Audio Talk - what is it?

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Sad thing is I think I was getting somewhere in my argument about loudness, and now this just pollutes the thread. It is a sad old saying about don't feed the troll. In snakeoilaudio you have a festering nest of them, they can break out any time. I have become their infatuation.

[Daniel Quinn]

And one could say exactly the same about your slavish devotion to RD with the addition of:

You follow him like a loyal puppy to every forum to defend him.

One could therefore discount your opinion using your own logic.

You see , to say I follow RD like a puupy is cheap , lazy and almost humerous . It is indicative of your approach to the truth .

My ego is far two big to follow anyone but myself , I advocate RD's approach to hifi because.

1] it is intelligently explained
2] it empirically worked

I advocate Marx's ideas on capitalism

1] it is intelligently explained
2] it is empirically verifiable .

And even if you were correct vis a vis your puppy analogy , to discount someones opinion upon the basis that they are an acolyte of the person known for originating the idea is not logic , it is stupidity.

You discount someone's opinion upon the content .

[Nick]

If you don't like my contribution why not ban me and show again your favouritism towards Dunn for all to see?

Fine by me.

[shane]

'Now that made me laugh!

[andrew Ivimey]

Oh dear - where to start? I've re-read the lot. ...definitions... we have to share and agree on meaning perhaps. But there is already far too much emotion and bandying about of powerful words like e.g. 'genetic' and 'psychology' with no obvious explanation of why these words were dropped into the discussion, just perhaps that they sound er, powerful and hence persuasive. They are not; unless they are used correctly and so let's start at the beginning with

'...loudness is a factor of distortion.'

I use 'loudness' as a sound gets louder and this is measurable in terms of dB-SPL. I think Nick alluded to sound measurement as a relative sort of thing; it is. We only measure anything, in general, with a purpose in mind. The amount of sound is measured in deciBels which is a relative scale of sensing things until you specify what sort of things you are measuring. dBA is nearly the same as dB-SPL and has very easy conversion factors when measuring sound for a hearing aid prescription (which is dB-HL). People who measure really loud things like aeroplane engines use dBC which takes into account how the human ear responds to ever increasingly loud sounds - human ears do not hear all frequencies at the same SPL. Indeed at say 'normal conversational' and below, adult ears are most sensitive at around 2.7kHz. As SPL/loudness increases our frequency response curve flattens out so that when 120dB-SPL is reached we hear low frequency sounds at the same level as high frequency sounds providing of course that the sound sources are putting the stuff out at the same levels in the first place. (if you Google 'phons curves' there is a very simple and accepted by all explanation that this is what is happening with human ears.

Now, at any given loudness there may or may not be distortion. To keep things simple I'll just mention harmonic distortion (where, if 'positive,' a little distortion can sound pleasant and if negative it can be but very often does not sound so pleasant due to the lack of harmonically related tones in the music/notes. A little musical knowledge can easily show how some notes are related in the octave and some can be but aren't - sorry that's not well expressed but.... ahem.... Google 'natural harmony'. I am sure Wikiwhatever will explain things succinctly!)

and 'intermodulation distortion'. I guess 'carrier wave', 'radio theory' or 'ring modulator' might yield some easy explanation. But it is very important to amplifier design, oh, all right, very important to me, building an SE PP amp that should have sounded superb but there was something strange going on that damaged the sound output in a way that I could not fathom; loud or not. Someone more knowledgeable than I suggested high frequency oscillation caused likely as not from the topology of the amplifier's parts. Having connected a 'scope I found oscillation at about 50kHz; couldn't hear it but could hear it's affect. 'Orrible. Moving the output trafos relative to the output valves helped.

I don't understand how the word 'factor' is involved in the original proposition. Factor in the mundane sense or Factor as mathematical? The difference might be crucial. I cannot even begin to understand how the proposition can be true. Though someone else put it very well by saying something like we don't mind a little distortion if we like the music - we like loud! Personally, Acker Bilk at any level, say an irritating but discernible 3dB, is far too loud. Distortion might even help cover the sheer horror!

If you have the pleasure of sitting in front of the trombones in a symphony orchestra you have to wear ear defenders; little ear pieces that savagely filter out loud sounds that are harmful. It's not only rock music that can be loud. Are explosions distortion? Possibly, though not always, Some modern guns are relatively quiet and some are of course extremely loud. You see how easily I can use the word 'loud' and I am guessing that none of you have difficulty in understanding the concept?!

Physiologically the ear mechanism gives up and adds a distortion. Somewhere around 120dB-SPL or on any dB scale really, sound becomes painful. It is too loud. But that is the extreme and not the norm. Nerve damage results, simple. Quite how and why and how, in certain circumstances, the ear can recover gets very complicated. But it is too high a sound pressure level that causes this distortion, not distortion itself.

From a professional position, what please is 'bone-whip'? I've never heard of it and yes there is quite a lot that I have never heard of so I am interested in or out of this discussion.

The portable radio... sounds loud if you are near it. If you are three feet away it is quieter and if you are 6 feet away it is half as quiet as at 3 feet and at twelve feet away it is half as quiet again. That's what sound pressure level does and is quite easy to measure. If my ear is pressed to a grizzly bear's chest his 'shouting in anger' will be loud - no dispute. At 12 feet away it will be a couple of times quieter and at half a mile I simply won't care what his mood is. Psychologically, I have found being quiet when one is angry is often more effective that ranting and raving. If you need to rant and rave you've lost the argument... which is as good a place to shut up as I can think of right now.

So I'll leave you all with a little question, a quiet question - Why do we use the term 'volume control' for what should/could be 'Loudness control or even 'distortion control' as some would have it'?

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

This shows not a word of my argument has been understood by this man.

I have qualified this right from the beginning of when I started talking about it years ago, and I qualified it here. I am not responsible as to how people define a word, and like most words loud and loudness have many definitions official and in common use. I have a specific use for it in this case. When someone is listening and says "that is too loud, turn it down" normally making a face that denotes discomfort. Ignorant people look at that as a result of too much power, my argument is that it is as a result of too much distortion, meaning often not enough power. I explained why, and why the *human* reaction is this way and why it is part of our genetic programming or unconscious mind reaction, which is also referred as our animal instinct which we still have.

This distorts our perception of good hi-fi and can be transferred very easily with a little lateral thought to explain why we react the way we do to music and why good reproduction is not objectively a certainty and cannot be effectively measured. We need our subjective reactions which are programmed into us genetically.

[Nick]

Why do we use the term 'volume control

I would guess for the same historical reason we use "Tone Control" when its effect is not to change the tuning at all of what we listen to. I would not use it as any firm proof of anything.

I use 'loudness' as a sound gets louder and this is measurable in terms of dB-SPL

In which case Dr I, you are using the other (possibly more correct) definition than Dr B, so its not surprising that you have come to a different conclusion.

So do you not accept that the subjective loudness of a sound as opposed to its physical SPL is not, in part a function of the level of distortion present in that sound?

[Michael L]

My Wife frequently asks me to turn down the volume. She doesn't like it loud. I suspect my Leak 20 is putting out around a watt.

[Daniel Quinn]

As Micheal's wife demonstrates - loudness is subjective and spl is not , they are not the same .

In respect of trumpet example , whilst the spl will be harmful , it will probably not sound loud , ie objectionable .

rock concerts can reach spl's of 120 ,which is potentially dangerous , at the ones I have been two , they did not sound loud .

[andrew Ivimey]

Okay while the answers flood in I do find the idea of a volume control interesting. There may be more to it than loudness.

Bit limp DrB. But what on earth is 'whip bone'? You've never used that before so perhaps we could be enlightened.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Ask an Audiologist or use your friend Google.

[Ali Tait]

He is an Audiologist.

[pre65]

Surely the "volume" of sound is constant, but the SPL varies with distance.

So to me (and I suspect most ordinary people) a volume control is a means of varying the "loudness" of a device.

[pre65]

Ask an Audiologist or use your friend Google.

Not only is Andrew an Audiologist (retired) but his dear wife is a Consultant Audiologist.

I Googled "whip bone" and found nothing.

Perhaps Richard could provide a link to details of this "whip bone" ?

Link to bones of the ear.

http://www.innerbody.com/anatomy/skelet ... /bones-ear

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Ali Tait - "He is an Audiologist."

Ear bone, also called Auditory Ossicle, any of the three tiny bones in the middle ear of all mammals. These are the malleus, or hammer, the incus, or anvil, and the stapes, or stirrup. Together they form a short chain that crosses the middle ear and transmits vibrations caused by sound waves from the eardrum membrane to the liquid of the inner ear. The malleus resembles a club more than a hammer, whereas the incus looks like a premolar tooth with an extensive root system. The stapes does closely resemble a stirrup. The top or head of the malleus and the body of the incus are held together by a tightly fitting joint and are seated in the attic, or upper portion, of the eardrum cavity. The handle of the malleus adheres to the upper half of the drum membrane. Three small ligaments hold the head of the malleus, and a fourth attaches a projection (called the short process) from the incus to a slight depression in the back wall of the cavity. The long process of the incus is bent near the lower end and carries a small knoblike bone that is jointed loosely to the head of the stapes—the third and smallest of the ossicles. The stapes lies in a horizontal position at right angles with the long process of the incus. There are two openings in the wall of the bony labyrinth and the stapes footplate fits perfectly in one of these openings—an oval-shaped window, where it is held in place by yet another ligament called the annular ligament.

There are two tiny muscles in the middle ear, which serve to alter the tension on the ear bones and thus the intensity (degree of loudness) of sounds. One, the tensor tympani, is attached to the handle of the malleus (itself attached to the eardrum membrane) and by its contraction tends to draw the malleus inward, thus increasing drum membrane tension. The second, called stapedius, tends to pull the footplate of the stapes out of the oval window. This is accomplished by tipping the stirrup, or stapes, backward.

I was told about it by my audiologist back years ago at Addenbrooks Hospital, Cambridge. I had a grommet fitted due to a virus infection damaging my Euston Station Tube He called it bone whip when one of the bones distorts and whips at a very loud sound causing pain.