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Tweaks Good, Bad or Different?
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The approach you take to tweaking will do one of two things. It will start you down a path to hearing more, or hearing less. Many times in this hobby (happens to all of us) we will hear something in our system that gets our attention. Let's use sloppy bass for example. Boomy bass is an issue most run into sometime in their hobby. This can be recording dependent, but it also can be a symptom of the system being out of balance. When you hear the bass booming you have choices. These choices run in threes, acoustical mechanical and electrical. All three of these choices will make changes to the bass. I recommend to listeners to study these three before they get too far into their tweaking, here's why.

One thing about tweaking is it's not hard to get focused on one area and try to make it compensate for another. For example, a lot of guys will try to make the amp and speakers over play the room. Instead of turning the room into the speaker, they will try to tighten up the sound of components. With most high end audio components they are already over tight and tightening them up more will start to give you a squeezed sound. Same is true with speakers. Most heavy speakers are locked into a sound and if you put them on the wrong floor or material or stand for them they will start to sound thin. At first someone might listen and say "this is tighter" but in the long run as you listen to more music, and if you reference other systems, you will hear that part of the music is missing in yours. This is because you tried to fix a room problem with the components.

It works the other way around as well. Many times someone will try to fix a component problem with the room. A good rule of thumb I have always tried to follow is

"DON'T KILL THE SOUND"

I have found that if I kill the sound in any area of my system acoustical, mechanical or electrical I will loose part of the audio signal. There's a huge difference between balancing the sound and killing it, and if you use one part of the audio trilogy to over come a problem with another part, you will loose part of the music and begin to go down a path of trading sound instead of revealing it. This is very important cause it's a trap that can burn up years of listening and sometimes, many times the hobby becomes one of trade offs instead of letting recordings opening up.

So it's very important if your going to get serious about this that you learn what each part of the audio trilogy means and what it will contribute to the overall sound. There is no way around dealing with the three parts, cause they all are equals. You can have the greatest system in the world but if it's sitting in the wrong environment a boom box in the right environment will sound better. Same goes with the electric part and mechanical.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

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michael green wrote:

The approach you take to tweaking will do one of two things. It will start you down a path to hearing more, or hearing less. Many times in this hobby (happens to all of us) we will hear something in our system that gets our attention. Let's use sloppy bass for example. Boomy bass is an issue most run into sometime in their hobby. This can be recording dependent, but it also can be a symptom of the system being out of balance. When you hear the bass booming you have choices. These choices run in threes, acoustical mechanical and electrical. All three of these choices will make changes to the bass. I recommend to listeners to study these three before they get too far into their tweaking, here's why.

One thing about tweaking is it's not hard to get focused on one area and try to make it compensate for another. For example, a lot of guys will try to make the amp and speakers over play the room. Instead of turning the room into the speaker, they will try to tighten up the sound of components. With most high end audio components they are already over tight and tightening them up more will start to give you a squeezed sound. Same is true with speakers. Most heavy speakers are locked into a sound and if you put them on the wrong floor or material or stand for them they will start to sound thin. At first someone might listen and say "this is tighter" but in the long run as you listen to more music, and if you reference other systems, you will hear that part of the music is missing in yours. This is because you tried to fix a room problem with the components.

It works the other way around as well. Many times someone will try to fix a component problem with the room. A good rule of thumb I have always tried to follow is

"DON'T KILL THE SOUND"

I have found that if I kill the sound in any area of my system acoustical, mechanical or electrical I will loose part of the audio signal. There's a huge difference between balancing the sound and killing it, and if you use one part of the audio trilogy to over come a problem with another part, you will loose part of the music and begin to go down a path of trading sound instead of revealing it. This is very important cause it's a trap that can burn up years of listening and sometimes, many times the hobby becomes one of trade offs instead of letting recordings opening up.

So it's very important if your going to get serious about this that you learn what each part of the audio trilogy means and what it will contribute to the overall sound. There is no way around dealing with the three parts, cause they all are equals. You can have the greatest system in the world but if it's sitting in the wrong environment a boom box in the right environment will sound better. Same goes with the electric part and mechanical.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

The fear of over-damping has kept more audiophiles back at square one than just about any other thing. Even the Japanese audiophile company Acoustic Revive cautions against "over dumping" when using their smokey quartz crystals and has a special paper backing for the crystals to avoid over damping. Of course it's possible to kill the sound. Is that supposed to be some sort of News Flash? Nobody said it was going to be easy. The problem is that most audiophiles are unfamiliar with the wide variety of damping solutions out there and just don't know know where to start. You got your rubber type stuff, Sorbothane, gels, foams, cork, viscoelastic material, clay, Blu Tac, bubble wrap, DYNAMAT, EAR stuff, all kinds of things, both DIY and commercial. Experimentation is the order of the day, I would focus on viscoelastic material and constrain it. This method avoids the pitfalls of storing energy and is fairly easy to implement around transformers and CD transports! even on speaker cabinets and on shelves that hold audio components. For micro vibration applications such as capacitors, CD trays, electron tubes, Marigo VTS tuning dots (constrained layer dampers) are just the ticket. And so tiny! The only thing to fear of over damping is fear itself.

Cheers,

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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And when your done we'll show you how to tune http://tuneland.techno-zone.net/ :) or you can start tuning right from the start.

but instead of me attacking any products let me show you this

Go out to your work shop and build a box out of .5" wood, four sides is fine. Now build a second box same size with 2.5" wood. Tap on the .5" box, full range. Tap on the 2.5" box, frequency shifted up. Do any kind of bracing you want, frequency shifts up higher. Put dampening in, even higher and dull.

Now go back to the box that is .5". Go half way up and size out a brace out of wood. Drill a hole in the cabinet where the brace will be going. Get a drywall screw and make sure the hole is big enough for the screw to go in and only the head touch. Put your brace in and barely tighten the screw.

Now get a small clock radio, turn it on and place it in the dead box at the bottom, sounds pretty bad I know. Now set it in the .5" box, not bad right? Tighten the screws a little, you know just tighten it till it sounds the way you like. Put some finish inside and out, sand it nice till you like it.

Which box do one want to put your drivers in? Which box do you think will work better in your room?

Let's take two amps. One in a metal chassis with the transformer in and dampening, and one in a wood chassis with the transformer outside with the same type of tuning brace as the speaker box, no dampening. Which do you want to listen to?

Let's take two CD players. One is a heavy dampen player with big transformer in a metal chassis, and the other player light weight small transformer, in a wooden box with the same tuning adjustment. Which one do you want to listen to?

which system do you want?

before you make a choice you should know something about the two

The one with the dampening will never be able to sound like the braced one or any other sound other than what it is. The components with the bracing can be tuned to sound just like the dampened one or any other system out there.

The dampened one only has one sonic choice for all the music, and the tunable one can be tune to the different music or sound of the room, or personal taste.

which one do you want?

Dampening is the slow way around to you finding what tuning can do. For some it's fun to go step by step, then back a step then forward and back and.....or there's tuning and get on with your collection building.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

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Michael, in all seriousness, you just haven't stumbled on the right damping material or device yet. Rubber and many other similar materials stink. Sonex, Rubber, lead, EAR blue grommets, Dynamat, certain silicon based products, even cork in some applications, I don't like a lot of things.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dramatica

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I like that ... Stumble versus tune.

Did you miss the key part in the DIY project that involved being able to change the sound by adjusting the bracing. That's the key take away.

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toledo wrote:

I like that ... Stumble versus tune.

Did you miss the key part in the DIY project that involved being able to change the sound by adjusting the bracing. That's the key take away.

Backfire Effect - when presented with clear logical arguments the Tuners become more convinced that they MUST be right. Nowhere is this more evident than with damping and isolation. This is why I am taking the view these days that you guys are a branch off the main stream of audiophiles. And a dogmatic one. You claim to be great listeners but in reality you just won't listen! See the irony?

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Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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Geoff,

We have suggested you research tuning to get more informed. There is some commonality in your approach and tuning and I cannot fathom why you would not do so.

Once you see and hear a well setup tuned system and understand the methodology, it might make more sense to you. Dampening does not fit into this methodology. How many times does this need to be reiterated.

Until then, your comments will be have to be considered more schoolyard bluster than anything else.

Upon reflecting on your comments over the past few months, I am reminded of how science evolves theories. They start out with wildly complicated ideas and fudge factors to account for discrepancies. These eventually boil down to simpler and more unifying concepts that address the overall issue. Does this sound familiar? Which approach is closer to that, tweaking or tuning. Tuning is based on a unified concept and tweaking is more akin to fudge factors.

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toledo wrote:

Geoff,

We have suggested you research tuning to get more informed. There is some commonality in your approach and tuning and I cannot fathom why you would not do so.

Once you see and hear a well setup tuned system and understand the methodology, it might make more sense to you. Dampening does not fit into this methodology. How many times does this need to be reiterated.

Until then, your comments will be have to be considered more schoolyard bluster than anything else.

Upon reflecting on your comments over the past few months, I am reminded of how science evolves theories. They start out with wildly complicated ideas and fudge factors to account for discrepancies. These eventually boil down to simpler and more unifying concepts that address the overall issue. Does this sound familiar? Which approach is closer to that, tweaking or tuning. Tuning is based on a unified concept and tweaking is more akin to fudge factors.

You wrote,

Upon reflecting on your comments over the past few months, I am reminded of how science evolves theories. They start out with wildly complicated ideas and fudge factors to account for discrepancies. These eventually boil down to simpler and more unifying concepts that address the overall issue. Does this sound familiar?

No it doesn't sound familiar because it's not true.

Now, you know I'm not one to criticize but your statement is loaded with more holes than Swiss cheese. Science does no such thing as you say Science usually starts out with an observation then comes up with a theory to explain the observation. There is nothing at all in Science that requires or even prefers complicated theories. Maybe that's what they teach English majors, who knows.

Everything should be as simple as possible but no simpler. A. Einstein

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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No text

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Geoff,

Thanks for making my point ... Simple unifying concept (or should I thank Mr Einstein)
I know you are trying to infer that oversimplification creates its own problems, but in this case is pure conjecture without any observations (listening to a tuned system perhaps) on your part.

I don't see how your explanation of theory evolution, differs from mine. Thanks for reinforcing, also.

Initial theories are not designed to be complicated, this is how the initial observation is viewed and explained and sometimes in very complicated ways and, when possible, simplified as further observations are made.

I think you're refusing to see the analogy to current audio "best practices" some of which you are advocate of (dampening and vibration control.)

The simplification process is underway and you go out of your way to tell others they are doing it wrong.

Debating theories is part of the simplification process, but, generally opposing theorists understand the theory they are opposing (at least you would hope so.)

BTW, i'm a computer science major, not that it matters to your silly putdowns.

Like I said, I feel like i'm in a schoolyard.

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toledo wrote:

Geoff,

Thanks for making my point ... Simple unifying concept (or should I thank Mr Einstein)
I know you are trying to infer that oversimplification creates its own problems, but in this case is pure conjecture without any observations (listening to a tuned system perhaps) on your part.

I don't see how your explanation of theory evolution, differs from mine. Thanks for reinforcing, also.

Initial theories are not designed to be complicated, this is how the initial observation is viewed and explained and sometimes in very complicated ways and, when possible, simplified as further observations are made.

I think you're refusing to see the analogy to current audio "best practices" some of which you are advocate of (dampening and vibration control.)

The simplification process is underway and you go out of your way to tell others they are doing it wrong.

Debating theories is part of the simplification process, but, generally opposing theorists understand the theory they are opposing (at least you would hope so.)

BTW, i'm a computer science major, not that it matters to your silly putdowns.

Like I said, I feel like i'm in a schoolyard.

You have a vivid imagination. I did not say anything about a simplification process or any such thing. I wish you wouldn't put words in my mouth. What I said has to do with observation and explanation of the observation.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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First thanks for all the PM's. I will try to keep my mailbox up to date on Tuneland. You can also contact Harold Cooper with product questions.

I just wanted to give a word of caution to listeners. Obviouly Geoff from Machina Dynamica has been making it a point to cause distractions on threads that involve the technology of tuning. For those interested that don't want to be bothered by this you can reach us at http://tuneland.techno-zone.net/ . PM's are fine but they are starting to pile up so if you would start a thread or email us we will get to you ASAP.

As far as the products Geoff is peddling, they in no way are apart of our process and we invite you to visit our product guides, however on here I would like to stay on concepts mostly so if you ask of course I'll be happy to answer but I don't want this to look like an ad campaign for product pushing. Pushing tuning, full steam ahead, products though if we could please send those directly to us, thanks.

michael green
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Geoff,

Quote:

You have a vivid imagination. I did not say anything about a simplification process or any such thing. I wish you wouldn't put words in my mouth. What I said has to do with observation and explanation of the observation.

I am not exactly sure what you are referring to but, I suspect it was related to my comment about your Einstein quote.

In actuality there is doubt that this quote can be attributed to Einstein and it's meaning can be interpreted in various ways.

I chose the "make it as simple as possible but not too simple to cause problems" which seems to fits your arguments that tuning is over simplifying and ignoring key elements. Just for the record, nothing is ignored in tuning.

Btw, I don't think you understood my original post when I was referring to how some theories evolve and not the origin of a theory.

I do appreciate that you didn't dispute that tuning uses an evolved simple unifying methodology to design a system .... We're making progress on this whole dialog thing, huh ;)

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My Einstein quote had nothing, zero, zilch, nada to do with Tuning. I was only responding to your comment about scientific theories and complexity. Actually I never said or at least never meant to say Tuning was oversimplified. What I did say is that Tuning Overlooks, ignores or dismisses some obviously very fundamental issues with sound reproduction. You guys are attempting to portray Tuning as a complete methodology. I'm here to tell you it's not.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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Geoff,

Why put the quotes in if they are not part of your argument and overall thought process. Overlooking elements in the quest for simplicity is what that quote means.

I fail to see how you are able to make your determinations of ignoring or dismissing issues without full knowledge of what tuning is.

Once you understand the methodology and observe a tuned system, your opinions would have more weight.

At that point we will have done a full circle and will be left with observations aka listening and referencing being the sole determinant.

Funny how we always end up back to listening, hmmm ;)

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It is bizzar to see a designer who doesn't have a system make such statements, that's one thing! But the good part to this is other people are starting to do and that's always exciting for me. I think when people do things inside of the community and start to compare this is when the idea break throughs start to take place.

As I have said many, many, times the doing is the path to truth and the figuring out what just happened can follow or for many doesn't need to even happen. One thing about tweaks you can bet on is for the exploring listener they have done about everything and there really isn't much of anything new. With a method however and especially one based on variables the ball game changes dramatically. Most of the time soon after starting we can go back to the audio trilogy and begin to see what part of the system holds things up and which part open things up, and this is when advanced listening starts to happen. The 3 parts electrical, mechanical and acoustical start to show themselves.

The most important thing I tell people is get to know these 3 parts, get to know what they are doing as a team in your system. When this starts to happen then the listener can start playing one part off of the other and the ladder becomes a scaffolding process where you raise a little on this side then here, then here, and on it goes taking the system higher in performance, getting rid of the blockage as you go.

A lot of times as we listen we find ourselves in a place where we have to go back and get rid of something that we thought was helping but later find that it was holding us up. For example, someone makes a move with the mechanical and it's a good move at that time, but later they find that this was something that does a better job in the acoustical or electrical domain, and they may want to change the blend. This is when the method moves beyond the tweak. You can't have the tweak end looking at the method saying you missed something, because the tweak is a small part of the whole and may or may not be in the end game. A tweak is like, here's what could happen to this part if you do this, but a method is the blending of all the parts and looks for something different, it looks for the whole. You who tweak, and I recommend they do so, are at the edge of their method, and the more they do, the closer they get to at least a part of the whole but it's usually not the whole.

for example

In this part of the industry, people tend to go after focus. They hear (when appying a tweak) something to them that cleans up, they can see something, some part of the recording big or small becomes much more visual. They'll keep going in that direction and then one listening session will happen and they will say "where am I", all of a sudden they'll be in a place in their tweaking of too far. So they step back or a friend hears it, which causes them to step back, and they see that they have been focusing on a part of the whole without building up the whole. Ladder vs scaffolding! At that point it's important to look at the audio trilogy and think about what in the system is doing what. This is when listeners make that decission. Do I move on to all three parts as being eqauls and working together or do I stay in tweak mode and limit myself with certain listening material or my system making all material it plays sound a certain way?

But here's the thing and I think this and other threads here have been a good illustration of this. A tweak can't see the method, it only sees the importance of what it is doing. No offence, but this is what I see Geoff doing. He is looking at his tweaks as replacing the whole, instead of looking at his tweaks as being parts and pieces of a variable, in action, moving moment to moment event. Where he gets off the boat it appears to me is when things go from a snapshot to a motion picture, and many people do. Many view this as something they can hold stable and never move. Vibration to them means something different from signal. They link vibration to distortion somehow instead of the needed function that it is and gives. "lets get rid of vibration" in other words instead of realizing that this vibration is the signal. They can't quite make the connection that the audio signal (electrical, mechanical and acoustical) is what's on the recording and stimulating every part in those three areas to the maximum gain that it can get. That's how energy works, but they (the tweaker) is trying to somehow cut the audio signal away from the part they feel is distortion. But here's what they don't get. Too much of cutting away of anything is within itself distortion.

Mechanics works like this. All the pieces and parts within the area of dissipation of the audio system has a play (a voice) in the presentation. And the audio trilogy is all for one and one for all. Energy is motion motivated in the audio spectrum, and while this varying signal is coming through this pathway because of it being part current means it is taking as much as giving and the other way around. This is what sets off (puts in motion) all three parts of the trilogy, and all three parts play a roll together until all the dissipation is done. Fascinating really. All three parts are playing out within the laws of energy, which means it wants to play out till it transfers into another form. What's cool about this is we aren't seeing it play we're hearing, and feeling it play, but if we aligned this energy out to it's fullest we would actually see colors (another talk for another time). As everyone of us is sitting in our listening chair the musical energy (all three parts) are working together surrounding you and on to the ends of it's dissipation. It doesn't know it is suppose to stop till it runs into something that makes it stop. Here's the cool part. If that signal is in tune (all the energy working form the same oscilation template) the actual recording will appear in your room. As you start to dampen this info, you start cutting back on how much of the whole you see, because the musical structure (fundamentals and their support harmonics) start to go out of tune. The more things go out of tune the more we start to see (hear) the stage do it's trade off, more of this less of that. We might make a tweak (change to the materials) and hear a part of the music do things really really well and hold our attention, but in time we start to see what is missing, usually by putting on another recording that we are very use to hearing on a previous setting. In time we realize that we made a change within the whole but it ended up being a trade and not a "better" or "improvement". That's not all bad, but it is the truth. There is an enormous amount of info on a recording, and you could be listening to ten % of it and be blown away, and there's absolutely nothing in the world wrong with this and to be honest you might never even know and it has no reflection on your hearing abilities. But just keep this in mind, there's a lot more if you want to go after it. The way to do this is to look at all that energy and see where you are stopping it short of it's potential motion to the end of it's dissipation. The longer you can keep it in-tune before the oscillation starts to stray the more of the recording you will hear.

This is why on my journey I have spent so much time on the room, and so much time on tuning the signal through transfer instead of what I did at one time like everyone else, stopping the signal too short on it's dissipation journey.

michael green
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toledo wrote:

Geoff,

Why put the quotes in if they are not part of your argument and overall thought process. Overlooking elements in the quest for simplicity is what that quote means.

I fail to see how you are able to make your determinations of ignoring or dismissing issues without full knowledge of what tuning is.

Once you understand the methodology and observe a tuned system, your opinions would have more weight.

At that point we will have done a full circle and will be left with observations aka listening and referencing being the sole determinant.

Funny how we always end up back to listening, hmmm ;)

Nobody could be more impressed than I am about low tech approaches to audio. I applaud you guys. I am also a big fan of going back in time, like to the 80s like you guys if necessary as long as it's worthwhile. Einstein also said, so it is said, everything's relative. For guys like yourself who was all frustrated with his sound and all I'm sure this tuning thing was just the ticket out of that audio hell.

Cheers,

Geoff I said it would be fun, I didn't say who for Kait
Machina Dynamica

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As a listener and tweaker and tunee, I would have to say that Toledo pretty much runs circles around you Geoff. Maybe you forgot but Toledo actually has a stereo system hooked up in his room and listens to it daily, whereas you have not a stereo hooked up in your room for over 7 years, and you decided to hang it up "and never looking back". So here you come up and call people names and put up pics showing your mentally, you suggest people do things on the fly without you ever listening to them and then you call people low tech who are obviously way beyond a guy who doesn't even have a stereo systems setup in his own listening room. That's a little scary at best.

You paint pictures of people being frustrated with their systems because they have moved past your tweaks after doing them. Now that's odd. I've seen people attempting tweaks cause stock doesn't get them there and people trying other tweaks cause the ones they've used don't do enough, but it's pretty strange for someone to paint such a negative picture of a "method of listening" especially one they have never done and admit to not understanding.

So you don't have a system

You don't tune

You don't understand tuning

and you still cut on people who do

You keep coming back to turn any thread you can into a mess if at all possible. Not just threads on tuning but any thread where someone has a different view than yours. I can see not agreeing and saying so but all out grade school stuff. Do you as an audio designer see this as ethical or even grown up behavior? Do you have friends in the audio business Geoff, and do you treat them with such disrespect, or is this just a side to your nature and people ignore you after a while as they have commented to me in private and can be read in public? I don't see what drives you to be so distructive. If it was something you looked into and you gave an impression than I could at least see where you were coming from but the way you let things fly without any point of reference seems irreverent and damaging to the industry you say you are a part of.

very sad for me to see

michael green
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Michael wrote,

"As a listener and tweaker and tunee, I would have to say that Toledo pretty much runs circles around you Geoff. Maybe you forgot but Toledo actually has a stereo system hooked up in his room and listens to it daily, whereas you have not a stereo hooked up in your room for over 7 years, and you decided to hang it up "and never looking back". So here you come up and call people names and put up pics showing your mentally, you suggest people do things on the fly without you ever listening to them and then you call people low tech who are obviously way beyond a guy who doesn't even have a stereo systems setup in his own listening room. That's a little scary at best."

Have you suffered memory loss? Maybe add try adding fish to your diet. I have a high end headphone system that comprises Sennheiser 600s, Woo Audio WA6 all tube SET amplifier with '52 Sylvania 6SN7s and '42 Tung Sol 5U4G coke bottle rectifier. Source is fully modded Oppo 103 from Ric Schultz at Electronic Visionary Systems. Cabling by Analysis Plus and Nordost. I have developed at least ten products in the last three or four years, and some were even developed before I assembled my current system. Lol.

Remember, eat more fish.

Where I come from the streets don't all stop at the edge of town.

I suspect you probably meant to say, "That's a little scary at least."

Cheers,

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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Hi Geoff

I think we know what you do have and what you don't have. What you do have is people using products to make their sound more to their taste that is available to everyone out there to order and use. Basically stock Mu Metal & Cork, something audiophiles have been using for years and years as a tweak. What you don't have is anyone yet who has used your particular designed product with favorable results, yet. I'm sure there will be but this is something that is not my problem.

The problem is you attack anyone who is not buying your stuff. Another problem is you assume others are like you. You thought we were going to pooh pooh the results that Bill and Dan are getting, and made a comment to that effect on their thread, but when you saw that we were happy for them as anyone we seeing giving something a try, your stuff or anyone elses, this got under your skin.

Next problem you have is you don't realize that the audio world is actually taking the time to read here. You think it's a private blog of some sort where people won't look like idiots when they act like it. Your vision is so narrow that you can't even see my agenda, and your playing right into it.

Next problem is you have exposed your limited system and facility of testing by posting a pic and the sin of ommision, again not realizing people are reading this. You attack others by posting jokes and put downs and pictures and all I have to do is say what you do and don't have. Makes my job rather easy. Geoff makes a comment about the audio system and michael reminds people Geoff doesn't have a complete in-room audio system. Geoff hasn't had one for 7 plus years yet still wishes to make comments about other's systems who are active listeners. If you simply pushed things for people to try like you did Bill & Dan and comment on things based on what you are actually doing, and gave people the right to express their views all would be find. However as you have and are showing everyone on a daily basis your not able to conduct yourself with respect for others unless they're feeding your pocket, or stroking your ego.

Sorry Geoff that your own posts come back to haunt you but I didn't write them, neither did costin, or jgossman or toledo or ChrisS nor anyone else. This is the internet Geoff and if you put it out there you have to be prepared for people to interpret it the way they see it.

As far as myself I'm going to keep on the path that has brought me this far. A main part of that path is to be open minded and continually exploring the different pathes traveled. I say because I do and for no other reason.

I wish you the best, I really do, but I feel your way could be maybe a little more honest and polite.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

geoffkait
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Dunno what your problem is, jealousy one supposes. Maybe you're just being intentionally dense. I am used to people misinterpreting what I say on the Internet. What else is new?

As Quint says to the other dude in reference to the shark in the movie Jaws, "He's either really smart or really dumb."

Cheers, Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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"I am used to people misinterpreting what I say on the Internet. What else is new?"

Your failure then is clear communication.

Or put another way, you succeed in willful obfuscation.

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Ain't my fault, buddy boy. I have a sneaking suspicion it's the education system.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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Even the rocket scientists can't figure you out.

It's been pointed out again and again that you don't have much to say, and what you say doesn't make much sense.

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!. I have products.

2. Buy them.

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Geoff Kait

The man without a home audio listening room setup speaks again. Do you readers understand that the guy in the center of all this stiring that goes on, doesn't even have a listening room stereo to compare with, to design with or even to debate with? You guys do realize this is going on right? He's talking about things you are listening to and causing stirs and hasn't even had a listening room audio setup for 7 years. I totally appreciate that he turned some guys on to an old tweak that has been around for 30 years, but he turns right around and dumps on the same guys because they found his tweaks to do something different than his claims.

I don't mind if someone wants to talk to me about stereo but please at least have one.

michael green
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Now you two nitwits knock it off before I clunk your heads together.

Photobucket Pictures, Images and Photos

Cheers,

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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This is what you do best, Geoff!

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ChrisS wrote:

This is what you do best, Geoff!

For being such a good sport you can have this to use for your avatar. No strings attached.

Photobucket Pictures, Images and Photos

Cheers,

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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It's called "Reaction of a common-sense guy when his horse tells him about Geoff's tweaks".

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Finding those "strings" of how you think amongst all your words makes reading your posts most intriguing.

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I took me half a page and about five (or was that six) posts to finally make him admit he misconstrued May Belt's affirmations on using her own tweaks. And when he did it he was not apologetic but rather had the reaction of a kid caught steeling ice cream from the freezer. I know old age bring people back to childhood but at least kids have limited Internet access.

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Not so much what Geoff says, because if you read closely, there's not much there. It's how he thinks that's most interesting. Just follow his pattern.

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But still he's a living example of "fuzzy logic" :)

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michael green wrote:

Geoff Kait

The man without a home audio listening room setup speaks again. Do you readers understand that the guy in the center of all this stiring that goes on, doesn't even have a listening room stereo to compare with, to design with or even to debate with? You guys do realize this is going on right? He's talking about things you are listening to and causing stirs and hasn't even had a listening room audio setup for 7 years. I totally appreciate that he turned some guys on to an old tweak that has been around for 30 years, but he turns right around and dumps on the same guys because they found his tweaks to do something different than his claims.

I don't mind if someone wants to talk to me about stereo but please at least have one.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

Since when did a headphone system stop being a stereo? Any who the hell are you to look down your nose on anyone who has chosen it as their method of enjoying music and evaluating changes to their system?

You need to get your narcissistic head out of your own ass.

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Hi Catch

We were not talking about headphones with any disrespect. I use them and love them. I was referencing not using headphones as an in-room system tweak.

I would also appreciate if your going to use a tone like that, not doing it in such a public and cowardly way. I'm sorry you have an axe to grind with me that goes beyond audio, but that's something to be dealt with in private and not splattered on public threads.

michael green
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You'll wkow that Geoff has plenty of tricks that are supposed to change the room response. So that makes it legit to ask how one can talk about room response without having a proper system for in-room listening.

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That's on his opening page. If his stuff doesn't work for somebody, they risk nothing. Well, maybe postage and a little time trying them.

I know nothing of his experience developing his products or what sort of systems he has utilized over his years of enjoying audio, but where he has ended up certainly wasn't where he started and if it works for someone, more power to them.

It's not that uncommon for people to gravitate more toward the "elegantly simple" as JA calls it, as they get older and more experienced.

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Catch,

Thats fine if Geoff gravitates to headphone listening for his personal listening and has products that he developed when he had a full system, although you would hope he would stay up to date on trends. Who's knows, actually, when he came out with those acoustic products.. I would have to look at the web archives to see what his web pages looked like 7-10 years ago ( if he had a web presence then.)

Just checked and frog in water, white poppy resonator introed to web in 2010, temple bell resonator and meanie wall dots in 2011 and I stopped at that point. Nothing accoustic before then as far as I can tell unless you consider his clock accoustic .. I only checked the price lists, so maybe they are somewhere else..who knows. It doesn't really matter to my main point below.

The conflict arises when he claims other techniques are low tech or cultish or any other dismissive statements.

He positions himself as an expert in all things audio but has neither the inclination nor the means to investigate these other methods.

How can one take the opinions of someone like that serious .. and he has been called out on it.

This is especially relevant to tuning since the basis of the method is the balancing of three key areas..electrical, mechanical and accoustic.

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I'd like to put this in context.

Geoff said

"There is no doubt that speakers, when I had them, are much more capable soundstage-wise than headphones; that's certainly one of the big challenges with headphones - to get as big and open and transparent and "realistic" a soundstage as possible. But I wouldn't say I was trying to get the soundstage my speakers, which were Fultons, had."

he continues

"I went from Fulton Nuances to Sennheiser HD600s six years ago and never looked back."

My question is, does this sound like someone who is qualified to give room acoustic advice, or be referencing his in-room sound with others who do have an in-room system?

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

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michael green wrote:

I'd like to put this in context.

Geoff said

"There is no doubt that speakers, when I had them, are much more capable soundstage-wise than headphones; that's certainly one of the big challenges with headphones - to get as big and open and transparent and "realistic" a soundstage as possible. But I wouldn't say I was trying to get the soundstage my speakers, which were Fultons, had."

he continues

"I went from Fulton Nuances to Sennheiser HD600s six years ago and never looked back."

My question is, does this sound like someone who is qualified to give room acoustic advice, or be referencing his in-room sound with others who do have an in-room system?

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

Geez, you act like room acoustics is some big mystery. It's not. Get over it! Every Yutz with ears who hasn't been asleep the last twenty five years knows all about comb filter effect, Helmholtz resonators, tiny little bowl acoustic resonators, diffusers, absorbers, Mpingo discs, SteinMusic Harmonizers, Ultra Tweeters, Schumann Frequency generators, Shakti Hallographs, Acoustic Revive Smakey Quartz crystals, Brilliant Pebbles crystals, clever little clocks, bowls of water. Unless you've been living in a cave the past 25 or 30 years. Wake up and smell the coffee!!

You and your industry types. Don't you even know It's not who you know, it's what you know. Hel-loo!

Geoff gee, did I really take theoretical physics in school? Kait
Machina Dynamica

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How can I get a money-back guarantee on his (in)famous "teleportation tweak" over the phone?
Should I just call him and say it didn't work so he better refund my $60? Or should I replay the noises back over the phone, as in "returning the goods"? Or, well, should I request another phone call with "cancelling tones" to get my refund?

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Actually, you're asking the wrong question. The real question is what can you do about it as a disgruntled customer if you find out it hurts the sound. I'm not saying this has actually happened, just hypothetically. The 30 day money back guarantee applies to all of my products including the Teleportation Tweak. On a related subject I have a policy of not selling to forum members. You know, what with the conflict of interest and everything.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

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And the answer is? Do you offer a "reversal sequence" or does the customer bear all the risk?

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The customer bears all the risk.

Geoff Kait
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geoffkait wrote:

The customer bears all the risk.

I wouldn't trust a surgeon to cut me if he used no knives at the table, so why should I trust you to "fix" my system since you don't seem to have one?

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No text

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Hi geoff

Could you break this down for the audiophile Yutz's.

"Geez, you act like room acoustics is some big mystery. It's not. Get over it! Every Yutz with ears who hasn't been asleep the last twenty five years knows all about comb filter effect, Helmholtz resonators, tiny little bowl acoustic resonators, diffusers, absorbers, Mpingo discs, SteinMusic Harmonizers, Ultra Tweeters, Schumann Frequency generators, Shakti Hallographs, Acoustic Revive Smakey Quartz crystals, Brilliant Pebbles crystals, clever little clocks, bowls of water. Unless you've been living in a cave the past 25 or 30 years. Wake up and smell the coffee!!"

Since your making references to this maybe you could tell us how you deal with them in your own system to start and then we can move on to others and you can guide them through. As for me I've used all these products and would like to compare notes. Since you say you have a method maybe you could walk us through it and we can do things with you as you go. I'm sure with your method your getting calls for walk throughs right?

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

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Considering the Hooterville crowd already believe in being able to hear what a system sounds like based on photos traveling over the internet? If sound can be teleported through pictures then surely it can be teleported by phone?

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And you could read the answer: if it works (but in a bad way) you can claim your $60 back but you're left with a bad-sounding $,$$$ (or even $$,$$$) system. Methink Geoff should buy mandatory malpractice insurance.

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