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In Reply to: Re: Ooooooh, I forgot........ posted by John Escallier on November 19, 2002 at 17:39:42:
like Steve Eddy have given up trying to engage this man in rational, mature debate. It is a waste of good time...
Follow Ups:
""like Steve Eddy have given up trying to engage this man in rational, mature debate. It is a waste of good time.."""Rational, mature" has little to do with it.... But, boy is it entertaining...
Somebody has to explain reality to him...
All I know is...My stomach is killing me..
TTFN, John
Folks, this is my reality.I originally used zip cord and Switchcraft prefab interconnect in the '60's and '70's. Then Polk introduced 'Cobra' cable and I tried it. It was different sounding than zip cord, or 14 ga Belden cable that I also had. Then, in 1978 I bought 'just for fun' a 1M silver cable in Japan when I was there. I listened to it, my girlfriend listened to it, and a hi fi store listened to it. We all found it 'bright' sounding. Later, I was approached by a couple of guys from Mendota Research with shielded litz / teflon cables and we found them very good sounding. Harry Pearson also found them good sounding. Years later, a firestorm destroyed my apartment building, so I had to start from scratch. At first, I just bought Radio Shack cable and listened with what equipment I could buy used or was given to me. It always had a slight electronic edge. Later, a cable manufacturer (not in business at this time) gave me a number of interconnect cables to use. They were better than the Radio Shack cables, but I did not know why. I kept the Radio Shack cables around for my test bench.
Then I determined that I might just be able to measure what Dr. Van den Hul had told me about. I measured difference in cables and interestingly the Radio Shack cables measured worse than many others. Still, I had a lot of noise and RFI that made it difficult to show others what I had measured. Recently, I purchased a special FFT based instrument that can resolve wire differences easily. That is what I am measuring with today.
Is it important, is it useful, is it worth my time? Heck if I know, but then DA and TIM were ridiculed at first, but we plodded on anyway. Later, others have tried to take credit for our efforts, and we have had to write formal letters to clarify our original research.
I expect to do so in future, with this kind of cable nonlinear distortion. My position is that people that I trust can easily hear differences in cables and that there must be something that is measurable about them. I am attempting to make these measurements, rather than tell my friends and associates that they just have overactive imaginations, like so many on this website are attempting to do. We do not progress, if we ignore what we can hear with good audio equipment.
Being familiar with a lot of your work and behind the scenes research throughout the years, i believe you 100% when you say that you are doing your best to try and understand and explain how / why things work the way that they do. There is no doubt in my mind that you put forth every effort possible to know and learn as much about audio electronics that you can. In doing so, i sometimes think that you take for granted that others may have the same level of understanding and / or desire to know what you know and that is simply not the case.Having said that, i did not take John E's initial response to you as being confrontational. I think that he was asking "how far does one have to go before we are sure that it is or isn't audible ? Are we barking up the wrong tree here? ". While i can see how you could take this as saying "this is so low, you are are wasting your time", i don't think that he meant it that way. I think that he's REALLY trying to figure out WHY cables sound different from one another and how we can document / analyze those differences. After all, he does acknowledge that cables DO sound different from one another.
I hope that you take this in the manner that i meant it to come across. I and many, many others here appreciate your efforts. At the same time, we also appreciate the efforts of some of those that tend to disagree with you. It is possible for even an imbecile like me to make sense once in a while and be able to help someone out. Let's try to keep things in balance and maybe we can make progress rather than enemies. If we don't understand what someone is trying to say or their post can be taken in several different ways, let's try asking for clarification rather than going off on what might simply be a misunderstanding. I'd like to continue learning from you and all the others that are willing to share but don't want to have to wade through posts and sometimes entire threads of nothing more than contempt to do such. Sean
>
I stand behind my first statement on this issue. John Es was 'sniping' at my efforts, without giving any more than his opinion about audio. This is a guy that looks up to K-horns! Been there, done than, even analyzed them. Know better today. Enough!
Sean is correct.K horns? Haven't had them since, oh, was it '81 , or '82? Who knows..Nobody cares except you. But you simply had to grab at anything in your feeble attempts at climbing to the top of the sandbox, regardless of who you have to step on. You are apparently losing sleep over the possibility someone else knows more than you on ANYTHING, not just audio. Reality is a brick wall you desparately try to avoid hitting, but eventually.....
""John Es was 'sniping' at my efforts, without giving any more than his opinion about audio""
Gee, John Curl.... Any possible shot in the dark, I see. I did not give my "opinion about audio" I asked you a simple question. Was 110 dB below 50 mV within the ability of human hearing. You sideswipe to avoid answering the obvious...It isn't. But that would prove your efforts to date useless...HORRORS..
One can only hope that you someday decide to think rationally in respect to audio. You certainly don't when it comes to posting.
If you wish for sniping, I'll certainly be happy to accomodate. Here's a small sample.
FFT based analyzers of the type you have purchased, are incapable (for math reasons beyond your understanding) detecting the type of signal you are looking for. That's why you are looking in the mud, below the noise floor of most typical amplifiers, as well below human hearing, especially at 35Khz.
What you are practicing, in the nomenclature of upper level academics, is called "Ice Cream Science". Shark attacks occur at the beach...Lots of ice cream is sold at the beach...They correlate, therefore, if you stop selling ice cream, shark attacks will stop.
I've been quite content to date to not address all the ridiculous, preposterous, unfounded, unscientific, unverified, untestable, unrepeatable and untrue theories you have provided this audience. I had not thought that was warranted. But I can see that you tend to use everybody's lack of understanding of subject areas outside of their expertise to your advantage. "New physics"??? I have no problem calling any more of that garbage to the table, John.
As you can see, I'm getting less and less tolerant of your posturing, and may in the future find it necessary to shift into "second gear". Trust me, not a pretty sight.As for now?? You are at level one. And going backwards..
As I have repeatedly stated, I would prefer a professional atmosphere. Act professional, for a change. And stop whining.
TTFN, John
John Es, you have accused me of 'whining' and I have accused you of 'sniping'. Let me define what I mean by 'sniping'.
To me, 'sniping' is the criticism of someone elses research without attempting to verify or ascertain whether your criticism has any merit. So far, you have 'sniped' Hummel, Hawksford, and me, in that order.For me, 'sniping' is related to 'refereeing' because that is where it does the most damage.
For everyone, this is what happened at an IEEE Conference on TIM at Tulsa in 1978. Walt Jung and I had completed giving our respective papers on (TIM or SID) when Walt recognized Dr. Ashley in the audience. He asked Dr. Ashley, in front of me, why Ashley had rejected his paper written specifically for the 'Journal of the AES' where Dr. Ashley was a referee at the time. Dr. Ashley responded that "he didn't like the math". He was referring the the 'Volterra series'. Dr. Ashley didn't try to PROVE that there was anything wrong with the math, and he never did show that anything was wrong, he just expressed his uninformed opinion.
I knew something about the 'Volterra series' because I studied it at UCB in the same graduate class as the co-author of Walt's Paper and this is where it had originally came from. Walt's paper wound up published in 'The Audio Amateur' and this started a long tradition of using alternate venues, rather than the AES.
This is 'sniping' folks.
As far as my measurements are concerned:
Engineers know that the underlying basis of any harmonic distortion is a deviation in the transfer function, which ideally should be a straight line. I am looking for 'kinks' in the transfer function. Harmonic analysis is one of the LEAST SENSITIVE methods of measuring the underlying non-linearity, but it is relatively easy to do, and we can measure extremely low levels, BECAUSE we can null the original signal. Actually, a multitone IM signal would be better, and real music would be better still.
Fortunately, a single harmonic can predict that there is an even greater amount of distortion generated with real music, but I just can't directly measure it at this time.
It is also true that I am using a 5kHz signal, for convenience. I could use a 500 Hz signal and then the 7th harmonic would fall at 3500 Hz. However, my THD analyser is 25 years old and does not want to null at 500 Hz without me readjusting it, while also measuring at the LOW LEVELS necessary for this test. The non-linearity that I am measuring will track with frequency. At higher input levels, the distortion goes away, as this a crossover type distortion, rather than a simple nonlinearity, so I am running my distortion analyser at its operational limits. This is why this sort of distortion in wires goes unnoticed,because nobody looks at wires at lower voltage levels, where they actually operate in audio systems.
To criticise my efforts at this point is 'sniping' as you have refused to consider what I just stated, and your intent is to block my input rather than to constructively criticise it. I knew this from the first, so I originally responded as to your 'intent' rather than the specifics of your question. I hope that this clarifies the situation, however, I will always have critics just like my friends. Oh well. ;-)
""To me, 'sniping' is the criticism of someone elses research without attempting to verify or ascertain whether your criticism has any merit.""Criticism of someone elses research hasn't happened within my posts. You react to a question you do not wish to answer by calling it sniping, and then deflecting the issue, dropping names, saying "read a book", criticising education, saying "oh, I proved that wrong 20 years ago", ad nauseum. People will soon be passing around the "top ten reasons John Curl is better than I" list. Humor is always the best medicine.
Criticism...no.. All I asked was "" if 110 dB below 50 mV at 35Khz was audible to humans.""
That is not criticism. Criticism is: "what you are testing is BS, you are stupid, you don't know what your talking about, your mother wears combat boots." A simple, nicely worded question is not that.
It may indeed prove out that the "measurements in the mud" you are doing correlate to the real issue. Then again, it may not.
Your attitude is not one of a professional. Is it any wonder a lot of the big names don't frequent this forum? To be constantly on guard lest John Curl feels impinged upon?
As you can see, I don't live my life worrying about you. You can be right at times, wrong at others.. I also "own" the same subset.
""So far, you have 'sniped' Hummel""You misquoted him, then beat everybody down with your "new electron physics" mumbo jumbo, which I am ridiculed about whenever I bring it up to a real physicist. And you still are unable to answer the question I posed with regard to that "physics", a simple, high school level question. How long did you spew that stuff on this forum??? And how many people were beginning to believe it??
""Hawksford,""
I identified a possible testing error, and discuss it with him. Pointing out an error in research is mandatory for the advancement of science. Blindly accepting incorrect analysis and testing methods is the quickest way to bring scientific advancement to a halt. I'm beginning to believe more and more that that is why you do not like peer review.
""and me, in that order""
YOU??? I hadn't sniped. You can believe what you want. I find a lot of your "postulates, or pseudoscience" to be beneath response. Unfortunately, those here without E/M theory background might actually believe some of your "interesting" theories...That "faith" based system is better suited for religion, not a technical forum.
Having papers not accepted for personal reasons is unacceptable, your story is interesting, and worthy of public review. But has nothing to do with your continued unprofessionalism..It's not a valid excuse.
My definition of whining? Read all the posts you have made in response to one of mine. THAT is whining. And that is unprofessional.
TTFN, John
John Es, I have only one nagging question. The rest I can ignore. That is: When and how did I misquote Hummel?
For the rest, it is amazing how many individuals can find 'research errors' in other peoples work, yet not do anything themselves to prove with any evidence of an oversight being actually made. This is what Dr. Ashley did, almost 25 years ago to Walt Jung, and allegedly blocked Walt's 55 page preprint from being put in the AES Journal. It is interesting that Walt Jung is now awarded for his efforts over the years, but when you are an innovator, trust me, you can easily be blocked by those who would take the credit themselves, or stop you just because they cannot change their paradigm of what they think is important in their area of expertise. Just for fun let me quote you a few examples:
"There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home" Ken Olsen Pres. of DEC 1977"I can accept the theory of relativity as little as I can accept the existance of atoms and other such dogmas" Ernst Mach 1913
"X-rays are a hoax" Lord Kelvin 1900
""John Es, I have only one nagging question. The rest I can ignore. That is: When and how did I misquote Hummel?""Well, it's about time. You passed that for a while.
Sent you an e-mail...Please read it.
I will not address any of this post or any other ""attack"" posts from you until you have done so.
Let me know if you didn't receive it. The system here had no problem sending it, or at least telling me it was sent.
Thanks.
Cheers, John
John Es, I answered your E-mail, not how did I 'misquote' Hummel? For the record, my test load is about 4K ohms.
John Es, I answered your E-mail, not how did I 'misquote' Hummel? For the record, my test load is about 4K ohms.
I am posting the following against my better judgment (a behavior pattern, BTW, that is not uncommon for me, unfortunately).My position is that people that I trust can easily hear differences in cables and that there must be something that is measurable about them.
That’s all well and good for you as a design engineer. You trust your hearing and that of others, so you believe this approach works for you. I can't imagine anyone here who would want to try and tell you how you should approach design. However, from the viewpoint of scientific validation, that approach just doesn’t cut it.
You have made it perfectly clear that you have no interest in scientific validation through DBTs. Again, that’s fine and that’s your prerogative. However, that, in my opinion, is no excuse for you to deride and demean those of us who do have an interest in it. To do so, again in my opinion, tarnishes both your credibility and your reputation. But, as it affect me personally, it is also undermining the potential we have at this forum to allow all points of views to be expressed and discussed in a civil manner.
I am attempting to make these measurements, rather than tell my friends and associates that they just have overactive imaginations, like so many on this website are attempting to do.
I am well aware of the attitude you are describing here. I have commented at length, and been subjected to severe criticism, at AR regarding the intellectual arrogance of some extremist objectivists. But I have not seen such attitude expressed on this board yet. In my opinion, most people here are attempting to respect opposing views and carry on discussions that are aimed at spirited debate and questioning of different viewpoints, while avoiding intellectual arrogance and personal attacks.
My own personal listening experiences with cables is very similar to how you have described yours. But I’m also interested in exploring this issue from a dispassionate, objective viewpoint. I have found your descriptions of the measurements you are attempting to make informative and interesting. I just don’t understand why you have to attack those who raise legitimate questions regarding the relevance of such measurements to audible sonic differences.
Phil, this is part of what I wrote about DBT in 1979 !
This was an LTE to Dr. Lipshitz et al in TAA.
3/1979 pp 61-62
PARALLELING, MAGNETICS & Z'A double blind listening test, while removing a subjective bias toward hearing differences that may not truly exist, unfortunately does nothing to remove bias toward NOT hearing any differences that may actually exist in equipment. Indeed a double blind testing situation could intimidate listener not to take a stance, since one could be embarrassed, if misled momentarily by a change in the quality of timbre of the musical source, to make what would seem to be a random decision. It seems we must invest a certain amount of faith in the objective integrity of the listener in any case. In conclusion, while I applaud any efforts to remove some of the inconsistencies in the listening tests, I believe a more technically accurate approach must be taken to correctly evaluate differences between equipment, that one must be willing to accept that others in the industry are also attempting to clarify understanding of the listening process. Ultimately, I hope that we can work together to advance audio design beyond the mysticism and sales hype that is present in so many instances, without irresponsibly disparaging much of the serious research aimed at improving the sonic qualities of existing audio equipment.'
I still stand behind my original statement.
John:I certainly agree with that. It seems to me (based on my limited knowledge of the subject) that, while people like jj may have refined DBTs for their specific purposes not directly involving high end audio, there has been little effort expended to address the concerns you expressed with DBTs back in 1979. It was the limitations upon the current state of the art in blind testing as it applies to high end audio, as much as anything, that I hoped would get explored on this forum.
I have a new power line conditioner in my system that I've been experimenting with (sighted auditions). I'm amazed at the sonic differences I perceive in trying different combinations of equipment plugged in to my existing PLC and the new one.
To the absolute best of my knowledge, I have no preconceived expectations with respect to either PLC, and certainly none with respect to the various combinations I am trying. I would be shocked if the degree of differences I'm perceiving weren't real, and I will settle on the combination that works best for me based on my sighted auditions. On the other hand, because my own personal choices haven't been be validated scientifically, I won't be making any absolute claims about the effectiveness of either PLC. I may, however, with the appropriate disclaimer, share my impressions of both.
I understand there is no need for you to justify to me or anyone how you proceed in your research and design efforts. If I were a designer myself, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't bother with DBTs either. But I am curious enough to hope that someone will refine the blind testing process as it relates to high end audio, and, for once, perform some DBTs that, regardless of outcome, there can be common agreement as to the validity of such tests.
1. All the people on this website can appreciate the effort you are putting into resolving cable differences.2. All the people can empathize with the trials and tribulations you have experienced.
3. All on this website, to date, have accepted the fact that cable differences exist. Why else would they be here?
4. All the people on this website should be tolerant of differences of opinion, without the unprovoked "attack posture" you have shown such willingness to use.
5. All the people here have the intelligence to ask questions of tests and research being done and presented. To blindly accept as gospel anything presented here is probably not going to happen without proof, repeatability, or verification.
6. All here, I'm confident, wish you well in your efforts.
7. And finally, all here would prefer a more civil discourse.
I have only been critical of your posturing and attacking, and have responded in kind to your postings. But I prefer civility.
Thank you.
John
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