capacitor test for EQ with audios

[kambo]

i used, Rus PIO, orange, wima, Xicon etc...

all caps are 0.22 uf

aif files normalized to zero db . 

just cap in the boost, no inductor.  basic boost principle, as explained in Ian's notes.

https://www.hightail.com/download/cUJWTXRlZDV1Yk0wTWNUQw


EDIT :  after reading some comments from groupdiy members re caps used in their passive EQs i decided to
hear the difference myself....

i never understood what exactly lush sounding PIO cap meant...
and Wima mkp4 is good to go etc...
after this basic test, now i know.... i was going to build PIO cap P2P EQ, but
after this simple test i am not sure if i needed a lush sounding EQ for now...
may be on second build, i would use PIO caps.

 

[kambo]

caps

wima mkp-4
9104-PIO
auri yellow
capling from tubedepot
orange 715P
orange 716p
teflon ( that big cap on picture, from Russia)
xicon_POLY_from_tubedepot

 

[guze]

i will listen for sure, thanks

 

[abbey road d enfer]

i used, Rus PIO, orange, wima, Xicon etc...

all caps are 0.22 uf

aif files normalized to zero db . 

just cap in the boost, no inductor.  basic boost principle, as explained in Ian's notes.

Can you tell us what this is? What EQ? A 0.22uF cap may be used in LF, MF, even HF EQ, and in many other positions... How much boost (or cut).
At the moment your post is just noise without signal.

 

[Martin Griffith]

Engineering is done with numbers.  Analysis without numbers is only an opinion.

 

[kambo]

i used, Rus PIO, orange, wima, Xicon etc...

all caps are 0.22 uf

aif files normalized to zero db . 

just cap in the boost, no inductor.  basic boost principle, as explained in Ian's notes.

Can you tell us what this is? What EQ? A 0.22uF cap may be used in LF, MF, even HF EQ, and in many other positions... How much boost (or cut).
At the moment your post is just noise without signal.

this is not a technical test. none would make any different ! c first post for necessary details.
this is to get some general idea about the caps.  different values on different frequencies didnt make any difference. they reacted the same. all caps sounding good anyway. but there are slight differences.

i can mail you some caps , if you wanna perform some scientific tests.
for now, enjoy the noise  8)

 

[abbey road d enfer]

this is not a technical test. none would make any different ! c first post for necessary details.
this is to get some general idea about the caps.  different values on different frequencies didnt make any difference. they reacted the same. all caps sounding good anyway. but there are slight differences.

Seeing the paucity of remotely positive answers to your post, you may conclude it's not that interesting. We're DIY here, not G.......z.
You, yourself mentioned noise...

 

[Kingston]

"basic boost principle, as explained in Ian's notes"

perhaps if it would help of you posted said notes and the schematic.

 

[kambo]

edit on  first post

 

[kambo]

Engineering is done with numbers.  Analysis without numbers is only an opinion.

(ur pots slipped in, missed that... )

you got that right... this test is about opinion on caps...

 

[gyraf]

..Yet opinion is the central component in building something that sounds good.  World is full of thingys that has been engineered numerically to target specs, but heats no blood at all. Do I have to mention Behringer?

Jakob E.

 

[Monte McGuire]

I'd like to think that opinion can be tempered with 'numbers' - one can have both at the same time, as long as the right numbers are followed, and the right principles for acting upon these numbers are employed.

Fundamentally, measurements are only quantified perceptions of a mechanical nature. One still has to choose what to perceive (or measure) and how to interpret the results of those observations. It's not that different from a subjective assessment, except that a valid numeric observation can point to 'better or worse', and this can allow a gradual refinement process, which is difficult with only abstract subjective assessments.

In both cases, a context for determining "good or bad" and hopefully "better or worse" is needed if one wants to use these measurements/perceptions to optimize/design a device. If you're just tasting, then yeah, have at it. I find it much more interesting to know why a circuit sounds good or not, and to turn that around into the process of building circuits that sound good. Numbers and theories can help with that, when applied properly.

 

[kambo]

..Yet opinion is the central component in building something that sounds good.  World is full of thingys that has been engineered numerically to target specs, but heats no blood at all. Do I have to mention Behringer?

Jakob E.

do i have to mention, that Behringer been on countless million selling albums  8)

 

[kambo]

I'd like to think that opinion can be tempered with 'numbers' - one can have both at the same time, as long as the right numbers are followed, and the right principles for acting upon these numbers are employed.

Fundamentally, measurements are only quantified perceptions of a mechanical nature. One still has to choose what to perceive (or measure) and how to interpret the results of those observations. It's not that different from a subjective assessment, except that a valid numeric observation can point to 'better or worse', and this can allow a gradual refinement process, which is difficult with only abstract subjective assessments.

In both cases, a context for determining "good or bad" and hopefully "better or worse" is needed if one wants to use these measurements/perceptions to optimize/design a device. If you're just tasting, then yeah, have at it. I find it much more interesting to know why a circuit sounds good or not, and to turn that around into the process of building circuits that sound good. Numbers and theories can help with that, when applied properly.

i am totally lost now
i dont get the relation between your post and PIO cap sounding lush vs Wima mkp4 n a passive EQ boost circuit...
i dont see any point of trying to change the sound character of capacitor via changing your EQ design, to make it sound better to your taste, either... i would just pick different cap if i didnt wanna hear lush sounding EQ. or bright sounding EQ... or whatever in between...

there is no "good or bad", neither "better or worse" in this case...
just personal taste for your needs;  as u say...

 

[CZ101]

To the OP -

Before you draw any conclusions about the "lush sound" of this or that type of cap, you might as well verify that the caps you're comparing are relatively close in their actual physical capacitance. Just because two caps are labeled ".22uF" doesn't necessarily mean they are actually .22uF.  So first things first, find a capacitance meter and sort caps into relatively close values. Then you have a baseline from which to build your understanding of the differences (or lack thereof).

 

[kambo]

fluke 187 measurements were with_in  +/-  0.001uf

 

[Gus]

Not having a schematic to look at makes it hard to understand how you are using the caps

What is the DC voltage difference between the plates? 

 

[kambo]

Not having a schematic to look at makes it hard to understand how you are using the caps

What is the DC voltage difference between the plates?

dont have the exact schematic, but i was just adding signal back in, simple shelving boost.
sorry, never measured the DC voltage difference,

i also tried in NYD passive EQ, and later Ian's latest ladder type EQ schematics.
results were still the same in comparison.
(due design/resistance change etc, 0.22uf wasnt sitting on exact frequency, but comparison was the same
with in the same capacitor batch).

all capacitors  had still same sound character.

i did try couple of different makeup amps, results were still same. only difference was additional color from
tubes.
i used 5751, 12ax7, 6SN7 based gain makeups.

so, character of caps  did not change with make up amp, nor with EQ design... although, all EQ boost part i used  is pretty much the same thing... just different R for the design.

 

[Monte McGuire]

i am totally lost now
i dont get the relation between your post and PIO cap sounding lush vs Wima mkp4 n a passive EQ boost circuit...
i dont see any point of trying to change the sound character of capacitor via changing your EQ design, to make it sound better to your taste, either... i would just pick different cap if i didnt wanna hear lush sounding EQ. or bright sounding EQ... or whatever in between...

there is no "good or bad", neither "better or worse" in this case...
just personal taste for your needs;  as u say...

My assertion is that it's not the "Wima" in a capacitor that makes a circuit sound lush or not, it's some real, physically observable characteristics of a cap that might be important in the context of a specific circuit. Change the circuit and maybe the Wima cap doesn't do the same thing. Or, maybe a different part does the "Wima" thing without being a Wima cap.

My point is that the process of engineering is to try to identify what makes a circuit work a certain way, and from that knowledge, be able to design a circuit that behaves the way you want it to. IMHO, the point of this site and the discussions here are to help engineers and designers to identify these patterns and techniques, so that they can be applied to the devices that they build.

Your original post provided no specific circuit, just some measurements and subjective reports, so for a person like myself, who has spent decades trying to figure out why some devices sound a certain way and others sound another way, it's really difficult to say anything more than "good for you!" as a response to your results.

Sure, that's a fine thing to do here, but many of us can do a whole lot more. Collectively, we have a lot of experience working with a wide variety of circuits, and have spent a lot of time trying to zero in to those ephemeral subjective properties of a circuit and how it's built. I guess I just wanted more details, so that I could extract something useful from your observations, or add my experience to your experience, so that we can both advance our craft. Still, you owe me nothing, so please don't take this as a criticism. I simply thought that pushing your discussion into a different place would make it more interesting to me, since the general topic you address is actually one that I'm very interested in - capacitors do have a sound, but the details of how and why that happens are not universally agreed upon, and I have found that new information has influenced my previous thoughts about this subject.

Anyway, have fun with your EQ, and cheers!

 

[kambo]

well, if you could post couple of different passive HF shelving boost schematics,
i can certainly try