Source units affect sound?

[chung]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

Harry Lavo wrote:
> <OneActor1@aol.com> wrote in message news:cs76gn02ulh@news1.newsguy.com...
>> <<The analog sections and power supply design
>> often "make or break" the resulting sound.>>
>>
>> I did secondary comparisons with analog outputs, which I have posted
>> about here. The power supply claims are silly, IMO, because none of the
>> units I've listened to, starting at $125 or so, had power supplies
>> introducing enough distortion to be audible. People will sit back and
>> claim that having more "robust" power supplies in isolated mounting
>> points, etc... will make cleaner sound. I'm sorry to break it to those
>> people that none of this units produce distortion that the human ear
>> could detect. Secondly, I found the same with DACs. The Denon AVR-5803
>> is a better reciver than my 2803 is, but any differences in sound
>> quality between mine and the 5803 are because of the 5803s more
>> powerful amps. The DACs in these units cannot make any audible
>> difference. Period.
>
> I guess there is no use in arguing with you...you have your mind made up.
> But the size/capacity/stability of the power supply has a direct bearing,
> IME, on how well the unit presents the lower midrange and upper bass. It is
> one of the distinguishing characteristics between true high end sound and
> mid-fi.
>
>

Sure, the power supply has a bearing; without it the CD player does not
work . But you are not going to find sonic differences between $5K and
$500 or less players due to power supply; all the mass manufacturer's CD
players I have read reviews on have no trouble keeping line spurs out of
the signal.

On the other hand, maybe there is something in what you said. There may
be boutique players with really poor supply regulations. The high-end
designers are fully capable of screwing up a power supply design!

Oh, and how did you figure out that the power supply in a CD player
affects how it presents "upper bass and midrange"? I would have guessed
that the results of a poor supply would have been hum and increased
jitter. Or worse high frequency response.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 1/14/05 3:28 PM, in article cs9a210arb@news3.newsguy.com, "Stewart
Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote:

> On 14 Jan 2005 00:31:28 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
>> If you cannot give an example of a $5k player that sounds "as good" as a
>> $500 one, then it would be good to just say so.
>
> Try the Meridian 800 series. Many would regard it as sheer engineering
> overkill, but it *is* designed to be utterly linear, without any 'high
> end' trickery to make it sound 'better' than mainstream units.

OK, that is your $5000 player. What about the $500 one?

 

[Guest]

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On 1/14/05 3:29 PM, in article cs9a450atr@news3.newsguy.com, "Richard"
<rstaples312@yahoo.com> wrote:

> More importantly, the responses to you here have been that the high
> end CDPs in the ~$5000 range were not _audibly_ different than a good
> quality ~$500 (not $20) player.

However if a $20 CDP sounds worse than a Benchmark for $900, then it
logically follows that there is possible differentiation between players and
not everything is SOTA which was my point.

I would go further and say a "$500 CDP" that being unspecified and
unidentified could very well be far worse than a "$5000 CDP." Since we are
talking hypothetically.

 

[Guest]

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On 1/13/05 8:17 PM, in article cs76k702uo2@news1.newsguy.com, "Chung"
<chunglau@covad.net> wrote:

>> If you don't want the unvarnished truth of the recording - I can't say you
>> are very much interested in high end. Even if you were to ask 'phile and
>> TAS editors (minor demons on this NG) their opinion - would they rather have
>> accurate and revealing or warm and mushy and inaccurate - they would
>> probably say that accuracy was first.
>
> That certainly is not true among the more subjectivist audiophile
> posters on this newsgroup. They do not value objective accuracy much.
> They want "accuracy" to their "memories of live music", whatever that
> means. I don't think that is the same as accuracy to the recording at all.

Given the way the brain works - that is not always a bad metric, but I agree
that it can be very elusive to pin down.

But, OTOH it also difficult to pi9n down what a "$500 CDP" might be and what
a "$5000 CDP" since some are very well engineered and some not so well....


>
> You remember that Wavac amp review, right?

Sure I do - the particular reviewer that performed the review was amazed
that an amp that measured so poorly sounded as good as it did.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 1/13/05 8:15 PM, in article cs76fp02ul8@news1.newsguy.com,
"OneActor1@aol.com" <OneActor1@aol.com> wrote:

> I like Klipsch's top-spec RF-7 towers quite a bit, enough to have
> bought a pair, however I also love the much more expensive equipment
> from Dynaudio and I'm even a bit partial to a few other speakers. Using
> the Klipsch RF-7s should not have effected our sound tests.

Dunno - I have a pair of Klipsch [albeit low end $200/pr] and they seem
rather bright and congested in the mid range. They really do sound good for
the money, though.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 14 Jan 2005 20:25:15 GMT, "Harry Lavo" <harry.lavo@rcn.com> wrote:

><OneActor1@aol.com> wrote in message news:cs76gn02ulh@news1.newsguy.com...
>> <<The analog sections and power supply design
>> often "make or break" the resulting sound.>>
>>
>> I did secondary comparisons with analog outputs, which I have posted
>> about here. The power supply claims are silly, IMO, because none of the
>> units I've listened to, starting at $125 or so, had power supplies
>> introducing enough distortion to be audible. People will sit back and
>> claim that having more "robust" power supplies in isolated mounting
>> points, etc... will make cleaner sound. I'm sorry to break it to those
>> people that none of this units produce distortion that the human ear
>> could detect. Secondly, I found the same with DACs. The Denon AVR-5803
>> is a better reciver than my 2803 is, but any differences in sound
>> quality between mine and the 5803 are because of the 5803s more
>> powerful amps. The DACs in these units cannot make any audible
>> difference. Period.
>
>I guess there is no use in arguing with you...you have your mind made up.
>But the size/capacity/stability of the power supply has a direct bearing,
>IME, on how well the unit presents the lower midrange and upper bass. It is
>one of the distinguishing characteristics between true high end sound and
>mid-fi.

OTOH, since you have *never* presented any reliable and repeatable
evidence that you can actually hear these claimed 'differences',
perhaps you should limit youreself to suggesting that such things
*may* cause a slight *theoretical* improvement.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

<OneActor1@aol.com> wrote in message news:csbe7v031ev@news3.newsguy.com...
> <<I guess there is no use in arguing with you...you have your mind made
> up.
> But the size/capacity/stability of the power supply has a direct
> bearing,
> IME, on how well the unit presents the lower midrange and upper bass.
> It is
> one of the distinguishing characteristics between true high end sound
> and
> mid-fi.>>
>
> It's not me you're arguing with as much as it is the blind testing I've
> been involved in. People are very "mental" about what they hear, or
> what they *think* they hear. When you know you're comparing a $5,000 CD
> player to a $125 player, and you're watching a sales person switch
> between the two, it's very easy to "hear" a difference. When you're
> forced to sit away from the players and can no longer see which one is
> being played, your ability to "hear" those differences simply goes
> away. I have very sensitive hearing, and enjoy high-end gear, I'm also
> very picky about my sound. And if I could find any solid evidence that
> a $5,000 player truly was better than a $125 player, I'd pay the $5k.
> But the difference simply isn;t there OR it's not a difference that
> your ears can pick up. You're partially fighting medical-science here,
> there are simply things that the human ear CANNOT detect. If my dogs
> ever learn to speak, I'll ask them if THEY heard a difference. =)

My basic problem is I believe the blind testing itself knocks out many
significant "ways" of hearing beyond just sight, and none of the arguments
here have convinced me otherwise. Until the testing is verified not to
interfere with open-ended evaluation of differences, and until the
"disappearing" is investigated in more depth than it has been, I and others
will continue to trust our basic instincts.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

In article <csbe92031hd@news3.newsguy.com>,
"OneActor1@aol.com" <OneActor1@aol.com> wrote:

> <<More importantly, the responses to you here have been that the high
> end CDPs in the ~$5000 range were not _audibly_ different than a good
> quality ~$500 (not $20) player.>>
>
> This was/is certainly my feeling, and it has been since I started the
> thread. I wasn't expecting or attempting to start an argument here, I
> simply wanted to see how many "high end audio guys" were actually
> buying into the idea of more money = *audible* increases in sound
> quality. I'm constantly frustrated by reviewers who insist that when
> going from CD player to CD player or from DAC/amp to DAC/amp they can
> hear a difference in sound - that one is "warmer" that one is
> "cleaner", etc...My own blind testing with self proclaimed "audiphiles"
> has proven my inclination to be right...that it's all marketing jazz
> and little more.

You didn't expect start an argument, but you wanted to see if anyone
thinks there's a difference so you can tell them they're wrong?

I think my Arcam CD23 FMJ sounds better than my AMC CD8b, although I
ascribe the difference to design, not to magic or "more money." Am I
wrong?

Stephen

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 15 Jan 2005 16:46:05 GMT, "Harry Lavo" <harry.lavo@rcn.com> wrote:

>
>My basic problem is I believe the blind testing itself knocks out many
>significant "ways" of hearing beyond just sight, and none of the arguments
>here have convinced me otherwise. Until the testing is verified not to
>interfere with open-ended evaluation of differences, and until the
>"disappearing" is investigated in more depth than it has been, I and others
>will continue to trust our basic instincts.

Several years ago I conducted a test which the participants believed
to be sighted. They all heard the differences quite distinctly every
time, and had no problem at all identifying the two components under
test.

The only problem was that the cables I was changing were not in fact
the ones carrying the signal. The real cables remained unchanged
throughout the test.

So without the pressure of blind testing, the participants were all
relaxed enough to hear the differences easily. Shame really that there
were no differences to hear.

This is why blind testing really works, and why the results it gives
can be trusted.

d
Pearce Consulting
http/www.pearce.uk.com

 

[chung]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

B&D wrote:
> On 1/14/05 3:29 PM, in article cs9a450atr@news3.newsguy.com, "Richard"
> <rstaples312@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> More importantly, the responses to you here have been that the high
>> end CDPs in the ~$5000 range were not _audibly_ different than a good
>> quality ~$500 (not $20) player.
>
> However if a $20 CDP sounds worse than a Benchmark for $900, then it
> logically follows that there is possible differentiation between players and
> not everything is SOTA which was my point.
>
> I would go further and say a "$500 CDP" that being unspecified and
> unidentified could very well be far worse than a "$5000 CDP." Since we are
> talking hypothetically.

I guess the concept of diminishing return does not work for you. Your
logic fails because there is a minimum cost to doing things right, like
when it comes to making a CD player with no errors detectible through
normal listening. We have been arguing that the minimum price for such
players is below $500, and no one has said that the price is $20 yet. We
are not saying that the $20 will sound as good as a $500 player, because
below a certain price point, some corners have to be cut that might
affect sound.

On the other hand, going above $500 rarely will buy you anything
improvement in sound. You might get some different sounding players, but
chances are they are less accurate.

 

[chung]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

B&D wrote:
> On 1/13/05 8:17 PM, in article cs76k702uo2@news1.newsguy.com, "Chung"
> <chunglau@covad.net> wrote:
>
>>> If you don't want the unvarnished truth of the recording - I can't say you
>>> are very much interested in high end. Even if you were to ask 'phile and
>>> TAS editors (minor demons on this NG) their opinion - would they rather have
>>> accurate and revealing or warm and mushy and inaccurate - they would
>>> probably say that accuracy was first.
>>
>> That certainly is not true among the more subjectivist audiophile
>> posters on this newsgroup. They do not value objective accuracy much.
>> They want "accuracy" to their "memories of live music", whatever that
>> means. I don't think that is the same as accuracy to the recording at all.
>
> Given the way the brain works - that is not always a bad metric,

Given the way the brain works, that is a terrible metric!

Do you believe that people have the same memory of live music,
regardless of the kind of music, where they sat, or how long ago they
had listened to live music? What about people who have never been at a
recording studio, how are they to know what a studio recording should
sound? What does accuracy mean for different people then? How does the
designer design to that elusive, highly personal, accuracy of memory?

Do you want to design a circuit with no objectively measureable specs?

> but I agree
> that it can be very elusive to pin down.
>
> But, OTOH it also difficult to pi9n down what a "$500 CDP" might be and what
> a "$5000 CDP" since some are very well engineered and some not so well....
>

But that is very different than what you said previously, that $5000
will *necessarily* buy you a better player, no?

Some of us are saying that the mass-manufactured players such as those
from Sony selling for less than $500 are more likely to be consistently
good in terms of accuracy.


>>
>> You remember that Wavac amp review, right?
>
> Sure I do - the particular reviewer that performed the review was amazed
> that an amp that measured so poorly sounded as good as it did.

Actually there were two reviewers. I am not sure if the one (Mr.
Atkinson) who made the measurements ever said that the unit sounded
good. And the one who wrote the purple prose appeared to not worry about
measurements at all.

The point is that inaccuracy, in a non-blind listening session where the
price-tag is known, might appear as excellent sounding for some golden-ears.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

OneActor1@aol.com wrote:
> <<More importantly, the responses to you here have been that the high
> end CDPs in the ~$5000 range were not _audibly_ different than a good
> quality ~$500 (not $20) player.>>
>
> This was/is certainly my feeling, and it has been since I started the
> thread. I wasn't expecting or attempting to start an argument here, I
> simply wanted to see how many "high end audio guys" were actually
> buying into the idea of more money = *audible* increases in sound
> quality.

Actually, lots of them, just not here. Other discussion sites, which
get a lot more traffic than this one (audiogon, audioasylum) are
dominated by people who believe that literally everything makes an
audible difference (and that they are special because they can hear
these differences). Those sites also exercise censorship to keep down
opposing viewpoints.

After all, if there weren't consumers willing to believe that $5,000 CD
players are better, there would be no $5,000 CD players.

> I'm constantly frustrated by reviewers who insist that when
> going from CD player to CD player or from DAC/amp to DAC/amp they can
> hear a difference in sound - that one is "warmer" that one is
> "cleaner", etc...

Ah, but that's what most people who buy those magazines want to read.
Atkinson and Pearson would starve if they tried to satisfy the likes of
you!

bob

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

MINe 109 wrote:

> I think my Arcam CD23 FMJ sounds better than my AMC CD8b, although I
> ascribe the difference to design, not to magic or "more money." Am I
> wrong?

You might be. What part of the latter's design do you think is subpar,
and how do you know that it is sufficiently subpar to be audible?

And while we're at it, how do you know you aren't just imaging a
difference between them? Happens all the time.

bob

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

Over the years I have wasted a lot of money. I have two Marantz CD
players - a 63SE and a 67SE. I added a MSB link D/A converter with a
special power supply, a DIP jitter buster and use Kimber PBJ cables. It
doesn't matter which I listen to or whether or not I go through the
outboard converter. Everything sounds the same. The cables don't make
any difference either.


---MIKE---

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

I have two pairs, a pair of $1,200 Synergy towers with built in subs
and a set of Reference Series RF-7s. Both are "crisp" but not painfully
bright, which is where I find the Infinity product to be, and neither
are congested anywhere in the line. In fact, I quite like their sound,
they have a nicely defined high end sound with solid mids. Mated with a
powerful amp and a good sub, I've found very little else, at least at
that price point, that sounds as good. But I am partial to Dynaudio's
towers, which start at about $1,500 a pair and move up to almost $80k a
pair.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

<<You didn't expect start an argument, but you wanted to see if anyone
thinks there's a difference so you can tell them they're wrong?
>>

Umm...no. I wanted to see if anyone could actually deny the reality of
the situation and come up with any evidence to support their claims.
The "I thought I heard it, so it's there" rhetoric is faulty.

<< think my Arcam CD23 FMJ sounds better than my AMC CD8b, although I
ascribe the difference to design, not to magic or "more money." Am I
wrong?>>

I wouldn't say that you're "wrong", I'd say that you're hearing things
the way you want to hear them, and not the way they actually ARE.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 12 Jan 2005 00:47:09 GMT, "OneActor1@aol.com" <OneActor1@aol.com>
wrote:

><<Take a $500 NAD C542 against a Arcam CD192 ($1700) - you will hear a
>definite improvement more detail, better high end and low end. Will be
>about 20% or so better, but better overall none the less.>>
>
>I'm sorry, but my own tests have proven this notion to be false. I
>compared CD players from a broad spectrum of price points and by
>various manufacturers. All of them were connected to a Denon A/V
>reciever via optical connection and the Denon was powering Klipsch
>Reference Series speakers. I was unable to detect ANY difference in
>sonic quality between the units. Similar tests have been done elsewhere
>to the same effect.

But this is an irrelevant comparison, because you are only comparing
the *transports* in these players, not the whole player. It is in fact
likely that if you take a dozen CD players ranging from $100 to
$10,000, they will all use one of the same two transport mechs
(Philips or Sony), and will all sound identical. This ain't rocket
science!

--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 15 Jan 2005 16:17:41 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>On 1/14/05 3:28 PM, in article cs9a210arb@news3.newsguy.com, "Stewart
>Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> On 14 Jan 2005 00:31:28 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>>
>>> If you cannot give an example of a $5k player that sounds "as good" as a
>>> $500 one, then it would be good to just say so.
>>
>> Try the Meridian 800 series. Many would regard it as sheer engineering
>> overkill, but it *is* designed to be utterly linear, without any 'high
>> end' trickery to make it sound 'better' than mainstream units.
>
>OK, that is your $5000 player.

More like $10,000, but whatever.

> What about the $500 one?

Why mess about with a mere CD player at that price? Go for the Pioneer
'universal' DV-565, and get great sound from almost any variety of
silver disc - plus all the films you can watch! If you insist on a
'pure' CD player, then the Arcam CD-73 is probably as good as it gets
technically.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

On 12 Jan 2005 00:44:31 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>On 1/10/05 8:25 PM, in article crv9us01mov@news1.newsguy.com, "Stewart
>Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>> Or, perhaps, that the power supply design was done more carefully, the
>>> transport selected was capable of resisting jitter
>>
>> The lowest jitter transport assembly available *at any price* is the
>> basic Sony model. That's why Arcam and others use it.
>
>Sure - and does Sony offer more than 1 transport to the OEM's?

I believe they have two basic transport mechs, I don't know if both
are sold to OEMs.

--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

 

[Guest]

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On 15 Jan 2005 16:18:09 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>On 1/14/05 3:29 PM, in article cs9a450atr@news3.newsguy.com, "Richard"
><rstaples312@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> More importantly, the responses to you here have been that the high
>> end CDPs in the ~$5000 range were not _audibly_ different than a good
>> quality ~$500 (not $20) player.
>
>However if a $20 CDP sounds worse than a Benchmark for $900, then it
>logically follows that there is possible differentiation between players and
>not everything is SOTA which was my point.

You first have to show that the $20 player does in fact sound worse
than the Benchmark.

>I would go further and say a "$500 CDP" that being unspecified and
>unidentified could very well be far worse than a "$5000 CDP." Since we are
>talking hypothetically.

I would say that it's *much* more likely that the $5,000 player will
have poor performance!
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering