Audio Science Review = "The better the measurement, the better the sound" philosophy

From a personal perspective; a friend of mine drank the Kool-Aid. He told me all about ASR when I bought a tweak and told him about the differences I was hearing. Of course, I wasn't really hearing a difference, I was just imagining things in view of the fact that he knew from reported measurements, that the tweak I had purchased is totally bogus. And please let me clarify, this is a device that he has never listened to. I don't mind dissenting opinion but I was basically being told that I'm full of s###. This is arrogance that I have trouble tolerating, friend or not.

@twoleftears I have an ASR amp and phonostage, please don’t confuse those with Audio Science Review, I am not a zealot!

My very first tweak was about 1967 when I used a friends portable record player and taped a quarter to the stylus end of the tonearm. I was like, wow! I told my friend and he said that it didn’t make a difference. I wonder if ASR could do a measurement review of that?

I wish we could get a few of those ASR zealots on this forum to engage in discourse but I doubt any would accept such an invitation.

@kokakolia All-right, then ASR members have it all figured out!

Demagogues tell people what they want to hear. I have a $ 4,000.00 amplifier and ASR tells me that it measures better than one of the hyped up $24,000.00 amplifiers. I like hearing that and automatically equate measures better to sounds better. This opinion cannot be subjective because it is proven by science and so I formulate all of these opinions about audio equipment without hearing any of them. So if the purpose behind buying audio equipment is to test them for frequency response, etc… without ever listening to them, then you have the quantitative evidence that you need for comparing measurements and that’s about it. 
So when I made that statement to my friend, he quickly countered with; ‘if you did a double blind listening comparison between your DAC and one of ASR’ cheaper recommended DAC’s, you wouldn’t be able to tell a difference.’ And my response was, ‘see you’ve already determined the results of a double blinded comparison without doing one.’

@esarhaddon How would a purchaser know the amount of measurement and testing that went into an audio component? There may be some designers who volunteer that information to the public domain but most do not for a variety of reasons, like not wanting their work to be pirated. And those customers who want to evaluate an amp or a DAC, etc... base their decisions on the sound and the visual aesthetics. Designers have to use testing and measurements to build their products but scientific data isn't what they're selling.

@esarhaddon I thought we were talking about the measurements recorded by ASR.  No, those test results are done on that website because they are not available in the public domain. That's the whole premise for the website.  Specifications and reviews from What HIFI, Stereophile, etc.. are given but the reviews are primarily done by listening. And by the way, your old friend Joe is the one who did the Stereophile review.

Anyone, are there examples where a cable maker, amp maker, etc.. has posted on the internet or anywhere else, all of the testing that was involved while designing their equipment? If that is the case, then I can see where ASR could compare those results with their own testing and essentially refute the information provided by the manufacturer. In general, I have not seen the testing results involved in building equipment while reading reviews. I've seen specifications and listening reviews/comparisons on 6 Moons, What HIFI and Stereophile but nothing more.

@thyname Yes, I am wrong, Stereophile does show measurements. I probably looked at them but haven’t in a while, now I just read the reviews. I do believe there to be value in measurements however, I’d be surprised if someone were to evaluate sonic characteristics based on measurements alone. The reviews themselves are based on listening, as with other publications.
 

I’m sorry you were targeted by an Audiogon member. That is reprehensible. As the Audiogon forum has grown in membership, there’s been an increase in bitter divisiveness among its posters. The Gramophone magazine forum was eradicated because of vitriolic attacks. I hope Audiogon doesn’t share the same fate. 

I don’t now why there should be such an insistence put on tests, charts and measurements when expressing an opinion about audio equipment on Audiogon. This website is comprised mainly of hobbyist who can listen seriously and verbally communicate what they hear, as a means of discourse with others who are doing the same. Sure, there are likely plenty of members who understand the science behind what ASR is doing (but may still disagree with their conclusions). But there are members who are more like myself. Those who have studied harmony, counterpoint, orchestration, arranging, conducting and music history to a certain degree. Who grew up playing an instrument and joined a band in their adolescence. Who attend concerts and recitals whenever possible. These types of personal life experiences are why I comprehend a listening review more than the triangulating of frequencies and mathematical charts. I’ve built sound waves and used charts to incorporate percussion rate, fall rate, attack rate, etc.. before interfacing them with an electronic polyphonic keyboard, so I know a little but my listening preferences are primarily based on what I hear, or what someone else describes hearing.

My father used to build cars before he got a job building aircraft engines. He can explain every part in a car and evaluate whether or not there’s a better or more economical way of engineering it. Today, people like him are usually involved in research. But despite his knowledge, he has terrible taste in cars and I don’t need to know what he knows to choose a better car than he would. Also, he’s always been a pretty bad driver. This of course may not be the best analogy but I’ve personally developed a way of evaluating based on listening reviews relevant to both equipment and recordings. And regardless of what I find in online publications, the best way for me to audition audio equipment is to actually hear it. I’d make the radical assumption that most people who are involved in this hobby can make sound purchasing decisions based on listening evaluations.

My reaction to ASR was based on a friend and ASR devotee telling me that what I claimed to be hearing was actually me imagining things. Of course he had never listened to the device mentioned but since Amir said it was bogus, then it has to be bogus. I’ve always agreed that audio science and test measurements are of course necessary in certain applications but to dismiss someone’s listening experiences if it contradicts measurements is inaccurate. The claim that ASR is factual because science supports it objectively and that listening reviews are subjective and therefore less valid is a faulty premise. I care very little about hundreds of website forums on the World Wide Web. Had my ASR friend not expressed his zealotry and told me that I was full of it, I wouldn’t know or care about ASR.