How much does it cost to be an audiophile?

[sandyk]

7 hours ago, semente said:

I've just been listening to a $165k+ new CD based system for some 4 hours. The owner and the other visitor enjoy listening at higher levels than I do and I confess that I felt uncomfortable at times.

 

I must admit that this sometimes applies to me as well, but not necessarily the next part.

 Although my electronics are way better than average, it does show that I should replace the bipolar electrolytic capacitors in the Crossover networks of my old DCM QED 1A speakers, as the HF impact is degraded a little compared with when new.

 This kind of thing is a gradual deterioration that creeps up on you, just like with aging Vacuum Tubes.

[sandyk]

Just now, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

 

 

 

A friend of mine says high-end audio is a bit like owning swimming pools and boats....best to use other peoples'.

 You wouldn't want to Pee in your own swimming pool, would you ?

[sandyk]

8 minutes ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

 

Hi Alex, yes I noticed the other week that once you requested to have the volume turned down. Mind you, in the past I have recalled you asking for it turned up. In general I listen at around 70 to 76 dB showing on my SPL meter. I do crank it up for rock tho.

 Hi David

 That wasn't directed specifically at you. My E.E. friend Ionwyn and the other David often play music at levels well above what you play yours at. Sometimes, at higher levels, the room dampening loses a little of it's effectiveness too, again, this was not directed at your listening room. It's a general observation.

 

Regards

Alex

[sandyk]

49 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Gotcha!

 

 Amusing, but has anyone here actually heard GUTB's system, or verified that he has no better audio discerning properties than the majority of those, usually from the hard line Objective side,  who love to take the piss out of him ?

 Perhaps he hasn't , but he does at least go to Audio Shows, and gets to hear a greater variety of equipment than somebody who rarely gets to hear recent Audio products.

 Yes, I do agree that he leaves himself wide open to attacks from the "Rat Pack"

[sandyk]

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

When I make outrageous statements, I expect to be kidded too, don't you? 

 

Yes. You keep making blanket outrageous statements about cables that have nothing to do with Microwave, UHF or whatever .

[sandyk]

12 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Yeah, I do don't I? Don't you know that unless your interconnects can pass a perfect square wave at a frequency of at least 1 Ghz, they're no good! ?

Do you have a 1GHZ Square Wave Generator that I can borrow to try this ? 

[sandyk]

1 minute ago, gmgraves said:

Yep but it weighs 60 pounds and you have to pay the shipping to OZ, BOTH WAYS!

Then how about I send you a bunch of cables to test ? 

[sandyk]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

I like music, and I understand the technology that delivers it. Combine the two.

Do you also have an interest in things like hi res video and perhaps hi res audio on Blu Ray ?

[sandyk]

6 hours ago, mansr said:

I prefer watching films/TV in hi-res, if that's what you mean. I've also done some work on codecs and other software. Here's something I built together with TI some years ago:

 

 

Very interesting.

Good to see that you are across so many different areas, as audio by itself doesn't have quite the same impact as high quality video along with the same attention to the audio area. That's an area where YouTube falls down badly as when you watch the highest resolution video version( perhaps even a lower bitrate 4K, or even a higher quality .webm version) the audio quality is substantially downgraded compared with that with the 1280 res. version also available.

 If you wish to save the best available quality you need to DL both the 1280 version and the higher res . version and re-mux. the best video and audio together.

 

[sandyk]

16 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Sure, go ahead. Send me all the cables you want to. Although, I can tell you without all the trouble that none of them will pass anything akin to a square wave at 1 GHz! Not even Nordost Valhalla at >US$2000 for a one meter pair! ? 

 

 Not RG59U properly terminated either.

[sandyk]

23 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Absolutely not!  But at audio frequencies RG59U is fine. As long as the runs aren't more than a few meters, RG59 (or 58)U will pass a perfect 500KHz square wave. That's more than high enough for audio.  

 But despite this, it does NOT mean that all 75 ohm Digital leads (Coax SPDIF) MUST sound the same, even though their bandwidth is many 100s of MHZ.

 Like you, I was a sceptic there, but got quite a surprise when I used a fairly cheap Digitec cable instead of my DIY one using a quality double screened 75 ohm cable from a damaged  Telstra Carrier system patch cord. ( (broken plug)

[sandyk]

16 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

I wasn't asserting that they do or don't sound the same, I was making a joke about the overkill  a lot of audiophiles and audio sales people seem to find important. You know; the "if enough is good, then more must be better" mentality. I wasn't serious at all.

 

And when you tested this Digitech cable did you Double-blind test it? While I don't believe that DBTs are a panacea or anything like it, they do make false positives very difficult. 

 Come on George, not everybody needs to use DBTs to tell whether something is better or worse sounding.

Swapping backwards and forwards a few time is usually enough !

[sandyk]

3 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

All that is needed is a pair of interconnect sets. a pair of Y connectors, and an amp with two line-level inputs.

That's a completely flawed concept George !

It put's 2 lots of interconnects in parallel at the output of the device, with the source device seeing double the capacitance at it's output.  

Many people ARE capable of hearing the differences between 2 cables in parallel, often  with half the load resistance, or one cable unterminated !

[sandyk]

10 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

We're just gonna have to agree to disagree on this one Alex. I simply know too much about wire and cable to buy that. They are only "in parallel" if both ends of both cable are terminated at the same point at the same time. In the DBT configuration that described, only one end is in parallel, the other, depending on which input is selected, is unterminated.

That's plain wrong ! There will be double the capacitance seen at the output of the source device if the cables have the same capacitance. Several of us went through the same crap with an E.E. from The Netherlands in another forum who attempted to show how to compare headphone cables.

 The cables ALSO need to be switched at the source device end !!!

 Perhaps you weren't sufficiently clear with what you were proposing, and I misunderstood you  ?

[sandyk]

7 hours ago, gmgraves said:

No you did not misunderstand me. And you're right! There will be double the capacitance seen at the output of the source device if the cables have the same capacitance. RG59 has about 60pf/meter of shunt capacitance. Put two runs in parallel and the total shunt capacitance is 120 pf/meter (capacitance, in parallel is Ct = C1 + C2 + Cx. In series it is Ct = 1/1/C1 + C2 + Cx).

 

That's about 23 dB loss/100M @ 100MHz or 0.00435 dB loss at 100 Khz over 1 meter. At 20 KHz that would be a loss of about 1/100th of a dB (give or take a few hundredths) for two 1 Meter parallel runs of RG59! It's minuscule, it's irrelevant. If one goes by the standard measurement in use in the electronics field today. Of

course, those who insist that LRC is not what gives cables their sound, then of course these calculations are meaningless.  

George

 It's not about losses due to the cables, it's the effect of the additional capacitance seen by the output device, and many opamps do not like to see a lot of direct capacitance at their output and may even become unstable, which is why most output I.C.s in typical consumer gear   (e.g.LM4562, LME49720 etc.) have something like a 100 ohm series resistor at their output.

 

Alex

[sandyk]

16 minutes ago, mansr said:

If the added capacitance is that troublesome, then a longer cable would be equally damaging. I don't recall seeing a maximum interconnect length specified in any equipment manuals.

 

 The series output resistors take care of that problem. Some of the data sheets showed the effect of the amount of direct capacitance at the output of an I.C. 

[sandyk]

Mansr

 Something specific.

Some constructors of the attached reported instability problems, and even overheating of the device due to oscillation.

 This was apparently caused by the direct capacitance of the lead to the RC volume control. One cure was to replace the output capacitor with a 100 ohms resistor. Due to the low DC offset this didn't cause any rustling noises etc. with rotation  of the control.

Alex

 

P.S.;

 With some of the early CD players, a Headphone socket cable to a front panel Headphone I.C. was directly connected to the output I.C.s This resulted in some audible degradation as reported by many users . The typical solution at the time was to disconnect the headphone output. 

In my case I connected a series 100ohm resistor to the input of the headphone cable.

[sandyk]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

I'm not disputing this. What I'm saying is that if a component can drive 2-metre interconnect, it can drive two 1-metre lengths in parallel.

 Obviously.  But the interconnects used as George is suggesting may need to be longer than 1M.

 From what I see in this forum, many use interconnects considerably longer than 1M due to equipment layout. considerations.

[sandyk]

8 minutes ago, mansr said:

Why?

 

Yes, I've seen Mani's 10-metre runs. So what? Don't do the test with extreme lengths, and it will be fine.

Mansr

This wasn't meant to be an ACADEMIC test. It was to enable your typical user to choose between 2 different interconnects ,which in many cases will be much longer as you just pointed out. This will likely affect many typically implemented opamp output stages to some extent, and neither cable will sound quite as good as it should.

[sandyk]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

If you normally use extremely long interconnects, temporarily move your equipment for the test session. I doubt many would be willing to drill extra holes through walls and floors just for a test anyway.

 You are missing the point.

The object of George's proposal was to enable selection between 2 cables to use with their equipment at it's present location.

 The cables they will wish to choose from, perhaps with a view to purchasing, will need to be of the length they normally need to use.

[sandyk]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

Well, most people don't have insanely long interconnects. Maybe George's suggestion is unsuitable for a select few. It's still a good method for most. You're trying to invalidate the entire idea on the grounds that there might be a setup where it doesn't work. That's not sound reasoning.

 

The simple fact is that many members (including Mani) report hearing differences that you consider are technically impossible.

 

The cables should be switched at BOTH ends !!!

[sandyk]

37 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Agreed, that op-amps don't like highly capacitive loads, but 120 pf/meter isn't a highly capacitive load.  

 

 2 in parallel, like you were suggesting, that would be quite a bit longer with the layouts of many members, is entirely different.

 

AGAIN : The cables should be switched at both ends !!!

 Are you E.Es too slack, and complacent in your blinkered views of what people can ,and can not hear,to do this properly ?

[sandyk]

12 minutes ago, esldude said:

Well optimally you'd switch at both ends.  But if not doing that is adequate for 90% of those doing this maybe that is still an okay suggestion.  Especially if you amended it to say unless your interconnects exceed 3 meters you'd be safe doing it as George suggests.  

 Dennis

 The graphs that I posted for the LM4562 clearly show that it doesn't like to see capacitive loads of loads of >100pFwithout a series output resistor. Not all output stages will have a series output resistor of adequate value to cope with much higher capacitive loads. Not so long back, designers often didn't think that they were even necessary !!!

 Constructors' feedback to Silicon Chip magazine re the schematic that I posted clearly demonstrated this problem.

 

Alex 

 

[sandyk]

2 hours ago, kumakuma said:

 

Is that why you resort to such stupid images ?

There is a correct way to do things,

and switching both ends is the correct way.The other method is lazy and any conclusions reached would be rejected as scientific proof.

[sandyk]

George 

Just because you personally can't hear differences between cables,or the effect of the extra capacitance on the output stage I.C. doesn't mean othat others are unable to. I would give a lengthier reply, but I am typing this on a small mobile.