As much as I try, I just don't get it........

@millercarbon That was a really nice, graduated ladder of listening growth -- the audiophile's bildungsroman. Another poster here with really great ears also uses YT, but not to evaluate anything in an absolute sense; rather, he does what you describe (I think), namely to "see in" to the system on YT, to grok its personality.

Right. There’s no such thing as evaluating anything in the absolute sense anyway. All we can do is evaluate relative. That’s why its so important to be willing to change things. The biggest waste of time in audio is to drive to a dealer or show or friend or whatever and listen the the system and not change anything. Which is of course what everyone does. What you must do instead is have them change something. Anything. Almost does not matter.
Easiest and maybe best is to bring along one of your interconnects. Ask to compare to one of theirs. Then you hear what was in the system, yours, and theirs. Three comparisons! Or ask about the power cord or IC in the system, what do they have for less or more, and try that. Seriously. Almost does not matter what it is. Point is the minute you hear one thing change like that you immediately get a handle on the whole system.

All you can really hear by the way is the relative difference between the two power cords. There’s no such thing as an "absolute" anything. Its all relative. All the same, its a tremendous advantage to listen and compare. Total game-changer.

That’s the real reason why when I have audiophiles over I like to remove the cable elevators. Or turn active shielding off. Its not to demo the elevators. Its not to test the listeners. Its to give them the chance to hear and learn.

To me its shocking how few people try these things. But then given that is the case, its no surprise the number who never advance past that second intermediate level, can’t find any value in YT videos. These things go hand in hand you know.

Another one, whining and blaming the room and setup for not being able to evaluate what they heard at a show. As if there is some reference room somewhere we all use, and only the show room is different! Stalled out at Level II....

This is crazy broad strokes, but there's a progression audiophiles tend to go through en route to becoming a good listener/evaluator. 

We start off being able to notice tone, frequency, and volume. When you hear people talk about cables being tone controls, this is where its coming from. You can tell the level of the audiophile by the language used. 

Next they start to notice things like dynamics, and that there's a sound stage. Dynamics is harder to differentiate than you might think, because there's things like bass extension and hyped treble can trick you into thinking its more dynamic. Also there's the obvious body slam impact aspect of dynamics, and then there's micro-dynamics, the subtle quiver or tremolo of a voice or string or whatever that triggers that hair on the back of the neck "this is real" kind of feeling. 

Usually most audiophiles up to this point are pretty well convinced of the need to have certain "reference tracks" they play at "reference volume" on something called a "reference system." They need to keep it simple because they haven't yet learned to differentiate, let alone mentally correct for, the effects of these things. 

For sure this is triggering some "aha" moments and recognition of a lot of what goes on around here. 

This is about where most stop, and its understandable, because its tough. The scope of what we're hearing expands into hard to describe things like timbre, attack and decay, air (most everyone blows this one), and the list goes on and on.  

Practice makes perfect. Here's another one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWp48WzlkMoThere's a whole bunch of them on this channel. They're great because even though the records change there's a bunch with the same table, cart and phono stage, and even DAC, and when these things change he lets you know.  

Keep in mind at this stage of the game you're simply trying to notice the similarities. You're not trying to figure out what these things sound like in any kind of absolute sense. What they would sound like in your system. Forget that. Just listen and try and get a handle on what's the same. Patience helps. I probably listened to that Christopher Cross a dozen times now. 

Bear in mind these guys all have a little bit different audience. The vast majority range in terms of knowledge and experience from utter noobs to advanced novice or maybe intermediate level. Even the ones who do know a lot, that is their audience, beginners.

The part about sound, the value of listening to a system on YT, in other words a laptop, I find a lot more value in that than anything any of these guys has to say.

You just need to learn how to listen, and evaluate what you’re hearing. This gets more complicated when recording the sound of a system in a room, because on top of all the usual problems of having all the same equipment we have the additional challenge of microphone placement that all by itself can swamp everything else. Still, even with all that, there’s things we can hear that can make it worthwhile.

Just to give you some idea what I mean, I’ve now bought three different components that were at least partially based on listening to them on YT. That’s right. I did all the research the usual way, and then also listened to them. Lo and behold, when I got them home they ALL sounded EXACTLY as I had come to expect from hearing them on my laptop. My freaking laptop!

The first was a Koetsu Black Goldline. That’s right. There’s a YT channel where all the guy does is spin a record. Not one word. You just know the cartridge, arm, turntable, and phono stage. You hear the feed from the phono stage. There’s a couple different Koetsu carts, a couple different tables, usually the same Herron phono stage, but never the same record. Normal audiophile would say has to be all the same stuff, certainly all the same record, too many changes, totally invalid. I had no problem evaluating what was what. Even used this same channel to buy the next component, the Herron VTPH2A.

The third one, Tekton Moab speakers. Besides the Moabs I "listened to" Ulfberhts on YT.

Hard to explain what to listen for. All I can say, the information is there. It is of value. You just need to learn how to evaluate it. 

Here you go-  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXtS7hApoSE Hit Show More for the component list. Listen to a few of these. See if you can spot the similarities between the ones with the same cart and phono stage.