Home Tweakers' Asylum

Tweaks for systems, rooms and Do It Yourself (DIY) help. FAQ.

Re: Oh no it isn`t.......

Why oh why didn`t I just keep to Music Forum like I`d decided earlier?

First of all, don`t ever worry about singling me out - it`s water off a duck`s back so hit me with your best shot; tree-swinging knuckle-scraper, ameoba-brained pond-life, scum-sucking plancton - you name it, I`ll take it :0)

Basically, my `beef` is that you are being condescending - I`ll include Steve Eddy here so as not to single you out - in that I`d question whether you`d even listened to the Cryo-treatment before explaining why it couldn`t possibly work.
If you`ve no problem with anyone saying "I think this is why it sounds better..." then fair enough, but I think that you do have a problem. If someone did say this, you`d jump in and explain that there`s no proof so the individual is deluding themselves, letting the power of suggestion interfere with an objective assessment.

I`d say that when confronted by a dubious explanation of why something sounds better, you should simply state that IF there is an improvement, you personally have no idea why this would be so, and you cannot measure any change with current technology.
The only way to accurately assess any changes to audio is by using the most advanced, sensitive devices available - our ears. Scientists - or the pretenders - hate this constant retort from people like me and again raise the subjective argument, as if they are themselves immune.
The reality is that engineers who use logic to decide some treatment or product cannot possibly work are themselves predisposed to ignore any improvement they may then hear, and the fact that they cannot measure any change supports their concrete view.

I`ve no idea what the earlier fuss (don`t think it was you) about this forum being a DBT or BT free zone was about either, but this is the only way that otherwise unmeasurable changes can be verified in my humble opinion - forget test equipment altogether, they`re the slave not the master.

Regarding Transports and jitter in particular, of course my spoutings were possibly total BS - I was merely repeating what I`d read by a high-end manufacturer of Hi-Fi in a Hi-Fi World interview and have been racking my brain who it was.
Did I thnk it sounded impressive?
What do you think, bearing in mind that I believe 90% of what I read is marketing bumph?

Now then, your reference to pseudoscience - I`ll agree that we`re swimming in the stuff, if you agree that audio `science` is far from exact. I notice that on the dynamic range issue, you prefix your explanation with "I believe...", as you`ll be well aware of how dynamic range is an ambiguous issue also - it`s sometimes claimed that a dynamic range of even 90dB cannot be achieved domestically as with a typical ambient noise level of around 35dB, we`d need peak levels of 125dB which is around 15dB more than the best systems can manage.

There`s another tangent - sorry, I`ll round this up before it happens again.
Although I`m not exactly convinced by the explanation I wrote regarding jitter error correction and it`s effect on sound, I`m even less convinced about yours.
You seem to imply that all transports should sound the same if their error correction circuits are up to scratch (even if data isn`t read, it can usually be recovered by the chip-set) - say, above a certain price level? This is assuming that the digital outputs are of comparable quality of course.
If you are suggesting this (and I accept you may not be), it`s no wonder you rely on theory so much as your ears must be in pretty bad order.

Best Regards,
Chris Redmond.


This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors:
  Parts Connexion  


Follow Ups Full Thread
Follow Ups


You can not post to an archived thread.