GRollins said:
Grey, there is a German book by Tietze and Schenk that is equally as good as Horowitz and Hill. They complement each other very well. Both of those are fairly out of date with regards to the parts mentioned, but a revised edition of the German book is due out any day now. Expensive, but worth it.
http://www.amazon.com/Electronic-Circuits-Handbook-Design-Application/dp/3540004297/
Questions (maybe philosophical?)
Now that the vast knowledge base and educational attainment of the multitudinous cognoscenti here on DIY has been established, what reproducible method, technique, apparati, should the rest of us meer mortals utilize to determine when something we've (done, changed, modified, etc.) ACTUALLY makes a difference to more than one person (usually the one who made the difference)?
How does one determine the (color, size, density, etc... unkown) of the "magic pixie dust" to (sprinkle, entomb, imbue, etc.) onto/into/upon our device/structure/embodiment in order to convince someone else that it really is occurring, if unmeasuarble and mysterious "thingies" make a difference in (cables/capacitors/IC's/whatever) that are propsed for use and argued about.??
Seems to me the subjective stance will always win the argument, with the "golden ear" trophy betrohen.
just a thought...
Now that the vast knowledge base and educational attainment of the multitudinous cognoscenti here on DIY has been established, what reproducible method, technique, apparati, should the rest of us meer mortals utilize to determine when something we've (done, changed, modified, etc.) ACTUALLY makes a difference to more than one person (usually the one who made the difference)?
How does one determine the (color, size, density, etc... unkown) of the "magic pixie dust" to (sprinkle, entomb, imbue, etc.) onto/into/upon our device/structure/embodiment in order to convince someone else that it really is occurring, if unmeasuarble and mysterious "thingies" make a difference in (cables/capacitors/IC's/whatever) that are propsed for use and argued about.??
Seems to me the subjective stance will always win the argument, with the "golden ear" trophy betrohen.
just a thought...
Re: Questions (maybe philosophical?)
That's easy. You apply the very same method used to hear ghosts, which science cannot yet detect by measurement and may never, since attaining infinite wisdom remains beyond human capacity.
You just listen.
See above. Or, you could read audiophile websites. Better yet, check out frontier, cutting edge science journals like Stereophile.
cheers,
AJ
auplater said:
That's easy. You apply the very same method used to hear ghosts, which science cannot yet detect by measurement and may never, since attaining infinite wisdom remains beyond human capacity.
You just listen.
See above. Or, you could read audiophile websites. Better yet, check out frontier, cutting edge science journals like Stereophile.
cheers,
AJ
GRollins said:
No, you only understand it by half. I did not say that lower distortion necessarily equates to "better sound".
Please note the above emphasis and please stop contorting and stupefying my arguments into the narrow confines of your own thinking.
Charles Hansen said:
I don’t think that Grey nailed anything on the head and I don’t think that I am confusing cause with correlation.
The fact of the matter is that, according to your claims, you lowered THD in an attempt to address a deficiency causing sonic degradation – your alleged sonic improvements came with a verifiable and measurable improvement in performance.
BTW, nobody here has come up with (or really even attempted) a remotely conclusive argument in support of actually dismissing the possibility of a cause and effect relationship with THD and perceived sonic performance.
And may I ask, if somebody actually set to design an amplifier with the objective aim to lower THD without a care for “sonics”, and did so, in part, with the same circuit tricks you used, would you agree that the end result could in fact be the same?
Or are the techniques you use to improve linearity too obscure and unknown to modern electronics engineering?
I don’t know what the threshold of audibility is. I would say that it would vary hugely from person to person and the situation of the listening environment.
But we are not talking about op amp or pre amps here – we are talking about power amplifiers.
The level of THD produced by your power amplifiers is above what I’d be comfortable with. I’ve owned or built and listened to enough high distortion amplifiers and enough low distortion amplifiers of a multitude of technologies to know that I don’t like high THD – whatever it’s flavour.
Now if you can give me a way of lowering THD (and the multitude of other interrelated non-linearities) to the level that I desire without applying with engineering sense these things that you deride as “band-aids”, I’d really like to hear it.
Unfortunately, meters are at least as flawed as the human ear. Moreso, in fact. The only thing they bring is a thin veneer of science. (Look, Ethel, my new Durawowsler 1000 has .0001% less distortion than the Gigafloobie 200. Obviously it's better.) If you choose meters as your "authority" you are just as much a slave as if you had given yourself blindly to some golden ear.
The solution--not much admired because it requires time and effort--is to train your own hearing.
Grey
P.S.: My background in psychology comes into play when I watch foolish people advocating blind listening tests, wherein they heard no difference. Well, golly gee, I reckon not since they went in with a predisposition to hear no difference.
Listener bias, indeed!
That ain't science, that's anti-science.
The solution--not much admired because it requires time and effort--is to train your own hearing.
Grey
P.S.: My background in psychology comes into play when I watch foolish people advocating blind listening tests, wherein they heard no difference. Well, golly gee, I reckon not since they went in with a predisposition to hear no difference.
Listener bias, indeed!
That ain't science, that's anti-science.
Charles Hansen said:
Huh? I thought all your potential customers are the type that just listen? Why would meaningless, measured distortion numbers matter to them? Doesn't seem to slow the sale of SET's, etc. I suspect it may increase your sales having those type numbers. As long as you amplifiers continue to sound so stellar when one just listens.
Charles Hansen said:
Wait, they just listen at Stereophile too correct? They are not going to be fooled by silly measurements and numbers come just listen review time, right?
Charles Hansen said:
Now I'm really confused. Wouldn't it be far more reliable and less time consuming/costly during QC to just listen to the damn unit?
Who cares if it measures at 0.05% if it sounds like angels singing, identical to your 0.01% unit? Your customer is concerned with how it sounds, not measures, correct? Is higher distortion an indication of unit failure probability?
cheers,
AJ
Even professional designers have the option of ignoring things they don't care to acknowledge. And you guys (Charles and John) have enough under your belt that I think you can easily do so, rather than take your ball and go home. The discussion has been 90% interesting and entertaining, and even if you do decide to take it private, you deserve many thanks; writing all this down was some real work, this isn't a paid gig, you don't have to do it, and I personally appreciate it and was entertained and educated.
From my own POV (not speaking as a moderator!) there are a few good points in the recent skeptical posts that ought to be addressed, but those points are rendered ineffective by the tone and bluster surrounding them by their presenters. If you're actually seeking an answer, a polite and respectful tone is the norm in professional circles; this isn't a professional forum but (now speaking as a moderator) that is the general tone we wish to keep here.
From my own POV (not speaking as a moderator!) there are a few good points in the recent skeptical posts that ought to be addressed, but those points are rendered ineffective by the tone and bluster surrounding them by their presenters. If you're actually seeking an answer, a polite and respectful tone is the norm in professional circles; this isn't a professional forum but (now speaking as a moderator) that is the general tone we wish to keep here.
I like records too. Today I listened to a Grateful Dead casette tape, recorded from an FM broadcast that was originally recorded on analog tape. It was wonderful! Sure, there was distortion, but the essence was there. Using the same automobile player, I turned on the only oldies rock station that has converted to some sort of digital format. What garbage! It is virtually unlistenable. Same car, same amps, same speakers.
What is the 'magic' that was first recorded? Why did digital processing destroy its essence? If you can't hear the difference, then quality audio reproduction is not for you.
What is the 'magic' that was first recorded? Why did digital processing destroy its essence? If you can't hear the difference, then quality audio reproduction is not for you.
If Charles Hansen hasn't already left, and if it fits well enough, I would like to hear his thoughts on resonance control and its impact on audio design. This is an area that Ayre seems to be in the forefront in the industry. For instance, machining the chassis out of solid billet with both ends of the heat sink fins integrated back into the chassis seems like a resonance control strategy. To me, there are other things to discuss when the designers are hanging out. - Thanks for your patience, and sorry if this is off whatever topic this thread is supposed to be about.
I was wondering that myself. Obviously a chassis machined from solid would have better vibration damping properties than one made up of formed sheetmetal of the same material. Vibration damping is a personal hobby horse of mine and I have recently toyed with the idea of casting a chassis from a non-ferrous HiDaMet (high-damping metal) alloy.
John
GRollins said:
Way off topic but gratifying to hear a professional in the field support what I've always maintained. The notion of acknowledged advocates of the inaudibility of passive components holding ABX demonstrations on subjects fully aware of the tester's bias to prove (more correctly teach) the inaudibility of passive components is comedy gold.
Sorry to see you go Charles. Understandable, but still a bummer. The discussions between you, Curl and Cordell were great reading.
I don't know about chassis machined from billet, but I can tell you that years ago we needed a non-resonant lump of aluminum for an optical scanner where I worked. We chose what we thought was a soft grade of aluminum and had a big prism shape cast, about a foot long. It was amazing. You could have hung it in any church bell tower and been proud. Tapped with a pencil, it rang and rang and rang. We covered it with lead/vinyl damping sheets. It still rang. The thing was convinced it was a bell, and nobody was going to tell it otherwise. IMHO, there's something to be said for wood, though I worry about flammability and you still have to shield it. Robust sheet metal with damping sheets isn't as impressive as machining from solid, but I'd be a little wary of big rigid structures. At least it wouldn't be cast. 
Hi Glen,
I will give you several small advices, if you allow me.
Even if you made the best engineered audio circuit, you would not be appreciated and received here.
Even if you made the best sounding audio gear, you would not be appreciated and received here.
The reasons are simple. You are not 80 years old and so you are not experienced in first audio opamps that saturated and had slew rate of 0.3V/us. If you were experienced, you would know that modern opamp with 2500v/us is good for nothing. You have not worked for a rock band. You do not have mighty crowd of devoted adorers.
Then, you must be half-educated in EE or self-educated to be able to perceive the audio circuit subtleties. Then you will know that circuit design itself does not matter, that it is mechanical resonance that counts.
After all, I'll share with you some of my personal experience. Several times I brought to Luxtone my designs of preamps and power amps. They were not placed in platinum chassis, they were not particularly mechanically stable. We compared them with very well known high end products, designers of which contribute here. We had pretty good loudspeakers for testing, no worse than Wilson Sophia, but mostly we made listening tests on Wilson Audio Maxx speakers. You would not believe it, but noname products beated those well known in sound, agreed by studio staff. I told them that it is circuit design and EMI protection that counts, not massive panels and 100kg weight of chassis. These guys were not aware of anything in electronics and believed in hypes. You would not believe their surprise when they seen the breadboarded stuff inside preamp. Then, after some time, I got a purchase order. Properly done circuit on a PCB with groundplane was even better than the breadboarded
.
So, take it easy here and have fun.
Regards,
Pavel
I will give you several small advices, if you allow me.
Even if you made the best engineered audio circuit, you would not be appreciated and received here.
Even if you made the best sounding audio gear, you would not be appreciated and received here.
The reasons are simple. You are not 80 years old and so you are not experienced in first audio opamps that saturated and had slew rate of 0.3V/us. If you were experienced, you would know that modern opamp with 2500v/us is good for nothing. You have not worked for a rock band. You do not have mighty crowd of devoted adorers.
Then, you must be half-educated in EE or self-educated to be able to perceive the audio circuit subtleties. Then you will know that circuit design itself does not matter, that it is mechanical resonance that counts.
After all, I'll share with you some of my personal experience. Several times I brought to Luxtone my designs of preamps and power amps. They were not placed in platinum chassis, they were not particularly mechanically stable. We compared them with very well known high end products, designers of which contribute here. We had pretty good loudspeakers for testing, no worse than Wilson Sophia, but mostly we made listening tests on Wilson Audio Maxx speakers. You would not believe it, but noname products beated those well known in sound, agreed by studio staff. I told them that it is circuit design and EMI protection that counts, not massive panels and 100kg weight of chassis. These guys were not aware of anything in electronics and believed in hypes. You would not believe their surprise when they seen the breadboarded stuff inside preamp. Then, after some time, I got a purchase order. Properly done circuit on a PCB with groundplane was even better than the breadboarded
.So, take it easy here and have fun
.Regards,
Pavel
I believe PMA's post identifies it well. The irony is that we do not see eye to eye at all, and likely never will.
But he is right, although why he offers advice to the unadvisable is beyond me.....
An accomplished EE will not be appreciated here. A self-educated designer with commercial products will not be appreciated either, and neither will a snake oil salesman. It is possible the ignorant poster who asks a pertinent, meek question might be appreciated, and that gives the hint.
I believe it comes down to two very human qualities. The propensity of highly intelligent human beings to carp at each other, bickering and obfuscating rather than confirming and creating; and the essentially subjective aspect of audio perception. There's nothing to be done about either.....
The fact is, as PMA points out, the market is dominated by high-buck imperfect designs, while the often superior home made products cannot penetrate. That's probably true of many of the more accessible technologies, actually, and nothing new, but it's cause for reflection all the same.
Perhaps we should close a thread that has clearly lost its way??
Cheers,
Hugh
But he is right, although why he offers advice to the unadvisable is beyond me.....
An accomplished EE will not be appreciated here. A self-educated designer with commercial products will not be appreciated either, and neither will a snake oil salesman. It is possible the ignorant poster who asks a pertinent, meek question might be appreciated, and that gives the hint.
I believe it comes down to two very human qualities. The propensity of highly intelligent human beings to carp at each other, bickering and obfuscating rather than confirming and creating; and the essentially subjective aspect of audio perception. There's nothing to be done about either.....
The fact is, as PMA points out, the market is dominated by high-buck imperfect designs, while the often superior home made products cannot penetrate. That's probably true of many of the more accessible technologies, actually, and nothing new, but it's cause for reflection all the same.
Perhaps we should close a thread that has clearly lost its way??
Cheers,
Hugh
Charles Hansen said:
It's a standard college textbook in these parts, been around for ages.
The ones who handle Germanico a little can take a peek at the latest edition here : www.tietze-schenk.de/tsbuch.htm
Additional confusing trivia : the Candy man has a PhD in physics, and a second one in mathematics.
One might interprete the common factor as diversification giving deeper insight in the nature of things. (possibly in people for some)
Way back when i did physical geography, i still find the geology classes of sand and silicates an enrichment for better understanding other/linked mechanisms.(besides the joys of peeping through a glass hole to layers interacting)
On the other hand, my sisterinlaw received her degree from the very same faculty but she's been floating in the Yoga/Moonie scene for the last decade.
Unilateral thinking never leads to progress, imho.
(although we may all agree that Glenn is in desperate need of a shag)
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