Describe your decisive experience that completely changed your view of audiophilia with a comment.

[ahofer]

that every is measurable and determinable.

One suspects the difference you heard is measurable, but the “studio standards of the time”, and conceivably today, did not include those measurements.

 

[Old_School_Brad]

I'd always been a bit skeptical, but I think the tipping point for me was when my 22kg class AB/A monster of an amplifier finally died. Sent it in for repairs, bought a cheap B-stock pro amp just so I could still have sound, and ended up barely hearing any difference. Subjectively it did sound a bit harsher at higher volumes, but I might've just been running it a bit too hard there... and it was also a tenth of the price of the big amp!

I eventually replaced the big amp with a Yamaha P3500S, which sounded identical but was way more usable, and cheaper to boot. Shame that the common internet "wisdom" of pro gear sounding "boring and emotionless" turned me off on that stuff before, but thankfully the amp died before I got too deep down the rabbit hole.

Oh yeah, and that cheap temporary amplifier? It's still kicking 10 years later! I disconnected its fan right after I first got it, and have been abusing it in all sorts of side setups for all those years... and it still runs great. Funny how that works. (it's a JB Systems 200.2 if anyone's curious)

The P3500S has a fan that only kicks in above 50 °C, right? Best to just leave it as is -it's a fairly sealed enclosure. That said, if you're not pushing it hard, it might not matter, but it is a Class A/B (or EEEngine) with toroidal transformer so heat is best expelled.
Just a heads up.

 

[Arindal]

One suspects the difference you heard is measurable, but the “studio standards of the time”, and conceivably today, did not include those measurements.

In all three cases the developers themselves independently claimed it is not measurable with standard models. In two of the cases, in which pro-audio developers were the ones to claim that, I had the opportunity to take part in A/B comparison tests to confirm this.

One I remember in detail, it was a listening comparison of two identical midrange drivers, one in a closed-box design, one in a cardioid/semi-open baffle concept. Both drivers were calibrated to on-axis response showing a deviation of less than 0.2dB from each other over the whole band and as the comparison took place in a true anechoic chamber, all standard measurements and models would have suggested no audible difference. In contrary, the audible difference was huge, spanning over the complete lowest octave of the midrange driver adding some kind of muddled, boosted, resonating lower midrange to the CB unit while the cardioid showed leaner timbre and increased midrange transparency.

You should have seen the eyes of the lab director who afterwards spent more than 2 hours to over and over measure the two, finding no FR difference in whatever angle of the sweet-spot being used.

Every reasonable audiophile is someone who recognizes and promotes the importance of measurements, research and room acoustics.

I agree, and of course there is a lot of unnecessary, overpriced stuff around. Nevertheless I have the feeling that with the right explanation and impressive demo, you can get many audiophiles to rethinking their beliefs, particularly when it comes to adopting a speaker to the room and doing room correction.

In contrary, I miss the willingness of the self-proclaimed objectivist fraction to accept audible phenomena and criteria of evaluating sound quality which are not determinable by standard models. I oftentimes think they could be learning from some crazy audiophiles as much as the latter might learn from them.

 

[davmol]

1. Buying a home cinema amp that came with auto EQ / DSP and it made my cheap speakers sound amazing.
2. Applied that to my car a few years later by buying a pioneer head unit with auto EQ / DSP. Double wow.
3. Finding ASR and all these great sounding new brands at affordable prices (love my topping and wiim gear).
4. Finding planar magnetic headphones. Although it basically ruined my ability to listen to pixel buds and Sony noise cancelling headphones, which prior to buying my Ananda's sounded great
5. Running a level matched test between different DACs and finding absolutely no difference (I made Thread about it on this forum). Stopped the never ending search for "better", and now I'm happy with what I have.

 

[RayDunzl]

Describe your decisive experience that completely changed your view of audiophilia with a comment.

Coming home from an afternoon at The Big Audio Show...

... and still being satisfied with what I have.

 

[XpanD]

The P3500S has a fan that only kicks in above 50 °C, right? Best to just leave it as is -it's a fairly sealed enclosure. That said, if you're not pushing it hard, it might not matter, but it is a Class A/B (or EEEngine) with toroidal transformer so heat is best expelled.
Just a heads up.

Nah, by "cheap temporary amplifier" I meant the JB Systems that I bought to hold me over during repairs. The Yamaha came later, and I never modified that -- have yet to hear the fan come on!

 

[Mort]

Two words.

BMR monitor

 

[Peterinvan]

Giving up on trying digital EQ, my best addition to my stack is the Schiit Loki+

I tweak the tone for different headphones, albums, and even individual tracks to keep my old ears happy

 

[ahofer]

In all three cases the developers themselves independently claimed it is not measurable with standard models. In two of the cases, in which pro-audio developers were the ones to claim that, I had the opportunity to take part in A/B comparison tests to confirm this.

One I remember in detail, it was a listening comparison of two identical midrange drivers, one in a closed-box design, one in a cardioid/semi-open baffle concept. Both drivers were calibrated to on-axis response showing a deviation of less than 0.2dB from each other over the whole band and as the comparison took place in a true anechoic chamber, all standard measurements and models would have suggested no audible difference. In contrary, the audible difference was huge, spanning over the complete lowest octave of the midrange driver adding some kind of muddled, boosted, resonating lower midrange to the CB unit while the cardioid showed leaner timbre and increased midrange transparency.

You should have seen the eyes of the lab director who afterwards spent more than 2 hours to over and over measure the two, finding no FR difference in whatever angle of the sweet-spot being used.



I agree, and of course there is a lot of unnecessary, overpriced stuff around. Nevertheless I have the feeling that with the right explanation and impressive demo, you can get many audiophiles to rethinking their beliefs, particularly when it comes to adopting a speaker to the room and doing room correction.

In contrary, I miss the willingness of the self-proclaimed objectivist fraction to accept audible phenomena and criteria of evaluating sound quality which are not determinable by standard models. I oftentimes think they could be learning from some crazy audiophiles as much as the latter might learn from them.

The A/B test wasn’t in an anechoic chamber. Give. The designs, the off-axis response couldn’t be the same, no compression tests?….i mean, you know all this.

EDIT: should be "given the designs". Apologies.

 

[Arindal]

The A/B test wasn’t in an anechoic chamber.

Yes, they were.

The designs, the off-axis response couldn’t be the same, no compression tests?

Off-axis response was naturally very different, but that should not have played a role in the anechoic chamber. Compression was tested in form of FR measurements at different levels. Of course both designs were not identical, there are multiple explanations possible why they sounded so overly different: longer sustain in the resonance area of the CB driver, reflections in the cabinet coming out through the diaphragm, slight deviations over different angles within the listening window and many more. The point is the experiment showed how limited our standard models of measuring loudspeakers are, and it was partly shaking worldviews of some lab engineers who had previously thought that no tonal differences are possible if FR is identical.

 

[ahofer]

Yes, they were.



Off-axis response was naturally very different, but that should not have played a role in the anechoic chamber. Compression was tested in form of FR measurements at different levels. Of course both designs were not identical, there are multiple explanations possible why they sounded so overly different: longer sustain in the resonance area of the CB driver, reflections in the cabinet coming out through the diaphragm, slight deviations over different angles within the listening window and many more. The point is the experiment showed how limited our standard models of measuring loudspeakers are, and it was partly shaking worldviews of some lab engineers who had previously thought that no tonal differences are possible if FR is identical.

Longer resonance and reflections would show up in standard (today) speaker tests. Was it just driver FR?

And given the importance of the result was the test replicated in blind ABX?

 

[waofner]

February 2020 i walked into the local music store to buy interconnects.
Another customer brought back a pair of Adam Audio S3V test monitors- Friday and nothing special to do for the weekend, a no brainer.
I had already some experience with REW- I did not sleep much that night.
My speaker's where Troels Gravensen developed CNO 2 1/2 way's(i would compare them to better Dynaudio's)

Up today i am happy beyond word's what DSP is able to do. (In my case i only need to EQ the room modes below 344 Hz)

(Qobuz,etc, from PC/ Thorens 2001+Benc Micro ACE SL+Rega Aria+Swissonic AD (thank's to Amir) to Topping D50II to S3V)

 

[love_budget_audio]

E-MU 0404 USB - I used it with a linear power supply for nearly 2 decades.
I remember people seriously debated whether or not it was on the same level as the Benchmark DAC-1 ........ so really long ago at this point, early 2000's.
It was a really major talking point for a while. It's still a nice DAC, I would still use it but I think the drivers haven't been updated since Windows XP was a supported OS, and needs its proprietary driver to work.

It convinced me that top tier sound does not need to come with a top tier price and ultimately kicked off my love for DIY audio, especially when using scientific methods to achieve better sound while decoupling that quality from the money value of the components.

 

[Arindal]

Longer resonance and reflections would show up in standard (today) speaker tests. Was it just driver FR?

Driver and whole speaker arrangement equally optimized in both forms.

Yes, resonance behavior was different, but outside the midrange´s typical band and what usually is covered by a standard waterfall plot. My assumption would be that in a standard speaker review differences would go unnoticed.

Reflections in an anechoic chamber?

And given the importance of the result was the test replicated in blind ABX?

I guess the manufacturer had been doing some tests which were replicated in a blind arrangement previously, yes. We refrained from this, for practical reasons, and because no-one of the lab guys who had not expected any audible differences, were doubting their existence.

This was neither a scientific test nor took place in any hi-fi scenario, but among pro-audio people.

 

[ahofer]

reflections in the cabinet coming out through the diaphragm,

It was your suggestion, and the cabinet is certainly in the chamber. Perhaps I’m missing something, but why exactly wouldn’t these phenomena show up in standard FR and waterfall?

Right, it wasn’t a scientific test. Yet the observation is, by far, important enough to merit one. The fact that nobody did just makes me suspicious that they felt it either wasn’t replicable or was easily explainable from known, measurable quantities. The sudden uncontrolled observation is not dispositive and every pro knows that.

Nothing personal, I don’t know you. I have to guess based on how this anecdote has been revealed in this forum.

 

[Arindal]

Perhaps I’m missing something, but why exactly wouldn’t these phenomena show up in standard FR and waterfall?

In a standard FR they would not show up due to DSP linearization.

In the waterfall plot there was a slight difference, but lower in frequency than what would be expected, and definitely not anything that would catch the attention in a standard loudspeaker test.

The fact that nobody did just makes me suspicious that they felt it either wasn’t replicable or was easily explainable from known, measurable quantities.

It definitely was replicable, and surely it is somehow explainable. Cannot tell you why no scientific test has been done to my knowledge, maybe because it was a part of R&D process for commercial products? In another case the very same manufacturer was cooperating with a university institute for acoustics, involving one of the most recognized professors for this field at the time. They surely have a way to repeat things on a scientific level and publish them, if desired.

As mentioned, this had nothing to do with hi-fi.

 

[crazycloud]

Describe your decisive experience that completely changed your view of audiophilia with a comment.

I have done a lot of blind tests over the years with people who claim to be able to hear all sorts of things, changed the system in ways that they claim are 'shockingly audible', yet they can't detect them by ear alone. I think, based on over 40y of being around 'philes (and a lot of musos who can be even worse) that most of them are FOS.