Is Audio Science Review going about it all wrong? Or partly wrong? Or all right?

[Hybride]

There is no, and I mean NO examples of anything demonstrated to be audible which is not also easily measurable.

I agree on spec's. But why does each DAC model sounds different? Does the designers not measure? Lowlevel signals below the tresshold of measuring equipment which itself also suffers with distortions due electronic components and LCR properties. It is also very hard measuring signal behaviour in a dac playing music. Static measurements are just a part of the story.

 

[solderdude]

Let's just say that the brain is a funny, and not understood thing.
Very easy to make yourself 'believe' in something. Once you believe it is hard to un-believe.
It is very easy for people to hear differences that are not there but seem so real it is 'clear as day'.

I know quite a few musicians. They hardly ever own audiophile equipment. On the contrary even. They don't care for SQ in general and listen for the emotional side of a music piece. That you can do on a cheap radio as well. They do not need 'esoteric' stuff for that.
It has nothing to do with the technical side.

Measurements are repeatable. Nulling is possible between DAC's when sync'ed. Why is it that only audio seems to show 'unexplained' behaviour and the rest of electronic applications do not ?
Brain or ...

 

[Soniclife]

I did some A/B testing with my LG CD player going through a $15 amazon DAC vs its own built in DAC. Not blind but switching back and forth. I couldn't tell a consistent difference. It sounded mediocre both ways. Maybe the rest of the setup hid all differences? Maybe both DACs sucked?

Setting up a DBT with hardware isn't simple, sadly. However software comparisons between lossless and lossy are simple with a laptop, and just as illuminating. Once you no longer hear the big differences you thought you heard in sighted listening things change.

 

[Soniclife]

I agree on spec's. But why does each DAC model sounds different? Does the designers not measure? Lowlevel signals below the tresshold of measuring equipment which itself also suffers with distortions due electronic components and LCR properties. It is also very hard measuring signal behaviour in a dac playing music. Static measurements are just a part of the story.

Where is your proof of these audible but unmeasurable differences?

 

[SIY]

I agree on spec's. But why does each DAC model sounds different?

Assertion is easy. People assert that they've been kidnapped by ETs and anally probed, offering just as much evidence as you have, i.e., none.

 

[solderdude]

But why does each DAC model sounds different?

Not every DAC model sounds the same but that doesn't mean each model sounds different at all.
There are models that sound and measure quite differently for a plethora of reasons and models that measure just slightly different well below any audible thresholds.
The measurements here provide folks with data that one can interpret correctly or incorrectly.
The better measuring one isn't always the preferred one to some people.
This does not mean measurements are worthless, it just means people have preferences.

 

[Blumlein 88]

RULE NUMBER ONE in ANY listening comparison sighted or blind is :

YOU MUST MATCH LEVELS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Even if you prefer the listen and describe subjective impressions methodology you still must match levels. Without that no conclusions are worth the time to think of them or express them.

Is matching level by ear good enough? NOOOOOO!
Levels must be matched to within .1 db and matching by ear is likely only good to 1 db or perhaps a half db. .2 db level difference is enough to make one bit of kit sound better/different vs another.

A good simple method is to measure voltage with a test tone (maybe -20 db 1 khz) at the speaker terminals. You want to get it to within 1 percent. So if one amp measures 10 volts, you want the other to be within 9.9 to 10.1 volts. Figure out how to switch gear and adjust volume between gear to maintain this. Then listen to music.

This is step one. This is the step without which none of your impressions are valid.

 

[Ron Texas]

I actually heard exactly nothing in my main system before purchase.

I didn't buy stuff and not like it and send it back, either, just for the record.

Good luck.

Was it turned off?

 

[JJB70]

My cousin designs lenses for ground and space-based telescopes. Nothing consumer oriented. There's a tremendous amount of math involved, and he even managed to create a groundbreaking, patented model for lens design. He also said that there's still a lot of trial and error and intuition in the process. In education, my field, there's plenty of research that matches my own experience, but the research also misleads constantly. This is clear in, among other things, the textbooks written for common core. Science and engineering have bias in them too.

Audio hardware is a mature technology. DACs achieved audible transparency over 20 years ago, amplifiers before that subject to being used within their limits. We aren't talking about stepping into the unknown and undertaking pioneering research into a new branch of knowledge and invention. Measurement underpins engineering and science, once the appropriate parameters to measure have been identified then measurement really can tell you what you need to know about objective performance.

 

[tpaxadpom]

tl:dr I heard all sort of differences in electronics until I did fair blind comparisons. After that, it was clear that speakers, acoustics, and source material were a better place to focus.

Curious as to what have changed now as to how you perceive the difference between components when not blind folded? Do you hear less difference or none?

 

[MrGoodbits]

I did some A/B testing with my LG CD player going through a $15 amazon DAC vs its own built in DAC. Not blind but switching back and forth. I couldn't tell a consistent difference. It sounded mediocre both ways. Maybe the rest of the setup hid all differences? Maybe both DACs sucked?

Ask yourself how likely is it that the two DACs had the exact same flaws so you could not tell them apart. Or is it more possible that they are just both transparent? I do think mediocre speakers/headphones/acoustics could hide some differences. It's definitely more convincing when the rest of the system is impeccable and you like the overall sound.

I did a lot of work with my switch box on many different systems and configurations that had generally good to excellent sound, I think the last was testing expensive speaker cables, and I the only time I heard a statistically meaningful difference was with a tubed Conrad Johnson preamp, the highs were very slightly rolled off. I think that was the only tubed part I ever tried.

The important thing is that, once I figured out that I could skip listening tests (for electronics), and all that's left to go by is measurements (and certain ephemerals that make me like or dislike a component) then it was quite a relief. So if there's some question about how audible good-measuring electronics are, but zero question at all of the audibility of differences between different speakers (& headphones), what does that tell us about how much to worry about how electronics sound?

 

[tpaxadpom]

On your larger question, again, all of us hear what you heard when tests are not controlled. Even knowledge of what can happen is insufficient from drawing the wrong conclusions. Our hearing is adaptive and pick what we want out of what we are hearing. So run to run variations are normal even when nothing has changed.

I would like to see an experiment that was not blind folded. For instance group of audio "experts" gather at Amir's place and compare his ML amps to $300 receiver from Best Buy. Volume matched, same source, nowhere near the clipping confirmed with AP measurements for each amp along with everything else you believe that would hide the difference. Then someone distracts the experts for a short time and the system is reconfigured in the way that when ML are selected $300 receiver is playing with nothing giving them a clue as to what happened. In theory all of the biased should have been taken away in this sighted comparison. I wonder what the outcome of that experiment would be.

 

[SIY]

No-one uses a blindfold. And that's a very poor way to control an experiment.

If two things sound different, they will still sound different if you don't peek.

 

[MrGoodbits]

Curious as to what have changed now as to how you perceive the difference between components when not blind folded? Do you hear less difference or none?

Excellent question. I still "hear" differences, certainly almost every component I buy "sounds better" than the last one. But then I when I imagine trying to pick that improvement out in a blind comparison, I just kind of stop caring. Not sure I'm explaining that well, but it's a key point to understand. Also I've not really "heard" differences in electronics that really altered my enjoyment of the music. Speakers, headphones, acoustics, are so much more important.

 

[JJB70]

Speakers, headphones, acoustics and the one that tends to be forgotten - the quality of the recording.

 

[Soniclife]

Excellent question. I still "hear" differences, certainly almost every component I buy "sounds better" than the last one. But then I when I imagine trying to pick that improvement out in a blind comparison, I just kind of stop caring. Not sure I'm explaining that well, but it's a key point to understand. Also I've not really "heard" differences in electronics that really altered my enjoyment of the music. Speakers, headphones, acoustics, are so much more important.

That's my mental process these days as well, once you have done some DBTs you sort of recalibrate yourself. The 'could I tell these apart blind' question is usually answered with I'm not sure I care.

 

[Daverz]

I wonder if the issue with the Rogue was damping factor. Rogue amps have a low output impedance for tube amps, or at least low enough. SINAD is not going to make a difference to intelligibility of vocals, but loose bass control might. Or maybe you were distracted by the tubes.

 

[tpaxadpom]

That's my mental process these days as well, once you have done some DBTs you sort of recalibrate yourself. The 'could I tell these apart blind' question is usually answered with I'm not sure I care.

This pretty much concludes that the only thing matters is how you "perceive" it in your own system - SIGHTED. In fact seeing poor measurement results can hurt ones feeling without really affecting the sound quality (objective or subjective) of the given component.

 

[Soniclife]

This pretty much concludes that the only thing matters is how you "perceive" it in your own system - SIGHTED. In fact seeing poor measurement results can hurt ones feeling without really affecting the sound quality (objective or subjective) of the given component.

That's not what I was getting at, I was saying that once you accept that the difference between some components may well exist, and you may even be able to pass a DBT, it's not the fact that the difference exists that counts most, it's how big the audible difference is. When you recalibrate to accepting the audible difference as very small, then how you perceive them sighted can be effectively discarded.

 

[tpaxadpom]

Speakers, headphones, acoustics and the one that tends to be forgotten - the quality of the recording.

It is not forgotten. You simply do not have control of that (assuming lossless media is used). Yes sometimes we can to choose remastered vs original version but most of the time that is not the case.