When buying an expensive locomotive, say a Athearn Genesis, Do you Prefer to purchase with sound, or without models?
Everyone has there own opinion and I am curious to find out what the majority of Modelers think.
Just a Simple With or Without is all I need.
With
with
Without!
WITH, but keep the sound level at a reasonable level or it will be annoying. Take into account what scale you model and the fact you are not at that scale.
Rich
with
[:-^]
I’m with Ray, WITHOUT !!!
I do this to relax and enjoy, not to be annoyed and that is what the sound that I have heard does for me.
Johnboy out…and loving the silence of my trains.
my personal experience has been that sound equipped dual mode locomotives do not pull as well as straight dc engines do. this may be because the sound gear takes up space that might otherwise be used for weight. if you do not need a lot of pulling ability, then it does not really matter.
charlie
No onboard sound or DCC here. Future plans for some layout based sound effects.
Sheldon
Any of the sounds I’ve heard from model trains sounds like they were recorded in a 10 foot length of 6’’ plastic pipe, it’s the farthest sound from reality that could possibly be, with all the technology to this date I’m surprised at the toy like sounds from these engines. Let’s hope some new creativity will bring us a more realistic sound system.
Don’t hold your breath. There are some specific laws of physics at work limiting the sound quality and frequency range that can be reproduced with two 1" speakers. Being a designer of HiFi speakers, I knew right away when this sound thing started what the limits would be. That’s why I have no use for onboard sound in scales as small as HO.
Now get up to G scale - that’s a different story.
Some people just like the fact that it makes any kind of noise that their imagination can call a locomotive. Others are more sensitive to the sound quality issue. At an adjust cost of about $50 a loco I will pass thank you.
Sheldon
With sound.
All I have to do for silence is push a button and I do that sometimes, but not often. It’s nice to have a choice.
Brent[C):-)]
Sound is apparently like conversion to DCC from DC for some of the older traingeeks. As a newer traingeek, I purchased my first HO locomotive precisely because it did have sound. I liked it. Those who have operated their trains for donkey’s years with just audible clicks and some soft music nearby probably were turned off by the too-loud-as-they-arrive sound equipped locomotives. The factory settings for speaker volume are at the ‘insane’ level.
As stated above, I never operate my sound decoders with the Master Volume set above 60%. They sound horrible out of the box. No wonder our blood pressure goes up. It’s bad enough when one QSI decoder’s injector sound goes off let alone another three or four sitting nearby. That, steam hiss, and pop-off are the first three to get dialled down.
So, a long way to answer that, yes, for me, it has to be sound. Just not factory levels…the ‘insane’ level. Just as the veteran DCC user learns to adjust six or seven CV’s related to motion control if he wants all that a given decoder can do for his locomotive’s realistic motion behaviour, so he must fiddle with the sound CV’s and tailor the sound to suit both is ears and his sense of reality.
Finally, I agree that HO scale sound leaves a lot to be desired. However, they are just toys and we have to suspend our disbelief in a myriad of ways when playing with our toys. Sound is just another one.
Crandell
Without. [swg]
Wayne
I never thought I would say this; WITH
Why, it is too costly to upgrade, & even though I’m good at it, I don’t like disassembling a perfectly good loco to experiment with adding sound & wiring… I have enough ‘angry undec’s’ for that, & believe me, they are all wanting some attention!
DCC without sound, to me, is just not right, go for the gusto, DCC/Sound or DC, that’s how I do it.
The cost, time, & effort of a conversion, now weighs heavy on me, as I am working again, & my time is limited… -I really want to participate in WPF each week, but can’t remember the last time I showed someting new, or had something new…!
I also have many “perfectly good” DC machines & also know how to F8 -Mute in DCC when I want to hear the beautifull swishing of them on the tracks like Grampa & I did in the 70’s! It’s like a calming rain sound & I still enjoy that nice sound when they run smoothly like that over nice rails.!
However, modern times beckon, & it is the way it is, so I’ll keep builfing both DCC/Sound & DC as long as I can.
Crandell,
In the old days the locomotive mechanisms made noise - we didn’t need extra sound!
As someone who operates on a number of “sound equiped” layouts that belong to others, I will agree with you about volume levels, they all need to be turned down out of the box, down as low as they can go and still be heard/make all the sounds.
For me, even suspending the necessary disbelief, the cost of sound is WAY past its point of diminishing return. Now if it cost $15 a loco, did not reqiure DCC, and could be turned on and off on command - maybe.
I do have plans for layout based whistles, horns and bells at approperate locations with high quality speakers…
Sheldon
I have heard my share of full scale locomotives, everything from teakettles to Mallets. On-board sound in HO compares to that about the way listening to a symphony on your cell phone compares to an evening at Lincoln Center. Hence, I prefer to opt for silent models rather than something that sounds like a caricature.
Another factor is that my main prototype ran low-backpressure exhausts (the reason for elephant ears on everything, even 2-8-0s.) At anything over 200 meters (8 feet in HOj scale) they were drowned out by birdsong and the wind in the trees. That’s another area where the laws of physics work against model sound. Sound attenuation at 8 feet is not the same as sound attenuation at 200 meters.
My locomotives sport Cxx or Dxx numbers (not I-xx or Ro-xx numbers)* but they do run silent and spend much of their time submerged in the netherworld. So be it.
(For those unfamiliar, Imperial Navy submarines weren’t named. Prefix I, pronounced Ee, was reserved for large, long range craft. Smaller boats carried Ro designations.)
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Interesting how the “score” is about 50/50 so far.
Sheldon
If money were no object, I’d probably buy most/all loco’s that came with sound as an option, although I don’t crave sound. But… money is an object so I have opted out mostly. As it has turned out, that has saved me from some grief because all the early Athearn Genesis came with the universally panned MRC sound. A few years back when I had a bit more disposable income, I purchased a couple of the Atlas GP40-2’s with sound and one Proto 2000 F7AB set with sound. As luck would have it, those are all QSI which, according to the audiophiles isn’t much better than MRC. One of these days I’ll pick up a Tsunami just to see what all the fuss is about - I have some tunnel motors - might be nice to try it out some day.
If you have to toss me in the pole, say “without” for me because only 3 of my ~150 engines has sound.
I think the short answer is “with”, but in your specific example of an Athearn Genesis I would first have to consider if the unit is an older one with the MRC decoder. In which case I would go “without”. If the Genesis has Tsunami then I am in the “with” again. So the real answer is that it depends on the sound processor in the uint. And by the way I consider Phoenix to be the “best”. Too bad they are too large to fit in all but the most huge HO locomotives.