Re: What's the use of a 192 kHz sample rate?

On Sat, 3 May 2008 07:34:24 -0700 (PDT), rickman <gnuarm@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
wrote:

>On May 3, 8:22 am, nos...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 (Don Pearce) wrote:
>> On Sat, 3 May 2008 05:11:53 -0700 (PDT), rickman <gnu...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >On May 3, 3:28 am, Randy Yates <ya...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> >> rickman <gnu...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> writes:
>> >> > If it really is a waste of time and money to use 192 kHz ADC and
DAC,
>> >> > why do you think they would do it?
>>
>> >> Greed. They think that the general public is dumb enough to buy into
>> >> the lie that they really need such a system and would then spend
lots of
>> >> money repurchasing what they already have.
>>
>> >I'm curious, how do you know what unnamed people are thinking?  My
>> >understanding is that regardless of what frequencies acoustic testing
>> >says that people can hear, audiophiles can hear the difference between
>> >many of these "wasteful" features and otherwise adequate audio
>> >systems.
>>
>> Utter nonsense - unless of course you can cite some proper tests.
>
>And what do you base this statement on?  I don't have any "proper"
>studies.  I am referring to a conversation with a friend who worked in
>the field.  He couldn't hear the difference, but his customers could.
>If they came out with a product that used a "lesser" technique,
>without *knowing* what technology was behind it they would reject the
>system as not being good enough.  If they didn't know anything about
>the methods, they only had their ears to judge the equipment.  Since
>they are paying serious bucks (>$100,000 some 20 years ago) for these
>systems, they have *NO* reason to buy racks of gear that is any better
>than a lower price system.  BTW, this was professional equipment, not
>the home stuff with oxygen free speaker wires and such.
>
>You can poo-poo this sort of evaluation.  But that doesn't make you
>right.  Do you have any "proof" that no one can hear the difference?
>Do you even know what the differences are that I was talking about?
>
That is a truly idiot comment. To prove that nobody could hear it I
would have to test everybody in the world for the rest of time with
every possible type of music - and even then there is no guarantee
that the next thing I tried wouldn't be the one that revealed the
difference. All you need to do is produce one person who can reliably
hear the difference with their choice of material and the job is done.

And no, anecdote won't do. This business is full of bull**** anecdotes
- mostly involving wives hearing the difference from the kitchen even
when they didn't know what had been done.

>
>> >I have known people who worked on professional equipment.  The
>> >extremes that they have design in are all audible to the buyers of
>> >such systems.  In the audio sections of the equipment they use 15 volt
>> >rails or even higher, just to increase the SNR when the noise floor
>> >can't be lowered anymore.  They totally eliminate all digital clocks
>> >from any circuit near the audio section to prevent noise injection.
>> >From what I have seen, they use more extreme measures in high end
>> >audio than is used in sensitive military radio gear which is trying to
>> >get over 140 dB of SNR!
>>
>> More nonsense. I have worked on many radio systems, both military and
>> civil, and a typical target SNR for these radios is in the region of 6
>> to 10dB.
>
>My bad, I used the wrong term, it should have been 140 dB signal
>strength.  Yes, I need to indicate what the reference is, but I don't
>recall if it was dBmW or dBW, a 30 dB difference.
>

So a meaningless number then?

>
>> >I am not going to try to tell someone else what they can and can't
>> >hear.  I know that my hearing has dropped of dramatically to where I
>> >can no longer hear the 15 kHz emitted by TVs and I'm not sure I can
>> >hear the high notes on a piano.  When I press the keys on the right, I
>> >hear more of a click than a ping (maybe it's the piano)!  But that
>> >doesn't mean that there aren't others who can hear the distortion
>> >created by the anti-alias filters used when the ADC and DAC run at
>> >44.1 kHz.
>>
>> Doesn't mean they can either. That isn't a piece of logic that
>> commutes.
>
>I didn't say it proves that others can.  What logic are you talking
>about?  I am simply saying that you shouldn't judge what others can
>perceive by what you can or even what the general public can according
>to "proper tests".
>

It isn't a question of "others" - one is all it takes, and I can
assure you that nobody has produced him yet.

>I'm not trying to "prove" anything.  I am presenting information which
>you can consider and believe or can ignore.  But you can't say my
>statements are false unless you have some information to "prove" they
>are.  Human hearing is not a microphone connected to an amplifier.  It
>is a very complex process which even includes the brain and we
>certainly don't understand it completely.

No, it isn't information - it is urban myth and anecdote.

d
-- 
Pearce Consulting
http://www.pearce.uk.com