[bluesky]

Dear Aksa Audio Community

I was just wondering if anyone has used these devices in their AKSA equipment.  I have read a few glowing reports and I am interested if anyone has tried them and what the results were.

If so, where did you put them in the AKSA amp, preamp or Aksonics speakers?

As Bybee's were originally designed to lower the noise floor in submarines (supposedly),  do they make the AKSA sound better underwater?  

Cheers,

The platypus in paradise (Brisbane, Australia)

[nmessick]

The message boards at Madisound had quite a discussion about this. Concensous was that its pure snake oil.

[bluesky]

Thanks for the response.  It seems like the old saying of "If it seems too good to be true....then it probably is", might be the case here .  I will follow up that discussion, thanks for the tip.

Cheers.

[bluesky]

Dear Aksaphiles

For those who are interested (seems like I'm replying to myself on this one, the response has been er.....underwhelming), I have cruised a couple of different sites regarding the efficacy of these Bybee thingies after some timely advice to do so.

There are definitely no magic results on this one.  At worst there are reports of less definition and at best a slight improvement.  There are no measurable improvements, although electrons are supposed to be a bit happier on their journeys around our audio systems.  The science of it has not been demonstrated but there are words like the ubiquitous "veil being lifted" etc.  

Even those people who champion it say it should last on the priorities of improvements.

Well at least I found out that the best thing you can do to an AKSA amplifier is to upgrade with a Nirvanaa kit!  

Cheers from,

The platypus in paradise.

[bubba966]

bluesky,

You might want to look at the posts here & at HD in the Bolder Cables forums about the effects of the newer/current Bybee filters. And check out the ModWright forum both here and at HD as well.

Both of those companies have had much experience in using Bybees. And there's much feedback from customers about Bybees in those companies forums.

[kyrill]

Hugh 

Do you have heard Bybees? Or a friend who'd opinion you trust? Are they worth the AKSA's and LF's of Down under?

[PSP]

...don't they have left-handed electrons in the southern hemisphere???    / Peter

[AKSA]

Ah, oleagenous reptilian excretions!!  How I love to hear about them.......

I have heard of Bybees, and their cousings, the Shun Mook pucks.

I do know people who swear by them.  I also know people, specifically trainined in engineering, who grow apoplectic at their mention.

Let me relay somewhich shown me a few days ago.

A very clever man, a scientist by training who spent many years as a mastering engineer in London, played me his modded CD player in his home.  Incredible, outstanding system it was, too.   

He removed the metal top of the CD player.  It sounded somehow better, 'open', dare I say it??     Put it back, took it off, put it back, there was definitely a difference.

I'm pretty sure you cannot measure this on a CRO, or with any kind of analyser.  But I heard a difference, not that my ears are that wonderful.  It was more lifelike with the top OFF.

On this basis I feel that the proximity of ferrous materials to sensitive audio circuitry could be problematic.  Call it resonance, hysteresis, whatever you prefer, but I suspect that the Bybee discs might be working in this area.  It is important to keep an open mind, because fact is always stranger than fiction.  I recall that Tesla was doing experiments in Colorado Springs in 1900 which showed the natural electromagnetic resonance of the planet to be around 8Hz.  Everyone said he was mad.  Now this is accepted science.  Witches were burned at the stake in medieval England, and even in the 1600s in Salem.......  we can now surmise that some of these people were merely mentally ill, and there are now long medical descriptions of their ailments, which are commonplace today and well understood.  My attitude is to be sceptical, never sneering or offensive, and quietly examine the facts, and see if, over time, there is any truth to it.  For example, there is now evidence that the magnetic field of earth is important to human health, and that the debilitating effects of space on the health of astronauts are somehow related to the withdrawal of the larger portion of this field.  These days, space stations and the space shuttle are fitted with Sherman rings, which create a static magnetic field within and appear to restore astronaut health, enabling long stays in space which hitherto proved very damaging.

Dunno, Ian, Kyrill, jury's out.  But I for one am listening.  There is a lot about audio that can't be measured, of that I'm convinced.  Until we can measure it all with a 100% correlation with good sound, then audio will remain an unholy combination of engineering and art with continuing daily duels to the death between objectivists and subjectivists.   

Cheers,

Hugh

[kyrill]

yes open minds are all we need LD

[AdamM]

Hugh,

That's one of the best descriptions and clearest stances on the topic of mystical audio mojo, which i've ever read.

While audio analysis isn't as intertwined with the experiment itself, in say a quantum Schrödinger's cat kind of way, i don't think human perception of what sounds 'good' is really a much less complicated thing to try and measure.

You've just helped me redefine and clarify to myself a POV on the curious synergy of hifi.

/A

[AKSA]

Adam,

I do not pretend to be a scientist or an engineer.  But I'm interested in scientific history, and I know something of human psychology and stealth marketing.  Where ignorance abounds, and for whatever reason, we humans are highly suggestible;  this has, and will continue to be, exploited for profit, in audio as everything else.

Another thing is certain, a fence-sitter, a term of denigration in the modern world, is probably a clear indication of an open mind, or even an impending decision or POV.  Another certainty might be that offensive, insulting behaviour, of which I have seen much on DIYaudio (and given and taken a tad myself), so quickly polarises the warring factions that further gainful discussion is impossible.  Emotion effectively blocks off all communication.  I admit there are people in forums I will never, ever engage again.  I'm reminded of that wonderful comment about two warring academics:

'And the fighting was bitter, and trenchant, and vindictive, because the stakes were so low'.

Apologies to those who have read this biting satire from my keyboard before.....

Perhaps the one area I am highly qualified is English language.  I have often felt that quite absurd persuasion is possible if the writing is good, and carries all the overt signs of the Greek language of discourse.  For example, hypothetical syllogism, where a implies b, and b implies c, therefore a implies c.   This is how most persuasive writing is achieved, and it is seriously flawed.  For example, All snakes have scales, All scaled creatures can swim, therefore all snakes can swim.  I am sure there are exceptions to this statement, so beware of such arguments, which abound in written material!

Conversely, consider how easy it is to fill the world with words, yet say nothing.   I suspect democracy and its practitioners gives the lie here.....

Cheers,

Hugh

[kyrill]

For all human experience beyond -and mostly in- the experience itself:

"There are no facts, only words" <--  thx Hugh

"Against that positivism which stops before phenomena, saying 'there are only facts,' I would say: no, it is precisely facts that do not exist, only interpretations." -- Nietzsche.

[AKSA]

Ah, yes Kyrill, Nietzsche, the triumph of perceptive description over factual observation.......

I suspect one understands this guy only when riding a Hayabusa at 300 kph   

Hugh

[kyrill]

Ah, yes Kyrill, Nietzsche, the triumph of perceptive description over factual observation.......

I suspect one understands this guy only when riding a Hayabusa at 300 kph   

Hugh

or Kamasutra with her and a lot of flowers, will do too   

[kyrill]

A,,

Let me relay somewhich shown me a few days ago.

A very clever man, a scientist by training who spent many years as a mastering engineer in London, played me his modded CD player in his home.  Incredible, outstanding system it was, too.   

He removed the metal top of the CD player.  It sounded somehow better, 'open', dare I say it??     Put it back, took it off, put it back, there was definitely a difference.

I'm pretty sure you cannot measure this on a CRO, or with any kind of analyser.  But I heard a difference, not that my ears are that wonderful.  It was more lifelike with the top OFF. ...........

Cheers,

Hugh

quote   "Over a dozen years ago the late Doug Dunlop, designer of the Concordant range of valve preamplifiers, demonstrated something to me so forcefully that I had to re-evaluate my whole audio system. He took the chassis of the Excelsior pre-amp he was evaluating out of its steel sleeve case and played the same tune through it. It was a dramatic and repeatable improvement in sound quality, "Chalk & cheese" as he put it. Then he put the chassis into a specially made hardwood sleeve. There was a further tiny improvement on the no-box condition.
Doug repeated this demonstration often enough with enough different models of pre-amp to convince me that the observed phenomenon was the same every time: repeatable empirical evidence.  unquote

Ha found this in a not so long ago post

[bluesky]

Hi

As to the effects of naked audio components I once visited an audio designer type person who has taken the clothes off his CD player and amp and holds that the music is better.

Something I couldn't confirm by before and after listening.  I would not try this myself due to the possibility of frying my cat.  He likes to come and sit with me when I'm working and is, of course, curious.

Bluesky  

[TONEPUB]

If it's any consolation, a freind of mine that is a certified audiologist, who also does
a lot of calibration work on hearing aids, told me that when her customers get a new
hearing aid it is usually just a little bit off from where the old one was...

Sort of like the prescription for your glasses.

She said that she can make frequency response adjustments to .1db and that often
all it takes is a tenth or two before the patient will say that it sounds correct.

What I have heard from a few of my freinds that are engineers is that often time
the equipment can not make fine enough measurements to describe what we
do or do not hear.

One of those engineers also told me to keep the lids off of my gear
whenever possible.  Hmmm...  And he's got the best sounding system
I've ever heard in someones home.

Bottom line, I believe you ARE on to something....