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Post by philietes on Dec 20, 2016 2:18:32 GMT
The audio world is really difficult to get reliable information about for regular customers like me. So a site like the one from Ethan Winer helps a lot. When doing google searches the only thing you end up with is sponsored reviews by big and small audio companies, and self proclaimed audio experts telling to match this cable with that amp and the like... Not to forget the people who decided to defend their last big purchase of their speakers upon till their death on internet forums...it is always the 'best sounding'. Whatever that might mean. Probably they really mean it though, because of the placebo effect in our brains processing audio. Anyways, I turn to Ethan Winer with these questions because I sincerely do not know any other way to get reliable information and I believe he is one of the few who thoroughly understands audio in all its aspects.
I am afraid I already know the answer for but first: I am using a phono preamp of $189 which is probably just a waste of money (Hagerman Bugle2). Will a 20$ dollar one present any audible difference? ABX tests for power amps are plenty, on phono amps I could not find any. Though in every forum I searched, nobody is recommending cheap phono stages. Nobody mentions them being audible transparent or having inaudible noise floor. And yes, CD's would be superior to vinyl audio wise..
Secondly, I am looking to buy a DJ mixer (actually a mixer with 3-band EQ per channel). I am still not sure if to buy one with phono inputs, or line inputs only using external phono preamps. Not your area of expertise perhaps, but do you think e.g. Allen & Heath or Rane or Rodec or Mackie or Urei mixers are the most transparent sounding for two channel mixing? Unfortunately, in this product branch no manufacturer is publishing reliable specs that I know of. Or worse, the products are designed by ear, by self-taught boutique audiophile...selling for thousands of dollars..
Furthermore, do you think the Klipschorn speakers (used about $1000) are the best bang for the buck sound-wise in a big room? Or some JBL speakers? Or Mackie HR824? Actually Klipsch Jubilee 2-way? I would prefer to have just two speakers, but if a separate subwoofer provides better sound then all the better. By the way, they will be used a lot for bass heavy music upon till about 30hz, which might or might not be necessary to reproduce but I do like chest rattling bass heavy music (maximum budget for speakers $2500).
In addition, as I learned from you, it is probably not wise to spend a lot of money on expensive amplifiers so I think I am buying an Emotiva power amp, with a passive volume attenuator to go with it for $5. Finally then, with the help of RealTraps I can improve the sound of the room a lot, which might be the most important part except for the speakers themselves.
On a sidenote, does biamping speakers make an audible difference in audio quality or is this practically an audiophile myth in this day of age? And is there any way to isolate the floor cheaply to avoid inconvenience to neighbors living below? If you could only answer one of these questions to me briefly I would be really happy! Thanks a lot anyways and have a nice day!
Regards, Philietes
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Post by arnyk on Dec 20, 2016 18:49:16 GMT
I question the Klipsches as they are legacy speakers and the technology they are based on has moved quite a bit forward since their day. Also, they have to be located in solid corners or die and that is likely to screw up your imaging.
Klipschorns sell based on just about 100% sentimentality, and if you aren't that sentimental about them, look elsewhere. If you are that sentimental about them, then I'm wasting my breath talking price/performance.
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Post by philietes on Dec 20, 2016 19:40:45 GMT
Interesting! I am not sentimental about them, just heard good stuff about them. It seems to me big speakers with horns are almost completely out of production nowadays. But then I thought horn loaded speaker design actually do have some advantages distortion wise. Also, they have tighter dispersion, which might make room treatment a bit easier? Anyways, do you think that Klipsch Jubilee speakers sound differently than e.g. a pair of Mackie HR824 with a subwoofer in a well treated room? Thanks!
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Post by Ethan Winer on Dec 20, 2016 20:32:28 GMT
The problem with answering questions about loudspeakers is there are probably 500 models out there (not exaggerating), and I've heard maybe half a dozen models in the past ten years. Klipsch sells many types of speakers, and I haven't hear any of them. They're probably fine! But I can't say for sure. I do know the Mackie and have a high regard for them. I know they're excellent, and people won't be unhappy after a few weeks, so I often recommend them. But for all I know there are other speakers that cost half as much and are twice as good. I doubt it! But it could be.
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Post by Ethan Winer on Dec 20, 2016 20:46:34 GMT
1) The only way to know for sure if one phono preamp is better than another is to compare specs. This is difficult because many specs are incompatible with other specs. But generally, these days, all electronic items from the larger well known companies are good quality. Especially with a phono preamp, where the medium itself has relatively high distortion, the difference between 0.01 and 0.1 percent in a preamp is irrelevant.
2) If you can get a mixer with phono inputs do it! That's much more convenient than dealing with separate pieces, and hoping to avoid hum from ground loops when you connect them together.
3) Power amps are like speakers: hundreds of models that are all probably fine, but I can speak only for 2-3 of them that I actually know of. But unlike speakers, all power amps should sound the same. Of course, all speakers should sound the same too, but we know they don't!
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Post by Hexspa on Dec 20, 2016 22:25:01 GMT
I'll just say buy for feature sets within your budget - not for audio quality.
-m
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Post by sal1950 on Dec 20, 2016 22:43:27 GMT
I question the Klipsches as they are legacy speakers and the technology they are based on has moved quite a bit forward since their day. Also, they have to be located in solid corners or die and that is likely to screw up your imaging. Klipschorns sell based on just about 100% sentimentality, and if you aren't that sentimental about them, look elsewhere. If you are that sentimental about them, then I'm wasting my breath talking price/performance. I'd have to strongly disagree with you there Armyk. The Klipsch Legacy lineup are highly competent speakers with their only major failure being in their size and Wife Acceptance Factor. A pair of La Scala's off the used market will offer sound quality on an pare with just about anything you can purchase today. www.soundhifi.com/klipsch/sam.htmAs to philietes needs, your desire for deep bass at high levels is going to lead you to a sub-woofered system no matter what speaker your looking at. And in that case bi-amping will end up being a necessity.
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Post by arnyk on Dec 21, 2016 3:01:04 GMT
I question the Klipsches as they are legacy speakers and the technology they are based on has moved quite a bit forward since their day. Also, they have to be located in solid corners or die and that is likely to screw up your imaging. Klipschorns sell based on just about 100% sentimentality, and if you aren't that sentimental about them, look elsewhere. If you are that sentimental about them, then I'm wasting my breath talking price/performance. I'd have to strongly disagree with you there Armyk. You get to hold whatever opinions you wish, but you are not talking apples and apples. I specifically mentioned only the Klipshorn while you slickly changed the topic to the whole Legacy line. You also didn't address the obvious positioning limitations of the Klipshhorn. If the Khorn is the best Klipsch can do, why do they make all those other modern speakers? BTW a past leading technical officer of Klipsch is a friend I see not infrequently (different guy then the next guy I'm going to mention) and his story is no surprise - people want them, so they make them and sell them. I'm not talking abstractly - several of my friends have K-horns. I routinely visit and listen to one of them every few months. His is an interesting case because he is a well-known speaker designer who is an AES Fellow and has published a number of papers on the topic. He also had his own highly successful speaker consulting business as well as having been a highly placed technical officer in several very successful speaker companies. He makes no bones about it, the K-horns are his private trip down memory lane. When it comes to best sound quality that takes him to a different room in his house with the serious system. I humbly agree with him. I think its time to stop pretending that speaker driver technology and crossover technology has been frozen for the past 50 years. A ten year old article by a reviewer whose claims typically fail just about every relevant scientific test in a ragazine well known for its confusion of science fiction with science fact. I'd look elsewhere... Besides, I have ears. Let me be clear - I have nothing against horns. Indeed the upper range drivers in my main system are based on them. But, the typical horn driver and crossover technology of today is light years beyond the La Scala. Time for you to catch up on your reading and listening! Nothing wrong with that!
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Post by sal1950 on Dec 21, 2016 16:31:04 GMT
Well, one mans ceiling is another mans floor. We all have ears and opinions, that's what makes the world go round.
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Post by philietes on Dec 21, 2016 17:23:46 GMT
A bit off-topic but something I was wondering about: when listening at a gig to very high sound levels for hours and hours on end, I read that the ear goes in protection mode to prevent hearing damage. It closes down so some frequencies are less loudly heard, which I think is the same as 'ear fatigue'. When designing a system likes this, would it make sense to have an EQ in place which suppresses the 2k-10k range a bit because the human human ear is more sensitive to those? An advantage would be that the volume would not have to be dialed up as much, preventing hearing damage. Anyways, is there no audible difference in sound quality between DJ mixers? Not even a difference between the implementation of EQ? (of course different frequencies will be effected). I have never heard someone make this claim but that would be really interesting. Also, isn't it true that to have phono preamps hit the RIAA curve with sub-1 dB accuracy that is a bit tricky since you can easily get 0.1% resistors but better than 5% capacitors are not easily obtained? Of course, the cartridge and the medium itself introduce even more distortion but that should not mean that all added distortion is not a problem anymore, I believe. Would be interesting if a null test has been done to learn what the difference really is, but I doubt it. arnyk , I am curious now to know what his *serious* system consists of. Do you happen to know what he is using? Will monitor speakers be sufficient to have a large enough sweet-spot for 10 people in a large room at very high SPL? Or put differently, are monitor speakers designed to listen to from up close only because they 'focus' the sound more? Also, as I understand, bi-amping does make an audible difference because of less distortions. And when reading the specs of Full Range speakers, most of them reproduce upon till 37hz. So what exactly is the advantage of a subwoofer? Thanks!
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Post by arnyk on Dec 22, 2016 14:07:27 GMT
A bit off-topic but something I was wondering about: when listening at a gig to very high sound levels for hours and hours on end, I read that the ear goes in protection mode to prevent hearing damage. A true but IME an relatively unappreciated fact. For example several highly regarded papers ignore the fact that loud sounds desensitize the ears and pretend that the original hearing threshold still applies. I've personally experienced this any number of times at live music concerts and dances. Doesn't everybody notice the tendency to talk loud during load out the night of the event? The mechanism is frequency selective, so its effects depend on the spectrum of the loud sound and the ear's frequency dependent sensitivity. Th eq you mention would have a very perceptible effect on sound quality. We use music to give ourselves pleasure, and we naturally choose our instruments and play them as we do primarily to give humans pleasure, not save our ears. If one measures them, when new they don't seem to be as different as people may think. Cheap mixers often have passable electronics, but they pick up unintended frequency response variations because the electrical calibration and the mechanical calibration of cheap parts is often poor. IOW the tone and eq controls don't give flat response when mechanically centered, and things like that. Cheap controls often start degrading early in their possibly short lives. Agreed. For example the more bands of eq, often (but not always) the easier it is to use to obtain the desired results. Not as much as you might think. One area that varies is the bass roll off. For example there are well known brands of mic preamps that are well-designed with good parts quality but per design roll the bass off below some surprisingly high frequency like 50 Hz. Others can be flat as a table down to 10 Hz and below. In a live sound situation, the higher roll off yields a system that doesn't exactly give full fidelity to Hip-hop, but is more resistant to feedback. I think that these days 1% and 2% caps are stock items with many big distributors like Mouser, Digi-Key, etc. Last time I looked... Besides a lot of this has been moved into the digital domain where the importance of parts tolerance is greatly reduced. The interaction between the cartridge compliance and the tone arm mass is a huge influence. Most DJ cartridges are very low compliance for durability, which means that they have a much higher bass roll-off frequency, even with high mass tone arms. And audiophile tone arm/cartridge combination and a DJ tone arm/cartridge combination are two vastly different things, and may your favorite deity help you if you mix them up! The difference has been well known for decades. It is easy to measure with fairly crude gear. I know exactly what it is, but I'm going to consider his privacy. Depends on the monitors. There are large ones, small ones... The biamping itself doesn't actually do a lot to reduce distortion, but it can result in a better distribution of power. Of course good megawatt amps are about $1.98 these days so it matters a lot less. Biamping and tri-amping is very common these days in active speakers and subwoofers. I facilitates the crossover(s). Ever see a well designed crossover @60 Hz for 8 ohm speakers? There is a lot of copper in it, and many yield to the temptation to use iron cores which can saturate on loud sounds and add a lot of distortion. I've seen passive crossovers operating at all kinds of frequencies fried and blown up when used for live sound and dance purposes. The active crossover may be in the digital domain and have no precision parts to speak of, or it may be analog and get the necessary roll-offs out of 25 cent parts. Live sound, dance and hi fi are at least two, probably three different animals. Most so-called professional subwoofers are just barely good woofers by audiophile standards. There are good reasons for that, and you got to use the right tool for the job at hand. [/quote]
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Post by philietes on Dec 23, 2016 12:52:32 GMT
Thank you, that leaves little question marks over. But wouldn't it be more enjoyable in the long run of the night, when the frequencies which are most offensive to the ear at HPL are toned down a bit. This way the protection mode of the ear does not kick in and you are able to enjoy the music for a longer period of time with more accuracy than if you did not. I mean, frequencies under 100 Hz at 110dB SPL is not annoying at all, but frequencies between 2k and 4k at 110dB SPL are extremely offensive. Aha! So Klipsch heritage speakers after all! For example the Mackie HR824; they are rated at 120dB at 1 meter, despite their small size. So what exactly would be the difference between the sound heard of a speaker this size, and a large PA system (from say 4 meters away)? The SPL would be about 110dB on both which is plenty.
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Post by arnyk on Dec 23, 2016 19:42:33 GMT
Thank you, that leaves little question marks over. But wouldn't it be more enjoyable in the long run of the night, when the frequencies which are most offensive to the ear at HPL are toned down a bit. When is the last time you saw a sound system with a multiband equalizer? Probably you saw a multi-band equalizer the last time you looked at a PA or DJ sound system, since they are now very common. That's all it takes to provide the sort of frequency response tailoring that you describe! So why isn't everybody already doing it? My impression that a lot of people set up their sound system so it sounds best to them...
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Post by philietes on Jan 2, 2017 18:00:37 GMT
To conclude, is there a way to improve on any audible distortion, or deviation on the frequency response larger than 1 or 2dB in the Hagerman Bugle2 phono stage design? Put differently, is a phono stage like this more or less audible transparent?
And can I use monitor speakers to have a large enough sweet-spot for 10 people in a large room at very high SPL? In other words, are monitor speakers designed to listen to from up close only because they 'focus' the sound more, or is there not that much of a difference to PA systems except for ruggedness of materials? Given that the size of the speakers is about the same (what is the advantage though of large speakers?).
Thank you!
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Post by arnyk on Jan 2, 2017 21:12:31 GMT
To conclude, is there a way to improve on any audible distortion, or deviation on the frequency response larger than 1 or 2dB in the Hagerman Bugle2 phono stage design? Put differently, is a phono stage like this more or less audible transparent?
To conclude, you're focusing on the wrong thing. Most of the audible problems with LP playback are due to the ancient and obsolete technology of the LP itself. Almost any reasonable electronics have orders of magnitude lower noise, distortion, and frequency response problems. I'm a firm believer in using the right tool for the job, and a pair of highly accurate small studio monitors are almost never the tool of choice for delivering very high SPL's to a group that size or larger. The smallest thing I've ever used for a purpose like that were a pair of EV ZX-1 speakers and a 12" subwoofer that I designed and built that used a 12" woofer with exceptional power handling capability for a home audio speaker.
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