Objectivist Audiophilism (1 Viewer)

[Michael R Price]

So the argument is over whether we can hear the difference between -90db noise and distortion versus -110db noise and distortion?

If my ears don't notice a difference then my brain may as well make up one. And why not sell people sugar pills if they worked as well as a new drug? (I personally think my stereo sounded better after I upgraded my CD player's power supply to lower noise.)

 

[Wayde_R]

Yeah Chu, what's your setup?

What would you or Tom Nousaine advocate for a newbie HT enthusiast? Just meeting the specifications required to fill the room with sound? Lets say this could be done with a $200 5X100WPC Sony receiver. Is this sufficient? Would there be anything "better" outside of features and specifications? Do you believe that a $1000 Onkyo 5X100WPC receiver (for example) offers any better sound than the $200 Sony receiver if they have the same specs?

Personally I think the $1K Onkyo will be heavier therefore higher current capacity so it’s going to be liable to sustain peaks without clipping even though they’re both rated at 100 watts. Are there advantages to a design with wider shorter circuit paths, higher current better quality parts? I think it’s obvious the $1K receiver will be much better. Where I think severe diminishing returns sets in is when you upgrade from that $1K Onkyo receiver to $10K worth of separates. I also see people applying inappropriate “improvements” to sound for their upgrade. IE: How can better cables give you a wider soundstage?

I just had the pleasure of helping a friend do some speaker shopping on the weekend. Having listened to HT speaker kits all day I had a chance to listen to a VERY expensive setup featuring Martin Logan’s some esoteric brand tube amps BIG electrostatic center. Probably $100K in gear was being demo’ed. I was simply under whelmed. Yes it sounded great, but so did many systems at a fraction of the cost. I question how much “goodness” you can get out of source material that starts with a lossy compression format like Dolby Digital. To be fair I didn’t hear the expensive system strut its stuff with some Hi-Res audio where I’d expect to hear massive improvements (or not).

BTW, most of what I was hearing from complete speaker systems in the $1-2K CND were very good had similar acoustic qualities Energy, Klipsch, Paradigm, Mission all had good offerings. My friend is likely going with the Klipsch system.

Wayde

 

[John Beavers]

 

[Jack Briggs]

Hi, my name is Jack and I used to own Audio Research, conrad-johnson, SOTA, and other "audiophile"-branded equipment, and I swallowed whole the Harry Pearson/J. Gordon Holt dogma of front-to-back depth/soundstaging/liquid midranges/vanilla veiling of the upper registers/stigmata-in-the-presence-of-solid-state phenomena.

But I've moved beyond that now. I now use my Magic Bricks (yes, I bought 'em) as doorstops and paperweights -- but, man, do they ever make those doors more solid-seeming; they shut with an authoritative sound they never produced before I started using those Bricks as doorstops.

I still have the first forty issues of The Absolute Sound -- in absolute mint condition. Taking offers.

 

[Yogi]

Good point John.

I dont have to rely on any DBTs for choosing my equipment. All I have to do is rely on mine and more so my wife's ears. She has a remarkably good sense of hearing and can pick out little details between two types of amps etc. No she can't tell cables apart. For her everything is blind testing cos she doesn't know the price of any of the equipment nor does she know about any of the brand names. For her Sony is a stronger brand name then B&K, or Levinson. So if she can pick out a no brand name B&K as being better than a better known (to her) Denon, I have no way to go but to trust her. Plus there is a big objectivist in me since I prefer my cheaper CJ, MV-55 tube amp over my more expensive Proceed amp for two channel listening. I prefer the CJ Prem140 (7K) over the ML336 (10K). So Chu would you call me an objectivist?

 

[ScottCHI]

don't you make yogurt with that?

 

[RobertR]

Given this empirical evidence, I'd say that it's you who are reciting dogma, not DBT advocates. By the way, people claim to hear "differences" even when listening to the same thing, while not even knowing they were being tested. That says a LOT about the origin of these "differences", and it has nothing to do with "stress".

 

[Angelo.M]

Hi. My name is Angelo. I'm the guy with the pricey wristwatch, silk shirt and sports coat that gets the attention of every salesperson at "If You Have to Ask...Audio." I think I paid for half of the carpeting in the shop.

I'm offering to head the East Coast branch of Audiophiles Anonymous; perhaps Mr. Briggs can run operations on the Left Coast.

And, by the way, Shakti stones make great pavers if you're laying down a new patio.


I ought to give up my day job. My professional activity is, at least in part, predicated on the results of DBTs.

 

[RobertR]

Your post assumes that the only basis for a nonobjective assessment is price, which is false.

 

[Yogi]

I rest my case.

Again life is short and who wants to waste time reading about someone else's experience (frankly none of you objectivists have ever done a DBT in your own system, all you speak is from reading others' experiences) when you can trust your own ears. In the words of a famous person (forget his name): "TRUTH IS JUST A PERSPECTIVE"

So there is no universal truth. You believe in your truth and I'll do in mine, and we all can be happy.

Cheers.

 

[RobertR]

I wasn't talking about Chu. I was talking about the basis for YOUR bias, so citing a post by Chu does nothing to either further or rest your case.

 

[Yogi]

And if you read carefully again, I am saying that my bias is in line with Chu's philosophy. I like the sound of cheaper stuff so I don't need to get into a DBT for my preference since my bias is towards something thats cheaper. So my orignal question to Chu was if that would make me somewhat of an objectivist. Did you get what I was saying? For once rise above your bias and see the other persons perspective.

 

[RobertR]

And I'm saying that it's clear from your posts that you have other biases having nothing to do with price, so to answer your question, you are not an objectivist.

 

[John Beavers]

Thing is I'm not trying to prove anything. I am simply stating my observations about my own reactions to tests, and how that might correlate with differing results from sighted to blind comparisons. I only go by what I experience, that is what this hobby is about to me; it's not about proving points. Though that does make for lively topic threads

 

[Yogi]

So you are agreeing that objectivists have a bias towards price, just like Chu pointed out? Something you were agains't just a minute ago.

I love our conversations - from The Last Samurai.

 

[Yogi]

Exactly what the objectivists fail to understand. An objectivist will frequently point to the dictionary (for literal meaning of terms), to literature, others experiences etc etc but never once provide any evidence from ones own personal experience.

 

[RobertR]

In other words, you're only interested in belief, not proof.

Which makes you a dogmatist, something you claimed objectivists were.

 

[RobertR]

Pointing out the biases of others does nothing to disprove your own biases (which you haven't disputed).

The difference, of course, is that objectivists favor methodologies to eliminate bias, and you don't.

 

[Angelo.M]

[Bizarro voice] Me confused. Me confused. [/Bizarro voice]

Well, we're on Page 2, and no mention of it yet, so here it is...

 

[Yogi]

Methodologies created by an objectivist to eliminate others biases which does nothing to eliminate his own. You have to understand that the objectivist has his own biases. Saying one doesn't have a bias is a bias in itself. That's why I call it pseudo science. The objectivist never starts with a clean slate. At least all the information I have gleaned about DBTs in audio point to the fact that the objectivist starts out to prove or disprove something. Once you have your end result in mind there is no fair test you can design without your own biases built into it. They sound like scientists but are they? That is an open question to everyone.