Fas42’s Stereo ‘Magic’

[Teresa]

10 hours ago, tmtomh said:

...And of course the big ones - speaker placement, speaker stands, and room treatments - usually can get you much closer to that immersive ideal than spending $$$ on new digital source components. 

 

Thanks Tmtomh, your entire post was great as have been most in this thread. I just quoted part of it as I wanted to emphasize that in my experience speaker placement is the most important area in achieving a large phantom center channel with a well defined soundstage and thus making the speakers sonically disappear.

 

Also George Graves points have been excellent, as well as the original poster Blackmorec.

 

I differ from Frank as I not only want instruments and voices to sound like the real thing, I also want to be aurally transported to the performance space. I find many audiophile and naturally made recordings to do that for me, recordings made in places like concert halls, jazz clubs, auditoriums, churches and other real performance spaces.

 

Also I don't believe a highly compressed recording with no dynamic range and the volume level pushed so high as to enter digital overload distortion with constant clipping can ever be made to sound good. By the same token extremely close miked recordings will never have correct timbre as microphones have raising high frequencies since they are designed to be place a reasonable distance from the musicians for flat response. Flat response is needed for accurate timbre. Thus, distant mic'ing combined with no EQ or any other studio tricks sound the most like real music to me. I firmly believe in garbage in garbage out. There is such a thing as great recordings and poor recordings IMHO.

[Teresa]

On 2/21/2019 at 2:28 PM, fas42 said:

...A competent setup allows one to completely hear "through the speakers" - you connect completely to the performance that was in front of the microphones, say; your mind is discarding all aspects of the sound image that are caused by just having two boxes doing their thing in the room. And the drivers and speaker cabinet are largely irrelevant to this behavior, unless one listens to more extreme volume levels, or is highly focused on deep bass being 'correct'...

 

On 2/21/2019 at 2:54 PM, semente said:

Wait 'till you listen to 'em through a good pair o' speakers. 😉

 

On 2/21/2019 at 3:13 PM, fas42 said:

...I've listened to too many expensive speakers sounding awful. Wilsons in particular come to mind here..

 

Fas42, evidently you were not able to hear "through the Wilson Audio speakers". That fact disproves your point that speakers are the least important since your mind could not discard them. I also don't like the sound of Wilson Audio speakers. However, I have heard many megabuck speaker systems that sound wonderful and present an image of real instruments and voices in a real acoustic space spread out so one does not hear sound coming from the actual speakers, what you call invisible speakers. BTW precise speaker placement is how you get speakers to become invisible not soldering interconnects.

 

21 hours ago, Paul R said:

But all in all, I would suggest speakers are much more important - at least to the listener -  than any other component of an audio system.

 

Paul, I agree that speakers are the most important and that a system is only as good as its weakest link.

[Teresa]

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

Teresa, the point is not to hear through the speakers, if the system is not performing well. Rather, if you can effortlessly hear through them, that's the marker of the setup working well - some speakers will be 'better' at exaggerating flaws earlier in the chain, and Wilson is one brand that's particularly good at it. So, it's not that the speakers have a problem, but that they are shining a stronger light on anomalies in the playback.

 

Precise speaker placement may help for some listening situations - but if the audible artifacts that are caused by having poor connections are eliminated, then one can be very casual in every aspect of the physical and listening positioning, and, the sound still "works".

 

Fas42 do you have a reading or comprehension problem? I clearly stated that my floor standing speakers are "sonically invisible", the image extends from about one foot outside the boundaries of the left and right speakers with a large nice stable fantom center image where no speakers are located. With orchestra music it forms a very believable orchestra shell. It was done with painstakingly accurate speaker placement. If you have not done this you do not have "sonically invisible" speakers. Precise speaker placement helps for all listening situations, not some. 

 

In post 178 I said "evidently you were not able to hear "through the Wilson Audio speakers". That fact disproves your point that speakers are the least important since your mind could not discard them. I also don't like the sound of Wilson Audio speakers. However, I have heard many megabuck speaker systems that sound wonderful and present an image of real instruments and voices in a real acoustic space spread out so one does not hear sound coming from the actual speakers, what you call invisible speakers. BTW precise speaker placement is how you get speakers to become invisible not soldering interconnects

 

If you have poor connections you will have substandard sound quality, this has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with making speakers disappear. The fix is to throw away those poor interconnects that come with audio equipment and get some with connectors that have a tight fit. This is one of the very first things most audiophiles do. We have went way beyond your baby steps and nonsense so-called cures to problems we have already fix. I am quit sure my large wooden floor standing speakers carefully placed are more invisible than your plastic speakers and that my system, as inexpensive as it is sounds more like the real thing when playing music recorded in a natural performance space.

 

Speakers are the least perfect of all audio products and sound very different from one and another, plus many speakers are amplifier dependent. Speakers will not all sound the same if you cure all the problems in your audio system, that is just one of the many facts you do not understand. Thus, speakers are the most important and an audio system is only as good as its weakest link. Making speakers sonically disappear is relatively easy, accurate timbre, sonic realism and accurate reproduction of the original recording space are harder and this is what you should be aiming for. Apparently you still have a long ways to go.

[Teresa]

14 minutes ago, semente said:

It's his thread.

 

Actually it is not, this thread was started by @Blackmorec . Here is the first post.

[Teresa]

19 hours ago, fas42 said:

... what buttons does it push, 🙂?

 

I don't push buttons, instead I prefer to listen to well engineered natural sounding music instead.

[Teresa]

16 hours ago, fas42 said:

Ambitious systems are troubling ... because if one has spent all that money, and it still has very obvious issues - what is one to do?...

 

Get a refund! If I buy an audio component or speaker and it has obvious issues I return it to the store for a refund and select a different model. Trouble is you buy stuff that has obvious issues instead of competently  manufactured ones because you like to tinker.  

 

16 hours ago, fas42 said:

One still has to define what it is about the recording, that makes it "bad sounding" - I have heard thousands of instances, of innumerable recordings, that "sound bad" at that moment, on that system - to be blown off my chair at another time, by how fabulous the tracks actually are, and how much pleasure I get in the listening to them.

 

@gmgraves explains it very well below, but I also would like to add. Most major label and other non-audiophile recordings are over-processed, gimmicky, compressed, EQ'ed recordings These recordings are made to sound good using cheap earbuds that come with portable digital players and smart cell phones. Before that they were made to sound good on AM radio, boom boxes and portable CD players. In addition, most are engineered to sound loud with the smallest dynamic range possible and use tools to alter the sound, which destroys the feeling of listening to actual music. All of this is the complete opposite of the goals of high resolution authentic audiophile recordings.

 

15 hours ago, gmgraves said:

Bad sounds bad everywhere, on every system! Inept microphone placement, multi miking a symphony orchestra and pan-potting every instrument into a single plane across the sound stage from left to right, injudicious use of equalization in the production stage, overuse of artificial reverb, overmodulation at some point during post production, and yes, even dynamic range compression or hard-limiting on modulation; all are contributors to poor recordings...

 

I agree totally GIGO (garbage in garbage out) and no amount of tweaking can perform the miracles that @fas42 advocates. Ever wonder why he hates accurate high fidelity audio systems and prefers Sharp boombox speakers and laptop speakers?  IMO they don't reveal the flaws in his worst recordings because they don't have enough resolution. I wish he could hear my audio system playing audiophile SACDs and DSD downloads.

 

10 hours ago, Allan F said:

Which brings up a more general observation. There are many "poor" recordings that sound a lot worse when played on high fidelity, i.e. high resolution systems, because their deficiencies are revealed as a far more obvious part of the listening experience.

 

Exactly!

[Teresa]

56 minutes ago, fas42 said:

The goal is to have a system that doesn't make a recording sound like crap! Note the key inclusion of the word "make" in that sentence - the recording is OK, but the playback doesn't elicit all the positive aspects of the source material.

 

Unless you have spent decades listening to expensive, ambitious rigs make recordings you know well sound like a garbled mess, you probably can't appreciate what's going on - money doesn't solve the problems, but it can certainly blind one to what the true possibilities are.

 

Frank your standards are way too low, what you find musically satisfying I would likely find to be of poor sound quality to unlistenable even on your supposed well-sorted mid-fi equipment.

 

I wish you could hear how realistic music can sound when the microphones are placed in the best positions, a great performance venue is chosen with musicians playing together and not separated by isolation booths. With recording engineers who know how to capture sonic realism.

 

GIGO (garbage in garbage out) cannot be fixed by soldering connections and the other tweaks you do. The music captured must sound real in order for any audio system to reproduce it realistically.

 

You have a much better imagination than I to be able to magically undo all the wrongs in poorly made recordings. It works for you but I know I would hate the sound of any music coming out of your well-sorted mid-fi system as my imagination is not as good as yours evidently.

 

BTW I have heard many superbly realistic sounding high-end audio systems at CES and The S.H.O.W. in Las Vegas, especially when I give them an SACD to play or they were playing high-res downloads, audiophile LPs or those wonderful sounding 2 track 15 IPS master tape copies. The only bad sounds I heard were when they were playing CDs or 16/44.1kHz digital music files.

 

In conclusion, I don't believe a single word you say as your statements are illogical to me.

[Teresa]

On 3/2/2020 at 2:57 PM, fas42 said:

...I will suggest this ... most audio people have at least once come across a "magic rig" - doesn't matter for how short a time it was, or how long ago, or whether it was ultra expensive, or not  - which pushed all the buttons ...

 

On 3/19/2020 at 10:09 PM, fas42 said:

 

Who here

 

(a) Has had this experience

(b) Thinks such a concept is BS

(c) Hasn't got a clue what I'm talking about

(d) Has no opinion about it

 

?

 

(a) Has had this experience

 

If by all the buttons you mean well recorded acoustic music sounding like I'm there listening to live music in the flesh, be it a concert hall, jazz club or other well chosen venue then yes I have. Many, many times. Including my current audio system who's sonic realism with high resolution correctly engineered recordings is magical indeed!

[Teresa]

19 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

I’m sure that I have heard more live music than most people have ever thought of. Keep in mind that I have to be there to record it, so I have to “hear it“. And I have heard, and I own a high-end rig that makes my own recordings of music that I’ve heard live sound very much as it did at the live event!

 

Sorry, but my frustration is that you persist in asserting that you have done the impossible. You have taken mediocre (and worse) components and made them sound better than systems that are state-of-the-art while also imbuing your system with the ability to make the most horrible and inept recordings rise above their inherent awfulness to become not only listenable, but enjoyably so. These two abilities are diametrically opposed, and thus impossible to achieve.
 

The reality is that the more resolving the system, the WORSE poor recordings sound. The only way to make bad recordings listenable is to make the playback so poor that all recordings, good or bad sound more or less alike. That is to say, that everything will sound the same, but the listener (that’s you, Frank) has made his peace with the mediocrity that has rendered all recordings, good or bad, the same. This reminds of an old Japanese saying: “the nail (in this case, representing an excellent recording) that sticks up shall be hammered down (by your playback “system”)”. 

 

This must be the truth, because it is the only way to reconcile your poor assemblage of parts with what you say they will do. The rest, of course, is in your head. 

 

George I agree with everything you said. 

[Teresa]

On 3/21/2020 at 5:06 PM, fas42 said:

Ahh, so the crazy idea is that a 3D soundscape is possible - or is it, that an extremely high percentage of recordings can be satisfying to listen to ... hmmm?

 

A 3D soundscape is quite possible only with correct speaker placement. Most of us have done this, you have not.

 

In my experience a percentage of recordings don't sound realistic mainly because they were not made to sound realistic and/or poorly engineered. I don't find such recordings enjoyable to listen to and there is no magic on Earth that can transform poorly engineered recordings into correctly engineered recordings.

 

20 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

You said "there is an inverse relationship between the sound quality and musical quality of his early recordings and his later recordings"...

 

Have you never heard the quote the better the performance the worst the sound quality, the better the sound quality the worst the performance?

 

14 hours ago, fas42 said:

You refuse to recognize that my method is about revealing everything that exists on the recording, while adding the absolute minimum of  playback chain character - the recording is not 'fixed', rather, it's 'rescued'...

 

I differentiate audio gear that sounds spectacular with the "right recordings", from that which consistently makes me feel that I'm in the presence of the musicians, or in fabulous landscapes of sound which constantly tantalise and delight - again, for me, it's all about being immersed in the texture of the sound, where nothing ever irritates or strikes me as "not quite right" ... and I agree, this is not what a significant number of the people in the audio enthusiasts groups seem to be interested in, IME.

 

IMHO there is no rescuing poorly made recordings, they might be made to sound better but more of their flaws are revealed.

 

If you want to truly be in the presence of the musicians and the venue they perform in then you need the "right recordings" which are made that way. 

 

10 hours ago, kumakuma said:

The underlying assumption behind this is that all music is well recorded.

 

I disagree with this.

 

Not all music is well recorded and "revealing everything that exists on the recording" can't "rescue" such recordings.

 

The listener may be able to forgive the poor sound quality and listen past these flaws but this is because there is something about the music that draws the listener to it, not because the system has been tweaked to the nth degree.

 

Thanks, I agree completely with this.

 

8 hours ago, Allan F said:

No. There is a reason for using acoustic music as a reference to determine a system's fidelity. Unless your are actually present, In the case of amplified or electronic music there is no way of really knowing what the original performance sounded like. Therefore, there is no basis for comparison of the recording to the source material. That is even truer when instruments are recorded separately and then mixed to produce the final recording.

 

I would also add once one gets acoustic music to sound realistic, then electronic music should sound excellent. And to compare acoustic music to an audio system one must use correctly made recordings and listen to live music in the flesh.

 

5 hours ago, gmgraves said:

Again Frank, you are telling us that your method achieves two diametrically opposite concepts. A more resolving system does NOT make poor recordings sound as though the listener is “in the presence of the musicians”. A more resolving system makes the shortcomings of the poor recording practices stick out like a sore thumb! If you want all recordings to be “listenable”, you’ll want a poor system, like an all-in-one table-top player which homogenizes every recording to the point where one can’t tell the difference between a good recording and a bad one. One way to achieve this is to listen only to low resolution MP3 recordings exclusively (32 Kbps or lower). That will surely give you your goal and everything will sound the same, good or bad. After all, cheap and dirty s the great leveler. Gee, that describes your playback kit perfectly, doesn’t it?😉

 

Since Frank thinks he has made all recordings sound great. I believe has not heard realistic sound from an audio system and is instead making all of his music sound the same in the ways you suggest by lowering the sound quality to that of the poorest music in his collection.

 

3 hours ago, fas42 said:

What makes it work is that all music is well enough recorded - that is, enough detail has been captured for the brain to interpret what the fine detail means, and it can separate that which belongs to the musical event as heard by the microphones, and that which is noise and distortion, that doesn't belong.

 

The listener does forgive the poor sound quality and listen past these flaws, but this occurs at a completely unconscious level  - one can't decide that it's worth listening to, and that makes all the difference - no matter how much one know that a particular recording can sound better than it does at that particular moment, it doesn't do an ounce of good in terms of being able to enjoy it.

 

It is the tweaking that makes the difference - I can draw on a specific example from a recent visit to the local audio friend ... he has a collection of Oscar Peterson tracks on one CD, spanning his career. A very early piece was played ... yuck!! Scratchy, very unpleasant piano; zero pleasure in listening to the track ... our response? "Right, there's a problem here, somewhere!" ... took about 10 minutes to track down a couple of areas where things had shifted, degraded from their optimum status - replayed the very same track - ahh, much, much better! It was still obviously an early track, if you listened carefully for various signs of such - but the music now came through; the connection was back with what the musicians were creating.

 

Now, I am also certain that there will be a certain percentage of people who cannot, because of how their brains are wired, hear this behaviour - but amongst the people I mix with, I haven't found anyone who doesn't pick the improvement in listening, when I find the sound to be "correct".

 

I would agree your brain works different than ours.

 

2 hours ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

Frank you constantly change your story and/or contradict yourself

 

If you now say you cannot fix the recording, you are NOW in the same camp as everyone else except, you and you alone have the special powers to selectively ignore the bad bits apparently because you have improved on the good bits to the extent that magic happens. Now Frank, before you prattle on about 'how the brain works', knowing something about the subject myself, you are alone in your assertions. That has implications from a brain functioning point of view...

 

Again Frank, you are only doing what everyone else already does but claiming magic outcomes which nobody else experiences...Making the playback improved is distinctly different from being able to "rescue" all and any recordings by your so called "method", the same method that everyone employs.

 

"Improvement" is not "fix" is not "rescue" and bad recordings still sound bad.Only you perceive otherwise and this speaks more to how yours and yours alone, "brain is wired" as you put it.

 

In your mind.

 

I agree it is only in his mind, as what he is pushing is illogical.

 

1 hour ago, kumakuma said:

I haven't seen single person here agree with you (fas42).

 

Simple reason, no one likely agrees with Frank (fas42).

 

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

Ahh, back to the laptop, are we ... 🤩 ?...

 

If you don't want it brought up you should never have posted about it.

 

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

It may pain you to realise that some people exist outside of this forum ... 😉...

 

People exist outside of this forum but I doubt any of them agree with your nonsense.

 

1 hour ago, kumakuma said:

...Sorry, but I don't think anyone here is buying what you're selling.

Agreed.

 

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

More and more you convince all in this thread that your idea of what sounds good and what the rest of us thinks is good sound are miles apart. Nothing personal, you understand, but I am completely convinced that you have no Idea what real, live, acoustic music sounds like, nor are you able to discern a good recording from a bad one. It’s the only answer that fits with your descriptions.

 

Yes, this is very evident from Franks posts.

 

1 hour ago, Racerxnet said:

Well, you certainly are NOT getting anyone to confirm your magic...As has been said by others, we have all tweaked our system to provide benefits throughout many years. GIGO

 

I don't believe anyone can confirm his magic. I also believe all of our audio systems sound more realistic than Frank's when playing recordings that are made that way.

 

1 hour ago, Racerxnet said:

Except that Blackmorec realizes that the room is a very important part of the equation and you don't. World's apart from your reality...

 

I agree. IMHO correct speaker placement and taming room problems are that most important if one want realistic sound quality from well engineered recordings.

[Teresa]

7 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Completely invisible speakers is part of the recipe for getting "bad" recordings to come good...

 

One only gets completely invisible speakers with correct speaker placement, which you don't believe in.

 

Invisible speakers improves imaging, sound staging, ambiance, etc. So bad recordings will sound better with correct speaker placement and taming room problems. But improving the image and soundstage of bad recordings does not make them magically sound like properly made recordings.

[Teresa]

5 hours ago, fas42 said:

One of the little pleasures is that N. tells of the times when he manages to squeeze an extra level of quality out of one of the rigs, his wife comes in, attracted by the sound, and says, "Gosh, you've got to get Frank across right now, to hear how it's going!" - ummm, not so sure, at 11.30pm, 😉.

 

 

Is "N" short for Nobody?

 

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

 

Meaning, a pipe organ recording shouldn't sound like a live pipe organ ... got it! 🙂

 

You totally misunderstand George's post, if you want a pipe organ to sound like a live pipe organ you need the lowest frequencies. The largest pipe is 16Hz.

[Teresa]

4 hours ago, fas42 said:

Most, classical, recordings ?? You must have a completely different collection of discs from what I have, then ...the 'worst' offenders with strange presentation of classical music I've come across have been from nominally "audiophile" labels - I have scratched with my head with these -what on earth are they trying to do!

 

Quite simply audiophile labels strive to make recordings that capture the musical performance as accurately as possible.

 

Read this from fonè Records: 
 

Quote

 

In the world of classical and jazz music recording, for almost thirty years fonè has been using advanced techniques, aimed at re-creating the atmosphere of the original performance. Each new recording is the result of an enthusiastic encounter between the art of performance and the art of recording, and aims to reproduce the spirit with which works of the past were executed.

One basic feature, which determines the difference between fonè and other record companies, is the recording of performances in their natural spaces, that is in the places where they were originally presented. This leads to a constant search for suitable locations, and the choice of churches, theatres, country mansions, drawing rooms and so on. The recordings are carried out with the utmost simplicity, the only way not to do violence to the music: all the equipment is high fidelity; use is made of valve-type paired microphones manufactured in the years 1947 and 1949 (U47, U48 and M49) with an extremely natural and transparent timbre and a bi-microphonic field effect; these microphones have a very important history: they were used to record the Beatles at the Abbey Road Studio and by the RCA for the “Living Stereo” recordings.

No use is made of electronic manipulation or artificial correction of the signal, which while making sound easier to realize also render it unacceptably unnatural...

 

I guess your system is not well sorted enough to enjoy the sonic realism of the best audiophile classical and jazz recordings. Oh, well.

[Teresa]

5 hours ago, fas42 said:

We've been here before, well and truly, Teresa 🙂 ...did I say, all, audiophile labels ... ?

 

This is relevant to George saying that recordings are made with many, many microphones - I'm thinking of one where there's a toy piano, and all the breadth of the orchestra is squashed between the speakers; the shoulders of the musicians would be severely overlapping, to make it happen, 😉.

 

No you didn't, however most of my music is on audiophile labels. According to my database I have recordings from 93 different labels, about 90% being from audiophile and boutique classical labels. And I have never heard such a mess from any audiophile recording as you describe above and in post #1177  

 

George is correct most classical recordings use too many microphones.

 

I'm not sure why you feel the need to belittle audiophile labels all the time. Audiophile labels do it for the love of music. Major labels do it for the money, because it's cheaper to record with a ton of microphones and channels then let the engineer fix it in the mix, than it is to get it right in the first place. 

[Teresa]

9 hours ago, fas42 said:

Simply, because nearly every time I listen to some recording, and it sounds 'boring', or just strange in how it's recorded - it turns out to be an 'audiophile' label. Perhaps I haven't listened to the "right" labels enough ... I never buy by the label, but purely by the content thereon - the exception is when there is some dumping type of sale happening.

 

Thanks for the reply. I understand boring, as I personally don't listen to music I find boring. However, I have never heard a strange sounding recording from an audiophile label so I would be curious what titles they are. If I have them I will give a listen and let you know what I think. OK?

 

3 hours ago, gmgraves said:

I think it might be because you’ve no Idea what an “honest” stereo recording is supposed to sound like. Good ones have a soundstage that visually, palpably lays the orchestra or ensemble out before the listener. It stretches from wall to wall, way beyond the outer edges of the speakers. The listener can pick out individual instruments in the exact positions on stage that they occupied in the recording venue. Multi-miked and multi-channeled recordings cannot do that at all. Neither can “stereo” recordings made with spaced omnidirectional mikes (Mercury Living Presence recordings, many of the Lewis Layton RCA Red Seals and most Telarcs) they can give a wide soundstage, but because spaced omnis are not phase coherent, they cannot give pinpoint imaging.

 

I agree with this, although your considerably more expensive audio system must get getter pinpoint imaging than mine because on my system Mercury Living Presence, RCA Living Stereo, Telarc and others don't sound deficient in that regard. I prefer recordings made with spaced omnidirectional mikes as they generally have more impact and power in the lower frequencies, and a wider, deeper soundstage. 

 

With my Infinity Kappa 7's, recordings made with spaced omnidirectional mikes do all the things you say they cannot do. Perhaps system differences? Or expectation bias based my memory of what an orchestra in a concert hall sounds like? Or perhaps I have a good imagination, though no as good as Frank's (fas42)? 

 

BTW, I thought you liked the Mercury Living Presence 180 gram LPs remastered by Classic Records.

 

3 hours ago, opus101 said:

MLP recordings to me sound in general too bright, the tonal balance sounds 'tipped up'. How might this happen? Or is it just my ears which aren't correct? I don't hear this with the very few Telarc recordings I have though.

 

I found that the original MLP (Mercury Living Presence) LPs sound too bright to me as well. However, most of the MLP CDs and all the SACDs I've heard don't have this problem. And the newer remastered MLP 180/200 gram LPs from Classic Records and Speakers Corner in my system sound smooth and warm.

 

I own more Telarc's than any other label and have never heard one that is too bright. I have one that sounds a little too dull though Vintage Cinema.

[Teresa]

15 hours ago, gmgraves said:

Frank, I think it’s time for you to change this thread’s name from “Frank’s Stereo Magic” to “Frank’s Stereo Alchemy” or perhaps “Frank’s Stereo Sorcery“. No, I’ve got it! “Frank’s Stereo Fantasy”. 😚

 

George, this is not Frank's @fas42 thread so he can't do that. The original poster is @Blackmorec only he can make your proposed changes.

[Teresa]

18 hours ago, opus101 said:

...first claim I've met to be able to hear RF...

 

Depends if it is in the audible range and at a high enough level. See below.

 

9 hours ago, gmgraves said:

Well, if one can’t “hear” the effects of RF interference in one’s system’s presentation, what difference would it make if the interference were present or not?...

 

None IMHO.

 

18 hours ago, gmgraves said:

...RF interference with enough amplitude to be a problem would be easy to see on a ‘scope (with no audio signal). Most of the time there is none.

 

Or in my experience, heard. I was hearing bad radio frequency interference (RFI) that actually sounded like a low level slightly mistuned radio station playing when I had no music playing or in between songs. I don’t own a tuner so I had no idea where this was coming from.
 
I bought a used Monster HDP1800 High Definition PowerCenter at a pawn shop for $60. I routed all my system power cords through the PowerCenter 1800 and the interference disappeared completely. The best $60 I ever spent.

 

I'm sure this is a worst case scenario, but shows RFI at least in some cases is audible and can be removed with a line conditioner.

[Teresa]

On 7/29/2020 at 5:34 PM, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

Of course, the better the "rig", the less it will sound like Frank's favorite ghetto blaster🤷‍♂️🙄 ...

 

I agree. I would not want my audio system to sound like the junk Frank peddles. I prefer sonic realism, tonal accuracy, wide / deep soundstage to actually be provided by my audio system when playing sonically accurate recordings. Unlike Frank's wishful thinking which will not get me there. It has to sound real period! I wish someone from Australia would visit Frank and reveal him for the fraud I believe he is. 

 

22 hours ago, fas42 said:

I know it's difficult to follow logic, David, so I'll spell it out:

 

You,

 

Me: I have posted often that I came across a prime example of how rigs in raw form can deliver exceptional sound, if all the circumstances are right; a Bryston and Dynaudio combo at the last hifi show, which also delivered PA levels of SPL - it sounded exactly like my "favorite ghetto blaster", 😉.

 

As an exercise, I'll leave it to a bright boy like yourself to add the next line ...

 

As an addendum, I have been making a list of @Audiophile Neuroscience certified junk brands, because they fit the metric that they deliver SQ just like the "favorite ghetto blaster" - as a service, I can post the list, so people know whose products they can ignore, 🙂

 

You don't get it! We don't want equipment that sounds as bad as your "favorite ghetto blaster", understand? I'm sure most of us prefer equipment that sounds like real music.

 

A list of equipment that doesn't deliver the awful sound quality of you "favorite ghetto blaster" wouldn't be junk brands but good brands.

 

17 hours ago, fas42 said:

...The aim is to hear the recording, not the playback chain...

 

That's our aim not yours. You want an audio system in which all recordings are listenable and sound to you like your fantasy of live (in the flesh) music. Do you ever hear live acoustic music?

 

Once you actually get your equipment to a level of realistic playback you will be able to hear what is actually on the recording (both good and bad). Right now you are listening to a playback chain that makes most recordings sound equally mediocre.

 

15 hours ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

So, with few exceptions , whether sorted or not, you prefer modified ghetto blaster sound over high end systems.....which brings me to" Of course, the better the "rig", the less it will sound like Frank's favorite ghetto blaster

 

Bingo! 😄

 

15 hours ago, fas42 said:

Actually, I prefer the sound of the recording ... others prefer the 'seasoning' which typically comes with high end rigs; which is why every one of them normally sounds so different from the next - of course, one can pretend to oneself that one's own seasoning is The One, that which is actually the sound of the recording, and everyone else's is wrong, or just not as good - so, the trick is to not share notes ...

 

No you don't, you prefer "seasoning" otherwise you would know that all recordings do not sound the same. Most  audio systems strive to be the most sonically accurate at their price point. High end components and speakers don't have to compromise on parts and construction and, of course, will sound more accurate. Which is the goal of must audio equipment manufacturers.

 

14 hours ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

...and so the circle goes round 🙄

 

you prefer "the sound of the recording" on a modified ghetto blaster, that is your '"seasoning". Others prefer the sound of high end quality gear, which sounds to them much closer to real life, not the "seasoning" of a ghetto blaster.🙂

 

Bingo again! 😄

 

14 hours ago, fas42 said:

 ...High end quality gear does so much damage to natural sounds, usually - I'm sure people are ecstatic when something like a solo piano being played starts to sound vaguely like the real thing ... who am I to disrupt such pleasures? 🙂

 

That is not true!!!! High end equipment strives for timbre accuracy and sonic realism. It is low-fi equipment that damages natural sounds. 

 

12 hours ago, Summit said:

“The current active speakers are so far pretty impressive, in raw form..”

“..others prefer the 'seasoning' which typically comes with high end rigs..”

“..of course, one can pretend to oneself that one's own seasoning is The One,..”

“High end quality gear does so much damage to natural sounds..”

 

The quotes above (all from today) make it clear (to me) that you actually consider your sound system to sound more truthful than 99% of all High End systems. This along with all the posts about how unimportant it is to set up the speakers properly, and that audiophile records all sound bad and many other controversial beliefs ... are just weird. I mean, you do realize that this goes against pretty much what all the people on an audiophile forum strive for, regardless of taste and budget?

 

That is why I don't take Frank @fas42 seriously.

[Teresa]

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

Unfortunately, Teresa, you can't seem to separate the cost of the equipment, from a dealer; with the capability of the setup to do its job - reproduce what's on the recording ... I left that place 30 years ago - the retail value of the bits of metal and wood in front of me mean close to zero in terms of being subjectively transparent to the content of the recording.

 

If some people want audio to be a hobby where the highest cost wins, every time - that's fine ... but that shouldn't condemn others to suffer inferior SQ, just because it suits the thinking of the former lot.

 

You are dead wrong again. While a higher retail price does allow for superior component parts and build quality, inexpensive components can offer very realistic sound quality if care is taken in topology and synergy of chosen affordable parts.

 

I, like nearly all audiophiles want to reproduce what is on the recording (both the good and bad) and an audio system which gets out of the way, reproduces what the microphones actually captured, nothing more, nothing less. But there is a limit on how cheaply something can be made and still sound realistic. And no matter what you do to boom box speakers, or the tiny speakers in a laptop computer, both of which you praised after you sorted them, you will never get sonic realism out of them.

 

I own a Yamaha Blu-ray / SACD player with sounds very realistic in my audio system and it had only a retail price of $330. I paid less. I would never delude myself in believing that it sounds as realistic as a $17,000 Playback Designs SACD player. I know I've heard one. Also I would never delude myself into believing that my floor standing Infinity Kappa 7 speakers sound more realistic than a $40,000 speaker system. I have heard many great sounding high-end systems and your trashing them I find highly offensive.

 

Finally, if a component, speakers or headphones doesn't accurately reproduce what's on the recording it goes back for a refund.

[Teresa]

9 hours ago, fas42 said:

Well, it's a journey - hence the title. I assume that the system is perfect, first up - and then let it, slowly or quickly, disappoint me...

 

At this point I would take it back for a refund. And purchase something that doesn't disappoint.

[Teresa]

7 hours ago, fas42 said:

You have shown me yours ... ???...

 

Actually @Audiophile Neuroscience has shown everyone his audio system, just click on his avatar and then click on "Audio System". He has an excellent picture of his audio system with a list of the components and speakers. Or click here.

 

By contrast your "Audio System" page says "In limbo at the moment ..."

 

Hope this helps. 😊

 

Frank as @Audiophile Neuroscience has said over and over, 'show and tell' time for you and there can be no more excuses IMHO. You will notice I don't list my audio equipment either, however I don't make bizarro claims like you.

[Teresa]

On 7/23/2021 at 4:15 PM, fas42 said:

“The best sounding audio product is the one that exhibits the least audible flaws.”

 Dr. Floyd Toole

 

I completely agree with Dr. Toole's statement above. The solution is easy, purchase the most accurate audio equipment in one's price range that sounds realistic in one's listening room when playing accurately made recordings. This is what I did decades ago and I'm extremely happy with the sonic realism of my audio system, instead of stressing about sound I just enjoy playing the best music collection I have ever had.

 

I recommend not succumbing to audiophilia nervosa as I believe Frank has. Audiophilia nervosa is defined as the anxiety resulting from the never-ending quest to obtain the ultimate performance from one's stereo system by means of employing state-of-the-art components, cables, and the use of certain tweaks.

 

From what Frank has posted I believe he tries to tweak extremely budget components which have lots of compromises due to meeting their low price. Frank hard wires cable connections, changing power supplies and other tweaks. Even though he bad mouths state-of-the-art components I still feel he has Audiophilia nervosa because of his forever tweaking and unhappiness with his sound quality. 

 

In short, I believe Frank is wrong. While there are people  who can't recognize the obvious flaws in the playback's real world performance such as those who buy their stereos at Walmart, but such a statement doesn't apply to 99% of people at Audiophile Style. IMHO most of us have achieved the best sounding results in our price range, it is Frank who is not there yet now or even 30 years ago.

 

On 7/23/2021 at 4:38 PM, kumakuma said:

 

Frank appears to be on a mission to make everyone as unhappy as he is...

 

I agree completely with this, his is not the way to musical enjoyment IMHO.

[Teresa]

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

...If you do it the 'right way', then every recording can give you, musical enjoyment...

 

This is one of many areas where we strongly disagree. In my over six decades of buying music recordings, I find that how a recording is engineered and/or remastered is as important as how it is reproduced. Inaccurate and poorly engineered  recordings cannot be saved by audio equipment including tweaks IMHO.

 

Some of my favorite recording engineers include Jack Renner, Michael Bishop, Prof. Keith O. Johnson, Marc Aubort, Tony Faulkner, Kenneth Wilkinson, C. Robert Fine, Lewis Layton, Richard Mohr, etc. There are many others I didn't mention, I didn't want to spend the time to go through my entire music collection. Your boneheaded idea that with the right tweaks all recordings will give all listeners musical enjoyment as you state above, but also all recordings including poorly engineered ones will sound realistic. This is impossible IMHO. And your insistence that this is true is an insult to all the recording engineers who work very hard to actually make realistic sounding recordings. Perhaps, your standard of what is listenable is much, much lower than mine? That would make more sense to me. 

[Teresa]

6 hours ago, fas42 said:

Where the nonsense is, is the refusal of people to accept that a single weakness in an audio system can severely undermine what you hear...

 

Everyone I know or have ever communicated with knows that an audio system is only as accurate as its weakest link. Thus, no one refuses to accept that, so you statement is false.

 

2 hours ago, kumakuma said:

Who are "most people"?

 

You (Frank - fas42) are the only one I've ever heard claim to be able fix flawed recording through tweaking of the equipment.

 

As far as I know he is the only one to believe such nonsense. 

 

Frank's claim of making poor recordings sound as realistic as correctly engineered recordings by tweaking super cheap audio equipment is false. To extract the resolution from audio recordings one needs an audio system that is as accurate as possible in their price range. No matter the equipment, correctly engineered recordings will always sound more realistic than poorly engineered recordings. His claim otherwise is an insult to all the recording engineers who produce realistic sounding recordings. Such sonic realism I am quite sure Frank has never heard.

[Teresa]

54 minutes ago, fas42 said:

They may say that, but they point to obvious things, like the speakers, or room, as being weakest - the reality is much, much more complex ...

 

Speaker placement and the listening room are important for accurate sound quality. An audio system is only as accurate as its weakest link! Those links include speakers, speaker placement, audio components, the listening room, etc. All of this is important if you want to hear what is actually on your sound recordings. 

 

Quote

I'm sure engineers who work on labels you like, do much to create a certain sound - which works very well on typical audio gear. However, what I'm interested in is to able to listen to any recording, and not be put off by what I'm hearing - no, cringe, etc, moments - this gives me, the full, historical recording archive to enjoy; rather than a small subsection of it - it's the music that matters, not how it was produced.

 

The labels I like don't produce a certain sound, they strive to produce the most accurate recordings possible.

 

Many historic recordings from the golden age are very accurate especially Jazz and Classical recordings from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s.

 

If you can enjoy any recording then your listening standards are very low IMHO. It is the music that matters and I prefer my music to not be mangled by poor engineering.