Waiting for the Truth

[Infinitely Baffled]

The problem with claiming that a component - any component - is reproducing the signal more faithfully than any other, is that it implies, nay states explicitly, that you know what the original signal is meant to sound like. How can anyone? You might have a chance of knowing what a symphony orchestra sounds like, or a string quartet. But you probably don't know what the original acoustic sounded like in which it was recorded, or what microphones the sound engineer used etc. The idea of there being a true and only "original sound" is even more meaningless in the case of electronically produced music, since there is a strong argument for saying that it doesn't even have a sound until it has been processed through some kind of music playback equipment - and they all sound different, as we know! So statements to the effect that all forms of signal attenuation change the sound, except for the one that you are using, are always going to be highly contentious. How do you know, for example, that those harmonic overtones that were heard when you used pre-amp X were not meant to be there, rather than the empty space that you might experience when listening with "The Truth", or that that warmth and richness was not in fact how the choir actually sounded on that day, rather than the "tonally neutral" presentation you are getting with "The Truth". The answer is, you don't. You cannot really say that one piece of equipment is more faithful to the original signal than another (*). All you can say is that you prefer it with (or without) the harmonic overtones, or that you like (or don't like) the sound of the choir when it is rich and golden. To claim more is to make a whole raft of assumptions that in many cases could never be checked-out and verified. This is a point I have made in other threads in the past. No music reproduction system is going to sound like the "real thing". They simply produce a facsimile of a musical performance, and if you can find and put together a set-up that appeals to your ears as a music lover, then you are winning! Go for it, but don't kid yourself that it is "real".
IB
(*) Well, you can in a purely technical sense, if you subject both pieces of equipment to bench tests with oscilloscopes and what-have-you. But that is not what we are talking about here, and good measurements might not translate into enhanced listening pleasure anyway.

[Macca]

.

Amazing how such a simple device cab cause such confusion, furory.

Not seen much fury (Jez is always like that)....

Anyway did the mat take care of the hardness problem completely?

[farflungstar]

I think so, will be doing more extensive listening tonight - but heard nothing yesterday post mat change.

Regarding hardness, it's not something I can get used to and so believe it's disappeared - I have a sensitivity to upper mid hardness that makes living in a city with sirens etc a problem and will be seeing a specialist next month. If there's even a hint if it, it's unbearable, literally.

[Arkless Electronics]

Not seen much fury (Jez is always like that)....

Anyway did the mat take care of the hardness problem completely?

No fury here pal... I trust science, not witchcraft that's all...

[farflungstar]

The problem with claiming that a component - any component - is reproducing the signal more faithfully than any other, is that it implies, nay states explicitly, that you know what the original signal is meant to sound like. How can anyone? You might have a chance of knowing what a symphony orchestra sounds like, or a string quartet. But you probably don't know what the original acoustic sounded like in which it was recorded, or what microphones the sound engineer used etc. The idea of there being a true and only "original sound" is even more meaningless in the case of electronically produced music, since there is a strong argument for saying that it doesn't even have a sound until it has been processed through some kind of music playback equipment - and they all sound different, as we know! So statements to the effect that all forms of signal attenuation change the sound, except for the one that you are using, are always going to be highly contentious. How do you know, for example, that those harmonic overtones that were heard when you used pre-amp X were not meant to be there, rather than the empty space that you might experience when listening with "The Truth", or that that warmth and richness was not in fact how the choir actually sounded on that day, rather than the "tonally neutral" presentation you are getting with "The Truth". The answer is, you don't. You cannot really say that one piece of equipment is more faithful to the original signal than another (*). All you can say is that you prefer it with (or without) the harmonic overtones, or that you like (or don't like) the sound of the choir when it is rich and golden. To claim more is to make a whole raft of assumptions that in many cases could never be checked-out and verified. This is a point I have made in other threads in the past. No music reproduction system is going to sound like the "real thing". They simply produce a facsimile of a musical performance, and if you can find and put together a set-up that appeals to your ears as a music lover, then you are winning! Go for it, but don't kid yourself that it is "real".
IB
(*) Well, you can in a purely technical sense, if you subject both pieces of equipment to bench tests with oscilloscopes and what-have-you. But that is not what we are talking about here, and good measurements might not translate into enhanced listening pleasure anyway.

I agree with you, which is why I said more truthful - and not compared to the original but to a direct connection of a source component (I can't perform this so can't verify other people's testing of it which have confirmed it).

I have no reason to not believe that if a certain track has lost a little bloom that's how it is if at the same time the subtlest spatial clues are present and weren't before. I would love to be in the UK and let you guys hear it, try it. But I'm not promoting the damn thing and I'm in Spain.

[farflungstar]

Jez I wasnt particularly referring to you... More the general ire caused by the name of the thing. And having lived in many middle eastern countries I can assure you that witchcraft does indeed exist, but that's another story and this is about a simple box with standard components but a very clever and illogical concept.

[Light Dependant Resistor]

My
personal opinion on this particular piece of equipment, and its creator
is not important in this thread, or dare I say, it would not be ethical
from a trade point of view to portray it.
However; I would like to make a few points and observations as far as
Audio equipment, and their associated electronics.
First of all, any device [be it semiconductor, Thermionic Valves,
resistors, capacitors, switches, connectors etc] within the signal path
will have an influence, however small, on the signal being passed
through it, therefore; it is obviously desirable from a design point to
limit the affect on the original signal by any devices, contacts,
switches, connections etc within the signal path to the absolute minimum
in order to achieve a desired outcome by the designer.

So, armed with this fact, any rational thinking mind should now be under
no illusion that any piece of equipment is going to tell the “absolute
truth” as far as the original signal it has been fed is concerned.

Now, sometimes adding more to the signal path can’ in many cases
actually improve the over-all performance of not only the individual
pieces of equipment, but the system as a whole, why, well, because your
dealing with Audio signals, and having the need to attenuate them to
achieve the desired final perceived volume of the system, therefore you
then have to deal with the matching of any attenuating device to the
previous, [Source] and post devices, Ie the Amplifier,,, this opens up a
huge can of worms, and can be a real headache to come up with a
satisfactory solution.

My own ideas on preamps have been documented elsewhere, and I was happy
enough with the final results [taking into account the issues outlined
above] to put some of them into production. However; I was under no
illusion that any of my designs were a perfect solution to all of the
issues associated with Audio signal drive and attenuation, but as I
said’ I was, and still am’ very happy with the results.

This brings me back to the original reason I decided to write this post.
There are some very good engineers here, who have also produced products
that they feel address the issues of attenuation, [some aspects to a
lesser, or greater degree, depending on the importance deemed by each
individual designer, with respect to the issues involved in attenuation]
some of us promote the simplest, and most straight forward approach,
and some of us feel that we needed a different approach, either way;
what I am saying is; there are several routes to achieving a desired
result as far as attenuating Audio signals, and overcoming the matching
of pre, and post equipment’ in an attempt to obtaining an acceptable
result by the designer.

Nothing is perfect!

Hi Anthony
Define signal path please ? ... if your hesitating at all -even the smallest amount,
Welcome , yes its a vast subject.

For instance... you might be now thinking,... but does it and can it include far
more than I first thought possible ? If you are now in that dark street with a torch
shining it around trying to gather where you are or what is around you - you are right.

I partially agree with you regarding reaching the definitive, it takes extraordinary depth in electronics
ending up being an examination of the designers whole life outlook, to push the boundaries further and further
but some of us keep on doing it.

Most of us small designers are the word that this means " a person who organizes and operates a business or businesses,
taking on greater than normal financial risks in order to do so". ... the word is entrepreneur

I would invite any manufacturer who has confidence in what they do... to take the next step
selecting the very best recording they know of ... to not hesitate supplying a sample of their ware to those
musicians if they are still alive, to ask their opinion comparing to the actual master tape or device recording. As involving
the musician invites direct comparison a bit closer if not far closer to the Truth. This is exactly what I am doing.

Following the musicians appraisal, the designer would put their product into full swing only if the appraisal was positive
but if negative would ask in what areas was my product not correct. Using even more resources in their back pack
the true designer would happily set off to climb the new mountain in the far distance. Obsession Yes ... up to the aforementioned point.


Cheers / Chris

[montesquieu]

I agree with you Anthony - there are more ways to skin a cat, but most of them leave some fur behind - this doesn't, perhaps the whiskers. I'm not alone in this conclusion, everyone who has tried it has said the same, compared to S&B, Emia etc, or the finest active linestages.

I think people have a problem with the name, it smacks as arrogant - but the truth (no pun intended) is in the listening - and it is more truthful to original source than anything yet (!) compared to it. Only a direct connection beats it (according to Salvatore), marginally. I can't test that opinion.

However, this transparency to source was demonstrated yesterday (I posted about it) when I put a sorbithane sheet on the tenutu platter mat - the difference was profound. I'd done this with the Slagles in situ on numerous occasions for various reasons and had never experienced such an obvious difference.

Now, I can imagine that if you have a problem upstream of it (glassy sounding CD maybe) the results could be brutal - and so it is not the panacea for the masses - it will not supercede every other preamp on the market. It has however, in my opinion, raised the bar for manufacturers.

In some ways im unsettled by the changes in my system - my 300b/845 SETs have suddenly found a new, pin sharp focus that is more akin to SS than lush valves. But listening yesterday each album/track had its own character, from thin to profoundly deep and rich. In that sense I think it's doing its job - passing on the information from FG tip on the Alaerts to the Vida and through the truth.

Amazing how such a simple device cab cause such confusion, furory.

You'll need to forgive some skepticism Adey ... some of us have been through similar journeys whether with top quality passives (I had a top notch one from Hifi Collective, fancy audio note resistors etc), Eva/LDR approaches (I had the Eva II), TVCs (I had the Prometheus and later a Music First MkII, which was about 4 grand retail when it came out), or buffer solutions like the Pass B1 (which seems to be similar in intent/concept, being all about impedance matching, though obviously different in execution - I think I've had three of these in various states of boutique bits-ness), Burson SS buffers, MF, EE and other tube buffers, and assorted mixes of the above (TVCs or passives in difference sequences with tube buffers before, after and before and after). All had their good points and at different times over the last decade I have been on forums singing their praises.

However everything is a compromise and in the end despite really wanting to go this way I've never found a non-active (ie no gain) solution to work long-term for me. I really have been round the houses on this and tubes with gain for me, remains the way to go. Transparency is not and never will be the whole story. (Though at one point, I believed it was). If you are happy with it, that's fantastic, but actually nothing you are writing here is encouraging me to give it one last try - I feel I've seen the movie before, in close-up.

As for Salvatore - surely the less said the better? There's more sense talked here in a day than on his whole site.

[farflungstar]

Tom I agree that transparency is not the only aim - the pleasure of listening is the most important - if I wanted detail and transparency at the expense of musicality I'd be running God awful naim electronics (apologies to any naim owners).

[Barry]

Tom I agree that transparency is not the only aim - the pleasure of listening is the most important - if I wanted detail and transparency at the expense of musicality I'd be running God awful naim electronics (apologies to any naim owners).

Haha - it could have been worse, you might have cited Quad electronics.

Regards
Barry (a Quad enthusiast)