psjug Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 1 hour ago, Spacehound said: I shall judge as much as I want. If we don't judge PC will make all these other things compulsory real soon. And in the UK I can legally refuse to sell a cake to anyone who doesn't meet with my approval. "The World's Most Exclusive Cake Maker" might well be a very successful business Well, I don't know the law and I don't know if your cake business would succeed, but I did just read this and the writer is pretty funny https://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/10/should-we-all-have-the-right-not-to-bake-a-cake/ Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 2 minutes ago, psjug said: Well, I don't know the law and I don't know if your cake business would succeed, but I did just read this and the writer is pretty funny https://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/10/should-we-all-have-the-right-not-to-bake-a-cake/ In UK law selling stuff is asking people to make "an offer to buy". Which the seller is legally entitled to refuse without giving a reason. It eliminates all this 'cake' stuff and all other similar nonsense Link to comment
Audiophile Neuroscience Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 coming in late so apologies if already covered but: What exactly is the null hypothesis? What variables will/won't be controlled for? When/ how will the null hypothesis be rejected or accepted, and at what level of statistical significance? I get if neither participant/s wants to make this a scholarly exercise and just keep it a bit of fun. <quote> Playing the same exact file using two different players or the same player with different settings can easily invalidate the test. You’re then comparing two players and their internal processing and not two storage devices. That’s why capturing the digital output to the DAC is critical to ensure that the same digital samples are being sent to it in both cases, as Mansr already said he’ll do.</quote> My question is does the same digital samples captured really control for the variables of different players? I mean, say if they were played at slightly different volumes, could they still have the same "digital output"? Regarding expectation or confirmation bias, this should be controlled by the blind testing and the agreed upon test methodology. I agree with the poster about ideally not over discussing the outcomes prior to the experiment (like that MQA test a while back) and even just knowing its an 'experiment'/test *some* would say influences behavior (Hawthorne effect). However, in this case both participants likely have an agenda and so it gets back to controlling for biases. However, it is very possible IMO that the more it is discussed, the more Mani will feel potentially stressed about performing (....the blue pills may help this??). I believe it is important that Mani, who has set the challenge, feels comfortable that somehow the ground rules have not been changed from his original intention or design. sandyk 1 Sound Minds Mind Sound Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 18 minutes ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said: coming in late so apologies if already covered but: What exactly is the null hypothesis? What variables will/won't be controlled for? When/ how will the null hypothesis be rejected or accepted, and at what level of statistical significance? I get if neither participant/s wants to make this a scholarly exercise and just keep it a bit of fun. <quote> Playing the same exact file using two different players or the same player with different settings can easily invalidate the test. You’re then comparing two players and their internal processing and not two storage devices. That’s why capturing the digital output to the DAC is critical to ensure that the same digital samples are being sent to it in both cases, as Mansr already said he’ll do.</quote> My question is does the same digital samples captured really control for the variables of different players? I mean, say if they were played at slightly different volumes, could they still have the same "digital output"? Regarding expectation or confirmation bias, this should be controlled by the blind testing and the agreed upon test methodology. I agree with the poster about ideally not over discussing the outcomes prior to the experiment (like that MQA test a while back) and even just knowing its an 'experiment'/test *some* would say influences behavior (Hawthorne effect). However, in this case both participants likely have an agenda and so it gets back to controlling for biases. However, it is very possible IMO that the more it is discussed, the more Mani will feel potentially stressed about performing (....the blue pills may help this??). I believe it is important that Mani, who has set the challenge, feels comfortable that somehow the ground rules have not been changed from his original intention or design. It doesn't really matter. Similar things have been tried often before. Those who believe in myth and magic will continue to do so whatever the test result because the methods, including any listening tests, blind or not, are "faulty" as they don't coincide with their beliefs. mav52 1 Link to comment
Audiophile Neuroscience Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 6 minutes ago, Spacehound said: It doesn't really matter. Similar things have been tried often before. Those who believe in myth and magic will continue to do so whatever the test result because the methods, including any listening tests, blind or not, are "faulty" as they don't coincide with their beliefs. there is a certain futility to be sure. I don't think its "faulty" to question beliefs if they don't match your particular experience. I also don't think it is "faulty" to question whether that experience is somehow an illusion. Sound Minds Mind Sound Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 1 hour ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said: there is a certain futility to be sure. I don't think its "faulty" to question beliefs if they don't match your particular experience. I also don't think it is "faulty" to question whether that experience is somehow an illusion. I agree with all that, but as I said, but the 'myth and magic' crowd will say the methods are faulty. They always do. Not, of course, that they would have taken the trouble to understand the methods anyway. And though they are somewhat 'opposed', both Mani and Mansr know what they are doing. Link to comment
Audiophile Neuroscience Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 1 hour ago, Spacehound said: I agree with all that, but as I said, but the 'myth and magic' crowd will say the methods are faulty. They may be right 1 hour ago, Spacehound said: They always do. always? 1 hour ago, Spacehound said: Not, of course, that they would have taken the trouble to understand the methods anyway. enlighten us 1 hour ago, Spacehound said: And though they are somewhat 'opposed', both Mani and Mansr know what they are doing. would you prefer they didn't? Sound Minds Mind Sound Link to comment
Popular Post lmitche Posted February 12, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted February 12, 2018 My two cents. . . Having extensively applied the so called "JSSG" and "JSGT" treatments to my USB, Ethernet band and DC power cables, I hypothesize that moving switching DC current and digital signals (KHz, MHz or GHz) through any cabling creates radio interference that gets to the DAC through either the ground plane or the air or both. By playing the same file from a NAS or through local storage you are creating a different RFI pattern that will impact the SQ of playback in different ways. In the case of the NAS, the transmitting antenna is much longer then playing from local storage with, for example, a short sata cable. Reducing the emissions from the cabling through grounding and shielding, and shorter cable lengths, has great impact. Vary the length of the antenna and strength of the RFI signal and you vary the quality of playback. This also explains the differences we hear in USB cables. With about 100 foot of tinned copper shielding recently added to my cable plant, one only needs a pair of ears to hear the difference, even on relatively short runs of cable. Anyway, just my two cents. One and a half, fas42 and Siltech817 1 2 Pareto Audio aka nuckleheadaudio Link to comment
manisandher Posted February 12, 2018 Author Share Posted February 12, 2018 On 2/11/2018 at 8:47 AM, manisandher said: A microphone should have no problem picking this 'temporal microstructure' up, but the ADC will screw it up if it's smoothing* this 'microstructure' up in any way. ... On 2/11/2018 at 8:47 AM, manisandher said: *I believe all the ADCs I've owned and still own do this to varying degrees. I forgot to mention that none of my needle drops (made with a variety of different ADCs over the years) manage to recreate surface ticks correctly - the ticks on a recording always sound smoothed out in comparison to those heard playing the vinyl directly. (Of course, they're still bloody annoying, and I do everything from vacuum- to ultrasonic-cleaning beforehand to minimise them.) Mani. Main: SOtM sMS-200 -> Okto dac8PRO -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Tune Audio Anima horns + 2x Rotel RB-1590 amps -> 4 subs Home Office: SOtM sMS-200 -> MOTU UltraLite-mk5 -> 6x Neurochrome 286 mono amps -> Impulse H2 speakers Vinyl: Technics SP10 / London (Decca) Reference -> Trafomatic Luna -> RME ADI-2 Pro Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 5 hours ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said: They may be right always? enlighten us would you prefer they didn't? It's not impossible. It appears so. They are unlikely to spend much time studying something they 100% misunderstand from the moment it's switched on and which they do not wish to understand as it would force them out of their cozy 'analogue' safe space. EG, while imitche's post above is true any effect from it is confined entirely to the 'last half' of the DAC and what follows. Of course not. Link to comment
fas42 Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 7 hours ago, manisandher said: ... I forgot to mention that none of my needle drops (made with a variety of different ADCs over the years) manage to recreate surface ticks correctly - the ticks on a recording always sound smoothed out in comparison to those heard playing the vinyl directly. (Of course, they're still bloody annoying, and I do everything from vacuum- to ultrasonic-cleaning beforehand to minimise them.) Mani. Yes, it even counts on needle drops ... where playback chains often fail is that the transient events are not reproduced with full impact - and a vinyl noise tick is a beautiful example of such. When the sound element is the attack of an instrument, this is an obvious giveaway that it's "not right", when the normal impact is not there. Link to comment
sandyk Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 16 hours ago, Spacehound said: It doesn't really matter. Similar things have been tried often before. Those who believe in myth and magic will continue to do so whatever the test result because the methods, including any listening tests, blind or not, are "faulty" as they don't coincide with their beliefs. A typically arrogant reply from an E.E. who appears to think that E.E.s are GODs, and infallible ! This belief system applies just as much to E.E.s as much as Audiophiles, whenever their deeply ingrained beliefs are questioned. Just a reminder that without Subjective reports, there would be no need for Objective measurements, and no incentive to further improve an electronic product other than on how attractive and easy to use it is , as well as the cost of the product . (Enter the " Bean Counters" ) Add to that, product lifetime issues built into designs, so that they had a limited lifetime, so that the public would keep periodically buying replacements. This appears to be the modern way, and not how it used to be with products that often kept working as designed for 30 years or more, with perhaps simple component replacements such as noisy volume controls. Even the main large filter capacitors in many designs would last considerably longer if proper attention was paid by the designer to heat issues due to component placement and good ventilation. A good example of that, was electrolytic filter capacitors too close to vacuum tubes etc. How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file. PROFILE UPDATED 13-11-2020 Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 3 hours ago, sandyk said: A typically arrogant reply from an E.E. who appears to think that E.E.s are GODs, and infallible ! This belief system applies just as much to E.E.s as much as Audiophiles, whenever their deeply ingrained beliefs are questioned. Just a reminder that without Subjective reports, there would be no need for Objective measurements, and no incentive to further improve an electronic product other than on how attractive and easy to use it is , as well as the cost of the product . (Enter the " Bean Counters" ) Add to that, product lifetime issues built into designs, so that they had a limited lifetime, so that the public would keep periodically buying replacements. This appears to be the modern way, and not how it used to be with products that often kept working as designed for 30 years or more, with perhaps simple component replacements such as noisy volume controls. Even the main large filter capacitors in many designs would last considerably longer if proper attention was paid by the designer to heat issues due to component placement and good ventilation. A good example of that, was electrolytic filter capacitors too close to vacuum tubes etc. "The Colloms" is worshipped as a god and claims to be an a EE. Mind you, he claims he's an "Expert Witness" too. What of he doesn't say, so presumably murders, car crashes, earthquakes, wars, that sort of routine stuff. Gods do get to see quite a lot, I would think. As for other EE's they are just people qualified in their field, by both education/examination and known expertise if they are members of professional bodies. Much like Doctors, Airline pilots, Quantum mechanics, Vets, etc are in their fields. All are totally useless of course. BTW: What does your reply have to do with what I posted? Link to comment
sandyk Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 31 minutes ago, Spacehound said: BTW: What does your reply have to do with what I posted? Are you so arrogant that you are unable to see why I posted the reply that I did ?. Neither does anything I posted in that reply have anything to do with M.C. either, yet you dragged him into it again. It was aimed purely at arrogant E.Es like yourself who treat people who make reports that they don't agree with ,as believing in "Myth and Magic" , even if they also happen to be fellow qualified E.E.s who post findings that you don't agree with ,and design electronic devices that you believe are a waste of time, just like you did in a reply to some Audiostream links recently. You didn't have a good word to say about any of those gentlemen, despite their obvious qualifications in their respective areas, and vastly more experience in those areas than you have ! How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file. PROFILE UPDATED 13-11-2020 Link to comment
Popular Post fas42 Posted February 13, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted February 13, 2018 3 hours ago, sandyk said: It was aimed purely at arrogant E.Es like yourself who treat people who make reports that they don't agree with ,as believing in "Myth and Magic" , even if they also happen to be fellow qualified E.E.s who post findings that you don't agree with ,and design electronic devices that you believe are a waste of time, just like you did in a reply to some Audiostream links recently. Alex, there is a full range of attitudes held by audio enthusiasts, a spectrum of beliefs from the 100% objectivist who has zero trust in his own ears, and can only accept numbers from instruments as 'evidence', through to the 100% subjectivist who relies on 'magic' solutions for everything that he considers "good sound". That spectrum is continuous in nature, you can find people dotted at all points between the two extremes - there is no areas in the range that are deserted, where no-one is to be found; and many of those at one spot are somewhat amused by those who are quite some distance away, on that attitude spectrum - and will make 'disparaging' remarks, on occasion. Which is just the nature of the world - individuals' experiences shape their beliefs, their thinking - there are no right and wrong positions in the spectrum of attitudes ... the smartest approach, I believe, is just to watch what everyone says, and pick up ideas that are useful for one's own journey - with minimum conflict along the way, . Don Hills, adamdea, botrytis and 6 others 6 2 1 Link to comment
beerandmusic Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 ^^^^ I am mostly objectivist...but i do believe that "some people's hearing" may be much better than the mass majority, but i believe that most of the "subjective" opinions are those that have bought into marketing hype. Just think, every year we have millions of new products available and they always sound better every year so the market can continue, but you have to "listen very hard" to actually know it is better....and we have been "listening very hard" year after year, and will probably continue for the next 100 years....at what point can we "listen very hard" so many years to hear only the slightest differences, that we can't distinguish in DBT, and not even consistently with our own ears, and not for every song, genre, frequency, instrument, etc...and then we have the law of diminishing returns.....How many times have we heard, this is the greatest DAC, or best amp of the year, and not get any "oh wow, totally new level" to realize that a lot of this stuff is marketing hype. Sure maybe slightly different sound, but SQ improvement that isn't measurable year after year of "listening very hard".... I even fool myself some time....then once in awhile i will put on vinyl record and think "OH WOW, that sounds really good". Link to comment
acg Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 Hey Mani, For my 2c, I think you just need to make the day low stress and interesting. Do your abx test, play with some USB cables, show your guests the difference in sound between a bloated operating system and one optimised by XXHE. Or don't. Then if you want to you could start an investigation into the 'why' of things or even attempt to record some things to share with the forum. Same goes for the guests as well. Don't feel unduly pressured, enjoy yourself, make new friends, keep an open mind. I helped run a multiple DAC blind test a few years ago and that proved to be a relatively stressful event for us who ran the show. It was, however, very interesting sitting on a perch and watching the participants, reading their assessments and then talking to them later. Cheers, Anthony. Superdad 1 Link to comment
Popular Post Spacehound Posted February 13, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted February 13, 2018 3 hours ago, beerandmusic said: ^^^^ I am mostly objectivist...but i do believe that "some people's hearing" may be much better than the mass majority, but i believe that most of the "subjective" opinions are those that have bought into marketing hype. Just think, every year we have millions of new products available and they always sound better every year so the market can continue, but you have to "listen very hard" to actually know it is better....and we have been "listening very hard" year after year, and will probably continue for the next 100 years....at what point can we "listen very hard" so many years to hear only the slightest differences, that we can't distinguish in DBT, and not even consistently with our own ears, and not for every song, genre, frequency, instrument, etc...and then we have the law of diminishing returns.....How many times have we heard, this is the greatest DAC, or best amp of the year, and not get any "oh wow, totally new level" to realize that a lot of this stuff is marketing hype. Sure maybe slightly different sound, but SQ improvement that isn't measurable year after year of "listening very hard".... I even fool myself some time....then once in awhile i will put on vinyl record and think "OH WOW, that sounds really good". Most of us are 'subjective' in the end - we buy what we like, though some of us may look at a magazine or two to see if it's got a flat frequency response or whatever. I do that sometimes. But I've also bought stuff from a UK manufacturer simply because they've been going for donkeys years in the UK's "Last of the Summer Wine" TV 'happy old farts' series county. Sugden amplifiers. They don't need to advertise much and their efforts sound much the same as everyone else's decent amplifiers. But there is a point in 'computer' audio that divides what doesn't matter at all from what does and from where 'external influences' don't matter at all from where they do. And that is in the DAC where the 'timing' and digital to analogue conversion is done. After that, including the 'latter' half of the DAC things start to matter. Before it they don't. But some people, often 'set in their ways' and lacking 'technical' knowledge in this area, do not understand 'digital' at all (btw - quite a lot of manufacturers take advantage of this) so try and stay in their 'safe spaces' in any way they can.. This includes insulting the entire body of (electronic) 'engineers' and the entire field of engineering knowledge, of those who disagree with them while desperately clinging to those very few who do NOT in fact agree with them 'in general' but may have tested 'statistically' with their ears on some point and their 'statistical' findings did not actively disagree. And of course THIS is what Mani's test is about. Ajax, STC, mansr and 3 others 6 Link to comment
sandyk Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 2 hours ago, beerandmusic said: How many times have we heard, this is the greatest DAC, or best amp of the year, and not get any "oh wow, totally new level" to realize that a lot of this stuff is marketing hype. Perhaps just like the current fascination in C.A. with Streaming, where the quality of the streamed music is highly unlikely to come close to that of a well optimised system at home using your own source material ? Teresa 1 How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file. PROFILE UPDATED 13-11-2020 Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 28 minutes ago, sandyk said: Perhaps just like the current fascination in C.A. with Streaming, where the quality of the streamed music is highly unlikely to come close to that of a well optimised system at home using your own source material ? Why's that? And don't forget that is what the test is partly about. And you aren't going. And if it goes 'against' you they don't know what they are doing. Link to comment
sandyk Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 46 minutes ago, Spacehound said: Why's that? And don't forget that is what the test is partly about. And you aren't going. And if it goes 'against' you they don't know what they are doing. I am glad I am not going. I have nothing against Mansr, who is highly experienced in general, but perhaps out of touch in a few areas with the general membership. I certainly would have no interest in meeting an arrogant and pompous person like yourself. However, I do admire Mani for setting up these tests. If I lived in the U.K. or the USA, I would have been more than happy to do the same, as I have already done for a couple of E.E. friends and several other Sydney C.A. members. In the case of one E.E. I wasn't even present when he used my files to successfully demonstrate the findings to an E.E. friend of his. These tests will have no resemblance to those that I already have had confirmed, so no definite conclusions can be drawn from the results obtained at your meeting, even in the unlikely event that Mani uses some of my material, as we are using very different equipment and software players. The proposed tests are very different to those that I have done, where both versions are usually saved on the same storage medium,(including adjacent tracks on the same CD-R) and played as .wav files with the same checksums as the original files ripped from CD, or as downloaded in high resolution and converted back to .wav files from the supplied .flac files, or extracted from DVD-A as .wav files in some cases. Even when mine are played (or uploaded) from different storage mediums on the same PC, the files are played AND uploaded from System Memory. There are no conversions to another format performed, or software manipulation. How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file. PROFILE UPDATED 13-11-2020 Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 24 minutes ago, sandyk said: .....so no definite conclusions can be drawn from the results obtained..... There ya go. You've decided already, Before it's been done. Thank you for proving my point. Link to comment
sandyk Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 Just now, Spacehound said: There ya go. You've decided already, Before it's been done. Due to the nature of the proposed tests as proposed by Mani, it will not be possible to draw any definite conclusions, as there will be format conversions etc. performed. Nevertheless, the results are likely to be very interesting and worthy of further investigation. I have very little doubt though, based on previous experience with Mani, that he will identify differences, but whether mansr will also hear those differences is another question, as he has a high Expectation Bias that there will be no differences. Why am I not surprised that you can't be bothered going ? How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file. PROFILE UPDATED 13-11-2020 Link to comment
Spacehound Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 34 minutes ago, sandyk said: ......Why am I not surprised that you can't be bothered going ? Changed yer mind then? How convenient. From your previous post you assumed I was a dead cert for going. And as Mani, totally unprompted, bet mansr, it's MANI who has the expectation bias, not mansr. But of course that doesn't fit your agenda. I'm not responding to your stuff anymore on this thread. It's way off topic. I was just responding to a question from Neuroscience. botrytis 1 Link to comment
sandyk Posted February 13, 2018 Share Posted February 13, 2018 1 hour ago, Spacehound said: And as Mani, totally unprompted, bet mansr, it's MANI who has the expectation bias, not mansr. But of course that doesn't fit your agenda. Expectation Bias works both ways ! If somebody has a high Expectation that there will be no differences, then they are far less likely to hear differences, even when there are differences.. A high Expectation that you will hear differences, does not mean that you will hear verifiable differences under non sighted conditions. One reason could be that you aren't relaxed enough (stress) , and the other reason that there are none to hear ! Allan F 1 How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file. PROFILE UPDATED 13-11-2020 Link to comment
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