Do objective youtube reviewers exist?

[Vini darko]

I would rather not start a flame war.

To bad I guess , It has begun

 

[Tks]

@amirm

Is there potential for a video on the particulars about "trained listening", or what such training actually constitutes? I hear it takes a few months or something, and is always constantly alluded to when "trained listeners" are able to ABX things like 320 mp3 and FLAC by using certain tells. Is this like some course?

 

[amirm]

While I disagree with most things @GoldenOne said in the post above: I beg to differ.

Some of his publications, such as his recent MQA deep dive are quite valuable to this forum, IMHO.

Oh? So I rob banks all the day long but if I give $10 to charity I am good to go? No, we are not here to entertain people who think no measurement could ever show a device is transparent. It doesn't get more wrong than that. It also makes his entire endeavor on MQA a farce if objective analysis doesn't answer audibility questions. Test signals are good in one argument but not another?

So it is clear, if he keeps making those arguments here, then we will show him the door. You all can reference his videos/writings elsewhere but we are not here to give him a megaphone otherwise.

 

[Pennyless Audiophile]

I've been quite open with my approach to reviews and my view on things.
I think that the polarisation between objectivist and subjectivist is getting worse and it isn't good for anyone.
...
I also do not think that just because something measures very well that it is guaranteed to sound excellent or the same as any other well measuring product.
.

I quite like the approach of the Golden One; I have been following him for a while and he is often very interesting.

To keep things short I just list the points where I beg to disagree with Amir:

a) We listen to a reproduction chain, and the interaction among equally well measuring components may have an audible effect.

b) Measures do not fully describe the stereo presentation. I know very well that it is room dependent and recording dependent, but in the same room two tonally equivalent chains may have a very different presentation. If you are anything like me, you can tolerate tonal uncertainties but definitely you cannot tolerate that the guitar is not sounding in a place different from the keyboards.
(I let you imagine how I feel when I hear interesting pop/rock/indie music being butchered by the mix engineers..in that case you can't even start thinking to spatial reconstruction, but I digress)

c) What measures well is not necessarily what we like. I like the Klipsch sound, despite the fact that I know very well that their frequency response is far from ideal. I have a hybrid tube amplifier that I use for Jazz and classic because it sounds a bit on the warm side.
I know that statistically we all tend to like the same type of sound, but if I am an outlier, then I may want to use different equipment.

I want to stress that what I said above doesn't detract at all from the work Amir is doing. I believe he is helping to make a lot of badly needed clarity and he deserves and enormous credit for that.

 

[eigenvalue]

(Though it's important to note a blind test cannot confirm if two things are the same/no difference as you can expectation bias yourself into not hearing one. Swimming teacher can't make you float but that doesn't prove that humans can't swim.
It can however confirm or suggest to a statistically significant degree that a difference is present)

This is in my opinion not a great argument. If you are firm believer in dacs sounding different to each other it why would you objective bias yourself into thinking otherwise? Also if this were the case then there would be people who would have minimal subjective bias, a little bit and people who have a lot of subjective bias towards dacs sounding the same. As a whole the population should balance itself in a proper trial and hence the results would be analysed as a whole, double blind tests aren't magic and this argument could be applied to basically any field including medicine yet we still double blind trials.

 

[amirm]

@amirm

Is there potential for a video on the particulars about "trained listening", or what such training actually constitutes? I hear it takes a few months or something, and is always constantly alluded to when "trained listeners" are able to ABX things like 320 mp3 and FLAC by using certain tells. Is this like some course?

There are no formal courses that I know of. I can do a video but I have to create the material for it which will be time consuming. And due to copyright issues, challenging.

 

[eigenvalue]

I


I'd be quite happy to make a video doing some blind tests on some of this stuff. To be honest the only reason I haven't is because I just assumed that anyone who disagreed that whatever I was comparing could make a difference would simply claim I'd faked it somehow so there wouldn't be all that much point.

To be this sounds like doublespeak. You say you would be happy to make a video on blind tests yet outline why you would in reality not be happy to perform such tests. Also the attitude of I won't do it because people will call fake is in my opinion broken. If someone calls out the video as fake you use counterarguments or counter tests to disprove them instead of throwing in the towel. All science is based on peer review which often involves getting called out for results being faked etc.

 

[amirm]

a) We listen to a reproduction chain, and the interaction among equally well measuring components may have an audible effect.

Great. Start a camera rolling, then run a blind test 10 times in a row and show us that you can hear such 8 out of 10 times. Not hard. Dead easy for a youtuber. Yet it is not done and we are told to just believe.

b) Measures do not fully describe the stereo presentation. I know very well that it is room dependent and recording dependent, but in the same room two tonally equivalent chains may have a very different presentation. If you are anything like me, you can tolerate tonal uncertainties but definitely you cannot tolerate that the guitar is not sounding in a place different from the keyboards.

Same as (a) above. Show that stuff that has nothing to do with this effect show this effect nevertheless. You would be more famous than discovering sasquatch is real.

c) What measures well is not necessarily what we like. I like the Klipsch sound, despite the fact that I know very well that their frequency response is far from ideal. I have a hybrid tube amplifier that I use for Jazz and classic because it sounds a bit on the warm side.
I know that statistically we all tend to like the same type of sound, but if I am an outlier, then I may want to use different equipment.

We are not discussing differences between speakers where differences exist. We are discussing things that are shown to be fully transparent in objective measurement and have the poster say, "well, it sounds different to me even though distortion+noise is -120 dB." No, we don't know that it sounds different to you. We know you think that but we are not interested in what you think. We are interested in fidelity differences that are reliable.

I want to stress that what I said above doesn't detract at all from the work Amir is doing. I believe he is helping to make a lot of badly needed clarity and he deserves and enormous credit for that.

I appreciated that but backhanded compliments are not going to get us there. We are here because we believe in audio engineering and research over decades on what equipment fidelity is about. We are NOT here to live on made up, lay audiophile rules of this and that. Oh I changed my outlet on the wall and vail was removed. Oh I changed my cable and bass became so much faster. Oh I listened to this headphone and it is the best headphone in the world.

These are all stories that have no foundation and have no business existing in this forum and site. We have tolerated this since inception in the name of "fairness" but enough is enough. It constantly generates arguments like I am addressing here with no gain in knowledge. I could have reviewed twice as much gear if I did not have to keep addressing these arguments.

 

[eigenvalue]

a) We listen to a reproduction chain, and the interaction among equally well measuring components may have an audible effect.

This is a non sense argument. Combing equipment isn't a chemistry experiment, we know how to measure each component and there is no proof that matching specific component X with Y is different to X and Z. If you have proof please kindly perform an ABX listening test you will be surprised.

b) Measures do not fully describe the stereo presentation. I know very well that it is room dependent and recording dependent, but in the same room two tonally equivalent chains may have a very different presentation. If you are anything like me, you can tolerate tonal uncertainties but definitely you cannot tolerate that the guitar is not sounding in a place different from the keyboards.
(I let you imagine how I feel when I hear interesting pop/rock/indie music being butchered by the mix engineers..in that case you can't even start thinking to spatial reconstruction, but I digress)

This sounds like argument a but with added waffle.

c) What measures well is not necessarily what we like. I like the Klipsch sound, despite the fact that I know very well that their frequency response is far from ideal. I have a hybrid tube amplifier that I use for Jazz and classic because it sounds a bit on the warm side.
I know that statistically we all tend to like the same type of sound, but if I am an outlier, then I may want to use different equipment.

We aren't arguing that you prefer distorted sounds. We are arguing that two pieces of equipment that measure identically will sound indistinguishable and that plugging a pair of hd650s will sound identical on a clean 300$ source vs a clean 2000$ source once blindfolded.

 

[amirm]

Additionally many studies were conducted with just normal people rather than musicians or experienced listeners who in various other studies have repeatedly shown to have much better audibility thresholds in various areas.

This is why I want to put a stop to those kind of posts. Musicians? You think they have super special hearing when it comes to hearing differences in amplifiers? No they don't. They have been tested in many blind tests and other than hearing reflections better, have no special hearing ability.

And what do you mean "experienced listeners?" If you mean audiophiles, they are miserable, not better:

There is your audio reviewers way underperforming people who really know what they listening for (Trained). So clearly the type of "experience" you talk about is of little value even with speakers.

You are just repeating a bunch of myths with no connection to reality.

 

[hardisj]

I think that the polarisation between objectivist and subjectivist is getting worse and it isn't good for anyone.

This. x100.

 

[eigenvalue]

I agree with Amir, the musician argument is terrible and frankly leads me to believe you don't know many musicians. Musicians often don't pay much attention as music unlike audio equipment is subjective. In fact most musicians may not even own a hifi setup (I know a musician who swears by his sonos system). Musician =/= critical listener.

 

[amirm]

I'd be quite happy to make a video doing some blind tests on some of this stuff. To be honest the only reason I haven't is because I just assumed that anyone who disagreed that whatever I was comparing could make a difference would simply claim I'd faked it somehow so there wouldn't be all that much point.

No, we know how to deal with that. We repeat your experiment. Ask first how you should run your test so that we can tell you the proper protocol. That way, there will be a lot less pushback.

 

[Helicopter]

@Gene DellaSala has some great objective videos. Among others, he recently did an excellent cable video with lots of measurements.

Ethan Winer also has some good videos and information too, though he uses null testimg where an AP analyzer is better.

And subjectivists can still entertain with stories, show you features, comment on style, fashion, recommend great recordings, etc., so are not worthless.

 

[eigenvalue]

@Gene DellaSala has some great objective videos. Among others, he recently did an excellent cable video with lots of measurements.

Ethan Winer also has some good videos and information too, though he uses null testimg where an AP analyzer is better.

And subjectivists can still entertain with stories, show you features, comment on style, fashion, recommend great recordings, etc., so are not worthless.

Thank you for the suggestions I will be sure to have a look.

 

[Cahudson42]

To segue a bit. but within topic - youtube headphone reviewers..
'Z' and 'V' - absolutely unwatchable and useless, IMO. One possible exception: Andrew/'resolve'..

Here, for example, is a generally positive review of a $150 HP . Now Headphones.com sells HP. Every $150 one sold is one less potential $1000 sale with a lot more profit. . Yet Andrew seems to fairly describe the HE400se, backed up with objective Gras measurements.

 

[RayDunzl]

"Do objective youtube reviewers exist?"

Are subjective replies appropriate in answer to the question?

 

[richard12511]

I'd be quite happy to make a video doing some blind tests on some of this stuff. To be honest the only reason I haven't is because I just assumed that anyone who disagreed that whatever I was comparing could make a difference would simply claim I'd faked it somehow so there wouldn't be all that much point.

Do it with an unbiased third party auditing. If you succeed (in a statistically significant manner) and people still have doubt, then science is no longer on their side(imo).

 

[amirm]

I think that the polarisation between objectivist and subjectivist is getting worse and it isn't good for anyone.

It isn't actually. I am seeing a large transformation toward audio science, engineering and objectivity. Our growth is great proof of that:

We are in blue, stereophile is orange:

A year ago we were tiny compared to head-fi. Now look at us:

We are getting very close to them. People are realizing what proper information about audio looks like. And it is not what you are saying.

So no, we are not going to lay low to make you feel better with your unresearched positions on audio. We are going to continue to raise our voices and stamp out misinformation. You all used to have free space on youtube but no more.

 

[Chrispy]

Depends on the youtubers credentials....just because they have an opinion and can video something without too many annoyances doesn't mean a lot. With good content and presentation and decent production value....can be useful but there's not a lot out there.