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Most Honest Audio Magazine?

I subscribe to Stereophile and I really enjoy reading it but something happened last year that made me raise an eyebrow as to the authenticity of their intentions. Remember the review of the B&W Nautilus 805's? The original reviewer raved about them and rated them "Class A Restricted Low Frequency". Shortly thereafter they demoted the same speaker down to "Class B Restricted Low Frequency". This really hurt the magazine's credibility in my eyes. My first conclusion was that they didn't want to upset the other manufacturers who produced "Class A" products at far higher prices. Shouldn't a trade journal give credit to the truly remarkable products especially when they are produced for relatively decent prices? It's unfortunate that the advertising dollars of the megabuck manufacturers bullied a stellar product into receiving a less than stellar final rating. I'm wondering if this hasn't happened before. I've since heard from some of my audio buddies that corruption does indeed exist in the audio press; everything from reviewers being related to manufacturers to reviewers being offered products for a song (pun intended). Please share your thoughts and experiences when it comes to audio magazines and let me know which ones you'd rate best and worst. Putting together a great system is hard enough without having to sift through the sometimes suspicious advice of those publications who purport to advance the hobby.
canadianguy

Showing 1 response by david12

david12
1,454 posts
 
I think the best you have to accept is that a magazine won't review a bad bit of kit. You could argue, what's the point? If it is useless, why waste the paper. I have spoken to reviewers and editors and they say the same. They will call a manufacturer and say "Do you really want a review of this kit?"

If they print bad reviews they won't get any advertising or any kit to review. That is a problem for sites/ mags not taking advertising, like Bound for Sound and the UK magazine HiFicritic. They can find it difficult to get stuff in to review, manufacturers are afraid they have no influence over the outcome, without an advertising budget to withdraw.

You can read between the lines of lukewarm reviews, so the magazines are'nt useless. I use them to become aware of new products to look out for at shows or consider for an audition
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