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bstcyr

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  1. Joel, I think this happens to every audiophile. The better equipment shows more clearly if the recording was done well or not. Also though since you can hear the recording and production techniques you become more aware of them, so when you are less tolerant of poor recordings. It's like after you taste steak prepared by a really excellent chef after all you had ever experienced was the greasy spoon, now you notice when you go back to the greasy spoon that it wasn't that good. Had you never gone to the good chef you wouldn't have known. The better equipment is like the better chef - it's still using the same ingredients but doing a better job, which allows you a better experience and improves your understanding.
  2. Two ways to go. 1. set those speakers on stands that you could move out to the ideal listening position for when you're sitting and listening and then move them back against the bookshelf when you're not listening or just doing background music. 2. get speakers designed for that sort of location. The Magnepan MMGW would be a great choice- they're designed to be mounted on a bookcase with hinges. There are a number of speakers designed to go against a wall or in a bookshelf, but having owned other Maggies I'd choose them - and you can buy that model direct for Magnepan with a 30 day money back warranty - try them. They do like power though so the emotiva will likely sound good but they'll really open up when you can upgrade to a pair of their 200 watt monos or the XPA 2 at 300 watts
  3. -you have commented on the paramaters fairly well, so I won't get into the theoretical, I am currently enjoying the Linkwitz Orion speakers -very much - they are quite complicated by your terms - 3 way, 5 drivers, electronic crossover, 4 channels of amplification per side - if you aren't familiar with them just google. I have owned LS35A's, original quads, magnepan mg1's, magnepan mg 3's, quad 63's. I have a friend with Van der steen 3a's and they are also a great sounding speaker. I originally was sold on the simpler is better notion but have obviously moved on. There are some great speakers that are relatively simple but when your think about the task - we would like a device that reproduces the sound (air movement) of a symphony orchestra, or rock group, with no distortion, total frequency, dynamic and phase accuracy. Well that's why there are so many speaker companies out there still working at it. good luck with your project
  4. I have always thought that many of my regular red book CDs sound fantastic, and some, not so much. I'm sure all of you have some really good sounding redbook CD's. So it seems that it is possible to make great sounding music recorded at 48/16 and that the resolution is not the problem. The problem then with focusing on raising the resolution is that we're not really fixing the problem, the problem must be something else. Proper recording process, care of microphone set up, lack of compression and many other things that the guys are doing to produce great CD's. Lets push the recording industry to actually get it right and give us the great sounding music that 48/16 is capable of rather than up the resolution and the price but not necesarily the fidelity.
  5. Reproducing a full orchestra in your living room is more difficult than say a solo acoustic instrument, or voice. There are many reasons for this - they have a lot to do with the size of the space and the ability of the speakers - large speakers, like the Dayton Wright electrotats, magnepan typmpanis, infinity IRS (now genesis 1.2, well sort of) are more capable of approaching a full symphony when given the space and power. My listening room which is 24 by 32 feet is too small to pull this off. Solo instrument, small group, both classical and jazz do well. I have heard the above speakers in larger rooms than mine where they did a credible job of a full orchestra - after all a full symphony orchestra is about 50 feet or so wide - depending on the exact orchestra could be slightly more or less. So generating a reproduction of an audio wave that was originally that big in a space that is a third the size or less is not going to work. Although not exactly the same it`s like trying to reproduce the view from the top of a mountain on a 50 inch screen, or even an 80 inch one for that matter. The larger screen will give a better impression of the experience. But I think this is off the point of this thread - is big bucks on bit perfect dacs worth it compared to some sound card outputs that allow the user to adjust the sound to their liking,
  6. I'm not sure that it's either or. With really well recorded music, good sound engineering, good musicianship why would I want to change anything, as a matter of a fact why would I want anything in my chain doing anything other than delivering the original musical intent. Musicians spend great amounts of time (years and years) perfecting their playing. They choose subtle hand changes, or breath changes etc. to bring out musical intent. These musical decisions create changes in dynamics and/or frequency content that can be very subtle. Am I a better judge than Oscar Peterson, Santana, Diana Krall, Joni Mitchel or any other artist as to how their music should sound (and of course the engineers). There are many recordings that are not so well done, but contain musical content that we would still like to enjoy. The bit perfect unaltered approach makes those recordings unenjoyable and altering the output to make it more listenable, it won't be perfect but better and more enjoyable. So while on one end we push to move the technology to allow all recordings and play back to be perfect including the effects of room interaction, we can simply understand how the technology can allow us to enjoy listening to music and hear into the performers intent. So if we are altering the sound in order to make a poor recording sound more enjoyable, that's OK. I listen to a lot of classical and acoustic guitars (hundreds of CD of this alone) I find some players have a very bright sound that I don't enjoy - and I know this is how they sound because I've heard them live - I would consider it a misuse of audio technology -to simply dial down the treble, that would give me a false impression of how that performer actually sounded- One of the problems with audio is that it is hard to have an absolute reference (I get out to several dozen live concerts a year, mostly acoustic, spend a few weeks a year at music camps where I get master classes from some of the worlds best musicians so my reference is "what did Jason Vieaux, of Jeff McFadden[both Naxos recording artists¨¸when I sat in a room getting a lesson, or when they were performing for a small group, or in the evening concert-larger venue. When I read a review that says something like - the piano had greater weight and fullness - I always wonder - and how do you know what that particular piano sounded like on that particular recording. Greater weight and fullness could mean that the component was helping the playback sound more like the real thing, or less like the real thing. The same goes for greater soundstage depth and many other comments made in reviews. So if you have a bunch of poorly recorded music that you would like to make listenable then adjust away, but don't loose sight of the goal - We'd like to move that great musical performance from the original venue, or recording studio to our listening room without any alteration.
  7. If there is a disagreement between measurement and perception there are several possibilities. The perception of some individuals is different than most of us and includes something that can't be measured - some folks insist on seeing ghosts, talking to dead people etc. (one of them used to be a Prime Minister of Canada -MacKenzie King). That doesn't make their perception wrong - just not relevant for most of us. Another possibility is that the measurement is wrong or incomplete. Back in the 1950's when transistors first came out engineers claimed transistor amps to be nearly perfect. Many listeners disagreed and it was discovered that since they were testing the new transistor amps the same as they tested tube amps they were missing some distortions. Once they learned how to test and measure for these distortions the race was on to improve transistor circuits to get rid of those distortions. I'm not saying there is anything missed in these measurements, only that it is possible. We know that the human perception system is an amazing thing. Most people can drink wine and say I like it or I don't like it. Some people can drink wine and identify the types of grapes used and sometimes even the year of those grapes. I have taken part in, and run blind listening test (I know some people disagree with blind listening as a valid test) with all kinds of equipment (cd vs records, cables, speakers, amplifiers,....) I'm most likely to be cynical and agree with the measurements if the blind listening tests verify the measurements. When they don't then scientifically it means we need to try and find reasons why. In my own tests I would tend to agree that I don't hear these differences. My ears are pretty good, I play and build guitars - have for 40 years, have been all over the world studying guitar building. I have, I believe, like a wine taster, practiced listening for small subtleties in the sound of instruments, my sound system consists of about $20k of well regarded 2 channel cd playing equipment (although experimenting with computer based). I would be happy to have anyone who thinks they percieve a difference verify that. Every time I thought I could hear a difference that was not measureable and I set up a carefull ABX test I found that there was a reason or that I couldn't reliably hear the difference after all. The real challenge here I think is to those who feel that this test does not explain what they are hearing is to find a way to verify that. Mitchco has done an excellent job of describing and supporting his position, Those of you who disagree are free to do so of course, but please take he stance that you have a different opinion which is at this point only opinion.
  8. 20hertz, I'm curious what software you're using on the PC that does not sound as good as the Aune S1 and what are you using to store files that feeds the Aune. The Aune looks like a great device, I always thought that something like this made sense- a customized computer with a stripped down OS like linux rather than windows, which puts it in reasonable price range. -where is the Aune available?
  9. Certainly one of the problems is that computers are versatile multifunction devices -one might say , jack of all trades, master of none. Building a function specific version of a computer does seem to be the way to go, but still has problems as Greasemonkey has pointed out. Jplay is attempting to address this in a software mannner - have software control the "other functions" to keep them from degrading the audio performance. The other way is building what is basically a specialized computer, which seems like it shouldn't be that expensive. Has anyone tried the aune S1 - it looks technically like a great device. Customized computer dac with multiple input choices, running linux, so it can be stripped down more so than windows, outboard power supply to remove much of the noise generating parts. The advantage of a standard computer with jplay or jriver, or both is that you can upgrade, change stuff as you please, but it's a little more work. The aune solution seems to be plug and play, but since it's linux there is more difficulty customizing, and if they go out of business you have a box with no support should it stop working, with a standard computer you can switch to another software and keep going.
  10. Below jackfish feels alright with prices that are related to what you get, in terms of resolution. We know that the original recording was done at 24/192 or higher resolution and then mixed down to offer 24/96, or 16/44. With downloads there is no physical product so it could be argued that the 24/192 should be the least expensive - it was recorded and offered for download, no extra work. The lower resolution file had to be ripped down to the lower resolution and stored. The CD version had to be ripped down to the lower resolution, burned to a disc and put in a case. We've been convinced by the industry that since it's in a higher resolution it should cost more. The download should cost the same irregardless of resolution and the physical product should have the additional cost of, manufacturing the physical product. New comment: Author: jackfish Title: Current prices? 16/44.1 hardcopy $12-$15 24/96 download $18 24/192 download $25 The 24/96 cost seems reasonable to me, for the 24/192 not so much.
  11. http://www.cepro.com/story/alanparsons.html Alan Parsons has a few words on audio equipment. "A lot of luck in getting a good sound" So that's why only about one in 192 recordings sounds good and about one in 2046 sounds great. That's a bit tongue in cheek but I do know that I have some regular CD recordings that sound awesome and some hi rez downloads that aren't as good. This would indicate that there's more to great sounding recordings than 192/24 vs 44.1/16. I'm sure most of us have Dark Side of the Moon in our collections - I have 4 variations, including SACD and the SACD is not the best sounding version to my ears.
  12. Lots of deja vu as I read what many are saying here. I bought my first receiver, turntable, speaker package about 40 years ago and there have been a wide variety of amps, preamps, speakers, cables, turntables, cartridges,... and of course music. I too found DIY recently, just completed a pair of Linkwitz Orions. They are by the way the best (IMHO) I've had -including several PSB's, LS35a's, Quad -original and 63's, magnepan MMG, 2a, 3.6, Eminent Technology VIII,... The complexity of it all though has me thinking (perhaps hoping), wouldn't it be nice to have a lovely little 2 speaker/ integrated with a digital source that sounded great? Of course now that I've built speakers that use an electronic crossover and 4 channels of amplification per speaker that one seems to be gone - although Linkwitz does have another model -the Pluto_ that is active- all electronics including the amps built into the speaker, just add preamp and a source. I have come to notice that there is plenty of music on CD that sounds great- great clear sound, good soundstaging, detail, full realistic sound, there are some high rez recordings that don't excite me so much. I think most of us have been captivated by the experience of those recordings that draw us in and have us experience the excitement of music making in our room. The exact combination of equipment and recordings that will do it for each of us could be different, then of course there's money and space. It does get tiring after awhile, the hype and marketing can suck you in and you can forget that what it's about is putting on one of those magic recordings sitting down and just enjoying the music making, but if you find that you're spending more time comparing cable x to cable y and swapping DAC a for DAC b, reading every audio magazine, info and blog than you are actually enjoying the music then maybe it's time to reevaluate. I'm not saying that the technology isn't important, without it we couldn't play those great recordings and therefore we need to choose our equipment and it is interesting to keep up with what's happening to some extent. I take much of it with a grain of salt, I happened to be studying physics and music at the University of Waterloo when the profs who ran the audio lab there were testing CD players. I saw many players with their clothes off (as it were), identified what components were being used in which from the lasers, the transports, d to a chips and circuits, power supplies, analogue output stages etc. and what I learnt was; price was no indicator of build quality or sound quality, often the boutique stuff was and out and out sham and rip off (I'm talking cheap players in new chasis with a analogue output filter to give a slightly different (though less accurate) sound). That experience left me a very skeptical audiophile. Really wouldn't the real nirvana be - I think of some music by a particular artist and a virtual performance perfect in every way occurs in the room- kind of star trek like. Notice that in that scenario there's no care or concern about the technology to make it happen, as a matter of a fact an awareness of the technology would get in the way of the experience, but the music and the performer that is what's important.
  13. I try to be a realist. I try to perceive my options as a consumer and act on them. It is not clear to me that most recorded music will be available at even CD quality in the future. I'm buying what I want as cheaply as possible now in part because it may not be available in any form other than lossy downloads in the future. -Some of my best sounding CD's are regular 44.1/16 unknown labels that I picked up second hand, or on sale. > and I am not a rich man. -most of us aren't, that's why there's some hope- there's a far bigger market with a little money - Some of the producers have decided there's more money in sell a few high priced items than many moderately priced but they don't all take that route. The music business has to find a new business model. I think that both lower prices and effortless purchasing will be necessary. Unless music companies like Bis see enough volume to justify the expense, they will discontinue the high res. download experiments. - If the companies already have the equipment to record in high rez then the cost is very little to record in high rez and then offer it in several resolutions, a various prices, so I'm not sure that volume is the only factor.
  14. Actually lawyers don't interpret the laws. They represent clients who have differing opinions (interpretations) of the law to the court. The court then decides which interpretation is most in line with the intention of the law. This is seen in the case posted in the earlier post of Sony vs Universal. Universal felt that users did not have the right to copy a show and watch it later, they couldn't go after all the folks doing it so they went after Sony for providing the equipment that allowed it. The court decided that Universals' interpretation of the law was not what was intended. I'm sure there were lots of lawyers involved but the interpreting was done by the court.
  15. for wgscott Where the line is drawn is interpreted by the courts and has been - see the post with the link regarding the sony case. You own the rights to watching the TV show now, or later and you can keep a copy for that purpose. You do not own that when you borrow from the library.
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