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Thread: Digital Facts and realities?

  1. #141
    Join Date: Jan 2008

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    Quote Originally Posted by NRG View Post
    You are seemingly dismissing the practical experience of others who have tried this, myself on 4 occasions now, as irrelevant yet you are happy to base your argument on a 20 year old paper as gospel with no experience yourself.
    Yup, and unfortunately that stance isn't unusual for Martin, with subjects that challenge the veracity of his (sometimes) entrenched views. I just wish he would concentrate more on basing his opinions, on certain aspects of audio, on the results of his practical experience in those areas, rather than the contents of technical papers, as the latter is no substitute for the former.

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  2. #142
    Join Date: Jan 2013

    Location: Birmingham

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    I'm James.

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    I can't see how you can have a reasoned valid view on something unless you have practical experience, especially concerning how something will sound?
    Main system : VPI Scout 1.1 / JMW 9T / 2M Black / Croft 25R+ / Croft 7 / Heco Celan GT 702

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  3. #143
    Join Date: Nov 2011

    Location: Seaton, Devon, UK

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    I'm Adrian.

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    Ok to try and put some reality into this I may be wrong but I seem to remember various manufacturers in the 80’s and early 90’s doing various things to try and improve playback quality of CD’s. In fact these were often referred to in HiFi mags, and were reviewed as an improvement over the manufactures same previous product. One manufacturer that comes to mind is Meridian, if I recall correctly they went through some intense development through the 506 508 CD players that involved oversampling, sampling rates, re-clocking using more accurate chip clocks and various other technical changes to improve CD replay SQ. at the time the last iteration of the Meridian 508 24bit player was considered by a many in the hifi press one of the best CD players to own, there were only one or possibly two others at the time that got close if I recall correctly.

    I purchased a 508 24 bit in the late 80’s early 90’s after auditionaing and listening to at least ten other CD players and each time I auditioned I did with it with the same pieces of music and was able to compare side by side and I would insist the dealer switched then blind. In fact I remember spending hours doing this, much to my wife’s annoyance. I did it because at the time spending £1850 on a CD player was a lot of money and a leap of faith.

    So my point is this the technical improvements already mentioned undertaken by Meridian and a few others did improve CD playback SQ, so for me it is quite clear that addressing error correction, clocking issues, and anything else that may impact SQ including jitter has to be good.

    I can still clearly demonstrate just how good my 508 CD player is to anyone. By accident I discovered a CD that did this. I put on Hawkwind space ritual cd 1 only to here what sounded like a mains loop coming from my hifi. I did everything to eradicate it swapping leads changing mains plugs running dedicated earths etc all to no success. I was confounded, then I put Cd 2 on and the earth loop sound went, suddenly the penny dropped, the Meridian 508 was replaying the earth loop that was actually on the recording, but why had I never heard this before. So up to the loft and out came my old CD player and connected it up to amp and in went cd 1 space ritual and no earth hum. I got my friend to bring his CD player, actually 5 years newer than my 508, and again no earth hum replayed.

    So for me the above proves that the more that is done to improve the accuracy of digital data retrieval and how it is processed then the more likely are you to get a more accurate replay close to the original recording. Whether this is CD, digital data files stored on whatever or streamed digital data it still applies in my opinion.

    I am certainly no digital expert and I certainly do not fully understand some of the articles recently posted on here in relation to jitter and other topics, but it is clear to me from experience that improvimg approach and technique in the digital realm has improved the resulting sound quality, certainly at the audiophile end of the spectrum. Sadly IMO it has also dumbed down SQ when compression has been used, and moved away from CD quality, to save storage space and enable streaming in large volumes to many end users.

    I hope this is not contentious for too many of you, it’s just an observation I thought I would share to try and put a practical experience into play, without getting into arguments quoting technical papers and their validity.
    Listening is the act of aural discrimination and dissemination of sound, and accepting you get it wrong sometimes.

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  4. #144
    Join Date: Oct 2012

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    I'm Alan.

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    Good post Adrian

  5. #145
    Join Date: Aug 2008

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    I'm Paul.

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    I do believe that your listening experience is as much about you as the equipment you listen to. I wouldn’t be surprised if what you know and understand about the engineering behind hifi effects your listening experience. If you intimately understand the science and engineering of digital audio and accept whar are sometimes sweeping statements as to what is below the limits of perception are you preconditioned to not hearing differences and then vice versa.
    ~Paul~

  6. #146
    Join Date: Nov 2011

    Location: Seaton, Devon, UK

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    I'm Adrian.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Primalsea View Post
    I do believe that your listening experience is as much about you as the equipment you listen to. I wouldn’t be surprised if what you know and understand about the engineering behind hifi effects your listening experience. If you intimately understand the science and engineering of digital audio and accept whar are sometimes sweeping statements as to what is below the limits of perception are you preconditioned to not hearing differences and then vice versa.
    I do not think that I am necessarily pre-conditioned as you imply. As I said I did many auditions and in at least 5 different hifi shops and often repeated listening to the same pieces of equipment side by side and as blind as I could with the dealer in control of which was out on. I just noted the track and sequence and my thoughts on how it sounded, at the end end he told me with CD related to which track. I then reviewed what I had written.

    As I said I can clearly demonstrate with at least one CD how a 508 CD player it is better than another manufactures, and I expect there are others out there now that are better than a 508 as design and digital manipulation has moved and and hopefully improved.

    Also I do not actually think I "intimately understand the science and engineering of digital audio", I have a bit of general information about what it is and how it is done, but I am certainly not an expert and do not fully understand the impacts that changes to how musical data processing affects how were hear it or the end result. I just rely on my ears as to whether it sound OK to me or not. I suspect that the majority on this forum are the same, although I do know there are a few who are very knowable in this area.
    Listening is the act of aural discrimination and dissemination of sound, and accepting you get it wrong sometimes.

    Analog Inputs: Pro-Ject Signature 10 TT & arm, Benz Micro LP-S, Michel Cusis MC, Goldring 2500 and Ortofon Rondo Blue cartridges, Hitachi FT5500 mk2 Tuner

    Digital:- Marantz SA-KI Pearl CD player, RaspberryPi/HifiBerry Digi+ Pro, Buffalo NAS Drive

    Amplification:- AudioValve Sunilda phono stage, Krell KSP-7B pre-amp, Krell KSA-80 power amp

    Output: Wilson Benesch Vector speakers, KLH Ultimate One Headphones

    Cables: Tellurium Q Ultra Black II RCA & Chord Epic 2 RCA, various speaker leads, & links


    I think I am nearing audio nirvana, but don’t tell anyone.

  7. #147
    Join Date: Aug 2008

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    I think that everyone is effected by pre-condition to some degree but it is not impossible overide it. I agree that you need just listen to a change over a period of time and keep swapping back and then listen again for a few days and then swap back again. For me are differences that I can hear and discern and there are differences that I can sense but not necessarily clearly say why. Sometimes I can change something in my hifi and over a few days I just don’t get the same satisfaction as I did before. Recently I came to the conclusion that I prefer it when I have turned the upsampling on my music server off. I can’t say exactly why just that I enjoy listening more that way.
    ~Paul~

  8. #148
    Join Date: Nov 2011

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    Yes we all have pre-conception or an anticipation of what something we are going to try or change may do for us, in this case a piece of of his or a change to it. I think that if you try and remain open minded and think it may be better or worse or in my view I may like but someone else may dislike it, then you have a chance of improving what and how you listen.

    I have recently made a series of changes to my turntable to try and improve its musical rendition, mainly trying to remove feedback type resonances and get better isolation. So changes worked and others didn't. But I took my time and listened carefully and for a period of time, not a few tracks but for many days until I decided there was or was an improvement to what I was hearing in the end rendition and across various types of music. The key is patience and let you ears and brain decide whether you like something or not.
    Listening is the act of aural discrimination and dissemination of sound, and accepting you get it wrong sometimes.

    Analog Inputs: Pro-Ject Signature 10 TT & arm, Benz Micro LP-S, Michel Cusis MC, Goldring 2500 and Ortofon Rondo Blue cartridges, Hitachi FT5500 mk2 Tuner

    Digital:- Marantz SA-KI Pearl CD player, RaspberryPi/HifiBerry Digi+ Pro, Buffalo NAS Drive

    Amplification:- AudioValve Sunilda phono stage, Krell KSP-7B pre-amp, Krell KSA-80 power amp

    Output: Wilson Benesch Vector speakers, KLH Ultimate One Headphones

    Cables: Tellurium Q Ultra Black II RCA & Chord Epic 2 RCA, various speaker leads, & links


    I think I am nearing audio nirvana, but don’t tell anyone.

  9. #149
    Join Date: Feb 2013

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    most things i try have made little if any difference; some backwards... But occasionally you move forward. Mine is where its likely to remain ability wise and not at all sure flinging money at it will improve it much if at all.
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  10. #150
    Join Date: Nov 2011

    Location: Seaton, Devon, UK

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    I'm Adrian.

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    Quote Originally Posted by struth View Post
    most things i try have made little if any difference; some backwards... But occasionally you move forward. Mine is where its likely to remain ability wise and not at all sure flinging money at it will improve it much if at all.
    Yes I quite agree, sometime changing a key part of a system amp, speakers or input does not necessarily introduce and improvement, sometimes just something that sounds different.

    I am facing a similar issue on the turntable front I have tweaked and tuned it probably as far as I can to get the best out of it to my ears anyway. So the question is now just how good is it really, maybe I will never know unless I stick another one next to it and am able to listen back to back. If I did that would what I chose be better than my existing set up or just different? I think that’s very hard to establish. What I do believe is that to get small gains in audio improvement, whatever that might be real or imagined, becomes very quickly exponentially costly.
    Listening is the act of aural discrimination and dissemination of sound, and accepting you get it wrong sometimes.

    Analog Inputs: Pro-Ject Signature 10 TT & arm, Benz Micro LP-S, Michel Cusis MC, Goldring 2500 and Ortofon Rondo Blue cartridges, Hitachi FT5500 mk2 Tuner

    Digital:- Marantz SA-KI Pearl CD player, RaspberryPi/HifiBerry Digi+ Pro, Buffalo NAS Drive

    Amplification:- AudioValve Sunilda phono stage, Krell KSP-7B pre-amp, Krell KSA-80 power amp

    Output: Wilson Benesch Vector speakers, KLH Ultimate One Headphones

    Cables: Tellurium Q Ultra Black II RCA & Chord Epic 2 RCA, various speaker leads, & links


    I think I am nearing audio nirvana, but don’t tell anyone.

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