CpuZapper wrote:If you like the SRPP would it not be better to add tone controls to it?
With a quick google I found some SRPP preamps with tone controls.
Last night I tried looking for some designs. I didn't come up with much.
Do you happen to come across some good links you can post?
nyazzip wrote:...regarding tone controls, i have to agree with the purists: assuming you are listening to professionally recorded, mixed, and mastered music, which i assume we all are 99.9% of the time, then you probably have either a 1)speaker problem, 2) an amp problem, or 3) an ear problem, if you often feel you need to tweak the EQ.
{Climbing up on soap box}
You are missing several other points too. I.E. Room problem, speaker placement, etc. But I do have to disagree with your opening comment about professionally recording music being recorded correct 99.9% of the time, that figure is more like 80%. Perhaps it is higher for those that listen to jazz and classical but as I said, I listen to modern music and production ranges from excellent to down right poor. This is probably the biggest reason of all to have tone controls.
i'm not saying there is any "Law of Good and Right Sounding Musick" or anything, but IMO it's generally safe to trust the source mix of the very experienced pro engineers, in pro studios, with pro mics, recording pro musicians and their pro instruments, thru pro mastering monitors, all paid for by corporations who presumably understand/understood that one key to selling recordings is having "good" sound. the science of audio reproduction has been done, and that all happened in the 1950s-60s.
I listen to music mostly from the 50's to the early 90's. And being that you mention the 50's and 60's let us bring up that point. For one, comparing one era to another warrants some kind of tone adjustment because most of the songs from the 50's and early 60's do sound thin. It wasn't until the mid 70's to 80's where pro audio equipment reached it's full sonic potential. Granted as time moved past the 80's, there is less of a need to use tone controls to take care of "an equipment problem" due to age of the original recording equipment used to create the piece. But I can clearly say that you would need some kind of tone adjustments going from one era of music to the next.
Then there is the issue of the production of the pieces. Production is done by a human being...so right there it is flawed. The hearing of ALL human beings change as time goes on. This is not only true of the listener, but the guy that has been making recordings for over 30 years +. I have seen many well known producers that have made excellent recordings in their early years, but not in their later years. More then likely that was due to hearing changes.
Moving along, sometimes you just get a 'bad' recording, even from professional and well known artists and producers. For example, let me use an example of a very well known band: The Rolling Stones. Perhaps one of my top favorite songs is Gimme Shelter. The recording quality of this song is absolutely horrendous. It has no high end, it has no low end, the middle is thin and the mid-base is VERY peaky. This song DOES require tone manipulation. Now I don't know who was in the booth the day the song was recorded, or if that person was 'stoned' or what have you. But the person clearly ruined an excellent song. Granted there could have been an equipment problem that day or something else because I clearly heard recordings made by the band around the same era that sounded much better.
Now using the SAME band but fast forwarding to the 80's, the Stones recorded "Miss You". This (to me) is an excellent recording. I can turn the tone controls off for this one. Sure you have many more variables when comparing this song to an earlier one and the first thing is better recording equipment. Now you might NOT agree with me that this is a well recorded song. And that brings up the next issue.
Personal Preference: What you hear and I hear as well as what everyone else hears is perceived differently and as such a specific way something is recorded might sound great to you, but horrible to me...even in the event both of our hearing levels would test identical (which wouldn't be the case).
Now going back to the 'reproduction' end of things. The room will play a major role in the sound quality and this is where I find tone controls most helpful. Sometimes you don't have an ideal speaker placement, sometimes the speakers may not be sized right for the room (I ran into this many times). And just a little tweak here or there will help balance things out. When I moved from my apartment to my house, I had a much larger space to fill, but not enough money in the kitty to purchase larger speakers. I had to punch the bass up considerably more. I had more reflective surfaces as I mounted my speakers higher and I also had to reduce the treble. The point is that I was able to do it because of the tone controls.
Now I also have friend that is a purist as well. He is a mostly a 'new age' and jazz listener. He HAS a perfectly tuned room and a very expensive sound system with no controls on the pre-amp. In his case everything sounded fine. But this was because of many factors that attributed to that.
1) Acoustically correct listening room
2) Very high end sound system with speakers that matched the room
3) A very narrow musical interest and cherry picking of audio recordings known to be well recorded.
Granted in his case, he probably doesn't need the tone controls.
But to me this is an 'ideal' system and not realistic. For one I don't have the $20k to buy the system he has (not counting the room alteration costs). Even if I did have that kind of cash outlay, my listening interests are very wide and varied.
The bottom line is that I HAVE gone the purist route and I HAVE built a pre-amp that has limited tone controls. I am overall happy with the pre-amp, but I need something more...something that I can hook up more pieces of equipment too (i.e. a phono and reel to reel deck) and also something that will allow me to have more control over the tone.
Also, just about every modern piece of equipment comes with some kind of tone control...even an Ipod. So what I would like to do isn't something that comes out of the far reaches of the Motaran Nebula.
I do recognize that tone controls CAN do more damage than good, but that is the reason why I posted here so this way I can examine tone control designs and select an option that is 'musical' and will properly correct the sound and not make it worse than it is.
Again, this is all just one persons opinion in lieu of my reasons why I want tone controls. Some may agree with me, some may not. I am just illustrating that there are many many more reasons why one would want tone controls on a pre-amp.
Thank You,
Geo
{Stepping down from soap box}