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Sterile vs. Transparent vs. HiFi

#22
To me, hi-fi doesn't describe any particular sound characteristics. If I send mad FiEldDy clack bass, or some triple whammy fuzz signal to the rig, that's what I want to hear, and if I do that's hi-fi reproduction. Scooped sound by it's nature is hi-fi in a real sense, following the Fletcher-Munson curve as someone else mentioned. Other euphonic effects like "warmth" are still hi-fi too as far as I'm concerned.

Transparent just means that something else in the chain is the weakest link, IMHO. To me it's a relative desciptor, not an absolute one.

Sterile? What's the alternative, septic? Ermmm...tough choice! :cool:
 
#24
There are many characteristics/qualities to musical sound reproduction.

Sterile means 'lifeless' or 'impotent'. Some musical equipment does indeed sound that way to me.

As bassists, our source is our bass instruments.

If you really like the sound of your instrument direct to board (using high quality studio components) then you should prefer a transparent (doesn't tonally color), high-fidelity (true to the source) bass system.

Not that adding colorations isn't a good thing for a different tonal flavor from time to time.

Just give me a clean slate to start from and some tweakability to adjust as desired here and there.
 
#25
I think they all mean the same thing. "Sterile" is often used as a pejorative term for "hi-fi" or "transparent".

A player who likes the traditional tone of passive basses might say "My Fender is warm, and that Fodera is sterile". Someone who prefers the modern boutique sound might say "My Sadowsky is transparent, and that Fender is muddy".

Me, I like traditional and modern sounds!
 
#26
Passinwind said:
Scooped sound by it's nature is hi-fi in a real sense, following the Fletcher-Munson curve as someone else mentioned.
I assume that the Fletcher-Munson curve is what I was trying to describe earlier... stating that the way we hear is not necessarily 'flat' on a scope. I'm interested in this... am I interpreting this correctly? If so, then wouldn't cabs with frequency curve that 'compensates' for human hearing (with a slight drop is the mids and an extension of the high end) be more 'flat' than the 'flat' cabs often discussed on the site. I guess there is more than one definition of flat... the relatively flat frequency curve vs. a curve that results in the listener hearing 'flat'... which would not be a flat frequency curve...?
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#27
KJung said:
Passinwind said:
Scooped sound by it's nature is hi-fi in a real sense, following the Fletcher-Munson curve as someone else mentioned.
I assume that the Fletcher-Munson curve is what I was trying to describe earlier... stating that the way we hear is not necessarily 'flat' on a scope. I'm interested in this... am I interpreting this correctly? If so, then wouldn't cabs with frequency curve that 'compensates' for human hearing (with a slight drop is the mids and an extension of the high end) be more 'flat' than the 'flat' cabs often discussed on the site. I guess there is more than one definition of flat... the relatively flat frequency curve vs. a curve that results in the listener hearing 'flat'... which would not be a flat frequency curve...?
Click to expand...

No, because it's not the same thing. You evaluate "flatness" in gear designed for music reproduction by comparing the output to the input. The less those two things differ, the more accurate the reproduction is. *It doesn't matter whether the signal contains an exact mix of treble and bass, and it doesn't matter whether the imperfections of human hearing don't take in all frequencies equally*. All that matters for flatness is whether the output signal resembles the input.

Imagine you're standing 8 feet from Edgar Meyer, listening to him play the bass. It doesn't matter that your hearing is not perfectly linear. It's the hearing you've got, so that is the truth of the sound for you. A perfect reproduction sounds to you exactly the way Meyer would if you were listening to him play without the reproductive medium. It's irrelevant whether your imperfect hearing "mishears" the reproduction in the fashion described by the F-M curve--if it's truly a perfect reproduction, you will mishear the original and the reproduction *in exactly the same way,* and they will sound identical. If you try to equalize the reproduction in some way, it will no longer sound identical to the original sound, which means that it will, *by definition*, be a poorer reproduction.

IOW, a reproduction that is deliberately made to sound different from the original cannot be a completely accurate reproduction.

This doesn't change the fact that sometimes, you need pronounced equalization within a system to achieve a flat output from that system. But flatness is still defined by the closeness of the output to the input. And you can't make an already flat output more flat by equalizing it to be less flat.
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#28
Richard Lindsey said:
No, because it's not the same thing. You evaluate "flatness" in gear designed for music reproduction by comparing the output to the input. The less those two things differ, the more accurate the reproduction is. *It doesn't matter whether the signal contains an exact mix of treble and bass, and it doesn't matter whether the imperfections of human hearing don't take in all frequencies equally*. All that matters for flatness is whether the output signal resembles the input.

Imagine you're standing 8 feet from Edgar Meyer, listening to him play the bass. It doesn't matter that your hearing is not perfectly linear. It's the hearing you've got, so that is the truth of the sound for you. A perfect reproduction sounds to you exactly the way Meyer would if you were listening to him play without the reproductive medium. It's irrelevant whether your imperfect hearing "mishears" the reproduction in the fashion described by the F-M curve--if it's truly a perfect reproduction, you will mishear the original and the reproduction *in exactly the same way,* and they will sound identical. If you try to equalize the reproduction in some way, it will no longer sound identical to the original sound, which means that it will, *by defintion*, be a poorer reproduction.

IOW, a reproduction that is deliberately made to sound different from the original cannot be a completely accurate reproduction.

This doesn't change the fact that sometimes, you need pronounced equalization within a system to achieve a flat output from that system. But flatness is still deifnition by the closeness of the output to the input. And you can't make an already flat output more flat by equalizing it to be less flat.
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Makes total sense... thanks.
 
#30
KJung said:
Passinwind said:
Scooped sound by it's nature is hi-fi in a real sense, following the Fletcher-Munson curve as someone else mentioned.
I assume that the Fletcher-Munson curve is what I was trying to describe earlier... stating that the way we hear is not necessarily 'flat' on a scope. I'm interested in this... am I interpreting this correctly? If so, then wouldn't cabs with frequency curve that 'compensates' for human hearing (with a slight drop is the mids and an extension of the high end) be more 'flat' than the 'flat' cabs often discussed on the site. I guess there is more than one definition of flat... the relatively flat frequency curve vs. a curve that results in the listener hearing 'flat'... which would not be a flat frequency curve...?
Click to expand...

Fletcher-Munson primarily relates to volume vs. frequency response of the human ear, so what I'm getting at is that if you play at a lower than average volume, a scooped cab or amp may be perceived as "flat". Play loud, and it'll be perceived as top (and maybe low) heavy, until it gets so loud that your high frequency acuity starts to roll off. Lots of actual hi-fis have a loudness button, but many others build that response in to the volume control circuit. Unless you listen to the Edgar Meyer recording at the exact same volume as the performance provided at your listening postion, with the same reverberation reflection profile, room dampening, etc., dead-flat response is not actually the most high fidelity realization of your live experience, IMHO. What this means to bass equipment descriptors is open to debate though, for sure.

The real problem is that humans auditioning different mixing consoles and studio monitors don't agree on what flat or transparent means. Hi-fis, as in home stereos, sure don't all sound equally accurate (uh-oh!) either. I admire Richard's rigorous definition, and I'd actually rather run with that. Problem is, nobody will agree on what it means. ;)

I'm a Spock-channeler, I have a scope and scary tech skills. But when I build my own gear I still just try a bunch of stuff and run with what I think sounds best. It's always interesting to hear how different people describe what I've built, just as it's interesting to see the varied opinions in this thread.
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#31
Passinwind said:
Fletcher-Munson primarily relates to volume vs. frequency response of the human ear, so what I'm getting at is that if you play at a lower than average volume, a scooped cab or amp may be perceived as "flat".
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You're right; it could be. But of course, as I think you imply, the degree of "scooped-ness" would have to vary with volume, as the compensation needed is not an either-or, on-off thing. So a cab with a given degree of scoop would only be perceived as flat within a relatively narrow volume range. Below that range, it would not be scooped enough; above it, it would be too scooped.
 
#32
jsbarber said:
... and eveybody is different
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I'm not.





...couldn't resist :ninja:


But you've got a point with the (small) differences in our hearing. That takes us some of the way towards an explaination of why one mans transparency is another mans sterility (that sounded weird, huh!?). But if hi-fi means to create an amplifier that amplifies a signal without altering it in any way, then how we hear things shouldn't have anything to do with that goal.
 
#33
Passinwind said:
Hi-fis, as in home stereos, sure don't all sound equally accurate (uh-oh!) either.
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Absolutely! They all have their inaccuracies.

I always thought there was a conceptual problem with evaluating the accuracy of systems designed to reproduce recorded music. To know how accurate a reproducing system is, you have to know exactly what the *recording* (not, as is sometimes maintained, the original performance) sounds like; otherwise, you have nothing to judge against (you're reproducing the recording of the performance, not the performance). But the only way to know *exactly* what a recording sounds like is to play it on a perfectly accurate reproducing system. Unfortunately, you can't assess the accuracy of your reproducing system unless you know exactly what your recording sounds like, and you can't know exactly what your recording sounds like unless you know that you have a perfectly accurate reproducing system, and so on .... it makes my head hurt.:crying:
 
#34
Richard Lindsey said:
Absolutely! They all have their inaccuracies.

I always thought there was a conceptual problem with evaluating the accuracy of systems designed to reproduce recorded music. To know how accurate a reproducing system is, you have to know exactly what the *recording* (not, as is sometimes maintained, the original performance) sounds like; otherwise, you have nothing to judge against (you're reproducing the recording of the performance, not the performance). But the only way to know *exactly* what a recording sounds like is to play it on a perfectly accurate reproducing system. Unfortunately, you can't assess the accuracy of your reproducing system unless you know exactly what your recording sounds like, and you can't know exactly what your recording sounds like unless you know that you have a perfectly accurate reproducing system, and so on .... it makes my head hurt.:crying:
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That's the loop I've been getting in. Of course, it all doesn't matter... what sounds good sounds good. I've just found so much variance in the sound of 'flat' bass cabs that I got confused about what 'flat' was.... and also.. depending on the voicing of the instrument (I'm back to bass now), some 'non flat' cabs sound more like the inherent sound of the instrument played 'acoustically' than a number of more 'flat' designed cabs!
 
#35
KJung said:
some 'non flat' cabs sound more like the inherent sound of the instrument played 'acoustically' than a number of more 'flat' designed cabs!
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Ah, but the sound of the instrument played acoustically--we're talking EBG, right?--*isn't* the inherent sound of the instrument, because it's mediated by magnetic PUs and electronics before actually going to an amp and cab, and that stuff isn't necessarily even close to "flat" (not that that's necessarily a bad thing musically, of course). The inherent sound of an EBG is what comes out the jack on the bass.
 
#37
Richard Lindsey said:
Ah, but the sound of the instrument played acoustically--we're talking EBG, right?--*isn't* the inherent sound of the instrument, because it's mediated by magnetic PUs and electronics before actually going to an amp and cab, and that stuff isn't necessarily even close to "flat" (not that that's necessarily a bad thing musically, of course). The inherent sound of an EBG is what comes out the jack on the bass.
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That's another thing to add in... what is the inherent sound of the instrument... the acoustic sound, the magnetic pickups, the sound after the signal goes into the on board preamp, the sound after the primary preamp, the sound after the power stage.... etc., etc. !!!!!

Many pickup and especially on-board preamp manufacturers talk about transparent sound (the true sound of the bass!)... so it gets very confounded. Again... just fun to think about for me.... everyone has that 'sound in their head' that they are going for... you might get there with a passive bass, a highly colored head and a flatter cab, or an active bass, a relatively flat head and cab and a lot of EQ, etc., etc., etc.
 
#38
KJung said:
That's another thing to add in... what is the inherent sound of the instrument... the acoustic sound, the magnetic pickups, the sound after the signal goes into the on board preamp, the sound after the primary preamp, the sound after the power stage.... etc., etc. !!!!!
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Exactly. With electric bass, the "sound" is the sum of it's parts. It is an instrument with the lone intent of being played amplified. Whether it is the wood of the bass, the PUs, pre, power cab that is contributing to the sound is not relevant. It's about getting a good sound. That's why you stick a mic in front of a speaker cabinet in so many circumstances. If the "inherent sound" of an electric bass was equated only with the slab, we all be dying to run DI on stage and in the studio.

It's isn't like a DB, where you have a naturally-produced acoustic sound, and you are simply trying to make it louder for easier audibility. It's a lot more like an electric guitar where every link in the chain plays a part.
 
#39
carl-anton said:
...and that's an electrical signal that can be measured, which makes it possible to know if you amplify it without coloring it, right? E.i. in that sense, hi-fi is truly possible, and not prone to affore mentioned loop. (...is that e.i. or i.e.?)
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If you make the assumption that what you measure is the totality of the information, then I guess so. I'm not sure I know enough to make that assumption. Is it possible for humans to consistently and reproducibly hear differences that don't correlate with electrical measurements in a consistent fashion? I honestly don't know.
 
#40
Neat discussion; For reference, Webster's defines high fidelity as "an approximately exact reproduction of sound."


A couple of thoughts that no-one has mentioned yet:

The Fletcher-Munsen curve is not the same at all SPLs. It is much more pronounced at lower SPLs and tends towards flat at higher ones. This is an adaption our hearing has developed to help make speech more intelligible at low SPLs. So "flat" to our ears, is relative even before subjectivity even enters into it.

That brings me to my second point. Many stereo systems have F-M curve compensation. It's called the 'Loudness' button. The circuit attenuates midrange and boosts low end and sibilance. The purpose is ostensibly to provide a more realistic reproduction at lower levels. Unfortunately, it's almost never used as intended as people keep it on at higher levels. I think this is the primary reason why "hi-fi" equates to "mid-scooped" to a lot of people. That's the sound they're used to hearing from stereo systems, car stereos etc... Of course, hyperextended bottom end is becoming the norm now too.

A true hi-fidelity system will tend to sound a bit mid-boosted at lower SPLs but more balanced at higher ones. True hi-fi is not mid-scooped at all. For me hi-fi==transparent.
 

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