The reason WHY A&H sounds warmer than Pioneer

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Originally Posted by Reticuli

I remember on Traktor 2 Pro when I was testing most of the DJ software out there that the key lock algorithm wasn't actually turning off completely at the time. Once you triggered it, it mangled the impulse response to hell and then deactivating it wouldn't actually resolve that until the program was rebooted. They fixed that and some other issue I informed them about concerning pitch bending. I was quite impressed with the 16bit VDJ 7's processing. Very clean and precise. There's something to be said with not oversampling, doing lots of interpolation, and then dithering the hell out of it at the end. I know they've moved to 32bit now and their key correction seems wildly improved in 7.4 and 8. Torq 2 was appalling. I don't know what the hell was going on with that DSP coding of theirs. The basic specs it produces weren't too bad, but it couldn't deal with a lot of test waveforms. I think its impulse response was practically non-existent and like inverted or something. Sounds real dark, crunchy, and processed, too. Has an unmistakable signature it gives everything. The old pre-Pro (not sure if that's what it was called) 2 channel version of Traktor had very pleasant sound and good tests.

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"Testing"
"clean and precise processing"
"seems wildly improved"
"i think its impulse response"
"dark cruncy and processed"
"umistakable signature"
"very pleasant sound and good tests"

Placebos and confirmation bias masquerading as objective reality.

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Originally Posted by ImNoDJ

You really can. :)

https://consumerist.com/2008/03/03/d...onster-cables/

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lmfao! OMG!

You would be amazed on how many people have been convinced into buying gold plated optical cables because gold is a better conductor...

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Originally Posted by pacific808

You would be amazed on how many people have been convinced into buying gold plated optical cables because gold is a better conductor...

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Lol. If only they knew science. Copper is a better conductor. Silver is better than both, but is way too brittle to be reliable.

But for an "optical cable"

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Originally Posted by pacific808

But for an "optical cable"

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Lol. Took me a minute. My mind went straight to SPFIF

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Originally Posted by ImNoDJ

In audio testing it really is. This has been proven experimentally time and time again. The entire audiophile market of pointless products also proves this.

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In science, non-blinded data gathering and testing is not useless. In electronics repair, non-blinded testing is not useless. In quality assurance, non-blinded testing is not useless. In the development of new products, like codecs, non-blinded testing is not useless. There was the case of, I think it was one of the big European broadcast standards groups, where they did blinded testing with a great many people who heard nothing wrong with the output of a new codec. Test subjects did not know which was the test track and which was the original. It took a single golden ears outside engineer later who knew it was a test track to hear there was a spurious tone that a glitch in the codec had embedded, which was then confirmed with actual measurements. Useless non-blinded observation? Confirmation bias in observation and later measurement? Lack of utility? Hogwash. The codec was improved as a result. That's as empirical as you can get. The blind tests using random test subjects were showing one thing: that the average listener was a poor critical listener. There is certainly a hierarchy of power in science with blinded data gathering and testing above non-blinded, because bias and preconceptions in a variety of ways can influence results, knowingly or unknowingly. But that does not mean some Doctor Without Borders physician running a rapid TB test out in the boonies in Africa doesn't find utility in the test because he runs it on someone who's showing outward symptoms of TB. Pardon the pun, bro, but get real.

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Originally Posted by pacific808

I recently hooked up my DJM-900NXS2 to ableton and ran some pink noise through it and observed the isolator work in a RTA graph and made a virtual NXS2 isolator EQ rack. From my expirience the NXS2 is quite a bit warmer than the old NXS. I have heard the analog A&H mixers are still wamer but I have never had the opurtunity to try one out.

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Can you give more information about what this actually does? Is this roughly like Traktor's various EQ settings, which emulate various mixers?

Basically what I was doing was using a technique sound engineers use to tune EQs for rooms and venues to help create a flat frequency response. I used a pink noise generator in ableton feeding two tracks and routed it directly into my NXS2 and used an iPad pro with a lightning connection to feed a real time analysis tool. The first track was a dry signal routed to the A side of my NXS2 and I had my B side with the same signal but with a 3 band EQ on it. I would use the NXS2 EQ to alter the dry signal on the A side and then recreate the crossover points and slope in ableton to match the NXS2 and then I could A/B to see and hear any difference. From my measurements I found the Low ISO to be around 290Hz and the High ISO to be around 4.8kHz. The slope appears to be 24db/oct.

http://rumrunn3r.com/wp-content/uplo...32539406_o.jpg

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Originally Posted by Reticuli

In science, non-blinded data gathering and testing is not useless. In electronics repair, non-blinded testing is not useless. In quality assurance, non-blinded testing is not useless. In the development of new products, like codecs, non-blinded testing is not useless. There was the case of, I think it was one of the big European broadcast standards groups, where they did blinded testing with a great many people who heard nothing wrong with the output of a new codec. Test subjects did not know which was the test track and which was the original. It took a single golden ears outside engineer later who knew it was a test track to hear there was a spurious tone that a glitch in the codec had embedded, which was then confirmed with actual measurements. Useless non-blinded observation? Confirmation bias in observation and later measurement? Lack of utility? Hogwash. The codec was improved as a result. That's as empirical as you can get. The blind tests using random test subjects were showing one thing: that the average listener was a poor critical listener. There is certainly a hierarchy of power in science with blinded data gathering and testing above non-blinded, because bias and preconceptions in a variety of ways can influence results, knowingly or unknowingly. But that does not mean some Doctor Without Borders physician running a rapid TB test out in the boonies in Africa doesn't find utility in the test because he runs it on someone who's showing outward symptoms of TB. Pardon the pun, bro, but get real.

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Yeah, literally none of that is relevant to my comment.

I specifically said that in AUDIO testing, non blind tests are worthless. I didnt make any comment about science in general.

Its as worthless as eyewitness testimony, which is wrong as often as it is right for the same reasons. Human construct sensory data with their brains. You are not hearing a true representation of reality. Unless you have a reference that shows that people with golden ears are not subject to confirmation bias or placebo, then Im going to go with the decades of journal articles rather than your opinion.

Not quite sure why youve gone on about Tuberculosis.

Got a reference for your codec story?

Exokinetic what the hell are you talking about?

The EQ's are just parametric with selected frequencies to cut or boost.

What does this have to do with the warmth of the sound?

Depending on the track you are playing one mixer might have an advantage over the other (the parametric frequency and bandwidth setting), but as far as the overall sound the EQ has nothing to do with it. Also, do some research on bandwidth. You can have two mixers that have the bass knob set at 200 Hz, but they can have a wider or narrower bandwidth. Which will create a different cut or boost.

"Pioneer sets the low knob to everything 70hz and below. NO! It will also affect frequencies above 70 Hz. Depending on how wide the bandwidth is. It could affect frequencies all the way up to 600Hz.

Then the high knob to everything 13000hz and above.

Meaning the mid band knob has everything from 70hz to 13000hz! < THIS IS WRONG. see above.


That leaves it with very little room for sonic manipulation of any music through EQing.


Whereas an Allen & Heath runs the 3 band EQ in the Xone:42 like:


Low: 420hz and down
Mid: Center point at 1200hz
High: 2700hz and up

This gives you a VERY warm low band, as well as giving you MUCH greater manipulation ability of the high band.

Allen & Heath's Xone:92 with its 4 band eq is run thus:

Low: 100hz and down
low-mid: center point at 250 hz
high-mid: center point at 2500hz
High: 10000hz and up "

And the fact that Allen and Heath have 2 mixers with completely different settings means they don't even know which is "better" . It's just personal preference on which twisty knobs flavors you prefer.

Here's an example of 3 frequencies with 3 different bandwidths.
100Hz (boost) has a wide bandwith (as you can see it affects a lot of frequencies above and below 100 Hz.)
at 1Khz (boost) you see a very narrow bandwith.
and the last one you see a medium level bandwidth (cut).
Attachment 27680

All DJ mixers use wide bandwidths so the photo below is what your sound manipulation would look like if the mixer you were using had the bass knob set at 30 Hz turned to +3. The mid knob set at 800 Hz turned to -3. And the high knob set at 18,000 Hz set to +3.

Attachment 27681

you probably shouldn't argue with a six year old thread...

fair enough. but do you get what I'm saying?

Good point - interesting that it wasn't mentioned 6 years ago.... This thread continues to be the most epic necrobump ever.

I do think the OP's point could still be correct, however; he just overstated the effects of the changes. Either way though different EQ points will make the EQ adjustments sound different between the two mixers, and one could be subjectively considered "warmer." Presumably though they'd sound pretty much the same when the EQ is flat however, and that may or may not be true of the two mixers. Maybe someone who owns both wants to do some experiments?

necrobump. lol

i thought that's what they call a corpse that died of a viagra overdose at the morgue.

I ran some white noise through traktor and sidechained the results back into a Pro-Q to compare.

Here's the control run:
Attachment 27730

Here's with a Z-ISO bass kill:
Attachment 27731

...and just eyeballing a match:
Attachment 27729

Looks like 300hz 24db/octave, then the whole damn thing is boosted 6db (I'm dubious about that boost part, surely I'm hitting a limiter or something. Will double check later).

I can do more, what's in demand?

can you get one with the mid? and do one at -3 and -6 and full kill.

and not z-iso. just classic.
thanks.

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Originally Posted by Reticuli

And the idea that an analog mix bus is superior to digital one is ludicrous, especially (but not exclusively) with digital sources.

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You have entire industries to take up with this claim. Everyone who makes analog summing boxes (where the whole point is to sum"digital sources", anyone who makes and uses analog mixing boards (Neve, SSL), even many plugin creators who try to mimic the sound. (Waves NLS is one of many)

Analog summing having non linearitys, effects on cross talk, etc is pretty well established.
Analog EQ causes phase shift, so does digital, its how eq works. (although there are digital EQ called Linear Phase EQ which do not cause phase shift BUT they can cause an artifact called pre-ringing to transients) Analog EQ is however known for having effect even when set to 0.

Edit: I just came here looking up the frequency points for a xone mixer so I could make a similar 4 band EQ in ableton. Thank you very much to the OP for posting these. And as others have pointed out, the curve/Q of these shelf and bell EQs is unknown, So just because high band is specified at 13k on pioneer, doesn't mean that band affects only 13k and above.

and just wanna say i love mixing on the xone92s as well as pioneer. For a 3 band eq i think the pioneer works fine, but i do love having two low eqs. people call it two mid eqs (250hz?) but it feels more like a second bass eq to me.

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Originally Posted by GHOSTEA

You have entire industries to take up with this claim. Everyone who makes analog summing boxes (where the whole point is to sum"digital sources", anyone who makes and uses analog mixing boards (Neve, SSL), even many plugin creators who try to mimic the sound. (Waves NLS is one of many)

Analog summing having non linearitys, effects on cross talk, etc is pretty well established.
Analog EQ causes phase shift, so does digital, its how eq works. (although there are digital EQ called Linear Phase EQ which do not cause phase shift BUT they can cause an artifact called pre-ringing to transients) Analog EQ is however known for having effect even when set to 0.

Edit: I just came here looking up the frequency points for a xone mixer so I could make a similar 4 band EQ in ableton. Thank you very much to the OP for posting these. And as others have pointed out, the curve/Q of these shelf and bell EQs is unknown, So just because high band is specified at 13k on pioneer, doesn't mean that band affects only 13k and above.

and just wanna say i love mixing on the xone92s as well as pioneer. For a 3 band eq i think the pioneer works fine, but i do love having two low eqs. people call it two mid eqs (250hz?) but it feels more like a second bass eq to me.

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There's also a whole industry dedicated to things like $10,000 speaker wires and audiophile rocks. There are plenty of studios who buy those, too.

Wow what a thread.
Haven't played out in 20 years like but came looking to see how different peeps set their eqs on the DDM4000.
With 4ch inputs, each switchable so upto 8 I got 1210s Denon CDs n all manner of digital bits going in. Just for fun like
Had that mixer years, used some ropey gear back in the day and I love the sound and customisable features. Always keep finding something new to tweak (despite having read the manual repetitively).

Anyway my post is to say Thanks for a truly fascinating read😁