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- Newsgroups: rec.audio
- Path: sparky!uunet!walter!porthos!hera!gfl
- From: gfl@herahera.cc.bellcore.com (lenahan,grant f)
- Subject: Re: DAC to ADC components? Snake Oil??
- Organization: Bellcore, Livingston, NJ
- Distribution: rec.audio, sci.electronics
- Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 18:30:48 GMT
- Message-ID: <1992Dec16.183048.15107@porthos.cc.bellcore.com>
- Summary: Zen, Engineering, and My Damned Opinions
- References: <1992Dec16.135923.9475@porthos.cc.bellcore.com> <1992Dec16.151227.2093@news.ysu.edu>
- Sender: netnews@porthos.cc.bellcore.com (USENET System Software)
- Lines: 52
-
- Somebody wrote:
- > : > My system consists of a Carver CT-6 pre-amp
- > : > tuner, Carver TFM-25 amp, KEF 104.2 speakers. I am an EE by training
- > : > and do understand the technical aspects of these designs, but I can't
- > : > help being scheptical about the added benifit of such devices, since
- > : > it appears that the audio world is approaching the limits of our
- > : > perceptability.
-
- I wrote:
- > : You mix two statements. One a question of absolute quality,
- > : one of perceptability and/or value judgement. I can never
- > : help you define the latter; its _your_ value judegment.
- > :
- avs.com (Joe Peterson) writes:
- > Havn't you ever read "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"?
- > If so, you'll know that "absolute quality" cannot be defined either.
- > But seriously, isn't quality in audio really just what sounds best?
- >
- And finally, I respond ....
-
- OoH, what an authoritative source. Yea, I read it.
-
- But you ask an interesting question (all others can zone out now):
- In an artistic light, sure, what else matters. But in a design,
- advance knowledge, bring better music to the market light, "sounds"
- "good" must be highly qualified. Through what associated components,
- for example? Should we design DACs that compensate for shitty
- speakers, so that when speakers improve our DACs are shitty?
-
- (no offense to speaker dsesigners out there - just an eg:)
-
- On the other hand, I can't adhere to the "if it measures well,
- it sounds well" school, because we don't always measure the
- right things, or know how to weight and interpret them. At
- least I don't; JJ claims he does, and he amd his rich employer
- are probably right.
-
- In most cases, I'd rather strive for a quantitative "good",
- within the bounds of what can be usefully quantified. Sometimes
- that involves double-blind listening on bunches of randomly
- different stuff, other times its actually measured. Unfortunately,
- too many companies claim to have reduced "reverberent quasi-random
- ordered 1/2 isotope channel noise" to unheard of levels, or
- simply lump random, harmonic, IM, even and odd harmonics, and
- all orders of the former in one giant, unweighted, useless
- blob. Sounds good is better than THAT mess, but is it really
- productive? I think not.
-
- Grant
-
-
-
-