Quiet, please. No noise other than metal wheels rolling, with an overlay of big band music, playing at normal conversational level.
Preference here, too, for rail noises. I suspect because that is what I heard most while standing beside the MCRR (NYC) as a kid. Whether steam or diesel, the motive power came and went rather quickly. The far greater portion of the time it was the clack of a long freight consist. Perhaps with an occasion squealing journal or clunk from a flat spot on a wheel (BTW, has any enterprising sound vendor come up with these?).
As for music? Dvorak, Debussy, Stanford, Brahms, or perhaps Bach. John Cage, Charles Ives, or Tschaikovsky only when derailments and collisions are planned.
[*-)]
John
Some nights, with my challenging work, and declining parents’ health (both in nursing homes, not doing so well), it can be hard to sleep soundly the whole night, so I’ll go downstairs and run a train at 3 or 4 am to get sleepy again.
There’s something beautiful about running a train in peace and quiet, when all the world outside is dark and sleepy, and the wife and kids are asleep in their beds.
For me it depends: Rapido’s sound engines are fantastic. They nailed the sound particularly in the most recent releases, so I can actually enjoy running them despite my general preferences for silent.
Then there’s the Atlas QSI dual-mode decoder engines, like the C420, which don’t sound very good by comparison, to put it nicely, and the whole gamut of other more recent “with sound” offerings to boot. My C420 is nos, from more than 10 years ago, so perhaps is not the best comparison…but even the Walthers Mainline PA-1 is well, not so great in the sound department.
So for me it depends upon just what the engine(s) are that are being run.
John
Sound for me. I can understand the logic of not wanting enough sound to distract from the experience, but I do think its possible to strike a balance. I remember in one of David Popp’s books how he discussed his railroad having a background track, with localized speakers playing different sounds in different areas of the layout (industrial in the city, birds chirping and distant vehicles in the country, the sound of a brook near a river etc.)
With that said, such over abundance of sound really only makes sense during a large operations session, were the ruffling noise of operators is going to muffle a lot of it anyways; and really only be noticable when the operators pause briefly in the action. I am sure the sound of birds chirping while a layout owner is working alone in the room would get old fast.
Of course I am the dork who hopes some company like Bath and Bodyworks makes a ‘Sage Brush’ smelling candle in the future so I could populate some hypothetical future layout room with the smell of the desert. I could also use some Cresote and Diesel exhaust candles please. [:P]
Diesel sound is good, steam sound gets annoying. Too much chuffing for me.
Layout size and ops type are a factor to consider, along with what I’ll call “scale sound”, for want of a better term.
Unless one’s sound is turned down low and he’s at the far end of a really large pike, the sound of any yard operation or engines merely parked there will be heard in the no longer pristine countryside where you’re watching a long-haul freight.
And as for “scale sound”, I’d bet there’s a difference in our expectations and preferences simply because we’re used to hearing railroad sounds from ground level, rather than the hundreds of scale feet above the ground that our ears actually are for most of our activities in the hobby. I’m presuming, though perhaps in error, that any railroad noise presents differently from above than beside, even at the same extended distance, because of differences in what is immediately behind the source. Perhaps there’s a railfan or two that have done it from a balloon that can can offer their observations on the matter.
John
Turbocharger whine is always annoying.
I prefer sound as long as it is good sound. There is nothing worse than a tinny squealing high pitched scratchy whine.
I prefer the volume to be at the 30% - 40% level except for shows when I crank it up to the highest volume that still sounds decent. Otherwise the background noise at the shows cancels the sound almost completely.
Dave
Living in the high desert of central Oregon, where true silver sage brush abounds, I can tell ya, it smells like the spice that it’s named after. Open a jar…
On topic, I’m happy with quiet. DC. If I do go DCC it won’t be for sound. Dan
on Flickr
As model railroaders, we have to liuve with a few facts. One of those facts is that sound cannot be scaled down, nor can our hearing be “confined” to what a scale person with ears only 3mm apart could hear. The same goes for the viewing perspective. Even if we bring up the layout to eye level, our eyes are 4 to 5 inches apart and not only 1.5mm, so we will never have a “realistic” view of our layout, nor will we ever have “realistic” sound.
Nevertheless, I think that sound has opened up a new dimension for us in experiencing our layout. It is up to the individual to employ this dimension.
I prefer the sounds in my engines but the bell at times can be annoying. I was running a few minutes ago and didn’t use the bell, it was great.
Tom
[banghead]You are so right. I have an RS Atlas unit with sound and a bell and when it runs on my DC layout it won’t shut off. At least my bachman RS units turn off the bell once you reach a certain speed.
Robert Sylvester
Newberry-Columbia Line
I prefer the quiet of non sound units. If I want sound, I will go trackside. I am autistic and being at a layout with lots of sound units going is totally overwhelming for me. Most of my trains are 2 rail O scale vintage units with big open frame motors, so there is some sound per say. Along with ozone and hot oil smells, its like heaven when I fire them up and let them run. None of my G scale has sound either. I have a live steamer if I want the sounds of steam! Mike the Aspie
My old DC switching layout is a quiet zone-just the hum of old Athearn and the clickety-clack of the railroad track. It’s a bit hypnotic but great to experience, just like it was when I was a kid and ran my trains on a snowy winters day back in up north in the 1960s.
Cedarwoodron
I get enough noise on the construction site with my job everyday. Sometimes after a half hour drive home my ears are still ringing.
The thought of just clickety clack on the rails sounds like music to my ears… sounds good to me.
(This was supposed to quote cedarwoodron’s comment up a couple)
That’s me, too! Except, it was the '70s I’ve heard it said with a measure of humor that the old Athearn BB diesels came equipped with sound already. I do have some extremely smooth and quiet Atlas (kato) and other locos, and love that about them. But I agree with the above statement. And one day I realized, it’s only the BB Athearns that don’t take turns on and off the layout. They dominate. Dan
Train noise is great. Not so much the noise grandkids make.
I’m still non-sound only. I’m kind of particular on audio quality, and the little speakers used in these trains just don’t sound that good to me, so it takes away from my enjoyment. There have actually been some recent BLI models I was very interested in getting, but they told me they wouldn’t be offering them without sound, so I’ve had to pass on buying them. I just don’t want to pay an extra $100 for a feature I’d be removing.
A few basic facts about audiology and sound reproduction.
FACT - listening to inaccurate, low fidelity sound will create irritablity in most people after a while. The degree of irriatation, and the time frame are highly variable, but in general the longer you listen to low quailty sound, and the louder it is , the sooner you will be bothered by it.
FACT - listening to a low quality reproduction of pleasing sounds you are familiar with will trigger more detailed memories of those sounds stored in your brain. This can and will partly offset the negative effects of low quality sound outlined above.
FACT - sounds are much different outdoors, some sounds travel more, some sounds dissipate more quickly.
Standing track side, at let’s say 150’, locomotive sounds come and go quickly as the loco passes by. Rolling stock track noise quickly drowns it out. Track noise can often be heard much farther away, and for longer than loco noise.
So, if you are seeking that intimate, one on one experiance with your train, as in being the engineer, than you probably like sound.
If you are more of a big picture, multiple trains moving, kind of guy, you are likely to be less interested in the noise from onboard sound.
We all choose based on our personal levels of comfort with these conflicting facts.
Sheldon