Tom Martin's reviews are my favorites. No need to change anything.

I love your style man. Promise me you’ll never change!

This review was beyond fantastic. I’ve been considering this product and trying to understand the claims. You explained a technical rendering succinctly. I very much appreciate this. I have listened / read to 100”s if not 1000”s of reviews and this is the best. I master class that I applaud.

You are very good at explaining equipment performance

This sounds very interesting and might be worth a try! Thanks Tom!

Great review. You nailed the summary with the TV analogy.

Have this unit. Breakthrough product and will never go back to the ancient way of listening.

I really appreciate innovation

The first thing that comes to my mind is Carver Sonic holography, Hughes SRS, and Polk SDA. I'm assuming this new way is superior to these older systems. A comparison would be beneficial to understanding the value of this.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

SRS (1989) is a complex and sophisticated approach to making stereo work better in the spatial dimension. From the descriptions I've read, it is somewhat unclear if the goal is accuracy to the recording or, rather, fixing common (but variable) defects in recordings for use in airplanes and cars. SRS was eventually acquired by DTS and is now used in a way that is unclear to me. Might be worth investigating. SDA was created specifically to deal with inter-aural crosstalk, like BACCH. As I understand it, Polk now uses it to make soundbars more immersive. But they have a new stereo model (L800) that revives the original SDA idea. That might make an interesting comparison.

Yes… This is very interesting….I will have to demo.. Please continue this very impressive review with the basic 1,000.00 version..

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Will do. The advantage of the basic version (uBACCH) is that it isn't customized to your head, so anyone can hear the impact it makes. I'm hopeful that it is something like 90% of what I heard. We shall see...

@briand66

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 There is also a Windows VST plug-in available through Bacch Labs (a separate but related company).

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

@@briand66 Cool. That might lower the effective price point or assuage the horrors that some feel with Apple. And anyway, who wants to learn a new OS?

@thomasmartin2219

4 ай бұрын

I’ll have the uBACCH coverage in about two weeks.

Just received my BAACH for MAC and love it! I wholeheartedly concur with you assessment in regards to soundstage width, depth and musicality especially the resonant qualities of both instruments and venues. Please share the recordings that feature a 360 degree presentation. Thanks!

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

IIRC you can hear it on the Pink Floyd album Ummagumma, the track Grantchester Meadows. Listen to the insect. I might view this more as a setup test.

What a great presentation tom. Back in the 1980s when my stereo speakers were double advents I fooled around with similar things like this but with physical placement so the first attempt was to have my double advance in stereo mode, but one set firing forward and one set firing Rearwood bouncing off the back wall which we now call the front wall that produced holographic live stage music but it also produced time delay, problems, etc. ….later I experimented with a three channel set up. My power amplifier was gas in Ampzilla and it could do it so I had it I had a center with doubleAdvents and then I had the left on the right speakers 20 feet apart, and I had a variable passive volume control running the center channel that produced a soundstage that was 20 feet wide, but again had similar problems but all of this was just fooling around with audio. It sounds like this new technology is doing what I was fooling with. Tom thanks for this review. This is all very interesting.

Straight insanity

This whole thing is kind of leaving out the fact that during the mixing and mastering the engineers were not using this technology to originally place the tracks in the production. They were using the regular two speaker monitoring and mastering playback we all always have for playback to make the decisions on how everything was going to sound. I could see this being a valid method maybe if you are listing to a reference live recording where there were no changes in the panning if the mic tracks from left to right by the engineers. Maybe a bunch of recordings done by the likes of Chesky this would be a game changer but for most of what exist that most people actually listen to on the regular basis this would greatly alter what the production team was listening to and using to mix and create the stereo recordings they were making.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

It is an important point to consider. I tried to explain some of this with the idea that it would be beneficial for mixing and mastering to use BACCH to see where the process is actually placing things. Surprisingly, on many modern recordings BACCH doesn't seem to greatly alter the placement that the production team was aiming for, assuming they envisioned re-creating a live stage sort of presentation. It seems to bring these recordings to life in a spatially correct way. It would appear that good engineers are mixing and mastering with at least an intuitive knowledge of how to make a better recording than what they hear on their monitors. But, indeed, there are recordings where BACCH presents things in a way that I don't think the production team envisioned. I talked about this when discussing those early jazz albums.

Just quickly. . . the Blumlein sterophonic recording setup used two figure 8 microphones. (the polar, or listening pattern - how the microphone hears) set at an angle to one another with near coincident capsules. (the listening bit) the idea being that the microphones, when panned hard left and hard right, would reproduce the signal each microphone "hears" in each separate channel, the clever bit is that the microphones polar pattern picks up a reverse phase, slightly different tone version of the opposite side the stage, each recorded channel would have information from the other side of the stage but slightly delayed and out of phase (almost as you describe in the stage analogy) this extra signal and the delay on each side provides your brain with the spatial information to position the sounds in front of you, if you remove the crosstalk in the spatial field you wouldnt have sterophonic sound, you would have two channels of mono sound.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

To be clear(er) than I perhaps was, the crosstalk BACCH is removing is the signal added by reproducing the signal a second time via speakers. As you say, the signal (and the phase information) that the left mic "hears" from the right side is critical to proper reproduction. Ditto for the right mic and the left side signal. BACCH fully retains the signals that the mics "heard". That may be oversimplified, but it roughly captures the ideas here.

OK studio engineers didn't have this tech either - they heard what you heard. So how does this let you hear what they intended whilst fundamentally changing what they intended?

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

To clarify, I am distinguishing the spatial data the engineers put on the recording from their intent. Accurately reproducing the recording, not the intent, creates tradeoffs. I agree it probably would be ideal to follow their intent. It also would be ideal if engineers actually could hear the spatial info they are recording. From what I hear, engineers are doing things to record data that can create a very accurate spatial representation of musical performances. After hearing BACCH, I would say the engineering and their recordings often (not always) are better than we knew. But others might listen and prefer conventional stereo, especially on constant directivity speakers.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

How do you know what they intended? Unless your system and room matches theirs you will not hear what they heard. And there is no way to know that what they heard was exactly what they wished for. What recording engineer has ever sat in a control room and said “thank goodness we have cross talk to minimize the potential for imaging and sound stage size”?

Thanks for this in depth description of what the technology does. I’ve been following it for a couple years now and it does seem amazing. This new approach using a Mac laptop is confusing to me. Could you do another video explaining how the software interacts with the system? How does it physically integrate? I do have a concern that despite the claim you noticed no difference in the frequency response, that having a laptop computer in the chain would be a choke point for sound quality.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

See the show notes for more, but the signal path is: Ethernet>MacMini>Roon Core>BACCH4Mac>USB>dCS Lina>preamp>amp>speakers. So, in simple terms the BACCH4Mac software takes the digital stream from Roon (Qobuz or Tidal sources in my case) and processes it and sends a digital stream to the DAC. Now many people are using PCs or Macs or Roon Nuclei as Roon servers; this is no different -- they're all computers that request music data and turn ethernet streams into USB streams. We are adding BACCH processing to the digital chain, but you sort of can't do BACCH processing without processing the data. It is possible that someone like Wadax could make a better platform for all this than a MacMini, and maybe Theoretica's BACCH-SP is that. But I would say (don't believe me, try it for yourself) that the magnitude of the impact of better streamers than a MacMini is 1/10th the magnitude of the impact of BACCH. Of course, it would be great to have both.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I should add that the concern about frequency response with BACCH is because doing crosstalk cancellation without affecting frequency response is, apparently, hard. I wouldn't expect the impact of using a Mac as the streamer to be on frequency response. But I've been surprised before!

@ScottoGrotto

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 I’ve been discovering on my 2019 iMac that cleaning up the usb out puts with iFi devices has significant gains especially when the iFi usb iPurifier 3 is linear power supplied, and used an iFi spdif iPurifier 2 with iPower X on the input of my dac. These little devices made my iMac sound much more like an audiophile source and transformed what I thought was the sound signature of my little metrum dac. More coherent clean frequency response top to bottom, much better image definition density and separation. Much better bass definition and presence. Very affordable Mac enhancers.

@jeffreythurston1822

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 Thank you for that information.

Very thorough review. I listened to Bacch a Highend show in Munich and years before that Weiss's version. I think it increases insight in to music (some not all as pointed out) but it is restricted to a single listener and as I listen almost each night with my wife it is not useful at all

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

When I report on uBACCH I will comment on whether it helps at all for multiple seating positions.

I'm curious if this is similar to the software running the state of the art sound system at the Sphere in Las Vegas. It would have to be a more complex version with the many speakers and sound cancellation going on intentionally in that space, but something like Bach Processing is seemingly incorporated.

Hope to see and hear BAACH at the upcoming SW Audiofest. Easy adoption when the science expands the bubble from 1 person benefit and experience, to a roomful of listeners.

I had a similar experience with an alpine car stereo with a gimmic effect button, made the image sound outside the car… I could sit there for hours, and I haven’t had the experience since.

fascinating does the addition of processing impact the sound signature, tone, decay or any other aspects of the sound (kind of addressed at 32:00)?

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Tonality seems unaffected. Decay and other spatial variables seem significantly more real. The sense of music occurring in a real room/club/hall is increased. Instrumental resolution seems higher. You do have to get used to hearing things from far left or right and behind. When these are hall or club ambient reflections you pretty quickly view them as improvements. When musicians are behind you, it seems (to me at least) odd. I don't think Dave Brubeck wanted that. Pink Floyd, OTOH, probably did. But I do think getting engineers to listen with BACCH would give them a greater ability to hear what they are doing spatially. A lot of engineering is very good, actually amazingly so given studio recording, but these artists could, perhaps, do even better if they could hear their work more accurately.

Each instrument occupied it's own space👍

How does Bacch peform using open baffle speakers like the Legacy Audio Whispers? I have the plugin for windows.

Me again. I'm still trying to figure out just what the Bacch system requires, but it looks like the SW runs on a Mac to produce a new audio signal ("render"). Not sure whether it requires a mic & head-tracker like the expensive previous system? For me, I'd need it to be able to "render" a new signal dynamically, on-the-fly, for instance, while streaming. Much appreciate any thoughts on this.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

See the show notes for the summary of my setup. But basically, I have Roon Core on a Mac for streaming Qobuz and Tidal. This feeds BACCH on the same Mac, which then goes to a dCS DAC via USB etc. I tested the BACCH version that has head tracking and correction for HRTF (that is done one time). But I will test uBACCH soon, which does not do client-specific HRTF correction or head-tracking.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

If you get the BACCH4Mac they can include everything you need or you can buy the Mac Mini and camera yourself. I take it back. You do need a keyboard and monitor

Is most of the music you are referencing from a streamer rather than LP? Can you alter the crosstalk with the Intro version of Bacch4 Mac?

I understand the crosstalk distortion. But, what is the software changing or adjusting at speakers? I assume it modifies the level of volume and eq (parametric and frequency levels) and phase (hence the use of camera and earphone application) of each speaker. I am more interested in an explanation of how and at what levels the unit makes the adjustments.

Wonder how this works with a lot of rock music with a very busy soundstage. Some of these were studio performances and not all recordings impart the sense of space. Wonder if this will correct these flattened digital recordings we get these days (compressed etc)

I hope they offer a roon ROCK version soon. Many of us audio nerds no longer use conventional computers for music playback.

What you are saying is correct then hi-end headphones are the ideal music listening tools. Because there is no crosstalk while listening to headphones.

My gut feelings always said to myself that this kind of processing is something special from Bacch. Which version is recommended if I use a PC as a source?

Love these videos how they are a different format and a lot of info would be missing. Side note "Audiophile Junkie" loved Bach so much he became a dealer. This seems like logical progression from dsp. 👍😀

GM ☕️❄️❄️ Beyond crosstalk…but your system has to be immaculately designed and set up….to gain a glimpse of what the Bach gives you. Interesting, let’s see if they license it out in an even more simplified version.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Indeed a good setup with high quality equipment is necessary for BACCH to do its thing.

@MichaelAmster

5 ай бұрын

One of the positive side effects of the setup process is that you will see reflections in the measurement of your XTC (cross talk cancellation). Using the BACCH setup process may help you in speaker placement and in room correction using absorbers, rugs, furniture placement, etc. As Tom said, better setup systems will benefit more, but you can also setup your existing system better using the information from the BACCH analysis.

@carminedesanto6746

5 ай бұрын

The set up is absolutely key ..no point in even contemplating this addition to the system …if you’re not getting consistent imaging and soundstage ..as for the boiling down into cross talk..I realize it’s more than that ..abd for that money ..I’d upgrade to a Zhale headphone amp and better cans .

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

This is an excellent point. As an example, the BACCH impulse response revealed an early reflection that my (old) room treatment missed when I changed layouts. Move the panels and bingo, reflection reduced. @@MichaelAmster

The two-channel purist’s dilemma is this: While the “data” that BACCH retrieves is genuinely “on the disc” it’s not what the artist or sound engineers heard at the time of recording, mixing and mastering.

This is what I’m talking bout. Straight out of a lab.

Would the need for BAACH be eliminated (for future recordings, at least) if all recordings were made with dummy head mics?

will this improve presentation of omni speakers ? like beolab?

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I haven't tried Omnis with BACCH, so I can't say for sure. But in principle, I think the answer is yes. That is because Omnis work in a way that is, I believe, often misunderstood -- their constant directivity gives the ear/brain fewer artificial cues about where the sound is coming from. That should aid the overall process. I would also prefer to say "BACCH would make omni speakers render an image more accurate to the data on the recording". You have to judge whether than is an improvement. Again, I stress that I haven't hear BACCH with Omnis, and we're talking about pretty complex phenomena.

Very good! Have you heard the Polk Legend L800? Does BACC do it better? I kinda feel Polk might be better just because the speakers were set up for this. What if you used BACC with the Polk legend L800! 🤯😱

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I'd like to hear the L800; we'll try to get a pair. In principle, once crosstalk is cancelled, there should be no further gains. So, it is not clear to me if daisy-chaining would be beneficial. But, I have been wrong before!

Where in the chain does it go?

Are you allowed to listen to CDs on this channel? If so, there was no mention if there was any difference in the presentation between different sources.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I listened to all widely available uncompressed resolutions of digital. 16/44.1k (Red Book CD) works spatially the way I described. So does 24/48k and 24/96k and 24/192k. The differences between CD and high res are still apparent, though I would say the added spatial sense that BACCH processed audio generally gives makes CD “less worse” than it is vs. high res via normal stereo.

If the system uses a head tracking camera, does this mean that it only works its "magic" for one listener in the room? What happens with two listeners?

@jaydee6268

5 ай бұрын

I saw a different demo video and the gentlemen doing the demo said those outside the sweet spot would hear regular stereo.

For however this intrigues me, needing an apple device is deal breaker.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I believe there is a Windows setup if that helps. Or the BACCH-SP box.

The that description at the end sounds like the one many already give speakers that csn go "3d"

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Yes. And yet I would say the speakers (usually dipoles or omnis) that are described as 3d often do their thing less dramatically and in a more recording-dependent way (as you say 'can go' 3d). That might be preferred or not, depending on how you react to the recordings that really go outside the normal stage with BACCH.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

Actually Edgar’s reference speakers are dipole.

Is BACCH4Mac digital to digital solution ? can i use it with my streamer COAX output , to my DAC COAX input ? without analogue conversion !

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

You should be able to do something like this. You will have to adjust your output choice to fit with the inputs on a Mac. See the show notes for how I had it set up.

Picture doesn't really make sense. The entire signal from the right speaker will get modified by the head transfer function because you have a head.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Indeed all the images are simplifications to roughly explain the magnitude of the issue being addressed and give some intuition about the solution. BACCH measures your specific HRTF to address allow it to address your point, AFAIK. And I’m quite sure it does things I don’t know about. Choueiri says there are 52 pieces of IP in BACCH.

Isn't this similar to what Polk was trying to do with their Stereo Dimensional Array technology?

Very interesting. The thing with the camera is not very appealing to me though.. what happens if you're listening with several people in a room? But up to 50% spatial distortion is a lot! It would be perfect if a steaming surface could provide BACCH processed files and I would not have to use a camera.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

You can use uBACCH (no camera), but I think it still assumes a central seating position. When I test uBACCH I'll see how it does with multiple seats. At Capitol Audio Fest it seemed to work fairly well off center, at least in the context of "normal stereo doesn't work very well off center".

@channel-ls4uv

5 ай бұрын

You 're right! "normal stereo doesn't work very well off centre" Thank you for your excellent explanation of what BACCH is doing@@thomasmartin2219

@briand66

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 The uBacch has a very tight horizontal sweetspot. The headtracking was a response to this limitation. Fortunately, any listeners outside the sweetspot will basically hear the unaltered sound.

It makes perfect sense to me. I've been telling everyone that will listen it doesn't matter how much you have spent on your system it still doesn't sound live because of the spatial distortion. Get rid of it and you're are your way to The Holy Grail.

I think the comment from "greglatula9749" mentions this. Does anyone remember this, or can anyone elaborate? I'm absolutely sure that Polk Audio achieved something VERY similar back in ca. 1980 with one of their then top-of-the line loudspeakers. Each speaker included special, additional drivers dedicated to producing a sound signal which, when received by the opposite side ear, in effect cancelled the distorting audio "cross-talk" signal which I guess Bacch removes from the electric signal before going to the loudspeaker. I spent quite some time listening to these Polk speakers and the effect was absolutely real & stunning.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Yes, Polk SDA was designed to cancel inter-aural crosstalk. As is BACCH. I never heard the original Polk SDA, so I can't comment on the relative merits. I do note that moving the crosstalk cancellation to a front-end box has the advantage of allowing flexibility in other equipment choices and upgrade paths.

@jebrehbaker8613

5 ай бұрын

Polk still makes Sda speakers

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

@@jebrehbaker8613Yes. The L800. We will try to get a pair.

ANYONE ever heard of Bob Carver's analog based Sonic Holography?

DSP is going to explode in every direction. This is just one sort. DAC's will be replaced by I will call them audio engines. That Maria 350 amp for instance. It processes the analog inputs too.

Wonder what it would do with Amused to Death and it’s surround tricks. I wonder if this product spoils the ears, as in if you use it a lot can you live without it.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I can try it. On the Linkwitz 521s it was impressive. I do think these tracks are are mixed bag for evaluation: they show the exceptional capabilities of the tech but I think for most music the surround type recordings can mislead people to think surround is the point. Which I don’t think it is. The big point is more that the performers exist on a richer and more real stage, and the club/hall space is presented better, so as to remove another cue that the reproduction isn’t real. This in turn increases engagement with the music.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

I have BACCH and have played Amused to Death many times. It’s off the map. Dogs barking from the neighbors yard. Definitely a demo recording for the BACCH

Tom: Confusing video, but your presentation is somehow impressive. But where does this device fit in one's audio chain. A little explanation might be nice.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I can describe how I set it up: BACCH4Mac is run on the "streamer" which is a MacMini (BACCH4Mac only runs on Macs as you might guess). I run ethernet from my router into a MacMini (M2). I run a Roon Core on the MacMini, which then feeds BACCH4Mac software, also on the MacMini. From the MacMini's USB out I go into a dCS DAC. The dCS DAC feeds into my preamp, then we go to power amps and speakers. With this setup, I can run digital sources without BACCH through the dCS. I can also run analog sources without BACCH via the preamp. It is possible to run analog and other digital sources (e.g. CD), through BACCH; I just didn't set it up that way so that I could do comparisons of BACCH to other sources without any BACCH touching the signal.

@joeb4349

5 ай бұрын

Tom, thanks for this explanation. All your reviews are great.@@thomasmartin2219

@RootsMusicHawaii

5 ай бұрын

@thomasmartin2219 1. This music chain info is a huge help. Maybe post as a stand-alone Comment *and* pin to the top? 2. To me, your explanation in this video is crystal clear. Thank you

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

@@RootsMusicHawaiiMy system configuration is in the show notes. Hope that helps.

You want to hear the two channels totally separated and have a 270 or even larger soundstage? Use headphones for Pete's sake! Many people, including me, do not like headphone presentation and there's lots of headphone amps attempting to 'correct', in the analog or digital domain for that total separation by introducing a bit of the other channel (data stream as you name it) phase corrected into the other channel. They call it 'crossfeed' or similar. The way you describe it, BACCH attempts to introduce HP presentation to speaker listening when many people try to make HPs sound like speakers.. In a nutshell, if you like HP presentation you may like this system. If you don't, don't bother. Btw recording and mixing is usually done with speaker monitors not HPs so until you convince them to use BACCH or HPs for that and, even better, use HRTF compensated binaural recordings for everything, this thing is destined to mostly sound even more unnatural than what it attempts to correct.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I understand that crosstalk cancellation simply described sounds like headphones, so I will add that BACCH on speakers doesn't sound anything like headphones. The image is not centered in your head. It appears to be in free space, sometimes outside the confines of your listening room. Hope that helps.

@razisn

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 Of course it would sound different because of sound source placement BUT similar in terms of soundstage angle of coverage. Only 'mono' sounds seem to come from inside your head in HPs and with many HPs and recordings they do seem to come from the front rather than from inside the head. Stereo separated sounds come from left and right and even back left and right with HPs in a way that they don't with speakers. It sounds unnatural unless the recording is binaural and I believe the same will take place with this system. Unless the material is recorded and mixed with this system in mind, the result will be unpredictable and not more natural than simple stereo speaker listening.

@crazyprayingmantis5596

5 ай бұрын

This video has convinced me that some audiophiles are completely out of their mind. Just enjoy your music how it is, gee wizz 🙄

@Michael-uw7xd

5 ай бұрын

You can use BACCH4Mac in headphone mode including head tracking, Thomas!!! And what you get is the same holographic sound image as from the loudspeakers being in XTC mode! Most stunning. I had the impression that I was listening to my loudspeakers. No in-head-localization anymore! You can even turn your head with headphones on and the stage doesn’t move with the headphone-movement! Awesome! And compared and in contrast to my older generation of XTC (a mode in TacT Audio RCS2.2XP) BACCH4Mac doesn’t change the timbre, spectral distribution at all. @@thomasmartin2219

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

Headphones have their own issues. The BACCH filters do not create a headphone effect. Not even close

Guitar errata: Knowledgeable writers posit that Bob Dylan most likely recorded his 1963 Freewheelin' album using a Gibson J-50 model guitar. While Dylan did own a 1963 Martin D-28, he did not acquire it until the late 1960's, and it was put up for auction by Heritage Auctions Nov. 11, 2017. (I just now found this auction data, or my post would be shorter.) In the guitar world, the term Dreadnought is universally linked to guitars built by Martin & Co., starting with its limited production for retailer the Oliver Ditson Company in 1916. The dreadnought, or D model, was incorporated into its regular guitar line in 1931, and was an instant smash. Its lower bout is 15 5/8" wide. As for the Gibson J-50, some would call it a small jumbo; it has a 16" wide lower bout. Jumbo is a term most often asdociated with Gibson guitars, beginning in 1937, with its Super Jumbo; they changed the designation to Super Jumbo 200 in 1939. The J-200's lower bout is 17" wide. This discussion is limited to guitars built on production lines. When it comes to one offs, or custom guitars, there are always departures. As early as 1895, other guitar builders built guitars with much larger bodies, in limited quantities. The jumbo body shape did not originate from Gibson, but came from the Larson brothers, guitar makers from Chicago, who also built guitars as big as 21" wide. Martin custom built a 21" wide guitar for the late Scott Chinery. For more on Martin guitar history, check vintagemartin dot com. For more on any vintage guitars, there are reams of data published online.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Cool. Nice history. I also read that he used a Gibson 'Nick Lucas' on Freewheelin'? I guess the documentation is not great or different guitars were used on different songs? I'm not familiar enough with the sounds of these guitars to be able to identify them, and my experience with my guitars is that the same size guitar can sound very different depending on build, tone woods, strings, picking technique etc. Not to mention mic variations. But, anyway, the general size of a guitar body, if you imagine the artist sitting in your room, is rendered nicely by BACCH.

@brucehammond8673

5 ай бұрын

Tom, you specialize in sound reproduction. Guitars are my specialty. In the future, I will restrain myself. For now,... There are reams of data out there on Nick Lucas and his signature model guitar. Lucas was a multi million record selling artist, and a phenomenal performer. Nick helped the guitar to eclipse the banjo in popularity, and also pioneered the use of a plectrum, or pick. This was the first artist signature guitar produced in America, and Gibson's first good flattop guitar. They were built with 12 fret, 13 fret, and 14 fret body joins. Nick Lucas's personal favorite instrument was a 14 fret model. Dylan's Nick Lucas was a 13 fret model, purchased from a New York music store run by Marc Silber. Dylan said he was looking for one, so Marc took one he had gifted to his sister, Julie, and sold it to Bob. She wasn't playing it. Some players like the different tone that a 13 fret model gives. The Nick Lucas guitar body is not too wide, but is very deep, giving it what one writer called "all the wallop of a dreadnought." They have quite the stentorian voice, when played hard. While I can't name a best authoritative source on Dylan's instrument use on various album tracks, there are online articles with data. Different guitar body tonewoods were options: mahogany, rosewood, and maple. Some were all rosewood, to wit: sides, back, AND top. These woods produce different tones and timbres. Many engineers AND players prefer recording mahogany instruments, as they present fewer issues. Like tube amp equipment, guitars may need hours of "playing in" to open up their sound. And some guitars take years to open up, or never open up at all. But the rabbit hole goes deeper... one builder can hand build two guitars from adjacent, book matched boards resawn from the same boards for the body, neck, and soundboard. Both instruments will sound different. For guitar mavens, since 1978, a California guitar company has built a recreation of the Gibson Nick Lucas Special, called the model H. The most reliable data on the model H (and much on Lucas and his signature model, too) can be found linked below (Links within the text provide further data.): www.lutherie.net/model_h.html Tom, if you would like a copy of a tribute CD, all songs performed on model H guitars built of different woods, I can send you one. Do you have an email address on the TAS website? I do not know how to DM youtube creators.

So it makes speakers behave more like headphones.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

In a way they seem similar (inter-aural crosstalk cancellation), but headphones don’t usually interact with the head-related transfer function of your outer ear, head and torso the way speakers do. And they usually don’t have head tracking to allow a variable HRTF as you experience with normal speaker or live music listening. The result is that headphones generally create an image inside or immediately adjacent to your head. These issues can be corrected too, with a somewhat different approach. But if we are talking about headphones fed by an unprocessed stereo signal, there is a massive difference in soundstage and imaging between headphones and stereo through loudspeakers with BACCH. There are advantages to headphones, but they are not in the realistic imaging realm unless these issues are addressed. Microsoft and Apple and Sony and Bose have all taken shots at addressing the headphone imaging issue (an indication that it probably isn’t minor) with varying degrees of success and applicability. There is a BACCH version for headphone listening as well. I plan to report on this in a future episode.

The only way this thing would make any sense to use is if the recordings were specifically encoded to be decoded by this thing. dbx noise reduction was able to provide more noise reduction than Dolby B or Dolby C noise reduction for cassettes. That doesn’t mean you take a Dolby B encoded tape and flick on dbx and enjoy your Dolby B recording with less noise now. That’s not how it works. In fact, if you play back a Dolby B encoded recording with dbx decoding enabled it will sound nothing like what it is supposed to sound like. I feel you’re making the same kind of mistake here. I’ve got a lot of experience with hearing 3D audio generated using HRTF processing from the PC gaming world. There used to be a 3D audio API called A3D that used a special DSP chip to handle the HRTF encoding, which had different modes depending on whether or not you were using headphones or speakers. And the processing it did varied a lot. But you could not take the signal processed for headphones and listen to it via speakers and get the intended sound. Nor could you hear the intended sound when listening to the speaker-targeted signal when listening via headphones. It let you hear something. But you didn’t hear the right thing. When listening to the headphone-targeted signal via headphones it gave you an incredibly realistic sound stage. It could place sounds anywhere around you, left, right, forward, back, up, and down. All in a “regular” stereo signal as long as you were actually listening with headphones. But that signal played through a pair of stereo speakers did not work the same. You didn’t hear the same sound sources via speakers because the frequency response and time domain stuff was altered to work properly with headphones, not speakers. I’ve no doubt this processor does something. But it isn’t doing anything I would call useful unless the people making the recording were also using the same thing and making their changes with regard to what this processor would do. It is misapplied processing, and nothing more.

@ClaytonMacleod

5 ай бұрын

If you search for Aureal A3D Demo you’ll find several examples on KZread. Here’s one that works with headphones. You’ll be able to hear sounds move all around you when listening via headphones, but if you try listening via speakers you won’t get the same effect. kzread.info/dash/bejne/oW2im8h-j6fLhKg.htmlsi=bNV3-i61J2Ynikgf

@joesalyers

5 ай бұрын

@@ClaytonMacleod As an audio engineer this sounds like Waves NX (which is for headphones) but this is for speakers and just more Hi-Fi snake oil. It's most likely some form of impulse response overlayed onto the audio to give early reflections during panning left to right to simulate ambisonic audio. Waves has this same thing for headphones and you can sit in Abby Road studios and other recording studios at the mixing consoles with full 360 degree rotation of room simulation. IT works and is made for engineers mixing on headphones. But Waves doesn't make any wild claims about it being audio magic doing anything other than a complete reproduction of the room with real time head tracking. I think Waves charges between $29 and $49 for the plugin if your audio player can use pro audio plugins like VST or Audio Units then this is literally the same thing but Thousands less. If you want to see what this basically is then just look at Waves Audio Nx Virtual Mix Room over Headphones. They have numerous rooms you can add to it as well like Abby Road. But 99% of us in studios are just using Genelec Monitors and a high quality audio interface for our playback systems for major label records!

@ClaytonMacleod

5 ай бұрын

@@joesalyersLater, it reminded me of when people would take a third speaker and wire it to the + terminals on the amp of both the left and right channels. This would give them a speaker that played only what was different between the left and right channels as a pseudo rear channel in the days before surround sound. Nobody in their right mind would try to claim "This was the intention all along!" It does something, but that doesn't mean the something is intentional. Same goes for this device. You can also run pretty much any stereo music through a Dolby Pro Logic decoder and get sound out of your centre and rear channels, but that doesn't mean that pretty much any stereo music was intended to be played through those decoders, most especially stuff recorded before they were even invented.

@joesalyers

5 ай бұрын

@@ClaytonMacleod yea I see these audiophile channels come up in my youtube feed sometimes and it blows my mind when they say that some snake oil junk will make it more like the artist intended, well most of the time a guy like me, the session engineer makes all of the decisions about what something sounds like and if you want it to sound just like the studio then get a nice pro audio converter and a set of flat studio monitors and you have exactly what all audio engineers have! No one in Pro audio even knows what this BACCH thing is. We do mix for Dolby Atmos and stereo and thats it, so if you want to hear what the studio hears get the gear studio's use. Yamaha and Genelec speakers are the two most common brands of studio monitors but those aren't fancy enough for some people. 2 types of audiophiles #1 those who buy good gear to listen to music and #2 those who play music to listen to their audio gear. I think BACCH is a number 2 snake oil product.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

Completely wrong

is the most basic offering something that one could live with

"Realism, it turns out, isn't really an analytical nerdy thing. It's a critical part of engaging with the music. Or at least I felt it was for me". I'm not really sure how to take that. Seeing as it's coming from a really nerdy guy who's analyzing something. Apologies, but it's quite true. 🤷‍♂️ ✌️

If what you claim during your assessment on BACCH4Mac's handling of Dark Side of the Moon is true (and I have no reason to believe that it's not), that is TOTALLY WILD!

DSP has timing issues 😮

Very interesting. But I’m a little confused as to where this product sits in the signal flow. It comes after a streamer, in front of a DAC. Or does it work on analogue signals? You also didn’t speak about the head tracking version.

@MichaelAmster

5 ай бұрын

You are correct in that it sits after the streamer and before the DAC or with an analog source will do the A/D conversion to process the signal and output to a DAC.

@joshuaschneck

5 ай бұрын

@@MichaelAmster Thanks Michael. I also have the skepticism/question that Jeffrey (below comment) shares in wondering how in the world inserting a Mac-based laptop in front of an analogue signal, then sending this signal to your DAC, or putting the Mac after a streamer in the case of digital isn't going to seriously affect sound quality on high-end systems like the one in the video behind the reviewer.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

See the show notes for my setup, but you and others have got the basic flow. BACCH can process analog, but you can also route analog outside BACCH. I only used the head-tracking and head-related transfer function version of BACCH, so all my comments apply to that. These features are to better adjust for specific timing and frequency impacts of your particular head. I will set up the uBACCH version (no head-tracking and average HRTF) and do a report on that in a bit.

I wonder how it would sound with Zeta Zero Orbital speakers. Why? its mid/high freq module is the most sophisticated one, that I am aware of, with 360deg dispersion. Heres my interview with the designer (also a sound engineer) covering many subjects: kzread.info/dash/bejne/gJV5m6-JZ92vibw.html

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

Hate to say it but wide dispersion is a disadvantage

The way this is being described feels like watching an Imax movie versus a 70mm movie if you've got a properly set up high end system in a well treated, well behaved room. Not sure how I feel after watching this, certainly would want to hear this at a show but not really sold that what's being presented is anything more than a processed best guess as there is absolutely no way to know that what this is presenting you is what was actually recorded.

For me the only thing to care about is whether the device adds a sense of more verisimilitude - even if that addition (or subtraction depending on how you look at it based on the review's explanation of what the device actually does) is not "true to source" (whatever that is). If it makes the illusion more real, I'm down for it. Just can't afford it right now, although if BTC goes parabolic in 2024 then I just might pull the trigger on it.

@crazyprayingmantis5596

5 ай бұрын

👍

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

It’s a night and day difference.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I think you put your finger on something I didn’t distinguish fully in the review: what many listeners would really enjoy about BACCH is that it creates a “sense” of space and performer placement that “seems” more real than conventional stereo. That “sense” of verisimilitude is what makes it enjoyable and engaging. Music lovers won’t really care if the sax player is 12” left or right of where the engineers wanted him. What they care about is that the space and placement seem legitimate. This is what I called suspension of disbelief. And honestly I’d bet the engineers are thinking about a representation that “seems” real, not inch-perfect spacing (which can’t be done in normal stereo anyway due to system and room variations). Now having evaluated audio gear for the 50 years of The Absolute Sound, we’ve learned that equipment that generates a “sense” of verisimilitude better do it by being more true to the recording in some important sense. I think BACCH passes this test, which is why it does so well on so many different recordings.

@a.s.2426

5 ай бұрын

@thomasmartin2219 Yes, but do you think that there are frequently cases in which the BACCH effectively takes the sort of analytical-ness that many of us don’t like in hi-fi to an extreme by separating individual recording components so greatly from one another and making them so distinct that there is a disappearance of the whole (a loss of the forest in the trees) in such a way that it strays so far from the artists’/engineers’ intent that it subtracts rather than adds value?

The Mozart recording you cite is of a Quintet, not a Quartet! Look at the album sleeve. There are five players illustrated. Mozart scores his six string quintets for two violins, two violas, and one cello. Shouldn't Bacch have made this apparent? James Hughes

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Yeah, the artists are the Eben Quartet (+1). The Quintet is obviously (I hoped) a quintet. Sorry for the confusion.

So, in other words it's turning a pair of speakers into huge headphones.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Conceptually, it would seem that way, but in reality it isn't the same because headphones create an image inside your head. Usually. This isn't like that. There is a headphone version of BACCH4Mac, which the Pro version has, and I will do a separate review of that.

@Douglas_Blake_579

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 Thing is, the human directional sense relies upon the phase/time difference across the ears to locate sounds in 3d space. Take that away and we can no longer tell what direction something is coming from... and that could be plenty confusing. It's bade enough we mess with it to create "soundstage". Beside that, most of the concerts I've been to, with sound reinforcement on stage edges and above the procenium the effect is almost monophonic to begin with. The stereo image is largely an engineering creation, not a representation of the actual performance. Anyhow, it is an interesting toy, but not one I think I would be interested in.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

@@Douglas_Blake_579 I believe the idea is that the left mic (to extend my explanation that focused on the left) already captures the phase/time differences from right side sounds in such a way that your ear/brain can properly position performers (the right mic does the same in reverse). When you hear those signals with BACCH, the performers are more clearly placed. It doesn't sound confusing at all. What is confusing (the theory goes) is to send your left ear and right ear error signals that they wouldn't have heard in a real performance. The theory (or my vast simplification of it) might be wrong, but then we have to explain why the results are so spatially good. It could be just a beautiful artifice, but such things are rare.

@Douglas_Blake_579

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 I'm not the big expert on this. I do know that over the years there have been lots of attempts to improve on the stereo image. While I do agree it's less than perfect, so far none of the gear claiming to do it, either in software or hardware, has yielded any real improvement that I've been able to hear or measure. This is not to say that somebody won't, maybe yours will, but so far it's hardly promising....

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

No

You are absolutely wrong about the being the best bang for buck improvement. For $115 you can make a stunning improvement to your system with an iFi iPurifier.

Dammit. I'd sworn to never own anything Apple ever again and I was doing incredibly well up to this point.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

Apparently you can get a Windows plug-in from Theoretica's sister company.

NO! Stereo is meant to reproduce the frontal soundstage only. It is possible to stretch that to about 240 degrees if recorded in MS and played back in surround, but normal stereo is front only. It would be wrong to stretch a stereo recording out farther than was intended. Binaural is meant to reproduce your 270 degrees, and it is an entirely different system. The two should never be confused with each other. Longer explanation available at BAS site on KZread by me called Spatial Audio.

This whole notion of the right and wrong way to think about where performers are located seems quite insane to me. Oftentimes the vocalist isn’t to the left or right of the room. The vocalist is directly in front of the mic in a recording booth in seattle. The guitarist is plugged directly into the mixing board and doesn’t “exist” anywhere. The bassist? He’s in the room next to the room housing the drummer. The keyboards were recorded digitally and sent in a file to the producer. To make any sense of what stereo is supposed to be and what this device purports to do, you need to restate this conversation in entirely different terms for any recording that is not a live performance with all members playing simultaneously in the same room. Stated differently, this discussion is meaningless for 90% of the pop and rock recorded from 1960 onwards. Now, if f this device is designed to better recreate where the recording engineer and producer want you to THINK these sounds emanated from in relation to each other, maybe we are getting somewhere. But what is the objective source of truth on what those locations are supposed to be in the first place? In summary, this is madness.

@dennismanning6684

5 ай бұрын

To: @ClatonMacleod & @edd2771, Tom's obvious enjoyment not withstanding, The way forward for this tech for the consumer (audiophile) doesn't seem cost effective give the best/most authentic application is the limited scope of live (and well engineered) recordings. On the other hand, I have been enjoying Chesky's approach of using the BACCH for their hi-res binaural albums, WITH playable headphone & speaker packages in PCM or DSD format...on normal equipment.... e.g. the older, Amber Rubarth and Noah Wall albums and under the new "Audiophile Society" issues, "The Rings of Saturn" or very enjoyable jazz, "Funky Buffalos" The sound and effects through my Mac-usb-Pontus II-Holo Bliss-HiFiman 1000se (or Aria II) chain is WOW! I'm mean that cello is 6' low to my left ear and the violin is 4' high to my right ear...etc... Highly recommended!

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

You raise an interesting point. It would appear from listening that many studio recordings are mixed and mastered to present the musicians "as if" they were in a real space. Perhaps we should do some interviews with the engineers to understand their goals more clearly. While I contemplate that, I will say that many studio recordings work quite well with BACCH. But the studio venue and the complexities of mixing and mastering certainly leave room for data to be encoded that is more unrealistic than on conventional stereo. You can turn BACCH processing off at the press of a button in such cases.

@ScottoGrotto

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219 I would think that studio recordings are generally produced to mimic an optimized virtual band/orchestra. One: I took a studio recording class from a high level LA recording engineer- retired to a local Junior college where he taught a few classes and was the general manager of their Saddleback College radio station for many years. Two in my system it’s not unusual to hear instruments laid out across or beyond the speakers, which mostly disappear as a point source. I have heard in the best systems with ambiance speakers a kind of life size believable images of singers and instruments. On a mixing board at least analog I think distance front to back is an illusion of volume vs time delay & volume in say a live recording? Does Bacch4mac process with time delays? Is Bacch4mac the “player”? Is it possible to process a stream such as Amazon HD? Or is it requiring music on a drive? Enlightening video! I think I watched a video a year or more ago showing some of the possibilities or potential. Nice they have a real world entry price point and platform! Thanks 🙏

@saint6563

5 ай бұрын

LOL It's the engineer that creates the soundstage; not the musicians for typical studio recordings. Live recordings' soundstage is the sonic reproduction of the performance.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

⁠@@ScottoGrottoSee the show notes for my BACCH configuration (which I think is approximately typical). To summarize, I stream Qobuz and Tidal via a Roon Core on the same Mac mini as I use for BACCH. The Mac then sends the processed digital stream to my DAC via USB. BAACH can process “any” digital source (streams or files or straight from CD) and can do A/D conversion of analog sources. There are probably some format limits to digital data - I mostly used Qobuz high res which is 24/96 or sometimes 24/48. Agree that engineers are aiming for a virtual soundstage similar to what you would hear in a performance venue. At least listening suggests this is what many are doing. And I would argue the best engineers do this better than one would think. Bob Ludwig and Bernie Grundman and Doug Sax and others are famous and revered for a reason. I’d bet there is a next generation or two of these folks at work now. At least I hope so!

this man speaks as if Pink Floyd never used four channel sound in their live shows, which they did. At least when they played the Santa Monica civic they did, using four big speakers. . Bird sounds were flying all around the room as the most prominent four channel effect. An excusable rock history mistake, that unimportant stuff happened a long time ago. sounds like it might be the new digital sound processing that was so heavily publicized when the circ de sole' Beatles show opened in Vegas. It means nothing to me, because I listen to vinyl records in a very simple, source, amplification, two speakers , set up, that throws a very satisfying soundstage way out beyond the speaker locations. . Unfortunately for me, m the odds of me ever using this product are slim. , most rock stuff that I listen to was probably recored in multiple studios, in separate booths , with separate tracks for each player, often on different days , so a realistic sound stage could only be fictional , so no big deal, , and the engineer is going to mix the tape to whatever sounds good on his studio monitors anyway . I have no computers in my system. But it does sound like fun to check out if it could be loaded onto a MacBook, and with earbuds, the expense of head tracking and that program complexity could be eliminated. For some reason, the stereo soundstage described in his example , is way smaller and spatially inferior than what my humble rig projects. I blame my tower speakers, they are extra nice. never sleep on medical grade custom drivers. If the predictions this guy makes come true, the old straight wire with gain philosophy for perfect amplification , where the less stuff inserted into the signal chain the better, , will be even more forgotten.

@Douglas_Blake_579

5 ай бұрын

_" satisfying soundstage way out beyond the speaker locations. "_ Before retiring I had a little game for my clients to play... I would set them in their sweet spot, turn the music on a bit quieter than normal (about 70dba-ish), have them close their eyes and point at their speakers. Most often they would open their eyes to discover they were pointing about 20+ degrees outside the front span of the speakers... much to their own delight. It's been my experience that a lot of the "bad soundstage" problems are simply matters of poor speaker placement.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

I would suggest experiencing the BACCH and see how that game works with the filter in and out

@Douglas_Blake_579

5 ай бұрын

@@scottwheeler2679 It would be interesting....

Software uh? I wonder if the Pirate Bay has it :)

As a university physics AP this is pure BS.

The price of this binaural software is laughable as it costs more than a full Solidworks license.

To me this is audio fakery at a Loony Tunes price point.

This product is far tooooooo expensive. It's software costing over 6000 dollars

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I thought I was clear that the entry price for the software is $980. But, to be clear: the entry price for the software is $980.

If it is not in/on the medium, it does not exist..... Or in your mind????? Sounds like a lot of crap to a design engineer with more than 55 years R&D experience and Ph.D in electronic engineering.

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

I tried to be clear that BACCH is cleaning up the signal to your ears so that you hear the data on the recording more accurately. Sorry if that wasn't apparent.

@YKsfo

5 ай бұрын

@@thomasmartin2219what? Good lord….

@thomasmartin2219

5 ай бұрын

@@YKsfoIn an attempt to address NicoJeanRas’s point about “if it is not in/on the medium”: BACCH is completely dependent on information that is on the recording, however Choueri would argue that normal stereo mixes up the presentation of the left and right signals to your ears in a predictable way that damages the spatial presentation comprehended by your brain. This is what BACCH cleans up. You may not agree with his logic of the error source in stereo, of course. I just don’t see how ‘if it’s not in/on the medium’ applies to BACCH. Maybe NicoJeanRas means there must be no deviation from the data on the recorded medium as presented to your ear/brain by a somewhat conventional but wildly non-standardized set of known-to-be-imperfect technologies? BACCH would violate that principle, though many viewers would ask “why/when is that principle valid?” Now, he may mean something else. Just trying to learn.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

The BACCH allows you to hear the spatial cues in the recording without the interference of conflicting spatial cues of speaker/ear crosstalk. It is NOT adding anything or rechanneling anything.

Lol this channel is just sad.

@Mark-lq3sb

5 ай бұрын

Laughing at something you don't understand?

@jamesrobinson9176

5 ай бұрын

@@Mark-lq3sb why would you assume that?

@_fakeklg

5 ай бұрын

Then, kick rocks. Bye.

@jamesrobinson9176

5 ай бұрын

@@_fakeklg bless your heart

@_fakeklg

5 ай бұрын

@@jamesrobinson9176 adorable. Enjoy your evening, comrade.

Why do you have that really annoying lift music intermittently playing in the background ?

Why not just place a picture in front of you to suppress the confusion in your mind.

@scottwheeler2679

5 ай бұрын

That won’t fix the effects of aural cross talk