Amir and Blind Testing

I manufacture batteries @tonywinga , or more specifically I develop the technology for the batteries that are manufactured. The only thing I am defending is common sense and against those that try to look like they know what they are talking about when they really don't. This place is great for music suggestion, good for speakers, and I like looking at rooms for design ideas which is why I have read it over the years. Some of the best music suggestions you will find. Otherwise, too many people who are convinced of their expertise in all things audio though they have likely not seen a physics class since high school. They are easy to tell, they throw around terms like Bureau of Standards in 2022, even thought it was eliminated in the 1980's. At that point it becomes obvious they picked up a term from someone else who also did not know what they are talking about either. It's tedious, and it is disrespectful to spread false information under the guise of fake expertise to a community that supposedly you respect.

@tonywinga, there has not been a Bureau of Standards for almost 35 years. Bringing this up shows you don’t have any experience in calibration or measurements which is likely why you were "abused". Other than absolute gain, what exactly do you think a NIST traceable calibration would be on an audio tester? A large portion of the test gear for what I do is not NIST traceable for calibration. Why? NIST does not have any standard remotely applicable. It’s fine for basic things like current, voltage, weight, thickness, etc. but not for complex measurements that either don’t have a standard or are defined by other technical bodies.

This is why I don’t post often in audio forums. Conversations just end up as pages of whining because 1/2 the world does not believe what I believe and I am offended that they will not stop. What is worse, people will make things up to support their argument.

Take this piece below. This is so factually incorrect that I wonder if the author even visited the site? I don’t go to ASR often either, as most of their threads end up as technical fights about things I don't care about, but when I was planning my room, I asked a lot of acoustic questions there and I can state without reserve, that most there would never discount acoustics and would abuse you if you said acoustics did not matter.

Look, you didn't even know the bureau of standards has been defunct for 35 years. Don't try to invent a backstory at this point in some questionable call to authority with made up qualifications. You didn't even know what NIST was till I put it in a post. If you were truly an engineering manager involved with metrology, you would know this. You did not.

You don't know what would be calibrated on a spectrum analyzer, let alone an audio one, or even how it would be relevant to the information being presented, most of which is differential in which case, calibration is effectively of no meaning. Whether one item is 1 and the other is 1.1, or one is 1.1, and the other is 1.21 is not relevant in a differential comparison. Again, if you were an metrology expert, you would know this. Similarly, whether something is 1.000KHz or 1.001KHz in audio would not be important. If it was, we could never use turntables.

On top of that, many instruments today incorporate self calibration features. In a device with an independent generator and recorder, if the recorded result matches the expected generator output, then you can be rather confident of the calibration.

tonywinga

193 posts

04-16-2022 at 01:08pm 

Wow, another self proclaimed expert.  Spectrum and frequency analyzers do need to be calibrated.  Since I was an Engineering Manager for several years with one of my responsibilities being test equipment design, calibration and repair in a major Aerospace Company I know that first hand.  All test equipment should be traceable back to the Bureau of Standards or NIST for serious test work or analysis.

@mahgister 

I understood quite clearly what you posted. You without any lack of clarity accused the users of the Audio Science site of ignorance wrt the need for room acoustic treatment. I will post it again.

Their common point is a total ignborance of acoustic condition because they need electrical tools they dont need to tune a room... All rooms are equal for their activities....

This is in my experience and to anyone who happens to visit there patently false.

I expect you went there and tried to tell some experts in acoustics how to do acoustics, and it was not well received. Based on your posts, it is likely you made some claims wrt what you could accomplish by ear alone that from my own audio journey is not impossible.

Audiophiles can't have it both ways. You have Tony complaining that a device was not recently calibrated to a 35 year defunct Bureau of Measurements meanwhile almost no companies in this industry supply any measurements let alone NIST traceable while you claim that your ears are "accurate" enough. Surely you see the irreconcilable issue here?

Mahgister, you appear unable to both form a coherent paragraph, nor stay on topic. Throwing out names like Helmholtz nor TYPING IN CAPS does not make your point any more succinct or accurate nor confer any expertise on you. You made a blanket statement that the users of Audio Science do not care about room acoustics. That is patently false. There is no walking that back. You made a false statement. It would be best to just admit it.

I hired an expert who participated on the Audio Science site. He came highly recommended and his references included professional studios, many business who set up studios, and high end residences. I had a great chat there with another gentleman who is a distinguished Bell Labs scientist. I have even ran into an old colleague from my TI days, I was working on a wafer process that was critical to a product he was lead on.  Oh, I also chatted with someone from Gik there too (the acoustic panel guys). So your claim about acoustics experts not participating there is also false. I did get directed to Gearslutz (now Gearspace) for a deeper dive into some acoustics discussions. The acoustics discussions are definitely deeper there, but of course more focused on studios and mixing spaces. The concepts are similar though.

I am not sure why you are comparing your room to headphones. They don't sound the same. That is an apples and orange comparison and does not mean anything.

Welcoming me does not change the fact you made a false statement, that I did not take out of context.  That would near impossible given what you said, and you both will not admit to the actual words you wrote nor their meaning. I don’t perceive any ability to have a coherent honest conversation with you.

My quote did not remove any relevant context.

@tonywinga

Who do you think you are fooling? Do you think people referencing 35 year defunct organizations like they still exist are taken seriously by anyone but the deluded? You need to get with reality bud no one buying your story. Throwing ISO or MIL into a sentence does not mean you know anything. If anything that you don’t reference specific standards shows you are just attempting to grandstand in the hopes someone will believe you. Those are not  standards. One is a standards body, the is just some letters. Mil spec standards are across a range of entities.

P.s. the battery venture is doing fine, it’s a good business to be in, lab budget almost unlimited but tied to profitability. Only small companies send their stuff out for calibration. The equipment we have that can be calibrated is done on site. But you wouldn’t know that.

@tonywinga what does lying about your qualifications and experience say about you?

@tonywinga

Bud, you referenced a 35 year defunct organization and didn’t even know it ... 35 years. ANYONE with actual working experience dealing with anything related to calibration and standards would not have done that. Just who do you think you are fooling? Again you referenced an organization defunct for 35 years. Not one or 2 years, 35 years. You are not fooling anyone.

PS the important acronyms and items of interest are NIST/ NVLAP, A2LA, IAS who are members/adhere to ILAC/APLAC so their results are accepted anywhere, and ISO/IEC 17025 defining their operation. Most of our equipment can only be calibrated by the manufacturer most of which have been certified by one of those bodies listed above.

Are you still going on about this? You don’t even expect measurements from 99.9% of audio companies, but you nit pick because a test site that produces likely accurate results within the framework of the measurements they are taking, produces results you don’t like?

My background is physics, so not an EE, but I understand most of the terms pretty well as we use similar measurements.

I personally don’t care if the amplifier I bought was 200 wpc into ohms or 195. I will never hear the difference and it is an acceptable margin of error or manufacturing tolerance. I would care about 170 because I paid for 200 and that is not an acceptable tolerance. In my industry, we specify batteries are either +/- tolerance or +/-0 (no lower than) depending on the product / contract.

Now if I am not mistaken, harmonic measurements, which are more important than power as long as power is close, is a relative measurement.

As well, as we discussed previously, it appears the test equipment in question both ships calibrated, as well as has a source and receiver. That provides a level of inherent feedback on current calibration.

Last, due to the relative nature of the critical measurements, the best measuring tested device, if available, could be used a 2nd reference to calibration to set a minimum benchmark. For example, if the best device you tested had a THD of 0.0010 %, and you test it again, 0.0010, you can be confident in the current operation of your system to testing devices with equal or higher distortion. We have a wide range of "reference standards" in our labs and production for validating current calibration, not to mention you are calibrating a whole fixture or system, not one item provided by a 3rd party vendor.

@nonoise ,

Can you point to any scientific papers that validate your hypothesis?

I have a strange past time. I strive to make the perfect cola syrup (preferably diet, but that is whole different ball of wax). We all have our vices. One of the many amateurs posted a blind taste test he did, absolutely convinced Coke was his personal Gold Standard. It would be the obvious best to him out of about 12 if my memory serves.

Decades of drinking Coke, and he didn't pick it out of a lineup as best. His preference, when everything but taste was taken out of the equation was Pepsi. Even though he had been conditioned for Coke.

I am sure there is a similar wine story, but I choose not to learn too much about wine lest it remove the pleasure of a bottle of good plonk.

In my mind, my Pepsi story negates your audio listening hypothesis.