DO SPECS REALLY MATTER in Audio? - Understanding Speaker Measurements!

[theyellowspecial]

Measurements are bad for YouTube personalities promoting products based on emotion.

 

[Helicopter]

Everyone who has ever heard my good speakers in my room thinks they sound great, and a good number say they are the best they have ever heard. I kinda like that too.

 

[Vini darko]

No disrespect to the man, the myth, the legend mr Olive. Thought we were trying to not do this type of thread anymore?

 

[richard12511]

My conspiracy theories:
a. Manufacturers who are getting affected by ASR are paying these influencers to talk against measurements
b. These YouTubers feel their jobs/revenue are threatened hence they talk against measurements. i.e. who will listen to my subjective nonesense when my audience gets woke to measurements?

Or do what Erin's audio corner is doing. Youtube and measurements . I really hope his channel takes off.

 

[Helicopter]

Just saw @Sean Olive response, from the comments:
View attachment 111155

I can't find it on YT. Did Andrew delete it?

 

[sweetchaos]

I can't find it on YT. Did Andrew delete it?

It's still there...
Sorted by "Newest First"...scroll down until you see:

Spoiler

 

[richard12511]

According to this guy, speaker measurements are not good indicators of sound quality because of other variables not accounted for in measurements that influence what we like including our hearing, our taste, our listening rooms, our program material.

So speaker companies that rely are measurements are deluding themselves. And they also admit they don't like neutral speakers but speakers that sound "fun". Apparently fun speakers are not designed with measurements. This should be a "fun" thread.

Sean,

You should publicly(in the youtube comments) invite him to your double blind test chamber to participate in your double blind tests to find out exactly how his tastes correlate with measurements. Especially if you offer to pay, that would go a long way towards bringing many subjectophiles over to the light side. I watch a lot of these guys videos, and youtube by and large is mostly in the subjective camp, and I wish that would change.

 

[dfuller]

Of course specs matter... They give you something to measure against.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

Of course specs matter...

I can't see much without them.

 

[Helicopter]

It's still there...
Sorted by "Newest First"...scroll down until you see:
View attachment 111169

I see now. Andrew posted a reply an hour ago too. That is worth reading before being too hard on him. He obviously was a bit careless and had no intention to pick a fight with Sean.

 

[Ericglo]

I see now. Andrew posted a reply an hour ago too. That is worth reading before being too hard on him. He obviously was a bit careless and had no intention to pick a fight with Sean.

It seems like he is back tracking a little. I give him credit for going to Harman though.

 

[sweetchaos]

I see now. Andrew posted a reply an hour ago too.

Here it is:

 

[hardisj]

I saw the video earlier. Replied. I was going to link it here but didn’t want to give him any publicity. Imagine my surprise when I see it posted here by none other than Sean himself.

 

[Helicopter]

It seems like he is back tracking a little. I give him credit for going to Harman though.

He doesn't have a ton of options to recover. He did his best to half-apologize and save face while expressing he knows he can't really win any contest of merit with Sean and does not want to go there in any deep way.

Personally, I would have admitted I was wrong and expressed an intent to do better next time, but I am an anonymous contributor and he is a professional reviewer so things are different for him.

 

[Sancus]

I saw the video earlier. Replied. I was going to link it here but didn’t want to give him any publicity. Imagine my surprise when I see it posted here by none other than Sean himself.

Yeah I have mixed feelings about these types of posts, in a lot of cases I think it's just signal boosting nonsense.

 

[Helicopter]

Best thing for him to do now is buy a pair of Revel Be speakers, put them in his reference system, and post a video about how they are better than anything else he has ever tried.

 

[hardisj]

I had planned to make a video about measurements and their importance at some point in the coming months as part of my efforts in education. Guess this AR video gives me a few more talking points.

People are really missing the point in all of this stuff. I’ll try to connect the dots in a week or so. Maybe put some of this crap to rest. Or just preach to the choir.

 

[typericey]

Or do what Erin's audio corner is doing. Youtube and measurements . I really hope his channel takes off.

@hardisj is one of my favorite YouTube channels now. I watch his videos even if I have no specific interest (to own the) driver or product he's measuring. Bonus that he's a car audio nut which was my previous interest.

Looking forward to more objective YouTubers. @HionHiFi, on the lookout for you. @Spocko should get back to doing more audio related vids.

 

[bo_knows]

Yeah, I blocked him from showing up in my recommendations. The guy is delusional and just shilling for ad revenue.


Don't know, didn't watch it either, but measurements can be part of the specifications. Some brands show their spins right there on the product page (too bad Revel doesn't do it) or in the brochures for their products.


Maybe @Sean Olive can invite him over to Harman when this pandemic thing is over. Let him do some double blind tests and see where his preferences lie.

FYI...According to him, he was at the Harman facility in Northridge CA already and participated in some listening tests. He talks about it in one of his videos.

 

[Zedly]

While watching one of Andrew's recent videos, I realized that he views speakers in a fundamentally different way than we do here. He said that he liked Speaker X because it sounds like listening to music in a club setting. He likes Speaker Y for its concert hall sound, and Speaker Z for its big, arena sound. Essentially, he wants to use speakers to provide atmosphere, not to merely reproduce recorded sounds.