fao null tester believers

so graham. going to throw away the wadia and battleship amp in favour of some disco amps and a 100quid cd player? thought not ;)
also having not done the test myself i don;t feel qualified to answer - this imho is the central tennent of subjectivism. i.e. everyones opinion counts rather that the fascististic mind set that objectivism brings (i.e. there is only one right - pun intended).
cheers


julian
 
julian2002 said:
so graham. going to throw away the wadia and battleship amp in favour of some disco amps and a 100quid cd player? thought not ;)
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Since I don't need to realise the capital tied up in that - then no. If I needed the money though, I would give it some serious thought (although I got the amp so cheap, I'm not sure how much it would raise). It would be interesting though to see what could be done to a cheap amp to match what I have now. If I needed to replace it, or had the time, I would certainly get the scope/analyser out and see what I needed to match. FWIW I suspect the thing I would be looking at the most would be vanishingly low inter-modulation distortion (and possibly very wide bandwidth). And if the "Wadia sound" is due to it's known inaccurate frequency response, then that should be fairly easy to replicate pretty cheaply.

But then of course there's the pride of ownership factor - which has nothing whatever to do with the sound (The difference between me and some others is that I'm happy to admit that).
 
I still have a hard time reconcilling valve amps with the null test. Valve amps are inherently distorting the signal, and yet for many produce a sound which is preferable to other amps. There is obviously a point where the distortion is irrelevant, and some have said 0.1dB, but valve amps frequently go up to 1%.

So what is the true story because the null test isn't the complete story.
 
Lee, I don't think the distortion in valve amps is irrelevant. On the contrary, it's probably the distortion they exhibit that makes some people prefer them over other amps. They may not be getting "accuracy" or "high fidelity" in the strict sense of the term but if they prefer it, who cares?

As an analogy, I like the look of Lisbon when the sun is going down on a clear crisp day. The buildings take on a really pleasing "warm" glow. I've taken photos of that and it just never seems to come out the way I remember it. I have to artificially exaggerate the effect in PhotoShop. Take a look at the pics below:

panteao1.jpg


panteao2.jpg


To most people (myself included) the first picture is far more pleasing and in every way preferable. However, the 2nd picture is probably a more accurate representation of what the scene actually looked like when the photo was taken.

Michael.
 
Michael, I agree entirely with the 'Rose tinted Glasses' view point. Is that the view from your place in Lisbon? Really interesting compare to our terraced houses.

BTW I re-read what I wrote and I didn't mean that distortion is irrelevant, but distortion below a certain threshold is. Valve amps are things which techinically should be hated, if you believe that measurements are everything, they distort, are bandwidth limted, more depenant on the output impedence of the source to ensure correct load lines.

I'm glad we don't ignore things just because they don't measure well.
 
Unfortunately Lee, that's not the view from my apartment. It's about 5-10 minutes walk away.

On the distortion thing, my DAC is something that, technically, should be hated too. It measures terribly. Sounds wonderful though :)

Michael.
 
Ultimately, isn't it about getting a system that sounds good to YOU? Who cares what someone in a magazine says, or how it measures for that matter - what matters is the kit in your room with your ears.

I think some people frequenting this forum are obsessive to the point of ridiculousness. Please, stick on some music and forget about frequency responses and tests for a bit!
 
michaelab said:
On the distortion thing, my DAC is something that, technically, should be hated too. It measures terribly. Sounds wonderful though :)
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The some as the valve amplifier...distortion can add euphonic colorations ,that can please some people.

Anyway can anyone enlighten me , how a TDA 1543 with a voltage compliance of +- 25 mV , designed to see a virtual short at the output (the inverting input of a op amp) can provide one or two output volts? ..Only with a lot of distortion...

Can this sound good?? :MILD:
 
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No NO NO
The picture analogy is false .A camera distorts the image , you are not making the picture better by adding distortions , but in fact trying to correct the cameras distortions.
Of course this may also be true to some degree with hi-fi, were we correct the distortions of the recording equipment to give a more accurate sound.
There is more to an amp sound than mere distortion rates.
My current power amp delivers greater bass depth and impact than my previous one, so doeas my pre amp.You can not get an amp to distort in order to produce that result, the newer amp are clearer better at driving the speakers bass cones.
 
spxy said:
No NO NO
The picture analogy is false .A camera distorts the image , you are not making the picture better by adding distortions , but in fact trying to correct the cameras distortions.
Click to expand...
spxy, both of those pictures have had PhotoShop post processing, allthough the camera original looks more like the second than the first. IMO the picture analogy is perfect. Sure, you can't get a digital sensor (or film for that matter) which has anything like the dynamic range of the human eye but the 2nd picture is a more accurate rendition of what the scene actually looked like (believe it or not, I was there ;) ) but it's the less pleasing one.

Michael.
 
...but as none of us were in the studio, we can't say how like the original anything sounds, and there your photo analogy falls down!

Ultimately, the more we invest in expensive kit, the more we reveal of our recordings. But is there one goal for everyone, one configuration that will reproduce sound in a totally pleasing manner for everyone? No, and that is why we continue to swap and change hifi gear until we find what we're looking for.
 
I rushed my last reply as my wife needed to use the computer, so I try to define what I'm talking about.
I thought that you were claiming the alterd picture more accurate, on re-reading thats not what your saying.
My point though is that both pictures are distortions compared to the image your eye would capture, and that altering in photo shop is no more a distortion than the original camera shot.
Yes I agree some people will prefer added distortion be they visual or audio.
What I don't agre with is this,that all differences in equipment are due to currently measurable distortions.
And I don't think you can equalise the sound of equipment just by changing these distortions to match each other.
This is because I believe not in magic , but that there are more factors that may involved, that are sometimes over looked.
I am not an expert on measurments so prehaps someone can clarify these next points.
Hi-fi measure a signal, measuring equipment measures a signal, the assumtion tends to be the the measuring equipment is not adding distortions , while the hi-fi equipment is.How do you measure out the measuring equipment?
In which way is the measuring equipment read, often a monitor.
What is the maximum resolution of a monitor?Its the size of a pixel on offer.
But the resolution of a loadspeaker is the size of the molcules it can vibrate, far far smaller than pixels.
The same with meters used to measure electricity current extra, they measure volts and amps extra ,but at what resolution compared to the vibrations of a drive unit?
Exactly at what resolution do we hear and exactly at what resolution is current measuring equipment?
If the resolution of measuring equipment is lower than the resolution of our hearing, then or current measurments are not good enought.
This is of cource assuming we are measuring for the right things in the first place.
What exactly is a distortion?Its not just added noise but how about changes in dynamic level within music.Are they accurately reproduced?
This in amps depends on its ability to drive the speakers.
The point is I belive there are a lot of factors that make up the actual sound we hear and we haven't managed to break them down into complely tangable measurment yet.
If you read up on quatum phisysics you'll find that the action of measurment is in fact a very complecated thing, and that its very difficult to make measurments without effecting those measurment with the test equipment.
Any way I'll shut up now as my wife needs to use the computer.
Of course I'm willing to except I'm wrong about all this , I just like a good debate.
(havent had time to check my spelling.Which is usually very bad)
 
Hi Spxy

Imagine a photo... if you can make a copy of that photo ,that any trace of that photo and any color coincide with original photo...you have a perfect copy of the original.

That is what the null test do...if the output coincide at any point to the input sound ,there is no sound in the null point.

So the output is equal to the original...

Cheers :MILD:
 
Imagine a photo... if you can make a copy of that photo ,that any trace of that photo and any color coincide with original photo...you have a perfect copy of the original.
Click to expand...

and i bet side by side you can still tell the difference
 
Saab said:
and i bet side by side you can still tell the difference
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What can I say...

That you , from two news fresh bank notes of the some amount ...you can tell them apart ...(forgetting the serial numbers...)

Fine!... I would like to make a null test to your senses...because they are extraordinary... :MILD:
 
Tube_Dude said:
What can I say...

That you , from two news fresh bank notes of the some amount ...you can tell them apart ...(forgetting the serial numbers...)

Fine!... I would like to make a null test to your senses...because they are extraordinary... :MILD:
Click to expand...

nope,but i could tell a photocopy from the real one, :)

ps i think you underestimate the human senses,
 
Saab said:
nope,but i could tell a photocopy from the real one, :)

ps i think you underestimate the human senses,
Click to expand...

No Saab i don't underestimate the human senses.

There are no sound ,as live music...but in a copy of the live music , the more similar (less null) ....the more like the original the sound will be.
 

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