Paul's Posts

For many of us, imaging is the quality that keeps us glued to the listening chair. It’s the ability of a system to place voices and instruments in a precise,... Read more...

Crosstalk

As audiophiles, we spend much of our time listening for space—how wide, how deep, and how convincing a stereo image can be. One of the factors that directly affects that... Read more...

It's absolute!

As audiophiles, we go to extraordinary lengths to preserve the integrity of the musical signal, and one of the more subtle but fascinating areas of debate is absolute phase. On... Read more...

Balanced vs. single ended

Noise is the enemy of fidelity, and how we move signals from one component to another has a major effect on how much noise we let in. Most audio gear... Read more...

Capacitors

Every component in an audio circuit leaves its mark, and few have been debated as much as capacitors. For decades, they were a necessary part of signal paths, blocking DC... Read more...

Clipping

In the early days of audio, clipping used to be one of the most damaging problems in audio, and it’s also one of the easiest to avoid if we understand... Read more...

The damping factor myth

Numbers can look impressive, but they don’t always mean what we think they do. Audiophiles are often drawn to specifications because they seem like objective markers of quality. The trouble... Read more...

More about power supplies

A day or two ago, we were discussing power supplies, and I mentioned switched-mode devices. The high-end community has traditionally eschewed these, but over time, like digital audio, they have... Read more...

Magnets vs. wires

One of the oldest debates in audio design is whether to couple signals magnetically, through transformers or inductors, or to pass them directly through wiring and capacitors. Both approaches have... Read more...

Different silicon

At the heart of most amplifiers are transistors, and two of the most common types are field-effect transistors (FETs) and bipolar junction transistors (BJTs). On a schematic they may look... Read more...

Why Power Supplies Matter

Every component in an audio system is at the mercy of its power supply. The circuits may handle the signal, but the signal itself rides on the back of the... Read more...

The Truth About Signal-to-Noise Ratio

Signal-to-noise ratio is one of the most misunderstood specifications in audio. It’s supposed to tell us how much louder the music is than the background noise of the system. On... Read more...

Resolution

Resolution and musicality are often set in tension, but they don’t have to be opposites. Resolution refers to how much detail a system can reveal—the ability to hear every strand... Read more...

Warmth and coolness

Here are two terms we often use when describing the performance of a system, despite the fact they have nothing to do with temperature. Warmth and coolness are two sides... Read more...

Speed and transient attack

Speed in audio isn’t about tempo, it’s about how quickly a system responds to musical events. Every note begins with a transient, the initial burst of energy that defines its... Read more...

Coherence

As we continue our delve into the linguistic treasures of Audiophile-speak, one word comes up often. Coherence. Coherence is the sense that music flows as a single, unified whole. It’s... Read more...

Pointing fingers

Precise imaging is what allows us to point to where each sound is coming from in a stereo field. It’s more than left, right, or center—it’s about focus. Does the... Read more...

Presence and intimacy

Don't get all excited about today's post's headline. We're on a roll about Audiophile terms, not the beginnings of a steamy novel. Presence is the quality that makes performers feel... Read more...

Timbre

No, that's not the way we spell a cautionary yell that a tree is falling. Timbre is the essence of musical realism is timbre. It’s what allows us to distinguish... Read more...

Louder and softer

Music without dynamics is like speech without inflection, while music with dynamics is one of the more exhilarating experiences one can find. Really. Dynamics are the variations in loudness that... Read more...

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