XXHighEnd

Dear all

Well it is seldom that I don't have a rapid remark to drop on an empty page when something new is applied to the XX. E.g. when Peter launch a 9d and a 9h or whatever had come over the time.

This time however I have been forced to keep my pistol in the belt as with the 9i incorporating the Qt controler, it has been much much more difficult to find a vocabulary to elaborate about it, even its so obvious impact. I had to run zillions of A-B'ing between my prefered 9h against the 9i before i felt sure what the big change is about.

I see I'm not alone. No one really commented it until sofar.

Let's start with the easy part: The polarity reverser.

Bravo. Not much more to say about it. On most recorded music it does not make a big difference as they all are multi-phased and screwed up by studio machines and engineers who does not care about this. But fortunately the are simple stereo-mic recordings, single voice, single instrument and alikes, where this feature really makes a difference. The blow-suck feature is a goodie we now have on hand and it's so easy to detect the difference it makes. So  :goodjob:

The Qt controler on the other hand is a major step towards perfect playback, but in a completely different compartment.
What does it do? Well yes, it does what Peter says it does. Removing square distortion or resonances appearing from sound trapped in a horn. Removes the walls from the horn as if the horn is not there anymore. What a story I'm telling  :wacko: (And Peter did'nt say excactly that, sorry).

If we imagine how it was possible for the XX to eliminate irritating standing vawes in the listening room without actually removing them at all, but just made them far less anoying it is maybe more easy to understand what I try to say here. As well as standing vawes is an outcome of traped sound in a given room, eventual resonances is an outcome of trapped sound in a horn.
The big difference is that trapping sound in a horn however is appearing in a much higher frequency specter and a specter where our ears are much much more sensitive to it.

Conclusion: Yes. The horn is there but it's audibility is gone. It's own footprint disapppeared.

I'm not capable of explaining the scientific reason for it. Peter is maybe as he's the one who found the medicine. But for me as a "user" i neither need to know. I can just be a widness to reject or like it.

But let me give you a bit more.

So A-B'ing now 100 of tracks against the 9h (left the 9d in the drawer somewhere) again and again, it is certainly not just about to find one setting of the Qt controller and just leave it there. There are simply too many different fiaskoes and succeses between the numerous recordings we have.
But to give you a beta-version of my present conclusion, so called audiophile recordings needs a tweak of approx 4 to remove resonance related audibility and make the speakers completely disappear, and some awefull squared and harsh recordings needs a setting of up to 15. And still it does not not cure everything, but God damn, it helps. The latter is the best example of how good the Qt controller is and how much it just spots the problem and attack it based on the right diagnosis and the precise medicine.

I cannot do anything but leave out what I know nothing about: How it is possible that a piece of SW can deal with it. But it can.

Now I mentioned trapped sound in a horn as being part of the fact that a horn by it self is audible when listening to music. It's unavoidable as well as we have footprints from each and every piece of mechanical thing that forms the whole speaker. That be from the cabinet to driver colorations and whatever affect the final result.
But I see now that much that provokes or emphasize those things to be audible is triggered by the signal feed to it. And my equation tells me that it does the same trick to any playback set-up. If not tell me.

Hence Peter saw it. Hence he knew what it was. Hence he made the Qt controler. Hence it deals with the phase and it's ability to provoke distortion and resonances and in particular "HOW WE PERCEIVE IT", because it is still there. He didn't remove the horn or anything related to the equipment or the other speaker ingrediences. He did'nt make any surgery in our brains or changed physical laws by it.
He just knew how phase is related to perception of sound. That's it.

Have I now better sound....Oh yes yes yes... As I said the speakers are gone and I mean they are really gone. Where I noticed sound emitting from the speaker itself on most recordings and thereby used a lot of brainprocessing to place that sound to the right place in the sound stage, I am now free'ed from doing that, as each and every bit of information suddently ran home to it's own source, namely the instrument or voice where it originally came from. Bang!

I filed of course a complaint to Bert that my speakers disappeared and I want my money back....ha ha ha.

The only anoying thing is a beginners one. You try and retry again and again to find the right setting for a given track until you are satisfied. But along the way you compromise as a result of lazyness or lack of interest and leave the Qt controler mostly in one final position. And mine became 7. At least for now.
Most of the music I listen to are treated best here. And if I play some Dave Sanborne sax it goes immediately to 15. I just know it by heart now. Many close mic female voice recordings goes likewise to 15.


And I completely forgot to address that the bass improves from the Qt controler as well, so if any got the impression that this is only medicine for horns, it isn't.

So for now....enjoy the magic of the Qt.


Gerner

Gerner, Thanks for your descriptions. Absolutely fascinating.

Unfortunately for me, it will be a little while before I set up a new PC with Vista and will be able to hear Peter's latest and enthralling development.

Can't wait!

Frank

That is understandable Frank.

And thanks a lot of your kind comment.

Gerner

Hey Gerner - I thought you preferred 0.9h over 0.9d? But Peter says the Q1 setting similar to 0.9h is 24. I'm a little surprised you now prefer 7 or 15 (when Peter said the similar to 0.9d is 14). Clearly I haven't done as extensive a listening session as yours, but I'm curious to know if you concur with Peter's assessment of 24 being similar to 0.9h?

Since I preferred 0.9h over 0.9d, I began my brief listening comparisons at 24 and went up from there. As I said, it was a brief comparison, but after a handful of songs, I preferred the setting of 29 (and with the Invert box checked). Yikes! After I read your post, I went back and had a listen to a couple more songs and I found the setting of 7 hazy in comparison to 29. But I'm no judge of what is more accurate. Just what I preferred at first glance. Does this mean I prefer distortion? FWIW, My criteria was mainly detail and clarity and I mostly listened to Tori Amos songs.

Now I'm really curious what Q1 setting everyone else is choosing.

Hi Edward

Certainly I prefer 9h over 9d.

I did set the Q at 24 and compared to 9h. What I heard was they are not completely alike. But as I did it only once to check it out, I left it and did no further comparation.
Neither I compared the Q14 to 9d.

I merely just concentrated on what influence the Q controler had and found the preferable settings to my gear. And the DAC also influence here...and the speakers indeed does. Neither we respond to phase the same way. But I think everyone could say it's audible.
Propably we shall all find our prefered settings to be quite different from each other.

Also the Q setting, as I said, is determined by the quality of the recorded track. But I do rarely listen to cr*p tracks even I like the music. That's why I left it for now at 7. But let's see if it matures along the way.

Gerner

Hi Gerner,

So indeed we posted separately and as it appears both our Q1's ended at 7. Hahaha. But maybe there is a difference how we both got there.

I got to 4 (and did not try lower) in order to remove the destortion from the saxophone ( http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=160.0 ).
But I found that not all recording did well at 4. This was day before yesterday.

Yesterday I started all over beginning at 24 and inverted phase, stepping to 14 with normal phase, and via 11 and 9 I landed at 7. Mind you, this is just challenging until you (I) think it is enough (and I think with the sax I jumped from 10 to 4 so maybe it can bear 7 as well).
So 7 is enough for me, and throughout I did not hear any of the so well known characteristic "distortion" anywhere. Mind you, "characteristic" had become "distortion". Times goes fast ...

What I cetainly do NOT do, is finding a better setting for poor material. I can't be sure, but I think that would be faking things. Filtering maybe. I'd rather go look for another amp or whatever it takes to represent the material accordingly, better. But again, I am not sure.

That nobody will land on the same value seems logic, while it is jitter impeeded, and jitter is different for everyone. Like you said, it depends on the DAC (too).

Gerner, it is amazing how you express about the "trapped" the waves in the horn, because I actually posted later than you did. Okay, since you are buildig speakers for ages you must know better than me anyway, but/and the other way around : this is how I felt it. So let it be true.

I feel like coming back to this one again :


What would happen, is kind of the opposite from eliminated unnatural squares : adding more. When more (unnatrual) squares are added to squares, you'll get sines again as long as we see that the derived squares are smaller than the originals. This will happen only (I think) because of bouncing or even reverberation of the horn wall. Another explanation I have not at hand (the digital data would not devide by half because of jitter (see my other post and the 50-50-50-50-50 becoming 50-0-100-0-100 ... it can't become 25-25-25-25-25 because of jitter).

Which brings me to the rather interesting next subject, hehe :
(just made this up)
I was wondering why Doubling isn't better anymore. Well, this is completely logic to me now :
Doubling was meant to be a form of jitter reducer, with Upsampling as a derival of it. And Upsampling (I think) sounds worse now. Ok ...
Upsampling is not nature; it's faked nature (calculated resolution, whatever). With upsampling indeed the 50-50-50-50-50 could become 25-25-25-25-25, really ending up as 25-50-0-50-0 because of jitter again (which always comes behind all). Thus, when we would be capable of expressing 50-50-50-50-50 indeed, for sure we should not turn that into 25-25-25-25-25 (assuming that is merely without jitter as well). But what would it do ?

It indeed would round squares. But it would round natural squares this time !! (again assuming we merely eliminated jitter).
Keep in mind the nos-DAC, which is just there to EXPRESS squares, once they are in the material anyway.


Gerner, you keep on saying that your speakers disappeared. All is relative as it appears now.
But this time *I* say my speakers disappeared. Hehe.

Thank you Gerner
Peter

I can't be sure because things won't be the same at your place, but possibly (even probably) your "hazy" is the refined fragility I was referring to in the other topic. It needs the experience *OR* special music to adopt it. If you have Roger Waters - Amused to Death ... try that. It contains loads of "information" hence detail at the micro level, to easily find out whether you deal with hazyness or fragility.

Both look alike when compared with too fresh sound because of added noise (that's what technicians would say). The difference would be in the level of detail. Fine detail. Not profound, but fine. "Planned" if you like. Air in between the squary waves of a synth. Air in between the distorted waves of a distortion guitar (not a feedback).

IMO (so far) the lower the better, until things collapse.  :)

Gerner, it is amazing how you express about the "trapped" the waves in the horn, because I actually posted later than you did. Okay, since you are buildig speakers for ages you must know better than me anyway, but/and the other way around : this is how I felt it. So let it be true.

Yeah, but you explained it too and I derive from it we hear the same and express it a little differently.

Now let me emphasize this: There is absolutely nothing wrong with the Orpheans as a horn. It is the best exsisting to my knowlegde. But no matter how good this horn is, it is governed by Mother Natures Law: It is a horn. And thereby it's signature. Bert did an amazing portion of magic to his horns, and I know what it is, that this horn is hardly comparable to any other horn. The remaining signature is however, even for Bert, impossible to come around with.
Ha..let me see who could knock on a piece of wood and it sounds like you are knocking into the open air. Ahh?

and

Peter, your explanation therapy starts to work on me. I start to understand what that digital let's call it himpsy-pimpsy actually acts and how jitter is able to influence sound in the way you explain it. Thanks.


Gerner, you keep on saying that your speakers disappeared. All is relative as it appears now.
But this time *I* say my speakers disappeared. Hehe.

Yeah where are they? Just filed the disappearence to Interpol. He...no I don't want them back.  :grazy:


Gerner

Well, I have a quite different experience with the "magic" of Qt. When I increase Qt the sound drops out. Greater number - more dropouts. When I reduce Qt  I am experiencing more noise or "small cracks" in the sound. This is exaxtly what happened with the #track with noise that is not there". Using Vista and a DDDac like before.
TorH

TorH, this is normal;
If you were using 0.9d satisfactory you must set it to 14 and work around that figure until it collapses.
If you *also* worked with 0.9h satisfactory (without the dropouts) your figures are between 14 and 24. Mind the "*also*". so 0.9h was 24.

I can't tell what is the bandwidth of your DDDac and whether you can achieve the same jitter signature as e.g. me. Anyway try to find the boundaries, and obviously only experiment for better sound in between those boundaries.

Hope it helps,
Peter

The 0.9h version works like a charm for me. No noise or dropouts. Will try the 14-24 tip. Thanks
TorH

Hi Peter,

After playing with 0.9i some remarks:

• After lowering Q1 from 24, I hear small clicks/cracks in the sound (Inverted checked). Probably a DAC problem!?!
• When I was listening to Erik Trufazz I got very loud cracks, almost on the rhythm of the sound (yes indeed, there are always a lot of cracks in his sound). When I switched the Inverted fase off, the cracks where gone. I have tested 0.9i-1 with the same result.
• In the real version 0.9h I can play Trufazz without the loud cracks.
• When activating the <play> button, the timescale disappears in the progression indicator.

Regards, Johan

Johan and all other good fellas..

It is strange to me to read about all kind of different problems related to 09i and former stepstones to it.

I did never ever experience any of the anomalities reported on this forum. Is it of pure luck or is there a pithole in the different combis of Vista etc. and the DAC's related? I can't tell.

But to me it looks like it.

Gerner

I'm not having any problems here either. I've been sliding Q all over the place.  I was starting to play with phase reverse when I was trying out high Q settings for fun and with some recordings I thought might benefit... but stopped after reading about some kind of loud sound Peter was warning about... I didn't know if it would do damage or what, but I never experienced it.  Really only tried phase reversal less than 20 song changes... dunno, but I guess I'll wait on that... cept I really wanted to have it in there and try it.  So, you're still using phase reversal Gerner? and no problems?

No problems at all...and I only use the reverse when the recording benefits from it -> Single stereo mic recordings etc... and of course if there is any need to reverse it.

I had a reverse switch on my old OS-DAC. The only thing that was wrong about it were, it was not remote controled. And lazy me didn't want to run back and forth. My wife didn't want it either....ha.

Gerner

Well, I have to admit.  I have not felt the need to do any back and forth between i and d.  I've been busy and when I do listen it's been late and I just throw on player i.  I believe it's doing the best dance I've heard, but ya, I will try to do some comparing.  I stopped going high in numbers with slider, just because I don't want to play with phase "switch" until Peter gets back, but I didn't have problems before when I briefly tried it.  I have found myself working the slider around the number 15, +/- 4, but I'll explore around higher/lower as I get a handle on things.  System is sounding clear as a bell with body and lots of air filling in the sound stage space... ima happy camper with XXHighEnd 0.9i-1.

Hehe Dave..

Well Peter is long gone to Alkatraz. So just play with your Q controler. It is undangerous..absolutely. And you found a setting too : CLEAR AS A BELL!

Here it's Friday evening and everything here is everything absolute out of topic or booze away. However I alowed Benjamin Britten to play for me at this very moment.
Have to offer him tea after he is finished.

Gerner  :)