Can even a Novice hear differences in Sound Qualit

Yeah, I know, it is hard trying to get one person to care. Harder still, a multitude of enough people to even base a plan on. Part of any plan has to be to change peoples attitude, and even admit that a problem even exists. Plans can be based on the participation, attitude, and input from a multitude of people. What is the point if you can't even change the attitude of even one person? I just can not stand the idea that the Recording Industry wins, therefore we lose, where is the plan in that! Any plan would be better than just rolling over, and doing nothing! Even failure would be a better option, than just giving up! O.K.- your arguements are not lacking persuasiveness, your apathy wins me over! I will concede the point, do nothing is the best option, allowing some of our best loved Music deteriorate under Corporate Profits and Greed makes it easier for me as well! So why do I feel the desperate need to take a shower, I just took one an hour ago? I guess I will just have to get used to that slimy feeling, can't seem to scrub it off! Never thought that I would even have to try to persuade someone to save their own neck, or act in their own best interest, but there it is-literally cutting ones own nose off to spite their face! If that is the only exercise in futility that everyone prefers, so be it! I'm through!

You think that Recording Industry Executives are welcome to reasonable, thoughtful. and thorough dialog with anyone toward finding a solution to better recording quality? You have got to be kidding me! Can you listen to yourself? Sounds like a Flee trying to negotiate with Darth Vader, trying not to tick him off too much before being splattered! Tickling the Dragons Tail are we, sounds pretty touchy/feely to me! Just how does a Deer negotiate with a Hunter, trying to prevent him from pulling the trigger? I will say it one more time, how many more crappy Formats does it take before you realize that you are the apathetic Target of the latest shell game? What is the point of even considering an action plan, when the attitude is to give up without even concidering trying? Simple question, why don't you even want to concider trying? Seems to me that it is going to take every ounce of effort in my action plan, just to get anyone to even concider a change in direction! Attitude might be the first step, ya think? In fact, it seems to me that attitude is 98% of the problem, it is obvious that it is the biggest obstacle! You have certainly proven that to me! Your attitude seems to be to roll out the big red carpet for higher Record Industry Profits, and degrading Sound Quality. Must you be so enthusiastic about making sure that carpet is properly cleaned, pressed, and vacuumed? You can't even bring yourself to admit that the Recording Industry really pulled a fast one over you, in the last three mutated, and malformed Formats that they have pawned on you! Is Ego part of the problem? Can you set aside your Ego for five minutes, and take a clear look at what the Recording Industry has recently done to Americas prestigious History in Recorded Music? If I can get you to do that, gee, how much more action plan do you require of me, for moving a mountain? It is a lot of heavy lifting, and I could use some help! The flood waters are already at our necks, and you want a reasonable/thoughtful/thorough plan before anyone should take action! How about swimming for your life, if self preservation is an instinct that you possess!

I think that the action plan should be to steam roll over those who are apathetic enablers of the Recording Industry. Lets see how they like it for a change! I can see that your apathetic action plan is to do nothing! I can already see how that is working out, thank you very much! Sound Quality is in the toilet, congradulations at your accomplishment, you must be proud! The view all the way from the bottom is quite impressive. Seems to me that I have got nothing to loose, and the only direction left is up. The first step, in any action plan, when in a quagmire, is to stop digging! I can see by your response, that you are not ready to set down the shovel yet! You, and just about everyone else! Well, that is the updated post! I guess the next detail of this, Highway to Hell, action plan ride of yours, is up to you! God help us, where do I get off of this Train? Under your action plan, can I still demand my Soul back from the Recording Industry, or are we all just damned? Why don't you keep me posted on that little detail? Will the Ninth level of Hell, have all of us eating and digesting CD/SACD/MP3 for all eternity? How many more crappy sounding Formats is it going to take before you realize that you are being hunted as an apathetic Prey! The first action plan should be to erase that Target off of your back! Just a suggestion, Cheers!
P.S.-"Another fine mess you have gotten us into"!

There is an organization fighting the horrible compressed modern sound. So you CAN do something constructive about it. Many artists are becoming aware that their fans don't like the horrid sound of their work.

I give up! The Recording Industry is Steam-Rolling over Sound Quality, as the rest of us are wrapped up in petty bickering! I can just hear us complaining with each other as we all are being squeezed flatter than a pancake!
" Look, it's K-K-K-Kenny, coming to K-K-K-Kill me! "
I have never heard a more apathetic, and nit-picking bunch! Oh, it's just the Market! Oh, we are not the Demographic that the Recording Industry is interested in! It's a hopeless cause this, it's a hopeless cause that! As if we all existed in a vacuum, or perhaps the World exists. and we are the vacuum! If you want to suck, do it on your own time! Me, I am going to find some way of nailing the Recording Industries carcass to the wall! No more crappy sounding CD's, no more slightly better than crappy sounding SACD/DVD-Audio! Sound Quality has hit rock bottom, even the sound on movie DVD's sounds three times better than CD, or hasn't anyone noticed! If you want to create a Market that leaves everyone hungry and starving for Sound Quality, then attach a leash to your neck! Me, I am going down standing on two feet! I refuse to be the Recording Industries Dog to be kicked around like a Mutt! This is one Demographic that is going to take MP3, and shove it deep in the Recording Industries back door! If you want to bury yourself in apathy, then get the hell out of my way! If you want a steady diet of nothing left, but MP3, constipated with it to the point that you would need a lifetime of exlax to survive, knock yourself out! I am not going there, and I am certainly not following anyone else there either! Just because everyone else is jumping off of a cliff......Awwww whats the use! Is it going to take an Emancipation Proclamation from the Recording Industry so that we are no longer their b__ch? Is there anyone out there that is not a Pig feeding from the Trough of the Record Industry? If there is, stand up and be counted as a Human Being! Surely there is someone out there with some pride in themselves! Even a 65 year old Novice can hear the difference, are you supposed to be part of the Demographic that can't?

Joe's numbers don't measure up to Tvad's and he's a bit embarrassed, that's all. It's a common problem and your friends here at Kizer can help.

Kizer is about to release a new product called Postagra. It's a browser plug-in that turns your cursor purple. Purple cursors are proven to encourage posting which will get those numbers up and keep them there. Don't feel inadequate because you're not as active a member. Use Postagra and post all night like you once did.

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Lithojoe, If I were to read 100 of TVAD's posts I would certainly get some positive information I can use or, if nothing else, an intelligent POV. So I benefit from his existence. So I read his posts.

Why should I read yours?

Hail to the holy Tvad grail of audio and now the english language. Has he reached the 3,000th bloviation on this site alone. I know he is on others, just loves to see his name and expressions in print. Simple amazing !!

The Public did reject SACD/DVD-Audio, but not for the reasons that you believe. It wasn't an experiment in High Rez. Digital, the manufacturers simply did not have all of their ducks in a row with sound quality prior to releasing SACD/DVD-Audio. They pretty much made the same mistake when CD was first released. Both of these technologies were premature as far as supporting a High Quality Sound Format. The Public was taken to the cleaners, with the supposed improved Sound Quality of CD. The Public giving the benefit of the doubt to the technological prowness of CD, presuming improved Sound Quality would follow. They are still waiting for the 'Perfect Sound Forever', despite decades of development of the CD Format. Some major improvements were made, but the older Format of Analog still sounded better. How much longer is the Public supposed to wait on the development of the CD Format.
SACD/DVD-Audio came along, prematurely again, and this time the Public wasn't going to give the New Format the benefit of the doubt. The Sound of SACD/DVD-Audio was judged as being only slightly better than CD, the Public not wanting to go down the same path of a supposed improved New Format just like when CD was new. The point isn't that the New Formats only sound slightly better than CD, but that the comparison Format of CD still sounds poorly when compared to the best Analog Standards. What does this say about the Sound Quality of SACD/DVD-Audio? It sounds only slightly better than CD, but it still doesn't measure up to Analog, an older Format. There has been three attempts at New Formats, CD/SACD/DVD-Audio, with 30 years of development in Digital Recording, and they still can't get it right! Three Strikes, and the American Public have decided 'your out'! Sounds only slightly better, means that the American Public knows that Manufacturers can do alot better, the Public demanding more! The American Public is unwilling to invest in a New Format, unless there is an improvement in Sound Quality that atleast approaches that of the best Analog. They simply feel cheated by decades of CD, and they are not about to be cheated again by SACD/DVD-Audio, with only a slight improvement in Sound Quality. They want more, not less Sound quality. If less was the goal, then everyone would be chucking their Records and CD's, for SACD/DVD-Audio Disks! That is simply not reality, SACD/DVD-Audio are going out of business, because no one will buy them. Slightly better, is not good enough! Better to go without, than to settle for slightly better!

A tangent or sidebar
SACD and DVD-A were hurt more, IMO, by their makers who refused to remember their earlier experience with going from mono to stereo. The price increase was all of $1.00. Had they done a simiiliar, maybe $2.00 difference these formats would be much more prevalent. It was not so much the public deciding against the hi-rez sound as their makers wanting to make a killing and in doing so almost killed the format.

Amazing that one can misspell a word, and yet someone still gets the correct meaning. Someone gets the accurate meaning in such a way, as to get the exact corrected version spelled properly. It is certainly not E.S.P., it must be coincidence. Once you are done flattering yourself, and breaking your arm patting yourself on the back, can we get back to the issue at hand? It is unfortunate that you will just have to suffer this fool gladly, on these Threads in Audiogon. Freedom of Speech doesn't selectively apply to only those with polished ego's!

if one is listening for differences, one will hear them, regardless of previous listening experiences. there are differences in aural acuity and differential threshholds, so a difference perceived by one person may not be noticed by another. motivation is as important as ear training.

Thanks Tvad! Let's keep the literary standards around here suitably elevated! J

I remember when I was a teenager, everything had to be for the moment. My attention span was extremely short, and everything had to be about convenience in a rapidly fast paced Teenagers life. I eventually grew out of it, and started to appreciate things of high quality. I learned to have patience, and realized that some of the best things in life are worth waiting for. This hardly fits a Teenagers Paradyne, but my Teenage years were a passing phase. They are now nothing more than a distant memory. I believe that most Teenagers mature, they just need someone with the patience that knows exactly where the Teenagers maturity is inevitably heading. It would be an unusual Teenager indeed, that could appreciate a high end Stereo System. My advice, just wait untill they get a little bigger.

Pettyofficer, the blind testing I was referring to was used to compare coupling capacitors-- which may move some audiophiles to orgasm, while barely eliciting a yawn from non-critical listeners.

I don't discount epiphanies in audio or in anything else. I wish could tease my teenager away from her MP3 toward better audio. Unfortunately that one isn't happening--unless maybe I stop torturing her with Anthony Braxton and Ornette Coleman.

One last response. Dgarretson, everything you say may be true, but you make it all sound like its stagnate and non-transitory. People do have epithanies, radical changes in opinions and awareness, something that comes along that violently rocks our psychological boat. A slap in the face, a bucket of water, something that rocks us out of our complacency. We all psychologically respond to these inputs. Hearing something for the first time that sounds radically better than anything we have ever heard before, can certainly flip our Paradyne Boat upside down. I have seen it happen, people will respond to radical psychological overload of input, they can't help it- they would have to be almost inhuman not to respond!

All great responses. Buconero117 hit the nail right on the head, Older Folk are fighting a drop off in hearing ability that makes it harder to appreciate 'difference'. All true, except despite this, and being ignorant of the equipment he was listening to, he immediately knew that it was the recording, and not the equipment. Most people don't care, he didn't used to, now he does because he has a verifiable, and measurable awareness of everything that has been missing from current Digital Recordings. He never shuts up, telling his freinds and neighbors about the unusually good sounding Digital Recording that he has heard. He has had an epithany, an awakening, an awareness of just how bad current Digital Recordings really are. He couldn't possibly go back to MP3, and enjoy it, knowing that there is something out there that is a magnitude better in sound quality. It will eat him alive. Most people don't care, because they only hear a slight improvement with 2-Channel SACD/DVD-Audio, it simply isn't enough to push them over the edge.
As far as Multi-Channel vs. 2-Channel, this is still a two Channel Downmix. Two Channel Analog still does a good job of carrying the Harmonic Content of the Music. Two Channel Digital has never been able to do the same. We are not trying to reproduce 4 distinct channels here, what we are trying to do is to utilize the extra channels to carry the Harmonic Content that is missing out of the 2-channel Digital. Harmonic Content that would normally be there if this were a 2-channel Analog Recording instead of Digital. Recombining the Harmonic Content with the two main channels by Downmixing, puts us right back to approximating something resembling 2-channel Analog. Lacking the pops and ticks, might be something to sweeten the pot. If Downmixing, the end result is still going to be 2-channel regardless, not requiring extra Speakers and Amplifiers.
The preference that I am talking about, isn't multi-channel 24/96 DVD-A per se, but multi-channel 24/96 DVD-A Downmixed to 2-channels. The Harmonic Content needs to be recombined with the original signal in the Main Channels to overcome Digitals lack of Harmonic Content. Downmix could be used for Music, non-downmix multi-channel could be used for Movies with Surround Sound Audio effects. I am not sure about multi-channel SACD Surround Sound, the point would be extra channels of Harmonic Content Downmixed with Main Channels for Digital Music, Separate Multi-channels for Surround Sound in Movies. If you want the Multi-channel Surround Soundtracks for Movies in SACD, so be it.
" Why don't they make all of them sound as good "? doesn't sound like someone who doesn't care, it sounds like someone who 'used' to not care. Not caring is no longer written in stone, if it ever was I am certainly starting to see the cracks!
Lets try to keep our conversations out of the gutter, "out of the mouths of Babes" is just a figure of speech, it doesn't mean that I find my friend a Babe. Our Sound Quality is already in the Gutter, I am not going to allow my conversation to be dragged there as well!

So, are you talking about the preference of multi-channel 24/96 DVD-A vs. SACD?

It comes down to most people don't care. They have grown up in a MP3 compressed digital world and don't know what good sound is all about. I have "experienced" ears and can pick out the details and "little" things that makes this hobby so engaging (at least to me). My wife just shakes her head but can also notice the upgrades even though my upgrades are never cash netural. I will always search for the best two channel sound until the day I die.

I always try to get feedback from someone who is not in the hobby when making or contemplating a change. Since they are not "invested" (literally and figuratively) in the outcome, their assessment may have the advantage of a certain objectivity, even if it has the disadvantage of being less discriminating. (FWIW, I feel similarly about tasting wine; "novices" often catch the differences worth catching.)

John

I recently read a white paper on controlled blind listening tests in which the results were random with a panel of non-audiophile listeners under tightly controlled conditions. The results became meaningful with experienced listeners, and more so when experienced listeners were able to exercise personal control over A/B source switching at leisure. It would seem that above posters' points regarding interest level, level of experience, and level of psychological involvement, are all pertinent in decoding the subtleties of audio.

I rarely have friends come over to just listen to music. I recently had some guys over for some beers and fired up the system. They ended up getting pretty absorbed. At one point my friend looked at me with something like wonder in his eyes, and said, "I'm not just hearing the sound of cymbals. I can hear that its a wood stick hitting a cymbal. Not that he is going to get immersed in the hobby, but he clearly heard the difference between a serious setup and every "stereo" he had ever heard.

Novices who like music, are music listeners, and enjoy music are capable of telling the difference and can immediately appreciate high quality sound reproduction. But like any other hobby, as Sjpin similarly points out, it's one thing to know it exists to like it and another to pursue and engage in it.

Yes, but only trained listeners seem to be able to advance their enjoyment of sound over time. As for the 'older' folk, they are fighting a drop off in hearing ability that makes it harder to appreciate 'difference'.

In my experience, it is not getting a novice to notice a difference as it is getting them to care. My wife notices the difference, but it doesn't matter to her. Friends will notice the difference, but they are not interested in paying for the increased quality. What strikes me as odd is that the sames folks that tell me they won't spend the extra money for better audio go nuts over getting HDTVs and blu-ray players. I guess it is preferable to see a difference than hear one.

Novices can indeed hear differences. They may be less able to describe them and slower to identify errors. However, there is no substitute for training to improve skills.

Kudo's for relating to a 65 year old friend as a Babe