There's a whole slew of "audiophiles" on this site who could have made that same video and posted the same inane comments. Having a lot of interest in something doesn't automatically fill your head with knowledge, and it sure doesn't make you any good at it. As with all things, you have to work at it.
Should people who can't solder, build or test their speakers be considered audiophiles?
So, if you bought that Porsche but can only drive it and not fix it do you really understand and appreciate what it is? I say no. The guy who can get in there and make it better, faster or prettier with his own hands has a superior ability to understand the final result and can appreciate what he has from a knowledge base and not just a look at what I bought base. I mean sure you can appreciate that car when you drive it but if all you do is take it back to the dealership for maintenance and repairs you just like the shape with no real understanding of what makes it the mechanical marvel it is.
I find that is true with the audio world too. There are those who spend a ton of money on things and then spend a lot of time seeking peer approval and assurance their purchase was the right one and that people are suitably impressed. Of course those who are most impressed are those who also do not design, build, test or experiment.
I propose that an audiophile must have more than a superficial knowledge about what he listens to and must technically understand what he is listening to. He knows why things work and what his end goal is and often makes his own components to achieve this. He knows how to use design software to make speakers that you can't buy and analyze the room they are in and set up the amplification with digital crossovers and DSP. He can take a plain jane system and tweak it and balance it to best suit the room it is in. He can make it sound far better than the guy who constantly buys new components based on his superficial knowledge who does not understand why what he keeps buying in vain never quite gets there.
A true audiophile can define his goal and with hands on ability achieve what a mere buyer of shiny parts never will. So out comes the Diana Krall music and the buyer says see how good my system is? The audiophile says I have taken a great voice and played it through a system where all was matched and tweaked or even purposely built and sits right down next to Diana as she sings. The buyer wants prestigious signature sound and the audiophile will work to achieve an end result that is faithful true to life audio as though you were in the room with Diana as she sings. The true audiophile wants true to life and not tonally pure according to someones artificial standard.
So are you a buyer or an audiophile and what do you think should make a person an audiophile?
Showing 8 responses by millercarbon
Top Gear would never stoop to sawing a speaker in half. They might crush one with a piano, smash it with a rock, burn with acid, and drop from a crane. Onto a caravan. Well, maybe not a speaker.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK1UQGfnlqY |
Have you ever open the engine lid on a 911? Not a lot of room in there to work on things! Not so fast, Grasshopper! You forgot to say "new" 911. If you open the engine lid on an early air-cooled 911 you will see a couple Weber carbs, and... not much else. The engine was very clearly exposed on a 911. Before watermelons (green on the outside, red on the inside) took over the automotive industry and without anyone ever being asked declared the exhaust fumes coming out must be cleaner than the air coming in. (True- allowable exhaust particulates are lower than the air in many places.) Now thanks to computer aided design hardly a cubic inch of engine bay space is wasted- its all used to meet regulatory requirements. Not only Porsche. Try and find any carmaker today with an engine you can just reach in and put your hands on. Now I don’t know about Spectron but if you were a smart and discerning audiophile and bought a quality tube amp then odds are you will find plenty of room in there and it would be no problem to replace that binding post. Not that it would have broken off in the first place. Tube gear tends to be made to last. Digital ages in dog years. |
Fortunately I started young, planting the Redwood tree that would grow to provide the Rosewood veneer for my DBA. While that was growing I was busy digging the ore I would refine down into voice coils and speaker cables. Fortunately tubes are not that hard, mostly silica for the glass although it took years building my lungs up to where I could get enough vacuum. Speakers actually not that hard, paper pulp cones only take a year or so to make, not bad at all. I did cheat and use melted down plastic bottles for the platter. All was on track and I was close to my goal of being a genuine Real McCoy Audiophile, one who built everything from scratch and trial and error, until I heard wire is directional. That's it. I am done with audio. Fortunately I was saving aluminum cans the whole time and have almost enough to melt down into the case and pistons for a flat six.... |
The OP is of course open to ridicule, but only for the "I propose we define" part. The larger point he is trying to make is perfectly valid. This comes up all the time here. Practically every day. Whole bunch of guys say something all authoritative as if they actually know something, when more often than not its just them repeating something they heard or read somewhere. But everyone says it so it must be true. Baloney! So I disagree, no one has to buy speaker design software and run it and build speakers to be an audiophile. That is just nuts. Especially since its hardly as if doing this is guaranteed to teach you anything other than how to run software, glue, and screw. But at least having done it you almost certainly will have a whole lot more appreciation for the tremendous amount of creativity, engineering, and effort that goes into it. Mostly though what audiophiles should do is simply learn to listen a whole lot better. Its simply not necessary to solder anything. Oh sure even something as simple as swapping out a single cap or diode is gonna elevate your understanding and appreciation like you can’t believe. But you could also simply get your system nicely warmed up and stable, listen real close to a favorite recording, remove and briskly wriggle up a power cord, and listen again. Boom. You may not go on from there to build your own. But believe me, but once you have seen there is no going back. You were an audiophile before. And now? A better one. |