Skip to main content ↑ ↓

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: Audible changes ... Or the Hawthorne effect... (Read 2760 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Audible changes ... Or the Hawthorne effect...

I just borrowed my friends RME Hammerfall DSP 9632, meant for recording studios and general audio production.  Its priced at around 600 US Dollars in my native home of Norway.

I have previously been using a $30 Behringer UCA202 external soundcard, and been happy with it. I understand that in order to check I should do some ABX'ing in order to find differences. However, with my basic  soundcard knowledge; what is it that I should listen for in differences with regards to two so vastly different cards ? I use them only for listening, and I use either Directsound or ASIO with Foobar and FLAC for my listening pleasure. I have a NAD 1155 preamp and a Cambridge Audio P500 amp together with Yamaha NS-333 speakers should it matter.  Honestly, just switching the soundcards didnt "alter" the sound for me in any noticeable fashion, although its hard to tell.  And I know; "if I cant tell the difference then why switch". Well, I just wanted to be adventurous, and fun to try a vastly "superior" soundcard.

So, my basic question is, without ABX testing, what is it that I should listen for to be a determining factor with regards to the two soundcards ?  Should there be an audible different representation of the sound ? Or are the extra dollars for the RME card merely there should I choose to do some audio production, using the inputs, the low latency for MIDI etc.

Any thoughts are welcome ...
 

Audible changes ... Or the Hawthorne effect...

Reply #1 –
Quote
Honestly, just switching the soundcards didnt "alter" the sound for me in any noticeable fashion, although its hard to tell...  So, my basic question is, without ABX testing, what is it that I should listen for to be a determining factor with regards to the two soundcards ?
  I would expect the main difference to be noise.  If you can't hear the background noise from either card, I wouldn't expect to hear any difference at all!  (Your external sound card is less prone to noise than an internal soundcard...  It's easier to design a quiet external soundcard, because there is a lot of potential electromagnetic interference inside a computer chassis.)

Quote
Or are the extra dollars for the RME card merely there should I choose to do some audio production, using the inputs, the low latency for MIDI etc.
  I think so...  Again, input (recording) noise is the first "sound quality" difference I'd look for.  The 192kHz/24 bit recording can make a difference when recording & mixing live music, but you don't need this much precision for playback.  (Your audio files are probably 16-bits anyway.)

Audible changes ... Or the Hawthorne effect...

Reply #2 –
Frequently, beyond a certain soundcard quality point, only very minor details will be different. A little beyond that, only your imagination, or a program such as RMAA  can supply any differences.
http://audio.rightmark.org/index_new.shtml
You often have to pay attention to limited, specific details, not the sound in general.

As an example, I recently obtained a portable Walkman CD for a specific purpose. Things did not sound quite right to me with the material for which I had the player, but I could not pin anything down. I therefore played a very high quality CD, with simple acoustic instrument background (one, or a few, instruments at once) and individual singer vocals. I quickly noticed certain details, whereas I could not be sure about anything with the more full music I started with. I later found that the sound was the same on another model of the same basic player, suggesting mine is not defective.

I confirmed that the (cheap) player has a problem by playing a CD of test tones into my good soundcard and examining the recording in my audio editor. Comparing this recording to one from a high quality  CD player, through tools such as Frequency Analysis, showed there were definite differences.

The recording from the good CD player looked very close to the files extracted from the CD, while the walkman recordings contained all sorts of spurious frequencies. This may have been difficult to analyze in music, but was very easily seen in pure frequency test tones. You might also be able to hear some problems with the proper test tones when the complexity of music obscures the differences.

Suppose there are no obvious detail problems? If you do close A/B comparisons, you may find a more generalized difference. It may be that neither sounds wrong or bad, just, when closely compared, not quite the same. ABX testing is often necessary to confirm that this kind of difference is real. There can be a very strong bias to believe the more expensive one is better, even when there is no difference.

At the point of having established some definite overall difference, you simply decide which you like best. If you have enough experience with live music, or exceptional hifi equipment, you may be able to peg one or the other as sounding more similar.

Audible changes ... Or the Hawthorne effect...

Reply #3 –
Thanks guys. This is kinda what I expected to hear. So Ill leave it there I think.  Regarding noise, neither card has a problem with it, which is good. I have heard of a lot of issues with internal soundcards and influence from surrounding cards, HDs, processors etc, but this is not the case here (no pun intended).