Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

[Pete Schumacher]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Hi, Jeff. Back in early '83 I participated in a blind test between a Philips CD player and a Nakamichi Dragon with TDK metal tape using the same source material. The factory guy was relating how the two were indistinguishable in reproduction and CD's offered "Perfect Sound Forever" (remember that?) I scored 10/10 in 3 separate sittings, judging the Nak superior in every criteria in each trial. I was not alone. My fellow recording engineers Eric Larson and Tim Rich did the same. Mike Wolfe, the recordist for the NM Symphony at the time, walked out of the room remarking about "sound from a tin can". Brings back happy memories :D

Dave

AJ just may be too young to remember.

AJ, Jeff was right. That was all the talk, not just marketing, but from the engineers who created the technology. It all looked great on paper, but the issues with jitter and anti-aliasing filters weren't caught until much later.

CD reproduction isn't quite as simple as a resistor though.

[davidl]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

I think this thread needs CLOSED considering all the hotheads in here. Notice I said hotheads as in plural because it's not just one person stirring the pot, there's 2 or maybe 3 in here guilty :rolleyes:

[dlr]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

You can read it anyway you wish Dave. I'm simply stating that I read "Perfect Sound Forever" as a manufacturers ad slogan and not something on par with Faraday's Law of Induction, like you may have. Just a different perspective or recollection of something past. I guess we are all subjectivists after all.

cheers,

AJ

Of course "Perfect Sound Forever" was a marketing slogan. Do you take every one of us for complete fools? Maybe I shouldn't ask that, even rhetorically, given your predilection for sarcasm in posting.

The people writing articles, letters to editors, etc., none of those were based on the slogan. It was a real debate. The fact that you can't remember it doesn't mean it did not happen. How about showing a tiny bit of recognition that there are life experiences outside of yours?

dlr

[Guest]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Hi, Jeff. Back in early '83 I participated in a blind test between a Philips CD player and a Nakamichi Dragon with TDK metal tape using the same source material. I scored 10/10 in 3 separate sittings. Mike Wolfe, the recordist for the NM Symphony at the time, walked out of the room remarking about "sound from a tin can".

Did you attribute this to the CD format itself, the lack of Mills resistors in the Phillips, the 14bit resolution, the cheap opamps, the different cables on each component, the switcher, sunspot activity that day, etc? Exactly what did you listen-through isolate it to?

The factory guy was relating how the two were indistinguishable in reproduction and CD's offered "Perfect Sound Forever" (remember that?)
Dave

The factory guy? Hmmm, I know who the family guy and the cable guy are, but I've never heard of the factory guy. What was his expertise? Sales? Marketing?

cheers,

AJ

[Guest]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Of course "Perfect Sound Forever" was a marketing slogan.
The people writing articles, letters to editors, etc., none of those were based on the slogan. It was a real debate.
dlr

Ok, the debate wasn't about the slogan that is being repeatedly quoted. So what was it about?

cheers,

AJ

[Jeff B.]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

I think this thread needs CLOSED considering all the hotheads in here. Notice I said hotheads as in plural because it's not just one person stirring the pot, there's 2 or maybe 3 in here guilty :rolleyes:

Who are the hotheads? I must be missing something, because I am reading this on a friendlier scale without the agitation normally associated with "hotheads". I guess it is all in how you choose to read something. And I don't understand why the tread necessarily needs to be closed just because people may see something differently.

[dlr]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Ok, the debate wasn't about the slogan that is being repeatedly quoted. So what was it about?

cheers,

AJ

Two things minimum. One, that CD sounded bad in comparison to analog reproduction. Knowing the variability of analog, I didn't pay much attention to this as I didn't put a lot of money into the front end back then. They didn't know whether it was "the CD format itself, the lack of Mills resistors in the Phillips, the 14bit resolution, the cheap opamps" or any other part. They mostly didn't claim to know. They simply said that the marketing departments were full of [email protected] They certainly did not accept "Perfect Sound Forever". Except for those die-hard objectivists that looked at CD technology, the Nyquist theorem, then pronounced that CD could not be bad.

Two, that CD players really did not all sound the same. The objectivists mostly scoffed at this. No one could hear a difference between two properly performing players. I mostly fell in line with the objectivists before I ever dropped a dime on CD. Being an EE, I knew that they had to be right and that those subjectivists were "hearing things". Only problem was, it went on for a long, long time. I actually started to have doubts, much to my chagrin. There couldn't be much variation in playback, they all had those measurements that proved that they were all very close to each other, just like they used THD to prove that there could not be a difference heard in any amp that had good THD numbers. Proof.

Then one day along comes this engineer who trusted himself enough to do some real research to find out why he thought there was a difference. That was the advent of jitter measurement.

Enough of that.

dlr

[Guest]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

AJ just may be too young to remember.

Or perhaps it's lacunar amnesia?

CD reproduction isn't quite as simple as a resistor though.

Au contraire, mon ami.

Who are the hotheads? I must be missing something, because I am reading this on a friendlier scale without the agitation normally associated with "hotheads". I guess it is all in how you choose to read something. And I don't understand why the tread necessarily needs to be closed just because people may see something differently.

Jeff are you familiar with the people who get really angry listening to talk radio? Everyday. Even though their tuning buttons and knobs aren't broken?

Two things minimum. One, that CD sounded bad in comparison to analog reproduction. Knowing the variability of analog, I didn't pay much attention to this as I didn't put a lot of money into the front end back then. They didn't know whether it was "the CD format itself, the lack of Mills resistors in the Phillips, the 14bit resolution, the cheap opamps" or any other part. They mostly didn't claim to know. They simply said that the marketing departments were full of [email protected] They certainly did not accept "Perfect Sound Forever". Except for those die-hard objectivists that looked at CD technology, the Nyquist theorem, then pronounced that CD could not be bad.

Two, that CD players really did not all sound the same. The objectivists mostly scoffed at this. No one could hear a difference between two properly performing players. I mostly fell in line with the objectivists before I ever dropped a dime on CD. Being an EE, I knew that they had to be right and that those subjectivists were "hearing things". Only problem was, it went on for a long, long time. I actually started to have doubts, much to my chagrin. There couldn't be much variation in playback, they all had those measurements that proved that they were all very close to each other, just like they used THD to prove that there could not be a difference heard in any amp that had good THD numbers. Proof.

Then one day along comes this engineer who trusted himself enough to do some real research to find out why he thought there was a difference. That was the advent of jitter measurement.

Enough of that.

dlr

So are you going to buy the jitterbug late 80's player for the next DIY at your place or not? Maybe you can invite "the factory guy" too.

cheers,

AJ

[Jeff B.]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Ok, the debate wasn't about the slogan that is being repeatedly quoted. So what was it about?

cheers,

AJ

It was about the fact that the engineers themselves - nearly every single one them that I read reports and papers from - that created the digital audio technology were saying this about CD reproduction. This statement wasn't about whether they were right, or their reasons for making the statements, or whether it was obvious to anyone listening to different players that it wasn't true; the statement was about the fact that they still said this. Yes, they were the engineers and scientists, and it was the overwhelming majority of them, and it happened, and that part is simply a fact of our history on the subject. You can't really debate whether it happened or not, because it simply did. I guess you can deny it took place, but that's just silly, and would have the same credibility as saying the Apollo missions were faked :eek:. ........And that's the whole point of this wayward thread - that people, especially engineers and scientists, often take positions that are later clearly proved to be wrong once a greater understanding of the subject known. It has been this way all through history, and it will continue to be this way for a long time to come too. And this is why we are talking about all of this in thread on Mills resistors. And I have not said what I think of the resistors one way or the other. I am just stating a fact about the past. :rolleyes:

[davidl]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Who are the hotheads? I must be missing something, because I am reading this on a friendlier scale without the agitation normally associated with "hotheads". I guess it is all in how you choose to read something. And I don't understand why the tread necessarily needs to be closed just because people may see something differently.

You're kidding right? DBE, AJ and DLR are close to being really stupidly rude to each other if not already. Whatever, you guys just duke it out and keep throwing the insults.....I'm done with your childishness in this thread

[dbe]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

I think this thread needs CLOSED considering all the hotheads in here. Notice I said hotheads as in plural because it's not just one person stirring the pot, there's 2 or maybe 3 in here guilty :rolleyes:

As one of your guilty parties, I would ask the you reread the thread from the point that it deteriorated to the spitfest that is going on. You might also want to do a search on the offender's posts and see the overall tone of each's posts. I think you will find that there are some that derive their satisfaction from belittling other's points of view, no matter what those may be.

AJ (and Daryl) and I go way back with either or both jumping in to any thread that I post in that asks a subjective question. Difference between them and me is that I have actually tried, use and sometimes even measured the things that I post about, whereas they just want to do the EE 101 thing and carp about measurements and peer reviewed white papers. They are so hung up on measurements that I'm sure it extends from the audio to the anatomical.

I find it simultaneously humorous and tragic. Sometimes I can't help from egging them on. My bad. I'm not sorry, though. AJ has nothing to add to discussions.

Dave

[Jeff B.]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

As one of your guilty parties, I would ask the you reread the thread from the point that it deteriorated to the spitfest that is going on. You might also want to do a search on the offender's posts and see the overall tone of each's posts. I tink you will find that there are some that derive their satisfaction from belittling other's points of view, no matter what those may be.

AJ (and Daryl) and I go way back with either or both jumping in to any thread that I post in that asks a subjective question. Difference between them and me is that I have actually tried, use and sometimes even measured the things that I post about, whereas they just want to do the EE 101 thing and carp about measurements and peer reviewed white papers. They are so hung up on measurements that I'm sure it extends from the audio to the anatomical.

I find it simultaneously humorous and tragic. Sometimes I can't help from egging them on. My bad. I'm not sorry, though. AJ has nothing to add to discussions.

Dave

After all these years you still make me chuckle. ;)

[natediggidy]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

Whatever, you guys just duke it out and keep throwing the insults.....I'm done with your childishness in this thread

Thankfully, the OP seemed to get what he wanted out of it.

[romanbednarek]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

No, AJ knows what we have read and not read while he was in college, apparently. Even to the point of knowing that I was reading letters to the editor from manufacturers' marketing departments. All of those that I read were all written under pseudonyms. How ignorant I was. I actually thought it was real people writing.

I mean, really, when I said that there were letters to the editor from some respected scientists, then he seemed to become condescending, that's only because even though he read my words, he knew that my words were wrong and it was only marketing departments involved in everything I was reading. There were no respectable scientists nor engineers involved back then. Even the discovery of jitter must have been some marketing hack's brilliance. How was I to know? Why would anyone have actually conducted research into it and developed a means of measuring it, since all CD players sounded the same, even in the early years before jitter was understood? Marketing, it was nothing but marketing. Jitter, snake oil, all the same.

AJ knows what we all read back then and that no one outside of manufacturers actually spoke out nor wrote about how they all sounded the same and were perfect. Those few who wrote that CD players didn't all sound the same, reason unknown, they were all also just marketing hacks to promote their brand. They weren't real people unaffiliated with any companies. Imagine my dismay in now realizing that for years I read the magazines (no web for posting links to REAL information back then) and actually believed that there was debate about the quality. Wow, how foolish of me.

I defer to you now, AJ. In the future I'll ask you to speak for me, since I obviously can't speak for myself and what I did or read over those years and I couldn't even get that right. Thank you for the enlightenment, I will be forever in your debt.

Oh, and of course, we're not to let the thread veer off of the original topic, no sirree. AJ will set us straight.

dlr

I'll admit that for a long time I told people not to spend a lot of money on CD players because they all sounded the same based on what little I knew of the technology. The problem was that I never took the time to prove this to myself through listening tests until recently. Now that I've had the chance to compare several players (CD and DVD ranging from the late 90's and newer) I can say without a doubt that all of the players I compared sound different to some degree (and these are all fairly recent players, my buddy has the very first Sony CD player released and he says it sounds terrible especially when compared to his new Cambridge player but that is about as wide of a comparison as you can make). Even further I could characterize the differences of my players distinctly. However, if you were to set up one of those players blindly and put in a random disc I "might" not be able to pick out which player it is due to my poor acoustic memory (I don't know if there is a better term for this but that is what I tend to use). Anyway, don't sweat it Dave, based on what I've read from your posts through the years your track record is pretty good in my opinion and I value your insight. The thing that I really hate is how some disputes, regardless of who is right or wrong, can sometimes drive away some of the experienced veterans of this hobby out of frustration.

[dlr]

Re: Do Mills resistors REALLY sound different?

I'll admit that for a long time I told people not to spend a lot of money on CD players because they all sounded the same based on what little I knew of the technology. The problem was that I never took the time to prove this to myself through listening tests until recently. Now that I've had the chance to compare several players (CD and DVD ranging from the late 90's and newer) I can say without a doubt that all of the players I compared sound different to some degree (and these are all fairly recent players, my buddy has the very first Sony CD player released and he says it sounds terrible especially when compared to his new Cambridge player but that is about as wide of a comparison as you can make). Even further I could characterize the differences of my players distinctly. However, if you were to set up one of those players blindly and put in a random disc I "might" not be able to pick out which player it is due to my poor acoustic memory (I don't know if there is a better term for this but that is what I tend to use). Anyway, don't sweat it Dave, based on what I've read from your posts through the years your track record is pretty good in my opinion and I value your insight. The thing that I really hate is how some disputes, regardless of who is right or wrong, can sometimes drive away some of the experienced veterans of this hobby out of frustration.

You know, I like a spirited debate. But it should be kept respectable. I don't know why anyone would be driven away due to a respectable debate. Some differences just can't be narrowed. Not all should be.

Thankfully we don't ALL believe that 1st order/LR4/T-P/Infinite Slope/Waveguide/Ribbons/Dynamic drivers/Electrostat is the only way to do speakers.

I'd also hate to have to recount the times that I couldn't hear what should have been an obvious problem. Ever wire up a crossover wrong and not realize it for a while? Sometimes you have to be in the mood to try to hear differences for them to become apparent. But then you're not listening for the enjoyment.

dlr