Judgement of Audiophilia

[Hypnotoad]

one’s Hi-Fi isn’t seen by many people and certainly no strangers so I see no way it is a status symbol, personally.

Probably not on this forum, but on some others I visit people have mile long signatures listing all their gear. A lot simply want better "named" gear for personal gratification and not just for the sound quality. My ex-brother-in-law got a whole B&O system, he didn't even like music, he said he wanted it because he thought it was the best.

 

[mikewxyz]

The comparison of high end watches to high end audio has been discussed in other forums and I never thought it worked although both are luxury products. High end watch collectors know that a $35 Casio keeps better time than a $50K Patek Phillipe. Contrast that with Audiophiles who actually believe their $50K amp sounds better than a $5K amp. A casual observer probably won’t recognize a PP watch or a luxury amplifier by site.

My observation is that audio review media is mostly a 3rd party marketing contractor. Objective facts have nothing to do with these reviews. Their business is to get the product in front of the customer.

I find it interesting that an aggregator site like https://www.dailyaudiophile.com/ will often have the same products, old and new, being reviewed or re-reviewed by several unrelated sites. A new product might be understandable but not one that has been on the market for many years i.e., Klipsch Forte speakers.

 

[Blumlein 88]

If it was just "art appreciation", high end audio wouldn't annoy me so much. What bugs me is that beyond just art appreciation, they claim superior performance, without any objective criteria. It's equivalent to claiming that this $10K mechanical watch keeps better time than that $2 quartz one.

And what's worse is that this happens at every single piece of equipment, from power conditioners to green markers on CDs, to high-res audio. And it will never stop because there is too much money to be made from wealthy men with large egos and bad hearing.

With a watch it is simple. If one keeps time better than the other one then it simply does. You can say some flowery things about how having a watch of a certain type gives you pleasure the simpler one doesn't. Even that is kinda touch feely rationalization for I like a fancy watch others will take note of. But it is relatively honest.

One can restore and drive on occasion an old car. No one will tell you it performs better than a modern car in some hidden way that mileage, safety, reliability, top speed and acceleration measures somehow don't uncover. They might say the experience is different, deeper, and more meaningful to them or less boring in a way they appreciate and prefer. Not boring like say a Toyota. Oh did I say a Toyota was the most boring car? Well no, but I don't know of more boring cars. Sorry for the aside.

But in audio, while some will countenance the experience is just different and preferred to modern appliance like gear when using tubes or LP or something, most don't go that route. No sir. Measurements are flawed or incomplete or we don't know everything about human hearing. Nope we have fanatical faith in certain designs as being fully superior in some hidden way. My system isn't just awesome it is awesome in hidden ways that other good gear isn't. And somehow that always involves shoddy science, or hucksterism or somehow costs more, is less convenient etc. etc.

I can demonstrate or try to convince someone driving an old manual transmission convertible is a different and fun experience in a way a drive in a Camry isn't without denying the good qualities of the Camry. In audio you can't do that. Analog LP is the reference after live sound, and digital is flawed, and you have to use incredible cables. And if you use digital every connection must have 14 boxes to fix the flaws in the platform to make it just barely palatable.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Ron Streicher, a past AES president and author of a book on stereo recording used to give a seminar where he conducted AB testing of some widget. He had a very sophisticated setup where he could flip a switch and the sound would mute very briefly while switching between A and B. The only external indicator was a red or blue light.

I witnessed Ron perform the test with an AES audience. Some could hear a difference between A and B. Some could not. At first I though one sounded better than the other but the more he continued the tests using different types of music, the less sure I was of the difference. Nevertheless, some became more sure of the differences. Keep in mind, many in the audience were practicing recording engineers. At the end of talk Ron took an informal poll to see whether A or B was better. There were certainly some definitive opinions on the topic. Then Ron revealed that all his widget did was briefly mute the audio and change which LED was lit. The actual audio path didn't change between tests. A lot of people were humbled by this. It proved how poor our auditory memory is and how easy we can fool ourselves in side-by-side comparisons.

Various versions of this have been done many times. How long until people can simply be told about it and understand how flawed how perception can be? Well apparently somewhere after the universe ends.

 

[Hugo9000]

Various versions of this have been done many times. How long until people can simply be told about it and understand how flawed how perception can be? Well apparently somewhere after the universe ends.

How do you know that the wavelength of the red or blue light in the widget wasn't impacting the sound of the system via some mechanism that is currently beyond scientific knowledge?


(In case it isn't obvious, my use of the grin emoji was meant to convey that I was joking, but it's possible some crazed subjectivist might think it was used in the sense of "gotcha!" hahaha! I should note, however, that the colors are not psychologically neutral, so there might be a subjective impact from that widget beyond imagination or changes in listening/concentration. I personally loathe blue LEDs, for example, so my enjoyment of music would likely be lower if I knew there were a blue LED connected to an audio system hahaha!)

 

[Blumlein 88]

How do you know that the wavelength of the red or blue light in the widget wasn't impacting the sound of the system via some mechanism that is currently beyond scientific knowledge?


(In case it isn't obvious, my use of the grin emoji was meant to convey that I was joking, but it's possible some crazed subjectivist might think it was used in the sense of "gotcha!" hahaha! I should note, however, that the colors are not psychologically neutral, so there might be a subjective impact from that widget beyond imagination or changes in listening/concentration. I personally loathe blue LEDs, for example, so my enjoyment of music would likely be lower if I knew there were a blue LED connected to an audio system hahaha!)

But blue is a soothing color. I have all blue LED night lights in the house. At rather low levels. As low level blue light impacts your ability to accurately judge distance it leads to a slightly surreal feeling if no other lights are on. So I like that at night.

On audio gear on the other hand those bright blinding blue and white LEDs get covered with black gaffer's tape. I will add, gaffers tape as known in the USA. Apparently in England that is duct tape which is not at all what I mean.

 

[Soniclife]

those bright blinding blue and white LEDs get covered with black gaffer's tape. I will add, gaffers tape as known in the USA. Apparently in England that is duct tape which is not at all what I mean.

Duct/Duck <> Gaffer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duct_tape
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaffer_tape

Duct tape is often confused with gaffer tape (which is designed to be non-reflective and cleanly removed, unlike duct tape).

 

[pwjazz]

Ron Streicher, a past AES president and author of a book on stereo recording used to give a seminar where he conducted AB testing of some widget. He had a very sophisticated setup where he could flip a switch and the sound would mute very briefly while switching between A and B. The only external indicator was a red or blue light.

I witnessed Ron perform the test with an AES audience. Some could hear a difference between A and B. Some could not. At first I though one sounded better than the other but the more he continued the tests using different types of music, the less sure I was of the difference. Nevertheless, some became more sure of the differences. Keep in mind, many in the audience were practicing recording engineers. At the end of talk Ron took an informal poll to see whether A or B was better. There were certainly some definitive opinions on the topic. Then Ron revealed that all his widget did was briefly mute the audio and change which LED was lit. The actual audio path didn't change between tests. A lot of people were humbled by this. It proved how poor our auditory memory is and how easy we can fool ourselves in side-by-side comparisons.

My favorite self inflicted version of this happens when I'm tweaking EQ settings while listening to music and hearing real results, only to later find that I've enabled the EQ bypass and I haven't actually changed a thing! ‍

 

[FrantzM]

My favorite self inflicted version of this happens when I'm tweaking EQ settings while listening to music and hearing real results, only to later find that I've enabled the EQ bypass and I haven't actually changed a thing! ‍

To that the hardcore subjectivist will reply: Your system is not revealing enough...

 

[Hugo9000]

My favorite self inflicted version of this happens when I'm tweaking EQ settings while listening to music and hearing real results, only to later find that I've enabled the EQ bypass and I haven't actually changed a thing! ‍

Unbeknownst to you, at the same time you were attempting your EQ tweaks, your neighbor was testing the latest device from Synergistic Research, and you really did hear real results due to the neighbor's device's profound impact on the electricity of the neighborhood and/or surrounding EM fields/unknown particle-wave interactions/fill-in-the-blanks-phenomenon-beyond-current-science!

Sadly, your defeatist attitude (assuming it was all in your mind simply because the EQ was bypassed) kept you from investigating the matter further, with the result that you certainly will not be the genius who discovers, categorizes, and names this mystery phenomenon. Another loss for science and humanity due to extremist audiophile objectivism/skepticism! hahahahaha! j/k

 

[SIY]

My favorite self inflicted version of this happens when I'm tweaking EQ settings while listening to music and hearing real results, only to later find that I've enabled the EQ bypass and I haven't actually changed a thing! ‍

#metoo

 

[Tks]

Witty fitting quote since all has been said otherwise that needs to be said (outside of me simply agreeing and hoping things like OP describes would just be funny every single time if such tests were performed).

-----------------------------------

“It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”

- Mark Twain

 

[fulffy512]

Always gotten good chuckle from people/reviewers who overhype TOTL stuff. Just came back reading a thread from one who really hates getting told from objective viewpoint his reviews are void since a graph showed his bias for anything above $500 - 2000.