Kids are strange
Maggie
I don't know what to make of this.
I'm having company this weekend, so I'm cleaning madly. To help the work
go quickly, I turned on the stereo and dropped in a few '80s
compilations. One of these compilations has Fight For Your Right (To
Party).
My not-quite-seven-year old listened to the opening riff, turned to me
and said "Oooh, Beastie Boys! Cool!" I've never played this for him,
matter of fact, I just bought the CD last week.
I don't know whether to be happy that he's been exposed to a wide range
of music at home and with his friends or if I should hide under my bed
in fear.
--
Maggie UIN 10248195
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/1374/
"I will. For chocolate."
Doc Hogan
news:MPG.11785f861...@news.stax.net...
>
> I don't know what to make of this.
>
> I'm having company this weekend, so I'm cleaning madly. To help the
work
> go quickly, I turned on the stereo and dropped in a few '80s
> compilations. One of these compilations has Fight For Your Right (To
> Party).
>
> My not-quite-seven-year old listened to the opening riff, turned to me
> and said "Oooh, Beastie Boys! Cool!" I've never played this for him,
> matter of fact, I just bought the CD last week.
>
> I don't know whether to be happy that he's been exposed to a wide
range
> of music at home and with his friends or if I should hide under my bed
> in fear.
My first, and immediate response was a belly laugh.
So, to share
HAHAHAHAHA
A few years back I went to see Glen Fry and Joe Walsh play in Orlando.
Joe told a great story:
(to paraphrase) "As I was walking up to the stage a few minutes ago, a
boy about 9 or 10 walked up to me and said,"Mr Walsh, can I please have
your autograph?". I said sure, and bent down to sign his book. As I
was signing I asked, "Son, how did you know who I was?". The boy said
"My Grandma told me.". I wonder when he'll realize I signed it as 'Joe
W..grrrrGo Away!'?'
As I said, it's paraphrased. But I found it hysterical and ironic. And
maybe more than just a bit apropos here, non?
Doc
Maggie
doch...@i.hate.spam.hotmail.com painted in Nutella on the kitchen
wall...
<Alex recognized the Beastie Boys>
> > I don't know whether to be happy that he's been exposed to a wide
> > range of music at home and with his friends or if I should hide under
> > my bed in fear.
>
>
> My first, and immediate response was a belly laugh.
I've decided to err on the side of fear and put away the ticket stubs, T-
shirt and photos from when I caught the Beasties in concert in 1986.
[...]
> A few years back I went to see Glen Fry and Joe Walsh play in Orlando.
> Joe told a great story:
>
> (to paraphrase) "As I was walking up to the stage a few minutes ago, a
> boy about 9 or 10 walked up to me and said,"Mr Walsh, can I please have
> your autograph?". I said sure, and bent down to sign his book. As I
> was signing I asked, "Son, how did you know who I was?". The boy said
> "My Grandma told me.". I wonder when he'll realize I signed it as 'Joe
> W..grrrrGo Away!'?'
>
> As I said, it's paraphrased. But I found it hysterical and ironic. And
> maybe more than just a bit apropos here, non?
Ironic? Not hardly.
But hysterical, I'll give you.
Alex cherishes, above all else, a concert stub and video. For his 5th
birthday, we took him to his very first concert -- Styx, with Pat Benetar
opening.
He knew all the words to all the songs and danced himself silly. People
all around us were dumbfounded that a five-year-old knew the words to
Renegade.
They were even more surprised that he could name all the band members.
<*grin*> He has taste, my boy does.
--
Maggie UIN: 10248195
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/1374/
"I've come to the conclusion that St**nt isn't actually a troll,
just a particularly noticeable example of how buying a ticket for the
genetic lottery does not guarantee winning anything." -- Alistair J. R.
Young on RASFWRJ
Trent Goulding
wrote:
>He knew all the words to all the songs and danced himself silly. People
>all around us were dumbfounded that a five-year-old knew the words to
>Renegade.
What a *rockin'* song. Pieces of Eight was my sister's very first
vinyl LP purchase.
"Oh mamma, I'm in fear for my life from the long arm of the law"
><*grin*> He has taste, my boy does.
Wow. In spades...
I'm not going to be able to get the damn song outta my head for the
rest of the night, though.
--
Trent
"...to him that is pitiless, the deeds of pity are
forever strange and beyond reckoning."
Amelia Bradburn
(Maggie ) say:
>Alex cherishes, above all else, a concert stub and video. For his 5th
>birthday, we took him to his very first concert -- Styx, with Pat Benetar
>opening.
>
>He knew all the words to all the songs and danced himself silly. People
>all around us were dumbfounded that a five-year-old knew the words to
>Renegade.
>
>They were even more surprised that he could name all the band members.
>
><*grin*> He has taste, my boy does.
>
It's interesting, the types of music that kids love, before they're
aware of the types of music that are actually popular. I remember
that my mom used to buy me Care Bears records and crap like that, but
I was never interested. At five, I had one of those Fisher-Price
record players and played my dad's Abba records endlessly. I also
liked Blondie, Fleetwood Mac and, yes, Styx!
My first concert was Glass Tiger, when I was 9. Who remembers them?
--
Amelia Bradburn
ICQ: 33990873
Maggie
goul...@student.REMOVE.law.ucla.edu painted in Nutella on the kitchen
wall...
> On Sat, 10 Apr 1999 00:03:19 -0400, mam...@stax.net (Maggie )
> wrote:
>
> >He knew all the words to all the songs and danced himself silly. People
> >all around us were dumbfounded that a five-year-old knew the words to
> >Renegade.
>
> vinyl LP purchase.
Our new(er) car has a cassette deck instead of a CD player, so we had to
dig out all the old tapes. That one is in the car, and in need of
replacing. Poor thing.
> "Oh mamma, I'm in fear for my life from the long arm of the law"
...and John Panozzo *pounding* his drum kit...Ooooh....
<sigh> The new drummer that toured with them just before and after
John's death was decent enough...but I missed John nonetheless.
> ><*grin*> He has taste, my boy does.
>
> Wow. In spades...
>
> I'm not going to be able to get the damn song outta my head for the
> rest of the night, though.
Appropriate for a lawyer, yes? <grin>
Perhaps that can be your theme song?
--
Maggie UIN 10248195
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/1374/
"I will. For chocolate."
Maggie
a.bra...@sympatico.ca painted in Nutella on the kitchen wall...
<kids and music>
> It's interesting, the types of music that kids love, before they're
> aware of the types of music that are actually popular. I remember
> that my mom used to buy me Care Bears records and crap like that, but
> I was never interested.
I never even tried that stunt with my kids. They have always been
allowed to spin the CD rack and choose for themselves. I've never seen
any point in hiding music from them or forcing them to listen to
"children's music". I will admit to owning several Disney soundtracks
(particularly both Lion King CDs)...I bought them for me and the boys
absconded with them!
We play *everything* here, from classical right on down the line, as
anyone who has ever been in my home can attest to (and as any neighbor
who has seen the nearly-three-year-old dancing in his underwear to
AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" will laugh about.)
> At five, I had one of those Fisher-Price
> record players and played my dad's Abba records endlessly. I also
> liked Blondie, Fleetwood Mac and, yes, Styx!
I still have a few of my records from my childhood days...Blondie's
"Paralell Lines", The J. Geils Band's "Love Stinks" and "Freeze Frame",
The Doobie Brothers' "Livin' on the Fault Line (Michael
McDonald's voice still gives me chills!)...Tommy Roe's "Dizzy" on
'45...Peter, Paul and Mary's "Leavin' On A Jet Plane"...and more stashed
away.
I had to laugh when Alex came across my box of vinyl for the first time.
"Mama? These are really funny looking CDs. I don't think they'll fit."
> My first concert was Glass Tiger, when I was 9. Who remembers them?
"Don't forget me when I'm gone (My heart would break)/I have loved you
for so long..."
Yes, I remember them. Still have "The Thin Red Line", matter of fact.
My first concert was Def Leppard, on the Pyromania tour in '81 or '82.
*Wow*! I've been hooked on live music ever since.
--
Maggie UIN 10248195
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/1374/
"Love knows nothing of order."
-Saint Jerome
Trent Goulding
wrote:
[Styx-- that icon of my early teenager-hood]
>> I'm not going to be able to get the damn song outta my head for the
>> rest of the night, though.
>
>Appropriate for a lawyer, yes? <grin>
>
>Perhaps that can be your theme song?
"The jig is up, the news is out, they finally found me/
The renegade, who had it made, retrieved for a bounty.
Never more to go astray, the judge will have his revenge today/
On a waaaanted man...."
Yeah, that might work.
Trent Goulding
wrote:
>My first concert was Def Leppard, on the Pyromania tour in '81 or '82.
>*Wow*! I've been hooked on live music ever since.
Whoah! Bad flashback.. I remember someone jamming "Photograph" and
"Rock of Ages" in the back of the bus when I was in 8th grade.
Scary.. (the flashback, not the music).
Amelia Bradburn
(Maggie ) say:
>In article <370ee5a4...@news1.sympatico.ca>,
>a.bra...@sympatico.ca painted in Nutella on the kitchen wall...
>> On Sat, 10 Apr 1999 00:03:19 -0400, methinks I heard mam...@stax.net
>> (Maggie ) say:
>
><kids and music>
>
>> It's interesting, the types of music that kids love, before they're
>> aware of the types of music that are actually popular. I remember
>> that my mom used to buy me Care Bears records and crap like that, but
>> I was never interested.
>
>I never even tried that stunt with my kids. They have always been
>allowed to spin the CD rack and choose for themselves. I've never seen
>any point in hiding music from them or forcing them to listen to
>"children's music".
Whoever even came up with the concept of the Care Bears should be
drawn and quartered.
>I will admit to owning several Disney soundtracks
>(particularly both Lion King CDs)...I bought them for me and the boys
>absconded with them!
>
Well, I wouldn't necessarily call those "kid's music", just as the
movies aren't just for kids. Hell, I've got them all on video.
>We play *everything* here, from classical right on down the line, as
>anyone who has ever been in my home can attest to (and as any neighbor
>who has seen the nearly-three-year-old dancing in his underwear to
>AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" will laugh about.)
>
Yeah, my parents thought it was cute when they saw me boogying down to
"Take A Chance On Me."
>> At five, I had one of those Fisher-Price
>> record players and played my dad's Abba records endlessly. I also
>> liked Blondie, Fleetwood Mac and, yes, Styx!
>
>I still have a few of my records from my childhood days...Blondie's
>"Paralell Lines", The J. Geils Band's "Love Stinks" and "Freeze Frame",
>The Doobie Brothers' "Livin' on the Fault Line (Michael
>McDonald's voice still gives me chills!)...Tommy Roe's "Dizzy" on
>'45...Peter, Paul and Mary's "Leavin' On A Jet Plane"...and more stashed
>away.
>
>I had to laugh when Alex came across my box of vinyl for the first time.
>
>"Mama? These are really funny looking CDs. I don't think they'll fit."
>
My parents still have 3 turntables in the house. I'll probably steal
one of them once I get settled someplace. Vinyl is a very cheap way
of getting good quality music if you've got something to play it on.
I've found that, especially with older music, the sound from a record
is warmer and fuller than that from a CD.
My friends often look at me funny when I come back from a shopping
trip with an armful of *records*!
>> My first concert was Glass Tiger, when I was 9. Who remembers them?
>
>"Don't forget me when I'm gone (My heart would break)/I have loved you
>for so long..."
>
>Yes, I remember them. Still have "The Thin Red Line", matter of fact.
>
_Diamond Sun_ was an even better album. Where are they now?
>My first concert was Def Leppard, on the Pyromania tour in '81 or '82.
>*Wow*! I've been hooked on live music ever since.
>
Peeve: being a poor student, I can't afford to go to as many concerts
as I once did. There are some decent free/cheap shows around here
sometimes, though.
--
Amelia Bradburn--drowning in '80s nostalgia
"You take my breath away, whoa-oh-oh-ohh..."
ICQ: 33990873
John Rowat
> I don't know what to make of this.
<Snip kid recognizing Beastie Boys>
> I don't know whether to be happy that he's been exposed to a wide range
> of music at home and with his friends or if I should hide under my bed
> in fear.
Be happy. Music recognition is always a happy thing. It's when they
start IMITATING their favorite musicians that you have to be worried.
ObOddThought: I can't think of a single signed musician who I would not
mock people for imitating. It's truly disturbing, I suppose.
-John
--
"Looking at the world / Through your innocent eyes
You're seeing the promises / No, they're only lies
And broken dreams"
-Black Sabbath, "Time Machine"
Steve Deffeyes
Amelia Bradburn <a.bra...@sympatico.ca> wrote in message
news:370ef3ea...@news1.sympatico.ca...
> My parents still have 3 turntables in the house. I'll probably steal
> one of them once I get settled someplace. Vinyl is a very cheap way
> of getting good quality music if you've got something to play it on.
> I've found that, especially with older music, the sound from a record
> is warmer and fuller than that from a CD.
> My friends often look at me funny when I come back from a shopping
> trip with an armful of *records*!
>
I'm an avid vinyl collector. Yes a well set up turntable can sound way
better than a CD. One reason is most older master tapes were so deteriorated
by the time they got around to digitizing them and the vinyl records were
pressed when the tapes were new. The trick is to know from the label designs
if a given record was pressed in the 50's or the 80's. Most pressings from
the end of the vinyl era suck. We are also due for a new digital standard,
the current CD standard was written in the early 80's, think how far
computer technology has progressed since then.
--
SED
Jim Hill
>My first concert was Glass Tiger, when I was 9. Who remembers them?
Everyone forgot them when they were gone.
Jim
--
jim...@swcp.com http://www.swcp.com/~jimhill/
"You can't see the truth when your head's in a bag, Jack!"
-- "Manson", The Ben Stiller Show
Jim Hill
>Whoah! Bad flashback.. I remember someone jamming "Photograph" and
>"Rock of Ages" in the back of the bus when I was in 8th grade.
>Scary.. (the flashback, not the music).
When I was in 8th grade we went on a band trip via the ObBus to a place
that was about seven hours from home. Before setting out on the return
leg of the trip, we stopped at a mall, where quite a few of the kids
bought copies of the released-that-day soundtrack to "Footloose".
If I'd heard it for the boy one more time before we got back to Martin
I'd've killed someone. Thanks for dredging that out of the long-term
memory banks.
Jasper Janssen
<S.Def...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in
<7emvft$spl$2...@bgtnsc01.worldnet.att.net>:
>We are also due for a new digital standard,
>the current CD standard was written in the early 80's, think how far
>computer technology has progressed since then.
Not really - DVD Audio might be _slightly_ better in quality, but not
massively. One thing it will offer is 6 tracks of surround sound. Six
_actual_ tracks, not some way of recovering four of them after
shoehorning them into 2 channels. But the sound quality.. well, 24 bit
96 kHz isn't gonna sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz.
Jasper
Lurker Below
>In article <370ee5a4...@news1.sympatico.ca>,
>a.bra...@sympatico.ca painted in Nutella on the kitchen wall...
>> My first concert was Glass Tiger, when I was 9. Who remembers them?
>"Don't forget me when I'm gone (My heart would break)/I have loved you
>for so long..."
>Yes, I remember them. Still have "The Thin Red Line", matter of fact.
>My first concert was Def Leppard, on the Pyromania tour in '81 or '82.
>*Wow*! I've been hooked on live music ever since.
My first concert was Black Sabbath. It was either the 'Paranoid' or
'Master of Reality' tour (Ozzie was still lead vocalist). The
marijuana smoke in the old Kiel Auditorium (St. Louis), since replaced
by the Kiel Center, so very thick. A couple of my cousins took me. My
second concert was Elvis Presley (his only St. Louis concert ever),
also at Kiel Auditorium later the same year. My mother took me to that
one. I was 12 at the time, IIRC.
--
"He can't even run his own life, I'll be damned if he'll run mine!"
-Jonathon Edwards
Lurker Below
>Trent Goulding wrote:
>>Whoah! Bad flashback.. I remember someone jamming "Photograph" and
>>"Rock of Ages" in the back of the bus when I was in 8th grade.
>>Scary.. (the flashback, not the music).
>When I was in 8th grade we went on a band trip via the ObBus to a place
>that was about seven hours from home. Before setting out on the return
>leg of the trip, we stopped at a mall, where quite a few of the kids
>bought copies of the released-that-day soundtrack to "Footloose".
>If I'd heard it for the boy one more time before we got back to Martin
>I'd've killed someone. Thanks for dredging that out of the long-term
>memory banks.
Heh...
When I was a senior in HS, we went on a debate trip to KC (from St.
Louis). A bunch of schools were going, so the districts got together
and chartered three buses. Our school (Pattonville) was the first to
load on one bus (and to make matters worse, I had a 30 mile drive to
school every morning so I had to leave EARLY, but I digress) and we
went to pick up the students from a 'hoity-toity' district (Ladue for
those who might know). I had brought my tape collection and my partner
had brought his boom box. We argued over control of the box until we
got to Ladue. I won. The Ladue kids filed on the bus (we had taken the
very back seat) and settled in. We pulled away from Ladue at about 6
AM. As we did, I fired up Led Zeppelin (sometimes called 4 or ZOSO).
Page's guitar wound down in the intro to Black Dog. And then Plant
started screaming, "Hey, hey mama...". Every head of every Ladue
student turned and looked daggers at my debate partner and I. We
cranked it a bit more...
--
"Curiosity is the very basis of education and if you tell me that
curiosity killed the cat, I say only the cat died nobly."
- Arnold Edinborough
Maggie
jro...@prince.carleton.ca painted in Nutella on the kitchen wall...
> Maggie screamed agonizingly:
>
> > I don't know what to make of this.
>
> <Snip kid recognizing Beastie Boys>
>
> > I don't know whether to be happy that he's been exposed to a wide range
> > of music at home and with his friends or if I should hide under my bed
> > in fear.
>
> Be happy. Music recognition is always a happy thing. It's when they
> start IMITATING their favorite musicians that you have to be worried.
<*blink*>
I'm worried, then.
Alex has been known to pretend the broom is a bass guitar...and growl
"Snowblind" like his idol, James Young.
--
Maggie UIN 10248195
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/1374/
"I will. For chocolate."
John Rowat
>> start IMITATING their favorite musicians that you have to be worried.
> <*blink*>
> I'm worried, then.
> Alex has been known to pretend the broom is a bass guitar...and growl
> "Snowblind" like his idol, James Young.
When he does it all the time, dresses like the guy, and starts plastering
the walls of his room with candid pictures, THEN you have to worry.
Air guitar is not imitation.
Stephen Deffeyes
wrote...
CD/DVD standards yet and thus don't have an opinion of what they sound
like.
How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz? You're
talking, what, 3 1\4 times the data. And don't say 16\44.1 is "perfect
sound forever" I don't agree. Sure if they use a DAT master, compress the
shit out of it for radio play and you play it back on a boom box on the
kitchen counter it won't sound that much different. I have to think after
all the advances in data storage and retrieval in the last two decades
the current CD is out of date.
--
SED
Jasper Janssen
Deffeyes) wrote in
<MPG.117be90cb...@netnews.worldnet.att.net>:
>I'll preface this by saying that I haven't heard any of the three new
>CD/DVD standards yet and thus don't have an opinion of what they sound
>like.
Well, neither have I, but I've read a few reviews, from, of all
people, "The Gramophone", just about the most respectable audiophile
magazine out there (anyone need back issues from '66 to '92? All of
them... Cost of postage).
>
>How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz? You're
>talking, what, 3 1\4 times the data.
Apparently, the difference between DVD audio and CD Audio sound is
negligible. Possibly this is due to the main source of noise and
distortion already being things _other_ than the AD and DA conversion
- You'd need massively better microphones, mixing tables, and other
studio equipment, IMHO.
>I have to think after
>all the advances in data storage and retrieval in the last two decades
>the current CD is out of date.
It's not the data storage and retrieval, it's the AD and DA conversion
- digitisation of sound hasn't improved all that much since 1980.
Jasper
John Dilick
(Stephen Deffeyes) proclaimed:
>How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz?
Because the human ear only works up to 20 kHz?
--
John Dilick dili...@home.com
If at first you don't succeed, cheat. Cheat until caught, then lie.
Jeff Krug
> Yea, verily, on Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:27:41 -0700, Deff...@worldnet.att.net
> (Stephen Deffeyes) proclaimed:
>>How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz?
> Because the human ear only works up to 20 kHz?
Kind of similar to how 24 bit color and 32 bit color are both considered
True Color.
There is probably some residual quantizing noise that exists with 16 bit
audio, but that alone should not merit 24 bit audio, particularily not
enough the extra bits are used to increase the bandwidth and not to
decrease the noise.
--
Jeff Krug <-> CS @ GT <-> BMAB <-> AAA - http://www.angband.org/
"That's the wonderful thing about life. It
never gets so bad that it can't get worse."
Mike Kozlowski
Jeff Krug <kr...@angband.org> wrote:
>There is probably some residual quantizing noise that exists with 16 bit
>audio, but that alone should not merit 24 bit audio,
You don't know many audiophiles, do you? If 16-bit sound is even slightly
grainy, then there are a bunch of people out there who want it improved to
its theoretical maximum. If you can eke out a 1% performance increase
just by changing digital encoding schemes, it's worth it to people who buy
$10,000 speaker cables.
And from what I've read, going from 16 to 20 bit encoding schemes actually
does make a real difference; it's not just CD pens and Shakti stones.
Admittedly, it's probably not a huge difference, but since digital
technology is so cheap, and DVDs can easily hold 24/96 data, why not?
--
Michael Kozlowski m...@cs.wisc.edu
Recommended SF (Updated 3/17): http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~mlk/sfbooks.html
Marc Sanders
>
> Maggie screamed agonizingly:
> > jro...@prince.carleton.ca painted in Nutella on the kitchen wall...
> >>
> >> Be happy. Music recognition is always a happy thing. It's when they
> >> start IMITATING their favorite musicians that you have to be worried.
>
> > <*blink*>
> > I'm worried, then.
> > Alex has been known to pretend the broom is a bass guitar...and growl
> > "Snowblind" like his idol, James Young.
>
> When he does it all the time, dresses like the guy, and starts plastering
> the walls of his room with candid pictures, THEN you have to worry.
That gives her about 5-8 years of leeway until he hits puberty.
=====================================================================
"A good insult is like a good knife; short, sharp, and pointed."
Marc Sanders (marc...@mindspring.com)
Jasper Janssen
<7etrpe$4fr$1...@news-int.gatech.edu>:
>Kind of similar to how 24 bit color and 32 bit color are both considered
>True Color.
That has a lot more to do with the fact that there is no such animal
as thirtytwo bit color. What those videomodes do is align the three
bytes of data on 4-byte word boundaries, to eke out an extra bit of
speed (this has to do with the way that computers work).
Jasper
Bill Garrett
The difference between 24-bit color and 32-bit color is the presence
of 8 bits of alpha (transparency) data. The alpha channel doesn't
specify any part of the color displayed on an output, but is used in
performing blending operations on image data stored in computer memory.
--
Bill Garrett I love cats. Do you?
wfg1 @ concentric.net If so, let's exchange recipes.
Aaron Bergman
>John Dilick <dili...@home.com> was allowed to say:
>> Yea, verily, on Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:27:41 -0700, Deff...@worldnet.att.net
>> (Stephen Deffeyes) proclaimed:
>
>>>How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz?
>
>> Because the human ear only works up to 20 kHz?
>
>Kind of similar to how 24 bit color and 32 bit color are both considered
>True Color.
24 bit isn't quite perfect because, IIRC, the average human eye can see
more than 256 shades of red.
Aaron
--
Aaron Bergman
<http://www.princeton.edu/~abergman/>
Maggie
> > Maggie screamed agonizingly:
<imitating your favorite musician>
> > When he does it all the time, dresses like the guy, and starts plastering
> > the walls of his room with candid pictures, THEN you have to worry.
Oh. I guess I'm safe. Alex performs in his underwear. <grin>
> That gives her about 5-8 years of leeway until he hits puberty.
Thanks, Marc. I'm going to go hide under the bed now.
--
Maggie UIN 10248195
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/1374/
"If it ain't broke, you're not trying hard enough."
-BKawalec on rmaag
Steve Deffeyes
> Yea, verily, on Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:27:41 -0700, Deff...@worldnet.att.net
> (Stephen Deffeyes) proclaimed:
>
> >How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz?
>
> Because the human ear only works up to 20 kHz?
>
>
data is stored on a CD, world lengths of 16 bits sampled at 44.1 kHz per
second, not the frequency range of the reproduced sound.
--
SED
Remove "kill.the.spam" to reply
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
> On Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:27:41 -0700, Deff...@worldnet.att.net (Stephen
> Deffeyes) wrote in
> <MPG.117be90cb...@netnews.worldnet.att.net>:
>
> >I'll preface this by saying that I haven't heard any of the three new
> >CD/DVD standards yet and thus don't have an opinion of what they sound
> >like.
>
> Well, neither have I, but I've read a few reviews, from, of all
> people, "The Gramophone", just about the most respectable audiophile
> magazine out there (anyone need back issues from '66 to '92? All of
> them... Cost of postage).
>
several favorable reviews of the Classic Records releases of 24/96 DVD
Discs. The Sony/Philips standard hasn't gone over as well.
>
> Apparently, the difference between DVD audio and CD Audio sound is
> negligible. Possibly this is due to the main source of noise and
> distortion already being things _other_ than the AD and DA conversion
> - You'd need massively better microphones, mixing tables, and other
> studio equipment, IMHO.
>
>
> >I have to think after
> >all the advances in data storage and retrieval in the last two decades
> >the current CD is out of date.
>
> It's not the data storage and retrieval, it's the AD and DA conversion
> - digitisation of sound hasn't improved all that much since 1980.
>
improved that much and we are due for something new, not that the ones on
the way will be that much better.
Conan T. Barbarian
>44.1 kHz per second
I hate it when I do that. Fortunately, I didn't do this.
Mike Kozlowski
Steve Deffeyes <Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>On 12 Apr 1999 14:28:06 PDT John Dilick dili...@home.com wrote...
>>
>> >How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz?
>>
>> Because the human ear only works up to 20 kHz?
>>
>I think you miss-understood. 16 bit 44.1 kHz refers to the way the music
>data is stored on a CD, world lengths of 16 bits sampled at 44.1 kHz per
>second, not the frequency range of the reproduced sound.
No, John's right. Music sampled at 44.1 kHz is going to give perfectly
accurate representations of sound up to 22 kHz, due to calculus of one
sort or another. I've yet to see anyone say that the move from 44.1 to 96
is going to be really beneficial; most of the proponents of 24/96 focus on
the 24 vs. 16 part. At least, most of the ones who sound like they know
what they're talking about.
Aaron Bergman
(Mike Kozlowski) wrote:
>No, John's right. Music sampled at 44.1 kHz is going to give perfectly
>accurate representations of sound up to 22 kHz, due to calculus of one
>sort or another.
Nyquist's theorem. The problem, of course, is that you have to cut off any
higher sequences to avoid unpleasentness like aliasing.
Jasper Janssen
Kozlowski) wrote in <7euimb$11v4$1...@news.doit.wisc.edu>:
>
>No, John's right. Music sampled at 44.1 kHz is going to give perfectly
>accurate representations of sound up to 22 kHz, due to calculus of one
>sort or another.
Nyquist. Only - I've never heard Nyquist say that it's "totally
accurate" up to that half. In fact, a sinewave at exactly half the
sampling frequency would come out looking like a square wave, would it
not? And believe me, square waves sound different from sine waves.
Jasper
Jasper Janssen
Garrett) wrote in <1999Apr1...@130.62.16.132>:
>The difference between 24-bit color and 32-bit color is the presence
>of 8 bits of alpha (transparency) data. The alpha channel doesn't
>specify any part of the color displayed on an output, but is used in
>performing blending operations on image data stored in computer memory.
So.. If we're talking about video cards and display modes, it's
totally irrelevant (and probably unused, too), right? It's when you
manipulate images in, say, Photoshop that this is used, in particular
when you put two images on top of eachother, have I got that right?
Just curious, as I'd never heard of this one before.
Jasper
John Dilick
Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam (Steve Deffeyes) proclaimed:
>On 12 Apr 1999 14:28:06 PDT John Dilick dili...@home.com wrote...
>> Yea, verily, on Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:27:41 -0700, Deff...@worldnet.att.net
>> (Stephen Deffeyes) proclaimed:
>>
>> >How could 24 bit 96 kHz -not- sound better than 16 bit 44.1 kHz?
>>
>> Because the human ear only works up to 20 kHz?
>>
>>
>I think you miss-understood. 16 bit 44.1 kHz refers to the way the music
>data is stored on a CD, world lengths of 16 bits sampled at 44.1 kHz per
>second, not the frequency range of the reproduced sound.
44.1 kHz is going to accurately represent all waveforms up to 22.05 kHz.
The Nyquist frequency -- look it up.
Bill Garrett
It's not irrelevent to the video card, because the video card is
usually what's being described as having 24 or 32 bits of image
data per pixel. If the card supports an alpha channel, software
like Photoshop can take advantage of it to do compositing in
hardware-accelerated buffers. Without it, the programs must do
compositing in software.
Marc Sanders
>
> In article <37127C...@mindspring.com>, marc...@mindspring.com
> painted in Nutella on the kitchen wall...
> > John Rowat wrote:
> > > Maggie screamed agonizingly:
>
> <imitating your favorite musician>
>
> > > When he does it all the time, dresses like the guy, and starts plastering
> > > the walls of his room with candid pictures, THEN you have to worry.
>
> Oh. I guess I'm safe. Alex performs in his underwear. <grin>
>
> > That gives her about 5-8 years of leeway until he hits puberty.
>
> Thanks, Marc. I'm going to go hide under the bed now.
It's nice to be appreciated. :)
Seriously, from your comments on child-rearing last week, I doubt you'll
have too many problems.
Aaron Bergman
(Jasper Janssen) wrote:
If you directly outputted the digital square wave, sure. There are ways of
using the samples to fully reconstruct the original waveform, atleast
mathematically. I have no idea how this works in practice. The actual
formula is given in Numerical Recipes, among many other places.
Jasper Janssen
Bergman) wrote in
<abergman-130...@abergman.student.princeton.edu>:
>If you directly outputted the digital square wave, sure. There are ways of
>using the samples to fully reconstruct the original waveform, atleast
>mathematically. I have no idea how this works in practice. The actual
>formula is given in Numerical Recipes, among many other places.
I don't have Numerical Recipes, so i'll ask you these questions:
Does it assume the waveform stays the same for a certain period?
Is there even any way to discern between a sine wane at 22.050 Hz and
a square wave? (ie, does the formula assume sine waves?)
I would imagine they both end up as "101010101010", if you know what I
mean. (0,65536,0,65536,65536, etc.)
Then there's the problem that music usually consists of many sine
waves all superimposed.. can anyone with knowledge of modern high-end
DACs say if they have the sheer horsepower for these sorts of
calculations?
As a second point, there are indications that the human ear may not
directly _hear_ frequencies over 20 kHz (or so), but that they still
affect our hearing experience.
Jasper
Aaron Bergman
(Jasper Janssen) wrote:
>On Tue, 13 Apr 1999 19:40:06 -0500, aber...@princeton.edu (Aaron
>Bergman) wrote in
><abergman-130...@abergman.student.princeton.edu>:
>
>>If you directly outputted the digital square wave, sure. There are ways of
>>using the samples to fully reconstruct the original waveform, atleast
>>mathematically. I have no idea how this works in practice. The actual
>>formula is given in Numerical Recipes, among many other places.
>
>I don't have Numerical Recipes, so i'll ask you these questions:
I don't really know much about the field, but I'll try.
>
>Does it assume the waveform stays the same for a certain period?
>Is there even any way to discern between a sine wane at 22.050 Hz and
>a square wave? (ie, does the formula assume sine waves?)
Yes. The reason why is that any wave can be decomposed as a sum of sine
waves. A square wave, for example, takes an infinte sum of sine waves. If
we cut this off at the Nyquist frequency, we get a reasonable facsimile
that the sampling can reproduce.
Arno Wagner
: On Tue, 13 Apr 1999 19:40:06 -0500, aber...@princeton.edu (Aaron
: Bergman) wrote in
: <abergman-130...@abergman.student.princeton.edu>:
: >If you directly outputted the digital square wave, sure. There are ways of
: >using the samples to fully reconstruct the original waveform, atleast
: >mathematically. I have no idea how this works in practice. The actual
: >formula is given in Numerical Recipes, among many other places.
The Idea is that not only the input signal will be filtered to contain
no frequency above half the sampling frequency, but the output signal
of the DA-converter needs to be filtered in the same way. When you
take a square wave at 22Khz and filter it so it contains no frequency
above 22Khz you will get a perfect sine wave. So no 'computation'
is actually needed.
Of course _real_ filters will not do a cutoff at some frequency,
but will dampen frequencies higher than a certain value (for
low-pass characteristic) proportionally to how much higher
the frequency is. A typical value for a 6rd order active filter
is 18dB/Octave (meaning doubling the frequency will lessen
the output value by a factor of 8).
: I don't have Numerical Recipes, so i'll ask you these questions:
: Does it assume the waveform stays the same for a certain period?
No.
: Is there even any way to discern between a sine wave at 22.050 Hz and
: a square wave? (ie, does the formula assume sine waves?)
Not when it has been filtered.
: I would imagine they both end up as "101010101010", if you know what I
: mean. (0,65536,0,65536,65536, etc.)
No, both end up as sinus. Every wave form not sinus has higher frequency
parts. Square wave has in addition to the base frequency 1/3 of
base frequency amplitude in 3 times base frequency, 1/5
of base frequency amplitude in 5 times base frequency,....
The most "complete" waveform is sawtooth. The leanest is sinus.
: Then there's the problem that music usually consists of many sine
: waves all superimposed.. can anyone with knowledge of modern high-end
Sorry to be lecturing: Every signal consists allways of superimposed
sinewaves. Strange, but that is how it is. If your signal is finite
(like a real signal) or infinite and nonperiodic, it actually consists
of an infinite number of superimposed sinewaves.
: DACs say if they have the sheer horsepower for these sorts of
: calculations?
They don't. Anyway it's an analogue problem, not a digital one.
There is allways a non-digital filter needed if a DA-converter is used
to generate audio signals.
: As a second point, there are indications that the human ear may not
: directly _hear_ frequencies over 20 kHz (or so), but that they still
: affect our hearing experience.
Are you sure? I haven't heard about that. I somewhat doubt it.
Arno
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Arno Wagner Dipl. Inform. University of Trier wag...@ti.uni-trier.de
Jim Mansfield
Jasper Janssen <spa...@janssen.dynip.com> wrote:
>On Tue, 13 Apr 1999 19:40:06 -0500, aber...@princeton.edu (Aaron
>Bergman) wrote in
><abergman-130...@abergman.student.princeton.edu>:
>
>>If you directly outputted the digital square wave, sure. There are ways of
>>using the samples to fully reconstruct the original waveform, atleast
>>mathematically. I have no idea how this works in practice. The actual
>>formula is given in Numerical Recipes, among many other places.
>
>
>Does it assume the waveform stays the same for a certain period?
>a square wave? (ie, does the formula assume sine waves?)
>mean. (0,65536,0,65536,65536, etc.)
Fourier transforms (to which the Nyquist frequency applies) only use
sine and cosine waves to reconstruct a waveform. It is very difficult
to properly reproduce a true square wave with sines and cosines, but
approximations exist.
>Then there's the problem that music usually consists of many sine
>waves all superimposed.. can anyone with knowledge of modern high-end
>DACs say if they have the sheer horsepower for these sorts of
>calculations?
Definately. Fast Fourier transforms (FFT's) have been around for decades
and don't require that much horsepower. The only drawback to a FFT is
that the waveform you want to reproduce has to have a power of 2 number
of points (ie, 2^n points).
-Jim
--
Jim Mansfield Internet: Jim.Ma...@nrc.ca
National Research Council of Canada Phone: (204) 984-5191
Institute for Biodiagnostics Fax: (204) 984-5472
http://www.ibd.nrc.ca/~mansfield/
Jasper Janssen
Wagner) wrote in <7f4obu$6tm$1...@fu-berlin.de>:
>Jasper Janssen wrote:
>The Idea is that not only the input signal will be filtered to contain
>no frequency above half the sampling frequency, but the output signal
>of the DA-converter needs to be filtered in the same way. When you
>take a square wave at 22Khz and filter it so it contains no frequency
>above 22Khz you will get a perfect sine wave. So no 'computation'
>is actually needed.
You're right, of course. That does mean a 22 kHz square wave can't be
represented properly with a 44.1 kHz digital sampling.
>No, both end up as sinus. Every wave form not sinus has higher frequency
>parts. Square wave has in addition to the base frequency 1/3 of
>base frequency amplitude in 3 times base frequency, 1/5
>of base frequency amplitude in 5 times base frequency,....
You're right, of course. I should have remembered that and drawn the
appropriate conclusions.
>The most "complete" waveform is sawtooth. The leanest is sinus.
Sawtooth? Heh, I suppose that does take rather a lot of factors to
generate..
>Sorry to be lecturing:
No problem.
>Every signal consists allways of superimposed sinewaves.
From a practical point of view it often makes more sense to describe
signals in other ways. Sawtooth, square wave, things like that. But
every periodic signal can be represented as superimposed sine waves,
you're right.
>They don't. Anyway it's an analogue problem, not a digital one.
>There is allways a non-digital filter needed if a DA-converter is used
>to generate audio signals.
Hmmm.. So, if you analyse a typical music spectrum, are there many
signals beyond 20 kHz?
>: As a second point, there are indications that the human ear may not
>: directly _hear_ frequencies over 20 kHz (or so), but that they still
>: affect our hearing experience.
>Are you sure? I haven't heard about that. I somewhat doubt it.
Listen to a 20 kHz (or whatever your hearing cutoff point is) sine
wave, and a square wave of the same frequency. If you hear a
difference, I prove my point, if you don't, it'll have to stay
undecided :). Seriously, I'm not sure where I heard it, or if it was a
reliable study.
Jasper
Jasper Janssen
Bergman) wrote in
<abergman-140...@abergman.student.princeton.edu>:
>Yes. The reason why is that any wave can be decomposed as a sum of sine
>waves. A square wave, for example, takes an infinte sum of sine waves. If
>we cut this off at the Nyquist frequency, we get a reasonable facsimile
>that the sampling can reproduce.
Hmm. So, a 20 kHz square wave (or any square wave of more than 7.5
kHz) can't be remotely accurately represented in CDA. 7 kHz still gets
just a first order approach - those aren't very accurate either.
Sounds like it's time for a new standard ;=)
Jasper
Aaron Bergman
(Jim Mansfield) wrote:
>Definately. Fast Fourier transforms (FFT's) have been around for decades
>and don't require that much horsepower. The only drawback to a FFT is
>that the waveform you want to reproduce has to have a power of 2 number
>of points (ie, 2^n points).
Not necessarily. The algorithms are just fastest for powers of 2.
John S. Novak, III
>>There is probably some residual quantizing noise that exists with 16 bit
>>audio, but that alone should not merit 24 bit audio,
>You don't know many audiophiles, do you?
I do.
Used to sell them monodirectional speaker cables, in school.
<Snicker>
"And for only fifty bucks a foot, I'll misuse all sorts of technical
terms during the sale!"
--
John S. Novak, III j...@concentric.net
The Humblest Man on the Net
John S. Novak, III
<aber...@princeton.edu> wrote:
>>I don't have Numerical Recipes, so i'll ask you these questions:
>I don't really know much about the field, but I'll try.
It's not my field of expertise, either, but I have to know my way
around an ADC in order to design software radios.
Here's the way Nyquist works:
Nyquist states that if you have a time domain waveform (ie, sound)
whose highest frequency component is F, then you can sample and
reconstruct the waveform _perfectly_ if you sample at frequency 2F.
Stated in the reverse, if you sample at F, you can perfectly
reconstruct a signal whose highest frequency component is F/2.
If you have frequency components in excess of Nyquist's limits, you
will lose information.(*)
So, can you reconstruct a 20 KHz square wave by sampling at 40 KHz?
No, for the reason Aaron stated-- a square wave has an infinitely wide
frequency response. In order to reconstruct a square wave of any
frequency, you need infinitely fast sampling.
However, in the world of practical engineering, one notes that the
frequency components of a square wave decrease rapidly with increasing
frequency. The majority of the signal energy is at the fundamental
frequency. Less is in the third harmonic, even less at the fifth, and
so on. By the time you reach 9 or 11, the energy contribution is
trivial for most concerns.
Note also that _the human ear_ has a frequency cut-off as well. It's
not as sharp and well defined as a digital filter, but it is there.
If the human ear has a generally accepted range of about 20 KHz, this
means that all you really need to accurately reproduce a 10 KHz square
wave in terms of the human ear is the fundamental frequency, and maybe
the third harmonic, just to keep the audiofreaks from bitching. The
next energy-bearing frequency from a 10 KHz square wave is at 50 KHz,
and trust me, you can't hear that.
If you can hear a 25 KHz tone, I'd be surprised (and would want proof)
if you could distinguish between a 25 KHz sine wave and a 25 KHz
square wave.
* There are also games you can play with downsampling and whatnot,
but the basic limitation is the same-- your bandwidth is limited by
Nyquist.
>>Does it assume the waveform stays the same for a certain period?
>>Is there even any way to discern between a sine wane at 22.050 Hz and
>>a square wave? (ie, does the formula assume sine waves?)
>Yes. The reason why is that any wave can be decomposed as a sum of sine
>waves. A square wave, for example, takes an infinte sum of sine waves. If
>we cut this off at the Nyquist frequency, we get a reasonable facsimile
>that the sampling can reproduce.
No, if you play by the normal rules, you get the fundamental tone
only. But at 20-25 KHz, I suspect your ear couldn't tell the
difference.
John S. Novak, III
>No, both end up as sinus.
<Sniff>
John S. Novak, III
>If you sold it for under $500 a foot, they got a deal. I mean, cable
>that's had technical terms invoked over it by a real EE... wow. That's
>good shit.
I was a freshman.
Aaron Bergman
I was referring to generic sine waves presumably with a frequency a couple
times less than the Nyquist frequency.
>But at 20-25 KHz, I suspect your ear couldn't tell the
>difference.
The audiophiles claim that it can have a sort of resonant effect. Of
course they also claim that using a green marker to draw a circle around a
CD increases sound quality, so I don't put much credence in their
pronouncements.
Whoever thought of that one must still be laughing.
John S. Novak, III
<aber...@princeton.edu> wrote:
>>But at 20-25 KHz, I suspect your ear couldn't tell the
>>difference.
>The audiophiles claim that it can have a sort of resonant effect.
A resonance effect with _what_?
Peeve: Audiofreaks. Put your money where your mouths are, and do
some blind tests.
Mike Kozlowski
John S. Novak, III <j...@concentric.net> wrote:
>On 12 Apr 1999 22:48:00 GMT, Mike Kozlowski <mkoz...@guy.ssc.wisc.edu> wrote:
>>You don't know many audiophiles, do you?
>
>I do.
>Used to sell them monodirectional speaker cables, in school.
If you sold it for under $500 a foot, they got a deal. I mean, cable
that's had technical terms invoked over it by a real EE... wow. That's
good shit.
("...And the constant inductance EMF matrix construction provides for
unmatched reproduction of complex transients and unparalleled dynamic
range.")
Mike Kozlowski
John S. Novak, III <j...@concentric.net> wrote:
>Peeve: Audiofreaks. Put your money where your mouths are, and do
>some blind tests.
One of the more interesting characters in the audio world is John Dunlavy.
He's designed some very well-reviewed speakers (I haven't heard them
myself -- $8K speakers are a bit beyond my college student budget), and
seems to be a very knowledgeable guy. But he's more well-known online for
publicly asserting that cables don't make a damn bit of difference to the
sound. He's backed it up both with measurements, which were unable to
detect any difference between Radio Shack 12 gauge wire and the $500/ft
stuff; and with blind tests, where a number of golden ear subjects were
unable to identify the cables any more reliably than random guessing would
get you.
Needless to say, these sorts of actual tests didn't have any impact on the
opinions of people who are just _convinced_ that they can hear a
difference. So Dunlavy actually sells $100/ft wire, which he touts as
being sonically identical to stuff five times as expensive. It's gotten
good reviews. People buy it. You can just imagine him chortling while
reciting P.T. Barnum quotes.
Brad
though, if you like that sort of techy thing.
Brad.
John S. Novak, III
>One of the more interesting characters in the audio world is John Dunlavy.
>He's designed some very well-reviewed speakers (I haven't heard them
>myself -- $8K speakers are a bit beyond my college student budget), and
>seems to be a very knowledgeable guy. But he's more well-known online for
>publicly asserting that cables don't make a damn bit of difference to the
>sound.
Well of _course_ they don't.
What physical process could _possibly_ cause a wire to affect sound
quality? It's either a wire, or it isn't. (At those frequencies.)
>Needless to say, these sorts of actual tests didn't have any impact on the
>opinions of people who are just _convinced_ that they can hear a
>difference.
It's like religion.
--
John S. Novak, III j...@concentric.net
John S. Novak, III
<kmmon...@ucdavis.edu> wrote:
>Outside interference. I've always been under the impression that it's
>best for speaker and headphone wires to be relatively well insulated,
>to minimize interference.
Interference with what?
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
> On Thu, 15 Apr 1999 22:20:10 -0500, Aaron Bergman
> <aber...@princeton.edu> wrote:
>
> >>But at 20-25 KHz, I suspect your ear couldn't tell the
> >>difference.
>
> >The audiophiles claim that it can have a sort of resonant effect.
>
> A resonance effect with _what_?
> some blind tests.
>
>
I may as well jump in here, could be anywhere on this thread. I am not as
well grounded as you all in digital sampling theory but the current state
of the art in sound reproduction is -not- perfect. Novak try this test,
sorry can't do it as an ABX double blind. Get yourself to your local
symphony hall, jazz club, whatever and listen to a live, unamplified,
piano. Then find yourself the best stereo you can and see if it comes
close. My system is modest but I've heard some pretty good ones. Nothing
I have heard has ever come close to truly recreating a live concert
space.
SED, who still listens to vinyl.
John S. Novak, III
<Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>> A resonance effect with _what_?
>> Peeve: Audiofreaks. Put your money where your mouths are, and do
>> some blind tests.
>I may as well jump in here, could be anywhere on this thread. I am not as
>well grounded as you all in digital sampling theory but the current state
>of the art in sound reproduction is -not- perfect. Novak try this test,
>sorry can't do it as an ABX double blind. Get yourself to your local
>symphony hall, jazz club, whatever and listen to a live, unamplified,
>piano. Then find yourself the best stereo you can and see if it comes
>close. My system is modest but I've heard some pretty good ones. Nothing
>I have heard has ever come close to truly recreating a live concert
>space.
This has nothing to do with sampling rate.
This has everything to do with acoustics, which is a different field.
--
John S. Novak, III j...@concentric.net
Kurt Montandon
>On 16 Apr 1999 03:38:35 GMT, Mike Kozlowski <mkoz...@guy.ssc.wisc.edu> wrote:
>>seems to be a very knowledgeable guy. But he's more well-known online for
>>publicly asserting that cables don't make a damn bit of difference to the
>>sound.
>
>Well of _course_ they don't.
>What physical process could _possibly_ cause a wire to affect sound
>quality?
Outside interference. I've always been under the impression that it's
best for speaker and headphone wires to be relatively well insulated,
to minimize interference.
(Unless you were just being sarcastic).
Kurt Montandon
--
"Yeah, but ten years ago we were debating whether emacs was better than
vi, whereas now the discussion is about whether vi is better than emacs.
So progress is clearly being made."
-- Steve Kirkendall in comp.editors
Mike Kozlowski
Steve Deffeyes <Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>sorry can't do it as an ABX double blind. Get yourself to your local
>symphony hall, jazz club, whatever and listen to a live, unamplified,
>piano. Then find yourself the best stereo you can and see if it comes
>close. My system is modest but I've heard some pretty good ones. Nothing
>I have heard has ever come close to truly recreating a live concert
>space.
John Dunlavy, who I mentioned earlier in this thread, did do an experiment
like this. In the middle of a large anechoic chamber, he put a string
quartet, and a hepped-up stereo system. Blind listeners were unable to
tell whether the recording or the reality was real.
In a non-anechoic room, if you'll excuse my excess of negation, you'd
almost certainly get different results since real sound disperses
differently than stereo sound.
--
Michael Kozlowski m...@cs.wisc.edu
Recommended SF (Updated 4/16): http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~mlk/sfbooks.html
Mike Kozlowski
John S. Novak, III <j...@concentric.net> wrote:
>On 16 Apr 1999 03:38:35 GMT, Mike Kozlowski <mkoz...@guy.ssc.wisc.edu> wrote:
>
>>seems to be a very knowledgeable guy. But he's more well-known online for
>>publicly asserting that cables don't make a damn bit of difference to the
>>sound.
>
>Well of _course_ they don't.
>What physical process could _possibly_ cause a wire to affect sound
>quality?
How about "characteristic impedance (series inductance and parallel
capacitance per unit length), loss resistance (including additional
resistance due to skin-effect losses versus frequency), dielectric losses
versus frequency (loss tangent, etc.), velocity-of-propagation factor,
overall loss versus frequency into different impedance loads, [and] those
properties of the dielectric material that contribute to microphonic noise
in the presence of ambient vibration, noise, etc. (in combination with a
D.C. off-set created by a pre-amp output circuit, etc.)."
(Can you tell that I cut-n-pasted that without having any clue what the
words mean?)
>>Needless to say, these sorts of actual tests didn't have any impact on the
>>opinions of people who are just _convinced_ that they can hear a
>>difference.
>
>It's like religion.
A burning in the ears, eh?
Aaron Bergman
Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam (Steve Deffeyes) wrote:
>SED, who still listens to vinyl.
Other than perverse nostalgia, why?
Don't say that they have better sound quality please.
Jeff Krug
> (Can you tell that I cut-n-pasted that without having any clue what the
> words mean?)
I was about to ask what the hell they teach CS majors at Wisconsin...
Although some of that made sense / sounded familiar after a telecom class
I had. Although running 3600 pairs of copper wire in one tube for several
miles is not really comparable to running speaker wire around a room.
--
Jeff Krug <-> CS @ GT <-> BMAB <-> AAA - http://www.angband.org/
"The sooner you fall behind, the more time you have to catch up."
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
> On Fri, 16 Apr 1999 20:58:18 -0700, Steve Deffeyes
> <Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>
> >> A resonance effect with _what_?
> >> Peeve: Audiofreaks. Put your money where your mouths are, and do
> >> some blind tests.
>
> >I may as well jump in here, could be anywhere on this thread. I am not as
> >well grounded as you all in digital sampling theory but the current state
> >of the art in sound reproduction is -not- perfect. Novak try this test,
> >symphony hall, jazz club, whatever and listen to a live, unamplified,
> >piano. Then find yourself the best stereo you can and see if it comes
> >close. My system is modest but I've heard some pretty good ones. Nothing
> >I have heard has ever come close to truly recreating a live concert
> >space.
>
> This has everything to do with acoustics, which is a different field.
>
>
>
best example but I still think we don't have a satisfactory way of
reproducing music. If the recording process were perfect, as I thought
you implied, I think we would be a lot closer than we are.
Peeve, "perfect sound forever"
--
SED
Remove "kill.the.spam" to reply
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
> In article <MPG.1181a6b21...@netnews.worldnet.att.net>,
> Steve Deffeyes <Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>
> >symphony hall, jazz club, whatever and listen to a live, unamplified,
> >piano. Then find yourself the best stereo you can and see if it comes
> >close. My system is modest but I've heard some pretty good ones. Nothing
> >I have heard has ever come close to truly recreating a live concert
> >space.
>
> like this. In the middle of a large anechoic chamber, he put a string
> quartet, and a hepped-up stereo system. Blind listeners were unable to
> tell whether the recording or the reality was real.
>
> In a non-anechoic room, if you'll excuse my excess of negation, you'd
> almost certainly get different results since real sound disperses
> differently than stereo sound.
>
>
off walls, the sense of space where you can hear how large the room was.
This is not peripheral either. Especially in classical music the sound of
the hall plays a big part in the overall feel. I heard an outdoor pipe
organ once and was shocked at how much of what you think of the way an
organ sounds is the sound of the church it's in.
At a Stereophile show in NYC I heard a recording on a Nagra digital open
real tape deck, I'm pretty sure it was 24 bit 96 kHz, of a solo
harpsichord and the same instrument live in the same room played by the
same musician. Not even close. Sure there are a ton of factors here but
that's what we are trying to do, reproduce music, not sine waves, in your
living room, not an anechoic chamber.
Steve Deffeyes
>
> >SED, who still listens to vinyl.
>
> Other than perverse nostalgia, why?
>
a record was pressed in the 80's or the 50's. Used records shops have
much more character CD chains. Would you rather hang out and shoot the
shit at the Princeton Record Exchange or Sam Goody? It's a cheep hobby, I
usually don't spend more than $5 or $10 on anything and have picked up
several that price guides say are worth $50 or $100.
>
> Don't say that they have better sound quality please.
>
it was still "Kids are Strange" Amelia, back me up OK?
Jeff McGuirk
Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam (Steve Deffeyes) wrote:
<snip irreproducibility of certain instumental sounds>
>What stereos get wrong is the room sound. The way the notes decay, echo
>off walls, the sense of space where you can hear how large the room was.
>This is not peripheral either. Especially in classical music the sound of
>the hall plays a big part in the overall feel. I heard an outdoor pipe
>organ once and was shocked at how much of what you think of the way an
>organ sounds is the sound of the church it's in.
Physics lecture hat on:
I heard a talk by a acoustical physicist (cum Episcopalian priest) who
was investigating this effect, the irreproducibility of certain
musical instruments, especially violins and pianos. Way he explained
it was that these instruments act as an antenna of a similar size as
the instrument (for a certain wavelength range). This makes the
far-field pattern of the instrument very complex in a standard room
environment (non-anechoic chamber). Miniscule variations in position
produce striking variations in sound due to interference. This is why
you can record and play back instruments which emit like a point
source (brass, woodwinds, etc.), but not antenna-like instruments.
At any rate, this guy created a speaker to play piano and violin music
more accurately. It basically had one speaker with a number of
different length pipes coming off of it. This had the effect of
turning the point-source speaker into four sources spaced of an
equivalent size as a violin. This gizmo produced some of the
far-field interferences which make piano and violin music so complex.
Physics lecture hat off.
At least that's what I heard.
JM
John S. Novak, III
<Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>> John Dunlavy, who I mentioned earlier in this thread, did do an experiment
>> like this. In the middle of a large anechoic chamber, he put a string
>> quartet, and a hepped-up stereo system. Blind listeners were unable to
>> tell whether the recording or the reality was real.
>What stereos get wrong is the room sound. The way the notes decay, echo
>off walls, the sense of space where you can hear how large the room was.
>This is not peripheral either.
Kozlowski has tried to point this out to you, as have I:
This is not a defect in the stereo, nor is it related to the sampling
rate (if we're talking about digital recordings.) This is a problem
with _the room_. This is a matter of acoustics.
Put a violin in your living room, have him play, and then listen to a
recording in your living room, and you won't be able to tell the
difference. Listen to a violin in a concert hall, then listen to a
recording in your living room, and of course you'll be able to tell
the difference.
The stereo, as far as your ear can tell, is reproducing the sound to
absolute perfection.
The 'room sounds' to which you refer are, of course, caused by _the
room_, not the stereo.
>At a Stereophile show in NYC I heard a recording on a Nagra digital open
>real tape deck, I'm pretty sure it was 24 bit 96 kHz, of a solo
>harpsichord and the same instrument live in the same room played by the
>same musician. Not even close.
When we do a blind test, I'll believe you.
Until then, the same factor that makes people go out and buy $100/foot
speaker cables (and think they're getting an 80% discount and a damned
good deal) is probably affecting you, too.
--
John S. Novak, III j...@concentric.net
Marc Sanders
>
> On Sat, 17 Apr 1999 00:07:41 GMT, Kurt Montandon
> <kmmon...@ucdavis.edu> wrote:
>
> >best for speaker and headphone wires to be relatively well insulated,
> >to minimize interference.
>
I believe he meant 'shielded', instead of 'insulated', to minimize
electromagnetic interference.
ObGeekSpeak: Interference used to be a big concern with computer
network cabling, before improvements in error checking and repeating
hubs made UTP (Unshielded Twisted Pair) cable the medium of choice for
LAN's. Shielded cabling is still used for some networks, though.
=====================================================================
"A good insult is like a good knife; short, sharp, and pointed."
Marc Sanders (marc...@mindspring.com)
John S. Novak, III
<je...@amo.physics.yale.edu> wrote:
>Physics lecture hat on:
>I heard a talk by a acoustical physicist (cum Episcopalian priest) who
>was investigating this effect, the irreproducibility of certain
>musical instruments, especially violins and pianos.
It's not irreproducible, it's just not as straight-forward to get an
approximation which your ear can't discern.
>Way he explained
>it was that these instruments act as an antenna of a similar size as
>the instrument (for a certain wavelength range). This makes the
>far-field pattern of the instrument very complex in a standard room
>environment (non-anechoic chamber).
Explanation for the unenlightened: Far-field and near-field patterns
are antenna engineering terms. In radio antennas, anyway, patterns
of electromagnetic fields take on a different character (and actually
have different computational methods of solution and approximation)
depending on how far away they are from the antenna. The region of
transition from the near-field characterization to the far field
characterization generally depends on the wavelength under
consideration.
Now, making a direct generalization from EM antenna patterns to sonic
antenna patterns is reprehensibly unfair, because the physics behind a
solely longitudinal accoustic wave and the more complex electromagnetic
waves is bound to yield different solutions. Further, I'm not even
going to pretend like I've investigated the math behind the accoustic
antenna interpretation of a violin.
And to make matters worse, my copy of Balanis is at the office.
Nevertheless, I'm going to opine, here, that there are two fairly
obvious ways to get a good approximation:
One is a physics approach, and therefore physically difficult: Make
your speaker of the appropriate shape and physical character, and your
difficulty goes away. You outline this in text which I have snipped.
The other is electronic, and therefore easy: Realize that once you
begin characterizing accoustic instruments as accoustic antennas, you
immediately open yourself up to the idea of creating electronic
_arrays_ of accoustic antennas. Even he most trivial stereo system
has two speakers, which creates an array of two elements. A more
modern system will have four, plus however many subwoofers. This, if
treated properly, will vastly improve your sound quality.
>Miniscule variations in position
>produce striking variations in sound due to interference. This is why
>you can record and play back instruments which emit like a point
>source (brass, woodwinds, etc.), but not antenna-like instruments.
...Ask him about drums. Which are the same kettle, in another
physical dimension. Then ask him if he's heard of Jim Irwin.
(I have no idea if Jim is well-known in those circles. But Jim was a
faculty member at Bradley when I was there, working on his PhD at
UIUC. His dissertation topic was the creation of new and better
algorithms for the synthesis of drumbeats. It's not my field, but the
antenna interpretations verge over toward it.)
John S. Novak, III
>Although some of that made sense / sounded familiar after a telecom class
>I had. Although running 3600 pairs of copper wire in one tube for several
>miles is not really comparable to running speaker wire around a room.
Not at _all_ comparable...
John S. Novak, III
<Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>Of course there are a ton of things involved here. Maybe that wasn't the
>best example but I still think we don't have a satisfactory way of
>reproducing music. If the recording process were perfect, as I thought
>you implied, I think we would be a lot closer than we are.
It's about as perfect as it needs to get, to fool your ears.
If you want something to sound like a concert hall, you have to Go To
A Concert Hall.
Either that, or get some really good headphones, or just stimulate
your auditory nerves directly.
It's not a problem with the recordings, it's a problem with the shape
and construction of your house.
John S. Novak, III
>>What physical process could _possibly_ cause a wire to affect sound
>>quality?
>How about "characteristic impedance (series inductance and parallel
>capacitance per unit length), loss resistance (including additional
>resistance due to skin-effect losses versus frequency), dielectric losses
>versus frequency (loss tangent, etc.), velocity-of-propagation factor,
>overall loss versus frequency into different impedance loads, [and] those
>properties of the dielectric material that contribute to microphonic noise
>in the presence of ambient vibration, noise, etc. (in combination with a
>D.C. off-set created by a pre-amp output circuit, etc.)."
>(Can you tell that I cut-n-pasted that without having any clue what the
>words mean?)
Yes, because if you knew what they meant and how they were applied, I
question whether you could type them in and still leave any
self-respect. Certainly, you couldn't do it without cracking up.
Skin effects? At audio frequencies?! The only reason I didn't spit
my glass of water all over the monitor is because I'm patiently
waiting for it to thaw out before I drink it.(*) Almost all of the
effects listed have been cut and pasted from the world of radio
frequency engineering. Most that aren't taken from RF engineering are
clearly being applied as if in an RF environment.
Clue: Just because it's a _radio frequency_ engineering term, does
not necessarily mean it applies to all aspects of a radio.
Particularly not those parts of a radio that operate at audio
frequencies (below 20 KHz) rather than at radio frequencies
(charitably, above 20 MHz. Some of them, I wouldn't worry about below
500 MHz.)
Jesus Christ, give some people a little knowledge and they immediately
become even more stupid than before.
* Peeve: Fucking building maintenance seems to have "fixed" my
fridge. To the point where the glass of water I put in there last
night is now frozen entirely solid. Not just a patch over the top.
It's one frozen lump.
John S. Novak, III
<marc...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>> Interference with what?
>I believe he meant 'shielded', instead of 'insulated', to minimize
>electromagnetic interference.
I know what he meant, and I was being charitable enough not to call
him on _that_ difference.
I repeat, given that we're talking about speaker wires, here:
Interference with _what_?
John Rowat
<snip sound-and-wires technobabble>
> (Can you tell that I cut-n-pasted that without having any clue what the
> words mean?)
I know what every one of those things is and how it works. Fuck. I think
my eternal geekdom has just been clinched.
-John
--
"Looking at the world / Through your innocent eyes
You're seeing the promises / No, they're only lies
And broken dreams"
-Black Sabbath, "Time Machine"
John S. Novak, III
>> (Can you tell that I cut-n-pasted that without having any clue what the
>> words mean?)
>I know what every one of those things is and how it works. Fuck. I think
>my eternal geekdom has just been clinched.
Okay, hotshot.
Skin effect?
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
>
> Put a violin in your living room, have him play, and then listen to a
> recording in your living room, and you won't be able to tell the
> difference. Listen to a violin in a concert hall, then listen to a
> recording in your living room, and of course you'll be able to tell
> the difference.
>
I'd guess we'd need a violin in your living room and a recording of the
violin in an anechoic chamber, otherwise we'd be hearing the room twice?
If I can reply to your other post here, in fact I do listen mostly on
headphones, Sennheiser HD 580, thin walls in my apartment. I am usually
not hearing my room but I will agree that the recording process,
microphone placement etc, accounts for more of the sound than the
reproduction chain.
>
> The stereo, as far as your ear can tell, is reproducing the sound to
> absolute perfection.
>
> The 'room sounds' to which you refer are, of course, caused by _the
> room_, not the stereo.
>
At the same show I mentioned before I heard about a hundred systems set
up in hotel rooms of the same shape and construction and there were
vast differences in the way they all sounded. No I wasn't blindfolded but
I refuse to believe it was -all- psychological, especially since several
speakers I thought I would like from reading about them sucked. You don't
need to belive it if you don't want but I'll trust my ears. I do think
most of the differences were due to room-speaker interactions and the
differences amongst D to A converters were way smaller and the difference
amongst wires were infinitesimal.
>
>$100 per foot speaker cables
>
Try $15,000 for a meter pair if Kimber Black Pearls. Before you jump on
me -my- speakers are hooked up with 18 gauge wire from Radio Shack.
John S. Novak, III
<Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>I'd guess we'd need a violin in your living room and a recording of the
>violin in an anechoic chamber, otherwise we'd be hearing the room twice?
Depends on your set-up, but clearly I'm beginning to get through,
here.
>At the same show I mentioned before I heard about a hundred systems set
>up in hotel rooms of the same shape and construction and there were
>vast differences in the way they all sounded. No I wasn't blindfolded but
>I refuse to believe it was -all- psychological,
I really don't care what you believe.
I'msure on some systems you could legitimately tell the difference.
But without the blind testing, we'll never know, will we?
--
John S. Novak, III j...@concentric.net
John S. Novak, III
>> Okay, hotshot.
>> Skin effect?
>I shoot the hostage.
Indeed.
>The skin effect is the tendency of high-frequency AC to be denser at the
>outer edge of a conductor. This results in an effectively higher
>resistance.
Correct, as it goes.
One might quibble on a definition of resistance, but if you define
your terms and the areas you're talking about carefully, you can
support your statement.
>WHY this happens, or how you predict it, I don't have a clue.
>Ask me again this time next year.
Peruse Maxwell's equations.
And tell your prof that if he isn't motivating the material by
backing it up with some real mathematics, then he's no better than
a gypsy fortune teller.
For bonus points, explain why this is bullshit, in terms of speaker
wire.
Then move on to loss tangents.
John S. Novak, III
>>I really don't care what you believe.
>>I'msure on some systems you could legitimately tell the difference.
>>But without the blind testing, we'll never know, will we?
>Now, wait a minute. Are you claiming that you can't hear the differences
>between _speakers_? 'Cause that's just insane. If you can't hear the
>differences between speakers, you're deaf. These aren't subtle
>differences.
I thought we were talking about telling the difference between the
real article, and the speaker system, not just telling the difference
between various speaker systems.
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
>
<snip Amelia praising vinyl>
>
Thanks, I take em on next time.
>
> As you pointed out above, collecting vinyl records is an enjoyable
> hobby. I used to spend hours in used record shops, hunting for some
> hidden treasure. (This is one thing I miss about living near Detroit,
> where there are TONS of great vinyl havens. Although Cheapies here in
> Hamilton is pretty cool. Beats HMV, anyway.) And used records are
> very cheap--I've bought many fine records in excellent condition for
> $1.99 or less. Of course, many album covers are works of art in
> themselves--for example, the cover of _Led Zeppelin III_ with the
> rotating stars and flowers, old jazz covers, or any album cover done
> by Roger Dean. Reduced to CD size, it just ain't the same.
>
Luckily for me Berkeley is ground zero for used vinyl. Trick is to find a
store that has such a high turnover that the staff doesn't have time to
consult price guides when stocking the shelves.
>
>!Sa'Peeve: a few months ago, finding a copy of Ella Fitzgerald's _The
>Cole Porter Songbook Vol. 1_ on Verve, good condition, for $5. Then
>finding an identical copy at another store for $35!
>
Cool, Ella and Miles are what I specialize in. As long as Aaron isn't
listening I'll go out on a limb and say _Clap_Hands_Here_Comes_Charlie_
is one album that just doesn't sound as good on CD. Check the label on
your Cole Porter. It should be black with silver printing. If it says
Verve Records Inc at the bottom it is an original pressing, pre '62, from
when Verve was independent. If it says MGM Records it is a later one made
between '62 and '72 and not worth as much. Not that you can't enjoy a
later one, anything you like to listen to is worth $5.
Steve Deffeyes
wrote...
a violin and speaker B can sound -exactly- like a violin how A & B can
sound different. Maybe I misinterpreted you but I also felt you were
saying each and every stereo in the world was doing a perfect job. All
wires sounding the same I can accept, all CD players, well for most
people similar enough to not make a difference, all speakers no way.
Jeff McGuirk
wrote:
<reproducing violin sound.>
>Nevertheless, I'm going to opine, here, that there are two fairly
>obvious ways to get a good approximation:
>
>One is a physics approach, and therefore physically difficult: Make
>your speaker of the appropriate shape and physical character, and your
>difficulty goes away. You outline this in text which I have snipped.
>
>The other is electronic, and therefore easy: Realize that once you
>begin characterizing accoustic instruments as accoustic antennas, you
>immediately open yourself up to the idea of creating electronic
>_arrays_ of accoustic antennas. Even he most trivial stereo system
>has two speakers, which creates an array of two elements. A more
>modern system will have four, plus however many subwoofers. This, if
>treated properly, will vastly improve your sound quality.
The electronic means is maybe more elegant. (It wouldn't look like
the underside of a sink with all the PVC pipe sticking off a speaker.)
Problem is, to reproduce accurately the directional nature of the
sound (directional tone color I think it's called) you might need more
than just four speakers. Multiple subwoofers aren't really necessary
because of the nondirectionality of bass.
>Jeff McGuirk:
>>Miniscule variations in position
>>produce striking variations in sound due to interference. This is why
>>you can record and play back instruments which emit like a point
>>source (brass, woodwinds, etc.), but not antenna-like instruments.
>
>...Ask him about drums. Which are the same kettle, in another
>physical dimension. Then ask him if he's heard of Jim Irwin.
>
>(I have no idea if Jim is well-known in those circles. But Jim was a
>faculty member at Bradley when I was there, working on his PhD at
>UIUC. His dissertation topic was the creation of new and better
>algorithms for the synthesis of drumbeats. It's not my field, but the
>antenna interpretations verge over toward it.)
Neither are my particular field. I can't ask him, he's a prof. at
Michigan, and was just here for a seminar. I would suppose that drums
probably don't exhibit strong directionality because they're mostly
bass, Higher pitches, I would guess might have the same effect.
Incidentally, IIRC, one doesn't get directional effects from an
orchestral group because of averaging from different sources, but this
is what allows a solo violin to be easily distinguished from a
background orchestra.
JM
.
Amelia Bradburn
Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam (Steve Deffeyes) say:
Well, I'm no audiophile, but...
I will admit that my reverence of vinyl is partly for sentimental
reasons--the first albums I owned were on vinyl (for what it's worth,
the first two albums I owned were The Beatles _1962-1966_ and
Madonna's first album). I had a cheapo turntable which I played them
on endlessly.
It goes way beyond that. The sound quality is one factor, especially
with older albums which are being transferred to CD from old, worn-out
master tapes. Many details tended to be lost when transferring from
album to CD. This is less of a factor now, though, as more and more
classics are being properly re-mastered.
As you pointed out above, collecting vinyl records is an enjoyable
hobby. I used to spend hours in used record shops, hunting for some
hidden treasure. (This is one thing I miss about living near Detroit,
where there are TONS of great vinyl havens. Although Cheapies here in
Hamilton is pretty cool. Beats HMV, anyway.) And used records are
very cheap--I've bought many fine records in excellent condition for
$1.99 or less. Of course, many album covers are works of art in
themselves--for example, the cover of _Led Zeppelin III_ with the
rotating stars and flowers, old jazz covers, or any album cover done
by Roger Dean. Reduced to CD size, it just ain't the same.
So, yeah, I'd say it's a bit more than perverse nostalgia. More like
obsessive-compulsive behaviour on my part. ;)
!Sa'Peeve: a few months ago, finding a copy of Ella Fitzgerald's _The
Cole Porter Songbook Vol. 1_ on Verve, good condition, for $5. Then
finding an identical copy at another store for $35!
--
Amelia Bradburn
ICQ: 33990873
John Rowat
> On 17 Apr 1999 17:51:54 GMT, John Rowat <jro...@prince.carleton.ca> wrote:
>>I know what every one of those things is and how it works. Fuck. I think
>>my eternal geekdom has just been clinched.
> Okay, hotshot.
Pop quiz?
> Skin effect?
I shoot the hostage.
Okay, so "how it works" was an exagerration on some of the secondaries.
The skin effect is the tendency of high-frequency AC to be denser at the
outer edge of a conductor. This results in an effectively higher
resistance. WHY this happens, or how you predict it, I don't have a clue.
Ask me again this time next year.
(and before you ask, no, I didn't look at my notes for that. On the other
hand, the exam was three days ago.)
Mike Kozlowski
John S. Novak, III <j...@concentric.net> wrote:
>On Sat, 17 Apr 1999 21:35:30 -0700, Steve Deffeyes
><Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>
>>At the same show I mentioned before I heard about a hundred systems set
>>up in hotel rooms of the same shape and construction and there were
>>vast differences in the way they all sounded. No I wasn't blindfolded but
>>I refuse to believe it was -all- psychological,
>
>I'msure on some systems you could legitimately tell the difference.
>But without the blind testing, we'll never know, will we?
Now, wait a minute. Are you claiming that you can't hear the differences
between _speakers_? 'Cause that's just insane. If you can't hear the
differences between speakers, you're deaf. These aren't subtle
differences.
--
Michael Bruce
>On Sat, 17 Apr 1999 00:06:46 -0700, Steve Deffeyes
><Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>
>>Of course there are a ton of things involved here. Maybe that wasn't the
>>best example but I still think we don't have a satisfactory way of
>>reproducing music. If the recording process were perfect, as I thought
>>you implied, I think we would be a lot closer than we are.
>
>It's about as perfect as it needs to get, to fool your ears.
>If you want something to sound like a concert hall, you have to Go To
>A Concert Hall.
>
>Either that, or get some really good headphones, or just stimulate
>your auditory nerves directly.
I'd like to emphasize the headphone part. I've found that good
headphones are much better than good speakers. In fact, one of my
goals is to buy some really good headphones at some point in the near
future; I've given them a test drive at the store, and boy do they
sound good.
This probably also means that I need to figure out a way to get my
soundcard to stop buzzing at higher volumes...which I'm guessing will
involve buying a new soundcard.
--
Michael Bruce | mab...@students.wisc.edu | finally a new .signature
<http://www.infinet.com/~bruce/> Redesign coming soon | update 081099
The website has short book reviews/recommendations, with more content
coming soon. Or at least, it will if I get around to it.
John Rowat
>>WHY this happens, or how you predict it, I don't have a clue.
>>Ask me again this time next year.
> Peruse Maxwell's equations.
> And tell your prof that if he isn't motivating the material by
> backing it up with some real mathematics, then he's no better than
> a gypsy fortune teller.
It's not on the course curriculum for another semester. It was a
throwaway comment from a prof who puts EVERYTHING he's ever said on his
tests and exams.
Bastard. Exams can be an unlubricated experience.
> For bonus points, explain why this is bullshit, in terms of speaker
> wire.
Because you're not using anywhere near a high enough frequency to make a
difference? You're a number of orders of magnitude too small?
> Then move on to loss tangents.
Aren't you supposed to do your OWN homework?
(Okay, that one eludes me at 4:45 am. It seems like something I SHOULD
know... but then, so did knowing what eating an entire cow felt like,
and THAT was just a bad scene all over.)
Leigh D. Butler
Kozlowski wrote:
<snip>
> John Dunlavy, who I mentioned earlier in this thread, did do an experiment
> like this. In the middle of a large anechoic chamber, he put a string
> quartet, and a hepped-up stereo system. Blind listeners were unable to
> tell whether the recording or the reality was real.
>
> In a non-anechoic room, if you'll excuse my excess of negation, you'd
> almost certainly get different results since real sound disperses
> differently than stereo sound.
It's odd that I completely understand what you're talking about even
though I don't believe I know what "anechoic" is. I have an idea, merely
from context, but could anyone define for me what it means exactly?
--
Leigh Butler leig...@bellsouth.net
UIN: 13474651
***************************
"Well, I mean, YES idealism, YES the dignity of pure research, YES the
pursuit of truth in all its forms, but there comes a point I'm afraid
where you begin to suspect that if there's any real truth, it's that
the entire multidimensional infinity of the Universe is almost certainly
being run by a bunch of maniacs."
Jasper Janssen
wrote in <slrn7hj2pc...@morrolan.dhs.org>:
>I'd like to emphasize the headphone part. I've found that good
>headphones are much better than good speakers. In fact, one of my
>goals is to buy some really good headphones at some point in the near
>future; I've given them a test drive at the store, and boy do they
>sound good.
>
>This probably also means that I need to figure out a way to get my
>soundcard to stop buzzing at higher volumes...which I'm guessing will
>involve buying a new soundcard.
Good god. You're buying a pair of expensive headphones ($500+,
right?), and you use a sound card that pretends it has a headphone
amplifier on it? Jesus, man, if you can afford a good sound card. And
that means line out only, with a separate headphone amp, usually. I
wouldn't use the average soundcard's amp to drive those 2", 4W,
"really only meant to produce beeps" speakers.
Jasper
Trond V Erlandsen
>I do not recall, Senator, whether on 17 Apr 1999 04:41:22 GMT Mike
>Kozlowski wrote:
[...]
>> In a non-anechoic room, if you'll excuse my excess of negation, you'd
>> almost certainly get different results since real sound disperses
>> differently than stereo sound.
>It's odd that I completely understand what you're talking about even
>though I don't believe I know what "anechoic" is. I have an idea, merely
>from context, but could anyone define for me what it means exactly?
"Anechoic" means "free from echo". If you want a room to have no echo
then you need to cover flat surfaces with something that dampens the
echo. One thing I know works is to have lots of small pyramids sticking
out of the walls. I think the pyramids are made of some material that
will absorb (most) of the energy in the sound waves.
I've also seen rooms like this that have been designed to dampen
electro-magnetic echoes, and those also dampen audio echoes quite
effectively. I know someone who used one of those to practice playing an
instrument, so as not to disturb anyone.
--
TV
UIN: 3843330
http://home.sol.no/~trondve/
Dave Rothgery
says...
> Good god. You're buying a pair of expensive headphones ($500+,
> right?), and you use a sound card that pretends it has a headphone
> amplifier on it? Jesus, man, if you can afford a good sound card. And
> that means line out only, with a separate headphone amp, usually. I
> wouldn't use the average soundcard's amp to drive those 2", 4W,
> "really only meant to produce beeps" speakers.
Feh.
The only reason I have speakers attached to my computer is because some
games are virtually unplayable without the sound effects.
So of course they're cheap speakers I bought used for $4.
--
Dave Rothgery R. Shanly & Associates
dave...@altavista.net
John S. Novak, III
<Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>Just for clarity's sake explain how if speaker A can sound -exactly- like
>a violin and speaker B can sound -exactly- like a violin how A & B can
>sound different. Maybe I misinterpreted you but I also felt you were
>saying each and every stereo in the world was doing a perfect job. All
>wires sounding the same I can accept, all CD players, well for most
>people similar enough to not make a difference, all speakers no way.
No, I didn't say each and every stereo was doing a perfect job, for
Chrissakes. The main point of this conversation has been the accuracy
of digital sampling, yes? And that, given a proper physical set-up,
you're not going to be able to tell the difference between a digital
recording and the real thing, yes?
Yes.
The other factors, which are going to cause horrid degredations in
sound, are physical factors, like speakers, and room accoustics.
So if you're going from booth to booth at a freak show, varying
quality of speakers is _obviously_ going to cause a difference, as is
differing position in the room. So, as I said, I'm very sure you
_could_ tell the difference between reality and speakers on some
set-ups. But all of them? Without a good blind test, I have my
extreme doubts.
--
John S. Novak, III j...@concentric.net
John S. Novak, III
<tro...@online.no.ANTISPAM> wrote:
>"Anechoic" means "free from echo". If you want a room to have no echo
>then you need to cover flat surfaces with something that dampens the
>echo. One thing I know works is to have lots of small pyramids sticking
>out of the walls. I think the pyramids are made of some material that
>will absorb (most) of the energy in the sound waves.
Foam usually works.
>I've also seen rooms like this that have been designed to dampen
>electro-magnetic echoes, and those also dampen audio echoes quite
>effectively. I know someone who used one of those to practice playing an
>instrument, so as not to disturb anyone.
That's... an awfully expensive way to practice an instrument. The
electromagnetic anechoic chambers (generally referred to as EMI
chambers) have more going on than just little foam pyramids in them.
They also have to be complete (or as complete as physically possible)
conductive cages of a given quality, and have fancy electronics to get
power sent in without screwing the environment up too much.
Robert Denier
"John S. Novak, III" wrote:
>
> On Sat, 17 Apr 1999 00:06:46 -0700, Steve Deffeyes
> <Deff...@worldnet.att.net.kill.the.spam> wrote:
>
> >Of course there are a ton of things involved here. Maybe that wasn't the
> >best example but I still think we don't have a satisfactory way of
> >reproducing music. If the recording process were perfect, as I thought
> >you implied, I think we would be a lot closer than we are.
Digital recording these days is very, very good if done correctly. I
think that perhaps an eventual move to a 24bit sampling standard
couldn't hurt along with a standard way for cd's to record more than two
tracks.
> It's not a problem with the recordings, it's a problem with the shape
> and construction of your house.
Speaker systems appear to introduce the most distortion into the scheme
of things. That and the shape and construction of the playback
environment as was mentioned above.
I once tried to measure a room acoustics accurately enough to remove
noise originating in one part of a room from an accoustic signal I was
recording in another part of the room. Both the noise and the signal
were recorded simultaneously. The best I could do was a significant
reduction in the noise below about 1kHz I think. There is just too many
paths for sound to go from pt A. to pt B. in a room to model such a
thing very easily.
The bottem line is room acoustics are in general very complex. A
concert hall is a lot more than a large room. Its in general a very
well laid out room taking into account as many factors at once. The
most important one can sometimes even be the people attenting who have a
tendancy to absorb sound. To expect ones living room to sound exactly
the same with your average home stereo is just folly.
Marc Sanders
>
> <marc...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>
> >> Interference with what?
>
> >I believe he meant 'shielded', instead of 'insulated', to minimize
> >electromagnetic interference.
>
> I know what he meant, and I was being charitable enough not to call
> him on _that_ difference.
Hmm. Keep this up, and you'll get a reputation as a nice guy. ;)
> I repeat, given that we're talking about speaker wires, here:
> Interference with _what_?
I guess it would depend on the setup of the stereo: where the speaker
wires are run relative to power cords and other electic equipment.
=====================================================================
"A good insult is like a good knife; short, sharp, and pointed."
Marc Sanders (marc...@mindspring.com)
Mike Kozlowski
Jasper Janssen <spa...@janssen.dynip.com> wrote:
>On 18 Apr 1999 08:18:50 GMT, mab...@students.wisc.edu (Michael Bruce)
>>headphones are much better than good speakers. In fact, one of my
>>goals is to buy some really good headphones at some point in the near
>>future;
>
>Good god. You're buying a pair of expensive headphones ($500+,
>right?)
No. Sennheiser HD-580 phones, which are downright superb -- when I was
looking at speakers recently, I couldn't find any for under $2,500 that
sounded as good -- sell for $279.
> and you use a sound card that pretends it has a headphone
>amplifier on it?
This doesn't sound all that bad, surprisingly. I took my headphones to
work once and plugged them into the headphone jack on the CD-ROM, and it
was quite listenable.
John S. Novak, III
>> And tell your prof that if he isn't motivating the material by
>> backing it up with some real mathematics, then he's no better than
>> a gypsy fortune teller.
>It's not on the course curriculum for another semester. It was a
>throwaway comment from a prof who puts EVERYTHING he's ever said on his
>tests and exams.
It's still useless, unless you know _why_ it happens.
>> For bonus points, explain why this is bullshit, in terms of speaker
>> wire.
>Because you're not using anywhere near a high enough frequency to make a
>difference? You're a number of orders of magnitude too small?
About three or four, yeah.
Depending on how anal retentive you want to get about it.
>> Then move on to loss tangents.
>Aren't you supposed to do your OWN homework?
<Snort>
That homework's been done for over six years, now.
>(Okay, that one eludes me at 4:45 am. It seems like something I SHOULD
> know... but then, so did knowing what eating an entire cow felt like,
> and THAT was just a bad scene all over.)
Yes, it is something you should know, if you want to be an RF board
designer. It's far more useful than skin effects are likely to be.
Physical dielectric media don't behave precisely the same as free
space, bewcause the presence of fields in physical media tends to
cause the atomic substructure to align, a little bit, and polarize
which augments the total displacement flux. That, combined with loss
factors, makes the epsilon into a complex number for a physical
dielectric.
The loss tangent, loosely speaking, relates the real part of it to the
imaginary part of it. (Strictly speaking, it's the real to the
imaginary part of the displacement current, as I recall.)
This, at least in my world, is a _lot_ more important than skin
effects. It's also a frequency dependent number, which I would never
even think to apply to a speaker wire. Christ, I'm not even sure
_how_ I'd apply it to a speak wire. Suffice to say that in the realm
of $400 hammers, we don't do that shit.
I'll stop now.