Test record tricks

I was looking over some old stereo magazines in my reading room, and I came across this interesting statement:

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Back in the sixties, a speaker company put out a sampler record that successfully sold thousands of one particular model in it's line. The speaker in question had a prominent treble peak, but the record had been made with a dip at that frequency, so it sounded right on the target speaker, and strangely lifeless on most others.

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This is from Stereo Review, January 1991, part of an article titled "Listening strategies for choosing speakers"
Naturally, this being Stereo Review, they don't name any names. So let's figure it out. Does anyone know which company and which speaker they are talking about? Could it be our favorite speaker company? The L-100? Which companies had their own demonstration records anyway? The only ones that I can think of right now are Yamaha, Fisher, and JBL.

Well it will be easy enough to see. I have the 2 record JBL sessions set. I can scan it in Cool Edit to see if there is a noticable notch in there.


Rob:)

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Originally Posted by Don C

I was looking over some old stereo magazines in my reading room, and I came across this interesting statement:

"Back in the sixties, a speaker company put out a sampler record that successfully sold thousands of one particular model in it's line. The speaker in question had a prominent treble peak, but the record had been made with a dip at that frequency, so it sounded right on the target speaker, and strangely lifeless on most others."

This is from Stereo Review, January 1991, part of an article titled "Listening strategies for choosing speakers"
Naturally, this being Stereo Review, they don't name any names. So let's figure it out. Does anyone know which company and which speaker they are talking about? Could it be our favorite speaker company? The L-100? Which companies had their own demonstration records anyway? The only ones that I can think of right now are Yamaha, Fisher, and JBL.

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late response :(

L-100's were 70's , too late. (and they sold 250,000 ..according to LHF library)
Altec had those records , as did Ohm (I think maybe Bose too ?)

JBL's "Sessions", Altec's "Sounds", and a "demo" LP put out by AR in the same time period all sounded great on the AR-5's and the 4310's I had at the time. The track on the Altec LP by Rick Wakeman, played on a well set up system in a decent room, was sonic excellence at its best.

The Violin "tests" on the AR records would take any loudspeaker to task, and I was impressed with how well those old 4310's handled the punishing dynamics, and their ability to retain good instrument localization focus as well as the AR's could.

In fact I would say that the JBL's passed all of AR's test criteria as included on their demo LP with "flying colors" and IMO actually beat out the AR5's performance in some.

BTW, was not "Sessions" put out in the early 70's not 60's? I think the Altec demo and definitely the AR record was 70's.

Bozak? KLH? Fisher? Rectilinear?

Great thread, DonC

Colleagues;

I worked in HiFi for a while in h 70's and we sold a TON of Altec 891's using the Altec record, and other demo records as well. I don't recall any particular EQ of the record that would make it preferable for one or another speaker it was just that the rockers really liked the 891. Any good salesman would use several demo records to sell what ever to whom ever. I do recall, (probably incorrectly) that the Bose record was somewhat dead sounding.

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Originally Posted by Doctor_Electron

BTW, was not "Sessions" put out in the early 70's not 60's? I think the Altec demo and definitely the AR record was 70's.

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SESSIONS must have come out in about '73 ... I got paroled from the Canoe Club in '72.
The thing that I remember from the JBL set is Hoyt Axton's version of "Joy to the world"
(last cut) ... I still have my Sessions somewhere ..

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Originally Posted by SEAWOLF97

SESSIONS must have come out in about '73 ... I got paroled from the Canoe Club in '72.
The thing that I remember from the JBL set is Hoyt Axton's version of "Joy to the world"
(last cut) ... I still have my Sessions somewhere ..

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"Devil on my shoulder" was the other good tune and IMO could have charted commercially if released.

Canoe Club / Altec

First time I hit Pearl around the middle of September 1971, went to a high-end stereo store somewhere in Honolulu. It was an amazing place, as they had EVERY hot piece of gear you could dream of.

We left when a salesman had "A hard way to go" by Savoy Brown on a system with two Altec Santana speakers up so loud it really was painful. Thorens TT with a Rabco arm & Stanton 681E I remember, but I think the amp used was a Lafayette receiver with quite a lot of power available. Its dial lamps were dimming considerably, but not much distortion just pain.

And the Santanas weren't even horn systems.

And then came the Cubi exchange, the "Main Change", the B-6 Annex, and (OMG), Yokuska...

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Originally Posted by Doctor_Electron

And then came the Cubi exchange, the "Main Change", the B-6 Annex, and (OMG), Yokuska...

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Been there, done that , was appropriately awed. Was there a more fun place in the world than Yokuska's photo/stereo building ? (not even in 'Po city !! , not even 'Da Cave)

Just watched "Hot Shots" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102059/ ,,, it was like being there again, almost :(

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Originally Posted by Just watched "Hot Shots" [URL

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102059/[/URL] ,,, it was like being there again, almost :(

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Wolf, do you recall where you would hear this:

"Main Gate ! Main Change ! B6 ! Cubi ! Cubi ! Cubi ! Top of Hill !
Hurry up, Joe, we go now !"

?

-D_E-

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Originally Posted by Doctor_Electron

Wolf, do you recall where you would hear this:

"Main Gate ! Main Change ! B6 ! Cubi ! Cubi ! Cubi ! Top of Hill !
Hurry up, Joe, we go now !"

?

-D_E-

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I was following until "Top of Hill" ..do recall that the buses had a cool horn mechanism. one contact went to a ring , the other went to a big spring with a knob on it - centered in the ring. Just bop the knob and you get about a hundred honks. :(

Did you ever take a launch out to Grande Island ? Some of the Navy craft headed out have been attacked by Pirates ..NO Sh1t.
Subic Bay on the nav charts has areas marked "avoid - Pirates"

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Originally Posted by SEAWOLF97

I was following until "Top of Hill" ..do recall that the buses had a cool horn mechanism. one contact went to a ring , the other went to a big spring with a knob on it - centered in the ring. Just bop the knob and you get about a hundred honks. :(

Did you ever take a launch out to Grande Island ? Some of the Navy craft headed out have been attacked by Pirates ..NO Sh1t.
Subic Bay on the nav charts has areas marked "avoid - Pirates"

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"Top of Hill" = Cubi Point NAS other than the runway/support area, up top.

Cafeteria with those great cheeseburgers and ice cold Heineken for ten cents!

Cubi Exchange, the enlisted club, the highly renowned "Top of the Mark" CPO club with an outrageous view of nearly the entire Subic area. (And God knows what was inside and the happenings there, beyond the obvious serious consumption of alcohol.)

And the barracks where I stayed while TAD to the VA-147 beach det (on duty section nights).

Grande Island? Oh yes, a quite bizarre story I have about an outing there. Should we go PM? It involves four joints of real ganja, a poisonous snake-infested WW2 pillbox, and a ship's welder who went berserk when recalled off liberty while incidently at least three sheets to the wind. And the resultant battle across the stair landing from our O-level AT shop, where the extremely irate and extremely intoxicated welder baracaded himself and took on four Marine "security" types. Ends with a straightjacket & gurney as well as what had to be some very painful billy club black & blues when he (I assume) finally sobered up.

You know, the sort of thing one could only witness or participate in while overseas in the U.S. Nav.

What nostalgia indeed!

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Originally Posted by Doctor_Electron

You know, the sort of thing one could only witness or participate in while overseas in the U.S. Nav.

What nostalgia indeed!

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Except for my "Connie tour", I was in a different Navy than you. More time/tours were "in greens"/"in-counry" than in traditional CanoeClub blue. Went to a DoD "A" school , run by the Army. Dressed like them. Had a Jeep/M16/45ACP. Flew in their discarded Gunships ..etc..etc ===>>>> http://www.seawolf.org/index.asp It was a real shock getting into the "sea going Navy".

When we left Bummerton to sail to SandyEggo, my Dad (psychologist/who's who in America) came aboard for a day. He remarked that CVA-64 was the most oppressive place he could ever remember seeing (and he was in Germany.WW2)

But it could be OKAY. The movie "Flight of the Intruder" touched on some of the Olongapo nights. Sometimes I think the movie "Animal House" was partly based on PoCity too.

I've worked for Federal/State govt's , Intel, Electric LightWave ..etc , and the vast majority of Vets that crossed paths with me have been Ex-Navy. Maybe we're a bit more technical ?

During a VA appointment last year , I met a new PCP. After talking a bit, she said "You were Navy, right" ?
I replied "No fair, You've got the computer open to my records" . Her again .. "NO, I'm not looking" ... Me "well why do you guess Navy then" ?

HER : "You Navy guys talk differently , you think differently , you're wired differently" (direct quote)

Both companies had records with a very simple and distant (from the performer) mic setup.
Dull on quite a few speakers, especially the NAD.

Ralph

JBL's "Sessions" 2 LP set in addition to being recorded well also seems to have another interesting feature.

LP's generally run 17-19 minutes per side .. thought I'd copy the 4 sides to an 80 minute disk. No go.

JBL's disks are about 24 minutes per side.

Usually you can get more time by limiting the bass, thus using
narrower tracks , but Sessions has good bass. Anybody know how they did that ?

Oh yeah, I bought the Clash's EP of "Rock the Casbah" ..it had the widest grooves ever seen
(by me)