Break/Burn in. Is it Real?

[allthumbs]

42 minutes ago, Assisi said:

One reason I suggest this is because if I run cables in my system (any of them-power, speaker, Interconnect analog or digital) for say a period of a month and then I mechanically move the cable, there is a noticeable degradation in sound for a period of a few hours to a few days depending on the cable

Would you see such degradation with a TV image or is it just sound that is affected?

[Assisi]

42 minutes ago, allthumbs said:

Would you see such degradation with a TV image or is it just sound that is affected?

I have TV that is 14 years old.  It is 720p and based on things that happen now to the picture from time to time it is on its last legs.  My DVD player is a hand me down and is also probably almost as old as the TV.  The TV antenna is not too flash and I am some distance from the transmitter and the quality of the signal strength is medium.  I could go on.  I mainly watch Free to Air broadcast.  I went for two years and did not watch a single DVD.  As you can probably realise, TV is not overly important to me whereas my audio is very important.  So, I cannot answer the question that you pose about degradation in the context of TV.  I never think about it.

John

[Ittaku]

46 minutes ago, allthumbs said:

Would you see such degradation with a TV image or is it just sound that is affected?

Don't worry, there are plenty of audiovisual forums with people raving about the improved picture from high end HDMI cables, and Audioquest and all the other usual suspects from the audio world are busily poisoning enriching that market too.

[BugPowderDust]

I wonder if someone should start a thread on audiophile improvements that don’t work?
 

It seems any idea people throw up, no matter how ill considered or inane, has many vociferous advocates.

 

The scientific and experimental experiences may vary, but when you hit paydirt every time, you might have to eventually wonder who is spraying the dogshit In your garden gold?

 

Edited September 25, 2020 by recur

[sir sanders zingmore]

15 minutes ago, recur said:

 

I wonder if someone should start a thread on audiophile improvements that don’t work?

 

Like this:

 

[rawl99]

On 23/09/2020 at 9:15 PM, allthumbs said:

Going back to my post that you  quoted and its opening paragraph and given it  is more than likely my lack of ability to be articulate than your misreading of it but here it is again:

 

"It's kinda amazing how science is often co-opted on the basis of its ignorance and shortfalls of the undiscovered, the not yet found, the remaining unknown factors and the unprocessed new information that comes to light as science itself advances day by day,  to bolster a case for the purely subjectivist case.  Their is no lack of irony there. But why not hey? "

 

Perhaps you can explain how this tallies with your understanding of my intent when you write:

 

 

 

“It’s also kinda amazing how science is co-opted on the basis of ‘we know all there is to know about the incredibly simple process of conduction of electricity down a piece of wire’ to bolster a case for the purely objectivist case.  There is no lack of irony there. But why not hey?”

 

And yet in spite of my asking many many times over many many years for the absolutely definitive list of metrics that COMPLETELY define the reproduction of sound I am still patiently waiting.

If we knew as much as is claimed then there would be absolutely no room for argument or subjective opinion.

”Accurate” would but one thing and one thing only.

There would be a definitive list of metrics and their optimum values.

There would be ‘perfect’ and there would be not perfect and I would be easily able to measure the system to find out how close to perfect it is.

Still waiting am I.

 

Remember the 70s/80s when THD was the enemy and attaining THD at 0.001% or less was the holy grail and a whole industry bloomed manufacturing equipment that sounded like utter **** (but geez the THD measured well).

And then many years later some advanced researchers discovered that the huge amounts of negative feedback used to achieve super-low THD destroyed the sound.

How did they know that the feedback destroyed the sound?

Through much experimentation and correlating the SUBJECTIVE experiences of people with the measurements.

 

How do we know whether a certain measured metric correlates with good sound?

By comparing said metric with the subjective perception of listeners.
So at the end of the day any measurements are only as good as the correlation with peoples SUBJECTIVE listening experience.

 

So if Science advances day by day and expounds upon the unprocessed new information as you say above, then by definition everything is not already known and there must be room for expansion of our knowledge base?????

Yes, No?

[sir sanders zingmore]

29 minutes ago, rawl99 said:

And yet in spite of my asking many many times over many many years for the absolutely definitive list of metrics that COMPLETELY define the reproduction of sound I am still patiently waiting.

If you know anything about science you’ll know how disingenuous that sounds. 
 

 

[davewantsmoore]

On 23/09/2020 at 7:27 PM, rawl99 said:

Are you suggesting that you know exactly how electricity works?

Are you suggesting you know exactly what makes a conductor conduct?

Are you suggesting that you know exactly how a dielectric functions?

Let's assume the answer to these qustions are "No"..... the follow up becomes "so what?!" .... no in a dismissive way.   In a serious and detailed way.   What is the implication of this?  (Not the implication that you ar trying to make.... but the real implication in the real-world).

 

On 23/09/2020 at 7:27 PM, rawl99 said:

BUT, to suggest that we know as much as you seem to suggest is curbing the avenues for further study and research.

Indeed.

 

So "settling" in (audio, or any) cables is (would be) more than just a little bit intersting to science...... yes?!?? (yes!)   The magnitude of "error" needed to hear a difference is enormous (understatement) compared to other types of uses for electromagnetism that operate at other orders of magnitude.... and often have much more important practical implications for the world than audio reproduction.

 

 

So, is this thing just somehow limited to audio frequency signals?.... or is the rest of science "ignorant" (or uninterested), or both?... or something else?   (Hint:  They're not uninterested)

 

 

 

[Ittaku]

The only thing settling is our minds. Seriously, try a blinded trial one day. Just get a friend to switch in and out something you are absolutely sure makes a massive audible difference that science doesn't support and see what you think of your hearing and perception after that. I'm willing to listen to changes to my system that I don't believe will make a difference, so you should be willing to try out a blinded comparison.

[davewantsmoore]

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

And yet in spite of my asking many many times over many many years for the absolutely definitive list of metrics that COMPLETELY define the reproduction of sound I am still patiently waiting.

"reproduction of sound" is very broad....  Let's keep it to "signal down a wire", for now

 

(....  but it's a similar answer for any permutaton, but of course pressure in 3 dimensions, is much more complex to measure).

 

Input signal = output signal.

 

They can be recorded and compared with equisite detail and accuracy if desired.... with detail and accuracy bordering on the inane.

 

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

There would be a definitive list of metrics and their optimum values.

That you do not alter the signal that you begin with.

 

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

There would be ‘perfect’ and there would be not perfect and I would be easily able to measure the system to find out how close to perfect it is.

Indeed.   That is what you do.... and that is why the types of effects you are talkng about are well studied (and quantified).

 

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

Remember the 70s/80s when THD was the enemy and attaining THD at 0.001%

Yes.... it is a overly simplistic measure for a number of different reasons.    Everyone who is anyone knows that it is bunk..... so it's not a very good example to bring up for any reason except to show how manufacturers will print anything they think will appeal to their consumers, and/or tick a box.

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

And then many years later some advanced researchers discovered that the huge amounts of negative feedback used to achieve super-low THD destroyed the sound.

That an over simplification of what they found.

 

The version you've printed here is what the "avoid feedback" manufacturers say.... for just the same reasons as the "low THD is the holy grail" manufacturers say what they say   

 

In the real world.... feedback is quite well understood.... and like many things, a good and powerful tool except when it's not used well, when it makes a "very effective mess".

 

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

How did they know that the feedback destroyed the sound?

Through much experimentation and correlating the SUBJECTIVE experiences of people with the measurements.

See above.   Not all uses of feedback lead to an equal result.

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

How do we know whether a certain measured metric correlates with good sound?

That's a very complex question.....  that very much depends on the recording and the speakers/environment..... for a "a wire".... it is quite simple (don't alter the signal).

 

1 hour ago, rawl99 said:

By comparing said metric with the subjective perception of listeners.

Are we supposed to ignore the whole body of science which tell us this is fraught with error

 

.... are we also supposed to ignore the inane detail with which we can measure the transmission of signals to see if we have actually changed them (vs. whether we think they changed)?

 

... or do you no believe that electomagnetism can be measured (very, very, very!) precicely?    Note well.... I'm talking about whether audio product designers do measure it precicley or dilligently ...... just is it possible

[davewantsmoore]

16 minutes ago, Ittaku said:

The only thing settling is our minds.

... and there is an entire branch of science which thinks so.   

 

Of course, for people who are skptical..... they can examine the signals, and demonstrate the change in signal.... and thus point to a possible alternate explanation.

 

The changes which do happen, and very very well understood, as they're not irrelevant in some fields.

 

16 minutes ago, Ittaku said:

Seriously, try a blinded trial one day. Just get a friend to switch in and out something you are absolutely sure makes a massive audible difference that science doesn't support and see what you think of your hearing and perception after that. I'm willing to listen to changes to my system that I don't believe will make a difference, so you should be willing to try out a blinded comparison.

What a lot of people seem to overlook is that a key part of blinded testing is that the test subjects don't know they're being tested.

 

... not that they don't know what the test is ..... that they don't even know there is a test happening.

 

I set up my computer back in the day to make random alterations to the audio whenever I played things through it..... it would record what it did to the music (eg. recode CDs into low bitrate MP3s .... or turn on and off EQ.... or many other things) .... and I would record my subjective impressions whenever I felt like there was something going on)..... most of the time (more than 70% of the time) the computer made no changes (so I wasn't sure if I was being tested.... and a lot of time I honestly mostly forgot about it)  ....  Some friends of mine also participated on occassions in the experiement.

 

It wasn't perfect.... but no subjectivity is, it's really fraught with problems.... but comparing my listening notes over nearly a year, to the logs on the computer.....  was more than a little bit eye opening.  

 

[muon*]

If I wanted the nicest sounding amp possible and built by someone in this thread, I'd pick rawl99 to do it.

[Ittaku]

54 minutes ago, davewantsmoore said:

What a lot of people seem to overlook is that a key part of blinded testing is that the test subjects don't know they're being tested.

 

... not that they don't know what the test is ..... that they don't even know there is a test happening.

 

I'm not even asking people to perform a properly conducted DBT. Even a simple blinded one will blow most people's minds. Let's not get into what a proper trial involves; it really doesn't matter. Not knowing when the random black discs are on your speaker terminals or not, or which power cable is plugged in, even if you know they're being tested, is enough.

[davewantsmoore]

6 hours ago, Ittaku said:

I'm not even asking people to perform a properly conducted DBT. Even a simple blinded one will blow most people's minds. Let's not get into what a proper trial involves; it really doesn't matter. Not knowing when the random black discs are on your speaker terminals or not, or which power cable is plugged in, even if you know they're being tested, is enough.

Indeed, it often is.

[RoHo]

7 hours ago, davewantsmoore said:

...

 

I set up my computer back in the day to make random alterations to the audio whenever I played things through it..... it would record what it did to the music (eg. recode CDs into low bitrate MP3s .... or turn on and off EQ.... or many other things) .... and I would record my subjective impressions whenever I felt like there was something going on)..... most of the time (more than 70% of the time) the computer made no changes (so I wasn't sure if I was being tested.... and a lot of time I honestly mostly forgot about it)  ....  Some friends of mine also participated on occassions in the experiement.

 

It wasn't perfect.... but no subjectivity is, it's really fraught with problems.... but comparing my listening notes over nearly a year, to the logs on the computer.....  was more than a little bit eye opening.  

 

Kudos to you Dave for actually going to this much effort.  Did you reach any conclusions?  Did you reliably notice anything?

[allthumbs]

10 hours ago, rawl99 said:

How do we know whether a certain measured metric correlates with good sound?

By comparing said metric with the subjective perception of listeners.
So at the end of the day any measurements are only as good as the correlation with peoples SUBJECTIVE listening experience.

Well to some extent it has been done in regards to Floyd Toole and Sean Olive's predictive assessment of what listeners subjectively consider "good sound" by a series of tests for a number of loudspeaker comparisons. The listeners were blind tested and consisted of golden eared audiophiles and others of sonically great unwashed and as I understand it came to the same conclusions as to what constituted to their like mindedness "good sound".  However it can only be seen as a starting point, because as it often said everyone is different, even the rudimentary characteristics of our anatomy, head size and shape, ear size and shape, health and range of hearing and on and on it goes.  But despite that some common ground was found in regards as to what "good sound" was to those people that undertook the testing.

 

So Toole's measurements reflect objective testing correlation with peoples subjective listening experiences so much so he built a predictive model out of it. Have you seen the film Money Ball, it springs to mind? At a long stretch it bears similarities to the great audio debate, Romance vs Hard data there's room for both but if you want to be successful consistently, economically, Hard Data is the way to go. 

 

I looked at Yamaha's 2019 Annual Report today and AVR sales globally were around AUD$680 million. Their main competition Bose and Sonos.

That's a lot of money to be risking on the basis of subjective listening experience alone, I'd hazard a guess there is a lot of hard data based on a lot of hard objective measurement . It runs the gamut of personal audio, PA and pro audio sound over and above the stuff they do in computers, automotive and industrial sound solutions.

 

I prefer the romance of audio myself, I love it, enjoy it, I envy every DIY'er on Stereonet and I tip my hat to them with gritted teeth from sheer jealousy.

 

But I am reliant on the Yamaha's and IAG's of the world, and so it goes.

 

In the end we are all just shooting the breeze over a many faceted topic......... just saying.

[davewantsmoore]

3 hours ago, RoHo said:

Kudos to you Dave for actually going to this much effort.

It was part of learning how to design speakers (better).... I initially thought I could use listening tests to help... but over time I found that to be (mostly) flawed.    I thought that was very unfortunate, as I thought I could do a good job of it (once upon a time I was an ok musician, and I think I have a fair bit of experience with that, and great taste, LOL).

3 hours ago, RoHo said:

 Did you reach any conclusions?

It's hard to compress it all into any type of "punchline"..... but if you know you are being tested, or worse if you have some expectations about the test.... then you can hear all manner of things.

 

Some of the different types of "testing" I have done since have been even more enlightening.... and it has really shaped the way I go about making a speaker.

[davewantsmoore]

2 hours ago, allthumbs said:

Well to some extent it has been done in regards to Floyd Toole and Sean Olive's predictive assessment of what listeners subjectively consider "good sound" by a series of tests for a number of loudspeaker comparisons. The listeners were blind tested and consisted of golden eared audiophiles and others of sonically great unwashed and as I understand it came to the same conclusions as to what constituted to their like mindedness "good sound".  However it can only be seen as a starting point, because as it often said everyone is different, even the rudimentary characteristics of our anatomy, head size and shape, ear size and shape, health and range of hearing and on and on it goes.  But despite that some common ground was found in regards as to what "good sound" was to those people that undertook the testing.

Toole/Olive are talking about a speaker (which I like to talk about) .... but earlier I was obviously limiting my analysis to "electronic signals".

 

Presure in a room is obviouslt a lot more complex..... but there isn't anything much controversial about what they found..... in so far as (in a similar way that electric signals should be "preserved") ..... that what they sound boils down to simply (after you account for some important caveats around what they tested) "don't distort the signal".

[allthumbs]

18 minutes ago, davewantsmoore said:

Toole/Olive are talking about a speaker (which I like to talk about)

@davewantsmoore I would give anything to be able to do what you do.  I'm kind of stuck in mid-fi Hi-Fi but don't get me wrong I enjoy this space, very much so because I can still make large leaps instead of incremental steps.

 

What fascinates me is that I can strum my uke or guitar or blow a note on a recorder or a mouth organ in my living room.  And then I see in some of signatures of fellow stereonetters a list a mile long of a sound reproduction system that neither for love nor money seems to be able to reproduce accurately those sounds.

 

But I have been fooled, I was down in Tassie on the Hobart Waterfront in one of those converted shipping halls on the pier, full of cafes and gift shops.  I heard a female pianist playing and singing but when I got to the space, there was a P.A. cube high up on the wall and what looked like a stage fold back speaker on the floor (tweeter, mids and bass I presume respectively). The music was playback from a computer. The space was all glass and wide open spaces, cafe tables and serving bar, the speakers looked like they had been placed by chance for convenience's sake more than sonic success, but gee did it sound sweet.

 

And so it goes.

[MLXXX]

12 hours ago, allthumbs said:

But I have been fooled, I was down in Tassie on the Hobart Waterfront in one of those converted shipping halls on the pier, full of cafes and gift shops.  I heard a female pianist playing and singing but when I got to the space, there was a P.A. cube high up on the wall and what looked like a stage fold back speaker on the floor (tweeter, mids and bass I presume respectively). The music was playback from a computer. The space was all glass and wide open spaces, cafe tables and serving bar, the speakers looked like they had been placed by chance for convenience's sake more than sonic success, but gee did it sound sweet.

 

And so it goes.

Yes, we often see claims that extraordinarily advanced and expensive equipment is required for audio reproduction to come within coo-ee of sounding realistic, but if we are around a corner from where sound is being produced, even modest equipment can fool us into thinking there is a live acoustic performance in progress.

 

There is a kind of converse I've noticed, that if you're in an auditorium for a live performance but seated in a bad seat (e.g. far from the stage and receiving a lot of reflected sound) the quality of the live sound you hear can actually be subjectively worse than reproduced sound from a mid-range system. 

 

(My above comments are in relation to live acoustic sound, e.g. a symphony orchestra plus solo pianist. With pop music where microphones and speakers are used in a live performance, what you hear even live is reproduced sound!)

[davewantsmoore]

13 hours ago, allthumbs said:

What fascinates me is that I can strum my uke or guitar or blow a note on a recorder or a mouth organ in my living room.  And then I see in some of signatures of fellow stereonetters a list a mile long of a sound reproduction system that neither for love nor money seems to be able to reproduce accurately those sounds.

Recordings are not typically made in a living room.    So the recording you are playing back, shouldn't sound a lot like the instrument played in your room.   Especially not when you are holding the instrument (close)  

 

One interesting experiment is one I heard propheted by Tom Danley..... record a speaker playing music from the listening position..... play it back.... switch back and forth between the actual music and the recording of the spaker playing the music (level match it, etc.).    How different does it sound?

 

.... now record, the speaker playing back the recording...... then record the speakr playing back the recording of the recording (of the recording of the recording of the music playback).

 

How many generations does it take to "get terrible"?    It's a very interesting experiment to do  (and was a good practical demonstration for me that constant directivity across the full frequency range was very very helpful)

 

13 hours ago, allthumbs said:

But I have been fooled

 

[MLXXX]

On 26/09/2020 at 9:41 PM, allthumbs said:

What fascinates me is that I can strum my uke or guitar or blow a note on a recorder or a mouth organ in my living room.  And then I see in some of signatures of fellow stereonetters a list a mile long of a sound reproduction system that neither for love nor money seems to be able to reproduce accurately those sounds.

Of course you need to consider not just the reproduction process but the recording process. Different microphones sound different, giving a different timbre, even condenser microphones with relatively flat looking frequency response curves. And the same microphone will sound different at a different distance from the source (partly because of the different mix of direct and reflected sound, and partly because of the microphone polar response interacting with the polar emission characteristics of the musical instruments).

 

Loudspeaker systems with their extremely jagged frequency response curves, and high THD and IMD figures, tend to sound dramatically different from each other. Even comparing left and right speaker systems purchased as a pair can reveal distinctly audible differences between them.  On the other hand, amplifiers tend to sound very similar.  And the left channel of an amplifier will tend to sound exactly the same as its right channel.

 

Human perception of sound varies greatly depending on one's physical and mental state. Sometimes playing the same track on a CD or a vinyl disc will transport the listener to another world. Other times that track may sound lifeless and boring.

 

Within the context of the above sorts of considerations, I find it remarkable that anyone could hear a slight change in amplifier performance especially if the change occurred gradually over many hours of "running in".  I also don't understand why the change would necessarily be favourable rather than merely "different".  I can't help feeling that in many cases people may simply get more accustomed to the sound of their kit, and learn to appreciate its sound more and more as time goes on, until they reach a plateau in their level of appreciation.

Edited September 27, 2020 by MLXXX

[allthumbs]

7 hours ago, davewantsmoore said:

constant directivity

Constant/controlled directivity is a theme I am trying to wrap my mind around recently.

[davewantsmoore]

2 hours ago, allthumbs said:

Constant/controlled directivity is a theme I am trying to wrap my mind around recently.

Putting it simply.

 

The sound that reaches you directly has a certin frequency balance (bass vs mid vs treble) .... and the sound that bounces off the walls and arrives later has a certain (likely different) frequency balance.

 

If the later arriving sound are the same as the first arrival, your brain can earily ignore them......  otherwise, your brain uses the difference has information to try and interpret the audio

 

[rawl99]

On 20/09/2020 at 2:40 PM, davewantsmoore said:

Yes... but it gave me a chuckle.

 

 

... and it does go to something quite relevant / true ..... If many of these effects promoted by audiophile companies had merit .... then they would be known in other areas and applications of science where they would have immense effect.   Audio is a very basic field of science compared to many many others.

And your last sentence is where I think the issue lies.

It may not be quite as simple as some people claim/believe.

I grant you that the coarse aspects could be reasonably well understood but there is an abundance of conflicting opinions and research to suggest that the fine aspects are not as well understood as you continue to claim.