Zaikesman,
I'm not quite sure what your post means,
Are you saying Analog LP's outperform 24 bit digital systems?
Anyway, I'm not sure its important.
If you want a cool experience that won't be a waste of your time. You should come to Baltimore and listen to the system I have posted. Bring some CD's, I'll show you something you haven't heard before, I promise! |
The better digital gets, the more two channel becomes a problem. If you are not using Prologic II or trifield to listen too two channel CD's you are not getting the best digital has to offer.
I know this will be disagreed with but digital makes 2 channels obsolete. Most of the "problems" with digital, forward highs, overly crisp and thin sound, metallic timbres are not inherent in digital per se. They are result of the greater resolution and signal to noise ratio resulting in completely different requirements for playback from analog LP's. Digital is several magnitudes better than analog in frequencies over 4khz. Much more accurate and phase correct, and when you crush all that ambiant information back into the front sound field the soundstage flattens out, timbre's change, spectral balance is tipped to the highs and the sound can become fatigueing.
You can call what I say ubsurd, but I have owned excellent analog systems for decades, equipment EAR, VPI, Roksan, Sota, SME, Counterpoint, Audible Illusions etc. What is ubsurd is banging your head against the two channel wall as the CD players with higher resolution and proven linear performance gains continue to sound worse, and less "musical" with more information coming off the disc?
That doesn't make sense, does it?
Is digital technology going backwards? hardly. In the proside its moving ahead in leaps and bounds. Maybe its advances are exposing what's backwards in our systems? Should make you wonder why more and more speakers are showing up with tweeters and midranges that spray sound all around the room, diffusing the soundfield. Think about before you spasm into an autopilot response please...
And if your answer is your experience with surround is that it sucks, well I don't doubt your experience was bad. But it doesn't suck, dealers and even manufacturers don't know how to setup their own equipment. This is a problem blocking many many people from realizing a great opportunity for music enjoyment.
One favor please when you consider what I wrote, assume I know how to setup a turntable, a two channel system also. I know that there's always this leap that the 2 channel system is some mystical animal, but its setup is very basic and easy for me. I've never had any trouble doing it.
I know most will assume I just got a denon, def tech system I want to rave about, but this is far from the case. So loan me some credibility for a moment if you would.
thank you |
Tvad,
Although I don't think we are coming from the same point of view, and records are dead in my mind and simply hanging on to them as a valid current source of music is beating a dead horse no matter how good it was. They are not coming back. But they were the perfect two channel source, their technical defects became strengths with a two channel system. A perfect marriage.
Digitals strengths are made weakness's within the two channel system.
But digital is like putting a aggressive racing suspension on your daily driver. Simply cannot be dealt with in a casual fashion. Audiophiles have been forced to be consumers of high end audio, and are subject to market forces like marketing and show me magazines with revenue building reviews. Where can you get the truth? Not here.
The percieved inferiority of digital has little to do with a bad format, although Redbook CD's should be long gone by now. And please note Any format from Sony should be rejected out of habit anymore by the public. When will we learn?
A 24/96 format is so vastly superior to ANY LP system it simply cannot be dealt with the alchemist trial and error methods of audiophile past. LP's leave a great deal of "play" in the system and it is very forgiving format like a regular street suspension. Digital is 1 and 0's and that means either you have it right or you have it wrong. That's why it is so polarizing. And yes if you're wondering I am implying that people still have very little clue how to build a digital system.
Just like NASCAR, being a good driver (audiophile, music lover) and rolling your car off the pickup for the weekend isn't good enough anymore. The precision of todays system requires more expertise not less. Just like having a racing setup suspension. If you don't anticipate conditions all the time you are more likely to wreck that car than a car with a standard suspension.
Just as the internet has swept in to knock the foundation out from under brick and mortar retail, audiophiles need technical help and REAL information more than ever. As improving your already very good systems can not be done seat of the pants trial and error anymore.
We've got a lot of baby boomers that cannot move on (old new trick) and let me tell you as a gen xer' this vast majority within the audiophile community has slammed the brakes on how we view home systems. Their 10 to 1 voices often overshadow advancements because they are content because unlike 20 something's today the music of their youth was actually released on LP's! No such luck for todays young people.
I see it all the time, I realize most brick & mortars are not setup to give the help audiophiles need (owned by baby-boomers too). But so many regrets with huge audio purchases. Why? Lack of knowledge at the retail level and amongst the internet help and advice. We have a 25 year old technology we assumed would be compatible with how we have done things in the past. I think there is long history of evidence this is not the case.
"is simply too damn good for the associated gear",
It's not too good for your gear, its too good for only having two channels of that gear. If you only have two channels you can't own a SOTA digital system IME & IMO.
I can beat any two channel digital system with a surround system day in and day out. Everything the tube/planar/analog diehard wants can be found playing Cd's back in surround.
Think about it, it's like having an awesome set of TV repair tools (LP system) but you need to fix your car (CD).
Like it or not digital is not going away so we better start addressing it and figuring the setup out, instead of avoiding it and playing aging and decaying records. |
Response to Mr. Tennis; (this is part of that promised email)
MRT"if one accepts the premise that live unamplified music is a valid reference, the experience of listening to live music is binaural."
"This is the classic and somewhat shortsited vision of how a human hears and more importantly how the microphones are setup. The recording happens in a space, that space unless anechoic will reflect and reinforce sound creating a tone, that tone is captured onto the recording. This is inescapable, that somewhat unimportant information is not as damaging to analog sound because it simply doesn't have the S/N ratio and the linear performance, so that medium masks effectively this information. The CD does not mask this information and two channel simply crushes that noise, ambiance and room tone back on top of the soundstage. Think of live recordings where all the people are clapping in a compressed area in front of you. That is not correct, that is simply the standard. Surround expands and sorts this off subject sound and places it properly in a soundfield.
MRT "I don't remember hearing the sound of a piano behind my head when attending a piano recital, in a large hall."
Then you weren't listening, the Piano likely filled the room with sound as if it was poured into the room, Think about it, room likely pulsed with the Piano's output, not that your hearing the primary key strike from behind but you were emmersed in sound....surround sound. Binaural gives us surround sound hearing not two channel hearing.
Think about it.
MRT "also, what does the representation of timbral accuracy have to do with the number of channels."
If there is audible "garbage" (artificial reverb, room tone and information, crowd noise) on the recording like I hear with CD (please note the garbage is not digititis, its simply unavoidable non subject noise collected by the microphones) this when crushed back onto the subject of recording can shift the entire spectral balance of the recording.
MRT "it is possible to create realistic timbre with one quad esl."
Not with a stereo digital recording it is not, one speaker will suffer the same fate as two, even three. You're not addressing the problem and simply creating a "flaw" that does not exist and accepting it as a medium problem, when infact I assert our playabck systems are what's incorrect. This is the point I make, digital is misunderstood.
MRT "now, back to the issue of digital. a good source is a good source, whether it is analog or digital."
So how do determine a good source? what objective repeatable solution do you have so we can all buy good sources? See this is the blindeness that has affected audio and has everyone chassing around with no direction. There is no good digital source for two channels, the better it gets the more the sound moves away from satisfying. We can't keep guessing, too many products, too expensive. We should know, but we don't.
MRT. "close your eyes and decide whether a recording of a piano, e.g., sounds like a real piano, to what ever degree."
The old days were good days when you there was only a few products that could do this. Now many many systems can do this pretty well, you can't run what you've brung anymore. Because room acoustics and component interaction all now matter a great deal. Because we all have great systems by 1980 standards, but its 2007, and to be great takes more than some demo at a store. That information has to translate to the home system.
MRT. "the source is much more important than the stereo equipment."
Which without getting into great detail is why I like surround, because the surround processor is the source where the DtoA happens. Giving me a great deal of control of the final sound. To me speakers are the gate keeper then the source.
MRT. "there are many decent examples of vintage (pre 1990) digital gear and some examples of decent current digital gear."
People don't want to spend $50K on decent
Actually right now except for audiophile brands that edit the sound there are many excellent digital products. People playing records are using a 2nd rate source in a proper setup. There's no argument except we "enjoy" the LP's more for LP's to be considered competition with CD. We need to find the system that allows us to enjoy digital more.
MRT. "The problem with today's high resolution components, is that they expose the flaws of recordings to a greater degree than some of the older components with less resolution."
Yes, but what if we could fix the "flaws" and remove them and turn them into positives? The pro's use awesome equipment too, and if we could minimize the "flaws" why shouldn't we? What if you were to discover that the things creating the perceived "flaws" in your two channel system become coherent waves of ambiant information and instead of hearing the piano in a glary two channel unidirectional presentation you get information that puts the Piano in the room, but not your room, the room it was recrded in. The added weight the surround information (no longer a "flaw")moves the bar for what sounds real and natural!
so pick your poison--euphonic coloration to cover up the sins of many digital recordings, or todays high resolution, less colored digital devices which are more accurate as to revealing what's on a recording.
See that's my focus, it doesn't have to be a "poison". It can be a step forward. |
Quadraphonic on 4 track tape like all types of recordings had good, and bad. I've heard some very good Quadraphonic recordings. The limitation of Quad was more at the end user/retail interface and the LP. Which has proven to be a weak surround source.
There is a reason companies invested heavily in Quad sound, there are intrinsic advantages to surround sound and how human respond to it. That research was done in the the 40's 50's.
So I would imagine that the very best Quad recordings would be satisfactory versus todays digital surround like PLII and Trifield. Computing power is beyond the imagination of people just 20 years ago let alone 40.
And this is the key to making surround a viable argument. The technology for it has matured and is available inexpensively. Digital can be edited and manipulated with very little tainting to the original information.
The key to digital is to jump in and embrace all its benefits. EQ, compression, room correction etc. Unlike analog, digital can be manipulated very effectively, because its ones and zeroes. A weakness that becomes a strength.
Now please note that digital can still be improved but the potential is being utilized and improvements are being made as computing power increases and that power becomes cheaper. |
Hey Snipes,
A quik answer, YES!!! My very budget surround system linked in my audiogon info, has "blown away" 2 channel systems that cost more. I put blown away in quotes because that is the same quote used by four different people after hearing the system listed recently. And trust me they were in the same state of disbelief you're feeling now when they said it. I don't expect you to believe me anyway...just come on by and hear for yourself anytime.
Now what I find amusing is this is a very entry level system with a very nice receiver and some speakers I build myself. What do you think a Meridian 861 and ATC's would sound like compared to two channel systems? I know what J Gordon thinks.
And YES, that "blown away" comment was addressing the systems ability to playback redbook 2 channel cd's in a limited PLII format as you would expect to hear them from a two channels system. All voices and instruments in a wide deep front soundstage, but with a naturalness you might just begin to find in the Meitner products with two channels. But maybe not.
D1 is a good choice, anything Meridian makes is the best for music, they give you so much control I can mimic other two channel and multi channel systems. But not any processor will do. Believe it or not, not all surround processors are competent. Some leave out critical adjustments that cripple the ability of the processor to do music well. Setup flexibility and EQ is very critical.
|
No, snipes, I just assumed you hadn't heard it that is all.
And my writing meant to imply that you're welcome to come see/ hear anytime and ask more questions. It was to be a friendly invitation, not a desuasion or persuasion.
Just bad writing :(
Ask away,
Referring to the system you can link too.
My setup is very linear +/- 1.5dB 200-20khz, all 6 speaker are exactly the same, 2 subs with eq, +/- 3db 20hz to 200hz all satellites are setup at the same height except the center, this is for demo purposes only. As people new to the surround format always say they can here the sound directly out of the center channel, even when I'm (tricking them) only playing two channels. :)
You want this kind of flat accurate speaker for surround, because the surround algorithms do diffuse the sense of detail slightly and having a speaker that might be "bright" or "too exact" for normal listening will be great for surround.
The best music format for our purposes is Trifield, Dolby Prologic II is a godsend for many manufacturers giving them access to a very coloration free surround mode.
The rest are to colored to be options.
note on my center channel;
By lowering the speaker a few inches it fully seperates the center sound from the center channel as the voices image above the speaker, disconnecting two strong visual cues. Normally all speakers at the same height.
Cambridge Audio Receiver is very good, the introduction of two ex-TAG McLaren engineers is paying big dividends. When it comes to buying the right equipment for surround, there is a great deal of info to consider. So to keep my posts from being outrageously long, email me because when you say the wrong thing about the right product the noise online gets to be problematic and distracting.
I leave you with one last thought.
A Home Theater will not necessarily make a great music surround system
But a music surround system makes for a great Home Theater. |
Hey Snipes,
Sorry for the lag time, let me answer your questions first;
"What genre of music do you primarily listen to?" It easier to describe what I don't listen too, I don't listen to Brubeck, Davis, DeMeola (GRP) type jazz, Very little country, No gangsta rap, and bagpipes.
But everything else is fair game,
"I believe you said you were in the north east someplace"
Baltimore/ Reading PA
"I'm very surprised more people haven't jumped in on the thread."
Everything I've written in this thread I have been writing on various boards for the last 7-8 years, I am not surprised.
Normally this would have turned into a pissing contest by now.
Most people have so little quality experience with surround it is dismissed not something to fight about.
"The ATC's look interesting as well, I bet the really do Rock and HT well."
The ATC's do everything well, large classical being where they can really seperate themselves with that midrange from most audiophile speakers. But there are few speakers that I can think of that can play Megadeth to Norah Jones with the same veracity and quality of two very different types of "rock/pop" music.
DAVE,
no special discs required, just setup your surround as it is now. I'm looking for someone with a system that I can help over the phone get their system correct. (snipes same for you) No takers yet. What center channel do you have? |
