michael green wrote:

Hi Geoff

I currently don't have a cassette collection so I have been doing some cassette listening at a local audiophile/musician's home (cassette madman par excell-lant). Pays to have music friends :). I've only had one visit since your bringing up the cassettes, but can go back when needed. We looked up the model you showed in the picture WM222. And listened to it, as well as a few other portables. He also has a Sony Pro hooked up to main speakers by way of a tube dynaco. Based on this I hope to be able to better answer questions about the units, which some sounded pretty cool, however compared to even his in-room system do not really hold a candle, and his setup is far field against the wall.

Here's what I have noticed so far in comparison to one of my setups here. The portable soundstage is in your head mostly and doesn't give much of a frontal stage. My headphone setup as well as his give more of a 3D spread out sound. The 222 (your pictured player) sounds more like a toy compared to the Pro. Honestly I'm thinking this has more to do with the construction and the headphones.

In comparison to his Nakamichi cassette deck and Teac Reel to Reel, both of these slaughter the portables in staging. Also want to point out that he has begun to tune so these results may change.

I don't want to discourage people from these, just saying that they should be fairly picky as well as not think that these players are going to comepare to a well setup in-room system. At the same time if you don't have an in-room that is displaying a good stage, then the portables/with better headphones might just be the ticket.

As for Geoff saying these are a reference compared to a low mass setup in a good room, well honestly not even close, regardless of the noise he tries to make.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune

Sorry to be such a downer but you seem absolutely obsessed with soundstage. You know there is more to the music than soundstage, don't you? Besides, I already conceded soundstage superiority to speakers a long time ago, haven't you been paying attention? You're comparing the sport model to Pro model? Well, duh! I don't think you have picked up on the message yet. I never said the mid price Sport cassette player was any kind of reference system. You are putting words in my mouth for the umpteenth time.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

Sure I cannot stand idiocies like the "amoeba brain" and subliminal messages affecting the way we're listen to music (please notice: if I don't hear any changes then I'm lacking experience, it's not them selling snake oil).

I'm slowly moving ahead with my amplifier project but looks less simple than I initially thought: will have to separate PCBs and replace conventional PSUs with switch mode supply ones... well, I either do it properly or I won't do it at all.
Meanwhile, I wish all amoeba brain users of subliminal messages good luck!

>>> “Please, take me slowly and only use arguments that I can follow (no, the "amoeba brain" won't do it).” <<<

>>> “So you assert that putting a purple something in place of my green identical something will change the way I perceive sound, even if the coloured thingie is out of my visual range. Explain and I'll believe!” <<<

Let me start your brain working. You have a brain perfectly capable of reasoning just like everyone else.

If the scientists are correct, then every colour is of a different frequency.

If the scientists are correct, then all the frequencies but one are absorbed by an object (or material) IRRESPECTIVE of whether you can SEE it or not. In other words, it is happening, so there IS a difference taking place when you change a colour – even when the colour is not in your visual range.!!

Now, it is your turn to use your brain to reason out how such a change can affect the sound.

When I say “it is up to you now to start thinking” I am meaning that the onus is as much on you (that is if you are interested in music and obtaining good sound) as anyone else to be ‘thinking’ “HOW” can something like that have an effect on the sound.

Let me suggest one direction in which you thinking process could go.

Is there, in Nature, a particular frequency which denotes “danger” (i.e. Watch out, there’s danger about) ?

Is there, in Nature, a particular frequency which denotes “reassurance” (i.e It’s OK, you can relax now, the danger has gone away) ?

Could we (human beings) – NOT the actual audio frequencies of the music being played – but us – be who (what) is reacting to the different frequencies of the different colours ????????????

Food for thought.

AND, iosiP, you don’t need to be an electronics or audio or acoustic engineer to start the THINKING process !!

I don’t have the definitive answer (which is obviously what you are wishing from me) – merely that there HAS TO BE an ongoing thought process proceeding to try to attempt to explain how different colours can give different sounds – which they CAN – however much you don’t want to believe such.

Regards,
May Belt,
PWB Electronics.

Michael, I now suspect you probably should have listened to the audio dealers in Dayton, Ohio who told you many years ago that audiophiles don't want to purchase speakers that they have to tune for every single record. Instead you have made it your personal quest to shove tuning down peoples' throats. This obsession of yours explains the weird attitude and your penchant for name calling. I said it would be fun here on these threads but I didn't say for who. When you set yourself up as the paragon of sound there are bound to be consequences. Relax it's only rock and roll.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

That's what makes him happy?

So he's a little long winded. Who cares? He's not shoving anything down anyone's throat. I'm not spending my audio days loosening screws and taking covers off my equipment, etc. But it's interesting to me that HE is and that HE is approaching it in a somewhat scientific manner. Hypothesize, try it. Soak it in. Try again if you don't like it. I really don't know what your issue is. So much that you have to track down every parade to bless with your rain.

jgossman wrote:

That's what makes him happy?

So he's a little long winded. Who cares? He's not shoving anything down anyone's throat. I'm not spending my audio days loosening screws and taking covers off my equipment, etc. But it's interesting to me that HE is and that HE is approaching it in a somewhat scientific manner. Hypothesize, try it. Soak it in. Try again if you don't like it. I really don't know what your issue is. So much that you have to track down every parade to bless with your rain.

You both need to brush up on your reading comprehension skills if you think running the portable through a Dynaco into speakers is in any way comparable to what I have been talking about, you know, a much simpler earphone system, without all the shit that produces distortion. The cables, the wiring, the speaker magnets, the transformer. There's nothing scientific about it. Have you been asleep?

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

That's all.

I don't even know what you're getting at or where you're going. All you do is lob insults and change the subject.

jgossman wrote:

That's all.

I don't even know what you're getting at or where you're going. All you do is lob insults and change the subject.

This is what happens when I try to have a scientific discussion with someone with a high school equivalency. About time for that cold shower, eh?

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

From the point of view of our senses, this means that all comments written by you are constantly, by virtue of personal attacks and aggressivity, pointing to your ass and then to your mouth. This creates a most alarming and disconcerting situation for your stomach to attempt to resolve.

See original at http://pwbelectronics.co.uk/whatamess.html

too long!

When Michael ventures into the world, he has great discussions about tuning, he makes friends, he does a lot of business, he interacts with everybody.

When someone lets you out, you don't seem to do any of that.

Call a cab. Go home.

...of the community is a stretch. Like I said before, having a discussion with him is like trying to have a conversation with someone in a bar.

Talking to someone in a bar always allows you to say "sorryI'mgonnapee" and never come back again close to the moron. But here we have to make up do with what the moron says!

Oh yes, and any decent bar has bodyguards throwing out old incontinent drunkards. But looks like this forum has no moderators...

That's exactly how you treat someone like Geoff. Take your drink and head the other way...

There's really no need to enter into a discussion or "interact" with Geoff in any way. He doesn't really represent much in the audio community.

He's like that guy we all meet in a bar who's got a lot to say, but doesn't say anything. Looking at pages and pages of his entries on this forum, he's just annoying.

The mods/bouncers can put him in a cab and send him home. Or we just walk away.

Everything is topsy turvy. Me topsy, you turvy. Please advise when you figure out the difference between volume and dynamic range. Oh, wait a second, look who I'm talking to, the guy who thinks soundstage is the only performance parameter. My bad.

ChrisS - walk away from what? A drunk mumbling to himself? The rules of the game here are simple, even a drunk can remember them: I win, you lose.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

iosiP wrote:

Talking to someone in a bar always allows you to say "sorryI'mgonnapee" and never come back again close to the moron. But here we have to make up do with what the moron says!

Oh yes, and any decent bar has bodyguards throwing out old incontinent drunkards. But looks like this forum has no moderators...

Good one! Looking in the mirror again? There is only one rule here and that rule is I win, you lose.

Give my condolences to your liver.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

Spoken like one of "The Hollow Men"...

What's that fragrance., Eau de Vomit?

Geoff Kait
Machina dYNAMICA

It's not the light at the end of the tunnel.

michael green wrote:

Geoff

I can't speak for everyone but it appears that you giving meaning to audio terms is not exactly what the audio God's had in mind.

>>>>>>I describe things in my own terms. Why would I try to use someone else's words? If you don't understand what I am referring to then ask me to define my terms or get a better vocabulary. But limiting your audio vocabulary to SOUNDSTAGE seem way to restrictive and even self serving. I have already stated many times, I can't help it if it hasn't sunken in, that there are many audio parameters, characteristics, adjectives, that can and should be applied to the sound other than soundstage. If you wish to continue to presemt yourself as some sort of soundstage freak be my guest.

you again said

"Everything is topsy turvy. Me topsy, you turvy. Please advise when you figure out the difference between volume and dynamic range. Oh, wait a second, look who I'm talking to, the guy who thinks soundstage is the only performance parameter. My bad."

Do you really want to keep making statements like this?

>>>>>Why not? You are presenting yourself as someone who puts soundstage above everything else. Even to the exclusion of everything else.

This is showing you don't know very much about recording or playback. Calling recording engineers names is not going to win you any friends in almost any part of this industry.

>>>>>I called them names? Where is that? Are you now saying you have not called anyone names here? Boy, what a hypocrite! Your memory is conveniently missing in action.

If people wish to go back and read, they can see where and how all the parts to the recording are found inside of the soundstage, it's what stereo is. Tone, dynamics, volume, value, harmonic structures, space, time, pace, pitch are all inside of the Soundstage. The soundstage is like the Earth's atmosphere. Inside of this evironment are all the elements that hold the parts and pieces together. Saying any of these parts can operate independent of the stage is physically impossible as they are all pieces of a whole. That "whole" is the actual recording itself, and if not able to be played as the "whole", meaning real size and space, than the conclusion is, not all the recording is being played back. This means that any one of those parts and pieces have something missing until the whole is achieved.

>>>>>Again with the soundstage is everything. The soundstage is like the Earth's atmosphere? Is that what audio engineers think? Really? What ever happened to transparency, pitch, tone, rhythm, bass response, musicality, air, and snap, crackle and pop?! It is quite possible to have a great soundstage and not have all the rest, happens all the time. It's actually better to have a good vocabulary when trying to describe the sound you hear to someone else, someone who cannot BE there to hear it for himself. You know, as opposed to trying to describe the sound of someone's system by looking at a picture of the system or the room.

You can't look at a globe and decide your going to start removing states countries or even continents and assume your looking at the whole globe. You can look at parts and pieces close up, but you can't say this is the world until you back up and take a look at the whole thing, and the whole thing in context of how it works. It's the globe and all the energies that keep showing themselves as you keep opening up and pulling back.

>>>>>>Actually, and I realize you have a short memory for these things, there are many things WRONG with playback systems, especially digital systems. That is why it is important, well, critical to find the problems that exist and attempt to correct them. Otherwise, what's the expression, you're just burying your head in the sand. It is just as possible to get soundstage without tone and without pitch and without details as it is to get great tone, air and pitch, without a great soundstage as you can with headphones. That is the reason why many folks prefer headphones I suspect. It is for me. Unless you address the scattered laser light, the magnetic fields in cables, the transformer magnetic fields, and the vibration in circuit boards and the other things I've been talking about you are living in a Fool's Paradise.

Saying the Stage is the whole is exactly how it works. The Earth doesn't do so well when you don't include the universe (space). So looking at something like tonal qualities for example is only like looking at a forcast in a particular area on the planet and how it works over a particular mass. It's not the whole picture at all, it's just what's going on in that particular spot in the soundstage.

>>>>>>Goodness, you do go on. What about transparency, air, pitch, etc. Etc.?

The body works the same way. You can limit yourself to take in the audio through the ears only or you can open the event up to involve all of you (vibrations).

>>>>>>Oh, geez, here we go again with the vibrations. Well, I am going to throw my hands up in the air!! I suspect we have beat this baby to death. There is no better example of the BACKFIRE EFFECT in all of these threads than your "let the vibrations be free" argument. If it were really true that vibrations are good for the sound, I have an idea for a new Tuning product for you, a shaker table. If you won't listen to reasons and isolate the components from vibration at least you can vibrate the crap out of them. Shake it Don't Break it! Or maybe Shake and Bake, lol

So, what I see Geoff doing is first choosing to take in the music with only a small part of his body, and then limiting his focus to the state of Nebraska and claiming it as the whole music experience. That's cool if he is going to retire in Nebraska, but if he is planing to travel to other recordings and hear the world he's going to need to do it by means of the soundstage. You can't squeeze the music into one sound incomplete, and call it right. Sorry but this is how recordings are and how they are meant to work. Looking at the Nebraska road map might be fun, but there's a big world out there.

>>>>>>Well, actually that's not what I'm doing at all. What I am doing is finding problems and solving them. See, that's not too hard to understand. Problems like static electricity, magnetic fields, the Vibrating Earths crust, the vibrating Transformer, the vibrating capacitors, scattered background scattered light. All of which I have already pointed out. At this point in time I get the distinct impression that I'm pissing up a rope.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune
http://tuneland.techno-zone.net/

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

Aside from name calling some more what can you tell me about how you deal with scattered laser light and the magnetic fields in transformers and speaker magnets and the induced magnetism in cables and wires and how you deal with RFI/EMI. And please do tell how you deal with the directionality of fuses and wires and cables. And I'm expecting something beyond the usual pablum response of "we deal with all of those things." You cannot get rid of them with a wave of the hair.

Which name are you thinking of adopting for your Tuning Foundation, Shake 'N Bake or Shake it Don't Break it?

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

geoffkait, Ive been pissed off for months about how the treble sounds on my CDs. I tried switching to better speakers. Same sound. I bought a better player(Marantz SACD player). Same sound. The top end sounds something like ( Ive given this a lot of thought), a steel cookie pan with a hundred bb's rolling around on it. In fact, the better equipment seems to make it even worse. The only CDs I have which has a listenable high end are Classical. Maybe it's the way pop and rock are recorded?

Yes, that's the primary issue, the treble. There are things you can do to improve it, to make it less harsh, less irritating, more natural, more detailed, more extended, with more air, but a lot of effort is generally required. That's why the humble cassette is such a Godsend. Beautiful, flesh out and extended treble. CDs just don't have the sweetness, the air, the naturalness of tape.

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the King's horses, And all the King's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again!

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

For it's faults, cassette is the most "immediate" and tactile format - including LP currently available. Little music is released on cassette anymore, but it is, especially if you get a good Nakamichi or Teac deck from the late 80's or 90's in most ways a superior format to CD. The one area where it is better, dynamic range, doesn't matter because no recording engineer takes advantage of it anyway. The siblance in most vocals especially.

jgossman wrote:

For it's faults, cassette is the most "immediate" and tactile format - including LP currently available. Little music is released on cassette anymore, but it is, especially if you get a good Nakamichi or Teac deck from the late 80's or 90's in most ways a superior format to CD. The one area where it is better, dynamic range, doesn't matter because no recording engineer takes advantage of it anyway. The siblance in most vocals especially.

That's precisely what they said about digital, all we need is a better mechanism, or better DAC, better, speakers, better sample rates, and all the rest of it. As Roger Miller put it so well, You Can't Roller Skate in a Buffalo Herd. A relatively cheap and relatively UN-technically advanced cassette player will kick an expensive CD player's ass any day of the week in most ways that matter. Digital was the single most obvious con job ever perpetrated on an unsuspecting naive public.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

I prefer analog, but a well recorded CD still gets my juices flowing. A poorly engineered recording, of which there are many, and poor in a variety of ways not limited to simply going way over the top with compression, are far more objectionable in a system put together to reproduce the really good recordings in the best way possible.

A well engineered recording will sound good on ANY system, but a poorly engineered recording will only sound acceptable on a system with very limited capabilities to begin with.

michael green wrote:

Geoff

Have you compared your portable tape players vs tape decks?

michael green
MGA/RoomTune
http://tuneland.techno-zone.net/

No, I haven't. Have you?

Geoff Kait
machine Dynamica

michael green wrote:

Hi Geoff yes I have. It was part of my job as tape runner.

michael green
MGA/RoomTune
http://tuneland.techno-zone.net/

So, let me ask you, what does that have to do with the price of spinach since my whole point has to do with comparing a portable cassette player to CD? I do have a Sony Cassette Walkman Professional model here if that helps.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

geoffkait wrote:

jgossman wrote:

For it's faults, cassette is the most "immediate" and tactile format - including LP currently available. Little music is released on cassette anymore, but it is, especially if you get a good Nakamichi or Teac deck from the late 80's or 90's in most ways a superior format to CD. The one area where it is better, dynamic range, doesn't matter because no recording engineer takes advantage of it anyway. The siblance in most vocals especially.

That's precisely what they said about digital, all we need is a better mechanism, or better DAC, better, speakers, better sample rates, and all the rest of it. As Roger Miller put it so well, You Can't Roller Skate in a Buffalo Herd. A relatively cheap and relatively UN-technically advanced cassette player will kick an expensive CD player's ass any day of the week in most ways that matter. Digital was the single most obvious con job ever perpetrated on an unsuspecting naive public.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica

So all the effort Sony, Nakamichi, JVC, etc. put into getting S/N ratio to levels exceeding that of most CDP's (around 89db - approaching that of the associated solid state electronics) and the effort Nakamichi put toward surpassing R2R wow and flutter numbers, which they had done on pretty much all decks by the mid 80's and were nearing unmeasurable by the 90's - that was all for naught? All that had nothing to do with the depth and width of the sound stage of say a Nakamichi LX-5 or the power and dynamics of a Tascam 122?

I'm happy you found the joy's of the "lowly" (said with a dose of irony) cassette, but this is an exercise in futility if you'd rather listen to tapes on your walkman than my old (and sold :( ) LX-5, the 480 I'm repairing, or my once mighty 581 which has unfortunately become a parts deck (it is nearly 40 years old). Or for that matter the lowly low end Sony now in my system or the Technics M7 I'm restoring.

I understand the joy of discovering something is better than it should be, but being skeptical of something that is clearly better? I don't get it.

geoffkait wrote:

So, let me ask you, what does that have to do with the price of spinach since my whole point has to do with comparing a portable cassette player to CD?

The point is simple: if you did compare and found the tape deck sounds better your whole theory about "look ma, no transformers" goes down the drain.

Hi, Micheal. Better equipment can, indeed,make a CD sound sound worse because it reveals the shortcomings of the recording and the medium (CD)which were not apparent on lesser gear. The distortion was always there, but my previous system's frequency response wasn't reproducing it as accurately.
I just received from Music Direct a High-Fidelity Pure-Audio Blu Ray of Supertramps"Crime of the Century". It blew me away. I've finally heard something which makes owning a Hi-Fi system worth it. NO HIGH-FREQUENCY DISTORTION!!! The piano sounds as if it's in the room with you. You can actually hear the wood cabinet of the piano. Anyone who's heard an actual piano in real life knows what I mean. The dynamic range is awesome. I've never heard anything like it in my living room. The disc is 24bit/192Khz. The crescendo in "Crime of the Century", starting with the drumbeats, had me sitting there in disbelief. This is the format I'm buying from now on. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of titles available on this format.I'm going to order a Diane Krall disc, and Supertramps "Breakfast in America" My speakers(Polk Rtia5's) finally sounded the way they,re supposed to. I can't believe the crappy quality of most regular CD's. The only ones that sound decent to me are "The Traveling Wilburys" And Robert Plants "Principal of Moments". The Beatles "Let it Be" sounds surprisingly good.

But it never lessened my enjoyment of my CD's. My Arcam CD 72, another unit I wish I'd never sold, really made some recordings sound pretty terrible compared to the Denon DCD 1520 (I think) that I was using before. That said, the best recordings I had met and sometimes surpassed the commercial release on both LP and cassette via both my Nak's. It was a VERY good CD player. And one day I may get another now that they are cheap. It's nice when a unit is so good that it becomes THE ubiquitous audiophile player. When you want one used, there are hundreds for sale at any given time!

Just because we all (almost) agree that the cassette and LP are often superior to CD doesn't mean you abandon the format. That would be silly.

What would you listen to on those excellent cassette decks? AFAIQ there is no offer for pre-recorded cassettes (and anyhow most of the old ones were dubbed on high-speed machines with horrible results).
BTW, I am shopping for a R2R machine but this will be just for fun, to make my own selections from my CD collection (yes, I could easily do this on my computer but then there is the magic of the spinning reels).

iosiP wrote:

geoffkait wrote:

So, let me ask you, what does that have to do with the price of spinach since my whole point has to do with comparing a portable cassette player to CD?

The point is simple: if you did compare and found the tape deck sounds better your whole theory about "look ma, no transformers" goes down the drain.

Well, if you go back and read what I said there was a lot more to it than just the transformer, but you're getting warm. Besides, I was unaware tape decks had big transformers in them. Maybe you're confusing them with amplifiers, who knows. In addition, have you forgotten the fine work with mu metal reported by the two dudes from Pittsburgh? Hint: we already know that transformers are bad for the sound. You can scratch it off your list of controversial audio topics.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dramatica

You wrote

Quote:

Here we go: no transformers, no capacitors, no big motors, full range transducers I.e., no crossovers in the earphone drivers, very lightweight transducers for lightning fast transient response, no cabling, no electronics boxes, no chassis, no house power, no ground so no ground issues, relative immunity to RFI/EMI, no room anomalies to worry Po me anymore, no thin, bass shy, tizzy synthetic CD sound due to a while raft of ills, including scattered laser light, out of round CDs, no seismic isolation, etc. etc., etc.

Now let me see:
1. A cassette deck has transformers, so it should sound worse than the walkman (FIY, a 3-motor deck requires a bigger transformer than your usual CD player).
2. A 3-motor deck has "more motor" than a CD player, so it should sound worse than the walkman.
3. Full-range transducers? For me, full range means 20Hz to 20kHz. How does an organ concert sound on the earphones, and what "dynamics" can you get from them??
4. Yes you are right about the rest but my argument still stands: if a cassette deck (with all the transformers, capacitors, motors, cabling, electronics boxes, chassis, house power, ground etc. etc., etc.) sounds better than the walkman what exactly remains valid from your arguments?

P.S. You can use the same headphones on a cassette deck (at least most of them).