The official "Theta" thread - Page 22

Not here. If I prefer component A over component B at the same volume levels, I'll still prefer it even if I turn down component A by 2db.

Shawn meant when you are doing a relative comparo -the volume should be identical-otherwise you would prefer a different component due to differring volume (even if it is 0.5dB higher). I have done that anal comparison and I switched my preferences of DAC once I level matched with multi-meter (over shack SPL). Only shows how tough a true comparison is for those who want to go all the way.

Cheers,
Kishore

I don't think anybody questions which component you would prefer at any given volume.
What they are saying is that many studies have shown that while comparing any two particular components, the component that has a slightly louder volume level is usually perceived as the better component.

It's just best to eliminate the possibility of an unfair advantage by matching these levels a closely as possible.

It's actually probably easier for you to level match with a multi-meter then it is to use that SPL meter and the results of course are far more accurate.

I had to write to you. Finally setup my Enterpise in the LCR in my room(Aerial Acoustic 7b/c5/sr3. I attached my Acoustic Zen Satoris to the LCR and my LAT power cables. After a quick listen, I was not quite sure if the amp needed further breakin. They sound quite good but not as open as I liked. Craig said there were limited hours on them... 16 hours. I bought a used Granite Audio 560 on audiogon because of Steve's audition. Plug it in for one of the amps and it was ...AMAZING. I could not believe what was coming out of my 7b's. The sound was glorious on ONLY one channel. I'm planning to pick up some more. I couldn't believe it until I heard it. The bass was define and tight. The mid-range was clear and high were nice and extended. It was simply very engaging. My 7bs never sounded so sweet.

My wife threw in Yanni.... Yes, Yanni ... she was really moved by it. I had to leave the room.

Hope to do some HT in the coming week.

Thanks Steve for your feedback and Craig for his incredible support.

The Enterprise, Aerial and Granite Audio is a great combination. Granite Audio should be standard equipment with Theta gear.

What amps did you move "up" from

Your Enterprises are gonna sound a lot better after at least 100 hours of burn-in!

They are great amps.

I've still got Enterprises for my center and surrounds. About two weeks got Citadel 1.5s for my front left and right (the Enterprises I used for those chennels will be sold), and as good as the Enterprises are, the Citadels
are even sweeter (of course, given that the cost bucka bucks more than the Enterprises, they should, and they do)!

Here's my Enterprise threads from a few years ago!!!@@@

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=873286

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=886844

From what I'm reading, everyone seems to agree that this is an accurate statement. I thought the issue was; mistaking a difference in gain to be a difference in audio quality and that, in general, most people will make that mistake in the absence of some sort of measuring device that equalizes the SPLs of the systems under evaluation.

May be I am missing a finer point here. Let's say I match levels of A and B inaccurately to within +/- 1 db. I then listen to A and B and prefer A. I then turn down ONLY component A by 2db, listen again and still prefer A. It is impossible I initially prefered A because it was playing louder because I still prefer A when it is playing less loud than B. This was my point. Only if my preference flips from A to B in this experiment do I need more accurate level matching to find the real winner.

The problem is that you have introduced a new variable. You already know that you preferred A and the act of lowering it does not remove the potential bias (whether conscious or unconscious). If you think you like A, and want to use variable volume levels, then you can use Amir's method; vary the volume levels, but find a way to keep the identity of the SUT blind. Not as good as a level matched test, but a decent compromise.

The soundstage is increible with these amp. Hard to imagine that the Citadel would be a greater improvement or refinement from the Enterprise. Everyone who owns the Citadels, believes so. I just have a big grin everytime these are fired up.

I like the idea of checking things at various levels as I've found that some things might just perform better at one end of the spectrum then the other.

Typically you can see this without any metering at all while looking for speakers.
For instance, some sound great when they're loud but sound less then good at lower volumes.
So, I think he can still get a pretty good idea about which one of these components he likes best without the need for the blind test, which is near impossible for him to do and even Amir's method is an awful lot of work.

I think he can check at various volume levels just as he has been doing, although I still think he needs that multi-meter to get the first measurement right!

It's next to impossible to try doing any of this quickly or accurately with an SPL meter, when it's so easy to get this first measurement within +/- 1db with a multi-meter.

He should have a multi-meter on-hand anyway, even if the only other thing he uses it for is to check and see if some fuse or a battery is still any good.

Of course, since he's been buying used cable, he might as well check those out too!

I am talking about analog preamps and have been all along. Yes, I am assuming if you market a 20k stand alone player, you feel it's better than the sound quality of the surround processor and I am sure you are aware of this http://www.meridian-audio.com/produc...cd-player.aspx. My position is simple. Surround processors,even with the aid of room correction do not deliver the best sound. I have compared most of them, including the Meridian 861 against both the Theta Six Shooter and the VTL 7.5 with a Marantz SACD player serving the source for all. In all cases, the Meridian 861 was inferior as was the Theta Casablanca.

How does not listening to multi-channel music preclude the use of parametric EQ?

We can disagree. I have no problem with that. I suggest that anyone that believe you are getting the best sound from a pre-pro for either digital to analog conversion or as a preamp test themselves. Many like myself at this point in time, find prepros lacking for music.

Basically what they are doing which they have been doing since I have been on this forum is attacking your ability to tell differences. The first point is that you did not level match. They will ignore that the difference still exist, play like you did not even say that, when the volume is increased for the product you did not prefer and your opinion is still the same.

"Not here. If I prefer component A over component B at the same volume levels, I'll still prefer it even if I turn down component A by 2db."

That isn't what I'm talking about. In that case you have changed the volume and know you did it. You also know what component you are listening to so your expectations will play a part. 2dB difference is also larger enough to be perceived as a SPL difference. Smaller level changes aren't heard that way, they are heard in SQ terms.

What I mean is if you compare A vs. B and A is slightly louder (and you don't know that) you may prefer A. If you compare A vs. B at a later date and B is slightly louder (and you don't know that) you may prefer B.

This has been demonstrated time and time again.

Until you actually have the experience of having your prefer change because of proper level matching you simply don't understand how pervasive this is.

Shawn

Call me simple minded, but if changing relative listening levels +/- 1 db changes my preference between component A and B, to me they are effectively identical within the margin of error, and I'll just keep the cheapest one. Keep in mind that my litmus test for justifying a component upgrade is a higher level of musical enjoyment, not the outcome of a scientific experiment.

Nope.

Just pointing out an area that can and does influence ones perception of sound quality when it in fact it has nothing to do with sound quality at all. Like Kishore the first time I experienced this was comparing DACs around 15 or so years ago. I was comparing two DACs from the same manufacturer and felt there was quite a big difference in sound quality between the various levels of DACs. Then I level matched them and compared again. The differences in how I perceived the two was startling and really eye opening. Looking into it more it became obvious this company was using level differences to their advantage. As you moved up the line each unit put out a little bit hotter signal then the model below it. Compared back to back the more expensive unit was slightly louder. Likewise their optional power supplies were at a higher voltage then the base PS. The voltage increased also increased the gain of the units… they played a little bit louder so comparing PS back to back had level differences too.

There are many examples of this. Remember the CD player Tube buffer thing of about 10 or 12 years ago? Anyone think it was a coincidence that all of them had a touch of gain to them?

That isn't to say any all of the above didn't have real SQ differences too. But they certainly had level differences and for the casual un-level matched comparison that will have influenced the perceived sound quality.

It always amazes me how those that claim to care so much about sound quality are the people that don't take the time to make sure they are just hearing sound quality differences and not being influenced by simple level differences.

Shawn

How does any of this have any influence what you use an SPL meter? The only inaccuracy is the accuracy level of the measurement, and the bias is random. Any component may happen to be the slightly louder one.

At this point, I cannot recall exactly but I was talking about a comparison between analog preamps and surround processors.


Perhaps I am too cynical to make that presumption and, yes, I know of that player.


Well, there you are. I do not agree for a variety of reasons but I doubt we will convince each other.


I do not recall saying that it does.

Audio Alchemy (Mark Schifter, et al)?

"How does any of this have any influence what you use an SPL meter?"

If you 'level matched' with a SPL meter you would have thought they were level matched.

They weren't and it would influence the perception of their sound quality.

A multi-meter would quickly and easily show the level differences.

"The only inaccuracy is the accuracy level of the measurement, and the bias is random. Any component may happen to be the slightly louder one."

That is the whole point. Any component may happen to be the slightly louder one. You therefor don't know if a level difference exists or not. So you don't know if that may be influencing your perception of the sound quality. It could be making the actual better component sound worse, the worse component sound better or inflating the superiority of the better component.

In the pursuit of sound quality wouldn't it be a good idea to eliminate this variable? It isn't that hard to do.

Shawn

Normally I'd be agreeing with you here, but the problem is he did go through the trouble of level matching.

He just did it with an SPL meter instead of a multi-meter.
I hate using car analogies when trying to relate to audio gear so how's this, to me this is like using the back-end of a screwdriver as hammer.

I think you probably agree that as long as he's going through all of the trouble to make the levels match, then they may as well match!
Otherwise, if he's not going to do it with a multi-meter, you're right, just play like he never even mentioned it

If they were matched correctly and somebody said...well, that's not good enough because the comparison wasn't done double blind, I'd tell em to go fly a kite right along with ya.

I think the exact opposite. I think the bias introduced by knowing what you are listening to is far more significant than miniscule (<1) differences in Db levels. I would have far more confidence in a double blind test calibrated with a Radioshack SLP meter than a non-blind test calibrated within 0.1db. May be this is how I ended up with all this analog junk.....

And why would you start to agree with me now?
If you did, I might start to worry about you

Still, this is probably the first time I've seen an argument for the use of an SPL meter over the use of a multi-meter, although for some reason, I doubt you'd have been the first to have made this argument.

Hmmm, it is not quite that simple. Some of the studies are likely being used well beyond the scope of the experiment. Before, I go further, some of the work that I have done in the field of Experimental Psychology is actually published. To publish, for the most part your work has to be either new work or in a significant way expand past research. What I am saying is that I have quite a bit of experience evaluating research. Most of what I know, I have forgotten. Experimental Psych is a low paying field. There is a tendency to "over reach" with the conclusion of a research even though all are aware of admonitions that the the data really usually only applies to a very limited clearly define paradigm. As soon as your listening session varied the volume, from a scientific perspective, it is likely that the results of a study that did constant volume levels comparison was no longer valid. Further study would have to be done.

Audiophile foolishness has created an environment where human perception is often ridiculed. IMO, the human ear is still more capable of discerning differences, that human consider pleasing than the current state of technology.

On the other side of the equation is the folly brought by the objective crowd. "Perfect sound forever," was largely championed by that group. While jitter is accepted my most as being audible now, it was widely, I mean WIDELY, ridiculed by the objective camp.


I would suggest you ask for equipment recommendations from the "other" camp and determine yourself. This is not to suggest that there is no validity to what Shawn is saying. The experimental psychologist in me would like to see the exact work that he is referencing and whether the scope covers variable levels. If it does then it does not apply. I think these points are certainly valid in dealer demonstrations where levels are not check and one component is selected and compared to another without regard to level. They however does not appear to be what you have done.

This entire derailment lies at your feet. Had you been able to keep us entranced with tells of the glorious sound of the upgrade, sir, this,would not be happening. It is ALL your fault. You were given the very first Theta Casablanca HD and look what you did???! Go to fracking Florida? Whew, the gall of some people.

Does anyone here, actually just sit & listen & enjoy the music? Instead of anaylzing the crap out of it?

How can you listen AND enjoy at the same time when it isn't perfect?

The spirit of DougWinsor, long banned from AVS and tired of trolling other internet forums using my moniker, is apparently still alive in this "official" Theta thread!

As you can see, Doug not only has lots of photos of the insides of audio gear at:

http://s716.photobucket.com/albums/ww161/DougWinsor/

But the real DougWinsor has lots of other types of photos showing the outsides of ???

http://www.dougwinsor.com/windex.html

Now, can this thread get back to Theta?

Not quite yet!


Hey!
"I didn't "just go to fracking Florida" and abandon any further testing of the
CB-IIIHD, this trip to our place in this kinda world class golf and country club, which just happens to be in frackin Florida, was born entirely for the sake of pure audio research and I was forced to make this trip all by my lonesome.
How much more dedicated to the cause can I get?

The only real problem with this place is I don't play fracking golf!
Although I am well practiced at the art of sitting by the pool, using a hot-tub to warm my aching body during this brutal winter, while reenergizing myself with some excellent food, so I will be in better condition to keep testing the CB-IIIHD upon my return to NY.

I am enduring this hardship, this completely selfless act, out of concern for all of you guys waiting for your upgrades.

I came all the way down here, on my own dime mind you, to compare the DAC1 with a pair of Dynaudio speakers, connected to the USB output from this Macbook pro and a Sonos, so I would then be more able to return to my CB-IIIHD and know what the difference in sound was when I connect said CB-IIIHD to a Mac via HDMI instead of this USB.
When I get back NY, I should know if the CB-IIIHD is really worth all of the hoopla that it has created.
I am using all different equipment then I use in NY so as to negate the need to use any sort of meter to do this comparison.

Of course the fact that I left my white car out in a snowstorm for the first time in 30yrs and my plow guy didn't see this white car in the middle of the snowstorm and completely encased it in a block of snow and ice had nothing to do with my hasty departure from NY.

I was ready to return NY today, and get back to my CB-IIIHD, since I've been told my car is visable again, when yet another winter storm warning was issued and I decided that it is best to remain right where I am until that mess is over with.
I mean, the CB-IIIHD is really nice and all but a little freedom to get out of the house and drive around a bit is kinda nice too.
And I finally have some use for this (com)PLEX server software using Netflix, Pandora and iTunes, but Craig may get a call about changing a password within Sonos.
I'm sure it'll be a good break for him from all of the CB-IIIHD questions.
You see, I have his best interests at heart too!

So, now I have a few more days to play with the USB input on the DAC1.
I'm only thinking about you guys and your CB-IIIHDs, really I am. Nothing is more important to me

I understand that some very top models hang out in Florida!!

http://www.dougwinsor.com/windex.html



Too bad you spent all your money on the CB3 HD and your Mini-Mac.
cause AVS could have set you up for a personal tour of the Sim2 faciity
which happens to be in Florida.

How are you measuring with a Multi-meter? A better instrument would be an oscilloscope. And what source material are you using for the test?