Do equipment stands have an impact on electronics?

Do some of your own research @agear

Nelson Pass on amp design and harmonics
https://passlabs.com/press/audio-distortion-and-feedback

That would not qualify as research....

Ralph, I read your posts several times. You didn’t describe a test you’re willing to take. Rather, you wasted several paragraph explaining why it’s impossible to devise such a test: Your cassette deck needs new rollers, a special platform must be constructed, and - most incredible of all - you can’t demonstrate digital aliasing on a digital system. :->) What a waste of both your time and mine this has been.

Actually I did. I said (again) that it would have to be on a system that lacked the artifacts under test. So to test aliasing, it would be on a system that is immune to such (an analog system). To test for higher ordered harmonics, on a system that lacks said (likely tubes). The test would be the same track, one ’with’ then the same ’without’.

I can easily make a recording of the 'with' and 'without problem of aliasing.

Your belief that distortion is different from "artifacts" and so can be heard at infinitesimally small levels is preposterous. I challenge you to prove it. Hint: you can’t because it’s not true. And your other belief, that distortion "brightness" is different from frequency response brightness, is equally preposterous. If you change the spectrum, how and why it changed is irrelevant. If you add 10 percent 3rd harmonic distortion to a 1 KHz triangle wave, that’s exactly the same as boosting an EQ by about 1 dB at 3 KHz.

Proof: analog and tubes are still very much alive, decades on after being declared ’obsolete’ (the market knows what’s up even if you don’t). But that’s not all: tubes/transistors debate (and the complaint against transistors is ***brightness***, when clearly there is no FR error, as I have explained....); the analog digital debate (again: brightness is the coloration...). Both of these debates are older than the web. And distortion is at the root of both of them. You **know** this!

In case its not clear, all audio products make distortion and all audio products have a coloration as a result. So even in this day and age its still all about the distortion.

The 3rd harmonic is not an example as I’m sure you knew when you wrote that. I’ve been careful to say ’higher ordered harmonics’, which are the 5th and above (the ear being relatively insensitive to the lower orders, the 2nd, 3rd and 4th). Your comment fits the definition of a Strawman to a ’T’.

Adding 0.05% of the 7th wouldn’t even show up in a FR analysis- but its easily heard. Go back to that link of John Curl:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZwS-oyqc3w

The book he refers to is the RadioTron Designer’s Handbook, a reference tome known to many. I have both the 1941 and 1953 editions (the latter is the red one). If you think you can make a better amp than he or Nelson Pass (or Charlie Hanson, IMO responsible for one of the other great solid state designs), let’s see you get out there and do it.

Again this is such basic stuff that I now have my answer: You do know that what you’re claiming is nonsense, but you do it anyway to sell stuff. So I’m pretty well done here, though I still look forward to your proof that distortion is always audible even when it’s 80+ dB below the music.

Apparently I was right that you don’t seem to understand why its important to get rid of distortion. If what you say were true, 10% would be unimportant as you would never hear it (by your way of thinking, your masking demo shows that in spades)! But its obvious that isn’t the case and you confirm that by insisting as I do that distortion should be low. The contradiction is obvious. I am currently of the impression that you are so intent on making me wrong that you don’t care if you contradict yourself.

I suggest once again that you read Norman Crowhurst.

http://www.tubebooks.org/technical_books_online.htm

Remember what I said about blind spots? This is an example of something where you act like you don’t seem to know, and you act like you don’t seem to know that you don’t know it. That was why I brought it up the first time and your posts have very consistently proven me correct.

agear, I’m glad you asked about harmonics in the context of music. Before I made my last post above I checked my Musical Notes chart to see how out of tune various harmonics are. Here’s the chart which shows a tempered scale, though that’s what everyone plays so those are the appropriate frequencies to consider:

http://ethanwiner.com/misc-content/notefreq.gif

This analysis is easy if you use A at 110 Hz as a starting point because you can easily do the math in your head:

2nd harmonic: 220 Hz
3rd harmonic: 330 Hz
4th harmonic: 440 Hz
5th harmonic: 550 Hz
6th harmonic: 660 Hz
7th harmonic: 770 Hz
8th harmonic: 880 Hz
9th harmonic: 990 Hz

So looking at my chart it’s clear that the 2nd, 4th, and 8th harmonics are all perfectly in tune, and thus "consonant" (versus dissonant) with an A note because they’re perfect octaves. The 3rd harmonic at 330 Hz is very close to an E, which is in the key of A major and A minor, so we’re good there too!

Next is the 5th harmonic at 550 Hz. That’s a few Hz flat of a C# which is the major note in an A major scale. So that will sound a little off if it’s loud enough to hear. But what if the music is in the key of A minor? Now that 550 Hz is way out of tune because the deciding note for minor is the C natural at 523 Hz. Fortunately, harmonics usually (though not always) decline in level as you go higher, so with normal causes of distortion the 5th harmonic is pretty soft in any competent audio gear.

And now we get to the famous 7th harmonic, or is that infamous? LOL. Here 770 Hz falls between an F# and a G, being out of tune with both. So yeah, it would be a problem if it were loud enough to hear. But again, with competent gear it will be way down by the noise floor and thus inaudible due to both its low level and masking by the rest of the music. The claim that high-order distortion components are somehow magically audible even when they’re incredibly soft is itself incredible. And as we all know, the more outrageous the claim, the more compelling must be the proof. Though at this point I’d settle for even minimal proof, as opposed to "because John Curl said so." :->)

Of course, as I have pointed out literally dozens of times in my various articles and videos, whenever you have harmonic distortion (THD) you also have similar amounts of IM distortion (IMD). And IM distortion is usually out of tune with the music, and so is much more audible and damaging than most forms of THD including the 7th harmonic. Chasing increasing small amounts of high-order THD in the presence of large quantities of IMD is like chasing unicorns.

whenever you have harmonic distortion (THD) you also have similar amounts of IM distortion (IMD).

This statement is misleading. You can have a fair amount of THD and still have relatively low IMD figures. This is however a very common saw and often it **happens** to be true; its just not true 100% of the time. 

And IM distortion is usually out of tune with the music, and so is much more audible and damaging than most forms of THD including the 7th harmonic.

This statement is true.

Chasing increasing small amounts of high-order THD in the presence of large quantities of IMD is like chasing unicorns.

The meaning here is unclear.

This whole thread has taken a nasty and totally unnecessary turn. In the first place ever since the bullet headed amplifier reviewer from Audio Review opined that all amplifiers that measure about the same sound the same, audiophiles who actually can hear have laughed at anyone who demands proof or measurements. A lot of you young whipper snappers are too young to remember the big solid state amp vs tube amp debate from the 80s. But noone could explain completely why a solid state amp with vanishingly low 0.0005% THD could sound SO %€$@! BAD relative to a reasonably good tube amp with 0.05% THD, which according my calculations is TWO ORDERS of magnitude - or for those technically challenged - 100 TIMES HIGHER than the solid state amp’s THD. Hel-loo!