Stereo vs 5.1 sound, AVR vs 2 Chn Amp, CDP vd DVDP

[venkatcr]

Re: Why Stereo Speakers are better than 5.1 for Music ?

We are not comparing a stereo amp costing 30k with an AVR costing 30k. If that would have been the case, the amp would win hands down. My point of comparison is the power rating. If two amplifiers have the same power rating, specified over the same frequency range and impedance and with same THD figures, they would sound the same. One can be a dedicated amp and the other can be an AVR. This assumes that the signal is not being modified by doing any processing etc. All this is, of course, in analog domain.

Power rating has no value. If you go into the design of an amplifier circuit (there is a thread somewhere where I have explained this in great technical detail with diagrams and such), a preamp sends the sound signal as direct current. The amplifier adds gain by adding AC power to the DC data and sending the combined power to the speakers. It is here that the design and construction of amps make a huge difference to the sound signature. Even assuming the speakers get the same amount of raw energy, how the speakers sound will vary depending upon how the amplifier is constructed. You can create two amplifiers in the same class with the same power output at the same price category, but they will sound completely different.

When you are adding AC power to a music signal, you are adding a lot of accompanying noise. How this noise is managed is the direct result of the amplifier design.

The contention is whether AVRs are inherently inferior to dedicated amps. An AVR with same components as that of the dedicated amp will sound the same. It might be more costly than the amp but price is not the contention here.

I never said an AVR is inferior in any way. Just that they are meant for a different job. Even if you design the amplifier in a way identical to the 2 channel amp, since there are so many other circuits that can generate noise, a bit of noise will always creep in. If you want avoid this, the amount and extent of shielding needed will make the AVR inviable. Most manufacturers of AVRs thus optimise for movies and leave it at that.

Regarding DVD players vs CD players, my opinion is that if you are not doing any processing on the data from the moment it is read till it reaches the digital out, it should sound the same. That is the whole point of having digital data. Please note that I am talking about digital out and pristine CDs. A better DAC with excellent jitter correction will have better sound but that comes after the digital out.

I have to go into a whole new area of DAC design. But let me say this. Though you are correct in saying that a digital signal is identical once it leaves the CD, that is not the end of the story. A external DAC will have to contend with a fixed signal. If it finds an error, all it can do is approximate the data and fill in the gaps, or skip that data area completely. In a CD player, if designed properly, the DAC can request the the drive to re-read the data. This can be done multiple times till it gets the data it thinks is best from, say, 4 reads.

There is whole lot of advantages in a DAC conversion as near to the source as possible.

In addition, as digital transmission in Audio/Video does not have feedback, there is nothing the receiver can do if there is a signal loss during transmission. Again the receiver has to approximate or just amplify and send the erroneous data to you. If you are using a optical cable, a 90 degree turn could easily distort the signal as the light signals bounce off the internal walls. There are similar issues with coaxial digital cables as is there with HDMI. As the length of HDMI increases, there is appreciable signal loss. In essence, there is no guarantee that the receiving end's data is 100% equivalent to that of the sending end.

Take your pick.

Cheers

 

[audiodelic]

Re: Why Stereo Speakers are better than 5.1 for Music ?

Informative thread ... thanks for all the explanations venkat

 

[svenkateshsmart]

Re: Why Stereo Speakers are better than 5.1 for Music ?

Informative thread ... thanks for all the explanations venkat

Yes, indeed very much. I request mods to make this a sticky one, if possible to change the title of thread, something like "AVR & DVDp Vs. Stereo Amp & CD for Music"

Cheers!

 

[madbullram]

Good info on this thread, have sticked it. Also, have changed the thread title based on the topics discussed.

Also, moved the thread to Amps section instead of having it in HTiB

 

[bansal98]

Re: Why Stereo Speakers are better than 5.1 for Music ?

Since lots of good things are coming out in this discussion, let's continue.

Power rating has no value. If you go into the design of an amplifier circuit (there is a thread somewhere where I have explained this in great technical detail with diagrams and such), a preamp sends the sound signal as direct current. The amplifier adds gain by adding AC power to the DC data and sending the combined power to the speakers. It is here that the design and construction of amps make a huge difference to the sound signature. Even assuming the speakers get the same amount of raw energy, how the speakers sound will vary depending upon how the amplifier is constructed. You can create two amplifiers in the same class with the same power output at the same price category, but they will sound completely different.

If two amplifiers, having the same power rating, sound different, it means that they are coloring the sound and hence were not designed properly. A good amplifier should not alter the signal in any way. It should just amplify it without changing the "sound". Speakers are another matter though.

I never said an AVR is inferior in any way. Just that they are meant for a different job. Even if you design the amplifier in a way identical to the 2 channel amp, since there are so many other circuits that can generate noise, a bit of noise will always creep in. If you want avoid this, the amount and extent of shielding needed will make the AVR inviable. Most manufacturers of AVRs thus optimise for movies and leave it at that.

I just wanted to clear the misconception that AVRs were inferior to dedicated amps when it came to playing music. You are right about the noise creeping in the original signal but how strong is the effect of that degradation and how audible it is, is up for debate.

I have to go into a whole new area of DAC design. But let me say this. Though you are correct in saying that a digital signal is identical once it leaves the CD, that is not the end of the story. A external DAC will have to contend with a fixed signal. If it finds an error, all it can do is approximate the data and fill in the gaps, or skip that data area completely. In a CD player, if designed properly, the DAC can request the the drive to re-read the data. This can be done multiple times till it gets the data it thinks is best from, say, 4 reads.

This in no way proves or disproves that DVD players can not act as a good transport. The DAC requesting the data to be sent again can be done in both. And as you have pointed out, it happens only if the player has been designed that way and that is not unique to the CD players. It also helps that dedicated CD players cost about 15k and DVD players cost only 3k.

There is whole lot of advantages in a DAC conversion as near to the source as possible.

In addition, as digital transmission in Audio/Video does not have feedback, there is nothing the receiver can do if there is a signal loss during transmission. Again the receiver has to approximate or just amplify and send the erroneous data to you. If you are using a optical cable, a 90 degree turn could easily distort the signal as the light signals bounce off the internal walls. There are similar issues with coaxial digital cables as is there with HDMI. As the length of HDMI increases, there is appreciable signal loss. In essence, there is no guarantee that the receiving end's data is 100% equivalent to that of the sending end.

I did not understand this part fully. Are you saying it's a good thing that dedicated CD players have DAC etc inside the unit as long cables can degrade the signal? If so, it's not relevant to the discussion as a better DAC will anyway give the dedicated CD player an advantage over regular DVD players. The question is can you obtain the same audio quality by using the DVD player just as a transport and doing the A/D conversion outside?

 

[thevortex]

Bansal98 - it is all well and good to say that an amplifier should not colour the sound in any way. But then if you listen to absolutely flat music - flat from 20 hz to 20Khz - you may not like it. I have listened to music in such completely flat conditions and I can tell you that such music is not very musical at all.

And almost all music that we listen to is coloured. Depends on what colours we like, I guess . And that is perhaps why sound perception is so very individual.

What you can do on this topic though is to see if you can get components like this:

AVR and Integrated amplifier with the same transformer, DAC section (including clock etc.) and rated power output.

Unless and until you take two such components which are evenly matched except for the additional functions of the AVR, we may not get too far. Just my thought.

 

[venkatcr]

Re: Why Stereo Speakers are better than 5.1 for Music ?

If two amplifiers, having the same power rating, sound different, it means that they are coloring the sound and hence were not designed properly. A good amplifier should not alter the signal in any way. It should just amplify it without changing the "sound". Speakers are another matter though.

All amplifiers, irrespective of price, colour the sound. As TheVortex said, if you hear a completely flat amp, you will not like it. Class D amps do that, and that is the reason they are not popular excepting for PA systems. Believe me you cannot stand under a PA amplified sound for more than a few minutes. (These statements are not completely correct and I have explained in http://www.hifivision.com/amplifier...vr-vs-2-chn-amp-cdp-vd-dvdp-4.html#post159106 below)

All amp designers work to make sure that the sound coming out of the amp is as musical as possible. Of course, each designer has different ideas and tastes. NAD amp always enhance low frequencies. Other design are bright - meaning mids and highs are enhanced.

This in no way proves or disproves that DVD players can not act as a good transport. The DAC requesting the data to be sent again can be done in both. And as you have pointed out, it happens only if the player has been designed that way and that is not unique to the CD players. It also helps that dedicated CD players cost about 15k and DVD players cost only 3k.

You must first understand that the media of a CD is max 800MB. A DVD player has to read close to 9 GB. As I said before the internal structure of a DVDP is different. The head has to move in smaller steps and the disc has to rotate at a different speed. When you insert a CD into a DVD Player, the head has to change it's reading dimension and well as the speed of the spindle. All these result in errors. So players have error correction built in. The subsequent processing corrects most of these issues, but there is always a loss somewhere. The loss could be minuscule but it results in skipped information, loss of sound stage, possible loss of certain frequencies during DAC conversion, and so on. Can you hear the difference? In a good system of amplifiers and speakers - very easily. Even my Oppo 983 for which I have a lot of respect, always get beaten by a CD Player such as the Marantz 6003, when you keep everything else the same. Not just me but a lot of members from Chennai have heard this difference very easily during a meeting here.

A DVD player is good for playing movies. A CD Player is good for playing music. If you marry the two, the cost in terms of what you have to do internally, takes the player costs to 1000s of dollars. That is the reason CD players are yet alive today and continue to evolve.

I did not understand this part fully. Are you saying it's a good thing that dedicated CD players have DAC etc inside the unit as long cables can degrade the signal? If so, it's not relevant to the discussion as a better DAC will anyway give the dedicated CD player an advantage over regular DVD players. The question is can you obtain the same audio quality by using the DVD player just as a transport and doing the A/D conversion outside?

I was talking about external DACs where the data has to be sent via a cable to another unit. If you are talking about a DAC inside a unit, and are talking about the differences between a DVDP and a CDP, I have already answered that point.

If you use the DVD as a transport and use an external DAC, you are again facing all the issues I spoke about sending digital data through a cable.

Cheers

 

[psychotropic]

Re: Why Stereo Speakers are better than 5.1 for Music ?

EDITING IN LIGHT OF VORTEX'S POST AND MINE BELOW.

This is a bizarre blanket statement. Firstly, a flat-sounding frequency response is not unpleasant. A flat-sounding frequency response is the aim of every good amplifier manufacturer (except for some of the tube guys, who want to add those even-order harmonics to sweeten the sound). To suggest that listening to an amplifier that has a flat-sounding frequency response would be unpleasant flies in the face of facts because...

Secondly, Digital amplifiers (whether they use chips from tripath or ICEpower or National Semiconductor) are very popular among audiophiles of all shades. I use a digital amplifier, which uses a tripath chip, it solidly kicked the ass of an analogue NAD that costs 5 times its price.

Digital amplifiers perform as well or better than other amps, that cost much much more, and carry out their amplification in the analogue domain. There is of course a bias against digital amplifiers among some people, much like the similarly uninformed bias against digital sources.

It is a fact that a well put together amp will sound good and neutral and pretty much flat across the frequency spectrum irrespective of whether it tube or solid-state and analogue or digital. For instance I was listenning to the Ayon Audio tube amplifier. What a genius piece of kit! It sounds fantastic without adding any of the tube 'thickness' to the sound.

But similarly there are digital amplifiers from the cheap Toppings to the ones from Virtue Audio, Red Wine Audio, Bel Canto, Sharp, and many others that have won tremendous acclaim and a cult fan following, for their beautiful, detailed, involving and "musical" reproduction of sound. They do this with a fairly flat-sounding frequency response as well....

Digital amplifiers are exactly like good solid state amplifiers, except cheaper, cleaner, quieter and cooler. Yes, they won't have the tube 'warmth', but that's a distinct flavour that people can choose to add to their music. But vis-a-vis other solid-state amps, digital amplifiers are not in any way inferior!

All amplifiers, irrespective of price, colour the sound. As TheVortex said, if you hear a completely flat amp, you will not like it. Class D amps do that, and that is the reason they are not popular excepting for PA systems. Believe me you cannot stand under a PA amplified sound for more than a few minutes.

 

[thevortex]

Vinay and Venkat - wanted to pitch in to clarify only one thing. It is not that a particular amplifier has a flat frequency response or a particular speaker or a particular source item. The entire system has to have a flat frequency response.

Vinay - you are welcome to come over and listen to how my system sounds when everything has been adjusted for flat frequency response. I have a particular setting saved just for flat response. It just sounds weird. Underwhelming in the bass and in your face with the treble. Among other things. It is different though. And I will not deny that some people may like it.

Lastly what we hear in a normal room can NEVER be flat. If you want to hear true flat response we can probably try in an anechoic room.

Even these equalization methods; I wont say that they get you to picture perfect results. But they are a start - definitely. They get you on that path, I would say.

I dont have much of an idea about Class D amplifiers though. So that part I will excuse myself out of.

 

[psychotropic]

actually i should correct myself. Flat-sounding frequency response is probably a more accurate description of the goal of an amplifier maker. There are a several factors including the equal loudness curves (fletcher-munson etc.,) that would make an absolutely flat frequency response unpleasant. The white-noise / pink-noise difference is handy to explain this.

But what I mean to say is that a flat, uncoloured sound is the aim of every good amplifier manufacturer, whether it is tube, solid-state or digital, unless they're deliberately adding colour, like some tube manufacturers. And therefore to say that Digital amplifiers are somehow deficient on account of pursuing this objective, is a bizarre thing!

Vinay and Venkat - wanted to pitch in to clarify only one thing. It is not that a particular amplifier has a flat frequency response or a particular speaker or a particular source item. The entire system has to have a flat frequency response.

Vinay - you are welcome to come over and listen to how my system sounds when everything has been adjusted for flat frequency response. I have a particular setting saved just for flat response. It just sounds weird. Underwhelming in the bass and in your face with the treble. Among other things. It is different though. And I will not deny that some people may like it.

Lastly what we hear in a normal room can NEVER be flat. If you want to hear true flat response we can probably try in an anechoic room.

Even these equalization methods; I wont say that they get you to picture perfect results. But they are a start - definitely. They get you on that path, I would say.

I dont have much of an idea about Class D amplifiers though. So that part I will excuse myself out of.

 

[thevortex]

actually i should correct myself. Flat-sounding frequency response is probably a more accurate description of the goal of an amplifier maker. There are a several factors including the equal loudness curves (fletcher-munson etc.,) that would make an absolutely flat frequency response unpleasant. The white-noise / pink-noise difference is handy to explain this.

But what I mean to say is that a flat, uncoloured sound is the aim of every good amplifier manufacturer, whether it is tube, solid-state or digital, unless they're deliberately adding colour, like some tube manufacturers. And therefore to say that Digital amplifiers are somehow deficient on account of pursuing this objective, is a bizarre thing!

Difficult to say, Vinay. Bass on a NAD is very different to that on an Arcam. Which is again very different to that of a Cyrus. And all of these are very very different to how the Lyrita does the same thing. Now who is to say which of these amps add colour and which dont?

I guess neutral sound rather than being a state of electronics depends probably on the manufacturer's interpretation of the same - recognizing the trade-offs involved in the (Cost vs materials) matrix. Or something like that .

 

[thevortex]

A stupid question - if I may be allowed that!

What is this term - digital amplifier? Does this refer only to Class D amps? What about normal integrated amps? Are these not digital amps? I thought all of these were digital amps....

 

[psychotropic]

Apart from power and current supply, the difference between well made amplifiers is relatively much less than say comparable speakers, and unless they're trying to add a particular flavour to the sound (like NAD does) the purist goal for an amp designer is to make a neutral sounding amp. Yes, of course, every capacitor and op-amp and component will lend a tiny bit of colour to the sound, and many brands build their reputations on having a unique sound, but none of this takes away from the fact that a neutral amplifier is a wonderful reference point to have and sounds great. There is of course the reality v. euphonics debate which is entirely another kettle of fish.

But if I can sum up my point, unless an amp manufacturer is deliberately trying to make an amp sound a particular way, his over-riding objective is to make the amp sound neutral and un-coloured. Many Digital amps do this very well, sound lovely and are well-liked by audiophiles.

About Class D, Digital and regular solid-state i'll leave someone who knows the technical stuff to explain, but no not all solid-state amps are digital...not all Class D is digital.... chip-amps like the tripath are digital.....the NAD for instance is not digital.

 

[psychotropic]

whaddya know? even NAD has started going digital!

 

[Blue Floyd]

being a relative layman just wanted to say....

Dont you think a Flat-sounding frequency response from an amp (without any colours) would give us sound the musician would actually want us to hear? because when recordings are made some sounds are amplified and some are toned down by the creator of THAT music.

So IMO a Flat-sounding frequency response is a more truer depiction of how music from a CD/DVD should sound and we can then tweak it as per our liking with the equalisers.

Pls correct me if my logic is wrong.

 

[suri]

being a relative layman just wanted to say....

Dont you think a Flat-sounding frequency response from an amp (without any colours) would give us sound the musician would actually want us to hear? because when recordings are made some sounds are amplified and some are toned down by the creator of THAT music.

So IMO a Flat-sounding frequency response is a more truer depiction of how music from a CD/DVD should sound and we can then tweak it as per our liking with the equalisers.

Pls correct me if my logic is wrong.

your logic is wrong.

 

[psychotropic]

yessar, you are broadly correct. Some exceptions though are:

a) tubes, people like the colour that the tubes add, it adds even order harmonic distortion which is euphonic (ie sounds good), and makes voices sound more full bodied and textured, at the expense (sometimes) of treble detail and bass definition/slam.

b) other amp makers that tailor their sound in a particular way. Like the NADs are known to be very polite, there is a high frequency rolloff, which means that many harsher sounds are more muted, so you can listen to a a lot of crap recordings without listening fatigue.

being a relative layman just wanted to say....

Dont you think a Flat-sounding frequency response from an amp (without any colours) would give us sound the musician would actually want us to hear? because when recordings are made some sounds are amplified and some are toned down by the creator of THAT music.

So IMO a Flat-sounding frequency response is a more truer depiction of how music from a CD/DVD should sound and we can then tweak it as per our liking with the equalisers.

Pls correct me if my logic is wrong.

 

[suri]

yessar, you are broadly correct. Some exceptions though are:

a) tubes, people like the colour that the tubes add, it adds even order harmonic distortion which is euphonic (ie sounds good), and makes voices sound more full bodied and textured, at the expense (sometimes) of treble detail and bass definition/slam.

b) other amp makers that tailor their sound in a particular way. Like the NADs are known to be very polite, there is a high frequency rolloff, which means that many harsher sounds are more muted, so you can listen to a a lot of crap recordings without listening fatigue.

https://addons.mozilla.org/z/en-US/firefox/addon/1219/?src=oftenusedwith

 

[venkatcr]

I think I made a error in my previous post leading to some confusion.

When I said was that 'Class D may not sound good'. This has actually nothing to do with flat response nor with PA Systems. Till some ago Class D amps had not matured, while PA amplifier systems are in a different class altogether. PA system do have a lot of distortion, but that is kind of accepted in that area.

Literally all amplifiers have or can be made to have a flat response. It is the output impedance, slew rate, SNR, THD, and other factors that make a difference.

A digital amplifer is in Class D. As against RF modulation in Class A and Class B, a digital amplifier uses pulse width modulation for amplification. The power supply can either be standard torroidal based system or a SMPS. Since the amount of power needed is very small, most modern digital amplifiers use SMPS.

For a long time, digital amplifiers (also called switching amplifiers) were very difficult to make as there was a clash of frequency used for pulse width modulation (some 20-25kHz) and the data in the audio stream. These kind of amplifiers would certainly be very difficult to hear as their THD was 0.1% or worse and they usually had high output impedance. In instruments such as telephones, this did not matter much and digital amps have been in use there for a long time. But in audio circles, such amps usually resulted in harsh tone with amplifier generated distortion creeping in. This could not be filtered out because of the frequency at which the PW modulation worked.

People at NuForce and IcePower have been slowly and steadily removing the issues with Class D amp, and in the recent past, Mark Levinson has taken this even further. One of the steps is to use PW modulation at the 100kHz range, well beyond the audio data range. Technology today exists to deliver low output impedance with frequency independent distortion control, and a high level of filtration.

Digital Amps (also commonly called Class D amps) are difficult to make. They require highly precision circuit boards. Most digital amps uses IC chips for amplification, and designers have to depend upon available IC amps. The ICs have also matured only in the recent past.

Though digital amps are all in Class D, it is yet unclear that all Class D are digital. But that is what they will be in a couple of years.

BTW, Tripath amps are in different category called Chip Amps.

Cheers

 

[ajinkya]

your logic is wrong.

Why is that Suri?