michael green
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one big musical instrument
michael green
michael green's picture
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Last seen: 5 years 10 months ago
Joined: Jan 10 2011 - 6:11pm

I've been getting emails and notes from listeners wanting to give their comments about some of the things I've been saying on this forum. One comment is that I seem to be flying in the face of the established. I asked the one guy "what do you think". His reply was "do you not think that these guys know what they are doing". My answer was simple. "I am these guys".

I asked this fella what his amp was. Then I asked if he was able to lift the transformer in his amp up and set it on wood. His first answer back to me was all the reasons he shouldn't but I asked again did you do this or not. Finally he did the experiement and got back to me with a Wow! I next asked if he liked soldering. He did and changes parts regularly in some of his stuff. I had him extend the leads on his amp transformer and move it outside of the chassis on it's own piece of tuned wood. "my soundstage doubled and I can hear what was missing"

Got another email saying that since he started tuning and has been trying to talk to others about it he gets blank stares and dead silence from the audiophiles.

I think this is why music lovers don't get audiophiles. I can bring an audiophile into one of my rooms and he is stuck cause the system is so simple and the sound is so real. He's lost and trying to come up with why something has to be wrong and isn't. He will say well I like this and not that, so I will make the change with my tunable setup and he really gets scared now. I bring a music lover into my room and play the same piece of music and they are tapping their toes looking around the room smiling. I do the same thing for them (make a change) and they say "that makes sense".

It makes sense to make a system like a big musical instrument. So I have to wonder why the audiophile has resisted so long what the rest of the world sees as normal for music and the making of it. I can give example after example of how this is happening and lets start with the word inert.

We must build our systems inert, really? Let me look up inert.

Definition of inert (adj)

Bing Dictionary

in·ert

[ i núrt ]

 

  1. motionless: not moving or not able to move
  2. nonreactive: not readily changed by chemical or biological reaction
  3. sluggish or unmotivated: lacking in energy or motivation

Everything I know about music or audio says inert is not a good thing. Every experiment I have made or seen anyone else make says the same thing. Audio is vibration, audio is motion, audio is energy. The audio system is based on reaction. Where does inert fit into the audio equation? So the signal is suppose to pass through the audio chain without motion?

Ok, what about damping? nah, I'll leave that one alone for now.

A listening buddy of mine said as we were talking about why this part of the hobby is so stuck. "there is a difference between a music lover and a audiophile engineer". It's his opinion that this is a hobby of engineers and not one of listeners. This may very well be why the audiophile has such a hard time getting good sound and the artist listening type finds good sound easy. He's right I think. When I'm with an artist type it's like tune and tweak and there. With the engineer type it's tune, wait a minute, side step, try this, can't get that to work, debate. Two clearly different types of hobbyist. I have noticed that the engineer can't quite put the soundstage together and gets off into test and placement and talk about the things that should work, but when they go to do it, it doesn't. I've also noticed when frustrated they will say that their tiny sound is right and the rest is distortion. So what about distortion.

Definition of distortion (n)

Bing Dictionary

dis·tor·tion

[ di stáwrsh'n ]

 

  1. misleading alteration: the describing or reporting of something in a way that is inaccurate or misleading
  2. reconfiguration from correct shape: the bending, twisting, stretching, or forcing of something out of its usual or natural shape
  3. misshapen part: a part of something that has been bent, twisted, stretched, or forced out of its usual or natural shape

So someone makes a real life picture "recorded soundstage" and it is played back on a high end audio system that shrinks it into a box of sound in front of them. This is distortion.

I want to thank the guys who have made this hobby fun for me and have been open minded about the possibilities of stereo and how you have gotten out of the box and keep me pushing toward a bigger picture.

michael green

MGA/RoomTune

michael green
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Joined: Jan 10 2011 - 6:11pm

It's been fun getting notes and calls and also people posting on TuneLand from here who are starting to tune. If you ask them you will see that even in a short time the hobby has changed dramatically for them. The biggest change is how much systems will open up and become more "3D".

michael green

MGA/RoomTune

michael green
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Had a chance to visit my tunable studio up in New York and give a room demo. Some of the local engineers were raising their dampened hands in the air and I needed to silence them. Of course you never really silence engineer types cause their on a mission that is usually one that has nothing to do with the topic. They sit there with a rubik's cube in one hand and a Radio Shack test mic in the other. But I had a job to do.

In meeting with them we stood in the middle of the studio talking. I chose this on purpose so the afternoon was about listening rather than talking. They went off on their rants and raves like usual saying how you need to kill the room instead of whatever I do to it. So I asked them to setup the room and record. They did. After, I went into the room and picked one corner of the room that I wanted to tune and began so. Took me about 15 minutes and I asked them to come back in. When they came in I had them record again with the same drum they were using but in the corner of the room I tuned. After the recording was done we went into the control room and we listened to the recordings. We played theirs first and then played the one in the tuned part of the room. First they looked at each other then at me. Excuses started flying when they realized that in the first recording even though they tuned the drum, on the recording it was out of tune, yet recorded in the tuned part of the room the drum was in tune. They wanted to do the recording again but before we did this, I had one of the drummers come in and tune the drum in the part of the studio where I had adjusted the walls putting them intune. The drummer tuned. then I asked him holding the drum to walk from the corner I did to the area that they did with their foam and traps and untuned walls. I pointed out where the tuning ended and the traps and foam and non-tuned part of the walls began. When the drummer walked from the tuned area to the trapped area the drum went out of tune. He walked back over the tuning line and it went back in tune. This was done several times, but the engineers still had a problem with me so I said draw their own line in the room and I will make one half tuned and the other they can treat anyway they want. We did, and the same thing happen. So the one engineer said ok lets tune the drum in our half, so I said sure. You tune the drum in your half, record, then tune the drum in my half and recorded. We did and went into the control room using headphones and the room, and in both cases their drum was out of tune and our half was intune. I went a step further and tuned the control room to our drum and it became even better sounding while theirs got worse.

The tunable room is an amasing tool and goes much further than the other types of rooms out there, but this is not my point. My point is this whole hobby of ours has far more to it than we have uncovered so far. The more we explore how tuning works, the more we are going to hear in our home listening. Those who are exploring tuning their systems are hearing more of the music then ever before in this hobby. I want to encourage you to take even the first step and hear how much more there is. You could be sitting there right now and instead of hearing a small portion of the production, have the whole thing open up like you were there. I know some are going to say you have all this resolution, well if you have the chassis on, and rugs in your room, and the rack between your speakers and your speakers against the same wall and multiple components needing line conditioning, I would bet you your hearing maybe a tenth. Wouldn't you like to hear more? If not that's cool go back to listening no harm done I'm not trying to upset you, but for those who want to hear more, for those who have been messing with this stuff a long time and have a closet full of components and tweaks and garden hoses, are you tired of the chase? After having 5 stereo stores full of this stuff I decided I needed a method of listening instead of piles of equipment.

Time to be thinking about the next step folks. Variable tuning is the next step in high end audio. It's been around a long time and is proven, but the industry needed to go on it's own path to get as far as it could by creating thousands of sounds but that's not enough. Time to open up what we have and head the other way. If your happy with your system I'm happy for you I really am no problem, but if you have been stuck and feel there is something more, there is, and you don't have to be caught in the never ending story.

Just do me one thing, next time your in an instrument store have a guy take a guitar and play it out of tune, have him tune it and play it again. Which did you like?

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

michael green
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This week there was a gathering at one of the "Tunable Rooms", and I wanted to share the comments as they come in.

"Harold here

I'm wrapping up my Chicago trip and want to give you some feedback. Let me start by saying when Michael tells you, your going to enjoy the tunable room this is one of audio's understatements of the century. I'm going to report more on this when I get settled, but I want to give my first impressions.

When you walk into someone's house and see the room standing there the first thought is "giant musical instrument". Hearing about the tunable room and seeing pictures is one thing, but having one in front of you is an experience that transcends. This is beyond high end audio and makes any listener rethink their priorities. This environment should be at the top of any serious audiophiles list. Forget about all the bells and whistles this hobby throws at you, this is the holy grail of rooms. For some this might have been a "where do I start" moment, but when that adjustment driver was placed in my hand I felt instantly at home. This room talks to you. That may sound odd, but when I sat down I knew what to do. It was like being able to see into the music and the room was guiding me. After listening a minute I made my first adjustment and the room did exactly what I was thinking. I sat back and smiled. After 3 more adjustments, I sat back and my smile turned into a laugh "what is this industry thinking"

I must and will have one

more to come"
_________________________________

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

michael green
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Last seen: 5 years 10 months ago
Joined: Jan 10 2011 - 6:11pm

Here's more on The Tunable Room visit by Harold Cooper

http://tuneland.techno-zone.net/t211p15-harold-cooper-of-sound-consultants

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

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