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How close to the real thing?

Recently a friend of mine heard a Chopin concert in a Baptist church. I had told him that I had gone out to RMAF this year and heard some of the latest gear. His comment was that he thinks the best audio systems are only about 5% close to the real thing, especially the sound of a piano, though he admitted he hasn't heard the best of the latest equipment.

That got me thinking as I have been going to the BSO a lot this fall and comparing the sound of my system to live orchestral music. It's hard to put a hard percentage on this kind of thing, but I think the best systems capture a lot more than just 5% of the sound of live music.

What do you think? Are we making progress and how close are we?
peterayer
pubul57
3,712 posts
 
Do Ayre and Pass use zero feedback desings in their amps? I only know they sound really good.
phaelon
1,050 posts
 
Hi Kirkus, I just pressed on your system and I'm so happy I did. How very cool! To saner times...
pubul57
3,712 posts
 
Wow, that JBL Marantz Mac setup is something else!
atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,807 posts
 
Hi Kirkus, that was not what I recalled so I looked up the Ampex schematic... Its not the record head that has feedback- prior to that the record calibration circuit does use a feedback mechanism. The rest of the circuit has none.

I did think about the playback after posting :/

Of course LP lathes do use feedback, primarily used to control resonance. You can't get channel separation in a Westerex 3D, for example, if you don't use feedback. However there is work being done to this day to try and find a way around that. Apparently feedback is not popular with mastering engineers and for good reason: if the electronics even turn on in the wrong order at power-up, the cutting head can be destroyed.

I have a set of Western Electric mic preamps that are zero feedback. I pulled them out of a dumpster about 30 years ago and boy am I glad I did. They are really transparent, after being updated with Jensen transformers and otherwise rebuilt.
weseixas
519 posts
 
Hello Atmasphere,

Are you involved in making your own recordings.....

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