Erukian

A little bit into the technical background of DVD-Audio. DVD-Audio uses the proprietary MLP lossless compression to keep the high quality digital audio resolution and sampling rates compressed to fit on a DVD while retaining 24bit depth and 96khz in 6 channels (or 24/192 into 2 channels). Typically, it's very expensive to get a DVD-A player to do digital out (read $800+ for the parts to modify a dvd-a player). So since DVD-A's have been out, it's been highly unpractical to make backups of your dvd-a's, make your own mixes, or do whatever you want with them like play them off a PC. MLP is a closed format, it uses encryption called CPPM and the discs (sometimes) use watermarks to protect the content from being ripped. But a few rogue russian programmers have done it. What they did was take a protected DVD-A. Managed to break through the CPPM encryption. then after breaking through the encryption, they can take the MLP files and output them digitally to a wave container, which can be either stored losslessly in a FLAC file for storage on a PC (or compressed into a 5.1 mp3) or even re-burned and remixed for your own pleasure. What this means is that for those of us who use PC's as transports to a DAC for our home stereo's/5.1 setups, we can use our PC's and browse through your dvd-a files just like browsing through MP3's. Or better yet, backup your DVD-A's if you get a dvd burner. This also opens up DVD-A to piracy and file trading, but in the end, it's a win for me because all I want to do is backup my dvd-a and play it on my computer without having to deal with swapping disc's and using dvd-video software. No doubt that news of this will be filtering to bigger sites within the week Here's the main mirror http://www.rarewares.org/ Also, they should be all over torrents soon and then you can grab them if the RIAA sends legal threats to rarewares and they have to take the files offline. The DVD-Audio Forum (people who made the DVD-A standard) use encrytion for a reason, to stop piracy, so their obviously not going to like these tools. I'm not promoting piracy in any way, i'm just letting you guys know that the tools exist to finally backup your DVD-A onto your computer (like ripping a CD to your computer) or burn copy's for safe-keeping. -Joe

---------------- On 7/3/2005 1:40:32 AM DeanG wrote: Garbage in garbage out. ---------------- I'm not so sure that applies. I could use a tube pre-amp which will provide some nice distortion (just like an equalizer) and a little negative feedback to give me a very plesant sound, which actually cover's up a bit (just some) of the edgyness and harshness that a high end DAC outputs. I also had the chance to demo some Boston Acoustics, Totems, Dynaudio monitors/bookshelves, and they all have much more mellow highs than my horn loaded tweeter. While they might not have the uber detailed mids/highs of horns, they certianly don't sound as sharp. Cutting back on the treble isnt such a bad thing when playing klipsch speakers at loud volumes, as long as you dont pull back on it so hard that you sacrafice realism with the high hat and ride cymbals I'm not trying to bash the horn here, It just IS very forward/fun and sharp by nature packed with layers of detail. that's why I believe people love tubes in here. Tubes distort the signal in a plesant way. Equalizers distort the signal in a plesant way. If your audio chain consists of very low levels of distortion all the way through, the sound can get harsh especially at loud volumes. I'm not telling you though, i'm sure you already knew that. -Joe

---------------- On 7/3/2005 8:22:53 AM doctorcilantro wrote: MP3 (lossy) CONVERTS FLAC & MAC (lossless) COMPRESS ---------------- I'm not 100% sure I understand what you mean, but let me take a stab at it to simplify. MP3/AAC/WMA/MPC/OGG are lossy. They LOSE information for the sake of compression. FLAC/APE/ALAC/WMA Lossless/Shorten are lossless. They lose no information, they work like a zip file. They both compress so your analogy about FLAC and MAC (Monkeys audio codec or ALAC?) being the compressing codecs isnt quite accurate. Lossless and Lossy should be self explanatory enough -Joe

Ever consider a sub? -Joe

I got some help with vinnie from redwineaudio, I asked him what would give me the most "bang for the buck mods" plus he gave up some technical advice. For as busy as the guy is, it was nice of him. I first removed the center channel board. I didnt take vinnie's recomendation to replace the RCA input jacks, i used the stock ones. But i had the RCA jacks wired directly to the amplifier board via a pair of Auricaps (3.3uF, 200V). I then pulled out the volume board. The teac's caps on the power supply board are below what's rated in teh Tripath specs. So I upgraded the capacitance to the proper 5V and 28V rails. parts were bought at http://www.partsconnexion.com/ I suck at soldering, my brother did it, he works on audio/video gear as a job (service shop) so he did all the mods. You'd get a lot more info from emailing vinnie and asking him directly for help with a specific issue, I don't trust myself to give sound advice about this stuff, i'm just a software programmer Good luck! -Joe

I'd hate to use the volume control's on the back of the teac. adjusting the left then right channel. I would recommend one of these setups, in this order. A preamp A cd-player with digital gain controls A high end computer audio card. For me, the teac is a dream come true, after I modded it, it really cleaned up the positions of insturments in the soundstage, but i'm not discounting placebo All for $150 after s/h + parts. I guess i'm just a cheap guy, can't see myself spending over $500 on an amp.. Maybe after I get a job.. heh Tom, what do you think of the amp? Compared to some of your own gear that is. For me, considering the quality/price ratio, i've yet to see something beat it, except maybe a modded Sonic Impact t-amp. -Joe

that's some good advice lynnm -Joe

In the meantime, i can pat myself on the back for not upgrading to the heritage line-- yet, the upgrade bug's been biting my butt for almost a year! Comon' ebay, let's see those heresy's for $200!

For me, i balance the klipsch's somewhat harsh highs out with my gear. For example, the source is the biggest source of tonal clarity which can bring in a very laid back sound or a very fun lively sound depending on the quality and brand of the DAC. The source matters more than the amp when it comes to sound quality. Trust me, if you don't, google around for yourself. compare an onboard computer sound card to a high end dedicated cd player, your jaw will drop. I suppose those who are older and might have a bit of hearing loss because of age and might want to bring out the highs even more, but for me, I got a fun lively sounding source, an amp with smooth highs to balance out hte source, then with the source I use a shelf eq that cuts off .6dB on everything over 7000khz. But that's just me. It's all a big balancing act in the end. -Joe

I would be concerned with copy protection when using Apple Lossless. I wonder if you can freely move these files from computer to computer, and I don't like the idea of being restricted to a single player software, and a closed format. ---------------- Encoder's are out there for you to use for free (free as in beer, not speech -- unlike FLAC). Also the latest Foobar2000 beta supports ALAC decoding and it supports its tagging format as well. FLAC's biggest competition by far is ALAC. Sure it's not "as" free and it's newer, and the compression is slightly worse than FLAC, it's still backed by a company. It's nothing like windows media lossless because it doesnt automatically tag DRM onto the files even if you encode w/ itunes. -Joe

As far as best ripper goes. Linux -- Grip uses the famous CD Paranoia core to rip. Some guy in IRC years ago had a peice of dried (something) on his cd, and cd-paranoia actually re-read the thing so many times, increased the laser power on the drive and spun it so fast that it would actually get through the substance to get a consistant reading off the disc. Pretty impressive... Most cd-ripping front-ends in linux use cd paranoia for it's base. Windows - CDex is great, Exact Audio Copy is the best. Found here just read the technology section of the site if your skeptical. Mac - Itunes does a great job ripping to Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC). While it's not as good as EAC at making you feel good about everyting being a bit-perfect copy it does a good job at covering up jitter and "pops" from old discs. ALAC is at least compatible with iPods, which are by far dominating the MP3 player market. The only bad thing about iPods is the DAC's on them are pretty bad and they really underpower headphones and cause clipping in the bass -- really badly... As far as encoding goes. I see three main types of people here. 1) Those who just want their CD's on their portable player, not too concerned about sound quality on the portable, if they want sound quality, they can use their high end stereo at home. So if you have a Rio or iRiver product, they should support OGG Vorbis. If you have an ipod. AAC (advanced audio codec) is what Apple sells music on the iTunes music store with, which is compatible of course with the iPods and sound quality is definately superior to MP3. In fact quite a few Vorbis developers jumped ship to AAC because they think it has more of a chance than Vorbis did at giving MP3 a run for its money without compromising sound quality. For an iPod, 128-192kbps is about as transparent as the ipod can put out because of limiting factors, like the relatively poor amp and DAC in the ipod. 2) Those who want to listen to their music on the computer from the CD Collection or from downloaded tunes. For this, OGG Vorbis/AAC/Musepack (all VBR codecs by nature) are probably the best choices you have. Those codecs are of course, lossy, not lossless, so you ARE losing bits of audio quality. If you do have the hard-drive space, then rip to FLAC, plus it might give you a warm fuzzy feeling about having perfect copies of your WAV files. 3) The guys who want their music backed up or to use a PC as a transport. FLAC is definately the way to go. EAC is also the way to go, you can even try using CUE file sheets, but I won't get into that and just say this. CUE file sheets will store any gap-information that's on the CD. So if there's supposed to be a Gap between songs, it'll be there when your outputting it to your stereo, just as if you were listening to the CD itself. Otherwise Tracks play out gaplessly if that's how the CD has the audio laid out on it. So it seems there's quite a few options in the audio codec world. For those guys in #2 I would use FLAC or ALAC if you have the space, just in case you want to burn the music back to a CD to replace it ... say if it gets stolen or destoryed of if you just want a copy you can put in your car. For #3, never backup as lossy, always lossless, you probably figure that since you paid for the CD, you might as well keep all the quality on it with a 1:1 bit perfect copy. Also your mind can be at ease knowing that when using the computer as a transport, the data is the same as if you put in the physical disc, which makes our audiophile insides all happy The only thing you'd have to worry about would be digital jitter, which a high end DAC can take care of.. usually. -Joe

This is a fun experiment. Take a song. Convert it from WAV to MP3 @ 192kbps Now make 4 copies of each filetype giving you 10 copies, 5 of each. You can do this two ways, first try to have someone (not you) mix them up randomly and burn them to a CD. That person also takes note of a cheat-sheet of which ones are from MP3 and which are from WAV. Then you put on your listening cap on, perk out your ears, and try to discern the differences between the songs, rating each song as either MP3 or WAV. Then look at the cheat sheat and see how you did when your all done. You can also do this by yourself by taking the 10 audio files, making the first 5 WAV and the last 5 MP3. If you can put your CD-player on random, cover up the LCD and when the song is just about done playing, pause it before it's over, restart it if you want to listen to it again then rate it as MP3 or WAV. Make sure it's paused before it's over so you don't lose the track # of what you just listened to so when you take a peek to see how you did, you'll discover if you can discern any differences. Blind listening tests are fun because they give the listener an idea of what they actually hear vs what they want to hear because someone with golden ears told them they should hear the difference. It doesnt mean though however that their ears cant train to pick up the artifacting in MP3. Just like a musican can train his ear to pick out flat/sharp notes. -Joe

MD1032, the bass on those things is unbeatable. Even compared to klipschorns because it's perfectly flat down past 20hz, they dont have to exactly battle room acoustics, at all. No room modes to worry about. I would definately consider Grado the Klipsch of headphones, very efficient and very dynamic. -Joe

Science isnt capable of explaining all of audio phenomena right now but I honstly believe it can someday. Even though using my philosophy of science to explain audio is incomplete, at least it's not inconsistant rather than a ton of people just yelling to me "it just sounds better!" and the other ton of people yelling "It's distortion! Tube owners are half-deaf!" For me, it's just not good enough to pick sides and call it a day. Sure they can sound better, but I need to know why. When it comes to amplifiers, and there are a lot of Tube lovers in here, here's what I have come to think of them and why they can sound better. THD and IMD measurements cannot distinguish between low order distortion and high order distortion. Here's a thesis to read about it and the author states high order distortion is MUCH more audible to human (our) ears. The arguement the paper makes is that SET amps while do pretty bad in the THD/IMD graphs, do surprisingly well in high order distortion than SS amps. The negative feedback is just a trade off, get some lower distortion to clean up the audible higher distortion and that triode amps in particular do a great job of reducing open-loop distortion. Keep in mind the paper doesn't take a very objective point of view, but besides that, it's fairly convincing. -Joe

I consider myself definately an audio-enthusiast-novice, so don't hit me over the head too hard for putting out these thoughts, so onto the reply. Comparing tubes to eachother is WAY different. It's pretty obvious that tubes distort. Like equalizers, tubes distort in a plesant way, from my experince, they bloom the mids to make them "lush" and roll off the high's removing a lot of listening fatigue but don't dim the highs at all, just slowly as the range goes up. Something that can be done with an "really good" equalizer, not just a 32 band analog, but an electronic 32-64band parametric EQ with Shelf EQ capabilities before it hits the DAC. Comparing tubes from different manuf's will give you measurably different THD. So yes, they will sound different. I'm not sure about caps though, I personally believe that blackgates sound definately better than a cheap brand even though their rated the same. A virgin to tube/ss gear or vynil is definately not going to hear the difference between mediocre and great equipment at first, they have to let their ears learn the difference. Being TOLD what sounds better only only perpeturates placebo down the line when the realize what they were first told is right; they tend to believe once they get a hand on the audio scene that "cables really do matter" because the knowledgable people who first pointed you in the right direction are now pointing you in a highly questionable direction. I think the audio scene is majorly screwed up when buyers honestly think that digital speakers are not analog, and that monster wire is half of the sound. Either way, back to the topic, I think it's a personal decision that i've made to not trust what others think they hear because the first thing that pops into my head when someone promotes one similiar product over another is "placebo". I honestly feel suckered into buying monster cable 16GA even though it was relatively cheap and on sale. From my own listening tests, looking at the stats on the equipment and learning the electrical facts i came to a conclusion. So now if some review gives me the buyers itch, i naturally question "why" it would do so scientifically, especially after reading a stereophile review With the state that the audio scene is in right now I honestly take everything said with a grain of salt from unknown to respected audiophiles, and I won't take it any other way until science can back what their saying. -Joe

oh, i wasnt at all trying to discount the knowlege of people who visit and post on these forums. But on that board, it's MUCH more active and it's specific to dedicated source components not just "technical questions". I was just trying to help him get an answer quicker, with different opinions. Not to hijack this thread, but here's a good link to brush over if you find most of your questions on forums go unanswered. It's designed for hackers/programmers and was recommended to me by my professor. It really applies to anything though and is some good information on how people in forums generally act. -Joe

Ask in this forum. -Joe

setup B looks better than A. You can try the sub behind the TV or in the top left corner. I would give the speakers about a foot's clearance from the wall and toe them in maybe 2 inches. Just for starters. If you want a cleaner more direct sound, or just a "different" sound than what I just recommended, when looking at the entertainment center, have it so the speakers drivers are point straight to your head. Either way, it'll sound different, which is best is up to you. -Joe

I bet you can't hear a difference between kernel streaming and DirectSound I know guys with $700 headphones and $200 amps with $1000 DAC's. They can't hear a difference either (no their not deaf). I honestly think the whole KS/ASIO vs Waveout/DS is a bunch of placebo. You might want to try and take a step back, don't trust what other people say, trust your own ears! If you honestly can hear a difference, and you see yourself wanting to hear the difference, then something's up! Run Directsound for a week, then switch to KS for a song, then switch back, there's really nothing "bad" DS does to the sound before it hits the DAC, you'd gain much better sound out of your system by adjusting your seat height and toe in/out. Those are my two cent's on the ASIO/KS vs. Waveout/DS thing -Joe

some subs (like mine -- i think most are as well) are passive crossovers. They try not to alter the amped signal from the main amp. They just take the signal, extract the LFE information from it, then do the bass to wherever you have the xover knob up to. So running your main amp to the high-level inputs then the speaker outputs on the sub, it isnt going to "cut out" the bass on your mains at the crossover point. If your speakers fall off at 50hz, and the sub's xover is at 80hz, you will have overlapping bass. Which isnt a "Good Thing". At least, this is the situation with all the sub's ive looked at. That's why I suggested using a tone generator program w/ the sub off to find where you should set your xover point to. EDIT: I got this quote from Vinny of RedWineAudio in an email. So if your hooking this up to a Tripath amp, be wary!! "The speaker outputs of a Tripath amp are not single-ended, they are bridged (differential). If you were to tie the L and R negative speaker outputs together, it will short out the amp. My guess is that your subwoofer ties these terminals to ground, but via a resistor (not a direct short), so your Teac is not overcurrent/overheating." Make sure your sub's amp has a resistor when it's grounding the negative L and R high-level inputs. So the tripath amp if you have one doesnt overheat. -Joe

Welcome to the forums! First of all, if you can give us your room dimensions, where your seat is located, is your seat movable or is it a couch against the wall? Speaker break-in is a myth, it's just audiophiles who believe they have perfect ears not realizing that the device's sonic properties aren't changing over time, it's their ears adjusting to the differences of the device under examination compared to what their "used to". With that out of the way, placement is KEY especially with music and setting it up, so cough up the room specs (X,Y,Z) and your seating position, then it should be pretty easy to make a recommendation. Have a blast with your new RF-25's! I think you'll love the detail of the horn tweeter! -Joe

my opinions pretty much mirror what is said about vynil vs cd audio in this document. http://www.theaudiocritic.com/downloads/article_1.pdf -Joe

If you don't feel comfortable using the high-level inputs, then do this. Take your main stereo amp, have the 1/8"/RCA y adapter go to your main amp. BIWIRE the amp to your speakers and then to your high-level inputs on the sub. That way your sub can do bass from both channels, the sub doesnt pollute the mains, and the mains get their own happy signal straight from the amp. That really is the cleanest signal path I can think of w/ your setup. Oh, and use NCH Tone Generator, turn off your sub, and use a rat-shack meter or your ears and see where your mains start to fall off in your room. Then set the sub's xover to there. Mine's at 50, the bass isnt boomy but it's really tight and natural when it doesnt majorly overlap on the mains. -Joe

does your sub have high level inputs like this? If so, just run the 1/8">RCA Y cable to the amp, then use speaker wire and have that run to the high-level inputs, then use more speaker wire and use the speaker outputs. The way your sub is set up now, is it's only getting the bass from one channel. You want it to get bass from both. -Joe

I found a longer discussion on head-fi. One of my old buddies 'Publius' shows up to offer his wisdom which is kinda cool, either way if your into this thread, it's worth reading through the linked one as well. http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=123921 -Joe