+1 laoman & ossicle2brain
Did Amir Change Your Mind About Anything?
It’s easy to make snide remarks like “yes- I do the opposite of what he says.” And in some respects I agree, but if you do that, this is just going to be taken down. So I’m asking a serious question. Has ASR actually changed your opinion on anything? For me, I would say 2 things. I am a conservatory-trained musician and I do trust my ears. But ASR has reminded me to double check my opinions on a piece of gear to make sure I’m not imagining improvements. Not to get into double blind testing, but just to keep in mind that the brain can be fooled and make doubly sure that I’m hearing what I think I’m hearing. The second is power conditioning. I went from an expensive box back to my wiremold and I really don’t think I can hear a difference. I think that now that I understand the engineering behind AC use in an audio component, I am not convinced that power conditioning affects the component output. I think.
So please resist the urge to pile on. I think this could be a worthwhile discussion if that’s possible anymore. I hope it is.
1,423 responses
Giving more information about the specs of designed gear components is a good job to do and in some case falsifying market claims too...it gives consumers new information to pounder about before purchasing among other infrormations source as reviewers or users...
Thanks to Amir...
But the bucks stop here...
Deducing from the gear specs measured by tools designed to measure electronic components , deducing from that the sound quality which will be experienced by a user in the natural ecological niche of his room by his specfic acquired hearing abilities and limitations is PREPOSTEROUS as a claim ...Attacking some ignorant audiophile and claiming to debunk them with blind test is one thing, but claiming that there is a linear predictible relation between measured electrical components and what we will experience in a specific room with specific ears is completely a different matter... Conflating the two is PURE TECHNOLOGICAL ideology not science...
What we hear and decode is determined by psycho-acoustical theories, not by measuring piece of gear specs about their design ...Techno babble is not science...
This is the last paragraphs of an article who say it all by two physicists...I underline some aspects of this important article...Which related future new hearing theories on the model of "ecological theory of the visual fields by Gibson... And also relate the hearing abilities to natural vibrating sound sources qualities and their long natural history of perception by humans... We dont hear only mere spectral envelopes or even time envelope, we hear QUALITIES of REAL vibrating sound sources we are trained to recognize by profession and by natural evolution in ecological real acoustical environment...... Any psycho-acoustic theory of hearing must be based on these facts....Imagine the complexity of this task and now compare that to someone saying that measuring this dac or this amplifier with simple electrical tools designed to measure gear components will tell all there is to tell about the hearing and listening experience... Listening as hearing does not reduce to simplistic electrical measurements sorry... We dont even have a general accepted theory of hearing...There is debates about many theories... As illustrated by the revolutionary nature of th3e experiments conducted by these two physicists...
https://phys.org/news/2013-02-human-fourier-uncertainty-principle.htmlHuman hearing beats the Fourier uncertainty principle«The results have implications for how we understand the way that the brain processes sound, a question that has interested scientists for a long time. In the early 1970s, scientists found hints that human hearing could violate the uncertainty principle, but the scientific understanding and technical capabilities were not advanced enough to enable a thorough investigation. As a result, most of today’s sound analysis models are based on old theories that may now be revisited in order to capture the precision of human hearing. "In seminars, I like demonstrating how much information is conveyed in sound by playing the sound from the scene in Casablanca where Ilsa pleads, "Play it once, Sam," Sam feigns ignorance, Ilsa insists," Magnasco said. "You can recognize the text being spoken, but you can also recognize the volume of the utterance, the emotional stance of both speakers, the identity of the speakers including the speaker’s accent (Ingrid’s faint Swedish, though her character is Norwegian, which I am told Norwegians can distinguish; Sam’s AAVE [African American Vernacular English]), the distance to the speaker (Ilsa whispers but she’s closer, Sam loudly feigns ignorance but he’s in the back), the position of the speaker (in your house you know when someone’s calling you from another room, in which room they are!), the orientation of the speaker (looking at you or away from you), an impression of the room (large, small, carpeted). "The issue is that many fields, both basic and commercial, in sound analysis try to reconstruct only one of these, and for that they may use crude models of early hearing that transmit enough information for their purposes. But the problem is that when your analysis is a pipeline, whatever information is lost on a given stage can never be recovered later. So if you try to do very fancy analysis of, let’s say, vocal inflections of a lyric soprano, you just cannot do it with cruder models." By ruling out many of the simpler models of auditory processing, the new results may help guide researchers to identify the true mechanism that underlies human auditory hyperacuity. Understanding this mechanism could have wide-ranging applications in areas such as speech recognition; sound analysis and processing; and radar, sonar, and radio astronomy. "You could use fancier methods in radar or sonar to try to analyze details beyond uncertainty, since you control the pinging waveform; in fact, bats do," Magnasco said. Building on the current results, the researchers are now investigating how human hearing is more finely tuned toward natural sounds, and also studying the temporal factor in hearing. "Such increases in performance cannot occur in general without some assumptions," Magnasco said. "For instance, if you’re testing accuracy vs. resolution, you need to assume all signals are well separated. We have indications that the hearing system is highly attuned to the sounds you actually hear in nature, as opposed to abstract time-series; this comes under the rubric of ’ecological theories of perception’ in which you try to understand the space of natural objects being analyzed in an ecologically relevant setting, and has been hugely successful in vision. Many sounds in nature are produced by an abrupt transfer of energy followed by slow, damped decay, and hence have broken time-reversal symmetry. We just tested that subjects do much better in discriminating timing and frequency in the forward version than in the time-reversed version (manuscript submitted). Therefore the nervous system uses specific information on the physics of sound production to extract information from the sensory stream. "We are also studying with these same methods the notion of simultaneity of sounds. If we’re listening to a flute-piano piece, we will have a distinct perception if the flute ’arrives late’ into a phrase and lags the piano, even though flute and piano produce extended sounds, much longer than the accuracy with which we perceive their alignment. In general, for many sounds we have a clear idea of one single ’time’ associated to the sound, many times, in our minds, having to do with what action we would take to generate the sound ourselves (strike, blow, etc)." A last word:
As i said objectivists and subjectivists are not even wrong, They are beside the real problem in audio which is a psycho-acoustic problem and an acoustic one...They focus on GEAR not on ACOUSTIC experience... They are the children of gear maketing publicity , objectivists as subjectivists... No acoustician nor any mature audiophile focus on gear piece , they focus on acoustic embeddings of the system... ( and less importantly but very necessary they focus on the mechanical and electrical embeddings of the system in the house/room )..
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laoman said....
"I bought my Dac at a hifi shop by listening to 7 different ones through the same equipment, with the same music and I had no idea what brand I was listening to or what it cost. The dealer was happy to go back and forth. I purchased the one that sounded second best, (I could not afford the best when I found out what it cost. ) I can tell you that the Topping I listened to sounded like crap with female voices. So do not tell me like some of your minions post, that all well measuring Dacs sound the same." I for one believe you. Imagine that. Trusting how something sounds! And this is more valid than any charts, graphs, oscilloscope readings etc. And the idea that it is not unless it was a double blind test etc takes the objectivity crowd off the cliff of absurdity. And it's insulting to imply that somehow you are not listening correctly and are doing it wrong. This is where the measurement crowd jumps the shark and gets ridiculous.
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ASR and Amir have value, but not the value they believe themselves to have. I try to find the silver lining in everything and when I look at support equipment (DDC, preamps, signal pass-through etc.) and ASR measures them, I do rely on their stamp of approval as encouragement. As other equipment, not so much. What I have purchased based on ASR reviews Singxer SU-6 Benchmark HPA4 (as a preamp) MiniDSP Dirac unit However there have been some gear that they have ripped to shreds that I absolutely love, along the lines of DAC's and amps and such. To that I say... measurements don't equate to sound, however measurements do equate to silence IMO. |
@hilde45 Its not unlike watching a snake swallow its tail. I’m ambivalent about the outcome but find an occasional glance at the progress inevitable. |
Whoa, morning coffee and a triggered Amir ;-).
Hey Amir, this is you advocating zero level matching, fabricating "blind" tests and being called out, correct? https://www.avsforum.com/threads/establishing-differences-by-the-10-volume-method.1136745/ Who did you say knows nil? What was that about projection?
My "garage" speakers and audio science seem to do ok vs the big boys. https://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/opinion/1762-the-best-of-florida-international-audio-expo-2023 That's why I keep asking if you're going to PAF next year again like this year. I'll set up some blind tests using my AVA ABX and my speaker turntables. Unlike you, I do real blind testing. This will be your chance, we'll test both various "SINAD" DACs and your choice of Revels (since you area a dealer, lest some forget) vs my garage stuff. Blind, level matched. If of course you decline, we'll understand ;-). |
"Indeed, his measurements are patterned after mine and using exactly the same measurement gear." WRONG. He no longer uses what you use. You also still do not answer the question of morally recommending equipment of poor build quality. Maybe you can not? |
"You said do we have further questions. You are projecting. Ton of insults are sent my way and I am calmly answering them. It is folks like you who can't for a moment stay professional and focus on the topic of audio. "2) Why do you throw people off your site for presenting contrary opinions?" People disagree and argue with me to death on ASR. We show extreme tolerance for this, to a fault. It is only in extreme cases that we resort to banning people. Note that showing up for battle by claiming you hear differences in audio cables and we must not listen to music and only read graphs, can get the door shown to you. But not before you dig that hole very deep by creating empty and rehashed arguments. Come forward with proper evidence of your claims and you will be more than welcome whether they agree with mine or not. "3) I bought my Dac at a hifi shop by listening to 7 different ones through the same equipment, ..." You don't say... Of course if you violate every rule in proper listening test you wind up with some random choice. Maybe your fellow audiophiles care about that kind of story, but we don't. We rely on what we can prove, not what we can imagine. Come back when you pick that same selection in proper blind test. Without it as I mentioned, you generated noise, not data. |
" I will say it gives me a lot of hesitancy to give a website the censors speech because someone uses his website to generate interest in their side of the conversation." Nothing Erin does is in conflict with ASR. Indeed, his measurements are patterned after mine and using exactly the same measurement gear. The only conflict as I mentioned was his desire to make money and get subscribers from ASR traffic. No site owner will let him do this. "I will say it gives me a lot of hesitancy to give a website the censors speech because someone uses his website to generate interest in their side of the conversation." Oh please... I have had countless posts here deleted. Heck entire threads with them in it have vanished. You don't see me crying and complaining about "censorship." Forum management is hard and if the owners/admins see fit to delete something, that is that. Don't go trying to milk that for fallacious arguments. "You also claim it doesn't make you any money and you don't do it for the cash so why care if someone benefits from the traffic." It is called equal treatment. If we allow one person to commercialize our site, then every dealer and manufacture would want to do the same thing. From our terms of service for people in the industry: "Please have a signature identifying the name of your business. You can have a single link to your business but that is it. This link must not lead directly to any form of Advertising or Commercial Sponsorship related links. Same applies to any posts in the forum." Erin's content is allowed on ASR anyway. So your whole thesis is wrong. |
LOL @amir_asr thinks he is done and keeps getting asked why he is rude. Tbh, I appreciate him being willing to answer people but he is shooting himself in the foot. I am a consistent contributor to ASR, which is how I found this. I will say it gives me a lot of hesitancy to give a website the censors speech because someone uses his website to generate interest in their side of the conversation. Shutting down a thread shoots you in the foot. You also claim it doesn't make you any money and you don't do it for the cash so why care if someone benefits from the traffic. The topic of audio integrity is still being talked about. Everyone is acting petulant here. Erin in old posts sounds not so nice, Amir isn't nice and he basically admits to being a d!#k. AJ from Soundfield sounds petty too. Makes me want to support none of these fools and enjoy the music on a system I find at Best Buy. |
@rtorchia "Personally I would never buy anything that wasn’t on his recommended list" Well there are Dacs on his recommended list that measure very well that sound likr crap and have really poor quality control. Yet he recommends them. Wow! You said do we have further questions. |
This is the most absurd discussion I have ever read on Audiogon (and there have been plenty of contenders). I understand the fascination with measurements, but I can't objectify my enjoyment of music. I like listening to different musical presentations (both live and reproduced), and I enjoy learning about different products, venues, performers, etc., but I can't say I consistantly enjoy one experience over the other – I guess it feels different depending on my mood. |
I spoke about the acoustic embeddings of a system as primary... But even electrical embeddings of a system matter a lot... An anecdote: I sold my big house and in this big house my audio system was connected to a secondary electrical panel at the second floor, then it was not connected directly on the main electrical panel of the house... In my actual small one floor house , my system is connected directly on the main panel... The decreasing of the electrical noise floor level is astonishing... The same gear give a more clearer outline of the sound source and a more transparent soundfield...My Sansui alpha, a very low noise floor amplifier, as many other good amplifier, go, metaphorically speaking, from low-fi or mid-fi level to super hi-fi as a costly upgrade formy ears experience...it was astonishing asw if i had another better system... Acoustic and electrical and mechanical embeddings controls are more important than tasting gear upgrade with our ears, golden one or not, or by measuring their specs and saying that it is the ultimate KEY to audio...Sorry but as useful it can be, verified specs are not the key at all... Why this is not evident for all ? The key is first acoustic, then electrical and mechanical embeddings control... This war between people with their ears or tools around the gear components, resulted from the incredible blinders created by one century of gear marketing claims ...The marketers or the designers or the people measuring the gear, never sold us the idea that it is not enough to buy good gear and upgrade it, it is necessary and MORE IMPORTANT to learn how to listen first and doing so by embedding any system in the house/room acoustically, electrically and mechanically...
Acoustic is the queen asleep on the bed , our ears are the prince awakening the princess, the gear are only the 7 working dwarves in the room ...
«Acoustician use blind test time to time on some guinea pigs subjects for psycho-acoustic objective results in some experiments for example, but designing a room, no acoustician blind test himself, because he learn how to listen in doing so » -- Anonymus acoustician😎 |
Objectivist tools=subjectivist ears =gear component evaluation Where is acoustic? We dont hear good speakers at their optimal if we have not designed a room for them... No Speakers sound the same way in different room... Audiophile experience is not about our "taste" or price tag of components or measured specs...it is about acoustic... It is incredible how people are completely blinded , the primary matter is under the rug of secondary problem of gear choice and evaluation... Nowadays it is easy to look and pick any components of very good quality at low price... And the only way to learn how to listen is not measuring gear specs nor listening to it, it is embeddding it in an acoustic space and experiment with varying the acoustic conditions...More fun and more deep than measuring a design specs or listening to an amplifier color....
«If there is a war between big egg ender and small egg ender, crack the egg on the boiler» --Groucho Marx 🤓 |
You already said that. 27 times. Which is the entire count of your “contributions” here. I believe you made your point. Everyone got that. Next
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"I have not once heard you say in your responses here, how you could do things better or where you fell short. That is why you are vilified here and Erin is beloved. you have no modesty and you can't even witness it. " Erin is not vilified because he doesn't go after your sacred cows. You know, all the stuff that makes no difference to sound but you all swear by it. Go ahead and ask Erin if he uses your fancy audio and power cables in his testing. Or uses boutique amplifiers, DACs, etc. You won't like the answer, I assure you. Erin also learned his lesson early on when he got to speaker testing. That you best not deliver negative outcomes straight out or it would not be good for growth of a youtube channel. See comments he received after his transparent review of a Klipsch speaker: https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/klipsch-heresy-iv-objective-speaker-review.1028801/page-4 "To male Karens in this thread ... Not the "beloved" Erin you know, right? Fortunately for him, he learned early on that saying stuff like this is not going to get you subscribers so best to tone it down. Me? I have not promised anyone niceness. What I have promised is data, objectivity, science and professionalism. Sometimes an answer is something you are not going to like. Not being motivated by money, I am not afraid to tell it like it is. Or have some of you get upset as you are. It can't be helped. As long as you put your emotions ahead of learning, that is going to be a problem for you. |
@ASR "Nope, that is not "what he has done." The cable configuration is what it is for electrical parameter control. The configuration is employed to determine the ratio of LCR reactance in order to shape a significant portion of the filter characteristics of that cable. It has an organic core instead of any polymer to decrease DA and lower DF." And what are those measurements? Don't exist, right? But let's say they exist: who the heck says these things are important characteristics in a power cable?" DARPA |
"Do you ever seat down and just enjoy your music like a normal human being?" What? Of course I do. I am at desk testing gear for good number of hours every day. All of that is spent listening to music. This is good number of hours per day. I recently came back from Pacific Audio Fest 2023 and not only did a bunch of listening there, I was the only reviewer posting what music was played there. See my trip reports: It is so preposterous and arrogant to keep claiming that only subjectivists listen to music. You just want to hate on people for the sake of hating. And folks say I am not nice enough to you??? |
Adding on, your audio gear performs filtering. If you need a power cable to do that for you, you have bought one hell of a bad design. Fortunately even the most incompetent designer out there will build a power supply with filtering (otherwise it would hum badly). So no, you don't need a filtering AC cable even if such an animal existed. |
"Nope, that is not "what he has done." The cable configuration is what it is for electrical parameter control. The configuration is employed to determine the ratio of LCR reactance in order to shape a significant portion of the filter characteristics of that cable. It has an organic core instead of any polymer to decrease DA and lower DF." And what are those measurements? Don't exist, right? But let's say they exist: who the heck says these things are important characteristics in a power cable? That cable provides zero filtering as I explained in the video. If you are going to dispute that where are those measurements? We can measure filtering, right? Or are you talking about filtering imaginary things? Also, if a power cable filters, by definition that is bad for impulses. A lot of these companies advertise how these cables can handle power spikes better. Well, if you filter then you filter that demand for power and produce less power! You see how you are confusing the role of a power cable with that of an interconnect? Regardless, I performed a null test with music. That showed there is not a hair difference when using this power cable vs the cheapest thinnest power cable I had on hand: |
"For someone trying to defend their honor, Amir sure is digging this hole deeper. Clearly he wont address the Erin stuff or the old posts Soundfield brought up. " There a bunch of you making all kinds of faulty arguments and personal remarks. It is only one of me answering you between everything else. Here is briefly the answer to those: Erin: He brings great value to audiophiles with respect to speaker measurements. All of you who watch his videos better go and support him with a donation or buy products with his sponsored links. What you can't do is ask me to use the membership and traffic on ASR to help him in gather said cash. I don't monetize ASR Forum in any form or fashion so sure as heck not going to let someone else do that. The last video that was posed was a clear clickbait. The title and thumbnail screamed that. I made a comment about it and folks started to scream back and forth that he should be entitled to that. To which I said he can do it in his platform (youtube), not on ASR. Complaints kept coming so I closed the thread. AJ (Soundfield) If I were you, I would dig into who AJ is before siding with him. He is used to be the most miserable objectivist on AVSForum.com. He would roast two high-end subjectivists in the morning for breakfast just as a warm up exercise. His bullying tactics were so bad that I actually chose to defend high-end audiophiles. Fortunately his knowledge of audio science and engineering was nill so was easy to push back on his claim after which, he would get personal over and over again. Let me give you a tasted of that: https://www.avsforum.com/threads/best-amp-for-1000.1309064/page-2#post-19897161 "Here is the reason why there will be such a dichotomy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning...3Kruger_effect One thing AJ never had was common sense and here is an example of it bringing out that I used to defend some of you while he attacked you mercilessly. Of course a few years later he decided to build speakers in the garage and quickly realized that saying stuff like above, and acting it, would not be good for business. Enter those faulty audiophile amplifiers and speaker cables in his exhibits at audio shows. Amazing how money causes people to completely change their color. Sadly, the same happened with Erin. He used to a wonderful and core member of ASR Forum. Then he bought the expensive Klippel measurement system and in the interest of paying it off, tilted hard toward monetizing the content -- again on the backs of ASR. We repeatedly told him to not do that only to have severely negative reaction from him. Have seen this happen with another member going through the same phase change and ultimately banned from ASR. Money's power over some people is incredible. |
Wow, take a few days away and away IT grows... ASR said this: "As to GR research, you have that backward. You are believe the word of someone trying to sell you something (Danny) vs an independent reviewer (me). You have to have very little sensibility to put your trust in a company rep who offers zero proof of efficacy of what he sells. Wires wrapped around a rope to make it look thick? Yep, that is what he has done: https://youtu.be/_7HbjdQRaAM " Nope, that is not "what he has done." The cable configuration is what it is for electrical parameter control. The configuration is employed to determine the ratio of LCR reactance in order to shape a significant portion of the filter characteristics of that cable. It has an organic core instead of any polymer to decrease DA and lower DF.
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Yes. Do you ever seat down and just enjoy your music like a normal human being?
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"When someone critiques an audio product based on measurements - and then never listens to the product, it greatly minimizes credibility and the overall review. " I assume you are talking about someone else as I do more listening tests than many reviewers combined. Again, every speaker, headphone and headphone amp gets listened to. And some others including audio tweaks. I don't do them in all areas because subjective tests there have the potential to create massively incorrect conclusions. Credibility takes a big dump when you just do listening tests that are uncontrolled and subject to huge error. In that sense you have it backward because I follow proper protocols in science of audio. Mind you, you are welcome to perform a controlled test and prove me wrong when I don't do them. Alas, no such test has come about despite me performing hundreds of tests. Any more talking points you want me to address? |
For someone trying to defend their honor, Amir sure is digging this hole deeper. Clearly he wont address the Erin stuff or the old posts Soundfield brought up. If you want to be accurate and thorough, address everything. Literally your reputation is built on objectivity. Address it. There are scientists who believe in god and preachers who believe in science. Open your mind to the possibilities. It's not either or. |
At last Amir replied to @painter24. Anybody see a straightforward apology. Told you so. |
I made nothing up nor did I attribute the last sentence to what he said. That was my takeaway re:"confines of their own listening room." A very logical take on the whole process. Love how you use quotation marks to make it look like I said it was Paul speaking when I never used them. You're getting kinda paranoid...no? As for "hearing through a room", how is that really any different than what I summed up as "people listening to the room and not the speakers." You're down to splitting hairs or as they say, "a distinction without a difference." And Paul did say that the subjects had to wait about half an hour before going in and thereafter, it took a few minutes to adjust, now that they understood the room, their hearing processes having adjusted. A point of that podcast that seems to elude you is that the speakers were tested as they were being made so the final product is fine as is. To go to the bother of testing the speaker for your sake and pick it apart is just overkill. That goes for all other gear as well unless the maker is unscrupulous and cuts corners , which you give the impression of thinking practically everyone does so you have this ready made audience of insecure hobbyists eagerly awaiting your next pronouncement. Nice gig if you can get it. All the best, |
There is no controversy... Measuring gear performance is a good thing, and interesting, especially if someone can falsify audio conmpanies claim...But thats all...Thanks Amir... But once this is said, we learn how to listen only in OUR ROOM, with acoustic experiments...( not by upgrades according to our "tastes" by the way, ) Tuning a room is a long process, incremental one, and has nothing to do with the comparison of two cables or amplifiers according to our " taste" or according to their specs verified ... Give me any relatively good system i will make a room able to serve it well... Then gear choice is a secondary matter compared to acoustic and psycho-acoustic... As Amir said it himself , objectivist and subjectivist focus on gear choice and design, but he did not say in his zeal to convert subjectivists to gear measures falsification that they forget doing so the hugely more powerful acoustic embeddings in the room... And the best amplifier in the world will not cancel mechanical control of vibrations nor electrical high noise floor of the house nor the acoustical bad content of the room ... Also in our room listening music we are not in a laboratory...We create an acoustic to serve our neurological hearing biases...we learn basic acoustic in the process...Blind test is accessory as gear choice is acessory ... There is controversy ONLY if an objectivist want to convert a subjectivist, and only if a subjectivist dont understand that the gear components of his "tasteful choice" so important they are , anyway are secondary to the acoustic embeddings for a full satisfying experience...If not, he will NEVER experience the full potential S.Q. of his gear... Its my experience... Instead of trying to convert people or instead of refusing to read information measures chart, forget the gear for a month ; people must think about acoustic to LEARN HOW TO LISTEN and then to learn how to be able to embed their system properly in the electrical, acoustical and mechanical dimension... Subjectivist and objectivist act sometimes fanatically... No acoustician on earth is a subjectivist or an objectivist...They dont mind about specific gear piece, they tought about their optimal acoustic embeddings...
«Crocodiles had tastes and act accordingly , acoustician had not» -- Anonymus acoustician 😎 «Biases are like savage animals , they must be tamed and controlled, but not erased or negated» -- Anonymus acoustician 😎 |
"Paul Barton, of PSB, worked with Toole, Harmon and others back in the day of speaker testing. Check out Darko's interview with him. Worth a listen. Lots of people like to name drop the audio greats and then go on to reengineer their methods of testing while hoping no one catches on or knows better on just how to do it, fancying themselves as being oh, so, scientific. Paul pointed out that when doing the first round of speaker testing (1/2 hours worth), the tests were thrown out the window due to the fact that the people were listening to the room and not the speakers. Evaluations were all over the place. It's why one has a better chance on getting their ears around a speaker in the confines of their own listening room." That is NOT at all what he said. He is talking about adaptation or how we can "hear through a room." This adaptation takes a few minutes so people in controlled tests needs to be allowed to acclimate a bit. He said nothing whatsoever about "confines of their own listening room." You made that up. Here are some bits I transcribed: ---------------- "Before you were introduced to dr. toole were you designing by ear.. Yes, I was designing based on early days ..... pink noise listening to it and music... when I took the first speaker to Ottawa [at NRC], there were clearly things that could be improved based on theory that speaker is a window.... flat frequency response and dispersion are all a factor." "[measurements at NRC] put a microscope on what I was doing... correlating measurements with listener preference." 1. Most of the people most of the time agree on relative quality of a group of loudspeaker. There is no personal taste when it comes to asking what sounds the most natural. That is the goal to make the recording exactly the musician intended. 2. Properly interpreted set of objective measurements correlate strongly with listener preferences. You can see the measurements and predict how listeners will prefer. [3] Musical tastes and experience is not material. When listeners go into the room, it will take a few minutes for listeners to adjust to the acoustics of the room. After that, they are able to sort out the speakers from room. We did both stereo and mono listening.... did the same experiment in mono and stereo (double blind)...when testing in stereo the anchor [bad speaker] got better in stereo because stereo masks tonal aspects of a speaker. You get better differentiation between sonic differences of speakers in mono than stereo. Most of stereo imaging we hear is in the recording, not the room. The final tuning is done by ear, i.e. ratio of highs to lows. Darko summarizing: "95% is done with measurements last bit is done by ear." Tuning is still done using measurements. Subjecting himself to double blind as he tweaks. "We can measure everything... but the scale of it you judge by ear." ----- So yes, people need to listen to that podcast. It is wonderful and fascinating to see how Darko's mind is shifting toward objective side of things. |
Yes, I think Amir is thoughtful (as in deliberate) and whether he’s interesting or not is a personal choice. But objective? What makes you think he’s objective? He’s one of the most biased people who posts here. Assigning numbers to something is itself no proof of objectivity. I think Amir is a self-promoting measurementalist, and his outbursts here are at odds with his claim to logic and reason. |
Ask any high-end acoustician what the #1 problem with DIY acoustic is and they tell you people creating dead rooms because of this mistake."
Sometimes you are far better off doing nothing than doing something.
I was sorry to read your reaction to Erin's latest video. For sure there was some clickbait involved but Erin's list was just a bit of fun considering he's not really reviewed that many models so far. I still tend to see his channel more as a complimentary one to yours rather than as a direct rival. It might also be worth remembering that some of the most factually accurate and informative channels ever on YouTube also have a pitifully small number of subscribers.
However, as you rightly say Amir, you are the host of the ASR website and it's your decision. |
"Yes my new opinion is he is a measurementophile not an audiophile. We should’ve be talking about him in these forums." Well, I don't know what your old opinion was but the new one couldn't be more wrong. As I have said here, listening tests are more valuable than measurements. The hitch is, you have to do them in controlled manner with statistical rigor. That is time consuming and frankly, not always fun to do. So we resort to not only measurements but also science and engineering of audio. Combine all of this and you get powerful evidence of whether something makes a difference to fidelity and if so, what that impact might be. Go and do random test and all you generate is noise, not data. |
"As Dr. Floyd Toole said "Two ears and a brain respond very differently to a complex sound field and are much more analytical, than an omni-directional mic and analyzer." Is Dr. Toole wrong?" He is absolutely right when it comes to acoustic measurements above transition frequencies of a few hundred hertz. Each ear hears something different due to wavelength of audio becoming smaller relative to the size of our head and torso. The brain then gets involved to adjudicate what the net summary is of the two differing signals from each ear. I have spent weeks of my life literally across multiple forums explaining this including the last drawn out battle in a recent thread on ASR. From my first post there: "2. He is optimizing for his eyes, not ears. Two ears and a brain don't work like a single microphone and a graph as Dr. Toole would again say. The notion that reflections are "bad" is folklore as comprehensive peer reviewed has repeatedly shown. Yet, it has become one of the "internet rules" to chase them using measurements. Doing so will lead to a completely dead room when you are done. Ask any high-end acoustician what the #1 problem with DIY acoustic is and they tell you people creating dead rooms because of this mistake." We are not discussing acoustic measurements here. We are talking about everything leading up to and including speakers. Dr. Toole has dedicated his life in correlating measurements of speakers to good sound. The culminated in a major standard in the form of ANSR/CTA/CEA-2034 which I follow when posting measurements of speakers. Alas, that correlation of measurements to speaker sound is about 70 to 80% predictive. To wit, I have liked speakers that didn't measure that well, and disliked some that did. It could be that my subjective assessments are wrong. Or that we are hitting on less known (e.g. role of directivity in preference). When you go upstream of the speaker though, you will see 100% agreement from Dr. Toole on measurements speaking the truth on whether something is performant or even functional. You don't see anything in Dr. Toole's book about screwing around with cables, power conditioners, etc. So I would not bring in his name in this context. |
"So you see, when I fallaciously sit down, kick back, throw some tunes on, I'm not really thinking graphs, charts, measurements, or how I can be saved from nasty audio manufacturers. " First, thank you for that heartfelt story. I am so sad to hear you about your blood disorder especially when found during that period. I can't possibly put myself in your shoes and imagine what it must be like for yourself, and work conditions you had to deal with. On the above quote, please allow me to say that we in the other camp absolutely do the same thing. Despite our differences, we all share the love for music and what it brings to our lives. None of us are thinking about graphs or anything when listening to wonderful music that moves us. As audiophiles though, as opposed to just music lovers, we also have a second passion and that is chasing equipment that best optimizes that experience. It is in that process that we differ. When it comes to purchasing something new, we seek out objective and reliable data such as measurements, prior research, engineering knowledge, etc. It is then that we look at said "graphs." Graphs teach us about the incredible technology that is behind what we just turn on and listen. We also sense betrayal when casual and incorrect subjective assessments get us to spend tons of money on things that absolutely do nothing for the sound of our system. But serve to bias us enough to then go and tell others they are gifts to audiophiles in how they "remove veils, lower noise floor, blacker backgrounds, faster bass, etc." You can't fault hundreds of thousands of your fellow audiophiles to see value in this. And certainly not shame them by implying that they must think of graphs when enjoying music. On the other hand, you have many fellow subjectivist audiophiles who are constantly worrying whether the most innocent thing in your system is impacting the sound. I know audiophiles who experimented with the cover and screw for their outlets and arrived at the conclusion that yet another veil was removed when those were upgraded. Clearly they are not just sitting back with confidence we have on the objectivist side that none of this matters and our systems are performant. So please, please, please, don't make stereotypes of us the way you are doing with the implication that we don't listen to music but just look at graphs. This accusation is made all the time by subjectivists who don't like measurements. It is untrue, and unkind to the Nth degree.
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Paul Barton, of PSB, worked with Toole, Harmon and others back in the day of speaker testing. Check out Darko's interview with him. Worth a listen. Lots of people like to name drop the audio greats and then go on to reengineer their methods of testing while hoping no one catches on or knows better on just how to do it, fancying themselves as being oh, so, scientific. Paul pointed out that when doing the first round of speaker testing (1/2 hours worth), the tests were thrown out the window due to the fact that the people were listening to the room and not the speakers. Evaluations were all over the place. It's why one has a better chance on getting their ears around a speaker in the confines of their own listening room. It tool at least half an hour for their hearing to settle down before they could go back in and when they did, the very same speakers in the very same room sounded completely different and there was more consensus on what sounded good to them. Their hearing had adjusted to the room and not the speakers. Our ears adapt to a changing environment enough so that with enough time, we can better understand what we hear. We do it automatically when the change isn't that great but we still do adjust. Some call it second nature. What bugs me the most is that those who do the name dropping know damn well the facts I just stated if they have, indeed, looked into these speaker tests and conveniently left out those salient facts, relying on ignorance to carry the day. All the best, |
Amir is interesting, I think he does a lot of good in providing tons of data at no cost, especially in the realm of speaker measurements. However, I find his tone condescending and I do not appreciate how he treats others. His attitude towards Erin has been baffling since their first interaction. I hoped he would mellow out and adopt a more humble persona over time but that does not seem to be in the cards. He clearly views any feedback or suggestions on improvement as an attack. I've learned a lot reading ASR, especially with regards to making electrical measurements at home with high performance ADCs. I find ASR attracts people who value similar things to me (tied with DIY Audio) and I especially enjoy helping others. However, I feel a bit ashamed to participate given Amir's attitude / behavior. The closure of the thread discussing Erin's recent video (but not before Amir got in two final attacks) being a prime example. Michael |
