You are right about the 12Khz:( missing in action (more or less)and yet "live" and recordings remain distinctly their own sonically.
P.S. I used TDK, when I wasn't on the Thorens..... |
don't forget revisions A,B,C.... of the Signaturre Reference Ultimate MK2.17 |
I agree 95% with:
11-23-10: Lrsky
Assigning an actual percentage would be an exercise in intellectual futility and meaningless as nobody would agree...it's enough to say that I've not heard reproduced sound, sound anything like the real thing, EVER.
The 5% difference is I would say reproduced sound does sound something like the real thing, yet it is recognizable as recorded, and always distinguishable from the real thing. The difference in % terms? No idea how one would assess that meaningfully, but I always know it is Memorex. |
Good point Onhwy61, or distinction. I often prefer listening to my home system to live while recongnizing there are aspects of live performance that are simply not present in a recording and I think the issue of compression mentioned by Shadorne is a very significant part of the difference between recorded and live music.
In my experience the difference between system and real thing does not speak to what might be more enjoyable in the listening - being different doesn't speak to what might be prefered, at least not necessarily. For example, live music rarely has the soundstaging and imaging of my system, and illusion and distortion I quite enjoy even if mostly an artifact of the recording process and better, more resolving equipment. |
You may be right, but to me it seems like more than just a matter of opinion in that sense that I find it hard to believe that anyone one accustomed to unamplified, acosutic music would ever be fooled by a stereo system into thinking it is real instruments in a real acoustic venue. As much as I would love to believe that my system, and other far more expensive systems I have heard, sound real, it just doesn't, though I do place a slight value on that difference. Has a recorded saxaphone, trumpet, or drum set ever sounded real to you, where you could not tell the difference (assuming you have heard the real thing)? Really? I want your system. I do agree that one person's 5% is another's 95%, but either way, somehow it is obviously never 100%, nor can it ever be IMHO. This just seems like a clearer divide to me than the tube/ss debates. |
If OP's friend is right, then it just might be that 5% sound pretty darn good, but I suspect "5%" is just hyperbole. |
"BK: Yes. I've heard great recordings that stun me. But every time I go to hear the group live in front of me with no amplification, I think that we are so far away from the live experience that we will never have that experience."
The truth of that use to make me frown, till I accepted that recorded music must be appreciated it on its own terms and its inherent limitations - yet totally satisfying and magical for what it is. I think Katz is 100% right about recorded music versus live, unamplified (critical)music. The gap is obvious and permanent, but no reason not to love and enjoy our home systems. |
Most performing musicians seem to spend as much time and money on home stereo as your friend, they tend not to be audiophiles - hmmmm. |
"Isn't it amazing though; just how much a great system can fool you into thinking it can reproduce the sound of a piano, until you actually have one in the room? Then, you're right, not even close." Precisely -- on all counts. What %, who knows, the thing is you know it's not a baby grand in your room (or horn, or drums, or voice....), if you could compare them in the same space. Close? Not close? I don't know, but almost always a discernable difference that you could pick "real" almost 100% of time, unlike figuring out if it is a tube or SS amp you are listening to. |
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I would think high efficency speakers with powerful amps would make distortion and noise worse -- no? |
Speaking of dynamics, can someone clarify micro (resolution an speed?) versus macro (grunt and drive?) dynamics? I was also thinking about the issue of high power amps, for some reason, lower power amps usually sound better to me, a pair of tubes per side amp seems to sound better to me than 4 tube per side versions of the same basic circuit, though the wattage is lower, must be some attribute having noting to do with SPLs. |
Frank, do you think lower power versions of the same basic amp circuits tend to have inherently less distortion than more power? I don't have super sensitive speakers (89db), listen acoustic jazz (trio to octets) 90% of the time, and I suppose I just don't listen to music that loud (I don't think)and there just seems to be something to the notion of using the lowest power amp that is sufficient to drive your speakers will sound better, not louder, than a higher powered version of the same basic amp (think Pass XA60 versus XA100)- and they key being "sufficient" power has to factor in speakers, room, and average volume levels. It is why I asked about the high power amp / high efficiency paradigm mentioned - it might very well do the macrodynamic thing well, but I somehow something would be lost going that route, at least to the way I listen to music - I suppose the fact that I have a smallish two-way (Merlin VSMs) and don't listen to alot of orchestral music on large multi-driver speakers also has alot to do with it. I find my 60 watt Atma-spehre M60s to play as loud as I could ever want, with huge space and purity, and microdynamics as described, and somehow feel a 1000 watt amps might destroy all that. That approach might be closer to the real thing in some ways, but not in others. |
Do Ayre and Pass use zero feedback desings in their amps? I only know they sound really good. |
Wow, that JBL Marantz Mac setup is something else! |
Yup, not even 1000 Class A watts with zero NF is going to do that - "close" in so many ways, but it never really sounds like the real thing - even if the "gap" is small, it is unpassable for whatever reasons from recordings thru source thru electronics thru speakers to the way we hear. Which does not mean our equipment and recordings are not tremendously enjoyable in spite of that, or worth persuing with a spirit of fun. |
