Videos of Acoustically-Coupled Audio Recordings

[PeterA]

Some of the biggest " experts " on WBF just continue to fail to deliver on that part.

You know, it is kind of interesting. This is a thread about system videos. I would think that comments would come from those who have actually made videos and posted them. It is an open forum so I guess it is too much to expect comments only from those who have made and shared videos themselves. I do place more value on the comments from those who post their own videos.

 

[Ron Resnick]

You preferred number 2, as I could expect. There is nothing in the general trend of the spectra that could justify a preference in such low quality media, but we see that the spectrum no 1 is much more ragged, showing sharp discontinuities that should not be expected in real music of this kind. Look for the sharp discontinuities in the band up to 2kHz in spectrum 1 and the nice plateau between 4 and 10 kHz of spectrum 2.

Small spectral changes in particular zones can completely change our perception of recordings. It is why I am always skeptical of such videos - the position of the microphone of an hand held iPhone can drastically change the sound quality of the recording.

I am still waiting to read what was your point in posting those charts.

 

[microstrip]

I am still waiting to read what was your point in posting those charts.

Sorry, I am still waiting for decent question from you on this particular subject. I have posted this type of data several times, nothing really new. Audio magazines and audio forums post them very often to diagnose recordings.

 

[PeterA]

I am still awaiting delivery of the Transducers that I ordered from you Serial number 002 I believe you said

Such personal jabs…. What is happening to this forum?

 

[Argonaut]

Such personal jabs…. What is happening to this forum?

Oh my… I seem to have been tag teamed by the forum drama queens

 

[microstrip]

(....) To my surprise my frequency response is literally rising slightly at 20Hz. And after I tamed most some of the 45Hz and 60Hz room boom, I was able to raise the woofer tower level up to -2.5. This leaves me 12.5 steps to go in raising the woofer level further.

Assuming your bass towers have high quality drivers and amplifiers I would think about excessive room gain at these frequencies. It can result in an uncontrolled, enveloping but boring bass zone. Do not expect to know the true reason unless you use adequate tools or simulation. In my long room I can place the SoundLabs to show a nice response down to 19 Hz - but surely they are not able to reproduce adequately this octave,

I would love to be able to talk myself into some practical excuse or some theoretical excuse for adding subwoofers to the system. It wouldn't take much, I assure you. But this woofer tower system with a 1,000 watt Gryphon Class AB amp has derailed my big subwoofer plans.

If you tame this excess of the 20 Hz placing your speakers in a more adequate localization probably you can get improved sound quality with subwoofers. I could have response down to 15Hz with the XLF's, adding a pair of subs, not just one, improved sound quality a lot. As some people say, the best speakers to add subs are those that do not need them. The real problem with subwoofers is that we just know if we need them after trying it. I was highly skeptical until I tried the JLAudio F113mk2 with the CR1 crossover with the XLF's. BTW, I do not consider your bass towers as subwoofers just because of their high crossover frequency.

 

[Rexp]

Can I just say . . . cosmopolitan quibbles about rarified audio preferences aside . . . that almost all, if not literally all, of the videos posted here reflect systems which likely sound amazing in person, and which would be a revelatory experience to any civilian outside of the hobby!

Totally agree! And any criticisms I've made have been graciously accepted.

 

[hopkins]

...
The original recording of YouTube is, big surprise, by far the best.
...

This is an important point to underline.

We have to be honest with ourselves, this is not only a consequence of the recording process.

Personally, listening with headphones is always a sobering experience.

I suspect that everyone who has posted a video here would find some aspects in which the sound they get from their speakers in their room falls short in comparison to the sound of the original track played with decent headphones.

While headphones do not provide the same experience as speakers, and whether you like listening to headphones or not, they are a useful reference point.

 

[hopkins]

Even musicians compare equipment on YouTube !

I wonder what microphone she used

Check out the comments, no one is claiming video comparisons are BS!

Answering my own question with this quote from her video description:

"All three are recorded with the same mic Zoom H4n Pro with ZERO processing after."

 

[hopkins]

Will and hopkins what kind of texture and bite do you hear on this cello comparison video? Just want to see how your listening system reproduce the texture and bite on this video and how texture and bite compares to the other videos on this thread. I hope that you hear my point that I’m trying to make here with hopkins’ own video here.

I was curious to try, so I extracted the audio from the YouTube video and played it on my speakers. I don't think there is much interest in recording the results, at this point, but the sound was good, with more perceptible nuances and detail than listening with headphones (it is also louder on my speakers). The reverberation of the notes is well reproduced, and the differences between the three cellos are obvious.

What is also obvious, and perhaps of more interest for us in this thread, is that the Zoom microphone used to record the video is pretty good for the mids and lows, but not so much in the upper range, which sounds a little crude (it could be my speakers as well).

I assume the mic was placed fairly close to the instrument.

There is a big gap between these types of recorders, and studio quality recordings we are used to. It should come at no surprise.

 

[Al M.]

Can I just say . . . cosmopolitan quibbles about rarified audio preferences aside . . . that almost all, if not literally all, of the videos posted here reflect systems which likely sound amazing in person, and which would be a revelatory experience to any civilian outside of the hobby!

Indeed. The question then becomes, why do people post videos? Videos are fine to document differences within a system, or to humor a crowd, but they are a poor gauge for the absolute sound of a system.

Carlos and perhaps others claim that people who don't post videos of their systems are scared and cowards. That of course is childish nonsense. No, those who don't post videos simply have made a rational decision. That decision is that videos don't adequately represent the sound of a system, which is not just true, but all too logical. How could they, with all the technical bottlenecks of sound reproduction involved?

 

[bonzo75]

but they are a poor gauge for the absolute sound of a system.

They are fantastic for this purpose. Please let's not start again, you really need to find a new hobby apart from derailing video threads.

 

[microstrip]

Indeed. The question then becomes, why do people post videos? Videos are fine to document differences within a system, or to humor a crowd, but they are a poor gauge for the absolute sound of a system.

Carlos and perhaps others claim that people who don't post videos of their systems are scared and cowards. That of course is childish nonsense. No, those who don't post videos simply have made a rational decision. That decision is that videos don't adequately represent the sound of a system, which is not just true, but all too logical. How could they, with all the technical bottlenecks of sound reproduction involved?

Surely. The main question of videos is that reducing an high-end sound system through a low quality, low bandwidth channel is misleading. Can you imagine a high quality meat evaluation process where the jury would just be served spicy hamburgers cooked by different cookers?

 

[Al M.]

They are fantastic for this purpose.

LOL

As you know, I like your dry British humor.

 

[PeterA]

I was curious to try, so I extracted the audio from the YouTube video and played it on my speakers. I don't think there is much interest in recording the results, at this point, but the sound was good, with more perceptible nuances and detail than listening with headphones (it is also louder on my speakers). The reverberation of the notes is well reproduced, and the differences between the three cellos are obvious.

What is also obvious, and perhaps of more interest for us in this thread, is that the Zoom microphone used to record the video is pretty good for the mids and lows, but not so much in the upper range, which sounds a little crude (it could be my speakers as well).

I assume the mic was placed fairly close to the instrument.

There is a big gap between these types of recorders, and studio quality recordings we are used to. It should come at no surprise.

Did you hear greater distinction between the three cellos over the speakers in your main system or over headphones?

 

[wil]

You know, it is kind of interesting. This is a thread about system videos. I would think that comments would come from those who have actually made videos and posted them. It is an open forum so I guess it is too much to expect comments only from those who have made and shared videos themselves. I do place more value on the comments from those who post their own videos. My system’s in major transition for the next couple of weeks, But will be happy to post some thing when

My system’s in major transition for the next couple of weeks, but I will be happy to post video when it’s settled in.

But I don’t think it should be a “requirement” for anyone who chooses to comment on posted videos.

 

[wil]

Will and hopkins what kind of texture and bite do you hear on this cello comparison video? Just want to see how your listening system reproduce the texture and bite on this video and how texture and bite compares to the other videos on this thread. I hope that you hear my point that I’m trying to make here with hopkins’ own video here.

The texture and changing pressures of the bow on the strings comes through beautifully in the vid.

 

[hopkins]

Did you hear greater distinction between the three cellos over the speakers in your main system or over headphones?

Yes, and this could seem to be in contradiction with everything I have said before about headphone listening, but I don't think it is.
- my speakers offer better resolution than my headphones
- but headphones don't introduce additional reverb (more problematic with system recordings than with this near-field recording of a single instrument) and still give you a very good idea of the tone of the instruments, over a wide frequency range (my speakers don't go down as deep)
- I am more relaxed when listening to my speakers than when listening to headphones, for these types of subtle A/B tests, that's important!

The difference is clear between the first cello, and the other two. The first cello has less depth (resonance), less refinement. Between the other two, I find the differences are more subtle, and auditory memory being short, I don't have the confidence to describe those differences.

The recording is quite good (notice also how you can hear the background noise of the NY streets quite clearly if you pay attention). I do think it lacks some refinement in the upper frequencies, but I am just being difficult. Also, I have not heard a cello "live" in some time!

Here is a link to a Google Drive folder with the three cellos in individual WAV tracks if you want to have fun comparing (you can add them in a playlist and do a blind test by playing them randomly, if you want to):

Cello - Google Drive

drive.google.com

 

[hopkins]

An additional word about recording quality... If you compare various recordings of Bach's Cello Suites (which I quickly did on Qobuz), you will find that the recording quality varies considerably from one album to the other.

Pablo Casal's recordings in the late 1930s are of lower quality, obviously, than some of the more modern recordings (though there are some outliers, like Yo-Yo Ma's which has a weird stereo effect, it seems). But there is still a very nice quality to it, and it is very enjoyable. The sound is not as "in your face", there is less resolution, less frequency range, but the tone of the instrument and the subtlety of his performance are still well conveyed.

Perhaps the ultimate test for a system is it's ability to disappear and let us focus on the subject at hand - the music. In order to do that, the system does not have to be perfect, but perhaps simply not have glaring defects that prevent us from being drawn in. Since no system is perfect, and we may have different sensitivities to various deficiencies, we probably cannot expect to agree on what sounds good to our ears.

I don't know how that relates to anything else, but I just felt like mentioning it

 

[Argonaut]

An additional word about recording quality... If you compare various recordings of Bach's Cello Suites (which I quickly did on Qobuz), you will find that the recording quality varies considerably from one album to the other.

One of my favourites on CD :