Objectivist Audiophilism (2 Viewers)

[RobertR]

I want the test to be open with her--no blindfolds, please.

 

[Yogi]

Good call I wouldn't want that test to be blind either.

 

[Rogozhin]

There are too many variables to conclude universally that any of the statements made, in that cited source, are valid or invalid.

Therefore: You have to trust your senses and not what you read.

I know for a fact that my $200 powerline conditioner cleaned up the sound from my NAD 314 and SD 300tis-but this was in a very old house with old wiring. I'm not naive or stupid enough to claim then that 'Powerline conditioners are necessary for all AV and HF applications'.

Z

 

[Jay Foster]

Chu: HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!

I laughed out loud at the Easter Bunny.


Does anyone on this forum know anyone who has one the $10,000.00?

 

[Yogi]

Keeping in mind the objective of this test, I dont think anyone won the 10K.

 

[Wayde_R]

I read a post from days ago that alarmed me. It seems someone quit the forum because of too much of this "objectivist" viewpoints, he felt insulted and mentioned something about annoying beer posts. :frowning:

I hope we HT enthusiasts are all mature enough to handle each others views without insulting or feeling insulted if someone disagrees.

Tastes in Audio gear is a bit like your tastes in women. The girl next door might not turn as many heads when you walk into a place. But she has a job, isn't on Prozac and can handle it if you want to go to the bar with your friends once in awhile.

If you can afford the high maintenance gear, more power to you. Chances are you have a better build quality and stuff made by employees who earn a living wage in a first world nation. I applaud you.

As for "liquid highs" and perfect matches between "laid back" amps and "warm" speakers, I don't hear all that stuff. Until there is a night course I can take at the local community college (and I would DEFINITELY take that course) I'm ignorant. I do not doubt that perhaps I am the one missing out on a real audiophile experience. I certainly mean no offence to those of you who do hear those sonic qualities. But ignorance is bliss where 'tis folly to be a working class dog with a mortgage a kid and bills to pay.

Until I strike it RICH, it's back to basics for me.

 

[Angelo.M]

Guilty.

Allow me the delicious irony of raising a glass in honor of our fallen brother...

 

[Jack Briggs]

I'm doing Saporro lately. So smooth.

Wayde, the problem I have with unlimited posting about subjectivist, nonscientific audio matters is that I don't want to see newcomers to the home-theater hobby being sidetracked and misinformed about sonic realities. Home theater is where electronics have value; the so-called "high-end" audio publications wax rhapsodic about overpriced, megabucks gear being marketed on flimsy, nonscientific pretexts and audio illusions that simply do not exist.

Which is why I cringe when reading posts that ask for listings of the best "warm-sounding" receivers, for example. If a receiver has been designed properly, then it doesn't have a "sound." The speaker and how it interacts with its environment is what determines the kind of sound one will hear.

 

[Angelo.M]

Well said, as usual.

All I would add is that one's preconditions/biases/central nervous system + the listening environment + the speaker = what determines the "sound" that one "hears."

 

[Yogi]

Thats a big 'IF' Jack. According to Chu all receivers and amps will have some finite impedance and will interact with most speakers. That's why tube amps have the sound they have (according to Chu) and they definetly are warmer sounding, IMHO.

One thing I would agree though with most of you is that room treatments and speakers will far outweigh all the other things that effect sound. Pre amp and amps would constitute a second order effect on sound and although subtle (not like the night and day change most reviews quote) are there nevertheless. Wires, cables, shakti stones/bricks and pricks have no effect on sound, or at least not to the extent of human resolution anyways.

 

[JasonBrandon]

Being a man of science myself, I believe that if it cannot be measured than it cannot be heard. The rest is just mumbo-jumbo designed to sell products at unreasonably high prices.

 

[Yogi]

You mean if it can be measured then it can be heard. Just kidding.

 

[John Beavers]

I just love generalizations. Not that someone has actually listened to the overpriced, nonscientific pretexted high end gear, to come to this conclusion...it's just a known, a fixed reality that cannot be doubted, and pity the poor newcomer who might be swayed into thinking that some cutting edge audio designers might have actually created something special, and are charging appropriately for it. I will never understand skeptics who make fixed judgements about stuff they've never tried. Doubt expressed in a non-accusing/judgemental manner is totally cool, this other stuff is just "resentments". IMHO

 

[RobertR]

Not really. Jack specifically referred to receivers, not amps, and I'm not aware of any home theater receivers that incorporate tube amps. Therefore, since the solid state amps in receivers all have quite small output impedances, and whatever differences there are would be negligible, it's rather silly to say something like "Pioneer/Sony receivers are warmer/colder than Yamaha/Kenwood receivers".

 

[Wayde_R]

I admit I've been riding the Chu-Chu train lately. But I've always been a proponent of Hi-Fi on a budget (not that objectivism necessarily = low cost)

Given advances in solid state and digital electronics today a $500 receiver is better than what went for many times that in ages past. Hi-fi is no longer an elite hobby and I'd hate for people looking for advice on lower budget systems to ever feel left out or shunned, not here or any HT community.

Damn, you guys are making it harder for me to try and stay away from beer for awhile. I was going to try to abstain from beer for a few weeks as a sort of spring time, get in shape routine. All this talk of Sapporo and other exotic delights. sigh.

 

[KrishnaS]

Wayde, What kind of equipment do you run? I've learned a lot from this thread and am now curious to see what "budget" equipment compares to the high dollar audiohpile stuff. Or maybe that's a different thread?

 

[RobertR]

I think Jack will tell you that he HAS been there/done that. He's said on more than one occasion that he indeed used to be "into" the High End, used to follow the likes of Harry Pearson, Gordon Holt, etc., and came to know it was bunk.

And I can tell you that I used to belong to an audio club where we were exposed to shakti stones, "isolation dampers", "super duper" speaker wire, interconnects, ad nauseum. My speaker dealer let me try out an 800 buck power cord for my amp. I've been to MANY High end shows, and have heard people demo CD mats, "stop lights", cable elevators, megabuck SS amps, pyramid shaped amps, tube amps, ultra low distortion amps, preamps, CD players, racks, etc. So please stop with the "you have no experience with the overpriced, nonscientific pretexted high end gear", because it's simply not true.

 

[Chu Gai]

I hope the person didn't leave the forum. The beer posts (I don't know who started those, maybe me? I certainly have a penchant for posts with women in them...but hey!) I think are basically a cooling off period. I get the feeling that if we were together, maybe in a nice tavern, with scratch paper and talking, there wouldn't be anywhere near as much potential for the feelings that people are being hostile. It's a tough thing to put down on paper what you want to say. No amount of smilies is going to convey the tone. There's no way of getting feedback from body signals. No way to tell a gentle rib from the feeling that you're being humiliated. And sometimes there's just not enough words or time to get your point across especially if you try to do so, you find that you're now 10 posts behind.

A lot of the reason why I post is to convey credible, scientific information and to deconvolute advertising. I want people to be skeptical not only of audio but of what they see in general in their every day lives. I take my shots at the high end but I've taken a fair amount of shots at everyday manufacturers. Many think they're not subject to advertising. They look at the commercials on TV for Budweiser or Coke or Pepsi or magnetic rings you put in your shoes and some football player uses it and say to themselves that they're not affected. Maybe. But then people look at websites, read 'white papers', and then don't realize that what they're reading is advertising. It's sucked them in to the point that they keep coming back to it. Damn, Coke would love that!

Many have favorite designers be they a Levinson, a Richard Marsh, a Nelson Pass, a whomever and look at their success as a direct or indirect vindication and validation of whatever they may say. Sometimes it's accurate, sometimes it's contrary to the laws of the universe. Sometimes people are successful in spite of being wrong. Advertising and marketing is about a lot of things. It's certainly about planting a thought without stepping over federal laws and regulations. It's about using science and knowledge of human behavior to sometimes skew results without making them looked skewed (Pepsi challenge).

I post because I have the most profound respect for your money. Ayn Randish if you will. I look upon your money as something you've worked for. Sacrificed for. You've earned it. I want you to spend it intelligently and with more information than companies are willing to give you. In other words, I happen to think that YOU are important and given a choice, I'll tend to side with the consumer.

I could care less if you own what I own or what it is that you've bought and what you've paid for it. I respect your preferences for Rotel over Parasound. Or Paradigm over NHT. Or whatever. I happen to think that if you've got good solid information, not speculation, not wishful thinking, then you're going to make a decision that's right for you. If that's my agenda, as some have suggested I have (shades of Oliver Stone, oh my!) then you've got it. I'm guilty.

 

[Yogi]

Picky, picky picky on words BTW Mcintosh does make a two channel receiver that uses tube output stages and even though I haven't heard it I have a feeling it will sound warmer than a Yamaha stereo receiver. Remember Jack said receiver not home theater receiver.

There is no point picking words to win an argument. You feel all receivers and amps sound alike then more power to you. I personally prefer the sound of one over the other (not necessarily the expensive one) then I should be allowed to live comfortably with my preference. Can we agree to respect each others preferences? After all you never hear someone cringe when someone else claims all amps sound alike. Then why does it always happen in this forum that whenever one asks for advice on warm sounding amps/receivers someone comes in and makes a cringing sound and farts. Beats me

 

[ChrisWiggles]

I'm sorry, but this is a blatantly stupid statement.

I hate to involve myself in this debate, but would the hard-liners on each side just please shut up?

There are some VERY clear bs marketing out there which is clearly ridiculous. There is a LOT of very important things which can be defined and characterised with careful, accurate measuremenrs (which, btw are rarely used thoroughly and extensively) which will give you a *VERY* good idea of what something will probably sound like.

But just the same, saying that "if it can't be measured by a tool it doesn't exist" is UTTER COMPLETE TOTAL NONSENSE.

Find me a SINGLE character that we perceive as sound that can be concretely described with measurements.

Take a couple basic characteristics of sound as we measure:
intensity
frequency

Is that what we hear? NO!!!!

We hear loudness and pitch.

Loudness and pitch are NOT synonyms for intensity and frequency. They are tied to the measured values sure, but subjective interpretations are ALWAYS the final arbiter of what your *BRAIN* hears.

It seems my previous post about the impact of your vision on stereo imaging was totally ignored so I will repeat it. Listen to your system with your eyes open, and then do the same with your eyes closed, and see what happens. Your brain puts your vision first, and will match what you expect via sight, to what you will subjectively hear. With your eyes open, your soundstage will usually be closely limited to the spread of the speakers, the back wall, etc, and be relatively flat. This is a great attribute for home theaters, since loose general placement of speakers in the front will be ok, since your brain will "make" things sound like where they are coming from in the video, even if with your eyes close they are actually in way different places.

So try turning the lights off and closing your eyes, and pay attention to what happens with the imaging. Not only will you get sucked into the music more by removing a second sense that is really just getting in the way, but the whole sonic image will seem to improve, or at least change, sometimes drastically. Has *ANYTHING* at all changed? NO. Nothing has changed, but your PERCEPTIONS are not equivalent to what is measurable.

Here, take another example, which has to do with how you perceive the pitch of a tone. With complex tones and harmonics, your brain does a LOT of processing on all the different instruments and frequencies you are hearing, but the end result is that given a note from an instrument, the fundamental frequency is what you will perceive as the pitch (ignoring, for a moment, other impacts on pitch perception, like intensity, duration, etc). All the harmonics will be perceived as the coloration, or timbre that makes an instrument sound like a piano, or a flute, or whatever. But what is fascinating, is that this perception of pitch is *NOT* based on the loudest frequency, but simply the *fundamental* frequency, no matter if all the harmonics and coloration may be WAY louder. In fact, you can even perceive a pitch at some fundamental frequency, even if that frequency DOES NOT EXIST IN THE SIGNAL AT ALL!!! simply by perceiving the harmonics correctly, and your brain will know what the fundamental frequency was an you will perceive THAT pitch.

So please!!! There is a LOT of bs out there, but it is equally as ignorant and ridiculous to state that everything can be measured, if what has been VERY carefully documented and studied are the various impacts on our perceptions of sound and how they CHANGE, regardless of what is measured.

Apologize for sounding harsh against you guys, but the human perception of sound is no small feat of simple measurements. We cannot explain all the intracacies of how we interpret sounds, how our brain processes them, etc. But we DO KNOW that many functions of sound perception do not at all follow what a sound meter might say.