A principle guiding the wise audiophile life

@sns 

I did try JPlay on an iPad with dBpoweramp Asset as an alternative to Roon. I thought it sounded slightly better. It's claimed to do so because there's less traffic on the network. It's cheaper, too.

Unfortunately, I couldn't use it because it didn't play gapless with my Linn DSM. I am hoping that one day Linn will make the DSM compatible with JPlay.

I have long come to the conclusion that audiophilia is a complex system of music, gear and listener in an environment. The result we get is a unique combination of innumerable factors coming together in an unpredictable way.

If we upgrade a component, we may well be able hear an improvement. However, the effect of the change soon becomes the new norm. In the longer term, does it really make a significant difference? Do we truly enjoy music any more than we did previously? Not necessarily, in my view.

Yet, I still try.

@livinon2wheels 

That’s heartwarming to hear. You are a fortunate man.

I can say much the same about my wife. Except that there’s no benefit in it for her. She has no interest in sitting down to listen to music. It’s one thing we can’t share. I guess she’s too much of an activist.

@livinon2wheels 

So it is with us. When she joins me in the evenings, the music goes off and we watch TV. It's often a struggle to find programmes or movies that we can both tolerate.

@rbstehno 

I don't know enough about Linux to use it with Roon. So I used ROCK on my NUC instead. I have an internal SSD for music storage. Been using it for a few years now without any problems. 

@tcutter

​​​​Nice summary. I think you’ve pretty well nailed it in one elegant paragraph.

Personally, the only thing I’d change would be to emphasise the importance of the source more. Although arguably you’ve got that covered by saying the signal should be as pure as possible.

@linndrum808 

That’s the irony of hifi - it’s perfectly possible to thoroughly enjoy music on the cheapest of systems.

Does that completely invalidate what audiophiles do? I guess we’re all going to take different views on that. There are no right or wrong answers to this question. 

On a similar note, my wife once posed the question to a musician friend, "Why does my husband sit trying to coax a tune out of the kids' toy guitar when he's got an expensive hand-built instrument."