Are expensive wires and interconnects necessary

[Victor]

It seems for every component, except speakers, there is a "expert" that claims there is no difference. Wires and vibration control aren't the only subjects that seem to bring on the naysayers.

What is wrong with knowledge? What is wrong with education? When you hear an opinion that is contrary to what you think the truth is, what do you do? Do you dismiss the opinion out of hand or do you engage it? Those are the questions. The ‘naysayers’ do have something to say and they say, - that physics and nature as we understand it today stands in opposition to your views.

There are also "experts" that think all that a CDP has to do is move 1's and 0's from the medium to the preamp and any do it equally well…

What else does a CD player do? Providing that you use its SPDI/F output port, - it, in fact, moves the digital signal composed of ‘ones’ and ‘zeroes’ from the disk to the outside processor.

I would not say that all CD Players do it equally well, because my experience has been that the SPDI/F interface is not well designed for the most part in most CD or DVD Players regardless of the price of the unit in question.

However, with approximately $30-50 worth of parts you can turn a hand-held commonly available Chinese made CD-player into an incredible machine that will dance circles around anything that this industry has so far designed.

...and I remember another EE professor that use to post at a forum Lex and I are very familiar with that claimed the only thing that mattered in a amp was the THD number and any differences that audiophiles could hear was nonesense.

Yes, I know…and I agree with that professor. The power amp does not create sound; - it can’t create anything, as it is physically impossible. It can only amplify the input and as a byproduct of the amplification process, it distorts it. This is all any power amp can ever do.

With this in mind, the THD+N behavior of a power amp along with its frequency response and its ability to output sufficient current to drive your speakers to the SPL that you desire is the only thing that matters.

To wit, - the sound that you claim you hear is the distortion that the amp generates, along with a possible low-pass effect of the amp-wire-speaker interface that many poorly designed power amps and highly inductive megabuck speaker cables create.

You may like this distortion as many people do, but it is a distortion none the less.

Well, could be. For all that think like that, my suggestion would be get the best speakers you can afford. Buy the cheapest portable CDP you can find, hoook it up with clothes hanger wire to the cheapest amp you can find, maybe from a auto stereo store, hook that up to the speakers with more clothes hanger wire and you're good to go.

Naturally, I do not suggest that you do that. The hangers and the cheap electronics simply serve to illustrate the point.

However, if you spend more then $2 per foot on a wire excluding the plugs, and more then $200 on a CD Player and more then $5 per Watt on the power amplifier, then in my opinion you are paying too much. Speakers are another matter and really good ones may cost quite a bit. I wouldn’t know, I build my own speakers. Damn, - I used to build my own power amps too!

[peterS]

Skin effect does nothing at audio frequencies. The additional resistance due to the skin effect is so negligible that it is only important on the theoretical level.
Litz wire is always a good way to go. However, its benefits are only important if we are talking about the speaker wire carrying significant current and for a significant distance, otherwise Litz or not, - it makes no difference. I am assuming a good power amp here wish a well controlled output impedance and a reasonably well behaved (resistive) speaker impedance. Otherwise Lutz wire construction may have a more pronounced and overall positive effect. Well, - these days most power amps are quite good in those regards but the speakers is another matter…

The low-level interconnects do not reject noise. Let me be more specific, - wire in general does not reject anything including the noise. It is the electronic circuits that are attached to the wire on both ends are responsible for noise rejection. The wire with better shielding and/or construction will contribute more to the overall noise rejection, but ultimately its contribution is negligible vis-à-vis what the electronics does.

Finally the geometry of wire does not contribute in any meaningful sense at the audio frequencies. The nature of electron transmission has nothing to do with geometry of the medium at low frequencies, - at least up to hundreds of megahertz, - such as nature as it is.

as far as db loss in terms that the human ear can distinguish you are correct that skin effect is negligible
but it is felt there are other issues at play

as far as noise rejection if you have ever done any work in car audio you might be singing a different tune
granted the noise floor is much lower in HT but the investment is not


as far as geometry goes of course it does, why do you think a voice coil causes inductance, not to mention that multi stranded wire introduces capacitance both of which not only have effects on db levels but more importantly phasing

all these effects are real and measurable, your biased opinion no matter how informed or popular is just as biased an opinion as is mine.... but i can say that all of my upgrades have had a noticeable effect and i was able to keep it proportional to my equipment

using wires properly can make the same magnitude difference as the jump from a 16bit to 24 bit cds in my experience... some would argue that there is no difference between 16 and 24 bit

on a side note i purchased a monster powercenter 3600 believing it was snake oil just to see what it was about... i still have it after it improved my picture which shocked me

[GregLett]

on a side note i purchased a monster powercenter 3600 believing it was snake oil just to see what it was about... i still have it after it improved my picture which shocked me

That's no shock to me. Many of us have bad power in or homes. Things
like the refrigerator reek havoc on our equipment. Snake oil would
would be some of those expensive power cords.

[peterS]

That's no shock to me. Many of us have bad power in or homes. Things
like the refrigerator reek havoc on our equipment. Snake oil would
would be some of those expensive power cords.

....i had a customer tell me what his system was... nothing substantial
then he goes but i have MIT wires that cost 1,200 each
i believe i made this face -----> 8O

[Bob]

What is wrong with knowledge? What is wrong with education? When you hear an opinion that is contrary to what you think the truth is, what do you do? Do you dismiss the opinion out of hand or do you engage it? Those are the questions.

Your absolutly right. And the answer is, "Your Welcome, for letting you know that when something vibrates or oscillates it is not the same as someone shaking it. Works for speakers, also, by the way. You can shake them like salt dispensers to your hearts content but, no sound. I guess that means that when they vibrate and the cone moves back and forth at a certain frequency there must not be any sound either."

Just funning you, Victor. To really answer your question, I love knowledge and am curious about many things and love to discover new things. When I observe something that I am curious about I try to find the why and how of it. I don't dismiss a observation because I don't understand it, if it is important to me I try to find out more about what I observed. In the case of audio, heard. What you are saying is, "What you observed is outside of the knowledge I have on how and why something works, therefore you did not observe it." I don't know but, to me that sounds like "the earth is flat, we all know it, quit exploring." And my answer is, "Thank you very much for sharing your knowledge but, since I did indeed make an observation I will continue to explore."

What else does a CD player do?

Is this a test? Or, do you really not know?

[Alaric]

$200 on a cd player?

Shouldn't spend more than $200.00 on a cd player??? Bring your $200 cd player to my house and we'll do an A/B with my $1000 cd player-Even if I paid too much , it wasn't $800 too much. I haven't heard every $200 cd player in the world , but I'm willing to bet on mine. That statement was over the top.
Victor , I think everybody respects what you say , to a point. You reached that point with me. Also , if you think you can match my humble little amp for $125 , more power to you , but from what I'm reading *******

Edit by moderator to remove rude insulting comment.

[GregLett]

Shouldn't spend more than $200.00 on a cd player??? Bring your $200 cd player to my house and we'll do an A/B with my $1000 cd player-Even if I paid too much , it wasn't $800 too much. I haven't heard every $200 cd player in the world , but I'm willing to bet on mine. That statement was over the top.
Victor , I think everybody respects what you say , to a point. You reached that point with me. Also , if you think you can match my humble little amp for $125 , more power to you , but from what I'm reading ********

He couldn't mean that..could he?? Maybe he ment $200 cd player, and a DAC. The CD player being used just as a transport. I've read on some forums of great combos like that. But no way a $200 CD player alone could stack up. If he really thinks a $200 CD player is good enough, then I'm with you Alaric..bring it on

[tec333]

aahhhh, the discussion gets a little heated.

I do not mean to instigate - I do respect the opinion of EVERYBODY on this board.

In regards to Victor saying "However, if you spend more then $2 per foot on a wire excluding the plugs, and more then $200 on a CD Player and more than $5 per Watt on the power amplifier, then in my opinion you are paying too much."

For me, **********************

Edit by moderator to remove rude comment

If you take this thinking to other products it just does not make sense.

Can I tell someone paying 300k for a Ferrari that it is way too much for a car - absolutely not! What you are saying is - there is no way you should buy a car or any mode of transportation that will cost you over 100k. What if I like the comfort of a Bentley or Maybach or let's just say I want to spend the 300k because I like the roar of the Italian sports cars?

And Yes a 20k Honda Civic will get you from point A to point B.

Just like audio interconnects and CD players - a $200 CD player and a $1000 CD player will play the same CD's - the $2 per foot cable and $100 per foot cable will still have you hearing something out of your speakers.

Just like a Ferrari and a Civic - YOU CAN GET FROM POINT A TO POINT B - THE QUESTION IS HOW.

Anyway - I hate analogies...

If someone is willing to pay what seems to you as a ridiculous amount of $$$. Always bear in mind it is all relative. I really do not see someone paying 20k for speakers and going to Home Depot to buy 12 gauge cable.

Mods/Admin - thanks for keeping the thread going.

[ThomasW]

aahhhh, the discussion gets a little heated.

Not for long......

Mods/Admin - thanks for keeping the thread going.

It's not going to keep going if people don't stop with the rude personal insults.

[GregLett]

Y'know, I really love this kind of thread. Wonder can we reach a 100 posts???

We made it!!!

[tec333]

Mod, I really did not think my comment was all that rude.

But it is not my forum and not my rules...(I also struggled writing that part - so maybe you are right and it was rude).


Anyway, the original question was and the title of this thread... "Are expensive wires and interconnects necessary?"

I guess my answer is - No it is not neccesary, since all my equipment/speakers are not necessary either.

But I guess the real question is - if your a regular Joe Smoe what is considered "expensive" cables. Even then, you might ask what the criteria is for a Joe Smoe.

I am thinking of starting a new thread - but I feel it might be 'rude' and innappropriate.

I wanted to see what audiophiles consider reasonable factoring in their annual income. For example - 100k per year - comfortable with 20k speakers? $250 interconnects?, and $1000 CD changer?

Maybe just throw the percentage - for example - I am comfortable spending 20% of my annual income for a pair of speakers.

I'm just curios what the average would be.

Anyway, hope everybody starts behaving to keep the thread going.

Tec

[NewBuyer]

...I played a Bonnie Raitt cd with the old wire and then, keeping the volume the same, switched to the new cables and played the same track again... The improvement was that noticable and significant. It was like someone took their hand away from in front of Ms. Raitt's mouth. The music simply opened up and became clearer and fuller sounding.

I have performed this demonstration for a few other skeptics that I know who are now likewise convinced...

Gump, that is an interesting story! I wonder if your first set of cables was accidentally terminated at one end with reversed polarity(?), causing your speakers to be out of phase with each other. You probably already thought of this possibility - but regarding the original cables, did you ever try reversing the + and - attachments at just one end of one cable (leaving all else the same) and see if you heard a difference? The difference can be quite striking, and sounds exactly like what you have described.

I'm sure that if the differences were as great as you've written, then these differences would surely survive a blind comparison test, using either your own ears or those of your skeptic friends. It would be interesting to read about your results if you do this, please post if you do?

P.S. About vibration concerns with solid-state equipment: A well-known manufacturer of high-end (expensive) subwoofers recently told me that such concerns are simply not legitimate, or else it would obviously present a major disaster for the electronics within any respectable subwoofer. Seemed like a reasonable response to me, but what do you all think?

[Alloroc]

We made it!!!

Damn!, Missed it..... Bloody different timezones.....

Anyhow, it's all getting a little tetchy I see. Pints of Guinness for posters on this thread if we get to 200 posts without a bloody nose, however I'm sure Victor won't take this lying down! Deep breaths, count to ten......

Caveat : Free Guinness in my local only!!!

V.

PS: If I'd only known about those $200 CDPs earlier, could have saved a fortune....... :W

[GregLett]

Caveat : Free Guinness in my local only!!!
:W

OK. Send the ticket

[Bob]

P.S. About vibration concerns with solid-state equipment: A well-known manufacturer of high-end (expensive) subwoofers recently told me that such concerns are simply not legitimate, or else it would obviously present a major disaster for the electronics within any respectable subwoofer. Seemed like a reasonable response to me, but what do you all think?

Even those that give arguement to vibration control would never think of vibration in terms of disaster. Just something that may contribute a sonic signature but, not in a subwoofer. Maybe in a DAC though.

[GregLett]

Mod, I really did not think my comment was all that rude.

But it is not my forum and not my rules...(I also struggled writing that part - so maybe you are right and it was rude).


Anyway, the original question was and the title of this thread... "Are expensive wires and interconnects necessary?"

I guess my answer is - No it is not neccesary, since all my equipment/speakers are not necessary either.

But I guess the real question is - if your a regular Joe Smoe what is considered "expensive" cables. Even then, you might ask what the criteria is for a Joe Smoe.

I am thinking of starting a new thread - but I feel it might be 'rude' and innappropriate.

I wanted to see what audiophiles consider reasonable factoring in their annual income. For example - 100k per year - comfortable with 20k speakers? $250 interconnects?, and $1000 CD changer?

Maybe just throw the percentage - for example - I am comfortable spending 20% of my annual income for a pair of speakers.

I'm just curios what the average would be.

Anyway, hope everybody starts behaving to keep the thread going.

Tec

Even a rich person would think 1k is alot for a cable.
I think your desire more than your income would determin
how much you are willing to spend

[Bob]

Here is a good article on some of the things touched upon in this thread:

http://www.stereophile.com//features/203/index.html

[Victor]

The topic is evolving. We started with cables and now we are into CD Players.

People, I know that some of your sensibilities were somewhat offended by my out of hand dismissal of the higher priced audio gear, - particularly my comment that a $200 CD Player is all you need today. I know that a lot of people spend a lot more money on a CD Player. My point is not to tell you that you need to sell your $1000 players. In fact, I would never presume to tell anyone how to spend their money or what choices to make when it comes to the purchases of audio components. My comment was meant as an illustration only, - an illustration of the technological state of the audio equipment available today. With this in mind, I stand by my comment, and trust me, I can defend my views.

I’ll try to make it short, but… What defines the quality of sound in a typical minimalist CD-Power Amp-Speaker sound reproduction chain? The quick answer would undoubtedly be, - the speaker. Let’s take the speakers and the power amps out of this equation, by assuming that you have a perfect amplifier and the perfect speaker in your room. We are now looking at the CD player. What constitutes the CD Player?

Well, the last time I looked at the beast, I noticed that there is a CD tray inside it with a laser pick-up and a bunch of IC chips. The laser pick up translates the grooves on the CD surface into electrical pulses which ultimately constitute the digital signal. Does this digital signal have a ‘sound quality’? To a degree, yes, because one might notice that not all the bits make it all the time. Do we care? No, - because the error correction protocol rescues those lost bits and it interpolates so very well that the result is nearly 100% bit recovery. So, we are in god shape here.

Question, does the megabuck CD player differ in this respect from a $200 CD Player? No, because they use the same chip set from the same manufacturer and the same error correction protocol. Another question, - does a more stable and more expensive laser pick-up and tray mechanism affort a better digital signal integrity? No, - for many reasons, - these days even the very cheap tray works very well, and the error-correction is so robust that we virtually lose nothing. Those are the facts.

Next here we may have an up-sampling mechanism. It normally comes in a form of an IC or a custom-coded microprocessor that the likes of Levinson, Krell, Meridian etc, like to implement. They say it is better. Is it? No. The up-sampling techniques involve bit decimation and FIR filtering. Those are the digital signal processing techniques and you can only do them one way, - the right way. Having more taps in a given FIR filter can give you a theoretically better THD and less pass-band ringing due to Gibb’s phenomena and that is what the Levinson claims, but from a practical perspective, the THD improvement is so negligible that there is nothing really to discuss here.

With this in mind the NPC-sourced IC commonly found in $200 CD player will produce the same results for about $10. These days also, most D/A makers like AKM integrate those functions with the D/A itself, - a further cost reduction. Again, - no sound quality issues here.

The D/A process may differ between the cheap and expensive units, but the chips themselves do not. These days the AKM sources IC’s rule the marketplace. You find them in $1000 players and also in $200 players, - the same chips. The anti-imaging circuitry is where the real problem exists and this is where the sound quality issues may show. Surprisingly, this part of the CD player is nearly always poorly implemented, resulting in at best 16-17 bits of signal reconstruction, regardless of how much money you paid.

Notice, I say nothing about the jitter, because it does not apply and any attempt to suppress it in the context of a CD player is untutored nonsense.

So, what do you get for your $1000 that you spend on that shiny CD Player? You get better warranty, better sheet-metal, better looks, better features and they might be important, - features like a high quality volume control, and also a better engineering overall, resulting in a marginally better specifications, like in the case of my favorite Benchmark DAC unit. However, do you get a better sound? No, - you can’t – the common logic will deny you that part of you overall purchase. There is nothing in that $1000 CD Player that will even remotely account for a better sound, - just look inside and you will see.

Finally, all those analogies about cars naturally do not apply here and for obvious reasons, what may apply, - is this, - you are what you eat!

[Shawn Parr]

So, what do you get for your $1000 that you spend on that shiny CD Player? You get better warranty, better sheet-metal, better looks, better features and they might be important, - features like a high quality volume control, and also a better engineering overall, resulting in a marginally better specifications, like in the case of my favorite Benchmark DAC unit. However, do you get a better sound? No, - you can’t – the common logic will deny you that part of you overall purchase. There is nothing in that $1000 CD Player that will even remotely account for a better sound, - just look inside and you will see.

I'm sorry, I must disagree with this. Analog components have differing qualities. One can buy a .2mF capacitor that sounds much better than other .2mF capacitors. Why this is I can not say, maybe because of higher tolerance standards, maybe because of the dialectric used within. What I do know is that a friend of mine showed me a blind test where I was able to pick out the more expensive capacitors every time. The same is true with resistors. Higher quality components sound better.

Now I don't claim that every $1000 CD player has better components and power supply circuitry than every $200 player, but I'll bet that many do. And yes there will be an audible difference between them with an appropriate set of ears listening and appropriate equipment to keep that difference audible throughout the chain.

You also dismiss jitter.

Notice, I say nothing about the jitter, because it does not apply and any attempt to suppress it in the context of a CD player is untutored nonsense.

A better built powersupply with a better designed clock circuit can and will increase sound quality. The main things people look at in a clock is the power supply quality, the clock stability, and noise shaping of the jitter to try to minimize what effect the jitter has to the audible component of the signal being sampled or reconstructed.

You also made a statement previously about cables not doing anything for noise reduction, rather it requires the electronics. This is also not accurate as it is the whole point of twisted pair wiring. One can use the same electronics with or without twisting pairs and the set with twisting will have better noise suppression. This has been known of ever since Ma-Bell started wiring up telephone systems more than 1/2 century ago.

I personally have not had much time or money to experiment, but I have seen a bit of discussion lately on cable differences based on the crystalline structure of the copper as it is cooled. OFC and OCC copper supposedly are controlled and their internal molecular structure is more consistent, thus potentially leading to more effective transfer of high frequency content.

Hopefully you are not also one of those individuals who believes that high resolution recording makes no sense because humans can't hear about 20khz. As that is easy to disprove. The human brain can use a lot of information you don't consciously hear. One great example is in phase differential. With over 40Khz of recording bandwidth you can capture timing information that would be smeared together at lower sample rates. Your ears and brain can detect these very subtle differences in timing and you get better spacial resolution from them. So while we don't hear a frequency above 20Khz, we can capture timing information by using much higher sampling rates.

[Victor]

Shawn Parr,

I read your post. I am sorry to say that you are all over the place with your understanding of electronics. It is difficult to respond to your post, but I shall try…

Analog components have differing qualities. One can buy a .2mF capacitor that sounds much better than other .2mF capacitors. Why this is I can not say…

Well, - then let me tell you. There is ample evidence that plastic capacitors particularly with polystyrene or polypropylene dielectric manifest less distortion in objective tests. I refer you to series of articles published over the past year in Wireless World magazine.

While the plastic caps are definitely better for filtering applications then the electrolytic caps, one needs to look at the numbers to make any sense for exactly how much better are they. The THD difference may be as much as a factor of 10, which is a lot and one may embrace plastic caps on that reason alone, - I certainly do not use electrolytics for signal conditioning. However, the great late Douglas Self observed that many well-established companies stubbornly use electrolytics everywhere, - why is that? He suggested looking at the voltage drop across those caps in a typical application.

It turns out that we are talking about a very minor voltage here, - a few hundreds milivolts on average. When you look at the THD now, you will see that plastic caps do not hold all that much advantage over the electrolytics.

Personally I was alarmed at that rather simple discovery and I decided to conduct a test. I invited 25 students as subjects and we used a very simple ‘diamond’ buffer with a coupling capacitor driving high-quality headphones. I, at first, tried single-frequency tones and music passages as a test material at a low 100 mV input. Results were completely random, i.e. nobody could tell the polypropylene cap from the common electrolytic. I then increased the input voltage to 10 volts, - the preference for the polypropelene caps rose to, if memory serves, nearly 85%, - suggesting that there is something to what Mr. Self was saying.

As you see there is no mystery here, - numbers never lie.

What I do know is that a friend of mine showed me a blind test where I was able to pick out the more expensive capacitors every time. The same is true with resistors. Higher quality components sound better.

I would challenge anybody to tell a sound difference between two resistors in a low-power application, - considering the amount of noise they generate it is a humanly impossible task. Still, why use noisy carbon resistors when a better choice is commonly available. Anyway, nearly all CD Players today use surface mount components, so this point is moot.

You also dismiss jitter.

A better built powersupply with a better designed clock circuit can and will increase sound quality. The main things people look at in a clock is the power supply quality, the clock stability, and noise shaping of the jitter to try to minimize what effect the jitter has to the audible component of the signal being sampled or reconstructed.

Shawn, we can talk about the jitter and we can talk about the power supply, but not in the same breath.

Jitter is a timing variation between the clocks that only applies to an asynchroulnous system, whereby two clocks are being synchronized or a clock being recovered from a digital stream, such as one used in a SPDI/F interface.

None of those scenarios apply in the context of a CD Player. Hence the CD Player can be declared jitter-free by default.

The clock used to operate the D/A IC in the CD Player can in theory benefit from a better-designed power supply. Question, - is it ever done commercially? Answer, - I personally have never seen it done even in $5000 Levinson Players or any Meridian Players that I ever saw. There might be a CD Player with a better power supply specifically dedicated for a clock circuit, - I just never saw one.

What is the benefit of that dedicated power supply? One reason that screams at you is a better edge generation in a clock signal. Does that improve the D/A performance? The published linearity tests do not suggest that.

However, Crystal Semiconductor always insisted on using a very clean power supply for the clock circuit in their application notes. Do you know what they had in mind when they made this suggesting? They felt that a 50 cents 3-terminal regulator is all you need, - just place it close to the oscillator with a large capacitor and you are all set!

Open up a $30 CD Player from China and you will see this very circuit, open up a Meridian G-series megabuck player and you will see the same approach. Reason, - no need to get fancy where it is not required! By the way the voltage regulation done as Crystal Semiconductor suggested does nothing at all, because at such high clock frequencies the transistors inside those regulators can’t switch fast enough anyway, so it is the capacitor that at least attempts to do the job.

As a side note, - I must also tell you that it is an extremely difficult task to design a useful regulator that can function at 10 MHz or faster, while holding the voltage at the required level and providing a required power. The cost of such sophisticated regulator both in terms of an R&D and parts would be prohibitive even for a megabuck Player, particularly if there is no real evidence that it is actually needed.

You also made a statement previously about cables not doing anything for noise reduction, rather it requires the electronics. This is also not accurate as it is the whole point of twisted pair wiring. One can use the same electronics with or without twisting pairs and the set with twisting will have better noise suppression. This has been known of ever since Ma-Bell started wiring up telephone systems more than 1/2 century ago.

Twisted pair is great when we are talking about minimizing the inductance of the wire. The problem is that I have no idea what good does it do at audio frequencies. You can twist the wire all you want, - it does nothing. It makes sence for the telephone wire though, because of great distances involved. Are you running miles of wire in your set-up?

Again, wire does not suppress noise, - if you can show that to be true, then you can quit you day job. Wire may aid in noise suppression but only if a proper electronics is used on both ends. Case in point, - balanced interconnects. You do need the differential driver on one end of the wire and differential receiver on the other end for the balanced wire to function.

I personally have not had much time or money to experiment, but I have seen a bit of discussion lately on cable differences based on the crystalline structure of the copper as it is cooled. OFC and OCC copper supposedly are controlled and their internal molecular structure is more consistent, thus potentially leading to more effective transfer of high frequency content.

This is all great and theoretically helpful. I must ask, what does it have to do with audio? A “…more effective transfer of high frequency content…” has nothing to do with audio because audio has no high frequency content. If you were talking about 100 MHz signal and you are concerned about its integrity, then you may have a leg to stand on, but just barely so. At 1 GHz you have a point.

Hopefully you are not also one of those individuals who believes that high resolution recording makes no sense because humans can't hear about 20khz. As that is easy to disprove.

Now you have done it! I have never seen or heard of an individual that can even hear 18 kHz tone under controlled conditions. If you are a male and older then 20, then statistically speaking you are good to about 17.5 kHz. At an age of 40 you are at 17 kHz if you are lucky. At 60 you are down top 14 kHz and it is downhill from there. Women have it better, but not by much. Those are the unfortunate facts. There are some exceptional people in this regard, but they are infinitely rare.

The human brain can use a lot of information you don't consciously hear. One great example is in phase differential. With over 40Khz of recording bandwidth you can capture timing information that would be smeared together at lower sample rates. Your ears and brain can detect these very subtle differences in timing and you get better spacial resolution from them. So while we don't hear a frequency above 20Khz, we can capture timing information by using much higher sampling rates.

I am sorry, the above does not wash. Timing information and frequency are interrelated. If you can’t hear above 20 kHz, then no timing information at 40 kHz be ever valuably to you. We have known that since early 18 century.

Lower Sample Rates do not smear anything,- the essence of DSP is that it can be shown that no information is lost due to sampling, if you do the electronics right. Yes, - even at 44.1 kHz sampling rate it is possible to completely reconstruct the signal to the requisite 16 bits. It is not easy and this is why we have over-sampling, but it is possible.

With higher sampling rates this process is easier and it opens up a door to 24-bit recordings on a CD. I however have never seen a CD Player that can demonstrate even an 18-bit output signal. Levinson, Krell, Meridian, Linn, etc, -none of them can do it.

So, - you can have a 192 kHz sampling but you cannot have a necessarily better sound quality. What a 24 bit recording will give you is a possibly better detail, providing that the system noise does not swallow it.

Regards,
Victor

[Shawn Parr]

I am sorry, the above does not wash. Timing information and frequency are interrelated. If you can’t hear above 20 kHz, then no timing information at 40 kHz be ever valuably to you. We have known that since early 18 century.

Lower Sample Rates do not smear anything,- the essence of DSP is that it can be shown that no information is lost due to sampling, if you do the electronics right. Yes, - even at 44.1 kHz sampling rate it is possible to completely reconstruct the signal to the requisite 16 bits. It is not easy and this is why we have over-sampling, but it is possible.

With higher sampling rates this process is easier and it opens up a door to 24-bit recordings on a CD. I however have never seen a CD Player that can demonstrate even an 18-bit output signal. Levinson, Krell, Meridian, Linn, etc, -none of them can do it.

So, - you can have a 192 kHz sampling but you cannot have a necessarily better sound quality. What a 24 bit recording will give you is a possibly better detail, providing that the system noise does not swallow it.

Regards,
Victor

I must humbly disagree. I personally ran a blind test with a recording done with a well known orchestra (the Synfonia de Camera) at a well known university (the University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign). We set up a set of Schoeps mics, along with some DPA's, as well as their vintage Neumann collection. All this was ran through an Amek BCIII console (one of the rare boards that uses balanced signals completely through the entire board), and directly into a Protools HD system. This was a couple months after the system was introduced to market.

After recording the orchestra for some time at 48Khz, 96Khz, and 192Khz, we moved the system into their mastering studio and prepared for listening tests. We had invited the staff for both the performing arts center and the recording staff of the School of Music. Also a few local studio owners stopped by to listen as well. Mind you most of the people involved did not want to hear any difference, as they very much did not want to consider expensive upgrades to their recording equipment.

As we changed between the sessions at different sampling rates, jaws hit the floor. The 192Khz recording was so much like being in the concert hall it was frightening. More than one person left cursing as they felt they needed to upgrade to high resolution recording equipment. Of course I knew which session was being ran at what times, but the rest of the room was not told until afterwards. Trust me, they didn't need told, they knew. As a matter of fact those sessions were used for quite a few Protools demonstrations throughout the midwest during that year.

Also:

Jitter is a timing variation between the clocks that only applies to an asynchroulnous system, whereby two clocks are being synchronized or a clock being recovered from a digital stream, such as one used in a SPDI/F interface

While there can be jitter differential between two separate devices, the actual definition of jitter found on wikipedia is:

is the variation from one period to the next adjacent period of the signal. In order to determine the variation between adjacent periods, all consecutive periods need to be measured. The peak to peak period jitter is the worst case of cycle to cycle jitter.

To illustrate lets assume we are talking about 44.1Khz. Every 44,100th of a second there should be a clock cycle that tells the convertor when to take a sample (obviously this is more complicated with oversampling involved, but it is conceptually the same). No system is perfect and as such there is variance in timing between one sample and another either just over or just under that 44,100th of a second. That differential is very likely not the same between the next set of samples, thus we get imperfect sampling.

This becomes a major problem not with synchronized systems but with non-syncronized systems. As the clock system in the playback device will likely have different jitter characteristics than that in the recording device. As such it is very likely that where a sample was recording with more than a 44,100th of a second between clock cycles, it could be played back with less than a 44,100th of a second between clock cycles.

This causes very measurable changes in shape of the waveforms. This is for some people very audible. For others it is not.

Minimizing the amount of jitter of the clock during recording is much more noticeable then when playing back. However during playback jitter reduction can be very apparent for those that know how to listen to the space around the recording rather than just the instruments/voices themselves. In fact it is the imaging and precision of the image that is most affected, with bass impact also seeing improvement when jitter is minimized.

Jitter when synchronizing two separate digital devices is an almost negligible issue as the secondary/slave device should be using the clock signal from the first device, or feed a clock signal from what the first device is slaving to, to ensure that data transfer happens with as little loss as possible. As such the second digital device receives the digital signal with the same amount of jitter that was originally recorded, unless some data was lost and interpolation is used to generate data that may have a different jitter characteristic.

It is in fact the A/D stage and the D/A stage where jitter rears its ugly head, and where it is most important to minimize it.

While many seem to think that just trying to get the lowest jitter numbers is the right way to go, it turns out that the best sounding clock products actually apply noise shaping filters to the clock to get reduced distortion due to jitter even though their numbers may be higher. The best example of this is Aardvark, who unfortunately went out of business, but was reborn as Antelope Audio. Unfortunately not everyone understands that concept and they occasionally use smear campaigns against it.

[Alaric]

Apologies

It seems I went over the top. I offer sincere apologies for that , and for straying from the thread. Obviously I can't offer knowledgeable rebuttal on the subject of someone else' equipment that I haven't heard. I am also chagrined at my earlier optimism. I just refuse to believe every manufacturer uses the same quality chipset. The point seems to be there is no technological difference between a written letter and a phone call because the information is of equal coherence , therefore it must be of equal quality. Writing in italics doesn't convey the emotion behind a statement , it just indicates there is some.
Since I am apparently not going to convince anyone I'm right , and the odds seem to be against me surrendering my point , I will bow out.


P.S. I still think Victor may save me some serious money in the future. Probably not on CD players , but I won't spend any more on cables than I have to spend to get the quality I received from CAT.

[Victor]

After recording the orchestra for some time at 48Khz, 96Khz, and 192Khz, we moved the system into their mastering studio and prepared for listening tests…As we changed between the sessions at different sampling rates, jaws hit the floor. The 192Khz recording was so much like being in the concert hall it was frightening. More than one person left cursing as they felt they needed to upgrade to high resolution recording equipment.

I am not surprised. You are confusing the sampling rate with precision, - that is to say that sampling frequency has nothing to do with sampling precision. Precision is about the number of bits used and the sampling frequency is about separating those bits from noise.

You cannot really compare 192 kHz recording process with 44.1 kHz recording process. One reason for that is that different anti-aliasing filters must be used, although one can in principle use the same filter designed for 44.1 kHz on the 192 kHz system, but not the other way around. Another point is that I do not know if the same precision was used for all recordings. I would assume that you used 16-bit sampling with 44.1 kHz and perhaps 24-bit sampling with 192 kHz. If the electronics is done right, and there is no reason to assume that it was not, then I would tip my hat to the 192 kHz recording, which is what you in fact noticed in your tests.

The point is this, we are not talking about sound recording here, - we are talking about sound reproduction. This is the key to understand. When we are trying to reproduce the sound, we are in fact trying to reconstruct the original signal as it was recorded. With this in mind, if the signal was recorded at 16 bits resolution, then there is a way to reconstruct it completely regardless of what Sampling Rate is used, as long as you do not violate practical Nyquist criteria. Therefore, the resulting sound quality must be the same irrespective of the sampling frequency.

To illustrate lets assume we are talking about 44.1Khz. Every 44,100th of a second there should be a clock cycle that tells the convertor when to take a sample (obviously this is more complicated with oversampling involved, but it is conceptually the same). No system is perfect and as such there is variance in timing between one sample and another either just over or just under that 44,100th of a second. That differential is very likely not the same between the next set of samples, thus we get imperfect sampling.

No, things do not work this way. I typical crystal oscillator used in a D/A or A/D conversions is extremely robust. The period variations are measured in few parts per million if memory serves correctly. This is next to nothing. Do not look for jitter where there is none. Call Raltron, who sells there oscillators to the audio industry and ask them. If the variation were as bad as you say, no A/D conversion would be possible for audio applications.

Another thing to notice, - Populous proved beyond any doubt that stochastic process is subject to the Fourier analysis. Uncorrelated Jitter is that kind of process. Therefore it must show itself on the common THD+N test. If the jitter is bad, you will get pretty pathetic THD numbers. Naturally we do not get that, therefore jitter is not that much of a problem.

Finally, I do not know anybody other then US Navy that can measure jitter to the nanosecond level. Certainly popular magazines can’t do it. It is a very sophisticated process requiring a rather expensive equipment. Well, - if it can not be reliably measured, then how can it be reliably evaluated as a problem?

This becomes a major problem not with synchronized systems but with non-syncronized systems. As the clock system in the playback device will likely have different jitter characteristics than that in the recording device. As such it is very likely that where a sample was recording with more than a 44,100th of a second between clock cycles, it could be played back with less than a 44,100th of a second between clock cycles.

This causes very measurable changes in shape of the waveforms. This is for some people very audible. For others it is not.

Yes, I agree. The difference between the clocks used during the recording and reproduction processes might be a problem in theory, but it is not in practice. Also the Sample Rate Converters are routinely used to set the sampling rate to what it needs to be. The oscillators are very robust these days. Besides we do use over-sampling techniques and sigma-delta D/A converters that minimize this to a greatest degree. Again, look at the THD spec to convince yourself that the jitter is not an issue.

While many seem to think that just trying to get the lowest jitter numbers is the right way to go, it turns out that the best sounding clock products actually apply noise shaping filters to the clock to get reduced distortion due to jitter even though their numbers may be higher. The best example of this is Aardvark, who unfortunately went out of business, but was reborn as Antelope Audio. Unfortunately not everyone understands that concept and they occasionally use smear campaigns against it.

The noise reduction of the clock is important during the recording process as is the stability of the clock. With this in mind, the jitter-reduction devices are beneficial here, but when we are into sound reproduction it is an entirely different set of requirements, with jitter only becoming an issue if you use an external DAC. I am familiar with Antelope Audio, - it is a very serious company. Notice that their products are designed specifically for recording.

Regards,
Victor

[bigburner]

Victor, you*********, you come here with your ***** fancy science, thinking that you ****** know it all. Well you can take take your ***** science and **********, and if that doesn't do the trick you can *********** as well. If there's one thing I can't abide it's a ******* that doesn't comply with the principles of an audiophile. Next you'll be telling us that flying saucers and the Loch Ness monster don't exist. You prove it. If you can't then I say close this thread down immediately.

[Kobus]

It does not matter whose side one is on, this is interesting reading.

And as to closing the thread, WHY.

I will buy a more expensive player because I believe it sounds better and I also like the better construction, warrenty ETC....

Kobus

[Chris D]

I do hope that was a joke post from the Kiwis...

[bigburner]

I do hope that was a joke post from the Kiwis...

Chris, as I'm Victor's greatest supporter, that would be a safe assumption to make!

[Shawn Parr]

Okay, due to inconsistencies in the 'engineer's' discussion, I am now leaving this thread.

Two things of note. My recording session used 24 bit for all sampling rates. We were comparing sampling rates, not bit depths.

Second, jitter for audio clocks is and has been for some time measured in pico-seconds. Claiming that only the Navy can detect jitter into nano seconds is really out of left field. (For those that are not aware 1000 picoseconds equal 1 nanosecond). Based on current technology jitter into the nanoseconds would sound extremely bad.

Also, for information, I actually teach this stuff at the University level. Anyone who wishes can PM me and I can provide references.

As far as cables go (back to the original discussion eh?). Once I get a chance, I plan on buying some Cat Cables (after I get a system with separates) and plan on doing some blind testing. This is gonna be a while though as I usually don't have a lot of spare cash for the home system.

[Alloroc]

Hi Victor,

May I ask if you have ever evaluated a high end CD player at home, in your existing setup? If so, opinions? If not, would you consider it?

I'm trying to get a handle on your arguement, which is very convincing and well written (not trying to patronise you, you understand, but to write a reply of that lenght requires time, effor and patience and that's something that I respect).

Note : perhaps "reference grade" could be an appropriate way to describe what I mean by high end - I know reference can mean most anything these days, but I think you'll understand what I mean.

Of course, anyone can offer their input here also.... I do appreciate we're digressing a tad but it's a facinating and entertaining thread.

[pembroke]

Leaving theory aside.
My ears tell me that, in my system, an Esoteric Universal player for $6k sounds much better than an old Sony XA777ES, and a Modwright Sony DVP999ES sounds even better still. In compaison to all of them my $200 UppoDigital (even though its great value) sounds harsh and dull.
So do I let theory decide my listening enjoyment? No, I'll just get back to enjoying the detail and musicality of my $2400 Modwright, and envy those that can realize the same level of enjoyment from a $200 player.

[Victor]

Shawn Parr,

I know that many claim to measure jitter into the picoseconds, but I have yet to see any published reports outlining exactly how they do it. Picoseconds measurement is not something you can do in a typical lab environment. Even a reliable nanosecond measurement is difficult enough, although is doable today with a commonly available but expensive equipment.

It is good to know that you used 24 bits throughout your recording session. So, the question is why the 192 kHz ‘sounded’ better then the 44.1 kHz recording if the precision was the same? Was the anti-aliasing filter the same too? If it was, - was it designed for the 192 kHz operation or was it designed for the 44.1 kHz operation? Those are critical issues and they just may tell us what went down at that recording. Setting the filter issue aside for the moment, the higher sampling rate would result in a much simpler filter, which in itself just might account for the listening preference.

The point I was trying to make is this, - the higher sampling rate is desirable by all means, but it does not in itself a guarantee of a better sound. I admit that it will be next to impossible to reconstruct a 24-bit signal sampled at 44.1 kHz to the full 24-bit precision. However, it is a rather trivial thing to do at 192 kHz sampling and is very doable at 96 kHz. Finally, regardless of what precisions or sampling rate is used, the best output that you can achieve today is about 18 bits precision. So, in some ways I am not too surprised that in your experience the 192 kHz recording sounded better, although I am surprised that it was a jaw-dropping experience.

I, as a rule, do not argue about equipment or the cables that one elect to use. I only am trying to stress that there is more to audio engineering than our ears along can tell us. It is imperative that we use a technical standard for our evolutions; otherwise we are all at the mercy of the audio industry that, as a rule, takes no prisoners. Just my onion…

Regards,
Victor

[Victor]

Hi Victor,

May I ask if you have ever evaluated a high end CD player at home, in your existing setup? If so, opinions? If not, would you consider it?

I'm trying to get a handle on your arguement, which is very convincing and well written (not trying to patronise you, you understand, but to write a reply of that lenght requires time, effor and patience and that's something that I respect).

Note : perhaps "reference grade" could be an appropriate way to describe what I mean by high end - I know reference can mean most anything these days, but I think you'll understand what I mean.

Of course, anyone can offer their input here also.... I do appreciate we're digressing a tad but it's a facinating and entertaining thread.

Alloroc,

I have used the top of the line Denon and Sony CD players. I also extensively modified them at the time. I am referring to the older models that appeared in mid to late 90’s. That technology is still today a state of the art as far as its D/A converters concerned and the overall mechanics. The CD players are a dieing breed as I am sure you know. I no longer use a CD player in my personal set-up although I still have my old Denon DCD-2560 and the 3560.

Both the Denons I had and the Sony pro777 series were excellent designs capable of a full 16-bit resolution output. I preferred Denon DCD2560 unit due to its use of a ladder-type AD1862 D/A chips in a differential mode and the ease of modification possibilities. The Sony on the other hands had a great pulse-current D/A which is still the one to beat by anybody.

You mention the term ‘reference grade’, - I have no idea what that might mean, but I can tell you that those CD Players that I had were the best in their construction and electronics. Certainly nothing that Levinson, Meridian or Esoteric produced were any better objectively speaking.

We are fully into the digital age these days. The only analog components in my system today are a dozen power amps. I am sure that soon even the power amps will be replaced by PWM amplifiers with digital inputs. So, as you can see, for me the sound quality argument is a rather remote point, since I have a 24-bit digital processing immediately after my DVD player and as long as the signal is kept in the digital domain it is impossible to talk about the sound quality issues as they might apply to the CD players or the cables.

I know that the digital processing may introduce its own sound character due to the algorithms being used, but with FIR filters even this point is rather remote. Bottom line is this, if you gear keeps flat frequency response at below 0.1% THD with overall noise levels at or below the precision of the recording and you do not overdrive your amplifiers, - you are in good shape regardless if you have a ‘reference quality’ electronics or not.

Regards,
Victor

[Punkuk]

Everyone company has the magic strand of wire, copper, silver ,gold or some exotic other material for there ICs or they Cryo them add snake oil or suspend them in a vacuum within the sleeve. But then that thin strand of wring hits a huge chunk of brass maybe coated with the cheapest gold on the market.
So how do you know how good that wire really sounds if it has to travel through the RCAs……….. twice and then of course the binding posts………. twice
Of course you could then buy some WBTs for the terminations but they are still a huge chunk of brass (or some other metal) that your signal has to pass through.
There are some purists out there who actually hard wire there IC and speaker wires, because no matter how good that strand is it will have to go through a RCA and then a binding post.

[Lex]

There's someone here I'd like to see be a bit less expert, and listen to other people's arguments and respect their opinions. No one person knows it all, yes, that includes engineers. So, everyone's opinions are to be respected, or nobody's will. the latter means, the thread will die an unnatural death. So, it's really up to you guys. I am impressed with how things have continued without spireling out of control, but I mean what I say about everyone's opinions being welcome, and at least held as a possibility their could be truth to their statements.

[comeup]

AAAA Lex everytime I see your name I think I'm looking at a Lexus, but it's a Beamer how come not a Lexus? You know the Lexus has a better sound system, although the BMW handles a lot better.

Peace

[tnt]

"Now you have done it! I have never seen or heard of an individual that can even hear 18 kHz tone under controlled conditions. If you are a male and older then 20, then statistically speaking you are good to about 17.5 kHz. At an age of 40 you are at 17 kHz if you are lucky. At 60 you are down top 14 kHz and it is downhill from there. Women have it better, but not by much. Those are the unfortunate facts." - Victor

Those numbers are well known, however many audiophiles and myself believe there're more to sound than just frequencies. I, an EE, work in a lab with a lot of instruments and I did test my own hearing limits, as well as frequency responses of amplifiers using AP system 3 in conjunction with LeCroy scopes capable of 2Gs/s and higher. Two amps, one class A/B and the other class-D, measure equally well in frequency response exceeding 50kHz. However they sound differently on the same speakers. The class AB amp gives me listener fatigue and the other none. The answer may lie in the high damping factor (>1000) of the class-D.

One simple experiment to proove the ear's response to ultrasonic frequencies would be to put a stiff 20kHz low-pass filter at the amp output and do AB comparison. I have yet to do that for lack of time but will eventually get to it.

Back to the two amps. While they have comparable frequency response, all listeners to my "quick and dirty" AB comparison can tell the difference right away. There was a "digital amps shoot-out" thread on other forums. Many of them use UcD modules. Yet in correctly-set double-blind tests, audiophiles can tell differences very quickly and rather consistently. That proves that there're more to sound than frequency response, as theoretically those UcD-based amps have same frequency response, THD, etc...

Another thing that puzzles me is some well-regarded set-ups at CES left me indifferent while my simple setup at home pleases me much more, where I listen to music constantly. A supposedly better setup at the lab (from component stand point) doesn't please me as much - less soundstage and fewer subtleties. So contrary to a supposedly golden ear's opinion, I gonna change the lab speakers to same ones I use at home, as I do listen to music while I work. The amps used are well-known high-end amps. Just my personal 2 cents.

[Alloroc]

Alloroc,

I have used the top of the line Denon and Sony CD players. I also extensively modified them at the time. I am referring to the older models that appeared in mid to late 90’s. That technology is still today a state of the art as far as its D/A converters concerned and the overall mechanics. The CD players are a dieing breed as I am sure you know. I no longer use a CD player in my personal set-up although I still have my old Denon DCD-2560 and the 3560.

Both the Denons I had and the Sony pro777 series were excellent designs capable of a full 16-bit resolution output. I preferred Denon DCD2560 unit due to its use of a ladder-type AD1862 D/A chips in a differential mode and the ease of modification possibilities. The Sony on the other hands had a great pulse-current D/A which is still the one to beat by anybody.

You mention the term ‘reference grade’, - I have no idea what that might mean, but I can tell you that those CD Players that I had were the best in their construction and electronics. Certainly nothing that Levinson, Meridian or Esoteric produced were any better objectively speaking.

We are fully into the digital age these days. The only analog components in my system today are a dozen power amps. I am sure that soon even the power amps will be replaced by PWM amplifiers with digital inputs. So, as you can see, for me the sound quality argument is a rather remote point, since I have a 24-bit digital processing immediately after my DVD player and as long as the signal is kept in the digital domain it is impossible to talk about the sound quality issues as they might apply to the CD players or the cables.

I know that the digital processing may introduce its own sound character due to the algorithms being used, but with FIR filters even this point is rather remote. Bottom line is this, if you gear keeps flat frequency response at below 0.1% THD with overall noise levels at or below the precision of the recording and you do not overdrive your amplifiers, - you are in good shape regardless if you have a ‘reference quality’ electronics or not.

Regards,
Victor

I'd just like to respond to a couple of points you raised. I believe that 'mass produced' big brand CD players are a dying(dead) breed. The format however, lives on and there still is a huge market for quality CDPs within the HiFi community, as, although you don't buy it, the format still continues to be pushed further and further in interesting ways.

Can't understand how you don't understand the term 'Reference Grade'?! Almost every manufacturer uses(and perhaps misuses it for that matter) it, or are you having a bit of a laugh!? :W

Finally, not all of us have the expertiese to take a mass market player and modify it into someting, well, much better. So we go out and buy them. Perhaps there's an opening in the market for you there!

[bigburner]

I no longer use a CD player in my personal set-up

Victor, do you mean that the SQ from your DVD player is as good as a CD player when listening to CDs?

[Victor]

Those numbers are well known, however many audiophiles and myself believe there're more to sound than just frequencies.

Well, - you are an EE, so you know what constitutes the sound and its relationship to ‘frequencies’.

I, an EE, work in a lab with a lot of instruments and I did test my own hearing limits, as well as frequency responses of amplifiers using AP system 3 in conjunction with LeCroy scopes capable of 2Gs/s and higher. Two amps, one class A/B and the other class-D, measure equally well in frequency response exceeding 50kHz. However they sound differently on the same speakers. The class AB amp gives me listener fatigue and the other none. The answer may lie in the high damping factor (>1000) of the class-D.

Amplifier testing is important and it is great that you decided to look at it and least to question why one amp may sound different form another. The frequency response is only one parameter to look at. Another is noise and the THD. I would guess that the class-D amp would have a lot more in-band noise then the class A-B amp with its inherently better linearity. When testing amps you must also make sure that the overall SPL remains the same. It would also help if you do it in a ‘Blind’ fashion.

One simple experiment to proove the ear's response to ultrasonic frequencies would be to put a stiff 20kHz low-pass filter at the amp output and do AB comparison. I have yet to do that for lack of time but will eventually get to it.

If you have an AP-3 system, then this filter is built-in. It is a very steep FIR filter with absolute minimum ringing. Its -3dB point is at 20 kHz. When using it you must consider that this filter will cut the signal level at 20 kHz to the 70% of what the level is at about 16 kHz. This will be audible when you compare the sound when no filter is used. In itself this does not show that our ears are sensitive to the ultrasonic frequencies.

Back to the two amps. While they have comparable frequency response, all listeners to my "quick and dirty" AB comparison can tell the difference right away. There was a "digital amps shoot-out" thread on other forums. Many of them use UcD modules. Yet in correctly-set double-blind tests, audiophiles can tell differences very quickly and rather consistently. That proves that there're more to sound than frequency response, as theoretically those UcD-based amps have same frequency response, THD, etc...

Yes, the UCD amps are good. I am going to be building a 6-channel version soon. Personally I would like to have a module that has SPDI/F input. Not sure if the UCD has that option.

Anyway, the test must be fair. That means, - same SPL, limit the power to the linear range, ‘Blind’ conditions. I also took part in those tests and my findings were different from yours.

Another thing that puzzles me is some well-regarded set-ups at CES left me indifferent while my simple setup at home pleases me much more, where I listen to music constantly. A supposedly better setup at the lab (from component stand point) doesn't please me as much - less soundstage and fewer subtleties. So contrary to a supposedly golden ear's opinion, I gonna change the lab speakers to same ones I use at home, as I do listen to music while I work. The amps used are well-known high-end amps. Just my personal 2 cents.

Look, - you personal opinion is a great starting point. I think that if you are to level the playing field so to speak where all participants have the same conditions while operating in their designed envelope, in other words do the Test right, - you might be surprised by the results.

[Victor]

Victor, do you mean that the SQ from your DVD player is as good as a CD player when listening to CDs?

I use a DVD player to listen to music. It is a Sony 975. I have a fully digital system all the way to the power amps and a DIY 3-way full range dipole speaker. My system includes digital volume control and digital crossover. I use Meridian 568 processor.

For music, the DVD player is connected digitally to the digital volume control, which is a 24-bit 96 kHz pro-audio unit that gives me at least 48 dB of level adjustment before I loose any resolution with 16-bit sources. From there the signal goes digitally to the Behringer DEQ2496-DCX2496 combination. The volume control uses Asynchronous Sample Rate Converter from Analog Devices. It also resamples the input to 24-bit word length.

I also set the power amplifier gains lower to about 20 dB to account for the higher overall amplitude of my digital gear. This further minimizes the use of the volume attenuation for normal listening levels.

The way my system is set-up, - the CD player contributes nothing to the sound quality as long as it does its job well. In fact, occasionally I use a cheap portable battery-operated CD player or a computer with the same results.

[NewBuyer]

Victor, I'm curious, what make/model of digital volume control are you using please?

[Victor]

Victor, I'm curious, what make/model of digital volume control are you using please?

I am using Roland M-1000. It is no longer made, but there are still few around on the web.

[Eliav]

Hi
Victor, I wanted you to know that I really enjoy reading your threads. they add a different point of view on these majestic-ultra-expensive toys we all purchase and upgrade religiously.
BTW, you are absolutely right about the human ear ability to hear higher frequencies, in fact , there are no available standards for normal human hearing above 12KHz, the highest frequency that is routinely evaluated is 8Khz, some times higher frequencies are evaluated with Oto acoustic emissions (OME) to show early stages of inner ear damage which is not even recognized by the patient .
Cheers
Eliav

[Alloroc]

Further digression.....

Anyone hear(LOL) of Psychoacoustics?

It is important to note that the question of what humans hear is not only a physiological question of features of the ear but very much also a psychological issue - what we perceive or 'feel' we hear. For example, the ear itself does not respond to frequencies below 20Hz, but these can be perceived via the body's sense of touch.

Comments?

[Victor]

Hi
Victor, I wanted you to know that I really enjoy reading your threads. they add a different point of view on these majestic-ultra-expensive toys we all purchase and upgrade religiously.
BTW, you are absolutely right about the human ear ability to hear higher frequencies, in fact , there are no available standards for normal human hearing above 12KHz, the highest frequency that is routinely evaluated is 8Khz, some times higher frequencies are evaluated with Oto acoustic emissions (OME) to show early stages of inner ear damage which is not even recognized by the patient .
Cheers
Eliav

Eliav, - thank you. Yes, I am painfully aware of the inadequacy of human hearing, and it only gets worst as we get older. Not long ago, I tested myself with a signal generator and some single frequency tones. Well, - I can hear 16.8 kHz. I spend quite some time trying to equalize my DIY speaker system to operate above 17 kHz. It was not easy to do, but my computer says that the speakers do work to 17.3 kHz. Too bad that only my computer can enjoy the higher frequencies.

Victor