I see the issue with ABX blind testing

If a recording is played back at a different SPL (Sound Pressure Level) than the original performance, is that not distortion? Yet, recordings do not come with liner notes that specify the playback volume. I tried to convince my wife years ago that I‘m not playing the stereo too loud, I‘m playing it at the original recording level and any less loud would be distortion. She didn‘t buy it but as long as it is a song she likes…

The size of the soundstage on my system varies with the recording. Some recordings are small and intimate and some go beyond the walls of my room. How would I know what is right if I have never heard the original performance? Based on my experiences listening to live music I judge what seems right during a listening session at home.

There is a Roger Waters recording that puts voices 90 degrees to my left and my right. It is the most extreme that I have heard on my system save for the “laughing voice“ that is right by my head near the end of Dark Side of the Moon. Depending on speaker placement and room treatments the Roger Waters recording that I am referring to will make the imaging move forward towards the front of the room a bit from extreme left and right. So I have used that as a benchmark to ensure I have an optimum setup- assuming the artist intent was to have the sounds to the extreme left and right.

@ tonywinga, @donavabdear

To evaluate the sounds, one needs to check the state of ears. Human ears trick our perception of sounds. A same sound can be heard much different by ears.

In below video, the sound at 0:27 seems pretty quiet, but the same sound is actually very noisy with a wide soundstage at 1:28. Generally, above sound can be heard like 0:27 to a’philes and like 1:28 to women/non-a’philes. Alex/WTA

 

donavabdear

469 posts

04-15-2024 at 10:53pm

If a cable makes your music have a wider soundstage that only means that it is defective, you should have the soundstage the mixer intended you to hear.

I think my current Nordost Tyr 2 XLR cables are defective then because they image and stage better than the mogami and several other cables that I used in the past.

Soundstage is done by placing the instruments using a pan pot on the mixer one side of the mix will have a louder signal than the other if the cable gives you extra loud images than that is the same as turning up the volume.

In the recording studio, may be. However, audio reproduction at home is an echo system consisting of components, speakers, room, listener and even cables. It is a complex blend of many factors that affect imaging and soundstage. A change of a speaker toe in angle will make it or break it. None of us have a reference of how it was intended. We weren’t there.

Your thought process, @donavabdear , is flawed in many ways. Including your belief that canare and mogami if used in the studio are good enough for home audio. If I use gruyere cheese and black truffle butter on my burgers and McDonalds doesn’t, are my burgers defective?

I concur with   audphile1

+1

Save for the hamburger part which is "defective" because i eat only McDonald one sorry ... 😊

Oh you absolutely have to expand your culinary horizons @mahgister 

LOL