In light of all the questions being asked at the moment, this part of the "system" may need to be considered a bit.
This post was provoked because we've just had a massive rain storm, hail was hammering down fit to burst the roof, there's a layer of hail "snow" carpeting the garden and patio. Before it started I had on a classic Cleo Lane album at a good, normal listening level: then the rain started, and it began to crash down, harder and harder. Not deafening, but very intense. And what happened to the music? It was getting softer and softer, I wound up the volume control more and more; but it was still sounding as quiet as a bedroom transistor radio.
Well, the ear's automatic gain control, AGC, cut in, it reduced the sensitivity of my ear/brain completely automatically to "cope" with the onslaught of sound from the storm. But nothing changed the volume of sound playback: it was just that my ear was "cloaked" by its inbuilt mechanism so that it was operating in a gain range that was suitable for making sense of the outside noise.
And my belief is that a lot of the "mysteries" of good and bad sound reproduction, and perception, is tied to the ear playing its own little games, adjusting always to suit the circumstances ...
Frank
This post was provoked because we've just had a massive rain storm, hail was hammering down fit to burst the roof, there's a layer of hail "snow" carpeting the garden and patio. Before it started I had on a classic Cleo Lane album at a good, normal listening level: then the rain started, and it began to crash down, harder and harder. Not deafening, but very intense. And what happened to the music? It was getting softer and softer, I wound up the volume control more and more; but it was still sounding as quiet as a bedroom transistor radio.
Well, the ear's automatic gain control, AGC, cut in, it reduced the sensitivity of my ear/brain completely automatically to "cope" with the onslaught of sound from the storm. But nothing changed the volume of sound playback: it was just that my ear was "cloaked" by its inbuilt mechanism so that it was operating in a gain range that was suitable for making sense of the outside noise.
And my belief is that a lot of the "mysteries" of good and bad sound reproduction, and perception, is tied to the ear playing its own little games, adjusting always to suit the circumstances ...
Frank