Yes. No. It’s always been the best of times or the worst of times. Everything is relative to your expectations, desires and means of participation! Enjoy the ride and ignore the irrelevant.
Have we lost civility and respect on Audio forums?
I think we have. I have seen many discussion on audio forums and how nasty they can become when you have people disagreeing. Seems like there are a lot more know it alls now. I been in 20 years and I can still learn. But I also know I know quite a bit. Like cables can enhance the sound and higher end well designed gear can truly be ear candy special. Is this just on audio forums or the internet period.
308 responses Add your response
I thought i was pretentious ego... And i am a bit for sure or perhaps more than a bit and i apologize...😁 But some beat me patronizing every hobbyist as deceptive and deceiving because we dont use only and essentially double blind test as the only factor to assess objective sound quality in our acoustic room or in our living room ... Fascinating human indeed ... I myself affirm that improvised simple blind test are enough in our optimization process ... I just bought a low cost pre-amplifier i dont need a double blind test to perceive immediate improvement... Why ? Because aural memory is associated with the body and not just the brain... Sound memory is not a book stored on a shelves... Sound qualia are associated with the body movement and reaction too because memorizing sound and producing sound are associated ... Also aural memory is of two kind : conscious memory manifesting as clear thought and unconscious deeper memory in the body emerging as emotion and feeling... i dont remember consciously for a long time the difference between two sounds impressions for sure , but relaxed with enough time my body and my associated emotions with the different sounds inform me on a subconcious level and i feel at ease with the sound or not ... I dont need a double blind test as claim scottwheel with a rapid switching to feel my emotion... I need time and relaxation in my acoustic room... I connected the low cost pre-amplifier i received today and , knowing my room/ system i felt an improvement ... Scottwheel will call me deceived and deceiving in my review because i did not pass a double blind test BEFORE writing my review... Some people were deceived in the past by some very costly high end products for nevermind the reason , and now they crusade against any subjective impression as almost a fraud if not verified by double blind test... For me simple improvised blind test is enough and not even always necessary ... Myself i was never frustrated because i never owned high end costlier product as scottwheel , save vintage one, and i always relied on my creativity not on double blind test ... I think scottwheel deceive himself with this mantra ...He dont even believe it himself ...😊 I hope for his sake he dont believe it himself ...😁
| |
I'm a DIY guy out of financial necessity. I make my cables, out of the best Beldon or Cardas I can afford, with the best hardware I can put my hands on. I freely admit I have copied commercial maker's designs. I have recapped both of my Kenwood KD TT's, a 500 and a 550. I have built Heathkit and other (like from plans...) amplifiers...I repair my CD players, and gear, it's not just smoke inside the wires for me. My complaint is this society's headlong rush into Orwell's 1984.... History started when you were born, NOTHING of importance happened before then, if it did we can change it (Stalin, Mao, and Che have been re-imagined as heroes? And heroes re-invented as criminals?). If you can't buy it. it just doesn't exist, or have an intrinsic value. (who had the price tag on her hat on Hee-Haw? Who's even seen Hee-Haw or heard Buck and Roy?) Dogma is knowledge, do not question the dogma (you want to be on the right side, don't you?) I do not want to be lectured to by a someone who wouldn't recognize a JBL Paragon if it was eating his B&W's. But at the same time I don't mind being taught. I'm sad that an old ear who can remember, let alone still use, something from the dawn of Hi-Fi (when it had to be figured out and knowledge was shared freely and joyfully...) be belittled by somebody who already knows it all, and has no tolerance for those that don't know it all, or know different, and smugly knows, JUST KNOWS that he knows it all, and you don't phewww, I need a nap, or a time out or something... wonder what my blood sugar is :-) | |
| Post removed | |
Exactly right ...Especially when it is done not on a statistical way with a crowd in a laboratory where the number of subjects is crux of the matter for the average results, but in a confortable living room with the owner listener own perceptive habits ...
| |
@puptent look. I been doing this 20 years. Because I sell cables people think in trying to shill. Most of us are smart enough to know what we are hearing in our audio systems by this point. We know when it sounds better and when it doesn’t. Not bragging but I have some seriously high engineered equipment in my system that I bought after months and years of research. Then one guy comes on and expects me and others to accept his way and only his way then personally attacks me, my integrity and those who agree with me. WHAT A JOKE! | |
No, they didn't. You keep repeating it as if were fact or it will be since you use it like a chant or a mantra. If you'd look up that conversation Darko had with Paul Barton (who was part of the team of Toole, Olive and others) you'd stop saying that. But you won't so here's a link to that conversation. They used the exact same speaker positions so all the room reflections would be the same so there had to be a pause to swap out speakers. No synchronized quick switching. You can quick switch with cables but that would negate what the masters learned about human hearing and how our brains work. People need time to adjust to properly ascertain what they're listening to. I was off a bit on the length of the listening sessions as they were of 20 minute durations and not half an hour. 20 minutes spent listening and 20 minutes spent not listening. The podcast is a great listen and worth anyone's time. All the best, | |
Yup. Civility is dead. Several months ago I read a comment, or a post, from an audiophile even older that I am, who was wondering how to re calibrate suggested stylus force numbers to "wet". Man oh man, did the flamers come out. If it hadn't been so sad and demoralizing.... It took me awhile to come back, I have no idea if the OP folded his tent or not. It isn't a problem unique to this forum. The ascendance of dogma over reason seems to be complete. I have literature from Thorens showing wet and dry stylus force tables. I have cartridge data sheets showing both... But the experts had no trouble coming down on a person who was just looking for usable knowledge. We are surrounded by those who think they can lift themselves up by pushing others down. these are dark days | |
BTW I think any constructive common interest or hobby like the pursuit of good sound tends to bring otherwise disparate people more together than the norm. That is a good thing! Just not all the way all the time. Sports and sports fans are another good example of how otherwise disparate groups can be brought together. All it takes sometimes is just one common interest. The more the merrier. Don’t let the politician’s divide you! | |
It’s always the extremists of any persuasion that cause the problems. The more people moderate and learn to respect and perhaps even learn from others who happen to not think exactly the same way about something, the better off we will all be. I think narcissism or perhaps just mere selfishness tends to be the driving force. If you care about others, you will respect them and value their opinions. If they act like a yahoo, then all all bets are off. Everyone just be civil! IS that too much to ask? Apparently so. As was pointed out above, conflict is a natural thing that is a part of Homo Sapiens as well as most every other species on the earth that battles for survival. But Homo Sapiens have the ability to learn and maybe evolve? Or maybe not so much. The jury is still out apparently. | |
| Post removed | |
Familiar listening condition in a relaxed mood with our biases and listening in artificial controlled conditions imposed on us trying to eliminate some biases ... In the two cases we use the ears/brain biases blind or not... As i said in my post ... I am not against double blind test, this would be stupid ... But they are impractical most of the times for most people ... Simple blind test is enough ...
No objectivist pick his gear by double blind test first... They read the electrical specs first ... They did not most of the times anyway double blind testing of their choices when the electrical specs are good, they bought it ..😊 You misread my post and truncate my sentence of his context : the context was THE GEAR CHOICES PICKING UP CONDITIONS...This is what separate these two groups..Not the acceptation or not of double blind test which is only here a rhetorical and ideological posture impractical to do anyway ... No objectivist go buying an amplifier blinding his eyes in a store to pick it up ...Do you ? he read the electrical specs and trust that first ... He listen after ... I think that you are an "objectivist" fanatic by the way you read my neutral and conciliating answer to you and trying to distort it for the sake of your double blind test obsession ... ... Sorry but for me objectivism made no sense no more than subjectivist taste as the main ways to create a system room with satisfaction using acoustics basic and simple blind test and ears training in simple acoustic experiment ... Are you here for wise discussion as your last post suggested to me or are you here to impose double blind testing as the only way to pick the gear or testing it on all people here ? Even Toole do not pick his personal system for his living room AFTER a double blind test ...He pick it as any sane individual by listening to it , reading the specs and thinking about his room acoustic content, geometry, topology and dimensions ... I am pretty sure that he will not come here nullifying any person testimony as meaningless if not put on double blind test ... He is a human first not a scientist doing statistical studies 24 hours on 24 hours ... Sound qualities can be defined by parameters but in these set of parameters, they are biases coming from personal history , Toscanini biases are not on the same nature than Toole biases or mine ... We use these biases, generally not in a laboratory to define what is human hearing in a general way, but for the enjoyment in a relax way or for our work habits with our EXCEPTIONAL way each of us to hear sound , deceived or not, with all the shade of grey between reality and illusion which is the "meaning" territory ... Eliminating all biases , which is impossible anyway, may be at the end also eliminitating meanings , the ears is not a microphone but a subjective part of ourself, not a tool ... Why is it impossible to eliminate all biases ? Because the way we listen is with all part of ourself, we decipher sound as meanings for us with our biases acquired from the womb till today... Only ignorant think that it is possible to listen without biases... Eliminating one bias as sight is one thing , eliminating all internal biases is impossible by the definition of what hearing is ..
We listen with our biases... You are obsessed by the elimination of biases... I am not... I am interested by the training of my biases... As any musicians ...Occasional simple blind test is enough ... Keep your double blind test as obsession , i will use my simple blind test occasionnally as test , and i will enjoy my biases ...
| |
Good post and interesting answer thanks ...
A subjectivist use ONLY his ears to decide that a system is good or bad... the objectivist will not say that in this way, they will state that the subjectivist listen with his biases and tastes to pick up gear...
An objectivist will pick up gear by the electrical measured specs mainly, but a subjectivist will not agree to this bias favoring the measuring tool over the ears trained or untrained biases...
Then Scottwheel your description of the objectivist and subjectivisdt is at the same time very good but beside the point and beside the quarrels in opposite audio forums as audiogon and ASR ...
You definition is very good because by the choice of names of professionals you associated with the two sides , you picked very wise people with divergent attitude but convergent goal ...Psychoacoustics is a science used by them all and this science fly over these marketing and ideological postures of these two sides as manifested in opposite audio forum as audiogon and ASR for example ... It is why your definition is very good but also miss the point which can explain the fanatical quarrel roots itself : the choice of pieces of gear based on listening biases or on electrical specs ...
A living room is not an acoustic laboratory ... In the laboratory Toole select subject as himself with their ears and biases and study them objectively trying to eliminate the biases gradually by blind tests or other methods of selection...In a living room the listener is not tested and very relax in familiar condition ...
Psychoacoustics tell us that the best listening conditions are those of the living room or any familiar acoustic environment ...Not the laboratory , the living room in relaxation is better for memory, (true memory or fabricated) or for acuity ( true acuity or fabricated one ) ... Acuity under deep relaxation of the body may be increased way over any test condition... This is why psychoacoustic use statistical method and not blind test of individuals to eliminate exception and study the average listener as representative of humans in general...
But listeners are not laboratory rats...For the most part they identify with the subjectivist attitude not with the analysis of a dial nor with statistical elimination of biases or statistical studies of the biases untrained or trained as with musicians ...
Then as you capture well ,with your description of some individuality carefully chosen by you , the subjectivist and objectivist separation, as such you missed the occasion to put the emphasis on this quarrel derived from the marketing imperatives of gear choices; which quarrel is an ARTIFICIAL and IMPOSED distinction that makes no sense in psycho-acoustics nor in acoustics ...on that we understand then each other you and me ...
Your description so good it was as i said omit the source of this separation : marketing methods to sell the gear ... And your very good description of these intelligent and wise exceptional professionals mask and hide in an involontary way the root origin of these battling crowds of ignorant subjectivist and objectivist fanatics , which mock one another all day long in the name of taste or in the name of their electrical reading tools and in the name of double blind test ( i myself as most people designing their system/room use simple blind test ) ...
We must become conscious and wise....We must go over these ideological separation in the crowd and act more as the personnalities you had wisely picked ...😊
| |
...and I’m going to be totally rude and inconsiderate, ignoring all the fine (and the not-so-much) discussion and dis’ing that has occurred since pg. 2, 12/10, 8:14pm to reply to: @2psyop , and Yes, I agree with you as well. There isn’t ever an adequate excuse for rude and inconsiderate behaviors. But there ’they’ are....🤷♂️ One can dial back the millennia to the one-celled organisms that started this whole morass, when 2 competed for some bit of nutrient where the ’winner’ not only got the bit from the other and consumed its’ competition in some unconscious sort of spite.... There’s been an awful lot of it, wayyyy beyond the warp and weft of this dialog...
| |
A subjectivist judges sound quality based on their personal preferences. The same way someone would judge food or art. If one finds the sound to their liking and then declares that to be good that is subjectivism. An objectivist judges sound quality on accuracy to some reference. Maybe the recording or maybe live sound. So we had people like Harry Pearson who cared nothing about measurements or science but was an objectivist because he felt there was an objective reference, “the absolute sound” the sound of live acoustic music, against which the accuracy of audio playback could be judged. Then you have people like Floyd Toole and Sean Olive who strictly evaluated sound quality in their research using proper time synchronized quick switching double blind tests but are subjectivists. All of their studies were based on listener preferences. All scoring of their tests were done with subjective ratings. And yet many would label Harry Pearson as the poster child for subjectivism in audio and would consider Toole and Olive to be poster children for objectivism in audio. | |
Define the difference between subjectivist and objectivist please ?
| |
“im done. I tried to get away from him but he has an apple AirTag on my posts. I’m done. I wonder what he has in his system or if he even has a system.” honestly, I don’t even know what an Apple AirTag is. As for my system… I am in China working until the end of February. When I get back I am diving into a major rebuild of my dedicated stereo room. After that I am looking at possibly doing one major upgrade with the Trinnov Waveforming technology. It should all be done sometime in late April. I expect the results to be state of the art. I live in Las Vegas. If you find yourself in our little town you would be welcome to come hear for yourself whether or not it is state of the art. | |
@wharfy @jacobsdad2000 im done. I tried to get away from him but he has an apple AirTag on my posts. I’m done. I wonder what he has in his system or if he even has a system. | |
He is not a troll ... He said it himself in a post above ... Stop calling everybody who dissent with you trolling ... He was only someone who was credulous enough to buy anything very costly and did not take it lightly when he discovered the hard way that price tags dont equate acoustics knowledge ...Read his posts ... Then if i read him correctly he embarked in a crusade even against his will against audiophiles and audiophile market products putting all of them in the same bag ...Like a children reacting to a negative experience always in the same way without any discerning ability ... Now he does not even believe his ears if he is not doubly blind ...Amazing human ! The very interesting part of his audio life , the BACCH filters , he dont spoke about it much here , too busy to impose double blind test to any cables owners and repeating the same song ... He is not nasty but polite as much as most of us by the way ...Blindly opinionated is not being nasty ... We must stay civil and polite ... Arguments matter ... Name calling is childish ... If i criticize in one sentence his saying i will say that it is complete misunderstanding of science to impose in any one listening room the same standard protocol on the listener than in a laboratory... The way we listen music is necessarily in a relaxed way in our own subjective world ... Meaningful acoustic experience of someone relaxing in his room cannot be negated as such because it is "unscientific" ... Sound experience can be objectively parametrized and it is, thanks to great engineers and physicist , but it stay also a pure subjective experience ... It is not taste, but taste there is ....😁
😊 «Ridicule kill everyone but kill "scientists" in a special way »-- Anonymus Nobel looser 🧐
| |
| Post removed | |
@calvinj -Mad is as mad does. The irony is music brings the performers and listeners joy. David | |
@wharfy you are so right. I had to order another driver. They were special made. 800$. I had to spend 200 getting it repaired. But it is as good as new. Some of them are angry. Mad to be mad. Mad cause you spent a lot on your system. Mad because we won’t let them tell us how stupid we are for doing it! Just mad. Just nasty. Wouldn’t dare talk this tough in person. Lol. Funny. | |
“So if you hear a difference with your basic cables compared to others out there, you won’t believe your own ears until you find a way to measure it?” If I can reliably identify a difference under controlled listening I would believe I heard a difference. By the way, I did not say all cables sound the same. Some are actually colored. If you could not reliably identify a difference between your cables and basic cables under controlled listening tests would you believe your ears? ”It must suck to be you.”
Hate to disappoint you but life is good. But more to the point, I am enjoying audio far far more now than I ever did when I bought into all the BS and was wasting enormous amounts of money on “state of the art high end” cables and power conditioners that only provided a buyers euphoria and no real improvement in sound. Once I got off that merry go round and started focusing on things that matter, using basic understanding of measured performance and correlations between that and personal preferences, and pursuing cutting edge technology both the quality of sound and the enjoyment of my system went up by leaps and bounds.
| |
@calvinj -"My daughter punched a hole in the cone of my Gato FM6 speaker when she was 2. lol 😂 I lost my mind that day." Ouch! I hope you were able to repair it. I suspect others on the A'gon chat board can share stories of pets, family, friends, and others who did "something" that caused understandably apoplectic responses. Someone I private messaged with here described the nastier A'gon members as angry adults posting from their parents' basements. I got a big chuckle from that. David | |
| Post removed | |
@cleeds you make a lot of valid points. | |
@wharfy i remember when that happened to you. My daughter punched a hole in the cone of my Gato FM6 speaker when she was 2. lol 😂 I lost my mind that day. We had the biggest kid adult daddy daughter argument in the world that day. She won’t even go near my set up anymore. lol. But I agree I post a thread like this. I get people calling me a shill. Saying I’m hurting in sales etc. look we let you try before you buy at INFIGO cables. It’s crazy some of the disrespectful stuff people say. Like we are 5 year olds who can tell a difference in how smthg sounds. Lol 😂 Folks will take a thread and turn it into world war 6 if you let them. | |
This guy has extreme confirmation bias, so it's unlikely he'd hear a difference:
| |
So if you hear a difference with your basic cables compared to others out there, you won't believe your own ears until you find a way to measure it? Must suck to be you. All the best, | |
Real conversation is possible when we recognize that our mutual conceptions could be and are usually "beliefs" ... Using double blind test to protect your belief in a set of electrical measures as the ONLY measure of truth is not science. it is techno-cultism... I already used simple blind test many times... I did not need to submit to a double blind test to convince you ... My system/room convince me and it is enough ... There is only one person here accusing others of "irrational beliefs" and asking before any discussion to double blind test standard... Everybody who did not do it is irrational and superstitious gullible consumers for you.. Do you see that we are not the only one with a "belief" here ? All the others here live with a set of perception which are well founded or not, deceptive or not, anyway they "perceive" it as real for them ...Their perceptions can be falsified by themselves without need for your double blind public test... They may use simple blind test for a cable for themselves... As i did... It is enough for someone who want to create his system experience... Your belief that all audio phenomenon must be reduced to a known set of electrical measures cannot be falsified ..it is not science but techno-cultism... Do you get the difference... Nobody here saying that their cables make a difference try to convince you, they only state their experience as a fact for them , right or wrong ... The refusal of their experience as only that, a subjective testimony, by you in the name of an unfalsifiable limited set of electrical measures and in the name of a future impractical double blind test is like religious propaganda ...It is the reverse attitude of high price cables marketers publicity... I hate publicity and dogmas be it from ideologues in techno cultism or from marketers... Myself i will keep simple blind test as a useful tool with no public objectivist official protocol as enough for my needs ...I am not into scientist faith, i am in the simple journey to create minimal acoustical satisfaction threshold ...And by the way i modified all my low cost cables myself ...
| |
Logical fallacy, ad hominem: "Ad hominem ...Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself." And - you’ve made a circular argument to boot! That’s another logical fallacy: "Circular reasoning ... also known as circular logic) is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with." And now you claim:
C’mon. You’ve insisted you know all there is to know on some audio matters.
| |
| Post removed | |
Wise post! thanks it was a pleasure to read... I think the same ... I call my actual experience with well embedded low cost system : a minimal acoustical satisfaction threshold passed ... With costlier gear someone with acoustics knowledge may hope for a maximal acoustical satisfaction threshold... i prefer to spoke about these two threshold experience than speaking about low-fi, mid-fi or Hi-fi Why ? Because nevermind the gear price, anybody aiming for the best acoustic experience must adress , not only gear synergy , but acoustical refine control of the speakers/room , mechanical controls of vibrations/resonance, electrical control over the noise floor levels of the house-room-gear and also about EMI RFI controls... And even other secondary aspects ... For subjectivist all is about taste which is not even wrong because acoustics factors are first and last objective parameters not tastes ... For objectivist all is about electrical measures over taste... But if audio is not taste, taste there is in audio ...It is called ears/brain trained or untrained biases , innate or/and acquired biases... Biases are not bad or good by the way ...😊 We are not in the obligation to negate them in a blind test ...We can use them constructively in our own learning audio journey...If someone sell a product or design a product blins test are useful in the process ... It is why i prefer psycho-acoustics basic to these two arguing opposite sides... I believe our ears can be trained by acoustic experiments...And music education...
We can learn as much with a low cost system than someone with a high cost system...Or not... Learning is an attitude... Musical ectasy with good sound in a minimal or in a maximal acoustical threshold is possible... We must learn the basic to be happy and not push ourself in frustration race of purchase...
| |
Speaking for myself, I feel that I’ve gained respect for the experiences and opinions of other audiophiles by participating in these forums. I came in with my biases, expressed my doubts about some of the claims I read, and through further discourse have become more aware of the limits of my personal experience. Some of the stuff I will never be willing to invest in due to the very high prices, so I’ll never be able to get the extended experience to better understand what it might have to offer. I’d still like to see more concrete evidence about exactly what these ultra high end things do, but I’m far less inclined to quickly write off their value for those who are able and willing to pay. I feel I better understand my position in the spectrum of audiophile experience and expertise, and as a result I’m happily satisfied that while my choices do not reflect what is absolutely best, maybe not even the best I could afford if I was better informed, they are what fulfill my desires to a substantial degree while fitting within my means. I keep participating to become better informed. Over time it seems to be paying off because I've never had a system I enjoy as much as what I now have. | |
“ Your way of quick switching is just a parlor trick, whereas the one you said I made up was actually done by the real experts.” Real experts know that the gold standard for scientific studies isn’t a “parlor trick” and understand why time synchronized quick switching comparisons are mandatory for comparisons. Since you seem to actually acknowledge Toole and Olive as actual legitimate science why don’t you read u on what they have to say about it. I’ll give you a hint, there is a reason HK spent 7 figures on their speaker shuffler to do DBT comparisons. Do some real research for a change | |
By the sound of your statement, it looks like you never went and listened to Darko’s interview with Paul Barton, did you? Your way of quick switching is just a parlor trick, whereas the one you said I made up was actually done by the real experts. I have to give you credit for sticking to your guns. That’s some real obstinance. All the best, | |
@tomic601 "Lord…i had banished from memory the Cat and the destroyed REF5 se …… instant PTSD…." LOL. Me too! I liken it to a teenager wrapping his dad's sports car around a mail box. | |
It’s true 90% of what gets posted here is opinion and everybody has one. That’s pretty much the case with high end audio in general. Some opinions carry more weight than others and people may battle along the way to wear the crown of hifi know-it-all.. That’s perfectly OK if done civilly. Opinions from credible sources can be valuable if one does all their homework properly. But behaving like a yahoo in order to win some silly hifi argument is simply petty in my eyes. With all the problems in the world, people want to fight about their luxurious hifis? Please, give everyone a break! For those who value concrete facts, other sites that focus more on actually measuring the performance of gear will add a lot of value. If that matters to you, you might even save quite a bit of money and time along the way.
| |
You are completely wrong here... The two side subjectivist and objectivist are not divided between scientists on one side and superstitious dudes on the other side ...😁 This division exist because some people trust first and often more their own hearing habits and personal histories in listening to create their own audio system than only measured specs ... The other side trust mostly if not only and completely the electrical measures specs of the pieces of gear over their own ears to create their own audio system ...They ask for double blind test precisely for this reason about any perceived change for any claims about sound qualities ... The fact that you mischaracterized the real distinctions between the two groups by reducing one side to supertitious or self deception and the other side to be scientific , reveal your own partiality and misunderstanding .. i myself identify with no side... the two sides may be beside the main acoustics points and matter for different reasons pertaining to their own divergent biases... I trust my ears but i learned that we can trust it only by acoustics experiments ...then i am neither a subjectivist nor an objectivist... But it is more wise to trust his common sense and ears when buying something than only confide in measured specs after blind test ... Nobody is against blind test but this is an impractical way to design an audio system in his acoustic environment by the way ... but it is useful if our mission in life is to mock and debunk an owner of a costly cable for sure ... 😊 Then you speak as an ideologue or a propagandist... Common sense is my preference ...And psycho-acoustics where subjectivity and objectivity are correlated and studied as not separable...
| |
