Misael Castillo Lopez
Active Member
I found this channel of a Japanese sound engineer on YouTube, with impressive old audio settings, listen to the carpenters on this 
Only Yesterday
YOM
Superstar
Only Yesterday
YOM
Superstar
Carpenters HI-FI Old Audio System
- Thread starter Misael Castillo Lopez
- Start date
CARPENTERS-COLLECTOR
Well-Known Member
now THAT`S an audio system 
looking at the second video though, that look`s like an apartment, so I bet his neighbours love him
looking at the second video though, that look`s like an apartment, so I bet his neighbours love him
tomswift2002
Well-Known Member
It's to bad that they were using MP3's to test those systems. On those speakers that's like playing a wax record!
Misael Castillo Lopez
Active Member
Oh sure, imagine that sounds good on youtube, and actually in situ always sounds much better
Eyewire
Well-Known Member
I must have missed it, but where does it say they're using mp3's? It would be a shame if that was the case. I imagine they are probably using lossless files, possibly even high resolution files, and they're probably using a high-end DAC as well.
You can get high resolution DSD and FLAC Carpenters music here:
Carpenters-Singles 1969-1981-DSD Single Rate 28MHz64fs Download|Acoustic Sounds
Carpenters-Singles 1969-1981-FLAC 96kHz24bit Download|Acoustic Sounds
I'll be visiting PS Audio this autumn, so I will report back with a firsthand impression. (I've done a couple of things for them, plus I own some of their products.) There is a bit of a back story behind this one.
Paul McGowan, owner of PS Audio, put a lot of effort into tuning this room, which he calls Music Room One, but they are currently in the process of moving to a larger facility where they will have at least two listening rooms, not just one (which is pictured above). The speakers here are the IRS (Infinity Reference Standard) system. Paul's friend and colleague Arnie Nudell designed the Infinity speakers back then, and they later joined forces (after Paul briefly sold PS Audio) to form Genesis, where they continued designing speaker systems. Paul eventually repurchased PS Audio and has built the company back up to where it is today. Nudell's last project before he passed away was yet another "reference standard" which PS Audio has plans to sell--Paul is working on the last few aspects of it and likely we'll see (or hear) it in 2018 or 2019. Paul has Nudell's last prototype of the system at PS Audio, and it is featured in one of his other videos.
Does the IRS seem like overkill? Maybe...but if you consider that PS Audio is designing audio components, they need something accurate on which to listen to their efforts. Paul's words on the IRS (in 2012, prior to acquiring the set seen and heard in the video):
I think perhaps what impressed me most was not the system’s total mastery of the room it played in, nor its ability to render a lifelike orchestra or large group perfectly. Rather it was its uncanny ability to playback a single instrument or small group better than anything I had ever heard before. This, the first and finest example of the line source loudspeaker.
In later years Infinity founder and my partner in Genesis Loudspeakers, Arnie Nudell and I built a more modern version of the original IRS called the Genesis 1. 1.2 tons in system weight, the setup included 4 floor to ceiling towers: two midrange treble wings and two woofer columns and here again was another implementation of what is known as the line source.
A line source loudspeaker is simple. You need only built it with speaker drivers covering every inch of space from floor to ceiling to have it qualify as such. And here’s the thing – there is perhaps nothing in the loudspeaker world that more accurately reproduces a single perfect point in space than this floor to ceiling approach – which looks about as counter intuitive as anything I have ever seen. The biggest loudspeaker system you can imagine reproducing more perfectly a single performer on acoustic guitar with perfect image size, specificity and reproduction – it just doesn’t make sense to you visually as you sit in awe of what you’re hearing.
In later years Infinity founder and my partner in Genesis Loudspeakers, Arnie Nudell and I built a more modern version of the original IRS called the Genesis 1. 1.2 tons in system weight, the setup included 4 floor to ceiling towers: two midrange treble wings and two woofer columns and here again was another implementation of what is known as the line source.
A line source loudspeaker is simple. You need only built it with speaker drivers covering every inch of space from floor to ceiling to have it qualify as such. And here’s the thing – there is perhaps nothing in the loudspeaker world that more accurately reproduces a single perfect point in space than this floor to ceiling approach – which looks about as counter intuitive as anything I have ever seen. The biggest loudspeaker system you can imagine reproducing more perfectly a single performer on acoustic guitar with perfect image size, specificity and reproduction – it just doesn’t make sense to you visually as you sit in awe of what you’re hearing.
Eyewire
Well-Known Member
Lucky you! I'm green with envy.
I remember lusting after those speakers, as well as the Duntech Sovereigns in the late '80s.
tomswift2002
Well-Known Member
If you watch the 2nd video at 1:52 (and switch to 1080p), if you look at the top of the iTunes player, under the "40/40 Disc 1" (clearly a rip from a CD) it gives a bit rate in the kbps (looks like 825, but the first number is blurred, could be a "3"). Also in the 1st video at 0:27, if you freeze it, it has a M4A logo beside "44.1/16bit 923 kbps", probably not MP3, but still it's definitely not High Quality audio, and it's compressed CD Audio (CD WAV is 1.5Mbps).
Eyewire
Well-Known Member
What you're seeing there is the average bit rate. They are using Apple's Lossless format (ALAC), which uses the file extension m4a. Apple Lossless, like FLAC, uses lossless compression to make the file size smaller. It's not lossy like mp3, where information actually gets thrown away. See this article for more detail:
Kirkville - An Overview of Apple Lossless Compression Results
Lossless is lossless, whether it's WAV, AIFF, FLAC or ALAC. I seriously doubt these audiophiles would play lossy mp3's on a super high-end audio system. One of those McIntosh amplifiers alone probably costs more than my car.
Here's a screenshot from my own iTunes collection. It's from the 40/40 CD that I personally ripped using dBpoweramp into AIFF (uncompressed lossless) and converted into Apple Lossless in iTunes:
tomswift2002
Well-Known Member
M4A doesn't mean that it's ALAC. M4A is just a container which can contain a variety of codecs including ALAC and MP3. The bit rate kind of rules out MP3. But for me when I used ALAC or other "lossless" codecs, except WAV in the past I was never satisified with the results, even at its highest bit rate. And I'm aware of the theory with lossless codecs like ALAC, but still, when compressing, there is still the destruction of data somewhere, since you simply can't physically squeeze 1.5Mbps of information down into a 700kbps space. It would've been better if they had been playing the actual CD's or been using the HDCD's.
Last edited:
Eyewire
Well-Known Member
Yes I know m4a is just a container. AAC files also use it. But what other lossless audio format uses m4a as their file extension? I don't know of any, other than ALAC. Also, these audiophiles appear to be using Apple products. Therefore it's quite reasonable to conclude that they are most likely using ALAC.
There is no destruction or loss of data at all with lossless codecs like ALAC and FLAC. For example, if you take a WAV file, convert it to FLAC and then convert it back to WAV, the resulting WAV file will be bit-for-bit identical to the original WAV file. There is no "destruction" or informational loss of data whatsoever. The research and science behind it has been tested and proven over and over again and is beyond reproach.
However, there are some people who claim that when the computer or device is decompressing FLAC or ALAC files on-the-fly, this can degrade the sound quality during playback. In the early days, when computer CPUs were not as fast or powerful and generated a lot of heat, this may have been true. But today's computers and devices have CPUs that are so incredibly fast and cool that the unpacking of the FLAC/ALAC files during playback should not be an issue affecting sound quality whatsoever.
Regardless, this topic of lossless compression still pops up every now and then among audiophiles. Just Google "FLAC vs WAV" or "AIFF vs ALAC" and you'll see tons of hotly debated discussion among audiophiles. It will probably be like this until the end of time, lol. There just never seems to be any general consensus among audiophiles when it comes to something so subjective as sound quality.
Similar discussions
