Hi guys,
It has been a very long time by now that I expressed something "wild", about my own "inventions" and strange stuff which actually can't be believed without scientific proof, but I think I found one again. Start laughing ...
As you know, quite a while back I created the digital volume in a way it should be. Ok, as how *I* think it should be.
Maybe not many got the real merits of it, which already starts with me actually never explaining what happened, and which I still don't.
Ok, never mind this, but what is kind of important to myself, is that me too could no really use it, because of too long interlinks, impedance problems, balance between those long interlinks and short LS cables and ... well, using the digital volume only, thus without preamp, in the end for me it just did not workout.
However, 10 days ago I got myself a line stage buffer (0 gain), and now things are different.
So, although the preamp is out of the way, there's still a device in there, but you could say it does nothing but creating the current to have the proper impedance towards the main amps. Ok.
All of the above is more or less UNrelated ...
At the first night I was very exhited. At the second night I was not and detached it again.
At the fourth night I gave it a try again, because I had to bring it back. I gave it one more go ...
It is still in there, and I have never in my life heard a so natural playback through loudspeakers.
Disclaimer : I have waited 5 days after subsequent playing to post this, and usually this is a bit too short of a time to be sure. So if I come back on it, don't shoot me. But I am just too enthusaist not to post now ...
Ok, I'll start at the end;
A guitar string has never been so tight. Bass strings have never been so full with individual vibes. Cymbals *did* have the color I am perceiving now, but this was in an earlier version of XX and was traded for - I don't know what anymore. Voices sound real as never before, and you can just feel this is better reality, although you never met the person in life. Emma Shapplin is singing like ... brrrrr
What happened, and what went wrong the second night ?
Most of us will have the experience of "balance". Balance to the sense of (possibly) the softer you play, the more things go wrong. Most often too few bass, and other things not fitting anymore. Now, one of the things the digital volume allows for, is pertaining that balance. Careful here, because a too low digital volume just creates distortion (certainly with 16 bit files and a 16 bit DAC), so the subject is difficult anyway.
This line stage buffer - or the effect it creates - shows a way *out* of balance when played softly. It just doesn't do the job at all, and far too much highs show then. BUT, again careful, because the digital volume may incur for it, and opposed to "without preamp and without buffer" it just
could be so that actually distorted highs (because of too few bits) are rounded hence less harsh, whereas now, with the proper impedance, they are not and thus audible better than the lower frequencies. I just don't know (yet). However, I am fairly sure something very else is going on, looking at this (and this should be the strange "invention") :
Right at the (SPL) level the music is spit out at natural levels, things suddenly -and in one big bang- get so much realistic, a whole, natural, just right, that IMO something must be going on with the relation to the real level the instruments and all played during the recording, and the playback level *THAT* needs. Something like :
when you play the violin softly it still produces the harmonics which consistently belong to that level of playing. But, when you play the instrument louder, the harmonics belonging to that level do not allow to squeeze down the volume ! In the latter case the harmonics to the louder playing stay, and you just make them softer, while in reality they just disappear, or change character.What about that ! I think it just all fits.
Sidenote, and for your reference :
Normally I am using a TVC (passive preamp) of which I know now, after serious comparison, it will just *never* be able to reproduce music 1:1 when it is about the micro details. It will shovle out all the crispyness which actually is there, and it makes all bored. Not that I thought all sounded bored because of it, but relative to without, oh yes. An active preamp makes that even worse.
Now think of all "sharp" waves as spit out by the DAC, being so much more able to do their jon in air, and know that rounded waves where they should not be rounded, cannot do that job *AT ALL*. Possibly now you feel what can happen all together, and which happens in my room here now. So :
When the music plays at the correct level, suddenly (and you would be amazed what I mean with "suddenly") all the pieces of the puzzle fit.
Nothing of the kind happend with the TVC, and nothing of the kind happend without TVC and without buffer (impedance not right).
This just shocks, and shook me being the far most large improvement I ever heard. Extasy ...
There is a downside
...
Do we all know what real levels are ? Did you ever have a drum set in your room ? I have, and I can tell you, this is not always funny.
But it *is* real ...
I measured, and a bit depending on the music, the SPL meter drifts between 92dB and 98dB. Have Emma Shapplin singing, and it goes to 104.
Does it hurt ? NO !!
This latter is -all together- one of the most strangest things to experience. At this way loud level highs are so fragile, they actually can't be. Still they are;
Very hard to explain, but all is so razor sharp that at first you will be blown off your socks. But strangely enough this "sharpness" is no harshness. It is just right, and reality when listening close.
Can you ever imagine that day before yesterday the music was playing at these levels for 4.5 hours ?? wife and child were there ...
As usual, things get extra-extra when playing music where synthesizers are involved. Hahaha, I don't think Emerson Lake & Palmer ever heard their own Pictures at an Exhibition like I did the other day.
Okay, another thing; Of course when playing loud the room gets more filled with music than playing softly. But here again, I feel some other thing is happening now : this filling of the room gets done in a way that it doesn't matter anymore where the sound is coming from.
What am I saying ?
The combination of the ever so important "no problems at all with standing waves" with this loud "sharp" level of playback, makes that it becomes rather impossible to focus on the source the music comes from (yep, the speakers). I know how to listen for reflections (just step into the middle of the speakers, and face the opposite of the room), and it is not that doing it. Instead, far more seems to happen in mid air;
Think of those now very "sharp" waves interacting far more in air with eachother, and where they collide they produce extra energy.
Focusing of instruments stays, but you are in the middle of them now. Or more in the middle. Walk through the room (12 x 8 x 3 meters here) and you'll meet them underway. Ehh, yes, 2 speakers here.
Yesterday a.o. I played The Byrds. 1963 stuff. Oh yes, you can hear recording capabilities are not on par with todays', but man, I prefer that above anyhthing else (you probably know I already shouted about the beatles, and Christmast old stuff). Besides the music itself (did I hear any from them ?) it is one flow of interesting things happening in the room. Way way way more than Roger Waters and his Q-sound Amuzed to Death. And again, the in your imagination in advance more brittle sounding Byrds, were they ? NO !
Enough said. Back to work.
Peter
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