The Audiophoolery Thread.

[Radio Wrangler]

Remember that humour can be a very powerful weapon.

Mr Churchill sent people out to fight Mr Hitler with battleships, bombs and guns. Mr Hitler planned that when he'd won, he would keep Mr Churchill captive in relative luxury, to be displayed to Mr Hitler's guests.

Mr Chaplin made a film taking the mickey out of Mr Hitler. Mr Hitler's plans for Mr Chaplin were very nasty indeed. He could handle being bombed, but not being laughed at.

Perhaps the most extreme example possible, but humour should be used carefully. Its effects can be, um, disproportionate.

I enjoy taking the micky out of audiophile beliefs, but I try not to aim at the audiophiles personally. I want to leave them an escape route to change their minds and decide that they never really believed in it anyway, and to move towards light and reason (and maths).

A famous football team manager with a bit of a dry sense of humour came out with "Football isn't a matter of life and death... it's more important than that." Some people hold comparable beliefs over audio, but I doubt whether humour is involved.

David

[Jez1234]

That's a great post David! I wish I could see it in such a light hearted and anodyne way myself.

I do this for a living (amp repairs, modifications, design and very small scale manufacture now and then etc) and when I get people who admit they don't know a resistor from a radish saying that the laws of physics don't count when it comes to hi fi, that people like myself are "'measurebators' staring into their instruments who just don't get even the basics, as witnessed by your refusal to admit that the Russ Abbott super fuses at £120 each are the greatest advance in hi fi tech in years, I wouldn't bring my hi fi to be worked on by a blah blah so called engineer like you" etc etc, I've been known to lose my temper rather... Luckily I'm "preaching to the converted" on this forum

Believe me I could rant on for 5000 words on this such are the battles I've had over the last ten years or so!

[Julesomega]

diyaudio.com is a mixture of useful data, particularly for schematics of your old hi-fi separates, while pandering to the Faithful audiophile community. You have to sign up to get any downloads, and they occasionally email me about new articles from the Priesthood

Today I got an email linking to a new design, about a "V-MOS" amplifier. "Um" I thought, and got my google out, to discover that it is the way power MOSFETs have been made since they emerged from the laboratory and went into production. It refers to the V formation through the layers. The author has designed his output stage using P-channel 2SJ28 devices, and is promising to make a new design using the equivalent N-ch 2SK82. The datasheets describe both as low on-resistance fast switching MOSFETs offering better heat dissipation and lower prices with higher breakdown voltages, suitable for switching regulators and pulse circuits. I guess this is what the Philes are looking for..?

[Ted Kendall]

Originally Posted by Jez1234

That's a great post David! I wish I could see it in such a light hearted and anodyne way myself.

I do this for a living (amp repairs, modifications, design and very small scale manufacture now and then etc) and when I get people who admit they don't know a resistor from a radish saying that the laws of physics don't count when it comes to hi fi, that people like myself are "'measurebators' staring into their instruments who just don't get even the basics, as witnessed by your refusal to admit that the Russ Abbott super fuses at £120 each are the greatest advance in hi fi tech in years, I wouldn't bring my hi fi to be worked on by a blah blah so called engineer like you" etc etc, I've been known to lose my temper rather... Luckily I'm "preaching to the converted" on this forum

Believe me I could rant on for 5000 words on this such are the battles I've had over the last ten years or so!

Leave 'em to it - life's too short.

[Radio Wrangler]

I thoroughly enjoyed the Russ Abbott jest.

There are several styles of power MOSFET. DMOS is a double-diffused sort, done in lateral form as LDMOS and it's the technology I've been recently using at 300W at 1090MHz (the frequency is a dead give-away for the application) There's somewhere over 10,000 of these out there. The V-MOS sort are quite tough, but confined to relatively lowish frequencies. IR brought out their range of hexagonal-cell power MOSFETs and were the first real runaway success.

In Audio, Hitachi did well with the first range of VMOS devices, but they're long out of production. They're what's in my amplifier, next door. The 'philes eschewed them when they were current. On the plus side they are triodes. They're not heated of course, but is that not heat direct or indirect? Because heat is dissipated directly into the channel, what heat there is is direct. Bingo. How could they have missed this?

David

[Philips210]

Originally Posted by Radio Wrangler

It's sole purpose is for showing-off. You don't think anyone is going to spend much time listening to music with it, do you?

You'll also need a ferrari stopwatch to time how long it takes before a visitor is told what it cost.

David

Note the subtle differene between listening to music with it, and listening to it.

I can just imagine Stan and Pam Herbert (Harry Enfield & Chums Series 1) bragging to their equally rich (well almost) friends how much the system cost but they would of course stress that "We are considerably richer than yow."

Regards,
Symon

[Craig Sawyers]

Originally Posted by Jez1234

Russ Abbott super fuses at £120 each

Well that is not actually true if you took the trouble to look at Russ Andrews site. Sure they are expensive, but nothing like £120.

Craig

[Julesomega]

Had to check on eBay: there are much better deals to be had

"HiFi Tuning Audiophile Fuses are made from ceramic bodies which are tuned for resonance control. Inside the fuses you’ll find pure silver wiring which is precisely calibrated for its rated capacity. This silver filament is then connected to pure silver end caps which are coated with a heavy layer of 24K Gold for better signal transfer and protection from corrosion" £34.94 free postage

100 times better than Screwfix, I'll be bound

[bikerhifinut]

Originally Posted by Julesomega

Had to check on eBay: there are much better deals to be had

"HiFi Tuning Audiophile Fuses are made from ceramic bodies which are tuned for resonance control. Inside the fuses you’ll find pure silver wiring which is precisely calibrated for its rated capacity. This silver filament is then connected to pure silver end caps which are coated with a heavy layer of 24K Gold for better signal transfer and protection from corrosion" £34.94 free postage

100 times better than Screwfix, I'll be bound

Has anyone told the electrons how priveliged they are to go back and forth ( I assume it's AC) through such rich and pure routing?

I'll get my coat......................

[bikerhifinut]

Originally Posted by Radio Wrangler

Remember that humour can be a very powerful weapon.

Mr Churchill sent people out to fight Mr Hitler with battleships, bombs and guns. Mr Hitler planned that when he'd won, he would keep Mr Churchill captive in relative luxury, to be displayed to Mr Hitler's guests.

Mr Chaplin made a film taking the mickey out of Mr Hitler. Mr Hitler's plans for Mr Chaplin were very nasty indeed. He could handle being bombed, but not being laughed at.

Perhaps the most extreme example possible, but humour should be used carefully. Its effects can be, um, disproportionate.

I enjoy taking the micky out of audiophile beliefs, but I try not to aim at the audiophiles personally. I want to leave them an escape route to change their minds and decide that they never really believed in it anyway, and to move towards light and reason (and maths).

A famous football team manager with a bit of a dry sense of humour came out with "Football isn't a matter of life and death... it's more important than that." Some people hold comparable beliefs over audio, but I doubt whether humour is involved.

David

"The great Dictator" if you havent seen it you ought to, especially in todays febrile atmosphere.
I remember as a newbie in the forum having a giggle with David about venezualean beaver hair and chipfat dielectric capacitors.
I've got some friends in the serious pro audio and hi Fi business and they are embarrassed by some of the stuff spouted in the popular press. Nuff said there.
I've been pilloried in fora for being sceptical, (and all that means is questioning, curious and wanting to know more) about the "sound" of components especially when I see people building circuits that defy the laws of electronics.
What do I know anyway?
Not as much as a lot of you guys. But by experience, a lot of it painful, all of it educational, I have learnt at a fairly basic level that stuff like layout and earthing runs makes a shedload more difference than any amount of silver plated wire, expensive exotic capacitors with weird often organic lipid based dielectrics, resistors with expensive wire leads, most of which gets snipped off after soldering, OH GOD WHERE DO I STOP?
I've had fun though revisiting old circuits, and what I consider a bit of a golden era of the 80s and 90s of dedicated audio chips etc and rediscovering that we didn't have it so bad then.
Sorry on a rant.

Andy.

[Radio Wrangler]

But the level of customer service in this area of the market is so good that if you needed a £120 fuse to match the correct proportion of your whole system cost, someone would soon develop one for you. 'Egress' would be a good brand name. With a silhouette of a small female eagle perched on a turnstile as the logo, of course.

David

[bikerhifinut]

Unfortunately for those wishing to turn a quick buck, It's a tiny market.

I'm wishing i hadn't, during a bit of lockdown ennui, paid for a year subscription to what I thought was one of the few remaining serious audio comics.

If I read one more review of a £800 for 2m length of loudspeaker wire, I shall quite likely turn to the genuine and ancient stone circle across the river and pray to the (more likely to be genuine) primeval gods for release.

Andy. Slightly but only slightly, tongue in cheek.

[GrimJosef]

Originally Posted by Radio Wrangler

... if you needed a £120 fuse ... someone would soon develop one for you ...

They already have

https://www.futureshop.co.uk/synergistic-research-blue-high-end-uk-13a-fuse

Specification

Fuse Size: 25.4mm
Fuse Rating: 13A
Ceramic Body
Silica Filled
Brass Nickel Plated Contacts
1,000,000 volt Quantum Treatment
2nd Stage Rev. 2.0 Molecular realignment process
Directional
UEF Treatment 2.0
Graphene
Recommended use with UK Mains Plugs
Warranty: 12 Months


The 12 month warranty is pure genius.

Cheers,

GJ

[Radio Wrangler]

When I see the price and VAT of that item and think that it's working to reduce, even if slightly, the tax burden for the rest of us, I experience the strange feeling of being glad to see VAT.

David

[Buzby123]

On the LessLoss site is an object with an even greater profit margin, just a shiny lump of metal.

Anybody with a lathe and a bottle of Brasso can get into this lucrative market.

https://www.lessloss.com/blackbody-p-200.html

[Craig Sawyers]

I thought that the complete nonsense that was being talked was bad enough - until I saw the price. I don't have it in me to even laugh because it is so sad.

But they can get away with that sort of nonsense in the US. Here we have the ASA overseeing advertising standards.

[GrimJosef]

There is always the cost of the advertising to take into account. I suspect these things don't sell themselves.

Cheers,

GJ

[Craig Sawyers]

This is the outfit behind the fuse https://www.synergisticresearch.com/ . American. Just look at what their stuff looks like. Dear oh dear.

The UK futureshop.co.uk need to be very careful about their wording, because they are claiming that the purchase will hear certain things. You can't do that. You can say that in their own listening tests that certain things were heard, but say that is no guarantee that the customer will hear the same thing.

[GrimJosef]

Originally Posted by Craig Sawyers

I thought that the complete nonsense that was being talked was bad enough ...

I wondered about the 1,000,000 volt quantum treatment. Probably the cheapest way of achieving that would be simply to irradiate the whole device with megavolt particles. A domestic ionisation smoke-detector contains a small quantity of Am-241 which emits 5.4MeV alpha particles. Since they're radioactive you're not supposed to tinker with them. But for the sake of the art maybe buying a couple and chopping your way into the irradiated zone would be acceptable ?

Cheers,

GJ

[Craig Sawyers]

I have tried the game at orchestral concerts of closing my eyes and listening as if it was a audio system.

Invariably I find myself thinking "Sounds muffled. And the imaging is lousy". But that is the way it actually is.

Indeed Wagner, in his design spec for the Festspielhaus at Bayreuth, the orchestra pit plays through a slot so that the music emerges amorphously and does not detract from the singing. Bad orchestral imaging by design.