I was thinking members in general but mods, sure why not?
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Funny people with money sit close at concert .But if you look at them they have earplugs in .LOL.I remember when I was young and you could go to tickecton in my nearest Macys and get there at opening ,when a Concerts tickets were going to go on stage and for like less than 10 bucks ,I could get front row seats.WOW...but after the concert I was deaf.So then I would get the front row in the balcony. Directly front stage with no one in front of me and they were great and didn't hear my hearing... |
@mijostyn: Thank you for your response. What you assert is certainly consistent with my experience. I started out with a really (in my room) edgy combo-- B&W's with Rotel and Creek components. After that my knee-jerk response was to go too far in the other direction-- Silverline monitors with Jolida tubed integrated and tube CDP. Moving to SS amp and transport + DAC helped but the fact that the system is located in our living room imposes constraints that gear upgrades cannot surmount, unfortunately. I'll have to wait until we move (likely within 5 years) and I can set up a dedicated room and start over from scratch, with neutrality as the aim. Given my age (65) my next system will be my last and I'd like to do a better job, this time. I'm not by nature, a patient individual- - I'm thinking I may buy a decent set of headphones and try to satisfy my audio jones that way, in the interim. BTW, there's no way I can afford 100K. I might manage 50K. I'm OK with used gear. |
@stuartk , Sorry for the delayed response. I wish everyone could afford an ultimate system. On the other hand one need not spend totally ridiculous money either. Accurate reproduction is not a problem of visual aesthetics. It is not an issue of personal taste. It is a science problem dealing with the accurate reproduction of sound. It is about physics and engineering, nothing else. Save the emotion for the music. There is equipment out there that is of extraordinary value and there is equipment that is pretty bad and sometimes it is not cheap either. It is up to the consumer to choose wisely. Most consumers are out to sea without a compass. They are subject to marketing which as we all know is the fine art of lying. Listening to what people think they hear is a seriously bad mistake unless you know that person and their experience well. What any system sounds like is a relative issue. It depends on what the person has been listening too. As an example, if the person has been listening to a system that is too bright, a system that is accurate will sound dull. If you really want to know what you are doing you have to calibrate your brain by measuring your system. In order to know what you are hearing you have to know what you are listening to. If you do not than your opinion is worthless. I think I just insulted at least 3/4 of the people on this site. It is easy to measure your system and all of you already have the most expensive part of a measurement system, your computer. Anyone (with a lot of money) can spend a lot of money on a system and come up with a pretty bad system. The trick (and fun) is to come up with a great system for reasonable money. I think you can create an "absolute sound system, including turntable for about $100,000. In another few months it might be up to $120,000 if the powers that be continue to destroy the economy. It might be less. I should also note that the single most expensive (and important) component is usually the room. |
The timbre of instruments is determined by the harmonic spectrum and the attack and decay of each harmonic relative to the fundamental. This means changing the frequency response (local ratio of harmonics opposite the fundamentals) or the decay of harmonics needs to alter. Amps do not change decay and attack so that leaves ... frequency response. |
I find this issue of timbre fascinating. It is something I have tried to understand but gave up. I’m interested to attempt to know how the choice of an amplification medium is material in reproducing the timbre in the recorded performance. This has been mentioned, but I’m still confused. An amp that reproduces detail/resolution may sound white/clinical/thin - is this the cutting out all the complex aspects of timbre? Or recognizing that aspects of timbre don’t exist in the recording in the first place (which clearly can’t be true)? On the other hand, does a tube amp add artificially to the timbre that was recorded or does it just amplify the existing complex harmonics in a manner that may or may not be correct? Or some combination? Am I confusing technical terms? Forgive me if I’m asking the wrong questions - there are knowns which are obviously unknown to me, see me struggle. I’m asking this from a measurement/objective perspective, if possible. I don’t like using the words distortion or colour - means different things to different people and handwaving ensues. |
@ mahgister, yes a misunderstanding. All good. The timbre of a sound is formed in it's entirety and does not depend on the room but is influenced by the room. By that I mean any instrument could play a note in an anechoic chamber or out in an open field and it's timbre will be heard. In the wikipedia definition there is no mention of the acoustic propagation. As I see it the decay mentioned in regard to ADSR (point 3) is the natural decay of the instrument and not the decay behaviour of the acoustic environment which affects your perception of that instrument's timbre. This link: https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/fidelity-vs-musicality-is-there-a-tug-of-war?lastpage=true&am... where they claim ' the duration of a sound also affects how we perceive its pitch, loudness and timbre' The sentence in parenthesis seems to support my understanding of timbre. |
Dear lemonhaze it is a misunderstanding... If you read my post i specifically said that timbre cannot be reduced to fundamental frequency and harmonics ONLY...A relatively low cost dac cannot replace room acoustic for example...And most of the times even the costlier dac cannot... All acoustic science and psycho-acoustic science cannot be reduced to Fourier transform...There is more in "timbre" concept than meet the eye.... If it was not the case there will be no definition of "timbre" in 5 points at least like for example in this wikipedia definition:
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@mahgister I usually enjoy and mostly agree with your posts except this: Timbre perceptive experience cannot be reduced to a mathematical additive bunch of frequencies and harmonics only ... Acoustic of small room play a great role more than the new hype electronical gearTimbre is in fact exactly that, it's the fundamental frequency (pitch) with its associated harmonics that allow you to recognise what instrument it is. The effect of the room will determine how you perceive that timbre. I do definitely agree with you about the room however. You may have noticed that I often join in a thread about acoustics and hold that the room has a huge influence on the resultant sound to the point where I have stated that a mediocre system in a properly treated room (beyond just a rug and curtains) will provide far greater enjoyment and reward than just throwing together a bunch of mega-expensive 'best in class A' 🙂 |
@mahgister,I am sure that you know the basic ....Your post speak well for yourself... But assembling a good system at low cost is relatively easy nowadays , thanks to great engineering progress in audio... Embedding rightfully a good system, mechanically, electrically and acoustically, is less, way less easy than picking a good system to begin with....It was for me at least.... That is my only point.....And my post goes in the opposite direction of most audio thread where the solution is and always will be upgrading gear.... Then sometimes basic evidence are forgotten.... |
@mahgister, No argument from me in regard to the influence of the listening room acoustics. But one has to assemble an audio system to place in the room. 1 Room acoustic interactions 2 Addressing vibration/resonance effects on speakers and components. 3 Acknowledging the importance of good quality AC power for the components. All of these are further fundamental factors in assessing the total picture of building and extracting the most from your audio system. Charles |
Individual choices so good they will be cannot replace simple acoustic controls for example... No dac, no amplifier and no speaker can beat the room....Especially if we think with S.Q./price ratio in our perspective... Saying that high end audio is unknown and inacessible for most of us is not false, it is worst than a lie, it is an half truth claimed by sellers....Or it is a common place evident fact... There is always "better" than what i own.... Of course there exist many better audio system than mine....But the goal is to reach optimal S.Q. not perfect S.Q.....With many low cost embeddings methods controls: mechanical,electrical and acoustical.... The only one who will speak otherwise are snobs or sellers....Or a mix of the two.... |
@douglas_schroder, "charles1dad, the performance spectrum is VERY large, and some audiophiles either are only vaguely aware of superb sound at the other end of the spectrum, or simply do not care and declare. It is a sideshow around here watching people argue preference. We see declarations in regard to vinyl/digital, genres of speakers, amp classes, etc." A good summation. I often think that the vast variety of options offered in High End audio is underappreciated. Each listener has their own unique hearing ability, ear-brain processing of what they hear and then add personal taste and objectives to the mix. With the incredibly large choices amongst speakers, amplification, source components and then cables to tie it all together the possible end result audio system is as individual as one could imagine. I believe that this is a fantastic opportunity to exploit. It genuinely does not matter what someone else thinks of another’s choice of components and audio system construction. It only matters what each individual music lover decides which is the best music reproduction and sound that suits them best and sounds most correct. High End audio is a tremendously rewarding endeavor if one recognises the outstanding opportunity for individualism waiting to be expressed. Depending on the listener in question, Benchmark can get you there, or 300b and all stops between. Charles |
Timbre perceptive experience cannot be reduced to a mathematical additive bunch of frequencies and harmonics only ... Acoustic of small room play a great role more than the new hype electronical gear.... Then if separating fidelity and musicality is not common or possible in the musical world.... In the artificial audio engineering world it is possible .... To equilibrate then these 2 perspective, the musical and the audio world, acoustic experiment is the golden way.... |
kijanki, lets look at what you said I said 😕 You don't like very detailed sound .. I don't think I said that, I said I don't like the result of combining components that major in detail. You don't like perfect imaging .. I did not say that either, just that pin-point imaging does not occur at a live event. You like coloring of the sound by overly warm 300B .. yes, guilty as charged but again not quite what I said. I think anybody present when we swapped amps would have not only preferred the valve amp but thoroughly enjoyed it. I played one of my favourite and best recorded albums which I recommend to all. It's Christina Pluhar's Los Impossibles where we could clearly hear the size of the recording venue, where the baritone voice was cleanly separate from the other voices in the choir. Another acid test is 10CC's I'm not in love. This is poorly recorded and what was heard that day was not a magical transformation but it was rendered in a way that brought back some strong nostalgia. I was able to listen and enjoy and this to me is all that matters. For a system to provide a sense of space fine detail is required. For a piano to sound like a piano the fundamental and all the harmonics need to be cleanly produced demanding detail. When harmonics are missing the ear/brain relationship has to work much harder leading to fatigue. Taken to the extreme, if we deliberately remove all harmonics we are left with just the fundamental frequency and if middle C was struck all that would be heard is a 261.6 Hz sine wave. We heard piano sound beautiful and I grew up with piano being played and though I don't play do know what a piano sounds like. For that piano sound we enjoyed that day I did not analyse, did not need to, it sounded glorious. The detail was there but just presented in a civilised manner. 😁 |
Musicality is linked to fidelity and fidelity to musicality...In music it is called "timbre perceptive experience"... Choosing make no sense for me... But there is a relative hierarchy between these 2 in the audio world not in music... Because no gear system is perfect i could prefer one which will be musical to another one who would be characterised with more fidelity... But it is possible with ACOUSTICAL science to improve optimally any system , musical one or more fidelity one.... Then even if there is no theoretical limit for the scale of high end quality product, these products must be EMBEDDED in an optimal acoustical environment to give the most of their potential... I am surprized like usual, (then at the end not so much surprized 😁😉 ) that in audio thread people vouch most of the times for their favorite branded name high end product ignoring the powerful role of acoustic to reach musicality +fidelity qualities in the same perceptive experience which is called "timbre perception".... Dont read reviewers of possible high end gear product first, buy first one acoustic book and listen and experiment....It cost me almost nothing.... And i have both musicality and fidelity....Not the best in the world among all system here.... But my system is one of the best for his ratio S.Q./price....my system cost is under 500 bucks... All that thanks to acoustical, mechanical and electrical embeddings controls... Dont spend money but think and experiment especially with acoustic.... |
Thanks, I think, @ douglas_schroeder :) LOL |
patrickdowns, Harley is correct; one can never have too much resolution/detail. If you suspect you have too much resolution, you have made an error in system establishment elsewhere, typically in the tonal balance. The most challenging thing about a short list is that it tends not to stay short. But, the absolute worst is when it is down to two! Solution? Buy both! Then, find out in comparison that you really want a blend of both components' characteristics. Now, that's fun! ;) charles1dad, the performance spectrum is VERY large, and some audiophiles either are only vaguely aware of superb sound at the other end of the spectrum, or simply do not care and declare. It is a sideshow around here watching people argue preference. We see declarations in regard to vinyl/digital, genres of speakers, amp classes, etc. |
So now douglas_schroder found the Benchmark amplifier to occupy the "clean/sterile" (White sounding?) end of the sonic spectrum.but in his review he says: The sound is indeed neutral and exact without being sterile or clinical. Colorless? Not really. The amp will send through the sound palette of the source component and disc/file without stripping any color away. Absolute Sound reviewer was condescending? Perhaps, but I feel the same way when people tell me, that odd harmonics are unnatural, that amount of details should be limited and imaging shouldn't be exact - just because neither is perfect in live performance. So, If venue has bad acoustics I should look for bad sounding dull CD to replicate it? In addition it was stated that high resolution is only good for classical music. Amount of detail is usually increased with pronounced high frequencies, that also reveal harshness/brightness caused by noise or distortion. Instead of fixing the problem many audiophiles cover it with "warm" sounding gear, producing even harmonics - a distortion that alters real sound of instruments. "Warmth" is considered a virtue by many who constantly praise it. Hard to argue with that - after all it is a matter of taste and what sounds right is OK, but it is not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for accurate uncolored reproduction of music and the ways to achieve it. It appears I will not find it here and this forum is not for me. |
"You’re perfect representation of what Absolute Sound review, I quoted, was talking about. You have great future on this forum" The Absolute Sound (TAS) reviewer was cited because he finds the Benchmark amplifier excellent for ’his’ taste as some posters here share that conclusion. He was exceedingly pejorative and condescending to those whose taste/listening priorities differ from his own. "Cults", "starry-eyed", really? What he finds to be audio perfection is someone else’s dry and uninvolving.What makes his opinion more credible? douglas_schroder found the Benchmark amplifier to occupy the "clean/sterile" (White sounding?) end of the sonic spectrum. But to him still a fine amplifier, understood. There are listeners who have even described it as cold/analytical/non-engaging. Benchmark advocates versus 300b advocates spans a broad chasm of preference for certain. Neither camp is wrong as it is dependent on how one hears and what they identify as sounding right. 300b "overly warm" how so? Compared to what? All 300b tubes or amplifiers sound the same? One could cite dozens of reviewers praising 300b attributes just as the TAS reviewer did for the Benchmark amplifier. Come on folks, we all like what we like. I am confident that we all can peacefully coexist😊. Charles |
Hi douglas_schroeder I read with great interest your dagogo review of the Legacy class D amp, and have added their 2-ch version to my short list under consideration. So I find it interesting that you mention here the Benchmark amp, which some reviews have called "nearly perfect" but which I wonder may be too clinical or neutral to a fault. That’s another amp I’ve been thinking of auditioning though. Then I read a review of the new Van Alstine monoblocks (by Dave McNair, a mastering engineer https://parttimeaudiophile.com/2021/07/09/audio-by-van-alstine-dva-m225-monoblock-amplifiers-review/) which made me short-list them. I’m all about fidelity AND musicality to the greatest extent I can achieve within budget and the limits of my speakers (Vandersteen 2CE Mk III, but maybe Treo CTs soon). It hard finding synergy between components at times (I’m trying to choose a DAC and preamp too), because as the saying goes, you should only solve for one variable in an equation at a time. There’s a question in here somewhere. Part of me wants to just pick an integrated all in one like a Mark Levinson or Aesthetix Mimas (with DAC card) and be done with it. The hunt for the Grail distracts me from just listening and enjoying, as my mind winds up to "How can I make this sound better?" Stop the merry-go-round, I want off. Or not! Thank god for the reviewers who stoke the upgrade fires! :) This by Lemonhaze rings true: Musicality is a rather vague and nebulous term but I think coined to differentiate between a system that is overly detailed and a system that has detail but does not slap you alongside the head. The fixation with detail has lead to systems that verge on the unlistenable when a few of these detail monsters are combined.I read a paper by Robert Harley that in essence said that one cannot have too much good detail, iirc. Of course, his current reference system iirc includes $300k Wilsons, and is probably more than $500k overall. It's safe to assume that in his custom built listening room, he has the whole ten course meal. I'm eating tacos from the drive-thru. |
Lemonhaze It is not about "My Benchmark" but rather about idea we are discussing. It could be any other amp of similar character. I hope you understand it. Let's summarize what you said: You don't like very detailed sound You don't like perfect imaging You like coloring of the sound by overly warm 300B You're perfect representation of what Absolute Sound review, I quoted, was talking about. You have great future on this forum. |
kijanki, this thread is not about you and your Benchmark. Musicality is a rather vague and nebulous term but I think coined to differentiate between a system that is overly detailed and a system that has detail but does not slap you alongside the head. The fixation with detail has lead to systems that verge on the unlistenable when a few of these detail monsters are combined. I have such a system that allows me to listen to maybe 20% of my files, the others are just screech. I am working to attain a system that truly entertains with the vast majority of my collection. So to address the OP's question, I err on the side of 'listenability'. The endless striving for detail, detail, detail leaves me cold. The type of detail some systems produce are not heard at a live performance unless you are one of the performers. Have you ever closed your eyes at an unamplified performance and tried to locate a certain instrument? I find I can hear where it is located but certainly not with clinical precision. I feel audiophiles themselves are partly responsible for this sorry state of affairs by elevating detail as a fundamental requirement. A friend of mine borrowed a Devialet amp claimed to be awesome. I'm sure the measurements revealed vanishingly low distortion etc. but the amp did not stay connected for very long. We inserted his 300B tube job and immediately relaxed with the music, enjoying the sound coming at us. It did not have the bass slam or control of the other amp but it sure did entertain us. My &%^$ detailed system is hardly used now except for movies which used to take a back-seat to the music evenings my wife and I once looked forward to. Sad but true. |
Musicality is a very vague term and in most cases it means nothing. Often it is just the ability to enjoy music. So. First of all, we need to realise that hi-fi does not play music, it just pushes and pulls air giving us an opportunity to reconstruct sound waves into music. Whether we can do it depends of what he've got between ears. That's why a Beethoven string quartet is beautiful music for some and just noise and cacophony for others. Second, "musicality" always goes hand in hand with fidelity. A musician carefully selects his instrument because he or she is looking for a certain tone, and fidelity is needed to reproduce it correctly. The interaction between musicians brings you the essence of the music and the good timing and truthful micro dynamics are needed to reproduce it. Etc etc... Excessive detail have nothing to do with fidelity, it is just what it is - subjectively excessive details, often caused by distorted reproduction of certain frequency range. Transparency though is vital for an emotional impact, or in other words musicality. So there is no contradiction between musicality and fidelity, quite the opposite. A more interesting dilemma is between fidelity and realism. Do we need high fidelity to create an illusion of realism? |
Here is conclusion from Absolute Sound review of AHB2, but it applies to subject discussed here: "Because accuracy allied to absolutely reliable performance is the goal of all the Benchmarks, they are not products that tend to attract cults or other sorts of starry-eyed enthusiasts, wholly lacking any of the quirks, foibles, idiosyncrasies, sonic flavorings, euphonic distortions, and so on that characterize the objects of most audio cults. Professionals buy Benchmark because they know the products work and are reliable and accurate—indeed, reference caliber. Music lovers buy them because they are neutral and accurate and thus reproduce the tonal character of voices and instruments correctly (and also, I presume, because they are reasonably priced, most musicians, like most other people, being typically not wealthy). But audiophiles? Well, the longer I’m in this racket, the less I sometimes think I understand what audiophiles really want except that a lot of dallying about with components, equipment swapping, and coloration matching seems to be what amuses them. I’m not sure I can in good conscience recommend this amplifier to them as I am not sure they are in search of what it offers: a precision instrument designed to perform the precisely defined task of reproducing music and sound accurately, which it does essentially to perfection. But to anyone else, the AHB2 gets as high, enthusiastic, and confident a thumbs up as my arm is capable of reaching." |
Be as critical as you care to be about the “sounds” of your reproduction system. If you are continually tweaking and searching for more/different products, you are failing, and possibly even miserable. If your system doesn’t make cohesive, convincing music that tricks you into focusing on the performance by becoming emotionally involved, you and “it” have failed imho. I believe you have missed the point. Gear is cool, building a kit is fun, challenging, and possibly even truly rewarding. Though for me, it is a necessary evil to get to what I have a true love for, and that’s the performance, the music. Don’t even go there with the crap that I have settled, or that I am trying to convince myself that it’s okay to not be constantly searching and spending and tweaking. We could mince words all day, let’s happily listen together instead. |
Musicality and fidelity should be the same in the area of high end audio. But there is a lot of equipment that pretends otherwise. This is the case of the 300B tube amplifier. it is the tube that has its own color so it is impossible to reproduce the steinway piano as steinway or Bosendolfer as Bosendolfer should sound in your system. |
The Benchmark is a fine amp, and it hovers nearer the clean/sterile sound, some would say "white" sound as opposed to colored. It will not bring gobs of warmth as some prefer. This is all on a spectrum of characteristics, so opinions will vary, and that makes such discussion difficult. Now, class D amps such as the Legacy Audio i.V4 Ultra have more warmth than the Benchmark and more resolution. See my reviews of these products at Dagogo.com. It's not the speakers. It's easy to characterize an amp when you use it in, say, 8-10 systems with five or six speaker genres, but if you only use it in one or two you have less understanding of the amp's character. However, different genres of speakers will influence how strong the character of the amp is expressed. Anyone who uses it in one rig and claims they know the sound only has a general idea regarding its character. |
"I took the AHB2 along with me for a weekend at our country place, in Connecticut, to see if it would be as successful with my more modest system there. That’s where I discovered that my new hero amp wasn’t quite perfect. Oh, its power and resolution were still not to be faulted, but through a pair of Monitor Audio Silver 8 speakers, the sound was somewhat hard and thin. Could it have had something to do with the Silver 8s themselves? .... Familiar recordings of women’s voices, such as Marianne Beate Kielland singing Finzi’s "Come Away, Death" .. and Sara K.’s cover of "Can’t Stand the Rain" from her Hell or High Water.., sounded strange. Both voices were higher, not in pitch but in tonal range, as if they’d been transformed from mezzo-sopranos (which Kielland is) to sopranos. Again, I would describe it as a loss of warmth and resonance in the fundamentals of their voices. Unfortunately for the AHB2, this loss pervaded the sound of whatever recording I played. I wrote it off as an example of an amp-speaker mismatch." - Kalman Rubinson Yep, probably the speakers, despite John Atkinson's assurance that they should be fine. Again, I’m glad that’s all clear as mud. |
Peter says in response to Karsten - "I really wish that I shared this experience. Do you think my AHB2 may be a duff specimen? Surely not - these are mass produced and should all sound identical. If you’ve read my original posting "REVIEW - Benchmark AHB2 with Avantgarde" you’ll see that my experience is hugely different from yours. I’m inclined to turn down the volume or move on to the next track and am certainly not on the edge of my seat - and I’m not a tube enthusiast! Why are we hearing things so differently? Either my AHB2 is a duff, or my tube amps are much better than any you’ve had in your system..." Yes, it does make me wonder, too, especially when this is Karsten’s response (in part, its very long and jazz hands clapping) to Peter - ’..Listen to a string quartet on most tube amplifiers and it will sound big, blooming and embellished, or listen to it on most solid state amps and it will sound opaque and "twisted".’ Well, I'm glad we cleared that up. |
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It moves or it doesn’t? We’re trying to find out why it is moving or not otherwise what is the sense in participating here. Many people believe that warm sounding gear "moves" them, while natural clean sounding gear sounds analytic, sterile etc. Read AHB2 opinion I found long time ago: "In my 25 years of of experience with mostly tube amplifiers of all sorts, I have never come across a more emotionally involving amplifier than the AHB2. It is exactly because it doesn’t "interpret" the music by adding coloration or any artificial sense of ambience or reverberation that it is so fascinating to listen to. The AHB2’s ability to reproduce the timbre and texture of acoustic instruments is beyond anything I have experienced before - just listen to brass or woodwind! - and the precision with which it reveals the actual acoustic properties of the recording venue, whether it be a small café or a concert hall, is second to none. At least to my ears. I think what captured my attention from the very first instant was how honest and genuine the sound is. If it is in the recording, it is there, otherwise not. This amplifier keeps me on the edge of my seat in excitement and anticipation even with recordings that I have known for years and not thought very highly of, so in my view it is the very antithesis of boring. I don’t remember having ever been so moved by reproduced music as with this Benchmark combo. FYI, I almost exclusively listen to classical music and much of it in hi-rez, but I have to say that well-recorded CDs are also much more enjoyable and listenable now than before. Karsten" |
No, you actually prefer an amp that adds distortion, and your benchmark reduces clarity. This is not true. Our hearing evolved over millennia to interpret the fundamental frequency and even ordered harmonics as natural and clear sound. There is no natural sound in nature that is not accompanied by even ordered harmonics.Not true as well. Piano does not have harmonics at all. It has overtones that are at different frequencies than harmonics. Clarinet has only odd order harmonics (acting like close tube resonator). Pure sine wave doesn't have any harmonics, etc. It is obvious that unique sound of (odd harmonics only) Clarinet will be altered when system adds even harmonics. The 0.00011% THD is achieved by dialing in large amounts of NFB. NFB results in odd ordered harmonics Not true. It results in odd harmonics (TIM distortions) only if NFB is recursive. AHB2 uses non-recursive feedback. Signal fed back does not come to the input section of the amplifier, but to completely different error amplifier, that runs in parallel. Even in minute amounts, odd ordered harmonics sound unnatural, sterile and not musical. Odd ordered harmonics do not occur naturally. This is wrong. Where you learning this ??? Almost all instruments (with few exceptions), produce series of even and odd harmonics. Odd harmonics do not occur naturally ??? What about Clarinet that has only odd harmonics? |
The Benchmark AHB2 has pushed distortion and noise so low it is inaudible to humans. Kijanki is correct you might not like it but the AHB2 is as close to a straight wire with gain as we've gotten. All this blabbing about harmonics is nonsense with this amplifier they are inaudible , even and odd. High Fidelity means something. It isn't whatever you happen to prefer. Ideally, high-fidelity equipment has inaudible noise and distortion, and a flat (neutral, uncolored) frequency response within the human hearing range. |
I prefer amplifier that does not add any distortion. My Benchmark AHB2 has THD=0.00011% (-119dB, inaudible). Any distortion is coloring sound (reducing clarity). No, you actually prefer an amp that adds distortion, and your benchmark reduces clarity. Our hearing evolved over millennia to interpret the fundamental frequency and even ordered harmonics as natural and clear sound. There is no natural sound in nature that is not accompanied by even ordered harmonics. The 0.00011% THD is achieved by dialing in large amounts of NFB. NFB results in odd ordered harmonics. Even in minute amounts, odd ordered harmonics sound unnatural, sterile and not musical. Odd ordered harmonics do not occur naturally. You make the mistake in thinking 5% 2nd order harmonics is more disruptive than 0.00011 5th order harmonics. That’s true for an oscilloscope, it’s not true for human hearing. |
@kijanki: "One might prefer to look at the paintings thru yellow glasses. There is nothing wrong with it, but he doesn't see what artist painted". Yes... BUT we are not robots with identical identical sound perception software installed! We each hear sound differently and our brains interpret it differently. And there's a further difference. Whereas, perception of visual art is a direct process-- from canvas to eye to brain, in audio, the process has more intermediate steps (recording/mixing and conveyance of the music to our ears via circuits and speakers). Is it not true that these added steps color/distort the accuracy of the original "painting ? You can have the more accurate system in the world and you are still hearing what pleased the ears of the engineer/producer in the studio-- your experience is ultimately subject to the coloring/distortion associated with their taste and this is associated with their preferences in mics, monitors, etc. Perhaps I'm missing something but I don't see how looking at a painting and listening to a recording are analogous. It seems to me that for the analogy to hold up, we'd have to compare viewing a painting in a gallery to hearing music in a concert hall. |
Colours would be visible fundamental wavelengths/frequencies. Not harmonics of the fundamental.We’re not talking about harmonics in the recorded music, but harmonics added where they did not exist at all. Adding harmonics to piano, that are different than piano overtones, is distorting piano sound (creating beats). You might like it, but it is distorted sound with reduced clarity. Trying to cover bright metal dome tweeter with warm sounding gear is adding further reduction in clarity. Now, we have both odd and even harmonics added, when replacing tweeter (or speakers) seems to be the better choice, at least to me. |