Yet another bold claim...

I won't test the Sim because I don't believe in its philosophy which was proven by Tube Dude to be not accurate by null testing it.

If Medicine is telling me that smoking is bad for my health, proven by numerous cientific tests, I won't start smoking just to prove they are right.

Some guy did it regarding McDonalds... but I'll pass it.

As for the maximum SPL, I owned the Craffts (also studio monitors) which have a max of 120dB (at 1,25m ) with THD<0.1%. All I can say is that I get a more live sensation with the Yammies and I also believe in metal drivers for their better stiffness/weight ratio (Beryllium is the best of all).

 

OK so any amplifier without a global feedback circuit is inferior to the Rotel? What a load of bollox. We haven't had such wild claims over here for quite a while I must say.

OK. A 6.5" bass unit that produces 120db at cut off with such a low THD? I also owned Craffts in the past. I don't remember the cone excursion being over a foot but maybe yours were special

 

Humm BD, so if TD tells you to paint your balls with marking blue, its the done thing then
Thats pretty close to saying I don't like Lambo's cuz they look gay yet they do preform rather well, Either your a serial wind up artist, or man you need some theropy, to which the Jury's still out

 

As WM and merlin have said, that is just the most ridiculous thing to say. It would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

One thing is to measure two amps and say that the one that measures better sounds better. People may disagree but it's a rational argument. However, suggesting that you can tell that an amplifier will measure badly just because it doesn't use global feedback is absurd, not to say extremely arrogant.

How do you know that Sim don't have a way to make a low distortion amp without global feedback? Even if TD has measured amps and found that, generally, no global feedback produces worse null test results that doesn't mean that someone else doesn't know how to do it .

This kind of fundamentalist narrow mindedness is really staggering. First it was "only speakers with metal drivers can sound good", then "only multibit DACs can sound good", now this.

Einstein said that the speed of light is constant and nothing can travel faster than it. Now João Magueijo (a Portuguese physicist working in London University) is showing that may not be true afterall. Nothing is written in stone.

Michael.

 

You are right it isn't so low, it is only <1%... sorry!

System Type - 2 way Passive
Sensitivity - (2.83V @ 1m) 83dB
Long Term Amplifier Power - (RMS IEC) 150 Watts/channel
Max. Recommended Power - 1000 Watts/channel
Nominal Impedance - 4 Ohms
Frequency Response - 40Hz to 25kHz (± 2.5dB)
Typical Maximum SPL - 120 dB at 1.25 m.
Crossover - Impedance corrected 1st order passive.
Max Total Distortion - (T.H.D. + I.M.D.) Less than 1%
Tweeter - 28 mm soft dome.
Bass Driver - 75 mm. pure aluminum wire voice coil.
Dimensions - 400 x 220 x 275 mm / 15.8 x 8.7 x 10.9"
Weight (per monitor) - 14 kg / 31 lbs.


As for an amplifier without global negative feedback being inferior to the Rotel it's very probable but I really don't care because I know from Tube Dude's experience that to an amplifier be accurate it needs global negative feedback (lots of it). Without it the amplifier won't be as accurate as it can possible be so why wasting money?

The 1062 is an excelent accurate starting point...

 

Michael,

If you could have the sim I-5 at your home I would be most glad in measuring it, along with the 1062, to prove my point.

Get an I-5 and I'll do it with you.

 

But I have no interest it null testing an i-5 myself, I'm quite happy with the amp I have. You're the one making the claims about the i-5, it's up to you to back them up with measurements.

Michael.

 

Speed of light, bah your all living in the dark ages, time & thought are one, distance becomes irrevient, speed as you preceive it to be have no meaning. Humans I do worry sometimes

 

I think threads like this are going nowhere, i have already said that accuracy is irrelevant,(FWIW my system is pretty accurate despite what ex flamers might once have said, in fact there is little difference between speaker presentation and that through electrostaic headphones), this is not a provacative or flaming response, but I feel all this accuracy debate is nonsense, we buy a component for how it sounds, not how it measures, if you buy a great sounding amp and then measure it, and i measures poorly, do you sell it and get another one, I doubt it, who cares how we measure it, listening to the music is important, if BD cannot believe he is there then he needs to LISTEN to kit that he likes rather than kit that measures well. Anyone who has heard the 1062 believe it punches above it's weight, but IMO the Sim trounces it, making desparaging statements about Sim Audios products, whithout backing this up with fact is leaving the forum(ie Mike) open to litigation.

I reckon BD is only here to inflame.

 

So do you really believe that a 6.5" cone will produce the bottom end of your favourite music at 120db with less than 1% distortion? What happens below 40hz?

You strike me as someone who is new to this whole hifi lark. Please don't take that as a dig, it's just that it might be adviseable to listen to some of the forum's more knowledgable contributors rather than tell them they are wrong.

 

Surely time is just a relative measurement.

 

Lets re-cap. You believe reality sounds good and is the goal. To get this you must reproduce the recording as accurately as possible and accuracy doesn't necessarily sound good.

So unless you use your system as a 'tool' where the goal is not to 'sound good' but let you know whats on the recording, your just talking rubbish. You contradicted yourself. Is your goal not to 'sound good'?

 

I think that's stretching things a bit AK. Someone saying that, in their opinion, a Sim i-5 sounds or measures worse than a Rotel 1062 hardly constitutes libel or defamation.

I don't think that threads like this are useless at all. It's unfortunate that BD is not prepared to have a reasoned, rational debate about the issue and just spouts out absolutisms everywhere but the subjectivist/objectivist debate is a very important one IMO.

We buy equipment by how it sounds, yes, but imagine if it were possible to measure "how it sounds"? I suspect this is much more possible than most people would believe. As I said before, I'd be very surprised if there wasn't a pretty strong correlation between how well a bit of kit measures and its subjectively rated performance (under blind conditions of course).

Personally, I'm of the opinion that the audio/hifi industry has gone WAAAAY to far into subjectivist territory, to the point where, for many people any kind of objective measurement whatsoever is deemed completely irrelevant. This is a very unfortunate situation indeed.

I'll post again the link to a most excellent article on the matter which I suggest everyone here reads. I have to say I agree strongly with the guy on pretty much every point he has to make:

http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/ampins/pseudo/subjectv.htm

It's my view that if more people in the industry held views like Douglas Self and more hifi was designed to objectively measureable criteria that we would all benefit from kit that sounded considerably better for a fraction of the price. However, that's very unlikely to happen. If Wavac can sell a SET amp for $350K that has 10% THD and there are mugs prepared to buy them then you can see that the manufacturers have an interest in sticking to subjectivism because, without objective measurement, anything goes. HiFi becomes like art, based entirely on hype and marketing instead of the engineering science that it is and should be regarded as.

Michael.

 

There speaks a true Dac 64 fan

Seriously Michael, I happen to agree with you to a great extent - something that measures poorly is likely to sound wrong. Having said that, virtually everything seems to measure well these days, and yet we still perceive sonic differences.

 

If BD really is an objectivist, he should, of course, blind test his Rotel against an amp which did badly in his null test...

-- Ian

 

I quite agree Ian. Like his MF A1000

Michael.

 

Ian,

Class sir

 

WM..

Fancy a go in my Cube?? It's been a bit bored recently, not made many trips. It's in need of a traveling companion i feel !


Global negative feedback?

Correct me if I'm wrong but surely that was the whole method of the Jap amp manufacturers in the 80's and early 90's that made such wonderfully low distorting amps that sounded like a pile of crap next to the more poorly measuring brit amps?

The only person I know that has had anything to do wtih hi-fi amp design is adamant that the best amps are produced by using a little negative feedback as possible. If the amp is designed well enough it should need much. There is no need to feedback a difference distortion figure if the native distortion of the amp is suitably low in the first place. Something that is more than easily acheivable with current op amp and power transistor technology.


GTM

 

Yeah Mike makinhg litigious claims was stretching it, but just thought it should be mentioned.

Mike I'm not saying that measuring tells us nothing, yes it helps the engineers design the bloody things, but we are primarily listeners, so that is the most important measurement for us, to discuss electrical accuracy and such tells us not a lot as we can see by the arguments, rotel measures well, but those who have heard it say it's ok but not the last word.

If i bring the analogy back to cars, we can measure a cars BHP, Torque Top speed, lateral g etc, but that does not tell us how it feels to drive, does the feedback give enough info about the road and how the car handles, these are subjective based on the experiennce of the driver, why did you choose your car Mike?, BHP, Torque, 6 cylinders, 155MPH, no you bought it because you liked how it drove, I'm sure.

We can debate and argue till the cows come home, it doesn't matter how accurate or innacurate the kit is if we don't like the noises it makes.

 

Subjectively, that's my experience too.

I believe, but I'm not certain, that it is possible to have a 'good' amplifier in which the global negative feedback can be varied by means of a potentiometer. As the feedback is increased, the distortion is reduced and, presumably, the 'null test' response improves.

The question is, where would we adjust the global feedback pot to if we're tuning by ear for maximum 'realism'.

We really need Thorsten or someone who could knock up such a contraption.

Regarding speakers, there is a school which goes for quite resonant enclosures with minimum damping (padding and stuffing), à la AudioNote, for a more musical overall sound. I believe in the philosophy of minimum damping for the same reason but attempt to design less resonant enclosures. Chaque à son gout (or something - Chirac's in town).