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The last 5 ?????

Sometimes as an Audiophile I come to a place where words no longer express the experience I’m having with my system. In this past year I have needed to sell off parts of my system, the biggest changes were going from two Plinius SA-102 amps bi-amped to a single amp, and replacing my Nordost Valhalla cabling with the far more affordable Kubala-Sosna Emotion cables.

The loss of the amp was clear, less dynamics and less involving. The cable change was something significantly different however. The Kubala-Sosna cables are every cliché we audiophiles use. Blacker, better definition, more space between notes, dynamic, extended… These words fail to express the improvement over my Valhalla cables however, and all I can say is I’m more musically involved. This was a clear improvement to my system, and for less money!!! But words fail to adequately express the improvements.

The second experience came when my Sony SCD-1 receiving all the remaining modifications available through Richard Kern at Audiomod.com I had half the mod’s done four years ago, and received the remaining just last month. The fully modified player is said to better the EMM Meitner/Phillips combination. I can not speak to that in that I have never heard this combination, so my basis is strictly within my experiences listening to other systems.

The fully modified Sony is simply amazing, beyond my limits of expression. I could say it’s more analog than any digital system I’ve heard, and yet it’s well beyond analog. It is simply so much more than the analog most of us can afford. It’s also not at all digital, it has none of the electronic, edgy artifacts of solid state and digital systems. The best way I can explain this system is it’s beyond digital and analog that I’m aware of.

Words like three dimensional, attack, tightness, extended, clear, dynamic, natural, subtle all fall completely inadequate when trying to explain my system today. Words just can not explain the sound.

This leads me to my purpose of this post. The topic actually came up talking to Albert Porter when we were discussing continued improvements we make to systems that are already beyond 95% of anything available. In Albert’s case I suspect he is beyond 99.99% and yet we continue to change our systems and reach DRAMATIC improvements.

How is this possible if the last five or three or one percent is as significant as 50% to 90%? What I mean is when I moved from a $1000 system to a $4000 system the improvements were dramatic. Then I moved to a $9000 then $20,000 and finally to where I am now. Each step was marked improvement over the earlier step and even at $4000 I was far beyond anything 95% of the consumers will ever hear. So what’s actually going on? If $4000 gets me to the last few percent, how can each additional step be doubling or tripling the previous systems musicality or involvement or measurable improvement?

Why do some of us get to a point where we believe a single multi-thousand dollar interconnect brought us 100% closer to the music? Why are there some who still claim cables do not effect sound? Clearly they want good sound, but somehow are not aware of what is possible due to limits in there 95% system.

My answer is either the last couple percent are actually far more significant than the first 95% or we are actually only 25% “there” with a $4000 system. I can not even express how big the changes I have made are. They are well beyond two times, maybe three or four times the significance on the system before these changes. That would mean I was something like 25% or 45% “there” before. Well that is crazy because I have not hear a system I enjoyed more than mine. I’ve heard some that were better in one area or another, but overall… Of course this is a subjective topic, and I understand that, but the point is for my room, my ears, my taste I was already 100%, yet now I’ve bettered it by two or three fold.

All I can think is this is not a 100% issue. This is something more like the open ended Richter scale. On the Richter scale every tenth of a point is doubling the magnitude of an earthquake. The Richter scale is logarithmic, that is an increase of 1 magnitude unit represents a factor of ten times in amplitude. The seismic waves of a magnitude 6 earthquake are 10 times greater in amplitude than those of a magnitude 5 earthquake. However, in terms of energy release, a magnitude 6 earthquake is about 31 times greater than a magnitude 5.

-1.5 on Richter scale, equals 6 ounces of TNT
1.0 on Richter scale, equals 30 pounds of TNT
1.5 on Richter scale, equals 320 pounds of TNT
2.0 on Richter scale, equals 1 ton of TNT
2.5 on Richter scale, equals 4.6 tons of TNT
3.0 on Richter scale, equals 29 tons of TNT
3.5 on Richter scale, equals 73 tons of TNT
4.0 on Richter scale, equals 1,000 tons of TNT
4.5 on Richter scale, equals 5,100 tons of TNT
5.0 on Richter scale, equals 32,000 tons of TNT
5.5 on Richter scale, equals 80,000 tons of TNT
6.0 on Richter scale, equals 1 million tons of TNT
6.5 on Richter scale, equals 5 million tons of TNT
7.0 on Richter scale, equals 32 million tons of TNT
7.5 on Richter scale, equals 160 million tons of TNT
8.0 on Richter scale, equals 1 billion tons of TNT
8.5 on Richter scale, equals 5 billion tons of TNT
9.0 on Richter scale, equals 32 billion tons of TNT
10.0 on Richter scale, equals 1 trillion tons of TNT
12.0 on Richter scale, equals 160 trillion tons of TNT

So if we said a boom box was a 1.0, a Bose radio might be considered a 3.0. A top of the line Best Buy system might be a 4.0. The typical audiophile system might then be a 5.5 where the old 98% system might be a 6.5. If my system was a 7.5 before the changes it might be a 7.9 now. Albert’s system might be an 8.5, but his new cables could make his system 100% better, or become an 8.6.

In my mind this is more logical for explaining the effects I have experienced. This also means we never find 100% for this scale has no end. Now the issue is how we actually mathematically quantify this logarithmic expression. I figure if some of the engineering minds out there might have an answer for this and this could be a new expression for us to use. If we could come up with a quantifiable formula, it might be a new language for us to express our systems to each other. If we had something like this maybe it could be a part of the virtual systems. We could then begin to understand how an improved cable is affecting our systems.

I may be way off here; it would not be the first time. I do however feel we need another language to express the “last couple percent” because the system we are using is inadequate, and at some point all the clichés mean nothing, and words are wholly inadequate. Perhaps this is a start???
128x128jadem6
rockvirgo
587 posts
 
Similar threads touting the undescribable and miraculous transformation, after repeated and exhaustive trials, some cord or wire imparted to a system remind me of a part of Voltaire's Candide. Exsqueeze me if I remember it poorly but it went something like this:

Candide, the eternal and naive optimist, meets a well heeled man with a vast library. He marvels at the wondrous colection and assemblage only to ask the man of all these volumes which is your favorite? The elitist replies well none of them, I dislike them all. Candide thinks to himself, here indeed is a great man of refined taste for nothing at all can please him!

Back in the 21st century I, as a lesser, more complacent but perhaps more balanced audiophile, feel complelled to perform an intervention whenever a thread glorifies the tone generator kind of fidelity of someone's system. I understand some are wholly invested in the gee-whiz-listen-to-that-replication form of thought so much so that nothing can change them. That's one deep rabbit hole. I was there once, but I climbed out and so can you. Color me happy to report that it's much more satisfying to perceive the performance and expression of the musicians than the sounds their instruments make. Along a similar line, I believe one reason analog fans are so dedicated is because the format itself forces them to listen thru an enormous noise floor to get to the music beyond. Maybe this is the rub here. If you choose to listen to your system and nitpick or quantify it's relation to some imagined reality you'll miss the glory of casting that whole concept aside once and forever. You may not believe it Jade but those of us steering our stereo ships on this heading really want to take you along to a new land of enjoyment.
jadem6's avatar
jadem6 OP
1,074 posts
 
It helps a lot to understand what was humor and what is criticism. When I started posting at this site six or seven years ago I used my typical expressive sarcasm to lighten some very serious discussions. I quickly learned that humor is difficult to portray over the internet. Expression and tone are a large part of the delivery. It was then I quit humor and decided to try and share experiences rather than debate the quality of certain experimentations. (Turns out I actually have a lot of humor in my life, it just is too hard over the internet) The cruel humor continued and eventually this site was shut down. After a lot of work by Audiogon they re-opened with new guidelines. I kept my humor to myself, which makes me sound like I’m preaching. I understand this shortcoming of my personality, and eventually left the site because I felt I was no longer of value to the forums.

I came back about nine months ago after a number of people asked me to return. Many of you may not know me or my approach to this hobby, and so I will briefly explain myself. I suffered a major heart attack nine years ago and was expected to die. I was never expected to be alive still today, but I am. My health is not good and I have not been able to work for over three years now. One small place I can express my creativity is here at Audiogon. As an architect creativity is my being, and I miss it deeply. I have found music, this site and volunteering at the local high school architectural drafting class my solace in an otherwise very boring existence.

I tell you this not for sympathy, I would hate that, but rather to explain where I come from. My system has been exactly the same for almost five years before an unexpected hospital visit and ungodly charges force me to downsize my system. Within this downsizing I had occasions where my system sonically fell completely apart, and a couple discoveries where I found better performance for less money. My goal, as always here is to share those findings. In that I no longer partake in the threads where we argue the merits of different cables or the possibility of power conditioning making a difference, or even the blind/ double blind tests, I was not fully prepared for some of the comments I was reading. I have shared my experiences as I downsized, and after receiving my modified SACD player I again wanted to share, but simply had no creative way to explain what I had found. To me a grading system that could compare systems to live music and to other experiences I’ve had made sense. It had nothing to do with elitist grading or the need to say mine is bigger than yours. In fact the huge amount of drugs I take guarantees mine is no longer bigger…

Those who have taken the time to know me know I am passionate about this hobby. Remember, this IS my life. Sad but true, I no longer have any physical activity, I no longer create, but I have incredible friends and family. Some of my friends are here, and we spend a lot of time discussing tweaks in private emails. We discovered it was easier to discuss these things without being critiqued for experimenting. I AM THE WORST OF THE WORST TWEAKER. This is fact, and I have discovered some extremely helpful things. Some want to argue those findings, and as I said I have quit those threads. I do however like to continue moving my enjoyment of this hobby forward. So much of what I have learned over the past five years cost little money, but these tweaks have cumulatively brought my system to a place I could never have imagined. I expect many have also not imagined these tweaks matter, so I share.

This thread is off course of my usual posting, and I have been far too sensitive to the comments I’ve read. I will calm down, and the above humor I now understand and appreciate.

I again apologies for taking this hobby so seriously, but again I will say “until you live in my shoes…”

As a different way to describe myself, people who change equipment like there cloths and every day express “This is the holy grail” drive me crazy. Please understand this is not me. Like I say, my system has remained until I was financially forced to change my components. Most of the time I’m simply enjoying music and ultimately this is where I’m happiest. This is my goal, enjoying music not equipment. I still however believe the initial purpose of this thread has merit, and could help to explain how “we” rank the changes we hear when playing stereo.

So all that said, Thanks for the clarifications and the humor.

Gratefully the most snobby of the esoteric Audiophile kings, JD
jax2
3,031 posts
 
C5150 - Alas, asking ME to correct grammer and spelling is like asking an
infant to do calculus! I'm lucky if I get one or two sentences in without
showing what my least favorite subject in second grade was (actually you're
lucky you did not provide historical references too).

JD, you are obviously a gentleman, to be sharing yourself so generously here,
and with such honesty. I am glad to meet you through this forum. I, on the
other hand, am an acquired taste, and not everyone likes pizza with
pineapples. Might I suggest some Bromo and a hot water-bag for your
stomach after reading my posts. I meant more to provoke thought rather
than to offend, and if I did the latter, I am sorry. I do like to stir the pot on
occasion, and mostly it comes in the form of humor, which I suppose is not
always easy to spot, and certainly not always appreciated by all.

Besides all that, I'm enjoying your thread, so thank you for posting it and
continuing to participate!

Marco
albertporter's avatar
Ag insider logo xs@2x
albertporter
4,949 posts
 
Just glad your here Jadem6, one of the first to be "approved" on the no censure list, way back in the early days of Audiogon :^).

I feel bad I did not press you more for a return to Audiogon, I missed your posts and had no idea about your health issues.

As for Marco, pay him no attention.

Today he is making so much money photographing all those kitchens (new job) that he could buy and sell all of us. He's just pretending he likes only the reasonably priced stuff.
jax2
3,031 posts
 
As for Marco, pay him no attention.

Sage advice, as anyone might expect from Albert! I'd recommend following it!

Oh yeah, Kitchen photography is my new specialty! I'd highly recommend reconsidering your career direction! Between kitchens, and burning tall stacks of cash, I can hardly find time to eat or sleep! What's a photographer to do? ;-)

Marco
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