Good read on "The Great Debate"

[Downunderwonder]

I want Seamonkey to double triple whatever blind test JimmyM with the hotdangdest SS SVT setup he can assemble vs a SVT driving an identical cab.

Jimmy M gets to call say up to 5 commonly used knob and switch positions of the SVT to be available for comparison.

Seamonkey gets 24 months to figure out all whizzbangery needed to duplicate Jimmy's settings and thus prove SS amp modeling can dupe Jimmy in a double blind test.

Seamonkey gets to do whatever he needs to do to the power supply for the room to make sure external power supply effects are nil and the amps just amp Jimmy's bass.

That would be fair proof of concept don't you think?

 

[One Drop]

Thanks Jerrold for that wonderfully lucid post. This isn't the first time I've (slowly but not reluctantly) learned from these discussions.

Bill, I'm no Luddite but I do have a shoddy education and serious gaps in my ability to reason properly due to being largely self taught, extremely curious and fairly lazy, not a very good combination. It's why I ask questions and why it sometimes takes me a few posts or threads to digest information and to understand fully the implications of them.

 

[JimmyM]

I want Seamonkey to double triple whatever blind test JimmyM with the hotdangdest SS SVT setup he can assemble vs a SVT driving an identical cab.

Jimmy M gets to call say up to 5 commonly used knob and switch positions of the SVT to be available for comparison.

Seamonkey gets 24 months to figure out all whizzbangery needed to duplicate Jimmy's settings and thus prove SS amp modeling can dupe Jimmy in a double blind test.

Seamonkey gets to do whatever he needs to do to the power supply for the room to make sure external power supply effects are nil and the amps just amp Jimmy's bass.

That would be fair proof of concept don't you think?

I will write Matthew Lesko and see if he can find us a government grant to get this done. Then I will do it. Then no matter the results, I will still like tube amps better, but I will still use micros when I don't feel like heavy lifting.

 

[Downunderwonder]

Don't need a grant, you need the tube nuts and the SS nuts to chip in for the two parties' expenses.

How about it Tube Nuts and SS Nuts? Save us all these threads for ever more? Or at least 5 years if Jimmy can pick his SVT reliably, but the SS Nuts have to pay the expenses for the 5 yearly retries and shut the heck up in the meantime. That's fair init?

 

[JimmyM]

Don't need a grant, you need the tube nuts and the SS nuts to chip in for the two parties' expenses.

How about it Tube Nuts and SS Nuts? Save us all these threads for ever more? Or at least 5 years if Jimmy can pick his SVT reliably, but the SS Nuts have to pay the expenses for the 5 yearly retries and shut the heck up in the meantime. That's fair init?

Isn't a little early in NZ to be drinking?

 

[Downunderwonder]

Not at all. The more I think about it the more I think it really could be done. I also believe Seamonkey will go to ground should anything actually materialise. After all, how could he hope to put together that which Ampeg themselves have failed to deliver?

 

[One Drop]

I'm pretty certain it can and will eventually be done, at least closely enough to satisfy even more people than the growing numbers that are satisfied with the current trade-offs between perceived performance and issues like weight and portability.

But for someone like myself neither are an issue and the idea, never mind the practical issues, of putting a rig together that emulated the characteristics that appeal to me in many traditional tube amp designs are too daunting.

I'm perfectly happy to use a VT pedal with any decent SS amplifier to get myself heard FOH and monitored, but whenever I can I prefer to plug in my SVT and spend 5 seconds to get a tone I love and that usually sounds good all over the stage and the room, and that the audience can hear and feel the way I intend.

We don't have often have the luxury of a decent sound man or great PA, so this approach usually makes perfect sense for half of the venues we play, and it makes me and my band happy, and people love our sound.

Some people like to build their own computers, more power to them. The more one is like an easy to use appliance, the happier I am. Everybody happy!

 

[billfitzmaurice]

Bill, I'm no Luddite but I do have a shoddy education and serious gaps in my ability to reason properly due to being largely self taught, extremely curious and fairly lazy, not a very good combination. It's why I ask questions and why it sometimes takes me a few posts or threads to digest information and to understand fully the implications of them.

Fair enough. The truth is out there, and where acoustical engineering truths are concerned they're not all that hard to find. I've got no problem with sticking to one's guns when you know that you're right. But first make sure that you are.

 

[seamonkey]

I want Seamonkey to double triple whatever blind test JimmyM with the hotdangdest SS SVT setup he can assemble vs a SVT driving an identical cab.

Jimmy M gets to call say up to 5 commonly used knob and switch positions of the SVT to be available for comparison.

Seamonkey gets 24 months to figure out all whizzbangery needed to duplicate Jimmy's settings and thus prove SS amp modeling can dupe Jimmy in a double blind test.

Seamonkey gets to do whatever he needs to do to the power supply for the room to make sure external power supply effects are nil and the amps just amp Jimmy's bass.

That would be fair proof of concept don't you think?

You're pointing your guns in the wrong direction. I didn't write the paper, I didn't peer review it. I read it, I read the conclusion. I'll be glad to read another DBT and it's conclusion.

It's not my subjective hearing versus anybody's hearing. Anonymous test subjects listen and report. I could participate, but that would be anonymous.

I would expect any new DBT to follow appropriate protocols, which would be taking know scientific data, and measuring the amps under test to be sure the testing process is valid. In this papers case 1 subject was able to hear distortion that the authors failed to measure. They were able to measure it, after "1" trained listener pointed it out. This was clearly disclosed in the conclusion.

As far as getting me to shut up, which seems to be your goal - get or find some scientific study, DBT, etc. that is conclusive in proving otherwise. It does amaze me that since 1981 there is no counter study following any protocol.

This paper here was only a simple SS versus Tube. 1981. Time has moved on and many Manufacturers like, Ampeg, Markbass, Fender, Orange, Peavey, even SS makers like GK have put their names on modeling products. Peavey's musebox may be a game changer here. Therefore I don't believe a new DBT using new products would result in a different conclusion.

I will continue to point out alternatives. At this point in time there are more than one way to achieve this, without compromise.

Somebody coming to this board for information should be able to find and consider alternatives.

BTW, I don't read JimmyM's posts and others. I found that some posts often focused on me and not the topic of discussion. I don't read or answer these to avoid flame wars. Myself being guilty of flaming. This does have the side effect that one of these folks has shut me up with their point when actually I haven't even read it. I have been PM'd about this, but the flame wars help nobody, including the moderators.

Best of luck on your DBT idea. I hope it pans out.

 

[seamonkey]

Good read on the debate of sited listening tests by Sean Olive:

Audio Musings by Sean Olive: The Dishonesty of Sighted Listening Tests

A strong point made in the conclusion:

It may already be too late according to Stereophile magazine founder, Gordon Holt, who lamented in a recent interview:

“Audio as a hobby is dying, largely by its own hand. As far as the real world is concerned, high-end audio lost its credibility during the 1980s, when it flatly refused to submit to the kind of basic honesty controls (double-blind testing, for example) that had legitimized every other serious scientific endeavor since Pascal. [This refusal] is a source of endless derisive amusement among rational people and of perpetual embarrassment for me..”
I do not have access to the AES paper but it it seems to be a good read also.​

Info on Harmon's DBT setup:

Harman Kardon's quest to standardise sound - Pocket-lint
(Search for other links about their setup, there are many)

They go through a lot of effort to blind the tests, and even to position each speaker at the exact same position in the room. Even though the room is acoustically treated. Maybe this room can be rented

 

[teemuk]

I want Seamonkey to double triple whatever blind test JimmyM with the hotdangdest SS SVT setup he can assemble vs a SVT driving an identical cab.

Jimmy M gets to call say up to 5 commonly used knob and switch positions of the SVT to be available for comparison.

Seamonkey gets 24 months to figure out all whizzbangery needed to duplicate Jimmy's settings and thus prove SS amp modeling can dupe Jimmy in a double blind test.

Seamonkey gets to do whatever he needs to do to the power supply for the room to make sure external power supply effects are nil and the amps just amp Jimmy's bass.

That would be fair proof of concept don't you think?

Why make things so difficult? Let's just have someone post a clip and have people guessing whether the amp heard in the clip is tube or solid-state. If the result is 100% accurate on all guessers then it's fair enough to say that amps made with those two different devices do have such striking differences that they can easily be distincted from each other...

Oh... but it fails to the fact it's been done over and over again and it's always a guessing game with 50-50 dividance in answers and pathetic excuses why the test can't be accurately performed...

Is there a "yawn" emoticon?

 

[Chef]

Which tube amp, versus which solid state amp would one use in this theoretical DBT?

There are tube amps that are very clean and hi-fi, and there are ss amps that are very warm and round, and furthermore, those that incorporate sampled/modeled tube "tones"...

How would you have the tone controls on either test amp set?

How would you have gain structures set?

Ultimately, does it really matter if it's tube or ss, if you like it and it meets your sonic goals?

 

[bongomania]

Oh... but it fails to the fact it's been done over and over again and it's always a guessing game with 50-50 dividance in answers and pathetic excuses why the test can't be accurately performed...

Painfully true, across the board! And in case anyone reading this thinks he's exaggerating any part of that, he's not, not even slightly.

 

[teemuk]

There are tube amps that are very clean and hi-fi, and there are ss amps that are very warm and round, and furthermore, those that incorporate sampled/modeled tube "tones"...

So what you're basically saying is that there are very "solid-stateish" tube amps and very "tubey" solid-state amps...?

Shouldn't the thread actually end at this point?

 

[jnewmark]

Which tube amp, versus which solid state amp would one use in this theoretical DBT?

There are tube amps that are very clean and hi-fi, and there are ss amps that are very warm and round, and furthermore, those that incorporate sampled/modeled tube "tones"...

How would you have the tone controls on either test amp set?

How would you have gain structures set?

Ultimately, does it really matter if it's tube or ss, if you like it and it meets your sonic goals?

That's the whole thing though. If you love tube amps, fine, it does'nt mean that they are better than SS amps, and vice versa. Personally, I would rather get my tone in a 10 lb package , as opposed to a 60 lb package, but, hey, that's just me.

 

[seamonkey]

So what you're basically saying is that there are very "solid-stateish" tube amps and very "tubey" solid-state amps...?

Shouldn't the thread actually end at this point?

Myself, I have a "black box", not a "clear-box"

 

[Kentucky Ryan]

as a guitarist and a bassist. i have never found a SS guitar amp that i like. but i have found many SS bass amps that i like. take it for what its worth. but i think there are way more overtones and nuances that can be heard on guitar that the bass just doesnt convey.

 

[Chef]

Yup, and, Yup.

This is all further obfuscated by "what do you mean by a tube amp sound/tone?"
SA200?
D180?
HD150?
SVT?
Set for clean, or set for "saturated," or, set for buzz saw?

Feel free to carry on though...

So what you're basically saying is that there are very "solid-stateish" tube amps and very "tubey" solid-state amps...?

Shouldn't the thread actually end at this point?

 

[JimmyM]

as a guitarist and a bassist. i have never found a SS guitar amp that i like. but i have found many SS bass amps that i like. take it for what its worth. but i think there are way more overtones and nuances that can be heard on guitar that the bass just doesnt convey.

I think there are many people who agree with you, including me. Solid state is perfectly acceptable on the bass and has been since the late 60's. But you can still tell the difference, just not as dramatically as you can with guitar.

 

[JimmyM]

Yup, and, Yup.

This is all further obfuscated by "what do you mean by a tube amp sound/tone?"
SA200?
D180?
HD150?
SVT?
Set for clean, or set for "saturated," or, set for buzz saw?

Feel free to carry on though...

Well out of those amps, maybe the SA200 might make you think of solid state over tube, but I'd bet someone used to the sound of it and its behavior could tell the difference.