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In Reply to: RE: "cap distortion" in spice. posted by Triode_Kingdom on December 04, 2014 at 09:01:25
So, how do we test this allegedly fundamental concept?
Perhaps more importantly: what would constitute proof or failure? I glean from the majority of your posts that how something sounds is of no concern.
Follow Ups:
"I glean from the majority of your posts that how something sounds is of no concern."It's of utmost concern but who decides?
If this hobby is completely subjective then all bets are off.
When someone says "it sounds good" I want to know what they mean and who they are and that they are experienced with the sound of real instruments.
I hate to even bring this up because it's controversial (only because a lot of people don't understand what Harry meant) but The Absolute Sound is the sound of acoustic instruments in a real space.
The sound of real acoustic instruments is the closest thing we have to a reference.
Without a deep personal experience with TAS, when someone says "it sounds good" they could just be saying that they like the sound.
We all have personal preferences. Before accepting a statement that "it sounds good" I want to know that the person saying that is educated in what real instruments sound like and that they are doing there best to repress their own preferences.
I have made technical improvements to my system that, at first listen, I didn't like, but the longer I listened the more I realized (and had to admit) that the piano now sounded more like a real piano, the acoustic guitar now sounded more like a real guitar, etc. What I "like" should not influence my choices as I build my system.
This brings to mind a cover of The Sensible Sound magazine, winter 1980/81
It pictures a guy sitting in the audience in a concert hall and a grand piano on stage being played by a guy in a tux. We can assume he's a professional pianist.
On the back of the seat in front of the audience member are a set of knobs, bass, treble, balance, volume. He's is sitting there adjusting them.
Does that make any sense to you at all?
Here's what I've learned from 35 years of building audio gear, the more I make my system technically correct, the more the playback sounds like the real thing.
P.S. I've been a musician since I was young and was a recording engineer for 15 years working with national acts. It's a short walk from the control room to the studio. The sound of the instrument itself is of utmost concern.
Tre'
Have Fun and Enjoy the Music
"Still Working the Problem"
Edits: 12/04/14 12/04/14 12/04/14 12/04/14
Ggg
"I glean from the majority of your posts that how something sounds is of no concern."
Most listening "tests" reported here and on other forums are not about how something sounds. They've been conducted in such a manner as to entirely void the supposed results. They are indeed of no concern, except for the fact they foster myth and misconceptions about the value of various components and techniques.
As for the capacitors, how much signal (music) voltage on the hot side of the last filter would be a likely indicator that the cap is contributing its own character to the music? One microvolt? One hundred microvolts? Ten millivolts? I think the answer could be derived with a series of legitimate listening tests, but that would be extremely time consuming, expensive, and a lot of hard work. Surely there's a ratio where audibility would seem doubtful. For example, if the final amplifier tube outputs 200v rms at its anode, say at 1 kHz, and the last filter cap exhibits one microvolt across its terminals, can we dismiss the cap as inaudible? The ratio under those conditions between the desired signal and the undesired signal at the cap (assuming the microvolt of capacitor signal consists wholly of distortion) would be 166 dB. Does anyone believe we can hear distortion or color at -166 dB?
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Buy Chinese. Bury freedom.
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