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      04-27-2013, 03:12 AM   #9
SteveC
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Typically.....

Quote:
Originally Posted by AussieSimon View Post
Of course there's been no agreement or conclusion, because the subjectivism is like religion -- everyone has their own story and is convinced it's correct. Yes, in the end, sound is an entirely emotional experience. But until those pressure waves hit your ears, the whole process is purely measurable, repeatable science. Unfortunately most system evaluations test the emotional experience, and almost never the actual sonic properties of a system.

In regards to blind tests, their usefulness entirely depends on the component, and the rigor used when setting up the test. For example, different copies of the identical model of speaker are often sufficiently different to be marginally audible. For components in the signal path, a difference in sound pressure of a couple of decibels is enough to reliably skew results heavily in favour of the louder component.

Your paragraph on imaging is substantially correct, but might as well be a quote from Layperson Wikipedia. It's not a response to anything I said.

Your paragraph on pace, rhythm and timing is amusing -- but like arguing with someone's religion there's just nowhere to start, and nowhere to go.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The entire consumer audio space is infected with many layers of misinformation, misunderstanding and plain old bullshit. Layer upon layer upon layer of complete and utter wrongness. Perhaps the biggest lie in audio is that personal taste matters. If you set up a good system properly (i.e. competent equipment, good acoustics and accurate calibration) then it will immediately sound fantastic to 90% of ears. The remaining 10% or so will take time to acclimate, but will always, without fail, eventually prefer the accurate system over their old system.

For anyone who's interested, here's a quick summary of what matters when it comes to audio reproduction:
  • What you're listening to. If you listen to terrible music, the best equipment in the world can't fix it!
  • What you're used to. If you're used to a treble-heavy system, everything else is going to sound flat. Like reducing salt from your diet, food will taste bland for a while. Your tongue can slowly acclimate; your ears can slowly acclimate, but it takes a while. The same applies to dips and peaks across the entire audible frequency spectrum.
  • The room. And anything you can do to improve the room. Simply stated, the best speakers in the world will sound like crap in your bathroom. Modest speakers will sound amazing in an ideal space. Most people's listening spaces are somewhere between a bathroom and the ideal; more often closer to the former than the latter.
  • The speakers and speaker cabinets. They matter a little bit; they certainly define the upper limit of potential of a system. Particularly the speaker cabinets -- this is why treating your door cavity can be so important.

And here's what doesn't matter:
  • Cables
  • Interconnects
  • Amplifiers (as long as they're driven within their limits, and not broken)
  • Digital audio exceeding 44.1kHz/16 bit
  • DACs and source devices
  • Magical tweaks
  • "Pure direct" modes
  • Your favourite brand name
  • Everything else I haven't mentioned

First off let me say that I would LOVE audio to be as simple and straightforward (and therefore cheap) as you claim. I work for one of the World's premier test and measurement companies and I can tell you categorically that every time a measurement system significantly increases in sensitivity, we find out new things about our World. Claiming we can measure everything assumes we know everything, which we most certainly don't. In fact every new discovery typically brings with it a host of new questions. There was a long debate about the efficacy of after-market power cables in hi-fi, one manufacturer even being sanctioned by an advertising standards agency for unsubstantiated claims. His response was to buy some sensitive test equipment and hire a consultant. The resulting scientific paper showed exactly what was causing the sonic differences between power cables. But of course you do have to know what to measure, which isn't always as straightforward as it sounds (excuse the pun)

On measurement vs. subjective listening I refer you to some back issues of Hi-Fi News or Stereophile, where they do both, exhaustively. Lots of examples of poor measurements sounding great and vice-versa. Most tube systems measure rather poorly but a lot sound great in terms of their ability to raise goose bumps vs. leave you cold and unmoved. Ask some of the truly legendary electric guitarists why they used old valve amps in preference to solid state blockbusters (figuratively speaking of course....because they're dead). Its was because the tubes sounded altogether more appealing, despite their poor measurements (and sometimes loud humming).

Think about all the progress we've made in the area of acoustics, CAD, materials, adhesives, power tools, precision manufacturing, measurement systems etc. Can we build anything approaching a Stradivarius or Guarneri violin? No we can't. One of the reasons (we hypothesize) is that climatic conditions at the time these violins were made caused the trees to grow much slower and therefore the grain of the wood to be much closer.....but mostly we don't really know why they sound so wonderful.

Regarding your point on imaging....you talk about 'real imaging' but what is 'real imaging'? My point was that all imaging is a psychoacoustic phenomenon created by manipulating sound pressure levels and phase of sound waves reaching the ears. Its is therefore just as possible to create imaging in a car as it is in any other space, as long as you can control SPLs and Phase. Given that the designer of a car system has almost everything under his control (system, speakers, acoustics, seating position, speaker positioning etc.) it is entirely possible to create 'real imaging' in a car....it just requires a different set of playback setpoints from those of a typical stereo system in a room.

In summary, there's a lot of misinformation and snake-oil around hi-fi, but the black and white "if you can't measure it, it ain't happening" view is equally misguided in my opinion, given our very limited knowledge on the subject of electronic measurement and psychoacoustics and bearing in mind that observation is the starting point of all measurements.

Anyway, I'm sure this is getting boring for non-audio BMW fans.

Suffice to say that to these experienced ears, the HK sound systems in BMWs take a considerable time to sound their best and that their best is really good at reproducing music in a highly entertaining and enjoyable manner, that in hi-fi related value terms far exceeds its relatively modest asking price. The changes to the system aren't subtle...the new system sounding electronic and quite harsh in the midrange and tops, while the bass lacks tonal definition and sounds monotonic. Given some hours, the system loses the harshness, becoming sweeter and more natural and the bass becomes a lot more musical, accurate and agile, propelling the music with a greater sense of rhythm and drive.

By the way, there is a major difference between compressed MP3 and lossless WAV files, the latter being altogether more musical. WAV takes a lot more memory but again the difference isn't subtle. I haven't tried every codec or data rate but 320kbit/s seems to be a minimum for reasonably good reproduction that preserves fidelity and transparency. Given that I have my music collection on 32GB memory sticks I'm not memory limited so can go for the superior WAV format, where I have the CD and 320kbit/s MP3 for downloads

Last edited by SteveC; 04-27-2013 at 04:34 AM..
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