nb Farlowe era Exposure.
I believe I experienced great PRAT for the first time
Pace, Rhythm and Timing - I've often heard about it, mainly in the context of certain turntables, but I don't think I've really experienced it in a highly satisfactory way until today when I mounted my new Soundsmith Hyperion, an upgrade from my Sussorro. Halfway through side two of Stevie Wonder's Original Musiquarium, it suddenly dawned on me that there was more going on than improvements in clarity, detail, neutrality, bass punch and other rather specific traits that I've until this point used to refer to what I'm hearing. For the first time in the 30 years I've had this album, I was struck by a sense of flow, ease, relaxation, and my feet were tapping! Yes, this must be it. I connected with the music at a higher level just now, something new to me. Get all the details correct, and the PRAT appears in front of you. So, this was nothing to do with the fact that my turntable runs at the correct speed with low W/F, as it was performing well at that before. I had assumed that's what PRAT meant. Perhaps it means that too, in a speed stability sense.
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I have found sprakers can be a great killer of PRAT.
Me too. I don’t think it’s too bad today but back in the 1990s and 2000s there seemed to be a lot of loudspeakers that would seem to suck out the life of music, unless perhaps they were turned up very loud. Some of them seemed to blur the timing by leaving the bass lagging behind and squash some of the dynamics so that the music always felt ’sat on’. This lead to some trying out various tweaks in order to correct things. I remember British reviewer Jimmy Hughes, the god of tweaks this side of the pond, advocating the extreme measure of removing some or all of the internal loudspeaker wadding in order to liven things up again. Of course that could lead to an increase in cabinet resonances but as they say, ’you pays your money and takes your choice’. |
@cd318 you must be nearly as ancient as me, as can I can well remember Jimmy’s penchant for ripping out the lining of speaker enclosures when writing for Hi Fi Answers - got right up the nose of a couple of manufacturers too if I recall correctly.. |
I think it was Hi-Fi Answers, mid 80s I think. Somehow, I got sucked into the Linn/Naim cult after HFA ceased publication and I picked up Hi-Fi Review edited by Chris Frankland. Bad if still an interesting move. Maybe I'm getting old too but today's audio mags do all seem rather homogenised in comparison to those good ol' 'Wild West' days of the 1980s.
I can imagine manufacturers not being too happy after all their work (and additional expenses) in damping enclosures only to see Jimmy recommending the reverse. I must have been naive back then for following much of his advice regarding twin and earth/solid core cables, LEDs etc. Whether removing (some of) the damping from various speakers worked or not would depend upon your preferences. I would be lying if I said I never preferred the sound with at least some of the wadding removed.
Perhaps there was something in Jimmy's idea all along as can be seen by the approach of experienced designers such as Russell Kauffman (of Russell K loudspeakers) who don't use any wadding/damping material in their current designs. Instead they seek to work with resonances instead of against them. A brilliant idea, if it can be pulled off, and from what little I've heard, Russell may well have done exactly that. |
"Perhaps there was something in Jimmy's idea all along as can be seen by the approach of experienced designers such as Russell Kauffman (of Russell K loudspeakers) who don't use any wadding/damping material in their current designs. Instead they seek to work with resonances instead of against them." Can you see the logical fallacy in that statement? Damping materials also seek to work with resonance. There is no getting away from resonance, so any and everything you do to a cabinet can either broaden a resonant peak or attempt to reduce the peak resonance in magnitude or you name it. But resonance is there, regardless of how you treat it, so not treating it is just another choice off the "treatment" menu. |
ah yes, the good old days of Chris and the flat earth society. In conjunction with the Linn/Naim marketing steamroller they did a pretty good job of brainwashing the British audio mindset for well over a decade, and managed to have the dealers who blinked at their demands fall into liquidation in quick succession. I think a lot of us finally lost Jimmy when both he and Ed Paul Benson fell in with Peter Belt and went straight down the rabbithole - last I heard he was clamping strange devices to his water pipes. |
@lewm I must say the trend is more toward using spectral decay plots and FFT analysis to influence cabinetry design and material choice such that what resonances do occur are pushed outside the band where the ear is most sensitive and are sufficiently low in magnitude that no ad-hoc post construction damping treatment is required. Which is what I think @cd318 was alluding to. |
ah yes, the good old days of Chris and the flat earth society. In conjunction with the Linn/Naim marketing steamroller they did a pretty good job of brainwashing the British audio mindset for well over a decade, and managed to have the dealers who blinked at their demands fall into liquidation in quick succession. I think a lot of us finally lost Jimmy when both he and Ed Paul Benson fell in with Peter Belt and went straight down the rabbithole - last I heard he was clamping strange devices to his water pipes.
A good summing up. Yes, the emergence of Peter Belt was a step too far for me too.
Good explanation too about shuffling resonances out of where they do most harm. Perhaps I should have explained in greater detail. After all I was there in person when Russell himself not only explained his approach but demonstrated it at the UK Hi-Fi Show a few months ago. That's also the goal of Harbeth if I remember correctly.
Although they both use a lot of science in their designs, they take a different approach to get there. Harbeth favour lossy cabinets to Russell K's listening by ear. Perhaps ultimately it's just a question of where you want to put the emphasis. |
"In any case shouldn't PRAT be more a function of the loudspeakers than any other component?" No, in my opinion, although other than the turntable itself, I could imagine that loudspeakers would come in second as a determinant of PRaT. (I've always hated that term, and I don't know why I am even getting into it now.) To repeat myself, the turntable is first and foremost the device that preserves rhythm and timing of the music, by its capacity or lack of capacity to maintain a constant speed despite factors that tend to cause speed errors, like stylus drag, belt creep, etc. I am not talking about absolutely perfect 33.333 rpm; small deviations are probably inaudible, but what is audible is the speed drifting up and down, which would be perceived as aberrant timing and loss of PRaT (god help us). I have more or less mentioned this previously but perhaps it didn't make a dent. |
PRAT is easily killed…. It is one of the most difficult attributes to get and keep through the signal path. My experience points to it being most easily destroyed in the electronics. My current system is outstanding at PRAT as well as detail… Thinking back PRAT has always been most closely associated with great tube equipment I have heard over the last fifty years. As I assembled my most recent system (all Audio Research:I have had ARC phono stage and preamp for a couple decades) when I inserted an ARC amp it jumped big time, then I inserted a ARC DAC… jumped again.
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Before I could put my finger an what PRAT was (by decades) I noticed some systems inspired me to tap my foot… some didn’t…. others drew me into the detail and made me listen for minute detail. Over a long period of time I realized foot tapping systems kept me enthralled for hours while listening to the venue and hearing details only kept my attention for a much shorted time. When I was working, if I got to sit down and listen to whole album I was lucky. So highlighted details were fascinating. But I never craved long sessions. When I finally started concentrating on musical accuracy (emphasis on musicality) the PRAT improved each move I made. Now my system is so enjoyable (details there, just not in the spotlights), I listen for several hours a day and still have to drag myself away. Way more enjoyable and involving… wished i’d figured this out decades earlier. But the journey was great fun… it has always been really a rewarding and learning experience. |
PRAT is like the old definition of pornography, I know it when I see (hear) it. I agree with many of the comments that you can kill it in the audio chain, but for me, if the source doesn't have it you won't pick it up down the chain. I slipped a Linn Ikemi into my system for a couple of weeks many years ago and the PRAT factor jumped at you--it was THAT noticeable. Same with TTs. I'm glad you got the VPI working for you, I never could and that's a big reason why mine is gone (mine was only a Classic One which replaced a Scoutmaster). I now have a Pure Fidelity Harmony with a PF-309 arm and (in my system) the PRAT and just pure engagement of that table just jumps out at you. |