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Miracles in Audio, by luck, by good choices,by design or by tweaking...

I owned a low cost headphone for many years, the Fostex TH7B, first version( a new one close version exist Fostex TH7BK), semi-open headphone...I was never completely satisfied by any headphones I ever owned: Hifiman 400, Stax basic lamda, Stax 5 gold,Akg 340,Akg 701, beyerdynamic 990, and T150... Because in each of them with all their qualities I never listen to at the same times, a confortable headphone with natural timbre and voicing, with a good imaging and a realistic soundstage(not too close to my ears)...


For the last days I tweaked this Fostex, to damp his internal resonance I used sorbothane, I put some shungite stones at the exterior part of the cups and I use some Herkimer diamond in the interior pads( 3 at 120 degree) … Now this low cost headphones crush all my others if I sum all his qualities... For example his mids and voicing cannot beat the AKG 340 but among all my other headphones it is the best that is near that mids and it is more confortable, and with longer cable than the 340...His imaging is better and more realistic than the 340 etc etc...It is the same if I compare with the others...


His most important qualities is natural timbre and clear imaging,very precise pinned point accuracy and natural, so clear it crush for that ALL the others to dust...In the French audio circle the reviews were more than very positive few years ago...Diapason d’or and choc Classica...I am not the only one impressed buy the ratio quality/price... But remember that thesae reviewers dont tweak their headphone...The difference between before and after the tweaks are staggering...


Yes Miracles happens in Audio: cost is under 100 American dollars... Few years ago they cost me 50 bucks new... I never dreamed that I will go back to headphones...


I will enjoy your miracles stories of any kind ….My best to all...
128x128mahgister
mahgister's avatar
mahgister OP
13,211 posts
 
The last year of my audio journey, with all these simple homemade creations of mine, i produced in a way an another audio system with the same electronic basic components, amp, dac, speakers...

Explaining a total change in imaging, dynamic, timbre, soundstage, increased clarity in frequencies and perception of new details,  by placebo effect is a bit too much.... If someone dont have an explanation it is better to say so, better than invoke the useful ghost out of the medical context in the experimental fields...By the way in the course of my experiments there is also a "nocebo" effect, the contrary effect of placebo where instead of an improvement there is a degradation effect... This is when the bad stones is located at a bad location....


But "placebo" + "nocebo" cancel each other....Then subsist the necessity to explain the increasing positive effect at the end... :)
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
They blindfolded a pledge in college and told him they were going to brand his arm with a hot branding iron as part of his initiation into the fraternity. They showed him the hot coals with the the branding iron Glowing Red Hot in the coals just before applying the blindfold. Then they told him, now we’re going to brand you, but instead of the branding iron they held an ice cube to his arm for three seconds and put the hot branding iron on a piece of raw liver at the same time so that the blindfolded college dude was convinced he was really being branded. When his blindfold was removed he and everyone was surprised to see a huge welt on his farm, the kind of welt that only a branding iron would make.
mahgister's avatar
mahgister OP
13,211 posts
 
Very good example of placebo...

But repeated experiments with different locations, weigh, different stones on a breaker "inert" non living panel or on electronic components is not reducible to this ice-fire effect on a suggestibe living body controlling itself unconsciously....

I was not suggested by someone that these stones will work that way and some others another way, and some others dont...For example ruby is not very good for positive impact on the electrical grid of an audio system...Shungite no more than ruby is always good directly on the electronic component except some E.C. like the S.G....

Nobody suggested positive or negative impacts in advance to my brain( the structural qualities pertaining to each stones is on a non living E.C. like the hot or fire properties on a living body.... Then how placebo can explain all the structural different qualities of each stones associated with many different locations? In the placebo example, it was suggested fire will hit the cobaye not ice; in the experiments many different structural qualities of the stones are unpredictable, because of weigh, location, and difference between the stones....
mahgister's avatar
mahgister OP
13,211 posts
 
«a beneficial effect produced by a placebo drug or treatment, which cannot be attributed to the properties of the placebo itself, and must therefore be due to the patient’s belief in that treatment...»


The important words are: "the beneficial effect... cannot be attributed to the properties of the placebo itself"


How do you know that the structural differentiated properties of each stones cannot be the cause of some physical changes in the audio grid, resulting in a different positive or negative perceived impact?


Discarding the importance of this fact, : each stones is very different from others, you reduce arbitrarily some possible physical effects, negative and positive, resulting from the introduction in an audio grid of some different objects to an undifferentiated psychological effect of a mind on his own body by suggestion....It seems to me that one is not reducible to the others without negating some facts before any investigation... Then speaking for this phenomena of placebo effect is premature to say the least...
mahgister's avatar
mahgister OP
13,211 posts
 
Back to my obsessive mind state.... :)

I just order 12 shungite tiles to makes my last "golden" plates....

But the graphene + mica liquid I wait for will take much times to comes, thank to the coronavirus...


With these 12 tiles of 110 grams each, lighter than my other tiles, I will cover more ground….Cost 100 dollars....(1,500 grams of shungite)


I cannot wait because the last additions in my basement gives a great upgrade to the imaging power of my audio system at the 2 listening locations, regular or nearfield ....

I am very pleased now but I am addict to the improvements and want to touch the limits of my actual system which I never think would be able to gives me so much.... :)

It seems my Mission Cyrus speakers, after suddenly repairing by themselves( I dont know how to this day), were a good purchase, the Sansui AU 7700 is astonishing, and my starting Point System NOS dac without perceptible limitations in this audio system with my ears.... Then after all these tweaks in the 4 areas : mechanical and electrical, and in the acoustical passive and active modes, I will know what is the real potential of my system finally....


I will repeat my mantra, rant, and experience ;the majority of us do not know what the system we have is capable of, to begins with....Dont buy anything, before deep thinking....


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