wrote in message
"Please tell us how you know about this distortion that
is "inherent" in LP playback.
Please compare
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/image...8/vinyl-vs-cd-...
Note that this graphic shows a 1 KHz tone, with the
second harmonic about 20
dB down, which I call 10% second harmonic nonlinear
distortion. 10% distortion is a lot of distortion by any standard.
As you point out, I was mislead by the author's commentary. The difference
is just about exactly 40 dB, which is still very poor performance for a
modern playback device. The accompanying text talks about 7-10% THD+N which
mislead me.
But more importantly, how do you
differentiate the distortion that is inherent from the
distortion that is unique to that particular rig and the
test record?
One presumes competence on the part of the person doing the test - that they
used an adequate test record.
to:
http://www.pcavtech.com/play-rec/rega-2/grado-SNR.gif
Note that this graphic shows a 300 Hz tone, with the
second and third
harmonics each 40-45 dB down, which I call less than one
percent second and third harmonic distortion.
OK. But again, how do you tell the difference between the
inherent distortion in the medium and the distortion that
is unique to your rig and the test record?
I used a SOTA test record. My modest rig outperformed a highly-expensive
rig.
Actually, your point is well taken. The poor technical performance is
partially due to the test record in the sense that as a rule, no test like
this ever obtains significantly better results, because after all, this is
LP playback.
Note that while my test results are still signficantly better - almost 6 dB
better, they are in the same rather pathetic range.
What playback equipment
have you used to determine this?
Looking at the two examples, it appears that we have
quite a range of
equipment.
I don't agree at all. I would argue that neither rig
would be found to be SOTA.
You've missed the point - the cheaper rig which most would agree is far
less SOTA than the more expensive one, outperformed the more expensive rig
by a signficant margin.
If you are looking for the
thresholds of the medium I think you have to start with a
disc cut at one of the handful of state of the art
mastering studios and you would have to use a Rockport
Sirius III or the top model Continuum or maybe the top
model Transrotor rig.
Persons with such equipment are free to publish their results. They haven't,
and that is because their results won't be signficantly better (i.e., 10
times better) than either of the above tests.
The PCAVTech equipment is obviously very humble -
Turntable was a Rega
Planar 2 with RB-100 Tone Arm. Test media was the HFN
Test LP . Preamp was a
Conrad Johnson CJ-2. The cartridge was either a Shure
M44-7 or a Rega
Silver. Kinda doesn't matter, their performance is not
that dissimilar.
I think it matters tremendously.
The hometheaterhifi.com equipment a McIntosh MT10
Turntable with factory
cartridge (made by Clearaudio), seems to be very
elegant. It seems to have
been set up with great care.
I'm sure it was.
Please be specific:
turntables, pickup arms, phono cartridges, phono
preamplifiers. Because you claim this playback
characteristic is "inherent," you must have experimented
with more than one playback system. Did you conduct any
measurements which document your claim?
I've done this kind of test many times over the decades,
and the results I
posted
athttp://www.pcavtech.com/play-rec/rega-2/index.htm are
very
typical of a wide range of equipment. I don't think I
could get as good
performance out of a $100 plastic USB
turntable/arm/cartrdige, but maybe I'm
saying that in a state of ignorace and negative
prejudice. ;-)
I think that is a possibility. If one really wants to get
a handle on inherent colorations one has to be extremely
careful to differentiate colorations that are inherent
from those that are unique to the rig and test record.
But, I've already show that a humble, apparently outdated rig can outperform
a modern, far more apparently sophisticated expensive one. If you check
the timing of the tests, my test predated the test of the expensive rig by
about 7 years.
The real surprise is the seemingly poor performance
posted
athttp://www.hometheaterhifi.com/images/stories/april-2008/vinyl-vs-cd-...
I call that really poor performance, and we don't even
have a frequency
response curve that actually involves playing vinyl.
But aren't you making a qualitative judgement without
even knowing what it sounds like?
We already know what both rigs sound like - they sound like vinyl, with
audible tics, timbre changes both static and dynamic, pops, rumble, hiss,
and distortion.