Question: will a high quality 2 x 80 watt mono block tube amplifier, based on 211 tubes, perform better with big difficult speakers like Dynaudio Consequence (a 5-way system), than the Krell FPB600 transistor amp?
Short answer: no.
I tested, borrowing a friend’s tube mono blocks, each weighing 50 kg or so, due to big oversize transformers. These were hardcore 80 watts, the amps should be able to drive difficult loads, or be much like a higher number of official transistor watts, say 150 to 200.
I noticed some interesting things on the way.
First, the tube amps would not get a decent volume in my ca 45 m2 room until I put the preamp volume at four o’clock – with the Krell, it reaches this level already at one o’clock. I first thought, well, this goes to show how power-hungry the Consequences are, but I also tested with a small Royd Sorcerer speaker, and the story was much the same there (or, to three o’clock). The amps need a stronger than usual input signal, which by itself should not influence the sound quality much. Possibly, my IO preamp sounds best cranked up, as long as it goes beyond 11 or 12 (with the Krell), it sounds fine.
I measured the decibel level in the listening position, music came alive around 75-85 decibel, much the same as with the Krell, although this required a higher than usual preamp volume.
Second, the tube amps are the first I have tried that seriously makes an attempt to make the Consequence speakers work. My small Ming Da 38 watts stereo tube amp does not work very well, making the speakers sound strange and thin.
However, even if “the hand” (amp) was now large enough to try out the “glove” (speaker), it was not a very good fit. The 80 watt tube amps did not “hold” the speakers in the way achieved by the Krell, not surprising, since the latter has perhaps x 2 or 3 in objective power level (hard to say exactly, many variables involved).
This was most noticeable on dynamic large scale music, but also on attacks, transients etc. The speakers sounded somewhat hollow, and the music somewhat strained.
In fact, after some hours of testing, my wife sat down to listen, and after an hour, concluded, “no, this does not work out, the sound is bad”. She used words like “hard, straining”; I would also say, “flat”.
Third, the experiment cast the Krell in a good light. Ken Kessler, reviewing the FPB 600 amp in Stereophile in 1997, was right when he said that the Krell was almost indistinguishable from good tube equipment in some key areas. The 2 x 80 tube monoblocs sounded remarkably “Krell-like” in suprising ways, for me, – quite analytical, much more frequency-linear and less “tubey” than my small Ming Da tube amp (less of a bell curve). The were less sweet than the Krell!
I have read reviewers writing of the convergence of transistor and tube, but have not experienced it for myself. The tubes sounded a bit harder and more analytical than the Krell – but this may be due to the fact that they were not quite powerful enough to drive the speakers properly, and perhaps also that the 211 tubes were not optimal. A main symptom was the hard, strained sound at high music volumes, and another that voices were not pronounced by the tube amps, as they should have been, but were instead more hollow, as if lost in the mix. A likely cause is power limitation, too few watts to drive the speakers properly, fill the “glove”.
One of my conclusions is, that the next time I suspect the Krell amp for adding transistor-related types of pollution to the sound, I should pause, and look for other factors instead. The transistor hardness was not much notable in the test.
Why do I take the trouble of this kind of test? Heavy hifi is, well, heavy. Changing cables, carrying equipment, adjusting and listening takes time. This is by intention my hobby only. I have no work connection or commercial interests in the audio field.
One reason is that I often hear various kinds of noise and sound pollutions. I listen to music and play some, as a musician, and since my positioning in music is as participant, not just spectator, I can’t help looking for what to blame, or what could be set (more) right. This is “the audio bug”, but it has also helped me and my family to get much more out of music than we would otherwise have achieved.
If I suspect the Krell, should I be more careful, perhaps the source is somewhere else? A possible broader conclusion has to do with – in audiophile terms – component matching and system synergy. If you drive speakers right, they will sound less hard, more dimensional, improving the imaging, and so on, everything will fall into place. You should test a component in its optimal system setting.
The German record label Speaker’s Corner has remastered and rereleased Wizz Jones 1972 LP Right now.
Why is this a great event? One, because the LP is great. Two, because it sounds better than ever before.
The LP has been an almost unobtainable secret classic, but it is also quite variable. Listen to its best tracks, especially on side one, and ignore the fillers, especially on side two. The best tracks include “Which of them you love the best”, with outstanding ensemble playing, singing, and thoughtful lyrics from Alan Tunbridge; “One grain of sand”, a great song by Pete Seeger brought successfully into a humble, c0ntemplative form; and “City of the angels” (Tunbridge), with exceptionally excellent guitar work from John Renbourn and Wizz Jones, playing duo.
Overall, the guitar work on the album is outstanding, or at least very competent, on the throwaway filler tracks. And the mood on the best tracks is very worthwhile, even today – we are a bit after the “youth revolt”, the 1960s revolution, the music reflects on what happened, what could it be. It is tentative, limited, in the works – and sometimes works all the better because of it.
The album was mainly ignored when it was released in 1972. So much happened at the time, and not many people got to hear it. All the more honour to Speaker’s Corner, rereleasing it today.
I don’t know how they do it, but this label has served me very well. No sense of digitalis here. For example, their remaster of Santana’s Caravanserai sounds much better than the MoFi remasters of the two first Santana LPs, which appeared around the same time, a couple of years ago. The MoFis are harder and flatter, the SC softer, more dimensional, deeper. Some of my SC LPs (like Caravanserai, and another goodie, Supersession) are cut a bit below standard volume, but that is not the case with Right now. My friend Bjørn Moe has A-B tested the reissue and the original CBS LP, which he owns, and he confirms that the reissue in many ways sounds better. The sound is more “here”, it pops out, dynamics seems greater. This is the case also with Steely Dan: Cant buy a thrill, another excellent SC reissue.
Stereophile had a comment to this effect, some months ago. It means: a step up in resolution will be more important than most tweaks to your sound system. Here is a new experiment, using my Cowon D2 small mobile music player.
1 Listening to Tom Petty: Mojo on LP on my main system, sound is quite good, ensemble playing enjoyable.
2 Downloading the hi-res (Flac) digital version of the same LP – will not play on the Cowon D2.
3 Downloading the mp3 version. Plays OK, but the sound is hard and digital. Turn it off, please.
4 Recording from the LP through the Korg MR1 DSD recorder, then downsampling to the best (standard CD) resolution the Cowon player can handle (using Korg’s Audiogate), and downloading to the Cowon. Result: much better. A much more embodied, relaxed but also lively sound, more like true music. More, thanks.
Conclusion: Considering how much mechanics and potential error that alternative 4 goes through, using a technology from a century ago, the result is in a sense quite amazing. However the resolution of the LP is even higher than that of today’s “hires” digital recordings, so the improvement shines through. Even downsampled down the chain, a higher upchain resolution makes a major difference.
I am one of the contributors to the Women’s health days event in Oslo 1-2 April. See
http://www.forskningsradet.no/no/Arrangement/Kvinnehelsedagene_2011/1253964755410
My paper is titled Gender, violence and health – do we need a gender perspective in health and medicine? (in Norwegian, Kjønn, vold og helse – trenger vi et kjønnsperspektiv på helse og medisin?v/Øystein Gullvåg Holter, professor i maskulinitets- og likestillingsforskning, UiO)
The seminar starts Friday 1st of April at 9, Oslo kongressenter, Youngstorget
My introduction, ca 10, will be focused on one example of why a gender perspective is needed – violence against children. New results show that violence against children is mainly performed by the adult who dominates the decision-making in the home.
Gender equal decision making among adults in families lowers the chance of violence against children perhaps as much as two thirds.
This is a major historical research result – in my view, and I will highlight it in my lecture.
The gender equality survey in Norway 2007 showed that children growing up in gender-equal homes, where the parents decided things equally, were less exposed to violence and physical punishment, compared to father- or mother-dominated homes.
This is a major new finding, and I regard it as one of the most important findings of my research, stretching over many years from 1980 to today.
The 2007 representative survey data maps adults retrospective experiences, growing up ca 1940-2000, and seems to be a clear and solid data source, for example, reported in a very similar way by men and women. Compared to violence in adult life relationships, also included in the survey, the data on childhood experiences seems more robust, less prone to “mission shift” or normative reinterpretation, although it is retrospective. If bad memory or rescripting due to age was substantial, we would expect disparate reports from different age groups, but instead, that data gives a coherent picture. The age groups tell of gradually reduced violence, like other sources, and also, they have much the same basis for regarding something as violence, as indicated by e g health correlations. For example, it is not the case, in terms of health outcomes, that violence in childhood reported by the young is any less serious than the violence reported by the old part of the sample. A variety of tests point in the same direction, the childhood gender equality and violence reporting is realistic.
Gender equality in the socialization agency, the family, or the parental group, in this study, reduces the chance of violence against children substantially, almost two thirds. In father-dominated homes, 27 percent experienced violence or punishment, in mother-dominated homes 17 percent, in gender-equal homes 10 percent. The main perpetrator, the violent or punishing person, also mapped in the survey, and in father-dominated homes was mainly the father, in mother-dominated homes mainly the mother, in equal homes more balanced but more often the father.
This main pattern was not much affected by gender, age, education, whether the parents were divorced, or mobbing in the socialization environment. Gender equality emerged as a strong independent factor, regarding violence against children, according to the survey results.
The main result was described in the report, see Holter etc: Gender equality and quality of life, p 239. but it took some time for the message to sink in, and this is a case that deserves better promotion. Further analyses of the survey results have confirmed the independent character of the gender equality decision-making variable. Its strong effect and similar patterning across other known variables, like social class related variables, family breakup, and social problems (mobbing in childhood environment) is remarkable.
These result are of historical importance. They should be better tested and established, can they be repeated in Norway, are they international, do they represent a wide trend? If they turn out to be right, through broader testing, they demand a rethinking, or even a paradigm change, in many disciplines.
In my March 15 blog post on the Japan catastrophe – earthquake, tsunami and nuclear fallout – I commented that the problems are also due to lacking gender equality. What does that mean?
We might start by considering plant eaters and meat eaters (Japanese terms), or soft and strong men (Norwegian terms), democracy and authoritarianism.
Historically, Japan managed to adapt successfully to Western imperialism only by regenerating authoritarian tendencies, leading to the axis power alliance and imperialism in World War II. Lack of attention to gender equality was part of the limited development of democracy in post-war Japan.
Women were not much present, it seems, in Japanese decisions leading to the lacking defence against the three main parts of the catastrophe (earthquake, tsunami, nuclear). The basic issue is not just gender balance, but gender interest balance. It is the reproductive sphere that is hurt, mainly, by the damages in today’s Japan, although production is diminished too. The main victim is civil society and human lives.
Perhaps Japan needs an ideas and behaviours revolution, learning from Egypt and Tunis, extending democracy peacefully? Japan needs to move beyond its authoritarian inheritance and conformism, leading e g to the ignorance of the warnings from outspoken researchers like the seismologist Ishibashi Katsuhiko.
In many countries of the world, new and old roles for men are in opposition, a change behind the scenes. In Japan, it has been called a struggle between “plant eaters” and “meat eaters”, in Norway, a struggle between “soft” and “hard” men. All over the world, there is a need for change, and also, for using tradition, for making use of the stability of culture, but no longer for authority, for democracy instead.
What can we do? Japan is hit by a terrible multiple tragedy, first, the earthquake, then, the tsunami, and now, the possibility of nuclear fallout. I am deeply concerned for the Japanese people. Yesterday, a Japanese student broke down in tears in my course, and asked for a postponement delivering her paper – I said yes, and tried to comfort her.
What I can do, as as a social researcher regarding gender equality, is to ask – what role gender equality, what role women, regarding nuclear and environment safety in Japan? Has this been an all-male affair?`It is fairly well known that men’s risk margins are larger than women’s. There are studies showing that the presence of women improves health, environment and safety in business organisations. I am not saying that gender equality could have avoided the catastrophe, but it could have reduced the impact.
The tragedy of the commons
Douglas J. Futuyma in Evolution (see blog post Futuyma: Evolution, March 7, 2011) writes on “the tragedy of the commons” and how this problem of individualism versus collectivism is found in nature too and how it can be escalated by selfish gene type of adaptations (p 415).
The tragedy of the commons, as Futuyma correctly states, consists in the depletion of common resources due to individualist behaviour. For example, each boat or fisherman may profit by the largest catch, but this behaviour threatens the longer-term resource. Fish stocks like North Atlantic cod are threatened.
The tragedy is an interpretative dilemma, a situation involving different social rules (individualism and collectivism). It is not just a fact issue. It has to do with theories and rules of social behaviour.
For example, the tragedy of the commons was described in Marx’s work, especially regarding how the upper class tends to delimit communal trends in the lower classes. Whatever the view, one cannot drop the social connections in the argument, the tragedy has to do with power (just like the tragedy of “social darwinism”, briefly acknowledged by Futuyma p 631). Interpretative knowledge of human behaviour is clearly needed. This is where gender research comes into view.
By the way, Evolution is the kind of book gender researchers can only dream of. It has 750 or so big A4 size pages in colour print with an illustration (photo, graph, model) every second page. It is pedagogically presented, with a big glossary, excercises, and an accompanying web site. A teacher’s wet dream, in my area.
Futuyma cites Oscar Wilde, arguing that human life is about meaning, not just utilitarianism, and he warns against using evolution theory for racism (p. 631). I could have wished for more, regarding the critique of Social Darwinism, but it is there, in terms of “race”, if not so clearly in terms of “gender”.
The tragedy of the commons is a process partly explained by social class, partly by “race” (ethnicity / centrality), partly by gender, age and partly by other ranking systems, as mapped by the social and cultural sciences. The lower class is usually more associated with the commons, as are the young, the women, and so on.
Selfish gene types can perhaps develop through selfish or short-sighted societal developments, and possibly correlate or interact with these (cf Jared Diamond: Collapse). Whatever (and however) the biological interaction, the material on sociocultural variation is strong, as well as a more common tendency in human society. The tragedy of the commons, in a more moderate form, that common property is often neglected, was noticed by Aristoteles already. The ‘corruption’ of communal power is a theme in early historical texts. Some societies are fairly well able to put the commons in the middle, others aren’t. Obviously, social systems including class and gender issues are important for understanding if the “neglect tendency” associated with the commons is to develop into a major issue, a tragedy (or catastrophe), or not.
I am writing as a researcher within the field of gender research. I work with recognition also of the limits of current gender research. These include a women-centrism that reflects today’s society and culture in general, perhaps an over-culturedness, a lack of male students and researchers, and much else. These weaknesses are understandable at this stage – this is a small, emerging field. Beyond weaknesses, the more important question is, does the field of gender studies have an important message for biological research?
Unlike some feminists, I would not say, so far, from my attempts to read up in biology, that the answer is a “resounding yes”. I don’t agree with some gender research ideas in the direction that biology or evolutionary psychology have “nothing to say”. I think these gender researchers lack a distinction between gender differentiation (where biology has a lot to say), and gender stratification (less, but possibly some, to say).
Even if there is no “resounding yes”, gender research does have an important message for biology, extending the understanding of social behaviour and the need for interpretative knowledge, and a potential to clear up the understanding in these disciplines. It does have a good case, especially, if gender research is angled towards gender equality (gender stratification), not just “what is gender” (gender differentiation). It has a case, especially, extending the critique of Social Darwinism from “race” to more general democratic and social learning considerations, including “gender”.
One research theme that stands out from my reading of Futuyma’s book, along with others, relates to discrimination of reproduction. This can be found in some outright forms, parents eating their children, and similar, in biology. But can we find an overall group tendency, or is this quite specific for human society? Women, in known human populations, are usually the ones ending up with the main costs of the tragedy of the commons (cf. John Lennon 1972 (Yoko Ono 1969): “woman is the nigger of the world”). Is this a fairly uncommon case? Human societies, especially socially stratified societies, have a tendency to disempower or devaluate reproduction and regeneration, compared to production, which seems less common among animal societies (even if these may have pro-male ranking too).
Although Futuyma is quite clear, in line with e g Kuhn and Wallerstein (not mentioned), in his critical emphasis on biology as research development, often contrary to current societal power and economic interests, he seems somewhat stuck “within the closet”. He correctly argues:
“Science is not a collection of facts, contrary to popular belief, but rather a process of acquiring understanding” 612 “the hypothesis is provisionally accepted” 612 – this is in line with Kuhn, but does not mention him, as part of debate against creationism. Intelligent design (creationism) is “not testable” p. 613. He goes on to say:
“A theory, as the word is used in science, doesn’t mean an unsupported speculation or hypothesis (the popular use of the word). A theory is, instead, a big idea that encompasses other ideas and hypotheses and weaves them into a coherent fabric. It is a mature, interconnected body of statements, based on reasoning and evidence, that explains a wide variety of observations. ” p 613
I like his arguments, and his definition of theory as a big idea, although he goes on to argue that “biology has few theories” – a doubtful sentiment. It has in fact a lot of theories, but usually implicit, and it needs better interpretative knowledge.
Could gender equality theory be like a radar, or a compass, beyond current feminist theory and gender theory? Can it be based on a critique of conventional gender theory? Can it develop major new insights?
These are problems I shall be working with, this spring, based on three months of author stipend.
