred that you made lots of changes to the power supply in order to improve its performance. In the post that you referred to at the beginning of your new post where you answered my question about what you did to the power supply, you said this:

In other words, nothing has been done to change the intrinsic components of the machine to improve their capability, I have just given the parts within the best possible chance to perform at their best. And it does the trick ...

Which is it Frank? Did you make “some very significant changes” or was “nothing done to change the intrinsic components of the machine to improve their capability?” If you don’t make any changes to the parts in the power supply in order to improve the performance, are we back to soldering the power cord to the wall socket and some ferrite beads?

 

[DaveyF]

Dead right, DaveyF -- be afraid ... be very afraid. The contagion is spreading, like an insidious cancer, it might seep into all corners and contaminate innocent young audio virgins, who may end with the ludicrous idea that that you can enjoy playback sounding as good as the real thing. A very dangerous, destructive malaise ...

Best to stamp it out, destroy it now, with wave after wave of ferocious attacks, before it goes too far, causes too many problems, creates too many uncertainties ...

Frank

Frank, comments like that simply reinforce the impression I have of you...and that is that you have absolutely no idea as to what you are talking about

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Ok Frank. In this post you inferred that you made lots of changes to the power supply in order to improve its performance. In the post that you referred to at the beginning of your new post where you answered my question about what you did to the power supply, you said this:



Which is it Frank? Did you make “some very significant changes” or was “nothing done to change the intrinsic components of the machine to improve their capability?” If you don’t make any changes to the parts in the power supply in order to improve the performance, are we back to soldering the power cord to the wall socket and some ferrite beads?

And turning off cell phones and such...

Tim

 

[mep]

OTOH, the unsettling point to me is that he is seemingly beginning to get other believers in his ideas and thoughts...hmm

Remember Davey, grown men actually joined the Heaven’s Gate cult in San Diego. That was the cult that believed that there was a spaceship hiding behind Haley’s Comet and once they killed themselves, they would hitch a ride on the space ship. All of the men that joined the cult (except the founder of course) had to be castrated. Now if you can talk a bunch of grown men into cutting their onions off, you are one smooth talker Betty Crocker.

My point is, never underestimate the power of persuasion. Sometimes the more outlandish the ideas are, the more people want to believe in them. It would be enticing to sell off your mega-buck stereo system and spend $150 on a Phillips HTIB and know it would sound better than live right?

 

[garylkoh]

As a speaker designer and manufacture with a foot both in the subjective and objective camp, I totally disagree with Frank's assertion that a HTIB with little plastic speakers can sound "live", but not having heard that particular implementation I have to give him the benefit of the doubt that in his mind, he experiences what he experiences and if he thinks that at the other end of the house, he can imagine a live band playing in the room where his system is...... it defys the laws of physics, but you can't discount psychoacoustics and the illusion in Frank's mind (and I mean no disrespect).

I cite a couple of examples. My sister has perfect absolute pitch. She has sung as a soloist in front of a symphony orchestra, and she helps evaluate my designs. However, she still clings to a little Aiwa mini-component system and a pair of JBL speakers I bought her nearly 20 years ago. Why? To her, it sounds "live" but a very small version of live. At the low volumes she listens to in her apartment, that is all the system she wants. She can play a cassette tape of a recording of the choir she sung with and hear the voices of her friends.

Outside audio, I visited a dear customer of mine on a island North of Victoria island. He has a pair of Genesis 1.1, the Clearaudio Statement turntable, and all Audio Research reference electronics. Obviously wealthy, but very environment conscious. Because his audio hobby is such a waste of resources, he eschews heating in his house. It was almost into winter when I visited him, and his listening room was nice and warm from the glow of the tubes. Up in his main living area, it was also quite nice and cosy - without obvious sources of heat. When I asked him, he pointed to a rock that I thought was there for the decor. He told me that it was the sole source of heat in the room, he's got them throughout the house- a heater that concentrates all the heat of a tea light so that none of it is wasted. He tried to explain to me that a single tea light was enough to heat a room if ALL the energy in the wax was used and not wasted.

http://www.thestoneheaters.com/Pg2.Story/story.html

 

[RogerD]

If you wan't to argue the details or semantics that's fine. I don't think there is a DIY or audio equipment manufacturer that would argue that low ESR electrolytics will not greatly improve meaureable and non-measurable low level distortion. The best application is in power supplies and coupling applications.

 

[silviajulieta]

Frank, comments like that simply enforce the impression I have of you...and that is that you have absolutely no idea as to what you are talking about

Dear DaveyF: At least I can attest that under some cirmcumstances when you hear your speaker tweeter at 1" the tweeter " disappear ".


In the other side I could say ( I want to think. ) that he knows what he is talking about but IMHO I think that even that he is talking in audio terms that all of us use and know the meaning of those audio terms is way different. I don't think he is literally deaf or crazy, only that he is talking in his own " audio language " that we can't even interpret it.

I don't think he is a " silly person " because ( as I posted ) he is clever enough that mantain people posting here page after page!

Problem with him too is that does not give precise answers even he does not gives answers when we ask, at least not all answers to all questions. That's why I said is: clever enough.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

 

[RogerD]

Why? To her, it sounds "live" but a very small version of live.

Bingo! we have a front line winner!

I doubt Frank would argue that point, I know I wouldn't. But that is the essence of what I experience,it's no doubt on a larger scale because my system is fairly large. I would never say that my system replicates "a live event" 100 pct, although some will go to extreme levels to get there and I find nothing wrong with that.

 

[garylkoh]

Bingo! we have a front line winner!

I doubt Frank would argue that point, I know I wouldn't. But that is the essence of what I experience,it's no doubt on a larger scale because my system is fairly large. I would never say that my system replicates "a live event" 100 pct, although some will go to extreme levels to get there and I find nothing wrong with that.

Roger, unfortunately, that is not Frank's point. His point is that his system replicates the level of a live orchestra. From 3-in drivers, I find that extremely hard to believe because the coefficient of restitution between air and the 3-in cone makes it impossible to go beyond a certain spl at a certain frequency. That spl falls logarithmically with frequency.

 

[DaveyF]

Dear DaveyF: At least I can attest that under some cirmcumstances when you hear your speaker tweeter at 1" the tweeter " disappear ".


In the other side I could say ( I want to think. ) that he knows what he is talking about but IMHO I think that even that he is talking in audio terms that all of us use and know the meaning of those audio terms is way different. I don't think he is literally deaf or crazy, only that he is talking in his own " audio language " that we can't even interpret it.

I don't think he is a " silly person " because ( as I posted ) he is clever enough that mantain people posting here page after page!

Problem with him too is that does not give precise answers even he does not gives answers when we ask, at least not all answers to all questions. That's why I said is: clever enough.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

Raul, If you were to put your ear right onto the tweeter, it would become even less directional..,

To give Frank the benefit of the doubt, I could agree with the rest of your post.
Mark, I think that the 'Heaven's Gate' example is well taken, Naturally it had to occur here in San Diego...

 

[RogerD]

Roger, unfortunately, that is not Frank's point. His point is that his system replicates the level of a live orchestra. From 3-in drivers, I find that extremely hard to believe because the coefficient of restitution between air and the 3-in cone makes it impossible to go beyond a certain spl at a certain frequency. That spl falls logarithmically with frequency.

Hi Gary,

Maybe I missed that in part of the thread. A live orchestra can at times be loud,but most of the time it's the level of dynamics that makes it so beautiful. A cymbal crash that startles you a drum whack that sounds like a gun going off,a oboe solo that is mesmirising,and a flute solo that stirs the emotion. The power and majesty of a full orchestra in total harmony is breathtaking. Can that be reproduced? Some of us think in our systems "that sounds live". "Live" in my world has nothing to do with volume levels, it is the reproduction of dynamics from ppp to ff.