Guest Eggcup The Daft Posted June 26, 2017 Share Posted June 26, 2017 On 16/06/2017 at 8:04 PM, Zaphod Beeblebrox said: Completely unnecessary, as the human ear/brain system compensates for a gradual hearing loss. A sudden hearing loss is a different matter entirely. Worst of all is fluctuating hearing loss. My partner has recently fallen in love with headphones - on top of greater clarity, she is hearing proper stereo for the first time in over 40 years. So the TV now runs through the stereo all the time and lip sync isn't correctable the way I have to do it... something I have to consider with my end of year upgrade. At the same time, when the headphones are plugged into my Moon i-1, imaging through the speakers goes wonky. Something else to add to my end of year upgrade. I need to catch her when hearing is good, to find out how far up the quality chain is worth buying for her, as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HdB Posted June 26, 2017 Share Posted June 26, 2017 I would suggest, and I'm no expert mind you, that you take your Mrs to the shop for her to have a listen for herself - it's not just the freq response but the sound itself, the clarity, the fit, the look, the matching amp/preamp, plus the 'less than immaculate source', etc - if this isn't possible, suggest discussing the problem with a local headphone specialist and organise a way to loan/return different models I know some people who's hearing starts to roll off above 4 - 5kHz but just love the sound reproduction of the expensive Stax headphone/amps - not so elderly either. On the other hand, many people are perfectly happy with the more basic headphones and have quite adequate hearing response Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Eggcup The Daft Posted June 26, 2017 Share Posted June 26, 2017 (edited) 32 minutes ago, jrhill said: I would suggest, and I'm no expert mind you, that you take your Mrs to the shop for her to have a listen for herself - it's not just the freq response but the sound itself, the clarity, the fit, the look, the matching amp/preamp, plus the 'less than immaculate source', etc - if this isn't possible, suggest discussing the problem with a local headphone specialist and organise a way to loan/return different models I know some people who's hearing starts to roll off above 4 - 5kHz but just love the sound reproduction of the expensive Stax headphone/amps - not so elderly either. On the other hand, many people are perfectly happy with the more basic headphones and have quite adequate hearing response That's my intention. However, there are periods where her hearing is bad to the point that any listening for sound quality is pointless, and times when her hearing is good enough to pick up differences between different CDs of the same music - it's that wide. Her hearing is also quite different between ears, to make things even worse, and one ear can be better and the other worse at times as well. I suspect a balance control and perhaps a mono switch would be useful for the worse periods, as well, but we'll find out over time. That's enough for this thread hijack. How do the old Quad tilt/slope controls compare to normal tone controls? I've wondered about that sometimes. Edited June 26, 2017 by Eggcup The Daft Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HdB Posted June 26, 2017 Share Posted June 26, 2017 I see you've got quite the problem with such changes in her hearing - do you know what's causing it? I haven't heard the old quad pre in some time but I think a guy on diyAudio called Thorsten Loersh did a modern equivalent awhile ago and all of his publications are worth a good look - apart from this phase problem with the tone controls, I'd suggest with good components and a clean, transparent follower/gain stage (if you didn't want to 'colour the sound' a bit), they'd perform rather well - they're limited in slope but I think that's not such a bad thing in practice - I remember there is a way to produce a +/- 3dB slope above the axis freq and a +/- 6dB slope below that'd be more useful for some recordings - I was thinking about adding this to the Aikido valve gain stage but didn't get around to it for some reason. Some time back, I remember a local here built a fully specced version of the simple form of the Neve basic desk 2 channel preamp with the bass, para mids, and treble and was astonished at the quality of the sound - and he's a pianist and prefers valve sound. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darth vader Posted June 26, 2017 Share Posted June 26, 2017 Tone controls take me back to being a 14 year old boy... If it feels good...do it. you dont have to tell anyone you did.... loudness. hmmm loudness. i like it. Hmmm more loudness. oh yeah, loud me up baby! Ohhh...just there. oh, oh, more loudness!..... Damn you Farrah Fawcett..... 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Newman Posted June 26, 2017 Share Posted June 26, 2017 hmmm loudness. @darth vader Tone controls have a bad rap for sure. Not entirely earned. Which is not to say they are the innocent victims of a setup, no sir, but it's easy to scream hang 'em! when all they did was steal a stubby holder at the car-boot fair, put jumping jacks in Evil Aunt Agatha's letterbox, run a coin down your car paint, and do burnouts outside the power station at 2am. Like anything, analog tone controls can be done well or done badly. A decent tone control circuit is pretty well indispensable if you don't have or want digital alternatives. Do you know how much source material has a tonal balance problem? Lots. But hey, I guess the high priests prefer to intone about blasphemy and moan about crappy recordings that they can't make any adjustments to. Use it with impunity and ignore the phase argument, which is really a debate. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
t_mike Posted June 27, 2017 Share Posted June 27, 2017 5 hours ago, Newman said: run a coin down your car paint, Yes, that should be a hangable offence. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Newman Posted June 27, 2017 Share Posted June 27, 2017 I actually put that one in as bait. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
t_mike Posted June 27, 2017 Share Posted June 27, 2017 7 minutes ago, Newman said: I actually put that one in as bait. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steam Posted June 27, 2017 Share Posted June 27, 2017 (edited) Tone Controls and Loudness are great. Best of all you can have them On or OFF! Yay! I bought an Accuphase pre for exactly this reason. So far I am yet to detect the end of the world when I turn the tone controls on. For good recordings nothing is needed. But when I dredge up an early track by The Who I can't stand it until it gets some treatment. Imaging and phase problems with some early seventies recordings are the least of your problems. Making your ears bleed with early digital? Why suffer that when you don't have to. You can cook it up just the way you like it - or not. So if YOU like em use them. The same phase science will also tell me that many valve amps are sub standard as well. But who cares if YOU like it. Never let anyone tell YOU what YOU like. Edited June 27, 2017 by Steam 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
almikel Posted June 27, 2017 Share Posted June 27, 2017 On 6/26/2017 at 10:11 AM, PleasantSounds said: The studio situation is a bit different, as you can adjust all the instruments individually. Typically you have one sound source per track, or in other words the EQ is applied to mono signal. That does not affect the subsequent placement of that instrument in the stereo image. What impacts the imaging is the uneven distribution of sounds in the image – this causes that phase shifts are different between the channels and result in blurred imaging. In a previous era where recordings were done with minimal mikes, you got a proper sense of space and depth on a recording, and on playback could "place" a particular instrument within the sound field. With modern recordings there's a tendency to "close mike" everything, and any "image" is artificial and created by the producer using pan potting etc - an example is if your room is wide, the piano appears as wide as your room... I hate it when they close mike the piano and the low notes come from 1 speaker and the high notes the other. I would say this is less natural sounding than any EQ applied during playback. Only my opinion, but good imaging starts during the recording process, and can be wrecked way before it gets to the CD, Vinyl, or whatever medium - and the concept of a "Sound Stage", where you could close your eyes and hear the singer at the front, instruments beside and behind the singer have largely disappeared due to close miking - capturing the depth of a sound stage - placing instruments on a stage front to back, doesn't work with close miking. It hasn't been my experience that mucking with playback EQ changes left to right placement of instruments or the overall image. On 6/26/2017 at 11:18 AM, jrhill said: Now, if I understand this correctly, electronic Xovers, as 'simple' filters, will also produce sonic degredation depending on the complexity, except for a specifically designed linear phase filters, yes? In fact, any filter at all that introduces a phase shift, wide band or narrow (Q) has this problem? Not sure what you mean by degradation? - all filters have impact including linear phase filters (no free lunch) - whether it's audible is the question. Linear phase filters introduce "pre ringing" - you start to hear the drum hit before the drum hit - a non-causal effect which is quite un-natural.. Most auditory things in nature are causal - something happens and you hear it. I'm not saying linear filters are bad, just that all filters have compromises. The steeper the filter the more they ring (resonate) - for linear filters this is both pre and post ringing, for non-linear filters this is only post ringing. - the energy in the ringing will be the same for equivalent filters - just that a linear phase filter will share the energy on both sides of Time = 0, a non linear filter has all ringing energy at Time > 0 Tone controls will experience the same thing - phase impact and ringing will depend on how much EQ is applied. The ringing of any filter is best observed in the impulse response. All filters ring Linear phase filters have pre-ringing and post-ringing Non-linear phase filters only have post ringing IMHO EQ is a great tool if used well - but it's effects and limitations should be understood. Linear Phase EQ isn't better or worse than minimum phase/parametric EQ, and neither is evil, unless poorly applied. Properly applied EQ could help imaging if correcting a room issue. Mike 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cyclingsteve Posted June 28, 2017 Share Posted June 28, 2017 On Wednesday, June 14, 2017 at 6:50 PM, catman said: G'day all, I have a new DIY project in mind to build another stereo line preamp with tone controls! Although I have always been a bit 'reluctant' about using tone controls, in my 'old age' I am starting to see that they may have some merit and value after all! Anybody routinely use tone controls, especially with phono sources? Regards, Felix. Hi Felix If it works for you go for it. After all its about how you enjoy your music. I have had tone controls on amps in the past and present. My main amp doesnt have them and I dont miss them. What did irk me was if I did start using them then I found I was fiddling with the controls constantly. But other times especially when a recording was super crappy those controls were very handy. steve 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
catman Posted June 29, 2017 Author Share Posted June 29, 2017 G'day all, I have now ordered the circuit board for this preamp project and yes it has tone controls: http://sound.whsites.net/project97.htm Regards, Felix. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts