Holographic imaging

I thought that would come, but to what degree, that is the question....(:

How many folks out there own the H-CAT? I've never heard it, but if it is half as good as Tbg says it is I'm surprised there would not be more owners. I would love to have an SS pre that puts my tubes pres to shame, in every way.

I've been considering a tube pre as well but would prefer to stick to SS as well.

What does H-CAT do that other SS pre-amps do not that makes it unique?

Actually, I just read about the H-CAT approach.

Seems like it requires careful "tuning" to provide the advertised benefit and that some have achieved "it" and some achieved something perhaps less desirable otherwise.

Definitely a different approach than Carver sonic holography, which the site correctly alludes to.

Having heard that the Carver holography does in fact work, I'll keep an open mind regarding this approach. Sounds like a different approach to lowering amp distortion than typical negative feedback approach as I understand it.

The site left the impression that earlier versions did not provide adjustment of the correction which is absolutely needed otherwise the chance of the gadget working was low. Assuming true, it was not very smart of the vendor to sell a gadget to audiphiles as such (missing a primary feature needed to work in most cases).

The Carver approach was technically not that complicated, yet effective. This approach seems much more complex and harder to get right, assuming it does in fact work. I suppose the only way to know would be to try it.

Does the vendor offer any kind of money back guarantee? I would think that might help entice those interested in taking the plunge.

Were I to go to a different SS pre today in search of better sound (rather than tube), I would strongly consider Classe based on what I have actually auditioned and liked.

Having worked with a good number of master tapes, I might be able to help with the terms here.

Bloom: a function of harmonic distortion, part of a spectrum: neutral, warmth, bloom, thick or fat, bloated, muddy all describe distortion, usually lacking odd orders, so it is more of a coloration than an irritant (generally associated but with not limited to tubes). Odd-ordered colorations are harsh, chalky, clinical, bright, etc (generally associated with but not limited to transistors).

Thus an amp that is transparent will lack bloom (although it can sound natural), as transparency comes from a lack of distortion.

Holographic imaging is a function of soundstage. It comes from the ability to reproduce low level detail and maintaining phase relationships, so it requires wide bandwidth for the latter and low distortion at low levels for the former.

Transistors have traditionally had difficulty with retrieving low level detail, and so the slight ambient cues that exist around an individual image in a soundstage are less likely to get reproduced. This will give the image a 2D quality in the soundfield, and simultaneously cause it to stand out more. Newbee correctly identified this phenomena, although I would like to add that as the slight ambient cues that exist around each image get added, there will be the effect of a more 3D image, but also a more homogenous overall effect in the soundstage as the relative size of the 3D image will be larger than that of the 2D image of the same thing.

Tubes are better at doing low level detail, and so are more likely to have 3D images and greater ambient information, adding to the holographic effect. Any processing in the signal chain that is not part of the original recording can be regarded as a form of distortion, as most imaging systems rely on altering phase relationships to obtain 'holographic' effects. Tubes are not so great at keeping phase relationships correct, as often tube amps have less high frequency bandwidth, owing to the presence of an output transformer, but there are nowadays amps with wide bandwidth OPTs and of course OTLs :) that overcome this issue.

If phase issues exists at or very near the upper limits of human hearing, some interesting imaging effects can occur that seem to enhance the 'holographic' effect and I would not doubt that this has served as an inspiration to some processor designers! At any rate this accounts for why some tube amplifiers that are not great performers in the bandwidth department can have some apparently 'enhanced' imaging effects.

If there are no phase anomalies and low level detail is maintained, many 2-mic recordings will exhibit a height phenomena, which is a function of the mic placement in the soundfield.

Having master tapes so you **know** what the recording is supposed to be like is paramount to sorting this stuff out!

Sorry for the diatribe...