Engine#3 Vs Engine#4 comparison

[PeterSt]

Hey Roy, good.

But what happened that you got it working ? or was it just a matter of enough  ?
Or the other way around of course hehe

[Telstar]

In my current situation, I think I now prefer 5-02 engine #3 without upsampling. Q1=4 is a fixed thing for me.
HF comparing engine #3 and #4 sound less distorted with #3. I know with a NOS DAC things will be different, but i suspect the cpu usage has something to do. For now i'll stick this way.

Funny thing is, the Quartet drivers do auto sample rate in W7 BUT the VST host doesnt, so it's a moot point
Anyway, i'm sure ESI will fix the drivers soon.

[AUDIODIDAKT]

#4Engine is definitely more distorted,
I already said this to Calibrator today.
But if you want massive try Enigma 4 - The Screen Behind the Mirror
Then I kind of liked it.
But I heard some more albums today, sometimes its just to distorded it gets on my nerves.
Especially when there are lots of samples or instruments at the same time, it becomes to difficult
Then really I prefer the latest #3Engine.

Will try some more settings, like upsampling on/off, latency, different drivers, 0,0,0,0 vs 30,30,0,0

 

[PeterSt]

Maybe don't get fooled by that higher buffer setting in the driver. I imagine not to hear a real difference with the lower setting, and remember, it was just a "strategy".

I am quite sure nothing disturbs here, and I like it very much.

But either way, keep it coming. The more the better, and negative doesn't harm. Something to work on on this side.

[PeterSt]

And Roy, would you care to describe "distortion" in this case ?
(just Roy, not Telstar please )

[AUDIODIDAKT]

I do understand why you like #4Engine, I like it (that) too, don't understand me wrong.
I will try to pinpoint this more exactly, with some tracks somewhere tomorrow.

It differs with music styles, I don't get it myself 100%. (but what to expect after just 1 day)
When parts become more complex, it can get into the direction of distortion (or preceived as)(have to compare)
This has nothing to do with wrong setup or something like that.
All sounds very nice, both engines for sure are better than the previous version of xx (0.9y-4)
This was just my first impression, but it does sounds very interesting.

Good to hear, it does great for you. ( I can only imagine)

I'am very happy with you bringing us back on the right track with the 0.9y-5 version.
4 was to clean, to analitycal.

For now more enjoyment ! more lively on both engines anyway

[PeterSt]

Ok, I'll wait for that. In the mean time, do you have an example of such a more complex piece ?

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Try Al Di Meola - Casino\02 - Chasin' the Voodoo for eg.

I think the guitar is cleaner on #3Engine but the percussions are better on #4Engine.
I mean some parts are better on #3 than #4 and v. v.

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Earl Klugh - Naked Guitar (acoustic guitar) for eg. sounds better with #3Engine, IMO
 

#3Engine gives it just that little warmth to the instrument while #4Engine makes it more .........?? distorded

[PeterSt]

Roy, I think you are right.
I'll try to explain after some .

[PeterSt]

Ok, Al Di Meola ... difficult to analyse with some sense ...

I played the album from track 1 (Engine#4), and after track 2 I didn't have the idea of more - or too complex at all. So, it came to me that I didn't know what you exactly were talking about, btw explicitly without the idea "it will be your system". Then I thought maybe you were using the remaster of it, and with the placebo "that must be it" I tried that for track 2. I kind of made the mistake to play it less loud for safety (remasters usually are way more loud), but the track came the same to me. Next I used the Volume Normalization which would show me the difference between the two versions, but apart from the track lengths being slightly different, they are the same. So, here is another hoax. Anyway, both are 9 dB softer than my "reference", and because of using the Normalized Volume they now played 9dB louder. Right ...

A useless story so far, although there was one thing : I just didn't like it much.
Engine#4 generally comes to me as more bright than Engine#3, and here the more bright disturbed. There's too much of cymbals, and they aren't right at the same time. It wouldn't fit in my brains.

After hearing the track quite some times now, I thought to hop over to Engine#3. Now a strange thing happened, or at least quite unexpected : NOW it showed as complex and "crowded" music. But, now it was interesting at the same time, and now I liked it very much ...

Next I "put up" Scenario (also from him) which seemed even more suitable for this kind of judgement, and is somewhat better to my likings to begin with. Still Engine#3 and nothing seemed to be wrong with it. Then, at the second track I "heard" my ever so often made mistake : forgot to set the latency to what it should be for Engine#3, which is 48 while it still was at 2048. Changed it, continued the track where it stopped, but immedietaly I noticed the life has gone out of it. Hmm ...
After one minute I set the latency back to 2048 and enjoyed the remainder with great pleasure.

In the end, Roy, this has all been noticed by you, and to what extend this depends on the type of music, I don't know (but I never like such a dependency so I'd rather like to think this "setting" is suitable for all. And to keep in mind : this is Windows7.

Right now I can't know what the higher latency will do to Vista, and all I have in mind is that with Vista I wasn't disturbed at all (Engine#3), while with W7 it was very apparent it needs the higher latency. What to make of the "fact" that for Engine#4 the latency doesn't do much to my ears, I don't know (yet).


Allright. Apart from these more technical issues, I think it is good to recognize what I actually perceived from Engine#4 and the "not complex at all" while Engine#3 showed the opposite. I think this is fairly easy to see : Engine#3 shows much more separation, and while Engine#4 exhibits a kind of "all together", Engine#3 shows dozens of rototoms, cymbals and everyting, and it just shows crowded where a crowd should be. It shows the crowd. Engine#4 shows the (coherent ?) mass.
It may be important that both these albums are not much compressed while using the full dynamic range at the same time. This means that high transient instruments (as used all over here) get the room to exhibit the transients, which with normal "audiophile" recordings are used sparsely (like one hit on a cymbal, which then shows nicely natural).
Engine#4 smears more and while smearing shouldn't create "emotion", maybe it does to some extend while first something else it not completely right. Changing the latency from 48 to 2048 seems to do similar to Engine#3, although I couldn't recognize something from "no emotion" to "emotion" because I just don't like Engine#3 (with the latency of 48 as it now turns out) on Windows7 to begin with. With 2048 I do (or at least after this short time I think I do), and it might just be that compensation needed for W7 using some crazy CPU, as explained by me in the "Windows7 maybe not" topic (and notice that a latency of 48 exhibits even way more cpu usage than what I encounter with Engine#4 by W7 itself), easiliy shown by TaskManager and which by itself is logic.


So, what's next ?
Maybe it would be good that people not having problems with Engine#3 on W7 recognize that they use a high latency (or can't set it, which implies the same), and that those who do have problems recognize this solves it.

Lastly, I must honestly say that I loved the "good old sound" from Engine#3 after so many weeks not listening to it. It came to me that not preferring this over Engine#4 is a waste of time. But as honest, these albums are not the most to get involved in, and they are "technical" albums again (suitable for Engine#3 to begin with). But, since I heard how the life got out of Engine#3 with this low latency, it well can be that the high latency is just the solution to everything (and not Engine#4 ! -> which I will continue for XP anyway).

So far,
Peter

[boleary]

I believe there was once a wise man who said:

[boleary]

Knowing that it's really difficult to say one sound is preferable to another given that everyone's system is so different, here's another observation on 9y-5 engine #3 with AP: Last week I went to a house concert at a local McMansion (one of the kinds of huge houses that sprung up all over the US earlier this decade, many of which now sit empty). The acoustics in the livingroom were quite good; thirty seven people in attendence. The artist used very mellow amplification cause it just didn't need to be blasting in a room like that. The sound was very natural and sweet; it was almost identical (slightly better) to 9y-5, engine #3 with AP. One way of describing the similarity is what Dan Hageland described earlier in this thread (though he said he didn't like the sound) regarding the vocals sounding diffuse. To me, on my system, this diffuse sound provides a kind of softness that is just VERY natural sounding, much better than 9y-04.

The fact that the artist at the concert was my step-daughter has nothing to do with my overall judgement that it was a great show, though it was only her with a guitar and no band. 

Oh, she will be touring in Europe beginning February 17th. Check out: http://www.carsieblanton.com/

[PeterSt]

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Hi, (feel I little like Youp van 't Hek with his Buckler beer, only he enjoyed it !) hehe

Thnx Peter for your great explanation and exploration, somewhat the same I had.
Your communicative skills good as ever, you saved me.
To be honest I've been quite lost for a while (kinda lost interest, not in the subject at all, but in the general SQ)
But this discovery only came to me with listening to the 0.9y-5 series.
Now I know what I've missed, because "its" back.

Shulman --->> #3Engine3 DAP (Lat. 2048) --->> Ears--->>Brains--->> WOW WOW Stunning.


PS: Gerard I think NOS1 will do very good right now, make me jealous, haha (Do grab that change in this state, must be best ever !)