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Just came back from my first audio show and oh boy

watchnerd

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A goal I whole heartedly support!



Right. But your claim seemed to be that the motivation was not about getting the sound the person wanted, but rather some OTHER factor like "feeling good about themselves."




Then I suggest that is a poor thesis. Or at least poorly formed.

What do you mean by "sound better?" What's your criteria?

The MBL speakers being omnis have a particular sonic characteristic of very open, boxless, detailed and spacious imaging/soundstaging.
If someone is looking for that type of sound, who are you to say it doesn't "sound better" than a speaker YOU like? You could appeal to ways that, for instance, it measures differently than a speaker you like, but if it produces a sound of the type someone is looking for, then it is "better" for that person's taste and criteria.




But since speakers do sound different, and if the presentation of the MBLs is what someone is looking for, then it DOES "sound better" from that person's criteria. I don't see any reason to just grant your premise that the MBLs won't "sound better" as it seems based on some as-yet-unargued for value scheme or criteria (and which you will also have to argue for).



Not quite the same as there may not be sonic differences between most DACs and competently designed cables, so that's another ball of wax. But different speaker designs do sound different, and hence someone's personal preferences plausibly come in to play.

If you buy an expensive sports car should I be telling you that's a waste of money beccause you can get from A to B cheaper? Or...do we allow that people have different tastes, goals, which can make their decisions quite rational in fulfilling those desires?



I don't follow. How does it follow that someone buying A expensive audio gear makes it about "feeling better about himself" than someone buying "B" expensive audio gear.

Many on this forum have bought and own audio gear that is VERY EXPENSIVE and looks extravegant from a non-audiophile's perspective. Do you think everyone's motivation is "to feel better about himself?" If yes, then I don't see the particular point you'd be making about someone buying on expensive item over another. In other words, no need to pick on someone buying a really expensive set of speakers in particular.

But, if it isn't everyone's motivation to "feel good about himself" in making an audio purchase, I don't see how you actually have grounds to make the exception you want to make for a more expensive speaker purchase.

(I just spent the most money I've ever put out for a pair of speakers. They are by any normal joe's viewpoint, extravagent. Did I do it to "make me feel better about myself?" Sorry, I don't recognize that motivation. I wanted a particular aesthetic and especially the particular sound of this speaker which really pushed my buttons. I don't recognize feeling "better about myself" before or after the purchase.)




Sure. Agreed. But that didn't seem to be your point. I was only arguing against the claim about the psychology of someone buying really expensive speakers (e.g. $100,000) being based on "how it makes them feel about themselves" as if the main motivation were not in fact "chasing better sound and buying the speakers on those grounds." As I suggest: most audiophiles buy for similar reasons: they like audio gear, and look to have systems with (to them) great sound. And their spending scales with their income.

Since this will all vary a lot by individual, why not just lump it all under the term "utility" like economists do and call it a day?
 

Frank Dernie

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Many on this forum have bought and own audio gear that is VERY EXPENSIVE and looks extravegant from a non-audiophile's perspective. Do you think everyone's motivation is "to feel better about himself?"
I have some expensive kit.
I have never bought it to feel better about myself. It has been because it either sounds or looks to my taste.
Before I joined an internet forum I had spent more on my hifi than my car for decades and nobody knew
 

MattHooper

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If you chose tubes for sound qualities that appealed to you, then your choice would be a rational one on subjective terms.

Ok, then it seems we are agreed that your previous claim about it being "stupid" to buy a 10k or even $500 amp that adds distortion" was too broad, and that, really, before we evaluate "stupid" purchase we should consider the goals of the purchaser.

Cheers

(BTW, quibble: strictly speaking, the rationality of ANY choice is based on "subjective" terms. That is: you start with a value, and then rationalize what action will fulfill that desire. Seeking "gear that measures within a certain range of neutrality" is a value judgement, a desire, and so the objective evidence one would seek is about meeting those subjective goals. This may seem like a quibble, but it's important, I think, because very often people make judgements against the rationality of other people by simply ASSUMING a value - e.g. low distortion/neutrality - by which to judge the rationality of decisions made by other people).
 

GrimSurfer

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Ok, then it seems we are agreed that your previous claim about it being "stupid" to buy a 10k or even $500 amp that adds distortion" was too broad, and that, really, before we evaluate "stupid" purchase we should consider the goals of the purchaser.

If people would be honest about their goals, we'd have far less contentious debate on ASR. Things seem to go sideways when they say one thing (high fidelity) and do another.
 

GrimSurfer

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Since this will all vary a lot by individual, why not just lump it all under the term "utility" like economists do and call it a day?

Because then you can't determine whether you're getting something good or something less than good.

Grade A Turkey vs Utility Turkey comes to mind...
 
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Fluffy

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Sure. Agreed. But that didn't seem to be your point. I was only arguing against the claim about the psychology of someone buying really expensive speakers (e.g. $100,000) being based on "how it makes them feel about themselves" as if the main motivation were not in fact "chasing better sound and buying the speakers on those grounds." As I suggest: most audiophiles buy for similar reasons: they like audio gear, and look to have systems with (to them) great sound. And their spending scales with their income.
Well maybe I wasn't explaining myself well or you didn't understand my intention. By "making them feel better about themselves", I meant it brings them joy and better musical listening experience. That's in essence why we are all striving for a better sound, isn't it? My argument was that buying uber-expansive gear is not justified by its intrinsic sonic value, but by how it makes its buyer feel (=how it affects his listening experience). So claiming that it's objectively better can be self-deluding.

I was talking about the MBL just as an example because you brought it up, I could have said the same on any 100K+ speaker out there. But if we are already talking about them, let me ask you this – do you really need to spend 80 grand to get omni speakers that " have a particular sonic characteristic of very open, boxless, detailed and spacious imaging/soundstaging"? Does the technology/engineering justify the cost? Or does it cost like that because of the gimmick, which by itself isn't very expansive to make or doesn't perform any better than a competently designed speaker that cost a fraction of the price? In other words, did the manufacturer said to themselves "if we make an omni speaker we can claim it's so much more spacious than other speakers, that we can charge a lot of money for it".
 

alont

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It's great to meet a fellow Israeli audio enthusiast here :D
I really wanted to visit digitown - alas, I'm currently overseas.

If you're in the Tel Aviv area, send me PM and we can meet up some time :)

By the way, there was a demo room that basically had just a laptop, a volume knob, and two beefy active speakers. Pretty clean presentation compared to the other rooms. And the young dude that ran it was pretty cool too, let me go through Tidal and put whatever I wanted. The speakers sounded pretty good with his demo tracks, but as soon as I threw Dream Theater at them they fell apart (later someone put Linkin Park with similar outcome). Not to say that Dream Theater is the peak of audio mastering, but that’s a good example of how different can speakers sound with audiophile music compared to real world music that is just imperfect. What good are speakers that only sound well with audiophile demo tracks?

Not sure I agree with you here. Despite being one of my favorite bands, there's no denying that the majority of dream theater's songs are mastered quite poorly. I'd expect poorly mastered songs to sound poor in a high quality, accurate setup; otherwise, there's some coloring being introduced somewhere in the signal chain.
 
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Fluffy

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@alont Well how about that, and I was about to give up completely on the Israeli audiophile community :)

I found out later that the active speakers I was talking about were the Dutch & Dutch 8c.

As I said many times on this forum, I don't really care about accuracy, I care about fun sound. All of my headphones are incredibly colored, and I like it this way. So speakers that deliver accurately on a sub-par mix aren't really interesting for me. I prefer speakers that lie to me in a predictable and controllable way. In a sense, I'd said I prefer a high quality inaccurate setup. And given how most modern music (especially metal…) is mixed, that's no wonder.
 

alont

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@alont Well how about that, and I was about to give up completely on the Israeli audiophile community :)

I found out later that the active speakers I was talking about were the Dutch & Dutch 8c.

As I said many times on this forum, I don't really care about accuracy, I care about fun sound. All of my headphones are incredibly colored, and I like it this way. So speakers that deliver accurately on a sub-par mix aren't really interesting for me. I prefer speakers that lie to me in a predictable and controllable way. In a sense, I'd said I prefer a high quality inaccurate setup. And given how most modern music (especially metal…) is mixed, that's no wonder.

Ah, that's completely fair. I keep a few pairs of colored headphones myself for this exact same purpose :p
 

MattHooper

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Well maybe I wasn't explaining myself well or you didn't understand my intention. By "making them feel better about themselves", I meant it brings them joy and better musical listening experience. That's in essence why we are all striving for a better sound, isn't it?

Exactly, so I didn't see the point of the distinction you were trying to make between anyone who can afford buying $100,000 speakers they want vs $20,000 or $5,000 or whatever are within their means.


My argument was that buying uber-expansive gear is not justified by its intrinsic sonic value,

There is no such thing as "intrinsic sonic value." That's the type of "importing one's own value judgement" I cautioned about. There is gear that measures one way or another, and we can talk about how that achieves any particular goal. But gear doesn't have "intrinsic" value - it has the value people assign to it, based on their desires and beliefs.

but by how it makes its buyer feel (=how it affects his listening experience). So claiming that it's objectively better can be self-deluding.

You still seem to be ignoring that speakers sound different, and the $100,000 speaker someone bought may indeed sound different in a way that meets their criteria and desires. That isn't delusion. It's rational.

Now, it can be the case people can make false technical claims about gear, for sure. But, again, I'm trying to separate that from the attempt to apply some *distinctive* psychoanalysis, as you are trying to do, to audiophile A who happens to spend more than Audiophile B.

I don't think the distinction holds up.

I was talking about the MBL just as an example because you brought it up, I could have said the same on any 100K+ speaker out there. But if we are already talking about them, let me ask you this – do you really need to spend 80 grand to get omni speakers that " have a particular sonic characteristic of very open, boxless, detailed and spacious imaging/soundstaging"? Does the technology/engineering justify the cost? Or does it cost like that because of the gimmick, which by itself isn't very expansive to make or doesn't perform any better than a competently designed speaker that cost a fraction of the price? In other words, did the manufacturer said to themselves "if we make an omni speaker we can claim it's so much more spacious than other speakers, that we can charge a lot of money for it".

Well there's a whole lot tangled up there, and this can be something like the question of whether "do we really need to spend all that money on an expensive sports car?" Different values and criteria come in that we have to separate.

But trying to keep it as neat as possible, I'll just describe my own reasons for having purchased some MBL speakers (a smaller stand mounted speaker). I have listened to an enormous number of speakers (like many on this site). But I had NEVER heard a speaker that sounded exactly like the MBL speakers. I'm not making a claim of some objective "they are better" but simply they had a pretty distinctive sonic presentation that I did not find in other speakers (even ones that soundstaged and imaged really well). I'm not a DIY guy so wasn't about to go building my own omnis. And I have seen that the construction of the MBL speakers is extremely intensive and proprietary. I've heard tons of speakers, and maybe there is some cheaper speaker somewhere out there that sounded just like the MBLs. But I don't have the time or care to search the world to ensure there is that alternative. So, all things considered, if I wanted THAT PARTICULAR SOUND I had to pay for it. I also quite enjoyed the speaker design, and the general engineering goal of those speakers. It was a compelling package, for me.

Now, as it turned out, those little monitors were about $18,000 CDN brand new. I didn't really have that money, so ended up finding a far cheaper pair (slightly damaged from shipping) second hand. And they did indeed sound TREMENDOUS with some sonic characteristics that no other speaker I own, or have owned, did. So was it worth the expense for me? Hell yes!

Now the fact that I paid less than MSRP for the speakers is mostly a contingent fact, based on my own level of income paying MSRP would have been too painful and impractical. But if I had a lot more money to burn, then if I really wanted that MBL sound, and wanted speakers in pristine beautiful, not used, condition, and I could easily afford it, then paying full MSRP is entirely rational.

That same reasoning goes for someone in a position to purchase the bigger more expensive models brand new.

Does this sound reasonable to you now, I hope? (Not that YOU could have good reasons to buy them, but that other people could?)
 
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Fluffy

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There is no such thing as "intrinsic sonic value." That's the type of "importing one's own value judgement" I cautioned about. There is gear that measures one way or another, and we can talk about how that achieves any particular goal. But gear doesn't have "intrinsic" value - it has the value people assign to it, based on their desires and beliefs.
Man, you're getting way too philosophical about this… Intrinsic sonic value means simply how well does it measure. Given that we first assume that a better measuring speaker also objectively should sound better (not an obvious assumption to make! See next paragraph), from there you can proceed with my initial argument – that uber expansive speakers doesn't necessarily measure better. I know it's true for dacs and amps from what I learned from this site, among others, and I have a strong belief that this conclusion also extends to high end speakers.

Of course, the act of correlating measurements with objective sound quality is not a simple task, and I myself have argued against some results of studies made by Harman on this very topic. But this being a facts-based site, in order to have any discussion one must start from some agreed upon axiom, so it might well be this one. You can argue that measurements and objective qualities doesn't correlate with sound quality, but then I would ask you why are you here…

And yes, I can fully imagine why someone would want to buy something, even if it goes against my own reasoning and preferences. I myself bought things that went against the recommendations of others and even against my own better judgement, simply because it had some particular quality I desperately wanted. No one is perfect in their decision making, but one should at least try to aspire to make rational choices and confront their own biases. Dishonest high-end manufacturers try to dissuade us from doing that because it will hurt their bottom line.
 

GrimSurfer

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GrimSurfer

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Wombat

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The most fun I ever had at an audio show was VSAC 2003 in Silverdale, Washington, back in the days when I moderated the three Vacuum tube forums at AudioAsylum.com.

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I had a lot of fun hanging out with some rather well-known members of the "fringe" crowd of vacuum tube fanatics - from DIY'ers to Josh Stippich and his insane Electron Luv amps. Those were the days when I owned a pair of Klipsch Forte II's driven by a handmade 2.5wpc Italian 2A3 Tektron amplifier. (I eventually sold the Forte II's to Charlie Kittleman of Vacuum Tube Valley magazine in Clearlake, California.)
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View attachment 36320
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View attachment 36322

Were beyond-fringe fanatics Dennis F. and Jeff M. around then? (SET Asylum).
 

Wombat

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It's in people's interest to get what they think, or are told, they're paying for.

Were this "Psychology Today", perhaps one could argue that this forum should pander to peoples' feelings. But it's actually a forum on audio science and advertised as such.

If you perceive this as blunt, that's your call. I meant it as direct.

Direct is good if valid.
cheers_10828.gif
 

Wombat

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Ha ha. Peter Brock was a great driver but could sell snake oil as good as Carroll Shelby (another driver/sidewinder).

He was called Peter Perfect because of his driving skills. Unfortunately he took it to heart in other ways. Celebrity stuff.
 

watchnerd

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Because then you can't determine whether you're getting something good or something less than good.

Grade A Turkey vs Utility Turkey comes to mind...

It's not the same as "commodity".

[paste]
What Is Utility?
Utility is a term in economics that refers to the total satisfaction received from consuming a good or service.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
  • Utility, in economics, refers to the usefulness or enjoyment a consumer can get from a service or good.
  • Economic utility can decline as the supply of a service or good increases.
  • Marginal utility is the utility gained by consuming an additional unit of a service or good.
[end paste]

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/u/utility.asp

So if a buyer gets enjoyment from the looks, status symbol, or other intangibles of an audio good, independent of its performance, that's part of the total utility.
 
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