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I Now Consider The Stereophile Staff Snake Oil Salesmen


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5 hours ago, mansr said:

I've never heard anyone say pratt with a double T. If prat didn't mean arse, you wouldn't have the word pratfall.

 

@Shadders was probably confusing the spelling with that of the place name or surname, as in (rather ironically) Pratts Bottom (a village located 'dan sarf' London, presumably reasonably near to where @Shadders lives) and Jonathan Pratt (a minor BBC TV personality and doubtless ridiculed at school, like many a Pratt).

We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us.

-- Jo Cox

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1 hour ago, mansr said:

How can anyone publish such twaddle and keep a straight face?

 

I have no issue with devotion to digital - I'm totally on board.  But I don't kid myself that the relatively simple digital sampling we do (i.e. no quantum computers yet) captures everything.  It captures what we've defined, to whatever extent, but there are things in the undefined yet to be mastered.

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7 hours ago, mansr said:

How can anyone publish such twaddle and keep a straight face?

Twaddle yes.  At the  top of his web site he states he is an "expert witness". On what  he doesn't say so presumably everything.

But the article is much later than when the term arose  and 'dynamics' is not necessarily the same as 'timing'

 

But in the UK  through about all the 1980s a Sondek/LP12 (a totally 100%  rip-off of a deck Linn Engineering made some parts for under contract), a Naim NAP250 (which was straight off an RCA power transistor data sheet) , and Linn Kans, Saras,  or Isobariks was the  standard issue UK 'reference' system.

 

It  works too, The NAP 250 was very 'musical' whatever that is. It really was.  It's only  measurable peculiarities were a deliberate  roll-off at  quite low frequency (25 KHz?) and a very high (continuous if demanded) current delivery into near enough any load, which might explain Colloms 'dynamics'.

 

It has a closely stabilised linear power supply, unusual in power amps. I use the present (7th? generation) one. It is their lowest priced one with a stabilised supply,  which supply   uses discrete components (a "further improvement" is a popular description though not used by Naim)  and 80 watts/channel  at 8 ohms which is more than sufficient for anything, including the local pub disco when the  DJ's tube amp blew up.

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7 hours ago, mansr said:

How can anyone publish such twaddle and keep a straight face?

 

The article was way too much of a ramble for me to read word for word all the way through, and anyway I think it is out of date. Digital recording and playback today is way better than in 1992. I don't take it too seriously. 

 

But as far as what is called PRaT, I think I've heard it. Probably has more to do with the speakers themselves (how "quick" they are and how well integrated and time aligned the drivers are) and possibly something in the particular speaker/amp interaction. 

Main listening (small home office):

Main setup: Surge protector +>Isol-8 Mini sub Axis Power Strip/Isolation>QuietPC Low Noise Server>Roon (Audiolense DRC)>Stack Audio Link II>Kii Control>Kii Three (on their own electric circuit) >GIK Room Treatments.

Secondary Path: Server with Audiolense RC>RPi4 or analog>Cayin iDAC6 MKII (tube mode) (XLR)>Kii Three .

Bedroom: SBTouch to Cambridge Soundworks Desktop Setup.
Living Room/Kitchen: Ropieee (RPi3b+ with touchscreen) + Schiit Modi3E to a pair of Morel Hogtalare. 

All absolute statements about audio are false :)

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5 hours ago, firedog said:

We won't argue that point, but I will make 2 others:

 

1. Many people who think digital doesn't equal analog playback either haven't heard really good modern digital playback, or they have much more invested in analog and digital and are setting up a rigged comparison. 

2. I can make a high quality digital recording of an LP or a tape. If I play them back on the same system no one can tell the difference. The digital version has all those "analog" sounds that digital supposedly can't capture. If digital is somehow lacking, then this wouldn't be possible.

 

See also:https://www.stereophile.com/content/ayre-acoustics-qa-9-usb-ad-converter

where JA says this about 3 LPs he digitized using the

...but there was no doubt that with a 192kHz sample rate I could not distinguish between the LP and the digital rip. And believe me, I tried. I A/B'd the two versions until blood came out of my ears and I was heartily sick of this music I hadn't heard for, in some cases, decades. When, in An Oxford Elegy, John Westbrook declaimed "Come, let me read the oft-read tale again . . ." for what must have been the tenth time, I felt like screaming "No! Don't read it again!"

 

Almost all LPs today are produced from digital masters. Yet LP devotees rave about how much better they sound than the digital master itself (which is often available). So what are they hearing? It isn't some "undefined" aspect of music that digital "hasn't nailed down" -  because their LPs are recorded digitally.

 

It's fine if you like analog better. But it isn't because digital is lacking something. What it means is that analog adds some kind of euphonic distortion that you prefer, not that it is more accurate to source.  
 

 

That's the usual reply, that "digital sounds as good or better", and related statements.  That I don't necessarily disagree with.

 

But when someone says that "digital captures and represents everything that analog contains", then I disagree.  Now to be fair, the above quote is an approximation of 100 different wordings on the subject, and some of those statements contain subtle hedges and disclaimers such as "effectively all" or "everything you can possibly hear" and so on.

 

The truth is, a lot of the pointless discussion can be cut off at the beginning when the argument starts with "while digital recordings are a sampling and do not capture *everything* that's in an analog recording, we believe that good digital recordings capture all of the essentials, and eliminate certain analog problems."

 

Words are important, and too many analog/digital arguments contain incomplete or incorrect premises.  Once we get past those, we can focus on the real differences.

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17 minutes ago, dalethorn said:

 

That's the usual reply, that "digital sounds as good or better", and related statements.  That I don't necessarily disagree with.

 

But when someone says that "digital captures and represents everything that analog contains", then I disagree.  Now to be fair, the above quote is an approximation of 100 different wordings on the subject, and some of those statements contain subtle hedges and disclaimers such as "effectively all" or "everything you can possibly hear" and so on.

 

The truth is, a lot of the pointless discussion can be cut off at the beginning when the argument starts with "while digital recordings are a sampling and do not capture *everything* that's in an analog recording, we believe that good digital recordings capture all of the essentials, and eliminate certain analog problems."

 

Words are important, and too many analog/digital arguments contain incomplete or incorrect premises.  Once we get past those, we can focus on the real differences.

Nice post but in no way answers the points I was trying to make. 

Main listening (small home office):

Main setup: Surge protector +>Isol-8 Mini sub Axis Power Strip/Isolation>QuietPC Low Noise Server>Roon (Audiolense DRC)>Stack Audio Link II>Kii Control>Kii Three (on their own electric circuit) >GIK Room Treatments.

Secondary Path: Server with Audiolense RC>RPi4 or analog>Cayin iDAC6 MKII (tube mode) (XLR)>Kii Three .

Bedroom: SBTouch to Cambridge Soundworks Desktop Setup.
Living Room/Kitchen: Ropieee (RPi3b+ with touchscreen) + Schiit Modi3E to a pair of Morel Hogtalare. 

All absolute statements about audio are false :)

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4 minutes ago, dalethorn said:

 

That's the usual reply, that "digital sounds as good or better", and related statements.  That I don't necessarily disagree with.

 

But when someone says that "digital captures and represents everything that analog contains", then I disagree.  Now to be fair, the above quote is an approximation of 100 different wordings on the subject, and some of those statements contain subtle hedges and disclaimers such as "effectively all" or "everything you can possibly hear" and so on.

 

The truth is, a lot of the pointless discussion can be cut off at the beginning when the argument starts with "while digital recordings are a sampling and do not capture *everything* that's in an analog recording, we believe that good digital recordings capture all of the essentials, and eliminate certain analog problems."

 

Words are important, and too many analog/digital arguments contain incomplete or incorrect premises.  Once we get past those, we can focus on the real differences.

 

I agree there's nuance to the discussion/debate around analog vs. digital.  But as long as we're trying to "complete" or "correct" the premises, consumerism and the psychology surrounding it should be in the mix as well.  My experience in audio forums is that the zeal with which someone argues one side or the other is directly proportional to how much they've invested in analog vs. digital.  It's pretty easy to spot "Team Analog" and "Team Digital".  There are others who see their gear as a mere appliance (like a toaster or microwave) and leave those debates to audio forums.

 

I've personally always seen the various flavors of, "scientists don't know everything" as way to dodge reality.  There is a bona fide "faith" aspect to audiophilia that derives from the narcissistic trappings of consumerism.   And both Team Analog and Team Digital worship at their respective altars.

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7 hours ago, firedog said:

where JA says this about 3 LPs he digitized using the

...but there was no doubt that with a 192kHz sample rate I could not distinguish between the LP and the digital rip.

 

I'd forgotten about that QA-9 review. Given the birth of the new world, Fremer is not gonna be happy when he realizes his editor prefers MQA to analog.;)

Roon ROCK (Roon 1.7; NUC7i3) > Ayre QB-9 Twenty > Ayre AX-5 Twenty > Thiel CS2.4SE (crossovers rebuilt with Clarity CSA and Multicap RTX caps, Mills MRA-12 resistors; ERSE and Jantzen coils; Cardas binding posts and hookup wire); Cardas and OEM power cables, interconnects, and speaker cables

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