Neutral electronics are a farce...

I should also point out that George’s criterion for determining which is better N or R for a given recording is that it’s one that sounds more like "live" music must be N. Roger’s criterion is the same, I.e., "live" music, for what his amp sounds like compared to amplifier X.

Well it was easy to hear on our system how the LP was better; and since LPs have greater bandwidth than CDs, pretty easy to discount his comment when he said 'you can't hear it on analog recordings'.

The fact of the matter is that you can. But to do so, the recording can't have more than 2 or 3 mikes (and the 3rd mike, which will be the one in the middle ala Mercury recordings, had better be phased properly). That is why we have the inversion switch BTW and we've had it since the inception of the preamp in 1989.

"Food for thought...
If you can’t tell the difference when you switch the phase then it [the system] is not clean enough to expose it."

That’s what I just got through telling Atmasphere is the likely explanation why George Louis was unable to hear the difference between R and N in the Atmasphere room at the show. The show is perhaps the worst possible venue to try to demonstrate anything, including the very speakers and amps and cables that make up the exhibit; exhibitors shoot themselves in the foot by not bringing along electonics or speakers that are ALREADY broken in.

We had broken-in electronics, as well as broken in loudspeakers. In this case I would not use a strawman argument for something, especially when you don't like them used on yourself: George made it quite clear upon entering our room that he could hear the difference. The funny thing is we could hear the difference on both the LP and CD (Canto is a 2-mic recording), and it was correct the first time when he came in. But despite that, George came had his own confidence; we entertained his requests without rancor but he just got up and left as fast as he could.

Atmosphere wrote,

"Well it was easy to hear on our system how the LP was better; and since LPs have greater bandwidth than CDs, pretty easy to discount his comment when he said ’you can’t hear it on analog recordings’."

But that’s not what he said based on your original description of the event. What he said - or at least implied in your comment - was he didn’t listen to analog, only CDs so he wasn’t sure he could hear R compared to N for vinyl.  He didn’t say NOBODY could hear polarity on analog recordings. That would be pretty silly, no?

Getting back to his database of N and R recordings for a second, I will ask again, do you see any mistakes in the polarity of the recordings George listed? Whether he could or couldn’t hear the difference at your room I consider somewhat irrelevant for reasons I already explained.

geoff kait

Geoff, you got it wrong:

If you go back and look, you will see where; I wrote:

At that point, upon not really hearing a difference, George said that you could not hear it on analog recordings.

So, I’m going with ’That would be pretty silly’, yes.

Back to the question I am now asking for the third (count ’em) time. The real question is is (two is’s in a row) George’s database correct or not? In other words do you have any evidence or even proof that he’s wrong? Forget about analog.

By the way, if you read George’s page more carefully you’ll find some (I think) logic reasoning there that might substantiate the idea that analog (vinyl) and perhaps cassettes as well don’t suffer the inverting polarity nearly to the extent that digital does. In any ace he is arguing that the vinyl counterpart can often be non-inverting whereas the CD version is R. And, he goes on, this difference in polarity between digital and vinyl generally speaking, is a big reason my words why audiophiles frequently prefer analog. Makes sense, no? So here is the relevant paragraph from George’s page:

"It almost goes without saying that the inverted playback of CDs greatly disadvantages them musically when compared to the non-inverted playback of their vinyl record counterparts. It should be noted that the polarity integrity of each element in the chain of a vinyl record’s recording through its playback can be determined without ever listening to it in a manner similar to that described below for digital media, but is much easier to accomplish for vinyl records than for CDs, because a record’s musical content is laid down continuously in its groove, which is fundamentally different from the discontinuous way the digital representation of a CD’s musical content is laid down in its track. Could this be a major reason why many listeners prefer analog to digital?** Sometimes there are additional reasons, that although substantially less significant, might influence some listener’s preference of vinyl records over digital media that you may read about below.*

So, even if you don’t buy into the problem of polarity being as big as George claims, say you think it’s 50% or whatever and perhaps you also don’t particularly care to check the polarity of every single CD and mark it Out Of Polarity like some people I know. Nevertheless, and as unfortunate as this may be, since absolute polarity is also an issue with (some) digital playback electronics, and I know that’s true because I had a CD player that was polarity inverting, unless the True Audiophile has some means to determine if in fact his system is in the correct absolute polarity, then at least 50% of the time he will be hearing the music in Reverse Polarity, no? Furthermore, even if one were to be really stubborn or in denial or whatever and say, Geez, I don’t think any CDs are Reverse Polarity, guess what? In that case ALL CDs will be heard as R since the system with an inverting component in it reverses polarity, so you wind up with the music out of polarity.

An ordinary man has no means of deliverance.

cheerios,

geoff kait

Could this be a major reason why many listeners prefer analog to digital?**

Such a Red Herring! We don't even know that such is even true... sheesh. Anyway, we let George hear the CD (so this was not an analog/digital thing at all) but he couldn't make the call on that one, despite telling us initially that the room sounded fine other than being the wrong polarity. Can you see the problem?

I'm sure that is why he left so quickly- it must have been as obvious to him as it was to us.