[AphileEarlyAdopter]

denverdoc/John,
Frequency response is one aspect of audio. Phase response is also important. I think most cables are altering the phase response, but I am not sure. There are also noise from electrical and mechanical sources. Digital music reproduction and power supply quality are other issues in high-fidelity playback.
There are lots of science involved in audio, even though the variables involved are few. But it is very difficult to communicate this science to the audiophile community. Some vested interests and unscrupulous elements do not want this to happen as well. In the process, many audiophiles, with or without proper electrical knowledge are doing things which may not have any scientific ending up discrediting all or most of the high end procedures.
I do think, digital processing power, has given us a way to effectively neutralise cable, component and room influences considerably. I will be getting a DEQX PDC in the near future. This will, I am hoping, will provide me a way to cost-effectively achieve high-fidelity without the hassles of many of the audiophile paraphernalia and cost-no-object components.

[denverdoc]

A'phile

As to phase, perhaps as in some kind of all pass filter--flat FR but phase delays. Don't know--what i do know is some cables are designed with unusual amounts of energy storage to deliberately effect FR and thus it become very pricey tone control of sorts. If it is neither FR or Phase response, or group delay, then what the hell is it?

I think you'll be mighty pleased with the DEQX, and what maybe most surprising is how removing all those edgy little resonances makes for glare free digital playback--hence Mac and I not too concerned about the "so-so" quote of the dacs. PM me if you have any questions,
John

[dman777]

Anyways, I thought this original discussion was whether digital amps in particular were in need of prolonged burn-in time (isn't that why this topic is in "Digital Doman Circle"?)...

Exactly.... I would prefer the topic not be hi-jacked to speakers and cable wire. There are other forums for that anyways....

[denverdoc]

Well it would seem that w/o the port flare this topic would have died long ago...as in all related issues and while IC burn-in may deserve a separate thread, this has been discussed in detail innumerable times, What made this different is the topic Heading v psychological, This is abig can of worms opened.

 Some of us are here w/o agendas and try to marry various issues under one roof,
John

[AphileEarlyAdopter]

Anyways, I thought this original discussion was whether digital amps in particular were in need of prolonged burn-in time (isn't that why this topic is in "Digital Doman Circle"?)...

Exactly.... I would prefer the topic not be hi-jacked to speakers and cable wire. There are other forums for that anyways....

All digital amplifiers have a low pass filter at the output. It is probably the capacitor in this filter, that is responsible for most of the 'burn-in'. There might be other contributors to this burn in too. Yes, burn-in with digital amps is real. Over at avsforum where the guys there are not of the 'audiophile' types, did not believe in burn-in, but atleast two of them, I know later posted that they were surprised the amps nature changed after some playback time. It is real.

[AphileEarlyAdopter]

A'phile

As to phase, perhaps as in some kind of all pass filter--flat FR but phase delays. Don't know--what i do know is some cables are designed with unusual amounts of energy storage to deliberately effect FR and thus it become very pricey tone control of sorts. If it is neither FR or Phase response, or group delay, then what the hell is it?

I think you'll be mighty pleased with the DEQX, and what maybe most surprising is how removing all those edgy little resonances makes for glare free digital pl ...

BTW, I dont mean to ignore you.
 To others, who think we are digressing, my take on burn-in is - it is introduced mainly by things that are capacitive in nature - either actual capacitor or insulation/dielectric, which are behaving like capacitor.
Digital edginess, I feel, is mostly caused by a bugaboo called 'jitter.
All the issues in high-fidelity playback can be handled with very little investment. But some entreprenuerial people have turned this into a lucrative business. My amp costs $250 and my power cords are not more than $100 bucks. Many of these, can be DIY'ed at less that $30 or $40 buck. Beyond, that you have to have a ultra-revealing system to hear the differences.

[denverdoc]

BTW, I dont mean to ignore you.
 To others, who think we are digressing, my take on burn-in is - it is introduced mainly by things that are capacitive in nature - either actual capacitor or insulation/dielectric, which are behaving like capacitor.
Digital edginess, I feel, is mostly caused by a bugaboo called 'jitter.
All the issues in high-fidelity playback can be handled with very little investment. But some entreprenuerial people have turned this into a lucrative business. My amp costs $250 and my pow ...

Perhaps, jitter is an issue as well, but you may change your mind once you get the speakers DEQX'ed. Everything becomes butter smooth even with extended FR out to 20k and beyond. Very analog like but with the detail of dig and transients that are near lifelike:  again likely why Mac, John A, and I feel the onboard DAC is quite good enough.

PS: At the risk of having scorn heaped on me, I will publicly confess  I am using a Universal Pioneer Elite DVD for transport, and have maybe 60 bucks total invested in IC's and cables.  

The sound is very transparent and with the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest in my recent past, heard dozens of very good systems costing from high single digit to 3 digit in K's playback systems. This is quite a ways off topic at this point but relevant in that "upgradeitis" has been treated definitively, though I still need to finish my line arrays!
John

[ctviggen]

I also use a Pioneer Elite DVD player as transport, although I'm negotiating to buy a Proceed PMDT.  (The Elite has the dreaded Chroma bug, and the Proceed doesn't.)

[denverdoc]

I also use a Pioneer Elite DVD player as transport, although I'm negotiating to buy a Proceed PMDT.  (The Elite has the dreaded Chroma bug, and the Proceed doesn't.)

Interesting; my Pioneer is now downstairs w/o video awaiting for the days when the digital FPTV's drop further in price.

Hopefully Blu-Ray or HD DVD will have some footing by then as well. Meanwhile, for grins I may try the $120.00 CCity special Pioneer Uni DVD in the system to see how transport sensitive the system is   and really stretch the cheapskate envelope.
John

[ctviggen]

Supposedly, the Proceed is also a very good transport.  I also bought the PVP cards, which give me 480p from the DVD and allow an input to be scaled to 480p.  This might be useful, as I can scale normal TV to 480p, but I'll also have to see whether the PVP can "stretch" the picture to fit my 16x9 TV.  Because Proceed is no longer a company, the PMDT has dropped in price to reasonable levels.

[Horizons]

PS: At the risk of having scorn heaped on me, I will publicly confess  I am using a Universal Pioneer Elite DVD for transport, and have maybe 60 bucks total invested in IC's and cables

No scorn from me. I had the good fortune to work in high end audio retail and more recently as a high end reviewer. These "jobs" gave me the opp to listen and try a great many ICs and speaker cables. I also was able to trick many listeners by swapping out cables without their knowledge. When you remove the placebo effect, I believe that the audible differences between cables are SLIGHT at best.

Having said all of the above I do believe that burn-in is a real factor in speakers and some electronics. However, NOT in cables. I frankly find that idea laughable.

[denverdoc]

Horizons,

Gutsy admission to make, and thanks for the vote of confidence, I'll sleep easier. Actually, did try 1 300/pr of bal IC's from Monster (I know, I know--we are supposed to be boycotting) and could not hear even a slight difference, but then again I had a friend swapping out the cables. Looks like the vote for burn-in is going to the yeas on this thread. I may have to recant!
John

[AphileEarlyAdopter]

Cables are being constructed in a variety of ways. Not all of them are optimised for low reactance. Some are high-capacitance and some are high inductance. Many fall in between. The more higher the capacitance, the more time it takes to 'burn-in'. Also, burn-in, varies with the insulation used. Anything with teflon takes a long time.  When it comes to interfacing components, the output and input  impedences matter. If your component has low output impedence and the component you are connecting to has high input impedence, chances are  now the interconnect may not make much of a difference.  Non-technical audiophiles might call this as 'synergy'. Similarly, there are situations when certain digital cables, speaker cables etc will be a good choice in specific systems. So when the cables do not make a difference it should not be generalized.
I have been reading up on all theory and quizzing some experts in forums and can see how certain tweaks can help. Now what I do is, either use the tweaks, when they are cheap or build a system, which circumvents some of these issues. That is why I now use a pure digital amplifier and a transport. I have basically reduced the number of variables that I need to be tweaking all the time.

This hobby is a not just pure sensual one. There is lot of technical things which one needs to be reading up on. My wife is surprised I am reading freq. response graphs etc and consider that as fun.  Richard, of whose writings I am a fan of, considers this akin to drugs. Yes, this hobby is addictive, but to me the technical part gives me immense intellectual satisfaction, which makes it more than just a short-lived pleasure. I am quite happy as my listening skills improve and the system sounds more and more realistic as days go by (as attested to by my wife, visitors to home etc).
(BTW, John, you should tell us  about your system. I am more of a person who likes to setup a realistic sounding system at a very 'reasonable' cost. I do not sit in the sweetspot anymore. The sound should be real/sound live even from the other room or while I am kneading my pugliese dough in the kitchen).

[-Richard-]

Hi AphileEarlyAdopter,

Actually it was denverdoc who made the suggestion that there was
more than a simple corollary between our hobby and certain forms
of drug addiction...and I believe he was injecting a good dose
of humor into his insights which tickled me enough to want to rejoin
him in the spirit of SELF mockery...whatever the fire that keeps the
intensity of our  interest alive and burns its hot flames within us...I
have it in spades...although on a modest level compared to many
of the deeply knowledgeable members of this forum...

This thread has a good dose of irony laced within it and denverdoc
is obviously having fun with it...and I think it is a very nice way of
pushing our usually overripe sentiments passed the borders of
the merely technical side of things...a nice shift of emphasis
which I welcome...

A good dose of my life is spent in the deeper understanding of some
form of science and technology and indeed there are many times when
I have almost convinced myself  that it is a peculiar dimension of OUR American
experience as young men that we never tire of once bitten...

Some things I look at very closely in my life...and meditate on what
I think I see...but somethings I just enjoy very deeply...and our hobby
is definitely one of those things I take particular pleasure in...

I am rather lucky in one respect...Deb is an entirely good sport...
she knows that audio makes me happy and will try to give me
her undivided attention when I go on and on about it...bless her
heart...but Deb loves music at least as much as I do...perhaps more...
and really enjoys the fruits of my labors to find audio heaven...and that
is part of the fun for me...

So you and I are certainly walking together on this, AphileEarlyAdopter...
and incidentally, I enjoy your writing as well...

Warmest regards -Richard-

[AphileEarlyAdopter]

Richard,
Drugs might be a latter day affliction or addiction in the Americas and painfully manufactured overt sexuality on TV might be the favorite indulgence of the country, but I come from a country which prayed to the gods, few milleniums ago, with drugs (soma ras) and continues to worship the phallus-in-vagina symbol  !! Though the profound philosophies behind all this escapes my westernised mind generously helped on by a catholic school upbringing. Neither this nor the fact that I have dedicated one-third of my life to the pursuit dollars selling my programming skills should make you disbelieve me, as just having born in that land, gives me the right to say, that losing ourselves with fine music in the warm sound of tubes or the JVC or the accurate sound of a solid-state or digital amplifers, with burnt-in cables or ears, is a form of yoga !!!

Regards,
- Yogi BurninNanda

 

[denverdoc]

Richard,
Drugs might be a latter day affliction or addiction in the Americas and painfully manufactured overt sexuality on TV might be the favorite indulgence of the country, but I come from a country which prayed to the gods, few milleniums ago, with drugs (soma ras) and continues to worship the phallus-in-vagina symbol  !! Though the profound philosophies behind all this escapes my westernised mind generously helped on by a catholic school upbringing. Neither this nor the fact that I have dedicated one-t ...

This has been an interesting thread, and while I still unwilling to believe that cables need burn-in simply because they are two conductors separated by insulation, and that because one form of capacitor, namely the electrolytic has a form of "memory" owing to its unique construction, we should be compelled to the conclusion wires change in a similar fashion. One can be measured, the other cannot.

As Richard suggests, it has been fun for me as I delight in any process that stimulates examination of ones belief systems, and try to live by the credo "that a life unexamined is one not worth living."  I am the opinion that many of us in the land of audiophilia have excellent technical and scientific training, which adds this curious irony that of all the technical hobbies in which I have been involved, we seem the most willing to accept all sorts of claptrap and nonsense as the path to enlightenment.

In trying to understand this phenomenon, I have drawn parallels to addictive processes, one area where denial and the unwillingness to critically examine behavior and belief seems paramount. The other would be religion, which also shares striking similarities with our pursuit. Just as it is tabu to question the priest, we seem to take on faith the operation of principles which for now at least seem to lie outside the province of science.

I believe Richard  attempted (beautifully) to describe the allure of music and  why for many of us this is a labor of love. I don't know that any one in the neurosciences has yet provided a "unified field" theory as to why it music strikes a chord so deep within our souls, nor why all cultures seem to develop music. Perhaps it is a preqequisite to language. Certainly there is some tie as my experience has been the more foreign the language, the more discordant (a relative term) the harmonic structure w/in the music.  

That music can be likened to a meditative experience is beyond doubt, I know for me it is a tonic at times more refreshing than a long pull of water on a hot afternoon. Other times, I can't seem to get there, little flaws in the reproduction distract and irritate. And this is where the so called "music lovers" among us have the advantage. They seem to make that connection much more readily and without a lot of expensive gear. They believe and perhaps rightly so that the software should cost many, many times what the hardware does. I certainly cannot lay claim to such status. Most of my life the speakers alone cost more than the software. Curiously, the age span where that prevailed 12 to 30, I spent more time listening to music than any time since. Perhaps it is about other obligations consuming a greater share of my life, and that alone, but I wonder. And wonderment IMO is always a good thing,

John

[AphileEarlyAdopter]

John,
On a serious note, I do think much of high-end audio has more to do with elitism and 'exclusive club' mentality than the desire for high-fidelity. This is borne out by the desire for equipment which are decked out with costly cosmetics and supposedly 'sophisticated' or 'fine' sound.
I am all for scientific measurements of many of the phenomena reported by audiophiles like burn-in , jitter etc. But I am not sure we will see conclusive proofs as this pursuit seems to be a niche and there is widespread mandate to get to the bottom of these things.

Re: measurements of burn-in. I could swear on all the holy books of the world that my new digital cable surely sounded drastically different from my previous one. Over a period, the difference has decresed to a subtely. I am sure earlier, any measurements of jitter would have been quite different. But still you can take these and many other anecdotes as hypotheses and try to verify it yourself or organize some shoot-outs at your home or in an audiophile club.

Re: harmonic structure. I probably dont know much about music, but I think in general terms music is universal. If Mozart's Eine Klien Nachtmusik is popular is America, it is still popular in Asia.  Indian music has a trivial harmonic structure, but quite a bit of fusion work has been done where chords, single note harmonies have been successfully used in popular music.

[BenF]

denverdoc wrote "In trying to understand this phenomenon, I have drawn parallels to addictive processes, one area where denial and the unwillingness to critically examine behavior and belief seems paramount. The other would be religion, which also shares striking similarities with our pursuit. Just as it is tabu to question the priest, we seem to take on faith the operation of principles which for now at least seem to lie outside the province of science."

You are all way more expert than I am. And far more eloquent.

At the risk of seeming too philosophical, I thought I might add to the discussion, as denverdoc suggests, that science may also be the limiting factor. We cannot assume that it is the great objective truth. But we do not need science to explain how something works before we make use of it. This is not faith, it is observed reality. However, all of our senses are not equal, so levels of observation differ in some cases. For example, not everyone hears high frequency sounds, which, until we have a way to measure sound frequencies, can lead to questions of whether that person really hears what they say they are hearing or they are just making it up.

Perhaps we do measure all that is important and we have figured out the measurements that "really matter." But then again, there may be some other aspects that we don't capture which are vital to the sound, but we don't yet really understand what they are, how they work, or how to measure them. Physics has a history of questions, that when "answered", led to deeper and more facinating ones. Audio reproduction is applied physics. My opinion is that we just don't understand it all yet, so we can't objectively deal yet with what doesn't make sense given our current level of knowledge. It will get better, but some of what we observe and can repeat, we can't yet figure out why. My preference is to try to find the measureable explanation for the observations, rather than doubt the individual's hearing.

It is important to question authority, religious and scientific. If the authority cannot provide truly well-reasoned answers, if the knowledge is not deep enough, it is completely correct to respect that there is a limitation in that particular authority, but at the same time to push on to look for answers which account for everything. True authority is always humble and acknowledges that there is something they don't know (there are priests and scientists, and priest-scientists like this).

What we want to avoid is being proud and thinking that we have the ability to figure it all out and then have it all neatly tied up. Once that happens, we become the bureaucracy that thinks they are god. As AphileEarlyAdopter put it "I do think much of high-end audio has more to do with elitism and 'exclusive club' mentality than the desire for high-fidelity."

The physical universe along with the uniqueness of every object and being provides an unending source of discoveries. How wonderful this is! We really all want to know the infinite, and if we are honest, we really do want it to be infinite.

Audio is just one aspect of the infinite that is still infinite to us. Happy situation! Discovering together, through the unique contribution of each one on this forum, just adds and accelerates the pleasant journey. My thanks to you all!

Ben

[woodsyi]

Thanks for the back door proselytizing for the Infinite! Peace be with you!  

[denverdoc]

Ben,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. It reminds me of the oft cited anecdote how well meaning friends or family tried to convince  James C. Maxwell not to embark on a career in physics, "because all the important discoveries have been made."  Or so the apocryphal tale goes.

No one among us I feels science has a wrap on audio, but a far sight more is known about audio science than the workings of the human brain. The premise that I have repeatedly tried to poke holes in is that somehow our ears are better than the equipment we measure. Certainly they are astonishing in their abilities, and recall as a grad student that the amplitude of hair cell (cilium) oscillation at the threshold of hearing was on the order of the diameter of Hydrogen atom. Careful research on vision is that the limit of vision is about 5 quanta! The dynamic range for audio is 130 dB, for vision, I believe closer to 90, (but its been a while). Clearly extraordinary transducers, but unfortunately the software is prone to all kinds of error, and to my way of thinking, it is easier to believe a software "error" are prejudice is responsible than heretofore unknown physical phenomenon. I guess I just cannot accept the latter when A/B/X testing, every time its tried, produces a null result. If these differences could be reliably detected why has no golden eared savant come forward and demonstrated this ability. Again such testing presumes that FR and phase response are the same and have tolerably low levels of distortio. It is this that ultimately sticks in the craw of subjectivism, and no explanation i have seen to date adequately accounts for this failure IMO.
John