are audiophiles different than non audiophiles ?

Elizabeth, that is a hilarious description - it also fits most orchestral musicians.

Frogman could not have stated the case better. As a professional musician myself, I agree with 100% of his post. There are indeed more audiophiles among musicians than in any other profession, as a percentage, especially when we are talking about classical musicians in particular. It is also true, as Orpheus said, that the average professional musician hears far more than the average audiophile when listening to music - our ears are very well trained from a very young age to hear a great many different types of things, including such things as Frogman's equipment example.

I have said this many times before here, but it always bears repeating - one of the best things an audiophile could do to deepen their appreciation of whatever type of music they listen to would be to take an ear training course at a local college. Even if one is not offered, there may be a grad student in music theory who would be willing to give private instruction - this is good experience for them, too. This type of work will also help greatly in learning to hear differences between pieces of audio equipment, too.