Robert Harleys 'listening room

[Carlos269]

Let exactly what sink in? In the professional recordings/videos I did, not once did I use some random phone to pick up instruments, and I think it's safe to say that no engineers in their right minds would do so. You're confusing studio / concert hall recordings with sticking a phone in a room and believing that a representative pickup is possible. You obviously have little idea what it takes to make a good, professional recording. Hint - it ain't an iPhone.

Check out my mastering and studio equipment that I use daily. They are the type that you have never laid your hands on. Any time you want to discuss the recording, production or mastering process let me know and we can compare notes. As they say, know your audience before you stick your foot in your mouth.

 

[Ampexed]

Check out my mastering and studio equipment that I use daily. They are the type that you have never laid your hands on. Any time you want to discuss the recording, production or mastering process let me know and we can compare notes. As they say, know your audience before you stick your foot in your mouth.

Interesting that you know what type of recording gear I've laid my hands on! That's quite the feat!

 

[Carlos269]

Interesting that you know what type of recording gear I've laid my hands on! That's quite the feat!

99.9% of commercial production facilities do not own the type of studio and mastering gear that I have so it’s not a stretch for me to make that statement.

 

[microstrip]

So just anybody with the microphones in their iPhone can walk around who-knows-where in a room, with no actual experience in how to make recordings, and capture something which is representative of a complex system of electronics, the room acoustics, and the source material? No experience needed? REALLY???? I'm sorry, but these system videos - I don't care who 'certifies' it - just sound like echo-y, distant, indistinct globs of sound which makes one system sound much like any other, or a boom box for that matter.

Everything anybody wants to know about my own system is below in my signature, but it would be stupid to the extreme for me to believe that even with careful microphone placement, not one bit of the subtleties would come through. I'm not afraid to make videos - I did it professionally for awhile, but I do know a useless exercise when I see it.

I have posted it before, it is not a question of hearing or experience, but of physics and reality. Real music creates a vectorial physical sound field, stereo limited and manipulated information creates an illusionary sound field in our mind with the help of our previous perceptual experience. No microphone can record your mind!

At best people can train to get some very specific and limited characteristics from low quality videos, such as some artifacts. But no way anyone can guess how a stereo system really sounds from an You tube video.

 

[Carlos269]

But no way anyone can guess how a stereo system really sounds from a You tube video.

Don’t you think that one would know and be able to make the determination if what one hears on a video is representative of one’s own system?

Come on professor please don’t devalue one’s intelligence.

 

[microstrip]

Don’t you think that one would know and be able to make the determination if what one hears on a video is representative of one’s own system?

Come on professor please don’t devalue one’s intelligence.

As always, you prefer to move using insinuations to a mud fight than discussing the argumentation of the complete post ...

Sorry, I do not enjoy your favorite sport. Bye.

 

[Carlos269]

As always, you prefer to move using insinuations to a mud fight than discussing the argumentation of the complete post ...

Sorry, I do not enjoy your favorite sport. Bye.

I prefer to get to the point and it looks like I got you stumped as you can not produce a response.

 

[Ron Resnick]

If audio . . . recordings were not conveying, then we would not have this hobby to begin with.

This reflects a gross misrepresentation of Ampexed's post which explicitly referred only to iPhone recordings.

 

[Carlos269]

This reflects a gross misrepresentation of Ampexed's post which explicitly referred only to iPhone recordings.

Well are they? Are audio and video recordings on iPhones conveying?

 

[PeterA]

Don’t you think that one would know and be able to make the determination if what one hears on a video is representative of one’s own system?

Come on professor please don’t devalue one’s intelligence.

Of course he or she can. Just listen to the system. Record it on an iPhone, and then listen over YouTube. Compare the two and simply judge whether or not the video is representative. I do it all the time with my system and have done it with a friend's system. The system sounds better, but the video gives a pretty good idea about the system. And it is easy and fun. Well, fun for some.

 

[Ampexed]

This reflects a gross misrepresentation of Ampexed's post which explicitly referred only to iPhone recordings

Well are they? Are audio and video recordings on iPhones conveying?

It has nothing to do with the quality of the microphones in an iPhone - they're actually quite good. What is the deal killer is that they are omnidirectional, the exact opposite of the directional pattern one would want to differentiate between the sound from the speakers and the sound of the room.

I say this not for you, because I don't believe you'd agree with anything I or anybody says, but more for others so that they realize I don't have anything per se against the microphones in an iPhone, but rather that their omnidirectional nature is not well suited to recording a specific sound source and controlling room pickup.

 

[Carlos269]

Of course he or she can. Just listen to the system. Record it on an iPhone, and then listen over YouTube. Compare the two and simply judge whether or not the video is representative. I do it all the time with my system and have done it with a friend's system. The system sounds better, but the video gives a pretty good idea about the system. And it is easy and fun. Well, fun for some.

Precisely. That was my point.

 

[Carlos269]

It has nothing to do with the quality of the microphones in an iPhone - they're actually quite good. What is the deal killer is that they are omnidirectional, the exact opposite of the directional pattern one would want to differentiate between the sound from the speakers and the sound of the room.

I say this not for you, because I don't believe you'd agree with anything I or anybody says, but more for others so that they realize I don't have anything per se against the microphones in an iPhone, but rather that their omnidirectional nature is not well suited to recording a specific sound source and controlling room pickup.

You can use an external X-Y arrangement if you wish. No one is limiting you or dictating how you capture the sound.

 

[microstrip]

Of course he or she can. Just listen to the system. Record it on an iPhone, and then listen over YouTube. Compare the two and simply judge whether or not the video is representative. I do it all the time with my system and have done it with a friend's system. The system sounds better, but the video gives a pretty good idea about the system. And it is easy and fun. Well, fun for some.

Peter,

Do you know of the Edison phonograph comparisons?

 

[Ampexed]

You can use an external X-Y arrangement if you wish. No one is limiting you and how you capture the sound.

Maybe a Blumlein. Or maybe M-S. What about that Ambisonics microphone? Perhaps the old crystal microphone that came with that Ham Radio set. PZM perhaps?

Or maybe just go with what I originally suggested - a handheld stereo digital recorder 5 feet from the speakers as a starting point. No need to make this a science project.

 

[Lee]

Michael Fremer did just that and not only showed us his room but allowed us to listen to a video that he certified as being representative of the sound in his room. I’m not sure how many other reviewers will do this as I’m starting to see that it takes a great deal of courage to do so. I never even thought twice about posting a video. I don’t even preview my videos. Just don’t get why anyone spending these large sums of money on these systems would have any hesitation, but obviously it is safer to be proud and confident on your signature line and on written text than it is on video.

The latest TAS video has Robert Harley's reference system as the topic...

 

[Another Johnson]

I haven’t studied this thread carefully, but I wonder if anyone commented on the idea that the room AND the gear should be depreciated over their expected lives. The gear is probably mostly 5 year property. The room is probably 20 year property. The depreciation can be deducted from income every year as long as the taxpayer stays in this business, reducing the basis for the calculation of gain at the time of sale.

Equipment on loan should have a lease value, and if no lease is collected, it is a taxable income unless the gift of no lease is from a family member (subject to the limits as prescribed by tax law).

So … I wonder how all this stuff is actually handled.

I said earlier that readers should take all reviews as entertainment rather than as instruction. I still feel that way. But I recognize that the price of playing in the deep end of the audiophile pool has become so high that most would be reviewers would have a hard time acquiring and updating a SOTA system against which to compare their assigned components.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Of course he or she can. Just listen to the system. Record it on an iPhone, and then listen over YouTube. Compare the two and simply judge whether or not the video is representative.

So just anybody with the microphones in their iPhone can . . . make recordings, and capture something which is representative of a complex system of electronics, the room acoustics, and the source material? . . . these system videos - makes one system sound much like any other

not one bit of the subtleties would come through

I feel badly discussing video recordings of audio systems yet again, especially on a thread which is not primarily this topic, but these two posts place the controversy in high relief.

My view is that video recordings of audio systems can be representative of the in-the-room sound of the audio system only (maybe primarily?) as to frequency balance and as to resolution (meaning, here, mainly "details).(I am still not sure about representativeness as to transparency.) I agree with Ampexed that room acoustics are largely stripped away, and that nuances and subtleties are lost. (Ampexed, I wonder if you agree with me that the recordings can be representative of the in-the-room sound as to frequency balance and resolution?)

This is why I believe that video recordings of audio systems can reveal a solitary change in an unfamiliar system in an unfamiliar room, but cannot be used to compare two unfamiliar systems, and cannot convey generally the in-the-room sound of an unfamiliar system.

Peter, Tim, Kedar and others believe that video recordings are representative generally (including room acoustics and soundstage and depth and nuance and subtleties) of the in-the-room sound of the system, and that that representativeness is not limited to frequency balance and resolution.

*The Shure MV88+ microphone, for one, with EQ determined for in-the-room tonal balance and resolution representativeness, and then fixed (held constant across recordings) was a necessary condition to get me even this far on videos.

 

[Ampexed]

I feel badly discussing video recordings of audio systems yet again, especially on a thread which is not primarily this topic, but these two posts place the controversy in high relief.

My view is that video recordings of audio systems can be representative of the in-the-room sound of the audio system only (maybe primarily?) as to frequency balance and as to resolution (meaning, here, mainly "details).(I am still not sure about representativeness as to transparency.) I agree with Ampexed that room acoustics are largely stripped away, and that nuances and subtleties are lost. (Ampexed, I wonder if you agree with me that the recordings can be representative of the in-the-room sound as to frequency balance and resolution?)

This is why I believe that video recordings of audio systems can reveal a solitary change in an unfamiliar system in an unfamiliar room, but cannot be used to compare two unfamiliar systems, and cannot convey generally the in-the-room sound of an unfamiliar system.

Peter, Tim, Kedar and others believe that video recordings are representative generally (including room acoustics and soundstage and depth and nuance and subtleties) of the in-the-room sound of the system, and that that representativeness is not limited to frequency balance and resolution.

*The Shure MV88+ microphone, for one, with EQ determined for in-the-room tonal balance and resolution representativeness, and then fixed (held constant across recordings) was a necessary condition to get me even this far on videos.

Regarding frequency balance, I believe generally that in-room recordings can convey this to a useful degree but to do so, the room's acoustic signature needs to be sacrificed in favor of direct sound from the speakers. The room just has such a profound influence on timbre that moving the microphones just a bit will cause the balance to be different - our ears and brain compensate for this (in conjunction with our eyes knowing we're moving), but microphones are 'stupid' in this regard. So to me, it makes sense to 'record the speakers' and ignore as much as possible the room, since the room is so hard to capture.

I'd set the mircophones close to the speakers (I'd use a handheld stereo digital recorder with directional X-Y microphones) at a distance which is far enough to allow the speaker drivers to have a fighting chance of integrating, yet not so far as to allow the room's contribution to intrude.

It's all a compromise, but in my opinion, the speaker's sound is more important to the spirit of the video than the sound of the room.

 

[dan31]

I like how Robert discussed the TT, Cartridge and Tonearm. Left out the Simaudio 810LP he has had forever. No cable discussion.

He must be looking for the CH phono and new cables.