Neutral electronics are a farce...

Al wrote,

"Hopefully Roger will provide further clarification, as a claim that "the speed of sound in air should be preserved by the amplifier" (that being Geoff’s restatement of Roger’s position), or to use some of Roger’s words earlier in the thread, "emulating the properties of air" and "addressing the delivery speed" are statements that have no meaning as far as I am concerned."

Al, go to this page on the N. American Products thread for Roger’s discourse on the subject of the speed of sound in air issue,

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/has-anyone-heard-the-new-north-american-products-preamp-and-a...

cheers

Thanks, Geoff.  I read through that page, and as I interpret it he's basically referring to how his design minimizes or eliminates phase jitter and other unwanted phase shifts and timing errors.  Still not sure how that has anything to do with the speed of sound in air.  Also, I agree with Ralph's comments in that thread to the effect that the claim of "velocity countermeasures" ("countermeasures" meaning "corrections," as I understand it) in the area of 700 or 800 db seems nonsensical.  I suspect those numbers would equate to resolution that is even in conflict with the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.  The universe itself isn't that precise.

Regards,
-- Al
 

I should also point out that George’s criterion for determining which is better N or R for a given recording is that it’s one that sounds more like "live" music must be N. Roger’s criterion is the same, I.e., "live" music, for what his amp sounds like compared to amplifier X.

Well it was easy to hear on our system how the LP was better; and since LPs have greater bandwidth than CDs, pretty easy to discount his comment when he said 'you can't hear it on analog recordings'.

The fact of the matter is that you can. But to do so, the recording can't have more than 2 or 3 mikes (and the 3rd mike, which will be the one in the middle ala Mercury recordings, had better be phased properly). That is why we have the inversion switch BTW and we've had it since the inception of the preamp in 1989.

"Food for thought...
If you can’t tell the difference when you switch the phase then it [the system] is not clean enough to expose it."

That’s what I just got through telling Atmasphere is the likely explanation why George Louis was unable to hear the difference between R and N in the Atmasphere room at the show. The show is perhaps the worst possible venue to try to demonstrate anything, including the very speakers and amps and cables that make up the exhibit; exhibitors shoot themselves in the foot by not bringing along electonics or speakers that are ALREADY broken in.

We had broken-in electronics, as well as broken in loudspeakers. In this case I would not use a strawman argument for something, especially when you don't like them used on yourself: George made it quite clear upon entering our room that he could hear the difference. The funny thing is we could hear the difference on both the LP and CD (Canto is a 2-mic recording), and it was correct the first time when he came in. But despite that, George came had his own confidence; we entertained his requests without rancor but he just got up and left as fast as he could.

Atmosphere wrote,

"Well it was easy to hear on our system how the LP was better; and since LPs have greater bandwidth than CDs, pretty easy to discount his comment when he said ’you can’t hear it on analog recordings’."

But that’s not what he said based on your original description of the event. What he said - or at least implied in your comment - was he didn’t listen to analog, only CDs so he wasn’t sure he could hear R compared to N for vinyl.  He didn’t say NOBODY could hear polarity on analog recordings. That would be pretty silly, no?

Getting back to his database of N and R recordings for a second, I will ask again, do you see any mistakes in the polarity of the recordings George listed? Whether he could or couldn’t hear the difference at your room I consider somewhat irrelevant for reasons I already explained.

geoff kait

Geoff, you got it wrong:

If you go back and look, you will see where; I wrote:

At that point, upon not really hearing a difference, George said that you could not hear it on analog recordings.

So, I’m going with ’That would be pretty silly’, yes.