More Consensus That Streaming Is An Inferior Format & Not High End?
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Thanks Rex. That is quite a marketing video.
My question was more general, though I appreciate people's suggestions on hardware solutions. I don't want my post to take the thread more off topic. I was just sharing my observation that over time, TV dialog has gotten more difficult to understand over the same Kuro TV I've had for years.
This leads me to wonder if there is something inherent in the nature of streaming or if the way data is being streamed is changing. My hardware is the same, but over time, the sonics seems to be decreasing in quality. There are articles on the net that address this observation and attempt to explain it, and a couple I have read hint at some of the speculation that Paul McGowan discusses in the OP video: storage and transmission costs.
Many posts are about making constant improvements to the sound of streaming. I get that and do not doubt that real improvements are being made. What I wonder about though, is why the sound quality of streaming over my same TV seems to have declined over time. Perhaps it is simply that the sound technicians on TV shows and movies are doing things differently now. High End audio streaming may be a completely different matter.
If the recording you have is flawed, then what you will get is a clearer understanding of why and what Is flawed. All other aspects about the performance, its pace, timing, rhythm, artistry, dynamics, tonal contrasts, detail, space, air, dimensionality, acoustic information etc will improve. Cleaning up the signal means that your brain has an easier time in interpreting all the detail and bringing it together in a more holistic and complete way. This is where all the above improvements come from. Your brain. And like all the rest of hi-fi, the reason is very simple: ‘Better in = Better out.
Let me give you an example. A track sounds slightly forward and too energetic in the treble, to the point its vaguely annoying. Then you make an upgrade like one I recently made to my server power supply. The resulting improvement adds a major uplift in the system’s and therefore to your brain’s ability to differentiate very small differences in timing, amplitude and direction (Balance). In other words; Resolution. And with that extra resolution, the slightly harsh treble is now resolved into the direct music and the subtly altered, very rapid first reflections of the playing/recording venue. Both were there before, just poorly resolved from one another so they were heard as one….a direct sound with too much treble energy. Suddenly, now they are resolved, the extra treble energy makes complete sense and its amplitude and timing now sounds correct. It now sounds like a note played in a small, reflective venue. In digital, making the digital signal (voltage stream, light stream, radio stream) as clean, accurate, well timed and as perfectly formed as possible has the exact same effect on the sound pressure waves and nerve impulses that reach your brain. And when the brain’s input is better, so is its output.
Hi Peter,
There’s a very simple answer to your question; “Why over the years has the sound of my TV become less intelligible?”
Noise! The level of digital noise is increasing all the time. There are more network connections, more people using wireless networks, more network devices. There are more mobile phones and tablets. There’s more network activity generally, especially since the pandemic.
All that increased activity around the World has an impact on the inherent level of noises in all environments, including your home, with its internet feed in whatever form.
Performance is maintained and can be dramatically improved by managing the amount of noise and network traffic your TV and TV network are subject to.
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What you are saying about noise is correct but I don't think that is reason why dialog is harder to hear now than before. I think it has to do with production and how all these shows are made. The budgets are lower for a lot of these Netflix, Amazon and Hulu dramas and the recording of sound suffers. The dialog isn't highlighted enough and the other sounds that are recorded interfere. One really needs to have a multi-channel setup to isolate the dialog into its own channel to make it more audible. That's been my experience.
Shhh, how hard would it have been to let a single page elapse following mention of a competing product that would lead the protégé through search results pointing at that which shall not be named.
Back to the action as we see him in the act of stirring waters the mentor wishes to see boiled off.
The shame is how good of quality OTA analog broadcasts were. Sound quality especially. Mono! the best audio was delivered in mono.
Peter, this is akin to having an out of date computer, Smart TV are computers with built in receivers, that no longer runs the most current programs and struggles with modern protocols. The Nvidia and Apple boxes are predominantly a means to add this functionality to older TV's or produce another entry point for one of the dominant ecosystem.
It could be your Kuro appliance is degrading as well as being fed data that is being poorly interpreted into two channels from something containing ten or more times as many on the higher end. Fast and dirty production quality of these potboiler shows doesn't help. Nor is it likely a multimedia speaker setup for dialogue and spatial sound effects will improve high end system videos to ends we value.
Get a decent OLED + powered center channel speaker. Then hook up a DAC to your computer if you want to solve both problems.
Hi Rex,
If you want to boil the whole thing down to a concentrated source (sauce), where digital is at is managing noise of all kinds (mechanical, electrical, radio frequency, ground plane, mains borne, network generated, RJ45 interface generated, fibre optic conversion generated Etc. Figure out ways how to remove noise and do it in an organised way…..i.e dont remove noise from one device only for the stream to encounter a noisier devices later in the stream. Look at power supplies, cables and their screening, vibration management/mitigation And arrange things in a hierarchy of improving specifications. That way, the better in = better out is operating at every stage and you get benefits compounding, where an improvement in the first stage improves the input to the next stage which improves its output and you get that uplift at every stage, which is why certain improvements have a quite major effect, when the network is arranged as a series of conditioning points where each output stage refines the signal‘s structure (timing, voltage, noise level, vibration control ).
This whole system can be done on a budget, gradually over time. The only ‘problem’ with that is the number of running in periods which become a pain.
Hi dminches,
My experience is limited to my system and my network so that‘s the basis of what im saying. In my system every improvement I make to remove noise usually results in more intelligible dialog and lyrics. A power conditioner placed at the TVs mains input, and a vibration protected high quality power supply + DC cable to drive the cable modem. In my system, all have increased the ‘fidelity’.
The problem is; all the problems you mention are still problems, but there is greater resolution in the improved version and that resolution helps to ‘resolve’ the interference between interacting parts of the soundtrack.
And since some digital takes months to settle in and the needed period of time may not be common knowledge, the effects of the various changes can overlap inadvertently. The more I read about limited results from changes that I myself have made, the more convinced I've become that some folks never hear what they bought because they didn't give that piece enough time to settle in. Some flip gear pretty quickly.
When upgrades require powering down equipment, how many people power back up without making the upgrade in order to understand if there are any difference caused by a simple power cycle?
I have found great sounding music on youtube .
But the quality differs immensly
Here some music straight out of you tube via a macbook pro ;
Not bad to my ears
But the quality differs immensly
Here some music straight out of you tube via a macbook pro ;
Not bad to my ears
Where is Waldo's glockenspiel?
I ran into a surprising (to me) issue yesterday, while accompanying a friend to audition some speakers. Before leaving his house, we listened to a few of his and my test tracks on his system. When he played John Renbourn's Earl of Salisbury from the Sir John Alot album, I immediately...
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Sorry, but at less at my urban corner TV still has the same level of understandability as five years ago. And although we can easily accept that the level of RF very high frequency noise has been increasing significantly there is not proof it has been affecting sound quality.
As I have access to RF generators and fast pulsers, just for fun I have I have tried injecting RF noise in in the main power lines and even in the audio signals in my system. It had little or no effect in sound quality, much less that of harmonic distortion of the 50/60 Hz added to the mains.
There is still a lot we can't understand about why some digital systems, streaming included, sound poor without apparent reason. But today I have been again at a friend's house listening to a BlueSound node I connected by SPDIF to the KSL DAC playing Qobuz. It sounded musical, full bodied, with plenty of slam and microdetail.
I absolutely agree with you. One example. When Innuos were launching their PhoenixNET they had a well run in demo system that they kindly loaned me. Unfortunately I really didn’t have the necessary cables to do the best job of installation (I use a loom which is important) . This first demo was very impressive and the system took about 5 days to sound its best. The problem was, the cable I was using had been replaced many months before and it imparted a particular character to the sound, which was a hump or emphasis in the bass. About 6 weeks later I’d obtained new cables so I requested a repeat of the loan PN and Innuos were able to oblige. Again 5 days for the system the sound good. Unfortunately the new cables were running in and not their best but the improvement the PN wrought was more than sufficient to go ahead and place my order.
My new PN arrived a few weeks later and was installed. I could hear some very specific improvements, but overall the sound was nowhere near as good as I knew it could/should be. The system went through a number of changes, some for the better, some for the worse, until about 3 months in, the system suddenly bloomed and I was rewarded with a sound quality well above anything I’d every obtained or heard before.
Over the years I’ve learned a few things about running in.
1. The same type of equipment i.e power supplies with the same capacitors and rectifiers
always follow the same burn-in pattern.
2. Radio Swiss Classics announcements provide a really good tool to understand sonically how burn-in is progressing. In essence a fully burned-in system results in very neutral voices with lots of individual human characteristics and attributes. Burn in removes a lot of those human insights and adds things such as sibilance and frequency anomalies like slightly emphasized treble or boomy bass that make voices sound unnatural and ‘recorded’.
3. Low power digital that runs on a few volts and low current takes a long time to achieve its optimum performance
4. Periodically switching off new units and letting them get cold seems to accelerate the burn-in process. Leaving something uninterruptedly switched on 24/7 seems to greatly prolong the burn-in period.
5 There’s usually a period of 5-10 days at the beginnning where a new unit will give a pretty good performance (a brief and diluted foretaste of what’s to come) before running off with the burn-in wizard.
Back to your point, I have read several posts where the poster has rejected an item after 1 month due to not being happy with the sound, when in my experience, the 1 month point was right in the middle of that particular unit’s burn-in process, when it sounded rather unbalanced and most certainly far below its best.
Good question. I’m always more concerned about how developers manage to decide between alternative components. I’ve asked this question of several well known developers and the answer was that the first few days are usually very Indicative of the final sound, so that’s what they go by.
Generally, the more highly optimised the system, the more disturbance caused by running in. In a non optimised system its doubtful that burn-in would even be noticed, let alone an issue.
When it comes to home demos, its good to know how much previous use the demo item has had. None, hours, weeks, months.
Bear in mind that the whole stereo illusion happens in the brain so running in apparently disrupts the signals to the point the brain isn‘t able to build quite as accurate, pure and detailed music-scapes.
To answer your question: A new product can, in my experience be adequately evaluated in roughly 10 days. A fully run-in piece can be evaluated after a few days. For a partially run in piece it will largely depend on the size of the difference (how much of an improvement) it makes. If it really makes a big difference there‘s no problem as the before and after differential is clear enough to make a decision. Depending what you’re evaluating you may get a nice surprise a couple of months down the road. Problems are more likely to arise when changes/differentials for partially run in units are quite subtle.
I have made what on the surface appear to be some really strange decisions in my system. For example mating $4000 power supplies and $600 DC cables to $250 modems and routers. Why? Because once fully run in, the $4600 investment is well worth the improvement it delivers but it takes the unit to be fully run in to appreciate the full value of what the power supply actually brings to the music.
I haven't tried Radio Swiss Classics, but do agree about the spoken voice as a very good gauge -- human evolution has made that our standard. Other than that, I have the same list of things I've learned about gear settling in.
And I had a similar experience when purchasing the Grimm MU1 streamer/server/DDC (problem with cables and needing two evaluation units). This is where audiophile experience helps. If you know how settling in occurs, you can anticipate (somewhat) the qualities of the gear once it blooms. I agree that one can usually get a taste of the eventual sound rather quickly, sometimes during the first hour or so. Luckily, whenever the change is positive, the eventual sound (or increase in engagement) is far greater than the initial change.
In the case of the MU1, several reviews used the DAC I have in the review process. That not only got me interested initially, it also helped me anticipate what the MU1 would sound like in three months or so.
Designers, having a far greater experience with the settling in process, must use that same faculty of projecting into the future to evaluate their products during listening tests. Listening because I'm assuming that at some point the measurements no longer indicate any improvement, but the designer continues to experiment with options for various parts (at least according to what I have read). There is a well-known speaker designer who tweaks the crossover for every speaker before it is delivered. How does he do that if the parts are new? This is a fascinating topic (to me) that I haven't seen discussed. As is the variability of the parts themselves. Even with tight tolerances (that have been tested and approved per each part), the parts are not identical, thus his insistence on matching by ear.
I don't doubt this, but it does make me wonder if a complete audiophile re-design of the routers and switches would be a more cost effective path. Seems like the folks at Taiko Audio, and their customers, are about to find out.
It wouldn’t be more cost effective because you’d need to do both. What it is is a very high cost improvement for a very major tick up in sound quality. An uptick that would take one well into the next rank of sound reproduction in terms of absolute musical sound quality.
The Extreme plus switch, modem, card and cables is an extremely expensive but also extremely tempting place to go. It sorts out a great part of the noise and timing issues by some very clever engineering that leverages a lot of good things by leaving stuff out and removing noise from hitherto noisy sources like RJ45 interfaces, blocking external EMI ingress by means of a faraday cage, fully encapsulating, vibration controlled, network traffic optimized router and switch. There is some interesting load swapping going on between server and router that allows the router to execute processes previously done on the server thereby reducing work on the Server. Taiko Audio represents extremely solid, innovative, highly discerning engineering that breaks new ground and thus makes progress.
But beyond Taiko, network components in general could all be massively improved for hi-fi use. What’s wrong with adding a very very good power supply to a cheap router if what you mainly hear in the final music is the quality and ability of the power supply because the signal is just the power supply in action. But the router is what modulates the power supply signal output and that really should be equally as good as the power supply, so here’s a huge area with upgrade potential….kick-ass network devices with kick-ass power supplies.
The network is like every other part of hi-fi….ripe for innovation and great engineering. Taiko is at the forefront in what will become a more significant wave of audiophile network components. Signals from the internet can already be made to sound incredible but the point is, there is a lot more left to come. We are still only just figuring out how some noise is deleterious to the resulting music’s quality and very few people have realised what a key role AC power supply and DC power supplies play.
And most important, its good to remember that this whole stereo thing is an illusion created in the brain. All these improvements we make are in order to make the illusion more accurate, complete and above all convincing, involving, emotional. Noise, vibration and mis-timing are all detremental and are really the enemies to the creation of a beautifully convincing illusion.
Hi PYP,
Thanks for the interesting read. I’m in complete harmony with your comments. I would guess that designers have two points in their minds. How it should sound now and how it will likely sound in the future and their goal is to exceed both.
In terms of measurement, when the system if completely run in it sounds incredibly open, pure, spatially detailed, with sound that is richer or dryer, warmer or colder depending entirely on the recording. The sound is fully enveloping, even if the performance is mainly out front like a typical orchestra there’s still a feeling of ‘behind’ in the acoustic clues. But the main improvement is the response of the listener. The music is more joyful, more involving, both deeper and lighter, and anywhere from warm and smooth to raw, brash and uncouth, depending entirely on the recording. The point is, all these feelings that the music generate get much stronger. The responses get more intense, the level of enjoyment increases and there’s a general feeling of ‘happiness’ around the sound. Nothing needs improving, nothing sounds imbalanced…it all sounds great and even MP3 radio will put on a memorable performance where its solely about the music and the listener’s response. The music allows you to lean in without getting in any way uncomfortable. There’s nothing disturbing.
In two words the music is just more ‘beautiful’ and ‘complete’. So how do you measure that?
I would guess that doing some noise differentials would let you measure the primary improvements but I doubt they would fully explain the run-in affect. I’m guessing that’s a lot more subtle than removing some noise
Agree with all you wrote. To me there is a tipping point where great sound becomes engaging sound.
During settling in of my latest addition, I would sometimes hear great sound but I wasn't fully engaged. In other words, I could not identify anything that was wrong, certainly no overt problems with frequencies overemphasized or sizzling highs, for example, but the "magic" wasn't there. A few more days and suddenly the "magic" returned.
The tipping point is easy to recognize because I start mass-consuming music. That is one fun part of Roon Radio. It serves up new (to me) music and I'm madly bookmarking the songs in order to listen to the entire albums later. And I keep checking to see if they are 24 bit because of the enveloping sound and the more realistic timbre (for me, probably the greatest difference between the setup I have now and the one I had years ago). Agree that to get there, noise in its many forms and points of ingress, vibration, jitter as well as the speaker/room interface need to be addressed.
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