Great sounding system - $2K all in

[kumakuma]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

 

True for everyone that I've come across - the ones that have the hardest time grokking it are, ummm, audiophiles ... 🤣.

 

Women who have close to zero interest in this bizarre hobby 🙃 have no trouble getting it - they're in the groove immediately ... they enjoy what they're hearing - and when I ask if they hear problems with the recording, they give me a puzzled look 🙂.

 

It's all part of the human hearing system's ability to adapt, and compensate, for picking up what matters when one is in a difficult, or unusual auditory situation - there will always be people who won't have this switch, but I suggest they would be in the minority.

 

Unfortunately, it's just hard to get an audio rig to the standard of integrity that's necessary for this behaviour to occur - hence, it's rare - and easy to to deny it's possible ... all those people who have come across some playback which was "just magic!!" at least once in their lives have encountered it - but haven't understood what was happening ...

 

The Sagan Standard was "invented" for claims like this...

[fas42]

Ah, I was waiting for the moment for throwing in the Rogue Wave Deniers story ... looks like it's arrived, 😉.

 

Rogue waves? Yep - monster waves that can overwhelm even the biggest sailing vessels; I just came across this phenomenon - a famous incident occurred in WWII:

 

Quote

.....But the worst was still to come. About 700 miles from Scotland, the Queen Mary suddenly fell into an almost bottomless pit. She was then broadsided on her port side by a monstrous wave crest that was at least twice as high as any wave she had encountered. This mountain of water shattered windows on the bridge, 95 feet above the waterline. It tore away all the lifeboats on the port side of the top deck. It broke through portholes, sending water rushing into hundreds of cabins. But most seriously, the weight of this stupendous wave, many thousands of tons of water, slowly rolled the Queen Mary over farther than she had ever rolled over before. The lifeboats on the starboard side swung down with the ship and almost touched the sea. Soldiers on the lower decks of the starboard side looked out of their portholes and saw dark seawater. Many were thrown out of their bunks and broke arms and legs or suffered concussions. In the dining rooms, chairs slid from one side to the other, and dishes and glasses shattered. For the soldiers at antiaircraft positions, a hundred feet above the waterline, the scene they witnessed was especially harrowing. Those on the port side stared in disbelief as a mountain of water appeared to come right at them, and those on the starboard side were one minute a hundred feet high and the next swinging wildly through the air until they almost touched the ocean itself. Soldiers slid out doorways riding torrents of water from broken portholes. Many soldiers threw on life preservers, convinced the ship had been torpedoed. When Mary had listed over on its side farther than any ship’s crew had ever experienced before, and when she seemed to stay there for an eternity, those seamen figured that the ship would never right itself again. In fact, according to later calculations, if the Queen Mary had listed over only three more degrees, she would have capsized. If she had capsized, she would have almost certainly sunk, taking with her 16,000 lives and instantly becoming the largest maritime disaster in history.

 

Okay, we are talking about one of the biggest ocean liners of the time, 80,000 tons - thrown around like a toy.

 

Guess what? The researchers and scientists refused to believe that such large waves could occur, because their mathematics didn't support the possibility of such large waves - until the mid 1990's ... it was a classic, Sagan Standard, pig-headedness on their part...

 

Meaning that a large number of ships were lost, and lives were lost - because the institutions regulating relevant matters did nothing to improve the situation, based on what the "experts" said.

[kumakuma]

4 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Ah, I was waiting for the moment for throwing in the Rogue Wave Deniers story ... looks like it's arrived, 😉.

 

Rogue waves? Yep - monster waves that can overwhelm even the biggest sailing vessels; I just came across this phenomenon - a famous incident occurred in WWII:

 

 

Okay, we are talking about one of the biggest ocean liners of the time, 80,000 tons - thrown around like a toy.

 

Guess what? The researchers and scientists refused to believe that such large waves could occur, because their mathematics didn't support the possibility of such large waves - until the mid 1990's ... it was a classic, Sagan Standard, pig-headedness on their part...

 

Meaning that a large number of ships were lost, and lives were lost - because the institutions regulating relevant matters did nothing to improve the situation, based on what the "experts" said.

 

An interesting story but using it to suggest that the default stance towards extraordinary claims should be belief is a classic example of a logical fallacy as it fails to take into account the hundreds of thousands of long-forgotten extraordinary claims made over the years that proved to be false.

[fas42]

42 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

An interesting story but using it to suggest that the default stance towards extraordinary claims should be belief is a classic example of a logical fallacy as it fails to take into account the hundreds of thousands of long-forgotten extraordinary claims made over the years that proved to be false.

 

So, how are we to sort the wheat from the chaff, eh? Of course, we could go with with that old standby, being open minded until we have satisfied ourselves by looking at everything; as against saying, "That's what the mob believes ... mob rules!!".

 

I take it then, that in your audio lifetime you have never come across a system that took your breath away ... 😉?

 

OK, games on, up the road! N. just rang, we'll do a session tomorrow ... he's been experimenting with coupling caps in his Naim amps - will see what special stuff has been unleashed by these mods, 😀.

[kumakuma]

12 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

So, how are we to sort the wheat from the chaff, eh? Of course, we could go with with that old standby, being open minded until we have satisfied ourselves by looking at everything

 

 

Seems a bizarre approach towards extraordinary claims as the vast majority are untrue.

 

12 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

I take it then, that in your audio lifetime you have never come across a system that took your breath away ... 😉?

 

 

I've heard numerous yet none that can make shite recordings sound good.

[fas42]

17 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

Seems a bizarre approach towards extraordinary claims as the vast majority are untrue.

 

Indeed, many are so out there that the limb you have climb out on extends a long, long way ...

 

Why I particularly like the Rogue Wave Deniers, RWD, is that an enormous number of subjective accounts were available, to say that something was happening that needed to be understood - but the intelligentsia refused to take any notice, because it didn't suit them; "it didn't fit" - the "extraordinary thing I'm claiming" is that human hearing is capable of deciphering what's on a recording, when it hasn't been trashed even further by distortion of the playback ... not quite in the flat earth category, I would have thought ... 😉.

 

17 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

 

I've heard numerous yet none that can make shite recordings sound good.

 

Right, we have a Shite Recording Believer here - how does that balance against a RWD? 🙂

[kumakuma]

27 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Why I particularly like the Rogue Wave Deniers, RWD, is that an enormous number of subjective accounts were available, to say that something was happening that needed to be understood - but the intelligentsia refused to take any notice, because it didn't suit them; "it didn't fit" - the "extraordinary thing I'm claiming" is that human hearing is capable of deciphering what's on a recording, when it hasn't been trashed even further by distortion of the playback ... not quite in the flat earth category, I would have thought ... 😉.

 

If there were an enormous number of subjective accounts, I'm not sure that I would clarify it as an extraordinary claim.

 

Your extraordinary claim, as I see it, is not that "human hearing is capable of deciphering what's on a recording" but that the human mind can somehow reverse the damage that's been done through poor recording, editing, or mastering techniques.

[sandyk]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

he's been experimenting with coupling caps in his Naim amps - will see what special stuff has been unleashed by these mods, 😀

 The best sounding  coupling caps are NO coupling caps.

I.O.W. D.C. coupled 

[sandyk]

15 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

but that the human mind can somehow reverse the damage that's been done through poor recording, editing, or mastering techniques.

Tom

That may be true to a small extent, as in my case, due to hearing damage and the Acoustic Neuroma pressing  on my right ear canal, occasionally, especially when my BP is a little elevated, it can take a short period before my hearing 

" locks in",  especially  to voices with accents, a bit like an electronic P.L.L. (Phase Lock Loop) locking in, but taking a little longer. 

 

Perhaps Frank also has some degree of hearing damage ?

Alex

[fas42]

7 minutes ago, sandyk said:

 The best sounding  coupling caps are NO coupling caps.

I.O.W. D.C. coupled 

 

Of course. But that's not how this amp has been engineered. I have heard these units produce "magic sound" at times, with the standard caps as used by Naim; so this will be interesting, to see what has been gained.

[fas42]

15 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

Your extraordinary claim, as I see it, is not that "human hearing is capable of deciphering what's on a recording" but that the human mind can somehow reverse the damage that's been done through poor recording, editing, or mastering techniques.

 

Some mastering techniques are difficult - the recent, extreme dynamic compression is an obvious one; and the Amy Winehouse "gotta sound like vinyl!" fiddling is pretty awful. But leaving those aside, if the people creating it had no intrinsic desire to mess up the sound, then IME it comes across extremely well.

 

The human mind latches onto the primary sound event in what it hears - and discards what it knows is not relevant; I do have recordings which have been butchered by people who are technically incompetent - and I was amazed at how well my hearing does this sorting, completely automatically - the first time this happened for a particular example, 🙂.

[kumakuma]

17 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Some mastering techniques are difficult - the recent, extreme dynamic compression is an obvious one; and the Amy Winehouse "gotta sound like vinyl!" fiddling is pretty awful. But leaving those aside, if the people creating it had no intrinsic desire to mess up the sound, then IME it comes across extremely well.

 

The human mind latches onto the primary sound event in what it hears - and discards what it knows is not relevant; I do have recordings which have been butchered by people who are technically incompetent - and I was amazed at how well my hearing does this sorting, completely automatically - the first time this happened for a particular example, 🙂.

 

Thanks for confirming my understanding of your "extraordinary claim". 👺

[fas42]

21 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

Thanks for confirming my understanding of your "extraordinary claim". 👺

 

Right, found this,

 

Are we putting these into the Shite Recording category, still? 😉

[kumakuma]

15 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Right, found this,

 

Are we putting these into the Shite Recording category, still? 😉

 

My opinion hasn't changed.

 

The RVG remaster of Herbie Hancock's Speak Like A Child, for example, is painful to listen to... especially when compared to the more recent 24/192 remaster created for BN's 75th Anniversary.  

[fas42]

This one?

 

 

 

[kumakuma]

4 minutes ago, fas42 said:

This one?

 

 

 

 

Yes. It pales in comparison to the later remaster.

[fas42]

Okay, have checked out some YT clips of the 75th remasters - from several artists, on piano ... they've killed the treble! ... Sorta honky tonk tonality, now 🙂

 

Well, it's one way of responding to people complaining, I guess ... but I prefer to hear the full richness of the piano, thank you!

[kumakuma]

34 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Okay, have checked out some YT clips of the 75th remasters - from several artists, on piano ... they've killed the treble! ... Sorta honky tonk tonality, now 🙂

 

Well, it's one way of responding to people complaining, I guess ... but I prefer to hear the full richness of the piano, thank you!

 

It's interesting that you prefer the artificially boosted treble of those remasters.

 

Perhaps you're suffering from the same hearing issues that RVG reportedly had when he did them. Not surprising considering that he was 80 when the remaster I mentioned above was released.

[fas42]

28 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

It's interesting that you prefer the artificially boosted treble of those remasters.

 

Perhaps you're suffering from the same hearing issues that RVG reportedly had when he did them. Not surprising considering that he was 80 when the remaster I mentioned above was released.

 

Artificially boosted? I thought the treble control was a very organic part of how recordings are made, 🙂.

 

An easy way calibrate your hearing - go to a clip where someone has recorded a live piano playing some energetic jazz ... not the output of some bloody PA crap(!); note the transient impact of the high notes, etc. Then compare it to the various styles of mastering - and pick the one which matches that amateur capture of piano sound best - you might be surprised ... 😉.

 

You now have a level playing field in the replay chain of YT video to you, and your hearing.

[fas42]

As a contrast to the big bucks items in earlier clips, how about this?

 

 

[kumakuma]

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

I prefer to hear the full richness of the piano, thank you!

 

If you've properly sorted out your rig, how the piano sounds in the recording doesn't matter. Your brain will flip that magic switch and your soul will be bathed in nothing but glorious music played by angels.

[botrytis]

11 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

Artificially boosted? I thought the treble control was a very organic part of how recordings are made, 🙂.

 

An easy way calibrate your hearing - go to a clip where someone has recorded a live piano playing some energetic jazz ... not the output of some bloody PA crap(!); note the transient impact of the high notes, etc. Then compare it to the various styles of mastering - and pick the one which matches that amateur capture of piano sound best - you might be surprised ... 😉.

 

You now have a level playing field in the replay chain of YT video to you, and your hearing.

 

How do you deal with the room acoustics in a live setting? Many small Jazz clubs have some of the worst acoustics out there. So how do you deal with that affect.  Then there is the affect of the room acoustics and what microphones record. There are too many affects to say for sure that what you hear in a live setting is only the instrument.

 

Carry on :D

[kumakuma]

31 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

How do you deal with the room acoustics in a live setting? Many small Jazz clubs have some of the worst acoustics out there. So how do you deal with that affect.  Then there is the affect of the room acoustics and what microphones record. There are too many affects to say for sure that what you hear in a live setting is only the instrument.

 

Carry on :D

 

+1

 

I found this interesting article that goes through the myriad of issues related to recording a piano:

 

https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/piano-recording

[kumakuma]

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

An easy way calibrate your hearing - go to a clip where someone has recorded a live piano playing some energetic jazz ... not the output of some bloody PA crap(!); note the transient impact of the high notes, etc. Then compare it to the various styles of mastering - and pick the one which matches that amateur capture of piano sound best - you might be surprised ... 😉.

 

You now have a level playing field in the replay chain of YT video to you, and your hearing.

 

I don't use YT to evaluate recordings.

[botrytis]

32 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

+1

 

I found this interesting article that goes through the myriad of issues related to recording a piano:

 

https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/piano-recording

 

 

Very interesting article but how many sound engineers at clubs read articles like that?

 

Thanks for the read...