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
Acoustics are primary, that’s a fact, but electronics can also be a bottleneck if you don’t pay attention to them.
For sure you are right...

But my point is related to the fact that it is very easy to buy a good audio system at low price.... By easy i means if we read like i did for over hundreds and hundreds  of hours carefully... But anyway it is the easy part... 😊

All the working embeddings we must do and figure out is the hard part of this hobby...

The acoustic is the most consuming time controls to install rightfully and i figure out myself that passive material treatment sometimes is not enough...

With the mechanical equalizer tuning almost complete, i am done...

Some other imprevisible improvements tecnique or devices for sure exist which i never think of, but my S.Q. is satisfying completely....Or almost....Then i am done with my listening experiments and i am even more in non critical music listening...

Imagine i just look for Chostakovitch symphonies directed by his son.... I will enjoy them in the late nights to come....

My best to you....
SECOND UPDATE:

THE HELMHOLTZ MECHANICAL EQUALIZER or H.M.E.

I can describe my H.M.E. like a SNAKE which has his HEAD (2 thin straws of different size) one inches 1/2 near the tweeter of my left speakers. The TAIL is 2 inches away from the bass diver of the right speaker (2 pipes one is a very big straw with a neck made with a very thinner one and the other a metal tubes 2 feet high with a 1/4 inch diameter) To these 2 pipes at the right speaker bass driver, i added yesterday a bigger, tube 15 inches high, made of toilet paper cardboard rolls 😁, closed with plastic sheet, with a neck 5 inch long and with the thinner possible straw diameter for his neck...

In my room,the other 2 set of 6 pipes and tubes of various size,diameter and necks are located at the first reflection points to my right and left, the last 7 one are behind me with the biggest one, 8 feet high....

My H.M.E. grid is a snake which has a head, a tail and a body, each part with different pressure zone damping and enhancing his own set of frequencies...The body enhance room wavefronts, the head and tail enhance speaker wavefronts....This is the CORE of my idea....

The dissymetric position of the head and tails in relation with the tweeter from one speaker and the bass driver of the other speakers is the SECRET MAGICAL component of my H.M.E. snake grid, the first wave front of sound coming from one speaker and the other one coming from the other speaker gives to EACH ear a different cue, these different cues made the brain more apt to recreate a third holograhic sound encompassing completely the listener....

I was inspired by the last research of  three Japanese acoustician in 2008 analysing the way the brain act in different timing tresholds between the direct early and late wavefronts...Reading it give me the idea on the spot.... My idea is my own application of their analysis and is not in the paper.... I am very proud of that invention so to speak.....😊

The addition of this last cardboard tube was the "cherry on the cake", and was no short of spectacular on ALL count of acoustic features....I was sure few days ago that nothing was missing but i was not right...I listened yesterday to some small negative resonance at some mid frequencies in my best harpsichord file, unnoticed till now... I decide to act and i win the bet on the spot!

It was a so great improvement that i cannot believe it myself...

I listen to a very well known files of Bach Golberg variations, by Fretwork ensemble.... Incredibly i listened to them for the first time being there with them in the studio....The "listener envelopment" acoustical experience was more striking than ever at a maximum possible level this time....The timbre of wood instruments in my Brandenburg concertos were also more accurate and distinctive....

I was flabbergasted because i have written here few posts ago that the experiment with H.M.E. was closed.....

It seems something was lacking all along  that i did not perceive in only few hours of listenings , it takes days....

I cannot imagine any real change of this level to come from my H.M.E. for the future....But i will not bet on that anymore now... 😁😊😎

My audio quest is terminate that is for sure.....No upgrading will interest me ever now.....It is way better to create sound with "paper toilet rolls " than buying the illusion with a very costly system....

I know that most cannot believe what i spoke about here but it is my journey and i wish to be useful to some....

Trust yourself, and create without after tought....After the heart the ear is the greatest master....







Addendum:
Like usual all improvements are there on regular position or in nearfield position similarly but differently....
Imagine i just look for Chostakovitch symphonies directed by his son.... I will enjoy them in the late nights to come....

I have often heard that his son performs his father's things better than others. I myself do not really like Shostakovich's symphonic music, the very heavy music to me and the natural sound of the orchestras in the recording leave much to be desired.

I love his early chamber works, where he plays the piano himself. Brilliant Trio Op. 67 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUorALVwVHA. The cello flageolets at the beginning are just a kind of a mystery. And how eloquently does Oistrakh violin speak!
I love his early chamber works, where he plays the piano himself. Brilliant Trio Op. 67 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUorALVwVHA. The cello flageolets at the beginning are just a kind of a mystery. And how eloquently does Oistrakh violin speak!
Thanks....I discovered Chostakovich music with his piano works which are for me very beautiful and powerfully expressive of the contemporary state of the soul in this century....

My most admired composer is Scriabin.... His music is the most powerful ever written for piano....And one of the most transformative music ever written.... His music is designed specifically to transform human soul not for esthetic enjoyment first, it is the reason why playing it is almost out of the range of almost all pianist save a few....Sofronitsky being king here....I.Zukhov second for me....And few others russian masters on par with him....

Russian piano school is the best in the world....Soul first, technic second.... But who knowns and listen unknown pianist master in America like Neuhaus?


Third UPDATE:

THE HELMHOLTZ MECHANICAL EQUALIZER or H.M.E.

Addition of bottles near the port hole of the speakers...







My last idea comes directly from the last acoustical research ,but i am proud to be the sole creator of my design...

We listen not to frequency like assume those who use an electronic equalizer and a mic with a tested response frequency for a PRECISE ARTIFICIAL location...

We listen to some multi dimensional complex different wavefronts, a bunch of frequencies,( like the voice timbre of a singer) coming from the tweeter, the bass drivers, and from early and late reflections in a PRECISE NATURAL time frame...

I used this fact creating my H.M.E. (Helmoltz mechanical equalizer): imagine a snake with head and tail...

The HEAD begins a few centimeters from the tweeter of one of my speakers with 2 pipes near the tweeter and 2 bottles near the port hole; then going to my left on the first reflection point with 6 pipes; then to my rear with the MAIN BODY of the snake, 8 pipes ,one 8 feet high; and then goes to the second reflection point to my right, with 6 pipes and finally ends at the TAIL, with 3 pipes near the bass driver of this speaker, with one bottle near the port hole....Asymmetric distribution of pipes and bottles and differences between them are very important at the head and tail....

Result: "listener envelopment" factor LEV and "source width" factor ASW and imaging complete optimization...

This means my 50 dollars speakers sound like almost the best speakers there is to my ears, with ONLY their design normal limitations and no more limitations from the room now... In the opposite, my room enhanced the speakers design to MY EARS (not to a mic from a mic)...

It seems   oldhvymec   were the only one to catch something about my idea with his comparison with silent organ pipe acoustical tuning in church.... This was half of my idea.... The other half is related to the way the ears/brain recreate the FIRST frontwave sound coming from the 2 speakers early and late reflections for each ear.... The gist of my idea is to control these different reflections with a qualitative control different for each ear...This is the powerful HEAD and TAIL of my acoustical snake or H.M.E. we can also reduce his name to a true "Helmholtz grid".... Speakers were not there tough at the time of Helmholtz....


Acoustic is so powerful that it is the main factor in audiophile perceived experience... The failure to understand this push the market obsession with upgrading electronics parts....There is less difference between each electronics parts at ANY cost than between electronic part in a bad or in a good room... PERIOD....

The tragedy is : it is not all people who can experience it in a dedicated room....The rest is audiophile blind history obsession with all that matter the less, cables,analog/digital,tubes/S.S. etc, at the cost of which really matter the most: acoustic....

NO ONE listen to his speakers only...We listen to our room.... The direct waves coming from the speakers are perceived, even in near listening field, MIXED with the reflections.... In my own room in one second the waves cross the room 80 times horizontally and more vertically ( my room is 13 feet square 8 1/2 feet high)....My ear/brain use a 80 milliseconds window, in which already many crossings(direct,early and late reflections) will be analyzed internally from EACH one ear... When people think that near listening field nullify the powerful impediment of their non controlled room this is completely false....Any change in my own acoustical settings were detected by me in nearfield listening or regular one position alike...

The addition of these 2 bottles to my left speaker port hole and one bottle to the right speaker enhance greatly the 3-d imaging.... I am now finished with the H.M.E.

😊