The 'Sound' of Capacitors..

Frequently asked questions on capacitor types, ratings, brands, use and abuse.
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diagrammatiks
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Post by diagrammatiks »

kleuck wrote:
Seiche wrote:
Seiche wrote:^this, statistics are a bitch. But it's necessary to be formal in these kinds of things.
sorry, I meant to agree with FiveseveN. :slap:

also kleuck, when someone disagrees with you, it doesn't mean he calls you dumb. Just an observation.
Well, no, it's not observation, i did observation, you can say "i do not trust your experience, i'll have to test it myself" that's a logical response, and here, since the beginning of the threads as far i've read, the responses are "You are wrong, as i do not understand why, no matter what you hear, and i won't experiment myself (some did- thanks to us) wich seems just stupid, science -at least as long as we are talking things that human senses are supposed to be able to feel- is meant to explain the experience, not on the contrary to justify or invalid a priori an experience, that's walking on the head.
diagrammatiks wrote:do these tests...

npn/npn cascode with cap bypass on the base and top emitter cap bypassed.

change the bypass caps from electrolytic to polypropylene to styrene.


active baxandall circuit. caps from ceramic to teflon.


the more advanced the circuit is and the more the caps are forced to interact with changing input/output impedances as well as variable resistors and other caps the easier it is to hear the differences.

kk happy testing.
You did ?
What were the results ?
I'm just looking for circuits where the caps are integral to the circuit performance since people were asking for example circuits.

i guess i could bread board some circuits.

I don't think I have any ceramic or mica caps though. :(

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Post by kleuck »

- is all about sharing knowledge.
Ho, and what did i do ?
I think i did actual tests and shared something, others did ; i don't' think
"IT DOESN'T, 'n YOU CAN'T!
I WON'T, 'n IT DON'T!
IT HASN'T, IT ISN'T, IT EVEN AIN'T
'N IT SHOULDN'T . . .
IT COULDN'T!"
can be considered as a shared knowledge.
Y
ou clearly need to review your perception of science as a field of studies and knowledge sharing, rather than a mud-throwing competition.
Fuck science, i'm not a scientific, you are probably not neither, actually there's probably not a single true scientific here !
I can't play scope, so i play guitar, i don't want to explain why at the moment, i just report that differences can be heard and that's all !
Randall Aïken said :
Q: Is there any advantage to using solder with a 2% silver content?
A: Yes. Silver solder keeps werewolves away from your amp.

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Post by grrrunge »

kleuck wrote:
- is all about sharing knowledge.
Ho, and what did i do ?
I think i did actual tests and shared something, others did ; i don't' think
"IT DOESN'T, 'n YOU CAN'T!
I WON'T, 'n IT DON'T!
IT HASN'T, IT ISN'T, IT EVEN AIN'T
'N IT SHOULDN'T . . .
IT COULDN'T!"
can be considered as a shared knowledge.
I just don't recall seing any test-data and/or documentation of experiments. I've only found "I've come to the conclusion that..." which - at least in my terminology - stands as an inconclusive statement untill it's backed up by solid evidence.
It's not like i want to be unfriendly or anything, but from my point of view, it seems quite obvious why you're getting quite a bit of heat from quite a few forumites here. Going "I've done the testing, but i won't share the data i've concluded upon, go do some testing yourself" seems rather contemptuous, and it's definately not the kind of knowledge sharing I'm used to from Danish universities.
Apart from that, it seems like we totally agree.
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Post by kleuck »

I did not record the tests from my boosters, as i di not think it would be useful at the time, as i have a hard time keeping a single one for me :cry: , and anyway, as the frequency corner is tunable, i would probably get some "the pot was not in the exact same position" type of response, but if i can i will record the comparison between two with the pots in a measured position (resistance)
But as i built a number of them, tested on all the possible settings before shipping, i know that the 3 technologies i used to use (Mica, polystyrene and ceramic) sounds slightly differently.
But i think that PIO in guitars make a more obvious difference, as i said before, in a few days my next LP Junior will be finished, i'll do comparison with a switch.
What upsets me here, is that the few that tested different technologies and heard differences -and shared their knowledges- get the "IT DOESN'T, 'n YOU CAN'T!
I WON'T, 'n IT DON'T!
IT HASN'T, IT ISN'T, IT EVEN AIN'T
'N IT SHOULDN'T . . .
IT COULDN'T!" thing, a single people if i remember right has tested and reported not having heard any difference -so he shared his knowledges too- where the "IT DOESN'T, 'n YOU CAN'T!
I WON'T, 'n IT DON'T!
IT HASN'T, IT ISN'T, IT EVEN AIN'T
'N IT SHOULDN'T . . .
IT COULDN'T!" guys as far as i know did not do a single test, and the only knowledge they seem to be able to share is "IT DOESN'T, 'n YOU CAN'T!
I WON'T, 'n IT DON'T!
IT HASN'T, IT ISN'T, IT EVEN AIN'T
'N IT SHOULDN'T . . .
IT COULDN'T!"
And i much prefer Frank Zappa.

Again, we are not in an university here, i don't want to prove anything -at least i did not planned to when i first posted in this thread.
It's pretty easy and cheap to swap a cap, it's not trivial to record subtle thing if you don't own a studio, have the skills to use it, and the time to set up a session right ?
Randall Aïken said :
Q: Is there any advantage to using solder with a 2% silver content?
A: Yes. Silver solder keeps werewolves away from your amp.

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Post by earthtonesaudio »

I have reached the conclusion that there will never be double-blind tests on this particular subject, for two reasons:

One, the side that believes there is a difference thinks it is beneath them to prove it in a double blind test.
Two, the side that believes there is no difference thinks it is beneath them to prove it in a double blind test.

:roll:
rocklander wrote:hairsplitting and semantics aren't exactly the same thing though.. we may need two contests for that.

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Post by FiveseveN »

the side that believes there is no difference thinks it is beneath them
Again, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophi ... n_of_proof and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
Like in the case of religion, it is not the atheists that need to prove something, their position is the rational default. And as I said earlier, it's one thing to say "I believe X" and another to say "You should also believe X", the reasons being "You're missing out/you're ignorant/you're prejudiced/you're going to hell etc.".
Fuck, I said I wouldn't get involved any further.
Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge. (Charles Darwin)

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Post by kleuck »

So, we are talking philosophy and religion here ?
We NEED to prove thing's ?
I was stupidly thinking it was a forum about pedals and sound ?
Randall Aïken said :
Q: Is there any advantage to using solder with a 2% silver content?
A: Yes. Silver solder keeps werewolves away from your amp.

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Post by diagrammatiks »

FiveseveN wrote:
the side that believes there is no difference thinks it is beneath them
Again, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophi ... n_of_proof and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
Like in the case of religion, it is not the atheists that need to prove something, their position is the rational default. And as I said earlier, it's one thing to say "I believe X" and another to say "You should also believe X", the reasons being "You're missing out/you're ignorant/you're prejudiced/you're going to hell etc.".
Fuck, I said I wouldn't get involved any further.
which side is the atheists here?

the side that believes all capacitors behave the same?

you building a bunch of precision vco's with radioshack caps at work?

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Post by grrrunge »

earthtonesaudio wrote:I have reached the conclusion that there will never be double-blind tests on this particular subject, for two reasons:

One, the side that believes there is a difference thinks it is beneath them to prove it in a double blind test.
Two, the side that believes there is no difference thinks it is beneath them to prove it in a double blind test.
And then there are the side that would like to believe either, but don't know which because of the lack of scientific proof of the matter.
I myself would love to do the testing, and share my findings. I just can't afford a scope and similar test equipment. Shedding out around $50 for a digital multimeter was kinda what i could justify at the time...
kleuck wrote:So, we are talking philosophy and religion here ?
No. FiveseveN was merely trying to explain two very different ways of argumentation.
kleuck wrote:We NEED to prove thing's ?
Yes. At least I think so. It's so much easier to convince people about something that might actually be factual enough, if it's backed up by tests and proper documentation. (Pictures of scope signals seem to be the way to go, as far as I've seen ;) )
kleuck wrote:I was stupidly thinking it was a forum about pedals and sound ?
It is. I've just gotten the impression that if people want to discuss pedal-religion and mojo-babble, they go to TGP. If they want to get to know how stuff actually works, they come here :)
Don't get me wrong. There's absolutely nothing wrong with religion and mojo in my perspective. There's just a different time and place for everything.
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Post by kleuck »

I use, build and sell some attenuators, at the moment limited to 30 watts.
Why ? Because i can source Hammond "C" enclosures, would need bigger for a more powerful attenuator.
Very often, one is begging for a 50 watt one or more, i reply "No, my enclosure can't dissipate that much power"
How did it determined that ? With my hand ! When the enclosure gets so hot i cannot touch it any more, the practical power handling is exceeded.
Well, you know, nobody ever replied "I don't trust your experience, your enclosure must be able to handle more/less power, you have to test it in a scientific way in an adiabatic enclosure" :roll:

But i understand Fiveseven etc, i just think the "proove it by science theory, whatever..." somewhat a caricature, when nobody understands why and when it's easy and cheap to just test things.
Doesn't mean i am against a "scientific" approach : i did with cable capacitance, but in this case, i found explanation about the theory and Spice sims, i had a bunch of good and crappy cables, so it was easy to compare and give an explanation, it's not always so easy.
Randall Aïken said :
Q: Is there any advantage to using solder with a 2% silver content?
A: Yes. Silver solder keeps werewolves away from your amp.

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Post by grrrunge »

kleuck wrote:
You clearly need to review your perception of science as a field of studies and knowledge sharing, rather than a mud-throwing competition.
Fuck science, i'm not a scientific, you are probably not neither, actually there's probably not a single true scientific here !
I can't play scope, so i play guitar, i don't want to explain why at the moment, i just report that differences can be heard and that's all !
I admit that wasn't very nice of me to say, but that's what happens sometimes, when emotions are running high. :oops:
In terms of electronics, i'm a hobbyist. Over the past year and a half I've become a pretty dedicated hobbyist, but I'm still a hobbyist and that's never going to change.
As far as science goes, I've got a candidate degree in usability and media sociology from the University of Copenhagen and Aalborg University, which indeed makes me a scientist, but it doesn't make me an inventor or an innovator. Theres a distinct difference ;)
Wikipedia wrote:A scientist in a broad sense is one engaging in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge. In a more restricted sense, a scientist is an individual who uses the scientific method. The person may be an expert in one or more areas of science. [...] Scientists perform research toward a more comprehensive understanding of nature, including physical, mathematical and social realms.
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Post by NQbass7 »

Once I get a new job and get moved in, I'm definitely interested in setting up a blind test with different cap types in the same circuit. I have a looper so I can do the same input each time, and I have recording equipment.

Sayeth a famous fiction character (in a not so famous fanfic), "That's what the experimental method is for, so that we don't have to resolve things just by arguing."

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Post by diagrammatiks »

totally forgot about this sweet article.

http://www.tubecad.com/2004/blog0004.htm

about testing and double blind tests.

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Post by Shiny_Beast »

diagrammatiks wrote:totally forgot about this sweet article.

http://www.tubecad.com/2004/blog0004.htm

about testing and double blind tests.
ya, I think 15 second AB tests are useless. Some things are subtle, but leave an impression over time, hen you aren't trying to listen for seomthing. Also, bad can leave a better first impression, but time tells the real picture.

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Post by DrNomis »

Personally, I'd just not worry about "Capacitor Sound" and just build circuits using whatever caps I'd happen to have at the time, works for me so far.... :hmmm:
Genius is not all about 99% perspiration, and 1% inspiration - sometimes the solution is staring you right in the face.-Frequencycentral.

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Post by mojah63 »

DrNomis wrote:Personally, I'd just not worry about "Capacitor Sound" and just build circuits using whatever caps I'd happen to have at the time, works for me so far.... :hmmm:
Yeah it's easy to get sucked into the lunacy when both views are right... Personally I do try to use similar dielectric materials when making a clone ...

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Post by teleK »

lets get the blind test using the forums ears and whatnot on with! so we can get one side to be quiet for a bit.
ears-important. but you cant do a half-assed test of it. scientific method and whatnot.
data sheets-important. but personal testing never hurts.
endless banter on a forum about how awesome your ears are-not important.

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Post by teleK »

actually, more i think about it. too many variables. dont care anymore. im gonna go back to making music in rooms with poor reverb and no bass with things i can afford and have fun doing so. maybe some demigod of tones will strike me down... thatd be a pretty sweet album cover...

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Post by kleuck »

Randall Aïken said :
Q: Is there any advantage to using solder with a 2% silver content?
A: Yes. Silver solder keeps werewolves away from your amp.

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Post by Hides-His-Eyes »

I can't hear a difference on 720p with headphones on,



Tell me those don't all sound exactly the same! (It's a timelink)
Testing, testing, won too fwee

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