Firmware 8.1 released!

[Mikeeo]

"...Of course in the future, we hope to do the same with firmware 8."

Guillaume

Perhaps I'm on a bit of a Devialet downer this week, but I really find the way they work pretty slapdash. I would have thought that by the time they reached firmware v8, they'd be experienced enough and have an r&d pipeline robust enough to at least make each major new firmware at the same SQ level or better than the previous. It wouldn't be hard - just keep testing/tweaking/fixing until it sounds right.

They are obviously very clever and pioneering, but they just don't seem to have much of a clue in terms of in-house testing and QA. I picture a scene of chaos inside 'the lab'. Rush, rush, rush.

If my unit wasn't about to wing it's way back I'd probably try 8.1, but I'm not holding out much hope in any case. Hopefully we'll be on 8.1.1_new_postcafe_mod_tweak by the time it comes back.

It has been said before at this forum but I will repeat it: Devialet do all their development without any listening just by engineering and technical analysis. This is what they told us Devialetchat forum members during our meeting in Munich.

Maybe they have a point as there are so many different positive as negative comments on this forum about the different FW's. 

Though I think it is an arrogant flaw of Dev not to lend your ears to a new version before releasing it.

/Mike

[Manoet]

Mikeeo wrote:
"Maybe they have a point as there are so many different positive as negative comments on this forum about the different FW's.

Though I think it is an arrogant flaw of Dev not to lend your ears to a new version before releasing it."

Methinks the first sentence goes a long way explaining the second. How would they achieve unanimous approval on a pending FW release when there's never unanymity on an already released FW!?! Seems to me it would relegate all proposed FW releases to a process of committee... and a camel is the perfect example of a horse that's gone thru committee.

[imprezap2]

not happy with 8.1, too much "boomy" mid bass, tried to go back to 8.0 but now I can only use factory configuration.
Whatever I do in the configurator and save on one of the two SD cards I have I get the message old config file.

[f1eng]

I have never expected an actual sound quality change with most FW updates, just functionality.
That is perhaps why I have rarely heard one.

[Nemal1]

not happy with 8.1, too much "boomy" mid bass, tried to go back to 8.0 but now I can only use factory configuration.
Whatever I do in the configurator and save on one of the two SD cards I have I get the message old config file.

Have you checked if the sub-sonic filter is off? I've just downloaded 8.1, turned the filter off and reduced the bass setting on my Montis to "flat" It wasn't "booming" however.

[GuillaumeB]

It has been said before at this forum but I will repeat it: Devialet do all their development without any listening just by engineering and technical analysis. This is what they told us Devialetchat forum members during our meeting in Munich.

Maybe they have a point as there are so many different positive as negative comments on this forum about the different FW's. 

I think Devialet's point was rather that the human hearing is hugely unreliable. If I recall correctly there was a question asked by a forum member in Munich about why Devialet amplifiers were so sensitive to the quality of mains cables and the answer to the question was "would we identify the change (of the mains cable) in a DBT?" It was a rhetorical question of course which didn't really give much away.

From these kind of comments it's easy to assume that no subjective listening takes place, but I'm not sure that we know that for sure. I might try and ask them next time I meet with them.

On the subject of listening tests I am reminded of a 1978 "Audio Amateur" interview of the late Peter Walker (founder of Quad):

TAA: How do you rate the merits of listening tests to instrument tests?

PW: We designed our valve (tube) amplifier, manufactured it, and put it on the market, and never actually listened to it. In fact, the same applies to the 303 and the 405. People say, "Well that's disgusting, you ought to have listened to it." However, we do a certain amount of listening tests, but they are for specific things. We listen to the differential distortion - does a certain thing matter? You've got to have a listening test to sort out whether it matters. You've got to do tests to sort out whether rumble is likely to overload pickup inputs, or whether very high frequency stuff coming out of the pickup due to record scratch is going to disturb the control unit. But we aren't sitting down listening to Beethoven's Fifth and saying, "That amplifier sounds better, let's change a resistor or two. Oh yes, that's now better still." We never sit down and listen to a music record through an amplifier in the design stage. We listen to funny noises, funny distortions, and see whether these things are going to matter, to get a subjective assessment. But we don't actually listen to program material at all.


Guillaume

[Antoine]

I simply try not to focus on it too much and as long as I hear no -clear- differences that stand out over a longer period of time (to average or rule out suggestion, bias, local environmental influences, moods, dips and peaks in hearing abilities) all is fine with me. For me this way of "evaluating" performance is much more relaxed, personally I really 'hate' A-B' ing.

So far 8.0/8.1 is perfectly fine with me SQ wise!

[imprezap2]

I will have a look, now playing with 8.0 and factory settings, no booming at all, strange

[GuillaumeB]

I will have a look, now playing with 8.0 and factory settings, no booming at all, strange

Can you tell us about the rest of your system? Are you using SAM?

Guillaume

[Manoet]

Me too Antoine! But truth be known, so was SQ on 7.1.2/7.1.3