Ciunas Audio
Trade: Ciunas Audio
But your point wasn't defensible - you can't compare TWO ears to ONE microphone & say two ears are better. Now two ears Vs two microphones is a more equitable comparison but ......
Illusions - what do we really hear
- Thread starter westsea
- Start date
But your point wasn't defensible - you can't compare TWO ears to ONE microphone & say two ears are better. Now two ears Vs two microphones is a more equitable comparison but ......
awkwardbydesign
Officially Awesome
Missed it again! That was the point! Read my post again.
westsea
Retirement present
This thread has gone way beyond my expectations, and I have learned much and misunderstood more.
Perhaps we should relax occasionally:-
This is possibly before many of you born!! But play it through to the end to get the message, and smile!
Google /Utube
Flanders And Swann ~ Song Of Reproduction ~ (1957)
Perhaps we should relax occasionally:-
This is possibly before many of you born!! But play it through to the end to get the message, and smile!
Google /Utube
Flanders And Swann ~ Song Of Reproduction ~ (1957)
westsea
Retirement present
I'm hurt, it was a suggestion not meant as an instruction
The answer is quite easily in that case Richard. It'll see it as a volume drop but it may see a change in FR as well.
Whilst a mic does not have the benefit (or disadvantage, LOL) of a human brain to interpret the sonic impact of various changes, a decent mic will have a frequency response that is more linear and far more extended in range than your ears.
Also, try drawing a frequency response of your system with any accuracy while playing some pink noise. Er...
The mic easily sees the effect of valve changes on frequency response. As I said I use it for that purpose quite a lot. What it can do, which you cannot, is give you much more insight into why it sounds different.
awkwardbydesign
Officially Awesome
Phew! Thanks Justin, a relevant reply at last. While I don't disagree with what you say here, I don't believe* a domestically usable mic set up can show everything that educated** ears can, especially a single mic. Hence the examples I suggested. Having heard your system, I am amazed you DON'T trust your ears!
*I only have a Behringer ECM8000 into REW, so can't be definitive about domestically available kit.
** By educated I mean yours and mine, not the MP3 user.
whatsnext
Naimless
F&S were clever crafters of lyrics. Admirable for their word skills but hardly funny. Different in their time.
Could you tell us a bit more about your technique. I like the idea.
What mic and software? How do you set up exactly to keep your measurements consistent?
I have REW and a Behringer ECM8000 but I'm not convinced this combination is accurate enough to detect subtle changes.
awkwardbydesign
Officially Awesome
Exactly my point.
cooky1257
pfm Member
Hold on, a microphone(s) was good enough to record all the subtleties in the first place so it should be easy to record the changes, before and after to be able to identify exactly what has changed. How can you accept data captured in the recording that is 'revealed' by certain components/accesories but is somehow invisible to any future attempts at recording them...
I do trust my ears, Dick. But only insofar as determining what I like the sound of.
Remember when I swapped the triodes in the Lampizator DAC? Your first statement was "they sound rolled off" when I went from 6A3 to VT-52. Actually, the mic reveals that the VT-52 is NOT rolled off. It is actually flatter in frequency response than the 6A3, which is rather more jagged. It is also a couple of DB down at around 83 DB compared to the 6A3's 85DB.
So really the perceived extra brightness of the 6A3 is down to a rougher FR i.e. a greater standard deviation from the mean. Plus there's a bit more output.
Exactly 100% excellent point.
The Behringer or a miniDSP Umik-1 are test mics. They will pic up small changes easily.
By rolling valves, and keeping the mic in the exact same position at the listening point (where your ears are), you will easily measure changes.
Make sure you are using at least 1/12 smoothing so the differences are not smoothed out. Just keep the mic in place, run your FR test a few times to convince yourself there is no significant variance between readings. If there is variance, try and make sure it is not your body position.
Then roll some valves, change some cables, change amps etc and do it again. Bingo, you should see the variance.
awkwardbydesign
Officially Awesome
OK. So the VT-52, being flatter, sounded rolled off compared to the 6A3? To MY ears, bearing in mind that I have an 8kHz spike in my measured hearing. Fair enough, and the mic showed what the measurable difference was. Certainly we all have preferences in sound, and mine will be different from yours.
I only mentioned that to point out that my ears were not insensitive.
My examples about mics NOT picking up everything specifically included examples that didn't rely on changes in overall level.
Your points are good, as far as they go, but I remain to be convinced that human hearing is less discriminating than microphones.
Still, you have certainly created a system that performs beyond mine, so what do I know?
Mics and ears are completely different things, Dick, that work in very different ways.
The fact that the organics of a human ear is also connected to a neural network i.e. a brain means that the whole human setup thang can do things no mic stands a chance of doing.
I'm pretty sure this is what you are getting at, no?
The fact that the organics of a human ear is also connected to a neural network i.e. a brain means that the whole human setup thang can do things no mic stands a chance of doing.
I'm pretty sure this is what you are getting at, no?
awkwardbydesign
Officially Awesome
I guess. I also feel there is a mindset that has crept into general acceptance that we (or rather not I) can trust the measurements, and not have to worry about missing something. It reminds me of the Victorian believe that Newtonian physics could provide the answers to everything, given time. We had the tools to answer all the questions.
And look how that turned out.
As I see it, the whole point is how it sounds to us. And as long as there are those like conductors who can pick out one player slightly out of feeling within an orchestra, then claiming we can explain everything we hear by measuring it (or trying to!) smacks of hubris. I am not convinced. Bear in mind that to a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
And look how that turned out.
As I see it, the whole point is how it sounds to us. And as long as there are those like conductors who can pick out one player slightly out of feeling within an orchestra, then claiming we can explain everything we hear by measuring it (or trying to!) smacks of hubris. I am not convinced. Bear in mind that to a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Werner
pfm Member
Ah, the Romantic Audiophile! All will be well once we have this Grand New Insight, a bit like an auditory theory of everything. It surely will turn entirely upside down the disciplines of DAC, amplifier, speaker, and certainly cable and rack design.
But please enlighten me. Given that sound in a given point is amplitude versus time, how can one introduce a difference if it does not change amplitude versus time?
adamdea
You are not a sound quality evaluation device
I'm tempted to say- by changing the listener. But of course you mean the pressure wave, not the auditory perception.
Funny isn't it how a thread about the anomalies of auditory perception get chewed up and spat out as silly statements about pressure time relationships.
a) it's all a bit complicated
b) I can speak with apparent confidence and no understanding
ergo
c) I can say whatever the hell I like
Meanwhile of course there is research and progress being made on spatial coding especially for headphones and multichannel. None of which has anything to do with cables, supports, jitter removal, rubidium clocks or fancy capacitors. I hope that one day soon it will be practical to measure my HRTF and place me in a recording
Ciunas Audio
Trade: Ciunas Audio
Ah, the Luddite Audiophile!
As Adamea says, it's interesting that a thread about auditory perception is reduced to a point about amplitude/time at a singular point in time. However, I do see the point that is being made - that anything we hear that is different has to have it's origin in a difference in the pressure waves that impinge on our ears.
Now when we attempt to measure differences we need to be informed by some theory of what it is we want to measure, & use conditions/techniques which will maximally expose the difference, otherwise we risk missing it. So for instance, Julien Dunn's test for jitter is informed by the theory of how inter-sample interference (ISI) can occur & cause a data dependent jitter. He therefore designed a test signal which was based on this theory & an understanding of the electronics involved - this test signal maximally exposed any ISI issues. Prior to this test, was jitter recognised as being of any significance?
If you are maintaining that a better understanding of the workings of the receiver of the signal (our auditory perception) will not better inform our testing & therefore our design of the transmitter of the signal (the audio chain), then I don't agree with you.
I would have assumed that trying to exaggerate this viewpoint into a forum debating tactic is beneath you.
I don't hold the Luddite view that little progress can be made in digital or analogue electronics, I hope we are moving into a more sophisticated consideration of audio reproduction - one that will be informed by our further learnings about auditory perception & as a result we will progress towards audio reproduction that gives a more believable illusion
Rodney gold
Im just me...
If Its an illusion , you cant measure it and its different for everyone.
Worst of all its really only applicable to a few nutcases.. the rest of the population really doesnt care.
Progress is driven by the masses ..
Worst of all its really only applicable to a few nutcases.. the rest of the population really doesnt care.
Progress is driven by the masses ..