jpm@bonnie.UUCP (Jay P. Morreale) (01/23/85)
hi bug. Hi, I am currently looking for a stereo/hi fi system (what every you call it) consisting ultimately of a tuner, preamp, amp, turn table, cassette player, hi-fi video VCR, maybe a CD player, and of course speakers. This system, moreover, will be purchased over the next several years due to financial reasons. I have been reading net.audio for some months now and have enjoyed reading the interactions on the net. I would interested in comments on topics such as the advantages/disadvantages of: 1) turner, pre-amp, and amp configuration verse a receiver? 2) purchasing a stereo system by mail order verses 'hi end' stereo store - possible service considerations? 3) sonic holography? 4) electronic sonic holography (as with caver pre-amps) verses mechanical sonic holography/imaging (as with the Polk SDA-1A and SDA-2)? 5) moving magnet verses moving coil? 6) linear tracking verses pivot tone arms? 7) Carver C-4000 pre-amp -why don't stores demo this unit? 8) 'linear phase' audio components (not the brand name)? Hopefully these topics are not to old hat for long time net readers. I am interested in the various audio topics in general and user experiences with the components using these techniques. Jay Morreale (bonnie!jpm) [is this enough?]
rfg@hound.UUCP (R.GRANTGES) (01/23/85)
[!] If you have really been reading net.audio "for some months," you should know that asking some of your questions is like throwing red meat to caged wolves. Let me give you a few opinions on some questions that are very complex, dependent upon circumstances, and otherwise not very amenable to objective treatment. 1) tuner,preamp,amp as separates vs receiver. Other things being equal, which they probably never are, you can probably save money and get good quality by buying a good receiver. Purchasing separates, however, allows you to optimize each (on excellence or cost) and allows you to replace a unit if there is an advance made you want to get. Many new audiophiles buy receivers as a good way to get started without incurring enduring poverty before you are sure that THIS IS THE THING (you want to become poverty stricken over - you see, some prefer boats, some cars, some persons of the opposite sex, some persons ...etc).Most true believers buy separates. 2)mail order vs 'hi end' stereo store. This, again, depends on your budget, among other things. First, do you know a store that has a good reputation for service. If you do, treasure it as a jewel beyond price, if you can afford it. I have never known one. I do not know anyone who has known one. Second, If you have unlimited funds then by all means go to a high end store whether-or-not they give good economical (reasonable) service. If you are an ordinary frugal person, buy mail order from a reputable store. You will get best price, rapid delivery, probably no sales tax, quick replacement if initially defective and if you have a problem after a few days, you can deal with the mfrs warranty service which is where you will probably wind up if you go the 'high end' route, only this way you will have saved time and money with the middle man. 3),4) no data 5) shame on you for asking. When all the smoke clears, go out and buy a Shure V-15MR for around $125 mail order. You won't regret it. 6)Suit yourself. Read the specs. Buy a good one of whatever kind but if you spend more than, say, $500, you are kidding yourself. 7) no data. Who, after all, sells Carver at all? Darn few. Probably Mr. carver prefers the markmup on his cd/vinyl transmogrifiers. 8)No comment at this time. Do you know of any? Cheers. -- "It's the thought, if any, that counts!" Dick Grantges hound!rfg
mat@hou4b.UUCP (Mark Terribile) (01/26/85)
> ... comments on topics such as the advantages/disadvantages of: > ... > 3) sonic holography? > 7) Carver C-4000 pre-amp -why don't stores demo this unit? Ok. I'll jump in the fray on this one, since I've got a couple of Carver's boxes. Sonic Holography does work ... and sometimes it is even a bit spooky. I'll be reading the newspaper, and I'll hear a sudden noise about six or seven feet from my elbow. All of a sudden I realize that WNCN played another oldish record wth a pop in it. Why isn't it demo'd? Well, it is considered to be a bit of a stage trick, not honest to goodness audio. Also, hearing it requires very good room geometry and cooperative recordings. And finally, given VERY well miked recordings and REALLY great speakers, you can do even a little better than you can with the Hologram. Room geometry: You MUST be equidistant from the speakers ... Carver recommends that you center your ``prime listening chair'' to within 1/2 inch of that centerline. This allows your head to move a little bit without destroying the effect. You can turn your head up to about 55 degrees before you lose it. You also have to work to reduce or remove room reflections. Many audio ``salon''s won't go to the considerable effort of setting this up. Recordings: It's hard to tell which ones will work well. For me, the bell sequence on the Telarc 1812 is a trip ... the bells are ringing in midair in front of me. The alarm clock sequence from Dark Side Of the Moon is another. The grandfather clock is in my front hall, about five feet to the left of the left speaker. And the early sequences that were designed to demo the quadrophonic discs actually give me the wraparound -- to about 55 degrees behind me. This isn't supposed to be possible. I've got some old ones that work well too, including some poorly miked Musical Heritage Society recordings. Stage Trick: As I said, this thing can be a trip, but it works via mechanisms that require the human ear to adjust to the magic box's inability to perfectly correct the binaural acoustic crosstalk. Also, while the Carver boxes look really good and feel pretty nice to use and do a lot for the money, there are corners cut in construction. They are where you will almost never notice them, either mechanically or audibly, but they are there. Really great speakers: This is the weak spot. As Phil Rastocny is so fond of pointing out, a genuine super setup will beat out almost anything else. (If I ever get sent on another Denver factory visit, I WANT to hear his system!) But this may require speakers that correct one aberration (imaging) at the expense of another, or that cost an arm and a leg, have their own geometry problems, and will melt down the first time you play massed strings a'la Mahler just a little too loud. While Carver's preamps sound good, there are others that sound very good too. Before I bought mine, I took a friend along to tell me if I was just hearing what I wanted to hear or if there WERE differences. The salesman had a pet preamp he wanted to sell ... a little box that had no tone controls (a seperate box for $300 or so) and had its power supply on the end of a cord. We listened to things without talking, and then discussed the matter afterwards over pizza. We had come to the same conclusions ... WITHOUT the Hologram the Carver box had better imaging, but slightly worse response to extreme transients (the Telarc OmniDisc ``Good Vibrations'' cut). We didn't hear it set up for the Hologram. Like any other exotic piece of equipment, you have to decide if YOU like it. The saleman I bought my C-4000 from wouldn't sell it to me without me giving it a home trial FIRST. Your best bet is to see if you can do the same, and see if you like it. The C-4000 has a lot of stuff on it besides the Hologram and you should also see if you like that. If it doesn't do anything for you, you can get the hologram in an add-on or in a smaller and cheaper pre-amp. Me? Only my budget is sorry. My system: Yamaha P350 turntable (needs replacement!) with Dynavector cartridge (don't remember the number right now ... It's 04:00 and I'm STILL at work) Carver C-4000 preamp. Carver M400 amp. Boston Acoustics A100 speakers (original model). Time delay speakers are Boston Acoustics A40 s. (Nice speaker for $150/pair!) Original model Phillips/Magnavox CD player. Phillips receiver used for tuner (needs replacement!) Onkyo cassette deck (about 4 years old, model # at home.) SAE impulse noise quieter for REALLY bad records. -- from Mole End Mark Terribile (scrape .. dig ) hou4b!mat ,.. .,, ,,, ..,***_*.
dswankii@uok.UUCP (01/30/85)
Interesting. I have a Carver add on Hologram unit that I got from an estate sale for $27 (It was in a box with a Phase Linear preamp too!)! Yes, you can do better with the right sound equipment but it will cost you more than twenty seven bucks. Because of the shape of my house, there is no way to set the speakers up as the manual says. However, even "done wrong" there is still an effect. The music seems to be more real. Before the unit the music "came from the speakers" and now the source is not so obvious. The spooky efects happen to me to. Some pops from the program material seem to be my front door opening! David Swank II University of Oklahoma ctvax!uokvax!uok!dswankii
bwm@ccice2.UUCP (Brad Miller) (01/30/85)
I own the carver holography setup (not the full preamp, just the holograph generator) and I am VERY SATISFIED. I find the difference is phenominal having it, and even better when I use my KOSS 4D time delay system to generate slight ambiance. A lot of people seem to think that using such a system is 'cheating' compared to sterio - you forget - sterio itself is just a gimmic. What the carver system does is correct a serious flaw in the gimmic: Given a point source of sound, some of the information from the sound will reach both ears, somewhat stronger to the ear that is most aligned with the sound. That is, given a normal seating and head position, a sound on the hearers left side will be heard more in the left ear. There are just two rays that are drawn from the point source to the ears, one for each (we will ignore reflections for the moment that create ambiance, we are discussing sound placement - psychoaccoustics. When a recorded item is PROPERLY miked with just two mikes (multimiked recordings don't survive the CARVER process sounding much different than straight - perhaps a slight bass emphasis), and replyed in sterio, each ear gets information from TWO speakers. That is the two rays drawn from the point source to the two speakers is an analogue for a human listener (try binaural recordings and play back thru headphones - this is the best recording method), though the mikes are somewhat further apart than the human ears. Unfortunately, some of the right channel info is picked up by the left ear, because you are replaying from two speakers, that is, we are now essentially dealing with two point sources, and have four rays representing the sound info going to the ears (two to each ear, one from each speaker). What the carver process does is generate information in the opposite speaker to cancel out this crosstalk, so (if perfect) the result is the same information reaching your ears as if you were directly listening to the point source. Thus all the position information originally present is restored. This is basically out of the CARVER lit, and I am no expert in the subject, but it seems to make sense to me. The sonic hologram really corrects a shortcoming in sterio. Brad Miller -- ...[rochester, cbrma, rlgvax, ritcv]!ccice5!ccice2!bwm
riner@dsd.UUCP (john riner) (02/04/85)
The "gimmic" in stereo is not really a gimmic but a limited implementation of the theory. The problem, even with two mic recording is that the "crosstalk" occurs twice. Once when the recording is made (which is the same as when you listen to a performance live) and again when you listen to the recording. There has been a fair amount of research on this phenomenon, mostly found in AES (Audio Engineering Society) publications. It has found its way into the commercial market through Carver. The term "holographic" applied to this is a misnomer (probably from the need for a marketing term). As with most Carver ideas (at least from what I gather on the net) the idea is based on fact and will probably be debated forever until others discover it. It would be interesting if some of the recording people did the processing on the record side. The implementation would not be as good probably but it would improve the imaging somewhat. It is possible that in some of the "better" recordings people comment on that either some of this was done either by design or by accident. -- John Riner UUCP: !fortune!dsd!riner AMPEX Corp Redwood City, CA. Nobody knows what I am talking about, so these must be my opinions and not theirs.