Audio Science Review = Rebuttal and Further Thoughts

i appreciate prof sharing his perspective. the guy is saying over and over that he consciously chooses equipment that "speaks" to him in some way beyond a set of measured specs, and that he doesn’t look at SINAD charts and go "oh yeah that one clearly sounds the best." jokes and differing opinions are all good imho but the way some people have responded to these threads looks like a mirror image of the worst aspects of ASR - the ignorance, lack of reading comprehension, closed-mindedness, tribalism etc.

as for amir i think he’s got an engineer’s brain with a manager’s skill set and he’s been arguing on audio forums for 20 years. thus the certitude, the imperiousness, the unemotional attitude, the hostility towards subjective experiences of any kind, and the (it has to be said) admirable ability to wave away any/everything that challenges his position. this might not be a great set of traits for a scientist, but for a forum poster it’s basically ideal.

anyhow, for my part i’m basically with art dudley on this stuff - there’s no one Correct way to hi-fi, and the people who claim otherwise are just confused

@kota1 i personally plan to measure the response in my room at some point next year because i am genuinely curious what's going on down here. as for getting the sound i want, i fooled around with speaker placement and furniture for a solid year and a half trying to get things sounding how i wanted.

am happy to report that i don't have any audible reflection issues at all due to the 18'x6.5' and 4'x6' shelves full of records, the 200lb desk and attached shelf with more records, heavy antique chair, multiple rugs, and the heavy sleeper sofa i listen from. but i would love to have a measured frequency response to reference for when i start seriously looking at speaker upgrades (am in the process of saving now, and will be for a couple more years most likely), and also just because it's nice info to have!

re: "signaling" - a big rack of shiny new mcintosh with $10k+ speakers poorly placed might be an example on the 'i'm really rich' side of audio. but if there's anything i've learned online, one can 'signal' their smartness, their coolness, their pride, or whatever it is they're interested in conveying in any number of different ways. for example, one can signal their audio 'wisdom' by buying all of the best measuring gear, regardless of how it sounds. 

as for 'lording it over' people, there are certainly some snobs out there. but those guys are mostly irrelevant. i'm sure their systems sound great or whatever, but literally no one with a life of their own cares how much you spent on your hi fi - we're too busy listening to music (and maybe plotting out upgrades) on our own. same goes for 'i know everything about audio because i'm an engineer' types. like, ok man, good for you. sure, yeah, whatever, i'm very impressed with your credentials. but i'm on my own path. you don't need to worry about what i'm doing. we don't even like the same music, why should i care what you think? etc etc

@cd318 exactly - & that's why i have no quarrel on principle with more objective minded approaches to evaluating gear. people are doing their own thing. some prefer to approach it from a purely "show me the evidence" engineering sort of perspective, while others would rather primarily rely on their senses first. i lean towards the latter but there is obviously real value in the former - after all, this hobby wouldn't exist if it weren't for the efforts of a century-plus worth of electronics nerds. ultimately which "camp" people fall into makes no difference to me because at the end of the day, if i'm drawn closer in to the music, i'm happy. we should all stop playing stereo cop and just accept that different people value different things in their gear. just my .02c

the funniest ASR guys are the ones who love vinyl but feel the need to qualify every statement about records or turntables with "look, i know it’s not as good as digital, yes i understand that objectively i deserve to be criticized for it, but..." because they’re scared of being cyberbullied by computer nerds. no self respect