In defense of ABX testing


We Audiophiles need to get ourselves out of the stoneage, reject mythology, and say goodbye to superstition. Especially the reviewers, who do us a disservice by endlessly writing articles claiming the latest tweak or gadget revolutionized the sound of their system. Likewise, any reviewer who claims that ABX testing is not applicable to high end audio needs to find a new career path. Like anything, there is a right way and many wrong ways. Hail Science!

Here's an interesting thread on the hydrogenaudio website:

http://www.hydrogenaud.io/forums/index.php?showtopic=108062

This caught my eye in particular:

"The problem with sighted evaluations is very visible in consumer high end audio, where all sorts of very poorly trained listeners claim that they have heard differences that, in technical terms are impossibly small or non existent.

The corresponding problem is that blind tests deal with this problem of false positives very effectively, but can easily produce false negatives."
psag

Showing 7 responses by nonoise

This dead horse has been flogged for so long that it's turning me into a vegetarian.
To properly assess something you have to immerse yourself in it. Moods and attitude can change very often but we still remain who we are. We assess things quickly but it's honed on a casual basis (learning curve) until it becomes second nature to us. By the time we are adults, our senses are mostly perfected on a level necessary to keep us alive, into old age.

Now comes along a hatred of things audio that uses the "scientific" method to deconstruct what we know to be true. The genesis of that hatred can be attributed to many things (envy, the wherewithal to buy, the refusal to relate, my mother ran off with an audio salesman, etc.).

We are constantly debating the manifestation of ABXing and not examining the latency behind it. It's been debunked time and again and yet it keeps rearing it's head turning these forums into another game of whack-a mole as new angles are tried.

All the best,
Nonoise
Since the flatter and more accurate frequency response was the most desirable I can see why speaker manufacturers should heed the results and simply strive to make speakers that behave as such. It just makes sense.

I also like your note that this is all subjective.
One can't have a universal truth (if I understand that correctly).

All the best,
Nonoise
Swampwalker, totally in the playful spirit intended.

In fact, after posting, I looked back at it and it seemed a bit succinct and could be interpreted in lots of ways. I should have followed it with a :-)

All the best,
Nonoise
All things considered, preferences play a major but under appreciated role. We can all agree on specs but in the final analysis we'll pick what we like.

All the best,
Nonoise
Jea48, I think if they did it the way you recommend, then we'd have nothing to argue about. :-)