Topic: GEAR COMP: Schoeps MK41 > Sonosax SX-M2/LS2 v. NBox

[Brian Skalinder]

Alright - MANY thanks to Bill LaPier for sending off his NBox, D100, etc. for me to run this comp.  I had many more comps planned between these two boxes, including different caps: MKx v. MKxV caps, modSBM-1 v SBM-1, SBM-1 v. D100 ADC, etc., but I was slow getting the comp started due to pressing real-life activities and had to return the gear before finding time for the rest.  So...this is it for now:

New Monsoon
Tea Leaf Green

2004-05-26
Cleveland, OH - Wilbert's

Taper: Brian Skalinder
Location: Center, 20' back, 6' up
Config: DIN (20cm, 90º)
Source 1: Schoeps MK41 > KCY 250/2lg > Sonosax SX-M2/LS2 (Lemosax) > Sony D100
Source 2: Schoeps MK41 > custom actives > N-Box > Sony D100
Conversion: Sony D100 > EgoSys Waveterminal 2496 > Cool Edit Pro 2.0
Editing: Cool Edit Pro 2.0 (fades), CD-Wave (tracking)

TRACKS

A01.newmonsoon2004-05-26
B01.newmonsoon2004-05-26

A02.tealeafgreen2004-05-26
B02.tealeafgreen2004-05-26

A03.tealeafgreen2004-05-26
B03.tealeafgreen2004-05-26

NOTES:

Mics clamped to the stand. Only difference in mic placement: a couple vertical inches. Avg RMS on the corresponding tracks is pretty darn close, mostly closer than 1dB and some closer than .5dB. You wanna get 'em closer, go for it, but this is close enough for me.

So...which tracks do you prefer: A or B? Why? Don't be shy - there is no right or wrong answer, only what your ears like to hear using your playback system and space/ears/brain! Please post your thoughts here, over on TapersSection.com (Ask The Tapers forum) or, directly at bskalinder[at]yahoo.com. Once you post your thoughts - either directly to me or on TS.com - I'll tell you which tracks (A or B) map to which source (1 or 2).

Edit:  oops, forgot to attach the torrent.

[Sean Gallemore]

hell yeah!  I love the comparisons

[Brian Skalinder]

Speaking of comparisons, Schwill, I'm finally sitting down to listen to your M1 v. Neuros HD comp.  PM coming...

[Brian Skalinder]

No bass rolloff on the Sax.

[Brian Skalinder]

No doubt the modSBM-1 helps smooth things out, I wish I'd had more time to drop the modSBM-1 into the mix.  But since I don't own a modSBM-1, I wanted to run the comp for my personal gear setup first.  I'd love to run (or lend gear for someone else to run) the same comp with the modSBM-1 in the mix.  Maybe sometime this summer.  

Thanks for the input, Alex.  But I'm more interested in what listeners ears tell them than what checking out the WAV stats tell them.  Levels alone may or may not tell the story - the Sax levels could be more even because I was able to tweak each channel individually, or the NBox levels could be more even because I couldn't get the damn Sax levels tweaked properly using the POS (relative to my usual V3 meters) D100 level meters.

And these questions are for everyone responding, not just Alex:

• Which do you prefer, A or B?
• What sonic characteristics lead you to your preferences?  
• Which track set (A or B) do you think matches which source (Lemosax or NBox)?
• On what playback system are you listening?

Thanks for the feedback, looking forward to more input from the listeners!  My g/f Jen mixed up the tracks and gave me a blind comp - I'll post my thoughts once I hear from some more people.

Edit: Alex, I'm guessing you preferred A and think it's the NBox recording as the only votes in the poll so far are for A preferred / NBox.  But thought I'd ask in case those votes are someone elses.

[Brian Skalinder]

The problem with the Sax is that the rolloff is too steep. With it on, you lose too much bass; with it off you get too much, which muddies up the rest of the mix.

Yeah, the Sax rolloff is, IMO, unusable: 18dB/octave!  I forget at what frequency it starts...gonna see if I can find my manual.  As for muddying up the rest of the mix, I'll post my full thoughts on the comp a little bit later.   

[Brian Skalinder]

Oh trust me we already had a listening party over here this morning. And voted. Let's go peeps, download this stuff and fire it up!!

Okay, cool - that's what I thought.  Tally two from Alex and party for A preferred / NBox source.    Any chance you guys'll provide any more input on the specific sonic characteristics you preferred/disliked and/or playback system used?  Just curious - in the V3/wmod-UA5 comp I ran a while back it became clear those with "higher end" playback systems preferred the V3 source while others preferred the wmod-UA5 source.

Thanks for the swift response, Alex and crew - my lazy ass is just finally getting around to Schwill's M1 v. Neuros comp posted a couple weeks ago!

edit by Moke:
correcting quote author name

[zhianosatch]

PM sent.

[bhadella]

My thoughts:

A-smoother detail especially on the low end, less fatiguing and more enjoyable to my ear

B-punchier, almost gritty general sound, mid's and upper more pronounced, only really lows come through and are vague, fatiguing to my ears


My playback: Sony CE275 (A) and Sony CX400 (B) > Denon DRA-395 > B&W 601's + 12' JBL Sub / Senneheiser HD497 Headphones

I flipped between seperate inputs so that I could quickly change between sources.  Any chance that future comparisons could have a track that changes between sources every 30 seconds?  I find that my memory can't hold details for long periods making a quick change between sources very helpful.

Edit: I had the wrong sources marked while comparing (once I pulled them from the CD players I realized my mistake)

[Sean Gallemore]

something is flawed here.  Source A the bass is shifted to the left and on source B the bass is favoring the right.

it's making it hard to keep things straight in my head

[zhianosatch]

really? too much crack for breakfast again?

[Sean Gallemore]

really? too much crack for breakfast again?

nah, really

[Brian Skalinder]

something is flawed here.  Source A the bass is shifted to the left and on source B the bass is favoring the right.

it's making it hard to keep things straight in my head

Ahhhhh, shit.  You're right, Schwill.  I've listened through the entire comp a dozen times and didn't notice it, but now that you point it out - yup, though I only really notice it with the crowd.  I'm not gonna go mess with the seed at this point.  Swap one of your sources L/R and you should be all set.  Sorry...  

[Sean Gallemore]

something is flawed here.  Source A the bass is shifted to the left and on source B the bass is favoring the right.

it's making it hard to keep things straight in my head

Ahhhhh, shit.  You're right, Schwill.  I've listened through the entire comp a dozen times and didn't notice it, but now that you point it out - yup, though I only really notice it with the crowd.  I'm not gonna go mess with the seed at this point.  Swap one of your sources L/R and you should be all set.  Sorry...  

it's alright, i just wanted to point it out to make sure I wasn't on crack, as armen would have you believe.  I'm listening on my headphones so it's easier for me to tell.  And I only notice it with the bass, fwiw

[Sean Gallemore]

prefer A, only because I listened so hard.  In reality, it wouldn't matter much to me.

I really only used the new monsoon track because I thought it had the best range, TLG lacked bass.

A has sloppier bass but the highs are easier to take.  Maybe it's just a beefier low-end on A bleeding into other sounds.

oh yeah, I think the sax is A, and the nBox is B

M-audio delta dio 2496 > hd580

[Sean Gallemore]

love the voting results so far.  Our ears are unanimous.

[nexus6]

The 'A sourced' sounds fuller in mid-low and low range.  I sense there is more detail in 'B' high end, or is that an 'illusion' from the missing mid-low and low from 'B'?

ANDY

[dklein]

I reversed the channels on 1 set of waves before doing the listening because of the l/r swap I read about so I don't know how much it changes the results...but for me:

B had a more pleasant bottom end - a little tighter and there was somehow more 'feel' to it even though it didn't seem any louder.
B also had a smoother top end, which I appreciated in this recording.  At all levels and over the 3 tracks, I consistently preferred B.  'A' seemed to be missing precision low down and was a little bit too much up high.  So in matching with the brightness of the 41s, B was it for me.

I have no clue which would be the n-box or the sonosax since I don't really know much about them and have only heard one n-box recording.  It was also with 41s and was placed right by my 184>UA-5 setup.  They were different for sure!  Actually, come to think of it, there was way more bottom end on the 184s so... I'll guess that source 'A' is the n-box.  Another unknown factor would be differences between the pairs of capsules.

Thanks for the comp Brian!   How many months will you beat yourself up over the sloppy work on the channels?    

[Brian Skalinder]

Thanks for the feedback, Andy - check your Hotmail account.  

How many months will you beat yourself up over the sloppy work on the channels?    

Oh, at least several - or maybe even until the next comp.        I've performed a 100 or so hours of bit-perfect testing using my soundcard and ODL-312 / NJB3 and all the devices are bit-perfect.  However, occasionally the soundcard will swap the L/R channels.  I think this is what happend here, but I should've caught it!

Schwill - not so unanimous anymore!  

[Sean Gallemore]

Thanks for the feedback, Andy - check your Hotmail account. 

How many months will you beat yourself up over the sloppy work on the channels?    

Schwill - not so unanimous anymore!   

yeah, well, I'm sure you'll give us the results based on the sound systems used

[Rick]

I prefer A, but I'm not sure why Both sound great to me. I hoping the Nbox is source A for obvious reasons ;-) But I wouldn’t be shocked it was a Sax.


Edit: After to listening to it some more I changed my mind on which one I like more…. B sounds better to me… its just more clearer. The bass sounds tigher to me. I still think source A is the Nbox and Source B is the Sax. Source A sounds like all the tapes I make with my Nbox, but these are using MK41 not MK4 so maybe the Nobx with the MK41 have a tighter bass. If that's the case, I know I'm getting next!

[Sean Gallemore]

I prefer A, but I'm not sure why Both sound great to me. I hoping the Nbox is source A for obvious reasons ;-) But I wouldn’t be shocked it was a sax.

[Rick]

I prefer A, but I'm not sure why Both sound great to me. I hoping the Nbox is source A for obvious reasons ;-) But I wouldn’t be shocked it was a sax.

I actually changed my mind.

[dklein]

After reading everybody elses descriptions, I went back and listened again.  It is so strange that we hear things so differently.  Especially on the bass - again 'B' seemed more authoritative and tight where 'A' was loose and sloppy to my ears (relatively speaking of course - both were good captures).

fwiw, I was listening on a laptop thru an Emagic A62 into my home system (Linn Isobariks / Naim Active electronics).  It may be that some of the bass detail on 'B' is very low in frequency and some people aren't hearing it???

This is quite interesting!

[Brian Skalinder]

Oops, looks like I forgot to post my feedback and the key publicly.  FWIW, my take on the comp:

A TRACKS

• Fuller, more extended bass.
• Smoother, more balanced lower mids.
• Richer highs, better transient detail.
• More detailed across the board.
• Much more coherent soundstage.

B TRACKS

• Punchier / more "hyped" throughout.
• Not as much low bass extension, but tighter.
• Lacking upper-bass/lower mids, and as a result...
• Punchier, grittier more up-front upper mids/guitar.
• Grittier, spittier highs, less transient detail.
• Less detailed over all.
• Lacking the soundstage/coherence of the A tracks.

Overall, I preferred A over B.¹  Final vote tally:

Preferences

• 10/15 | preferred A
• 04/15 | preferred B
• 01/15 | couldn't tell the difference

Gear guesses

Of the 10 preferring A tracks:


• 04/15 | guessed A = Lemosax
• 06/15 | guessed A = NBox
Of the 4 preferring B tracks:


• 02/15 | guessed B = Lemosax
• 02/15 | guessed B = NBox

Source key:

• Tracks A = Lemosax source
• Tracks B = NBox source

¹ Of course, I'm at an advantage in the comps I run because I'm very familiar with the sonic characteristics of my gear - and I chose my gear for its sonic characteristics - so it's no surprise which source I preferred.

[Rick]

The Sax/LS2 is about $500 more right?

[Brian Skalinder]

The Sax/LS2 is about $500 more right?

I don't remember specifically, but in that ballpark, yeah.

[Rick]

I wonder how much different the results would be with MK4 caps instead? Its my understanding that the hypers tend to have tighter bass so the sax (no bass roll) with mk4 might just be to bassy ??

I personally liked the MK41 combo with the Nbox, maybe I should think about picking up a pair



 

[Brian Skalinder]

I wonder how much different the results would be with MK4 caps instead? Its my understanding that the hypers tend to have tighter bass so the sax (no bass roll) with mk4 might just be to bassy ??

I personally liked the MK41 combo with the Nbox, maybe I should think about picking up a pair

Rick - running the test with MK4s was in the plans, but I ran outta time on the gear loan through no one's doing but my own.  The MK4 with the Sax may be too bassy for some - whether the 4s + Sax are too bassy a combo probably depends more on the playback equipment than the recording gear, IMO, though certainly there'd be more bass than the 41s.

I really, really wanted to prefer the NBox as it would've saved me a good chunk of change!  No doubt, it's a great piece of gear - just not for me.  I bet you'd love the MK41s with the NBox, they're my favorite Schoeps cap behind the MK21 (which are favorite, of course, because I just got 'em and have been using 'em a lot!).  The MK41s come up for sale used every so often, keep an eye out here, on Oade, Gearslutz, and TapeOp.

[Brian Skalinder]

The comparison is now available on tapers.org in the gear comparisons directory.

[jdawg]

The comparison is now available on tapers.org in the gear comparisons directory.

+t for that site reference. Good stuff up there