Videos of Acoustically-Coupled Audio Recordings

[MadFloyd]

David is not reading this forum. I suggested it to him and he said no.

apparently my experience with him is different from yours. He only shared negative comments about something when I have directly asked him for his opinion. This is very different from other dealers I have met at their dealerships. Psalm denigrate competitors without solicitation. Just to pump up the stuff they are selling. This is what I was pushing back on Rex about because that is the implication I got from his post.

When I met David at your place, it didn’t take more than 10 minutes for him to say the tone arm I was interested in was ‘shit’. I did not ask him for his opinion, I was merely conveying my enthusiasm.

 

[bonzo75]

When I met David at your place, it didn’t take more than 10 minutes for him to say the tone arm I was interested in was ‘shit’. I did not ask him for his opinion, I was merely conveying my enthusiasm.

You mean he did not tell you what he thinks of Kronos?

 

[morricab]

I can assure you he isn't. He's done with this forum.

You can assure nothing of the sort...unless you are spying on him...

 

[microstrip]

David is a dealer, but he never tried to sell me anything. He never denigrated any of my equipment. I guess my experience is just completely different from yours. Didn’t you contact him many times for advice? Did he ever try to sell you anything?

Peter,

David left the forum, he choose not participate in our debates. Why are you bringing here old disputes, particularly as you are, perhaps unwillingly, misrepresenting his forum opinions?

Sometimes I have the feeling that you have not managed to give up on what you consider the long lost years listening to a poor choice of components that is your responsibility.

 

[hopkins]

Reconsidering the OP, I really appreciate Audiophile Bill's insight above. We must ignore obvious imprecise associations (Bill is asserting that he can tell that Kedar's video was of a live event and not a recorded event, despite the video being made on a mobile phone, despite all the limitations implied and discussed herein).

Despite my being on the autistic spectrum, I can still tell if someone I am speaking to is angry, sad or happy. Likewise, I can perceive such over the phone, despite the lack of facial clues and lower acoustic fidelity associated with a telephone call, it is just a bit more difficult.

Our minds are powerful tools that do this automatically. We are not born with innate language capabilities but gather comprehension and competence by interpreting uttered noises and associated gestures by those around us. Why should this fantastic skill suddenly stop as we get older?

Kedar I believe, in a different thread, demonstrated how a single piece of music sounded when played back from an iPhone recording and then same again from an Android phone recording. What I learned from that demonstration that my iPhone will not show my system off as well as an Android phone would, but that is my take, others may differ. When I listen to telephone videos of music being played from different equipment on this and other sites, I try to remove as many confounding variables as possible.

At home, I prefer to listen to vinyl through SET's and old-school horn speakers so that when I listen to telephone recordings I look out for those of the same (that is what I like and want to compare my system to). I do not listen to those playing electronic instruments, rock etc. as with all the distortion added (EL34's pushed to distortion in Marshall amplifiers, fuzz tones, wah-wah etc. ) as I can not tell how "natural" it sounds. Same CD sourced (they always sound unnatural to me). Instead I listen only to systems playing a vinyl recording of acoustic instruments and from those make my judgements.

Out of curiosity, would you agree that this sounds "natural"? You can simply listen to it with your phone if you want to.

 

[PeterA]

It's very simple, when you call over someone who is in the trade over to your place, you are willing to change and already know his background. You are kidding yourself if you think otherwise. If you call a Wadax dealer over, you are already half expecting to move from your digital. Whetherhe tells you yours sucks or not is moot. If you call someone in the trade you know is strongly against the things you own, it is just a question of then whether you buy his philosophy or not.

so this scenario does not reflect my experience in any way. I went to visit David, he did not come to visit me. I went to inspect a turntable which I decided to commission him to find for me. He was the only person I knew of who could locate a near mint condition Micro Seiki for my budget.

for years you had been telling me to increase my exposure and hear some horn speakers. That was the secondary reason for my trip to Utah. There was no intent to buy anything, it was just to increase exposure as I was quite happy with my sublime sound system after my series of experiments.

this has nothing to do with asking a turntable dealer to come to my house and try to sell me a turntable.

 

[microstrip]

(...) But it only takes a moment or two to gauge if the sound is realistic.

Unless you train people you will find that what sounds realistic to some people is not realistic to others.
WBF is a real proof of it!

 

[PeterA]

Do you or Peter disagree with what I have quoted about what he thinks of those components? Some of that is available on the forum itself.

David prefers Ching Cheng power cords to all other power cords in the context of systems that he works on. He prefers the LAMM electronics to alternatives, both the SET‘s and hybrids. He prefers his handful of beyond turntables and beyond speakers. He has told me which components and which brands he likes in what contexts, but I have not asked him about brands he specifically dislikes. He has told me about some system videos which he thinks sound terrible.

he does prefer the low power 1st W to the larger Pass Labs amplifiers. He sounds fairly neutral on Magico and Wilson saying he only likes the ones that match well with particular amplifiers.

I don’t know what you’re trying to get me to verify for you.

 

[Bobvin]

This little entertaining piece is yours, right? If so, I’d say at times you hit the nail right on the head.

If philosophy isn't your cup of tea, have you ever considered putting your eloquent writing skills to good use by becoming a reviewer?

And sometimes great performances can be of material that makes me want to barf. That the performance causes an emotional response is, I suppose, desired. But in my case all I felt was a growing anxiety.

Compared to the boy on the talent show — simply moved by the beauty of it all. Hopefully I’ll get through the pearly gates when the time comes, that is the sound i expect from the angels. But even that would grow old i’m afraid and i’d be looking for the best blues bar in heaven.

 

[bonzo75]

By then you already knew what he doesn’t like.

I am not saying you did not like his sound Brit buying and I credit you for open mindedness to shift. But it is just incorrect to think you did not clearly know his views on your components

 

[Rensselaer]

Out of curiosity, would you agree that this sounds "natural"? You can simply listen to it with your phone if you want to.

I said that I only listen to valve systems, preferably SETs playing vinyl records. Since you are not showing the system playing a record, nor saying anything about the system, I am fairly certain you are putting a digital recording in front of me to prove something?

 

[MadFloyd]

You mean he did not tell you what he thinks of Kronos?

No and I didn’t ask nor raise the topic.

 

[PeterA]

Peter,

David left the forum, he choose not participate in our debates. Why are you bringing here old disputes, particularly as you are, perhaps unwillingly, misrepresenting his forum opinions?

Sometimes I have the feeling that you have not managed to give up on what you consider the long lost years listening to a poor choice of components that is your responsibility.

anyone reading my sublime sound thread or visiting me during those years will understand I enjoyed that system a lot. I spent a lot of time listening to it and sharing it with others and I learned a lot by experimenting with it. Those were not lost years. Everything I do is my responsibility.

I made many recordings of that system and shared them and welcomed feedback.

 

[PeterA]

By then you already knew what he doesn’t like.

I am not saying you did not like his sound Brit buying and I credit you for open mindedness to shift. But it is just incorrect to think you did not clearly know his views on your components

You think you know something you are simply not privy to. I think we should move on. There’s no reason to talk about someone who cannot participate in the discussion. I was simply pushing back on Rex’s assertions because they did not match my experience in any way.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Out of curiosity, would you agree that this sounds "natural"? You can simply listen to it with your phone if you want to.

I listened on the iPhone to the track beginning at 25:18. I am puzzled why you posted this recording.

There is so much background noise (vinyl surface noise?) that I found it distracting. I felt like I'm listening to a old recording on an AM radio that is tuned to slightly off from the transmit frequency.

I don't think the instruments sound very clear and resolved. It sounds like such a relatively noisy mess to me (relative to the low noise vinyl playback I am accustomed to -- I am an analog absolutist, not a vinyl absolutist) I am having trouble even relaxing enough to reach the question of whether it sounds natural.

 

[hopkins]

I said that I only listen to valve systems, preferably SETs playing vinyl records. Since you are not showing the system playing a record, nor saying anything about the system, I am fairly certain you are putting a digital recording in front of me to prove something?

I'm not trying to trick you.

This is a vinyl rip uploaded to YouTube. The album was never released as a CD, so someone played it on a turntable (a pretty good one, presumably) plugged in to an ADC and then saved the file to a computer.

There was most probably no further processing (noise/click removal).

I happen to own this LP, and there was only one version of this recording ever released, so I know this is a nice vinyl rip.

Is it a "digital recording"? Yes, necessarily since you can listen to it on your phone.

Is it "more digital" or "less digital" than it would be were you to listen, on your phone, to a recording of horn speakers playing this LP with SET amps ? The question is not relevant.

How would the album sound like "in-room" played with a quality turntable [EDIT: with possibly less surface noise - as pointed out by Ron] and full analog setup with SET amps and horns ? I don't know because I have never heard it in this context. But I hope it would preserve the tone and timber of the instruments that are heard in the LP rip, preserve the sense of air and space in the recording, and the dynamics. If that is the case, it could certainly sound wonderful.

Now would it sound "natural"? The recording as captured in the vinyl pressing ? The playback ? Who is to say...

 

[hopkins]

I listened on the iPhone to the track beginning at 25:18. There is so much background noise (vinyl surface noise?) that I found it distracting. I felt like I'm listening to a old recording on an AM radio that is tuned to slightly off from the transmit frequency.

I don't think the instruments sound very clear and resolved.

There are definitely better recordings out there, but I find it very enjoyable. I chose it because I own the LP and know there are no CD versions available to compare.

Does the surface noise alter the "natural" aspect of the recording ? I don't think so.

If we can say that an iphone recording of speakers sounds "natural", then I think we can say the same of this one.

 

[bonzo75]

You think you know something you are simply not privy to. I think we should move on. There’s no reason to talk about someone who cannot participate in the discussion. I was simply pushing back on Rex’s assertions because they did not match my experience in any way.

there is nothing privy about the fact he did not like SME tables, Magico speakers, the cables you had before, and what he thinks of Opus

 

[Ron Resnick]

Does the surface noise alter the "natural" aspect of the recording ? I don't think so.

Fair enough. I think I have certain preconditions before I can walk through the threshold of suspension of disbelief. If I'm distracted by surface noise, I just can't get there. (Brightness or edginess are other ones.)

 

[stehno]

And sometimes great performances can be of material that makes me want to barf. That the performance causes an emotional response is, I suppose, desired. But in my case all I felt was a growing anxiety.

Compared to the boy on the talent show — simply moved by the beauty of it all. Hopefully I’ll get through the pearly gates when the time comes, that is the sound i expect from the angels. But even that would grow old i’m afraid and i’d be looking for the best blues bar in heaven.

Sorry but I’m unfamiliar with this version of heaven you describe but perhaps this too will help once you get there – if it doesn’t help you get there?

And for Pete's sake, crank this baby all the way up.