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phase correction for records?

I am probably asking this out of pure ignorance, but is it possible that some of my records were encoded in a different phase than others in my collections? I ask this because given the identical setup, some of my records have a very open sound stage while others seem very compressed. This variance occurs with records of the same production year and condition. I have compared the LPs to CD versions and found that certain LPs are far more open than their CD equivalents and vice-versa but have no other explanation.

My setup:

vpi Scout with TNT platter, Grado Sonata cartridge
Musical Fidelity X-LPS phono stage
Audio Aero Capitole 24/192 cd player
simaudio moon i3 integrated amp
mbl 121 speakers
mbl subwoofer
bybee power conditioner
various decent cables, only the tonearm cable being shielded

There's a lot I'd like to improve on in this setup and suggestions are welcome.
jennyjones
dopogue
1,773 posts
 
That's odd, Raul. I have a friend with those giant Souindlabs AND a preamp with a polarity switch and he disabled the switch because he was never able to hear the slightest difference with it in either position.
thafler
21 posts
 
Raul

Do you know of any test record that has a pulse signal to check for absolute polarity?

Thank You

Tom
rauliruegas
13,129 posts
 
Dear Dopogue: Rare that that happen because Guillermo and I were 4-5 hours working on.

Maybe that friend's switch was out of work and we have to take in count to the system's differences and room interaction.

It is much a coincidence that in two different " bipolar " ( JJ and Guillermo ones. ) speakers we can heard those differences that like JJ point out are heard mainly on the soundstage presentation.

In my speakers I can't hear almost nothing but that with inverted polarity the music comes with less " emotion ".

Anyway, it could be interesting that other bipolar speaker owners try on it and see what happen.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.
rauliruegas
13,129 posts
 
Dear Tom: These test records have it:

Vanguard StereoLab Test Record ( VSD-100 ), HI-FI Sound Stereo Test Record, OmniDisc by Telarc ( DG-10073/74 ), Stereo Review SRT-14, CBS Laboratories STR-100.

I hope this could help you.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.
jennyjones OP
13 posts
 
Thanks to everyone for their comments. I performed the following experiment to see if I truly understood phase:

I found a record that I did not feel had any phase problems.

1. I switched the polarity of one of the speakers. The sound had a very unusual timing problem, as if one speaker were reaching my ear at a different time than the other.

2. I switched both speakers. I can't explain why, but suddenly the LP sounded like a CD. It was decidedly colder and transitions seemed choppy by comparison to having correct polarity.

The difference between switching only one speaker is far more pronounced than switching both.
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