Oh nice, formats that wear down during use. Great.Cut it out. We had dbx with 110dB dynamic range, Dolby C came out before CD and gave us in the 70dB+ S/N. And open reel.
Oh nice, formats that wear down during use. Great.Cut it out. We had dbx with 110dB dynamic range, Dolby C came out before CD and gave us in the 70dB+ S/N. And open reel.
Oh nice, formats that wear down during use. Great.
They were beautifully made too, had that military precision quality.
Cut it out. We had dbx with 110dB dynamic range, Dolby C came out before CD and gave us in the 70dB+ S/N. And open reel.
dbx playback had quite a lot of audible artifact - gain pumping, swishing, etc. So did Dolby S and Dolby C
A proper pre-amplifier yesterday:Preamplifiers are a shadow and I mean a shadow of their former selves. Not even close. Okto, Topping and Benchmark 'preamps' are just linestages with hardly any functionality. Where's the MM stage, the MC stage, the tone controls, the filters, the loudness contours, the multiple inputs, headphone stages and processor loops? Notably absent. They are a tiny sub facet of a real preamplifier.
A lot of classical Music masters were done at 1/2"OR 1"tape width at 30 ips.dbx playback had quite a lot of audible artifact - gain pumping, swishing, etc. So did Dolby S and Dolby C. Dolby B is a little better in this regard. Open reel - well, for example a 4 track Revox A77 ( considered one of the best hifi reel to reel machines made, kind of a pro-sumer unit ) has a S/N ratio of 62 dB at 7½ ips. So, yes, 20 dB better than vinyl- but still 40 dB worse than good digital. And at 7½ ips it rolled off by 3 dB at 20 kHz and more like 6 db down at 20 Hz. So, nothing really to brag about. 15 ips is better, but no commercially pre-recorded tapes back then were done at 15 ips.
So sources back then were not really all that transparent.
You mean, "even if the overload was one tenth the published figure..."?Even if the overload was half the published figure, it would still be far better than the recently reviewed Sutherland Phono Pre-amp. Why can't Sutherland achieve similar results.
Edited.
It seems that vinyl recorded velocities can reach 50 cm/s, which would be 50 mV for a typical MM cartridge. Why shouldn't a phono stage be able to accommodate that? (Scratches or other faults are another matter, of course.)They've been building phono stages for a while and know what they are doing. I'd say they consider a typical overload from a scratch/pop as something that you really don't want to fully reproduce if you want to keep your tweeter voicecoils in one piece.
I could argue for a high overload capability and a low overload/soft clipping capability equally validly. Vinyl just doesn't have the dynamic range needed in real terms and clicks and pops are faults anyway. A bit like the so-called 'intersample overs' needing headroom in a DAC. No, you don't need headroom for IS overs- you need recordings that aren't faulty in the first place.
Preamplifiers are a shadow and I mean a shadow of their former selves. Not even close. Okto, Topping and Benchmark 'preamps' are just linestages with hardly any functionality. Where's the MM stage, the MC stage, the tone controls, the filters, the loudness contours, the multiple inputs, headphone stages and processor loops? Notably absent. They are a tiny sub facet of a real preamplifier.
True. Great post for balance and perspective .I agree with you from an historical standpoint. However, for digital sources, preamplification signal modification functions can be done in software.
The problem arises when one introduces an analog signal path into the setup. Typically this means a phono input. We've mentioned this before, but a phono source requires adjustments (balance, mono switch, subsonic filter, loading etc.) in order to properly integrate into the overall system. These features are generally unavailable in even most separate phono stages.
A tape loop suitable for dubbing, with appropriate filters, is less important for the vast majority of audiophiles, since there are no high quality tape machines (either open reel or cassette) made. At least one manufacturer is making Type II tapes, however the best Type IV cassette tapes are no longer available (as far as I know). In any case, anyone using analog tape is probably out of 'feature luck' with any pre or integrated amplifier made today. Top of the line Yamaha (and even more expensive Lux/Accuphase products) will not help. In that case, a legacy preamp or receiver is the only way to go.
I'm not a headphone uber alles fan, but my guess (and it is only a guess) is that modern headphone amplifiers are much better than what was usually available in integrated gear from the '70s and '80s.
Tone controls were always questionable in actual use, with some exceptions (early Pioneers offered dual mode selectable turnover controls, and I think Sansui too). In the analog world, useful tone modification was typically done via external EQ, either graphic or parametric.
For what it's worth, featureless preamplification was pushed by the high end press. Features were supposed to make the device 'sound bad'. I think manufacturers liked it, because it made their job easier, not having to include features. Compare something like the multi-flexible LNP-2 with the later ML-6a, and then back to the future again, with the Cello Audio Palette.
1- The issue is not the amplitude but the clipping sound.They've been building phono stages for a while and know what they are doing. I'd say they consider a typical overload from a scratch/pop as something that you really don't want to fully reproduce if you want to keep your tweeter voicecoils in one piece.
Wow! That is a beauty to behold. All that fiddling you can do with no computer! Dang youngsters and their digital stuff, why back in my day we just listened to AM radio on our fillings in our teeth. Plus we walked to school uphill 5 miles both ways in the snow.From a 'feature' standpoint, in an analog world, there was no limit to what you could get. No doubt one of the (over the) top consumer devices in this regard was the C-1. Back then, the well equipped audiophile likely had two record players (a changer for 'casual' listening and a manual for 'serious' use), two tape decks (in various combinations), and a tuner. So you needed some switching capability, for sure.
Aczel, scratching his head at all the buttons quipped: Look at it this way: a Krohn-Hite 4100a push-button oscillator costs $695.00; a General Radio 1382 white/pink noise generator costs $675.00; a DB Systems preamp costs $425.00. Total: $1795.00. So for five dollars less than the price of the C-1 you can get two superb professional lab instruments, plus a preamp. And the Kronh Hite has 40 controls on its front panel, nine more than the C-1...
His advice--if you want a Yamaha, save some dollars and go for the C-2!
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DBX added horrible fake quality to music. Tone controls for treble and bass were often not defeatable and added more problems than they solved. MC and MM amplification was often noisy and the RIAA (or inverse RIAA) input FR commonly with 2-3 db of error. I am happy now and I was not so much until late 1990’s when they finally mastered CDs right and DACs began to perform well enough. There is nothing, xcept my youth, that I miss from those old days.Cut it out. We had dbx with 110dB dynamic range, Dolby C came out before CD and gave us in the 70dB+ S/N. And open reel.
Preamplifiers are a shadow and I mean a shadow of their former selves. Not even close. Okto, Topping and Benchmark 'preamps' are just linestages with hardly any functionality. Where's the MM stage, the MC stage, the tone controls, the filters, the loudness contours, the multiple inputs, headphone stages and processor loops? Notably absent. They are a tiny sub facet of a real preamplifier.
I have plenty of real preamplifiers- you should try one yourself. And today (because it's pouring rain), just for fun, I'm measuring phono overloads because a bunch of people are interested. Guess what? The worst one so far is a 2015 product. The best one so far is a 1980 product!
Back in the early 80s I was trying to purchase a Perraux amp, and went to a dealer that advertised it, only later to find out he no longer carried it. Being a "High-End" dealer, he had moved on to better SS amps. I should not have listened to him, because the amp he sold me twice needed substantial repairs over a 10 yr period. I still have the amp in storage (I paid $1300 back then). He also tried to convince me to buy a tube amp instead, but I didn't like the necessity of changing tubes; however, if I had listened to him at least I could have re-sold those mono amps and not lost too much money, whereas my ss amp (which was well reviewed by Absolute Sound) is basically ballast.
YESCut it out. We had dbx with 110dB dynamic range, Dolby C came out before CD and gave us in the 70dB+ S/N. And open reel.
Preamplifiers are a shadow and I mean a shadow of their former selves. Not even close. Okto, Topping and Benchmark 'preamps' are just linestages with hardly any functionality. Where's the MM stage, the MC stage, the tone controls, the filters, the loudness contours, the multiple inputs, headphone stages and processor loops? Notably absent. They are a tiny sub facet of a real preamplifier.