Flacs vs Mp3's

[SSL]

I'm not wholly convinced that expensive equipment makes it easier to hear a difference.

 

I'm not convinced, period. Mainly because no one can explain exactly what makes expensive equipment more capable of revealing encoding differences than appropriately priced equipment. Once you factor in how overpriced boutique "audiophile" grade gear can be, the notion just seems laughable.

[bomerr]

Thats not what ABX entails necessarily.

 

 

Why do you get to decide the end of the discussion?

because you act like a religious fanatic

[SSL]

because you act like a religious fanatic

 

ShearMe is probably the most un-fanatical regular here. I'm surprised he even sullied himself by getting involved in this shitfest.

[BoredErica]

 

What is HA? hehehe, I don't know all of the internet places...

 

Well, as I said, my 40+ thousand dollar sound system wouldn't create a discernible difference, so there's that...

 

I mean, regardless, I rip my CDs into .WAV, but I have tons of space, and I like the thought of being able to burn a CD that is exactly the same as the original... It does not have anything to do with whether or not I can hear a difference...

 

HA is HydrogenAudio, the official support forum for Foobar. Imagine if you took all of the technical-minded people from Sound Science section of Headfi and made them hang out in a forum dedicated to their way of thinking. The people on HA are among the most knowledgeable in audio I've seen. I went over there for some help in deciphering the hieroglyphics on Nwavguy's blog when I was writing 'can my amps power my headphone?' thread.

They don't tolerate fuzzy bullshit. There is very strong pressure to validate your claims about sound differences through empirical data. If you repeatedly just make crazy claims without evidence your posts will be moderated per the forum rules. You cannot run in and daze them with some measurements because those guys know about all that stuff. They will find the flaw in your testing methodology, or the gap in your understanding of audio, electronics, etc. This is why I feel Creatip should take it to HA. The last time Creatip came up with measurements, I took them to HA to verify and it turned out that Creatip made some sort of basic mistake on something. Creatip likes to get his hands dirty, that's great, but I think he's putting too much weight on his own findings without verifying it with the experts.

But, as Creatip said, they can also be cranky which he finds to be a big turnoff. But... they also have a habit of being right. Sound Science on Headfi is friendlier to noobs and people with ridiculous beliefs that stroll in from other sections of Headfi. (Well, they have to, or they get banned. Case in point, Bigshot.)

Personally I do FLAC for my files. I mean, FLAC is also lossless and it takes up less space. I like to collect my files in flac just because. What speakers do you use again?

Also, you remind me of some dude I used to know called TeenGeek or something or the other. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

 

I'm not convinced, period. Mainly because no one can explain exactly what makes expensive equipment more capable of revealing encoding differences than appropriately priced equipment. Once you factor in how overpriced boutique "audiophile" grade gear can be, the notion just seems laughable.

I was thinking about distortion levels. Perhaps the HD800s have lower distortion in 2-5k range where human ears are most sensitive? So i'm looking at distortion across various devices.

 

Turns out, the distortion for the O2 is very low, even lower than I remembered. We're talking 0.001%. The source is so ludicrously accurate there's no point to look at it any longer. Even if I triple the noise it's still totally inaudible. Then I look at Inner Fidelity's numbers on distortion of HD600 vs HD800.

 

http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/SennheiserHD800.pdf

http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/SennheiserHD600.pdf

 

I read that 0.1% THD is the worst case scenario for a test tone that is at 2-5khz which is truly the worst case. Music masks the imperfections.

 

So I'm looking at the distortion graphs with the browser zoomed in at 300% and I'm seeing distortion that could be audible playing a test tone at 2-5khz. But I don't see the HD800's distortion being better than HD600s. I'd say they are about equal. I was thinking of the argument that the HD600s would be worse for picking out any problems mp3 might have because it has higher distortion than the HD800s - but the distortion levels seem to be a dead heat...  Which kills the argument. And if distortion were a problem nobody would be able to pick up differences with speakers because the distortions are like a magnitude higher.

 

Soooooooo yeah. That happened.

 

We don't have displayport cable comparisons in gaming. So I'm wondering why this stuff happens to audio but not gaming. I mean, visually what you see on the screen seems to me just as subjective as audio. Why are gamers not lured to placebo regarding visual improvement with AMD vs Nvidia, for example? 

 

 

And finally. I guess the big question isn't even about lossless vs lossy. What exactly is better about HD800s compared to HD600s? What makes The LCD-3 better than the LCD-2 which should be better than the Mad Dogs? What exactly?

[DigitalHermit]

Everytime I read flac I think about this:

 

Also, with high-end audio equipment you can tell the difference. Most consumer grade stuff? Not really.

 

Well.. between the legit German Flak cannons and the imitations... The differences are very... explosive... so to speak...

[BoredErica]

Yeah, sounds familar. I think we may be attracted by the odor of BS.

Might I interest you in some LTT religious debates?

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/400283-do-you-believe-religon/

 

It's even worse than audio.

[KaminKevCrew]

 

 

TeenGeek or something or the other. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

@Dark_Wizzle

 

I am one and the Same! I should really put that in my sig or something. The first time I signed into the forum was with my steam account, which I made several years ago. I no longer go by that, so I got it changed

 

hehehe!

 

The speakers I use at the moment are an old pair of Carvers circa 2001.

 

The speakers we used to have (and I am very sad that we no longer have them...) were some Bowers and Wilkins 803 Diamond speakers in cherry wood, with (I think) the DB1 subwoofer (or an earlier version of that) along with a classe amp, pre-amp, and cd player. That was hooked up to an ipod dock, and a transporter that could stream audio from our home server. I don't know what cables we used, but they were good and thick! (not that it matter what cables they were )  Unfortunately, we had to get rid of it when my step-dad died... That whole thing sucked... Anyway, I would give just about anything to keep that sound setup. 

 

I played Madden 07 on a gamecube over those speakers once... I literally thought I was in a football stadium!

 

Edit:\ It's in my Siggy now  

 

Also, the mad dogs are closed Vs. the Audeze options being open, but that's a different can of beans. Also, as for why the audio cables are tested and everything, I have a question... Linus once claimed that, in the days of VGA, the quality of the cable, to a point, could very noticeably improve your image. Is that true? Because I suspect that something like that may have to do with why we have so much speculation over things like that. (also, it could have to do with very early headphones and speakers having truly crappy sound from the cables unless you spent more money on actually good cables that weren't broken from the factory/builder.)

[BoredErica]

@Dark_Wizzle

 

I am one and the Same! I should really put that in my sig or something. The first time I signed into the forum was with my steam account, which I made several years ago. I no longer go by that, so I got it changed

I wasn't being serious. I can tell by your avatar.

[KaminKevCrew]

I wasn't being serious. I can tell by your avatar.

What can I say, it doesn't always come across in text

[TumbleButt]

We don't have displayport cable comparisons in gaming. So I'm wondering why this stuff happens to audio but not gaming. I mean, visually what you see on the screen seems to me just as subjective as audio. Why are gamers not lured to placebo regarding visual improvement with AMD vs Nvidia, for example? 

 

"I got a displayport cable made up of the jizz of pro CS:GO players. My KDR was 200:1 in just hours. Yes, cables matter" - some bum with more money than sense (thats how he said it)...

Sorry, I just had to, I remembered the time I heard this from a friend of my friend who's 16 and could probably buy three SR-009 as if its just nothing. He bought some expensive ass displayport cable worth $300 (barely even a meter long, not even gold plated, even saw the receipt...) and... I dunno. All I know is that he was already ridiculously good at CS:GO (maybe not good enough for major tournaments, but I say his skill level is that close) so... I don't see how displayport cables help other than just serve as a connection.

[KaminKevCrew]

not even gold plated

didn't you know!? Rhodium is all the rage right now!

[creatip123]

The last time we went around this barbecue, you remember how it went? It turns out you tried but what you did didn't make any sense. Likely this is just another episode of that. It's abundantly clear that I'm the one what wants you to take it to HA because you're playing with tests you don't understand.

 

I'm asking you to do your due diligence it fact-checking your findings. That's what I want, yes. That's not what you want or else you would've done it already. At this rate my attitude will be no better than what you will get from HA themselves, but if I did do the relay I won't be able to explain it as well as they, in which case taking it from the source (HA) makes more sense. I've done it before for you regardless of whether you asked for it or not, and I don't want to do it again.

 

There has been enough blind tests to prove that cables don't make a difference so you have to jump through more hoops to make your argument more compelling. It's like coming up with a new test for radiometric dating proving that the earth is 6000 years old. I can't exactly prove to you that you're wrong, but before I take whatever the finding is on board, I want some good sources to verify. So while your rhetoric might sound good on paper, no dice.

 

Why am I complaining? Because I don't like wrong info being strung about, that's why.

 

 

I just want to make it clear:

Of all the people that still believe in cables, I like you the best. But this subject just drives me crazy. I think you have an open mind and you're not always wrong. Hell, I take back what I said about the snobbishness with that $2500? flac player. You were right. But not here, I think you're wrong. I think sometimes your mind is too open. When we're doing these kinds of tests we have to be very careful we know what we're doing. For example, when I was doing the amp powering the headphones thread, I took an entire week writing because I was scared my information would be wrong. It was my job to curate the content.

 

Well, I know about 'too closed minded' but it's actually the first time I've heard of 'too open minded'. Granted, almost anything with 'too' in the front is bad in some ways or the other, but comparing the two (too closed vs too open), I'd choose 'too open'.  

 

An example, what I read in a science article: prior to 1905, people would either call you crazy or simply ignore you if you say matter (as in solid matter, etc) is another form of energy. Classic physics clearly separated those two as different 'beings'. Well, good thing Einstein got 'too open' of a mind that enabled him to write and coined the famous E=mc², which states that matters can be converted entirely to energies, in other words matter is another form of energy. 

 

Like I said, my mindset is 'I'd rather try/do something that later on might be proven wrong, because that way I can keep learning'. 

 

You know what, forget all that. Forget all the testings, procedures, and methods from last time. Let's just say they're all wrong. Just go back to basic:

 

I just did this a few moments ago. Prepared 2x m2m interconnects with different cables, Canare and Mundorf. Both aren't high-classed cables, just mediocre, good priced, decent cables. Recorded two excerpts of a song (one for each cable), for plain and simple ABX. This time I didn't do all the inverting, level tweaking, and all of that which I did last time.

 

The recording chain goes: ipad LOD => different m2m => aune B1 (I was test driving the B1 at the same time) => cheap, over the counter m2m that costs about $1 or so (this stayed the same all the while) => VIA onboard line-in as recording device => audacity, recorded as 16bit PCM WAV. Playback and abx-ing with aune T1 to HE-400. 

 

So the only free/changing variables were the m2m interconnect cables. Everything else stayed the same.

 

The (latest try) ABX:

 

The report generated by the foobar abx:

foo_abx 1.3.4 report

foobar2000 v1.2.9

2015/07/06 20:26:04

File A: F:\mp3\teskabel\test16\canare-titanium.wav

File B: F:\mp3\teskabel\test16\mundorf-titanium.wav

20:26:04 : Test started.

20:29:18 : 01/01  50.0%

20:30:07 : 01/02  75.0%

20:30:10 : Trial reset.

20:30:33 : 00/01  100.0%

20:30:35 : Trial reset.

20:30:36 : Trial reset.

20:30:36 : Trial reset.

20:31:27 : 00/01  100.0%

20:31:28 : Trial reset.

20:31:29 : Trial reset.

20:31:29 : Trial reset.

20:31:29 : Trial reset.

20:34:30 : 01/01  50.0%

20:35:07 : 02/02  25.0%

20:36:31 : 03/03  12.5%

20:38:02 : 03/04  31.3%

20:40:38 : 04/05  18.8%

20:41:05 : 04/06  34.4%

20:41:07 : Trial reset.

20:41:08 : Trial reset.

20:41:09 : Trial reset.

20:41:09 : Trial reset.

20:41:44 : 01/01  50.0%

20:42:08 : 02/02  25.0%

20:43:23 : 03/03  12.5%

20:43:58 : 04/04  6.3%

20:45:04 : 04/05  18.8%

20:45:36 : 05/06  10.9%

20:45:48 : 06/07  6.3%

20:46:18 : 07/08  3.5%

20:47:47 : 07/09  9.0%

20:48:10 : 07/10  17.2%

20:48:12 : Trial reset.

20:48:36 : 01/01  50.0%

20:48:58 : 02/02  25.0%

20:49:11 : 03/03  12.5%

20:49:52 : 03/04  31.3%

20:50:42 : 04/05  18.8%

20:51:05 : 05/06  10.9%

20:52:10 : 06/07  6.3%

20:52:25 : 07/08  3.5%

20:52:58 : 07/09  9.0%

20:53:29 : 08/10  5.5%

20:53:46 : 09/11  3.3%

20:54:00 : 10/12  1.9%

20:54:29 : 11/13  1.1%

20:54:58 : 12/14  0.6%

20:55:18 : 12/15  1.8%

20:55:41 : 13/16  1.1%

20:56:11 : 14/17  0.6%

20:56:29 : 15/18  0.4%

20:56:52 : 16/19  0.2%

20:59:58 : Test finished.

----------

Total: 28/39 (0.5%)

 

Restarted the test a few times, because I was having trouble concentrating in the beginning. Well, even if all of the tests that I weren't satisfied with still get accounted for, it accumulates to 28/39 (0.5% of guessing).

 

These are the exact same 2 files that I used, if you or anybody wanna try: http://www.filedropper.com/abx They're already level-matched with foobar's replaygain, so they're ready to load into the ABX plugin.

 

Of course I can't give a proof that those 2 files are indeed the same files I used (I might did some foul plays), so the best I can do is swear that the procedure I did is exactly what I wrote above, and those 2 files are really the exact files I used.

 

Download it if anybody wanna see/hear, that those 2 files are indeed very identical (no cheating, no sound cues), yet still discernible by abx.

 

Now, keeping in mind that other than the 2 types of m2m, everything else stayed the same in the recording chain, and they were all digital (not analog). So saying that the other devices caused the sound to be different, would almost be the same as implying that each time you play the exact same song, using the same PC, same media player, same EQ, same amp, same everything else, they would sound different.

 

The point? For me, different cables give an audible differences. Not one is better than the other, just different. Last time, I did all that editing and inverting and whatnot to separate just the difference, which turned out to be a questionable methods (although nobody has pointed any flaws so far). So this time, it's just plain ears with ABX-ing.

[SSL]

I was thinking about distortion levels. Perhaps the HD800s have lower distortion in 2-5k range where human ears are most sensitive? So i'm looking at distortion across various devices.

 

Turns out, the distortion for the O2 is very low, even lower than I remembered. We're talking 0.001%. The source is so ludicrously accurate there's no point to look at it any longer. Even if I triple the noise it's still totally inaudible. Then I look at Inner Fidelity's numbers on distortion of HD600 vs HD800.

 

=snippsters=

 

And finally. I guess the big question isn't even about lossless vs lossy. What exactly is better about HD800s compared to HD600s? What makes The LCD-3 better than the LCD-2 which should be better than the Mad Dogs? What exactly?

 

Yeah, and of course people will claim that you can't know everything about how a headphone sounds from measurements.

 

Check out the preliminary numbers from the innerfidelity amp measurements: http://www.innerfidelity.com/content/working-amp-measurements. The O2 has the lower noise and distortion than a $3500 amp in every measurement except crosstalk. But no, the Simaudio has a "very black background".

 

But seriously, the fact that an amp costing 1/10th as much can best their product in any way should be an embarrassment to companies like this. But people just don't want to know; too much money at stake?

[SSL]

Snippsters

 

By what mechanisms (3) does a cable affect the sound?

[creatip123]

By what mechanisms (3) does a cable affect the sound?

 

That, haven't found the proper answer yet. Thought about resistancy, but doesn't seem right. 

 

Well, based on the procedure (where the cables were the only free variables), and the fact that I got 16 out of 19 right on the ABX, it's either different cables indeed change the sound, or I'm a powerful psychic. Of course don't dismiss the possibility that I was cheating. That's why I uploaded the exact files for anyone who wanna double check, and swore that I didn't swap the files before uploading.

[SSL]

That, haven't found the proper answer yet. Thought about resistancy, but doesn't seem right. 

 

Well, based on the procedure (where the cables were the only free variables), and the fact that I got 16 out of 19 right on the ABX, it's either different cables indeed change the sound, or I'm a powerful psychic. Of course don't dismiss the possibility that I was cheating. That's why I uploaded the exact files for anyone who wanna double check, and swore that I didn't swap the files before uploading.

 

Resistance, inductance, capacitance. Some others get talked about, like skin effect, but these are the primary factors. Resistance attenuates all frequencies by about the same amount, inductance attenuates more with increasing frequency. Capacitance is less important but should still be low. Note that all of this is also contingent to the load impedance, which is why it is brought up with speakers so frequently. Headphones have much higher impedance and so are less sensitive to changes in cable characteristics; plus, headphone cables are typically shorter, further diminishing the effect.

 

I assume that these interconnects are also pretty short, right? At those kinds of lengths, the differences should be negligible. Either your cables are garbage, 50ft long, or there is some other combination of factors unique to your test setup that are influencing the result.

 

My main contention is that sufficiently good equipment (excluding transducers) should be mostly indistinguishable from other sufficiently good equipment. If equipment sounds demonstrably different (again, excluding transducers), then something is wrong with it, no matter how much it costs.

 

If your point was that cables can sound different in specific situations, then yeah, no shit. That's sidestepping the issue that increasingly expensive cables and other equipment rarely sound increasingly better beyond a certain point.

[Whit3Rav3n]

 

 

 

HA is HydrogenAudio, the official support forum for Foobar. Imagine if you took all of the technical-minded people from Sound Science section of Headfi and made them hang out in a forum dedicated to their way of thinking. The people on HA are among the most knowledgeable in audio I've seen. I went over there for some help in deciphering the hieroglyphics on Nwavguy's blog when I was writing 'can my amps power my headphone?' thread.

They don't tolerate fuzzy bullshit. There is very strong pressure to validate your claims about sound differences through empirical data. If you repeatedly just make crazy claims without evidence your posts will be moderated per the forum rules. You cannot run in and daze them with some measurements because those guys know about all that stuff. They will find the flaw in your testing methodology, or the gap in your understanding of audio, electronics, etc. This is why I feel Creatip should take it to HA. The last time Creatip came up with measurements, I took them to HA to verify and it turned out that Creatip made some sort of basic mistake on something. Creatip likes to get his hands dirty, that's great, but I think he's putting too much weight on his own findings without verifying it with the experts.

But, as Creatip said, they can also be cranky which he finds to be a big turnoff. But... they also have a habit of being right. Sound Science on Headfi is friendlier to noobs and people with ridiculous beliefs that stroll in from other sections of Headfi. (Well, they have to, or they get banned. Case in point, Bigshot.)

Personally I do FLAC for my files. I mean, FLAC is also lossless and it takes up less space. I like to collect my files in flac just because. What speakers do you use again?

Also, you remind me of some dude I used to know called TeenGeek or something or the other. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

 

I was thinking about distortion levels. Perhaps the HD800s have lower distortion in 2-5k range where human ears are most sensitive? So i'm looking at distortion across various devices.

 

Turns out, the distortion for the O2 is very low, even lower than I remembered. We're talking 0.001%. The source is so ludicrously accurate there's no point to look at it any longer. Even if I triple the noise it's still totally inaudible. Then I look at Inner Fidelity's numbers on distortion of HD600 vs HD800.

 

http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/SennheiserHD800.pdf

http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/SennheiserHD600.pdf

 

I read that 0.1% THD is the worst case scenario for a test tone that is at 2-5khz which is truly the worst case. Music masks the imperfections.

 

So I'm looking at the distortion graphs with the browser zoomed in at 300% and I'm seeing distortion that could be audible playing a test tone at 2-5khz. But I don't see the HD800's distortion being better than HD600s. I'd say they are about equal. I was thinking of the argument that the HD600s would be worse for picking out any problems mp3 might have because it has higher distortion than the HD800s - but the distortion levels seem to be a dead heat...  Which kills the argument. And if distortion were a problem nobody would be able to pick up differences with speakers because the distortions are like a magnitude higher.

 

Soooooooo yeah. That happened.

 

We don't have displayport cable comparisons in gaming. So I'm wondering why this stuff happens to audio but not gaming. I mean, visually what you see on the screen seems to me just as subjective as audio. Why are gamers not lured to placebo regarding visual improvement with AMD vs Nvidia, for example? 

 

 

And finally. I guess the big question isn't even about lossless vs lossy. What exactly is better about HD800s compared to HD600s? What makes The LCD-3 better than the LCD-2 which should be better than the Mad Dogs? What exactly?

 

I don´t know for me it looks like that the average distortion for the hd 800 is around 0.2%, and for the HD 600 around 0.4%. That would be a pretty big difference. Step response is also pretty different for the two headphones. 

[creatip123]

 

If your point was that cables can sound different in specific situations, then yeah, no shit. That's sidestepping the issue that increasingly expensive cables and other equipment rarely sound increasingly better beyond a certain point.

 

That was actually my point, and what I said earlier, more or less, before I got bombarded by quantum mechanics and empty spaces.

 

If not taking into account the scale of differences, I actually agrees with him, and in audible spectrum of course. The (audible) differences are there, just in tiny scale. I'd say it's like wearing 100% cotton shirt vs 90% cotton + 10% polyester (or something) shirt. Is it different? Yes. Can you feel it? On and off for me, but maybe someone somewhere can. Is it worth the extra money? Not for me, dunno about others. 

 

Never said anything about more expensive or multi-thousands cables being better and reaching heaven. Different cable materials can sound different, and that's that. Different is different. Better and worse are just humans labeling things.

[BoredErica]

Well, I know about 'too closed minded' but it's actually the first time I've heard of 'too open minded'. Granted, almost anything with 'too' in the front is bad in some ways or the other, but comparing the two (too closed vs too open), I'd choose 'too open'.  

 

I'm burnt out. Tell you what, when I have something, I'll PM you in the future. I'll look back to your post for reference.

 

I don´t know for me it looks like that the average distortion for the hd 800 is around 0.2%, and for the HD 600 around 0.4%. That would be a pretty big difference. Step response is also pretty different for the two headphones. 

I was talking about 2-5khz range specifically. But yes, outside of that range it does look like the HD800s have lower distortion. 0.2% is a pretty big difference outside of 2-5khz?

[SSL]

I got bombarded by quantum mechanics and empty spaces.

 

Was my comment here also bombarding you with "quantum mechanics"?

 

Different is different. Better and worse are just humans labeling things.

 

No. They're not. Are you really going to turn this into a bullshit philosophical argument? The criteria of high-fidelity audio is very well-defined and not arbitrary or an abstract construct.

 

Is it different? Yes. Can you feel it? On and off for me, but maybe someone somewhere can. Is it worth the extra money? Not for me, dunno about others.

 

This is thoroughly disingenuous. Are people really interested in spending money on audio gear that merely sounds "different"? I seriously doubt it. These products get sold because people believe they are beneficial in some way. That's how they're marketed, reviewed, and discussed online. If you're happy with cables that merely sound different, and recognize that they may even reduce fidelity, that's your prerogative. But arguing across the board that people are merely going for tiny "differences" in sound is dishonest. I think it's pretty clear that people invest in cables and everything else because they are trying to get better, more accurate sound.

 

Never said anything about more expensive or multi-thousands cables being better and reaching heaven.

 

But the implication is there; this discussion is not occurring in a vacuum ("Is it worth the extra money?"). Expensive gear is generally valued more on the understanding that it is more capable. But if the only thing people cared about was getting a sound that they liked - something "different" - then expensive gear wouldn't exist. It's not hard to fuck with an audio signal to get a certain timbre or tone and therefore shouldn't cost any more. If identifying such a difference takes a double blind ABX test that you can't even pass 100% of the time, then what exactly was accomplished? If not for quality, then at least enjoyment?

[ShearMe]

ShearMe is probably the most un-fanatical regular here. I'm surprised he even sullied himself by getting involved in this shitfest.

 

I shouldn't have. Wizzie's final drafts always sound smarter in the end.

[Footy]

Can you measure the accuracy of sound based on recording to what is replayed... yes to a certain accuracy factor you can

 

Do people want to listen to a sound exactly the same as the recording... quite often no

 

I personally find overbearing high frequencies on some tracks down right annoying, others love this, so I have picked electronics, speakers and cables to blend a little of the highend while keeping a really rich mid range and accurate but not boomy bass. 

 

I spent several years in the hifi trade and I can say there are a lot of things that make no difference, there are however a lot of things that do.

I did many blind tests, and between cables or electronics that have a similar sound profile it can be very hard to distinguish, sometimes its as little as a sharp note in a specific track making you cringe a little with one and it not with another.

 

More expensive is not always better, I was listening to a 150k$ system back in feb and I preferred the sound from my 7-8k$ setup, the best sound I have heard to date is Quad electrostatic speakers with Quad valve amps from a record deck I cant remember the name of, I think system price was ~20k$ and if i have space at home and some way to dissipate the heat from the valves I would love to own them one day.

 

How people want their music is very personal and it would be nice if we could all exercise our ability to accept thats someone has a different of opinion.

I personally feel quite sick at how this thread escalated, by some people, from a discussion to personal insults. If your response post includes insulting the previous author you have already lost. I would also like to thank those that showed restraint in not reciprocating

 

I like my wagu beef steaks cooked well done, others think this is sacrilege, but you know I like the taste and flavors better than when it's rare.

This doesn't make me wrong or the other people wrong, it just means we are different.

[Lays]

I shouldn't have. Wizzie's final drafts always sound smarter in the end.

 

 

Was actually gonna post on here, but ya......

 

how u been doge?

[SSL]

Do people want to listen to a sound exactly the same as the recording... quite often no

 

Good, fine. Nothing wrong with that. Regardless, the signal chain between the audio medium and the transducer should be as transparent as possible. If someone wants to have a certain sound coloration, they can use EQ, tone controls, and a specific speaker or headphone to get it. Maybe a tube amp.

 

That doesn't change the fact that high fidelity is 1) generally an end-game proposition for most audiophiles 2) objectively and empirically quantifiable.

[BoredErica]

I shouldn't have. Wizzie's final drafts always sound smarter in the end.