Do all amplifiers sound the same thread

[Harrison20]

it depends

Have you wrapped your speaker wires in tinfoil and elevated the wires off the ground and are you using oxygen depleted copper. If so, than I can more or less guarantee you will hear a difference between amps.

 

[PENG]

Or the Sony was lopping off a peak here and there, where the ATI wasn't. (Just trying to give Irv's ears the benefit of the doubt before throwing them under the DBT bus.)

Benefit of doubt? I did better than that, I actually assume he was kidding. A guy like him just wouldn't pair his big and demanding Salon2 with an old Sony. Well unless that old Sony is in top condition and is one of those 9000ES or equivalent even older models. Even then he would have to level match the ATI and the 9000ES at levels where the Sony would be well within its power limit. As I said before, I won't discount claims of huge improvements gain from swapping out a good AVR with separate amps but there has got to be some real reasons such as defective and/or low quality (HTIAB, entry level AVRs) components, room size, improverly set up comparisons, prone to Placebo, degree of exaggeration etc. Otherwise, differences would be subtle, relative to swapping out say a pair of R900 with a pair of Blades just as an example.

 

[PENG]

View attachment 10723



I took some photos of the watt meters the day I auditioned the Blades. Most of the times the watt meters was indicating a couple of watts, with frequent peaks to around 12W. In that approximately 1 hour listening session I caught a peak moment of 120W max a few times (captured that in photo too) but it never exceeded the 120W mark even at extremely loud and bass heavy moments. The room was not huge but quite big and we were pushing the Blades so hard and loud the dealer at one point begged us to back off. He seemed quite concerned that the speakers may get damaged the day before the open house. It was after that day I decided that the R900s were good and close enough for me. The dealer only had the R500 hooked up to a 200W Cambridge Audio but they sounded pretty close even in bass but of course they were in a much smaller room. I have had that kind of demo many times, enough times to know that with amps, it does not take much to reach the point of diminishing return, unless you really need the power that only those kW amps can offer. The dealer would have kicked me out if I had told him his little CA 2X200W amps could, and would make his Blades sound just as good as his Mc 1KW pairs would.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Benefit of doubt? I did better than that, I actually assume he was kidding. A guy like him just wouldn't pair his big and demanding Salon2 with an old Sony. Well unless that old Sony is in top condition and is one of those 9000ES or equivalent even older models. Even then he would have to level match the ATI and the 9000ES at levels where the Sony would be well within its power limit. As I said before, I won't discount claims of huge improvements gain from swapping out a good AVR with separate amps but there has got to be some real reasons such as defective and/or low quality (HTIAB, entry level AVRs) components, room size, improverly set up comparisons, prone to Placebo, degree of exaggeration etc. Otherwise, differences would be subtle, relative to swapping out say a pair of R900 with a pair of Blades just as an example.

Perhaps there was a misunderstanding. The Sony AVR was driving a pair of JBL E20 monitors, which have 5" woofers. I wouldn't let the Sony near the Revels. The ATI now driving the JBLs in this case is an AT602, which is ATI's lowest power offering, while the Sony is rated at 100w/ch into 8 ohms.

Sorry for any confusion. I did mention earlier in the thread my testing of the AT602 versus the AT3005 on the Revels, but not the Sony AVR, and that must have confused some folks.

FWIW, I'm not even convinced the difference we think we're hearing is caused by the AVR's amp sections. I think the problem is in the pre-pro section.

 

[Irvrobinson]

View attachment 10723

I do love McIntosh power meters. The best there is. But don't quit your day job to become a photographer.

 

[PENG]

Perhaps there was a misunderstanding. The Sony AVR was driving a pair of JBL E20 monitors, which have 5" woofers. I wouldn't let the Sony near the Revel. The ATI now driving the JBLs in this case is an AT602, which is ATI's lowest power offering, while the Sony is rated at 100w/ch into 8 ohms.

Sorry any confusion. I did mention earlier in the thread my testing of the AT602 versus the AT3005 on the Revels, but not the Sony AVR, and that must have confused some folks.

FWIW, I'm not even convinced the difference we think we're hearing is caused by the AVR's amp sections. I think the problem is in the pre-pro section.

Actually you made it clear enough, but I missed one post. Now I know it wasn't the Salon2, I can believe you aren't kidding about what you are saying..

 

[PENG]

I do love McIntosh power meters. The best there is. But don't quit your day job to become a photographer.

I took quite a few and the others are much sharper, but the one I posted is the only one that without editing, won't ID the dealer, hopefully. Believe me though, those big Blades were singing really loud, clear and musical, with average power draw well below 100W and never peaked above the 120W mark regardless of anything we threw (classical, heavy metal etc.) at them. With them, I firmly believe one hardly needs to spend much on amps, but the dealers will no doubt try to sell you those Mc Monoblocks. On the other hand, if I had 32K for one pair of speakers, I wouldn't worry about go over budget a little to buy 2 kW of amps whether I need them or not.

 

[3db]

Irvrobinson.. I agree with you that your Sony is defective somewhere..espcially if you here things clearer at lower volume levels than with the Sony.


PEng.. Thanks for the subjective tests. I wish I were with you. It sounded like you had a whole lot of fun.

 

[MidnightSensi2]

I don't think I could hear a difference between amps as long as they were capable of driving the load and are reasonably well built. Exception would be like really cheapo stuff ... but I haven't tried a side by side comparison but I remember when Class D amps first came out and people said they sounded funky but I never found that.

One thing to be aware of with analog meters and even the common radio shack meters used, they measure with respect to time. You can have dynamic swings in a Masters Audio track of 40dB that will only register on high frequency meters that are really expensive. Same goes for power measurement.

My friend who works in mastering showed me this. I have a radio shack meter and he has some high end SPL meter. His has hold, records to a laptop, etc. But it can measure really small spikes in levels.

My meter showed peaks of about 95dB in my room, his showed peaks of 120dB...but they were really short (like pico seconds).

So, I guess, if your amplfier can't supply the power for those 'short' bursts maybe someone could hear it? I don't know.

The spikes were so short, that normally 120dB would be painful, but at such a short timespan it's fine.

 

[Irvrobinson]

One thing to be aware of with analog meters and even the common radio shack meters used, they measure with respect to time. You can have dynamic swings in a Masters Audio track of 40dB that will only register on high frequency meters that are really expensive. Same goes for power measurement.

My friend who works in mastering showed me this. I have a radio shack meter and he has some high end SPL meter. His has hold, records to a laptop, etc. But it can measure really small spikes in levels.

My meter showed peaks of about 95dB in my room, his showed peaks of 120dB...but they were really short (like pico seconds).

So, I guess, if your amplfier can't supply the power for those 'short' bursts maybe someone could hear it? I don't know.

The spikes were so short, that normally 120dB would be painful, but at such a short timespan it's fine.

I've noticed this too. My handheld registers lower peaks than the OmniMic V2. I see peaks about 6db or more higher on the OmniMic. Whether the shorter peaks are audible is an interesting question, but I would guess that it is still important to have enough amplifier power to cover them.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I don't think I could hear a difference between amps as long as they were capable of driving the load and are reasonably well built. Exception would be like really cheapo stuff ... but I haven't tried a side by side comparison but I remember when Class D amps first came out and people said they sounded funky but I never found that.

One thing to be aware of with analog meters and even the common radio shack meters used, they measure with respect to time. You can have dynamic swings in a Masters Audio track of 40dB that will only register on high frequency meters that are really expensive. Same goes for power measurement.

My friend who works in mastering showed me this. I have a radio shack meter and he has some high end SPL meter. His has hold, records to a laptop, etc. But it can measure really small spikes in levels.

My meter showed peaks of about 95dB in my room, his showed peaks of 120dB...but they were really short (like pico seconds).

So, I guess, if your amplfier can't supply the power for those 'short' bursts maybe someone could hear it? I don't know.

The spikes were so short, that normally 120dB would be painful, but at such a short timespan it's fine.

That's a good point. If the peaks are only a microsecond duration, that seems like very insignificant exposure to me. Would a microsecond duration peak even be AUDIBLE to us? Or would our neural perception just completely ignore that signal altogether ?

 

[3db]

I don't think I could hear a difference between amps as long as they were capable of driving the load and are reasonably well built. Exception would be like really cheapo stuff ... but I haven't tried a side by side comparison but I remember when Class D amps first came out and people said they sounded funky but I never found that.

One thing to be aware of with analog meters and even the common radio shack meters used, they measure with respect to time. You can have dynamic swings in a Masters Audio track of 40dB that will only register on high frequency meters that are really expensive. Same goes for power measurement.

My friend who works in mastering showed me this. I have a radio shack meter and he has some high end SPL meter. His has hold, records to a laptop, etc. But it can measure really small spikes in levels.

My meter showed peaks of about 95dB in my room, his showed peaks of 120dB...but they were really short (like pico seconds).

So, I guess, if your amplfier can't supply the power for those 'short' bursts maybe someone could hear it? I don't know.

The spikes were so short, that normally 120dB would be painful, but at such a short timespan it's fine.

The really short peaks are easily handled.. Its the longer duration peaks that reek havoc on amps. I wonder, can the human ear even detect a peak of 0.00000000000X seconds?

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Its the longer duration peaks that reek havoc on amps.

True. But most of us cannot handle sustained long duration peaks of 100+ dB at the listening position. We would just turn down the volume due to excruciating pain. So the amps wouldn't be asked to handle what we can't handle ourselves.

 

[Irvrobinson]

That's a good point. If the peaks are only a microsecond duration, that seems like very insignificant exposure to me. Would a microsecond duration peak even be AUDIBLE to us? Or would our neural perception just completely ignore that signal altogether ?

The problem is that music is a bunch of peaks happening in quick succession, and the peaks aren't a microsecond, they're more likely several milliseconds. Distort them by clipping the peaks or whatever and it seems likely to cause audible anomalies. I wouldn't discount these peaks as an audible factor so quickly.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

The problem is that music is a bunch of peaks happening in quick succession, and the peaks aren't a microsecond, they're more likely several milliseconds. Distort them by clipping the peaks or whatever and it seems likely to cause audible anomalies. I wouldn't discount these peaks as an audible factor so quickly.

1,000 milliseconds = 1 second.

Will 10 milliseconds be audible?

Will 100 milliseconds be audible?

 

[Irvrobinson]

1,000 milliseconds = 1 second.

Will 10 milliseconds be audible?

Will 100 milliseconds be audible?

When you're into computer architecture even one millisecond seems like an incredibly long time.

But to answer your question, yes, I think a collection of clipped 10ms peaks might be audible. I'd be surprised if a collection of 100ms peaks *aren't* audible.

 

[MidnightSensi2]

The problem is that music is a bunch of peaks happening in quick succession, and the peaks aren't a microsecond, they're more likely several milliseconds. Distort them by clipping the peaks or whatever and it seems likely to cause audible anomalies. I wouldn't discount these peaks as an audible factor so quickly.

1,000 milliseconds = 1 second.

Will 10 milliseconds be audible?

Will 100 milliseconds be audible?

When you're into computer architecture even one millisecond seems like an incredibly long time.

But to answer your question, yes, I think a collection of clipped 10ms peaks might be audible. I'd be surprised if a collection of 100ms peaks *aren't* audible.

I'm interested to know hehe. I can't find anything on it. We're audioholics, we need data.

When I used to DJ I'd sometimes bring an SPL meter and I'd see sustained levels of 105-110dB. I have earplugs that lower the level but don't hurt response too bad and wouldn't interfere with my headphones. Most DJs do that now that play a lot. Your ears go quick otherwise. Think anything over 100dB and your doing damage. I like it with the earplugs because you still get the feeling of pressure in your chest but don't have any pain or 'the after club silence (meaning you did damage)'. I still wear them now, don't feel dorky at all... actually see more and more people wearing them.

 

[Irvrobinson]

When I used to DJ I'd sometimes bring an SPL meter and I'd see sustained levels of 105-110dB. I have earplugs that lower the level but don't hurt response too bad and wouldn't interfere with my headphones. Most DJs do that now that play a lot. Your ears go quick otherwise. Think anything over 100dB and your doing damage. I like it with the earplugs because you still get the feeling of pressure in your chest but don't have any pain or 'the after club silence (meaning you did damage)'. I still wear them now, don't feel dorky at all... actually see more and more people wearing them.

I wear earplugs for the gigs of my wife's rock band. Most rock bands are just too damned loud, and her band is no different. I tell them to turn it down a little, but they can't hear me. I like her jazz trio better. I've measured her rock drum kit in the house with 110db+ peaks on rim shots. They really need a pretty big venue to sound right, IMO. Crash cymbals also produce impressive peaks, though more in the 105db range. It does affect her hearing; she needs movies turned up louder than I do to understand dialog.

 

[ski2xblack]

1,000 milliseconds = 1 second.

Will 10 milliseconds be audible?

Will 100 milliseconds be audible?

If a peak of any duration causes the amp to clip, high order harmonic distortion results. If enough of this transient clipping piles up it will eventually become audible, and you would have the strong desire to turn it down.

The peak levels you guys are reporting (and I get similar readings) require some serious amp headroom. Makes me think that more than just Walter have their amps begging for mercy.

 

[KEW]

A speaker is a comparatively slow mechanical system. Talking about microseconds makes sense with amps, but not with speakers. So this begs the question of what duration of a signal is audible? Does a high amplitude microsecond pulse have any residual impact on the signal a speaker plays?

It looks like the measured pulse here lasted about 0.1 milliseconds or 100 microseconds. So I'm thinking a speaker would not have time to start movement at the cone before a microsecond signal was gone (frequency and size of the driver would matter).

Anyone know or care to speculate what the audible effect of such a short pulse would be?

Would the effects of clipping hang around longer to effect the speaker's motion?