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?
mahlman

Showing 18 responses by roberttdid

mahlman,

I am shocked not by your post, but how the intended sarcasm went over so many heads :-)

He who lives in a glass house shouldn't cast pebbles: 

https://www.machinadynamica.com/mikro-pebbles.jpg
geoffkait22,850 posts06-22-2020 11:16amGive me a break. Just another in a long line of troll posts by the OP, to whit from 2 years ago,

That wooshing sound that many hear is their last "clue" flying away. That would explain the clueless responses to obvious sarcasm :-)
Judging by your presence, the answer is obvious.
geoffkait22,846 posts06-22-2020 8:40amDid someone forget to leave the Roach Motels out last night?

Maybe the system was accurate, and you don't like accurate systems?  In my experience, musicians will tell me what sounds most accurate, and what sounds most pleasing and often they are not the same, it all depends on the person.



>>>>I’m getting a bad feeling. One of the worst sounding systems I’ve come across was the system of a professional musician. First Oboe, National Symphony of Washington to be precise. It’s not that his components were bad, either, on the contrary. He was a dealer for Cello speakers and electronics.

So, the moral of the story is being a musician doesn’t necessarily guarantee anything. An ordinary man has no means of deliverance. 😬

Just keep tapping the middle of your forehead. Something is bound to happen eventually.

geoffkait22,899 posts06-24-2020 3:39pm
>>>>Is there a Report Whiner button?

Mahlman was making fun of Sokogear's elitist post w.r.t. whether you needed to have a turntable or R-R to be considered an audiophile, then went on to equate it to the difference between Porsche SUV drivers and Porsche sports car drivers (Porschefiles). Surprisingly or not surprisingly that was lost on many.

Geoffy baby, U mind if I call U that?


I prefer to refer to him as "Mr. Pebbles".
Have you ever noticed @mahlman, that Mr. Pebbles only makes fun of the people who don't know much because they are easy marks and attempts to discredit those who do know their stuff because they make him feel inadequate? We should probably go easier on him. That's a lot of baggage to be carrying around from 6am to 10pm.
From what I can tell Mahlman is in the company of friends, while others are in the company of friends of convenience :-)
10 pages .... and the intended humor and sarcasm of the posted topic .... is still lost (on some).  It has been an interesting psychology experiment @mahlhan.
My favorite psychology experiment mahlman is double doors. I can't count the number of times I have walked past a line of people all queued up behind the person in front of them to enter or exit through a single door, only to walk by all of them and open the other door and walk through. The looks are always priceless.
Let me know when you want to borrow that dictionary ISO. You seem to have a difficulty with understanding what certain words mean.
Oh ISO, look at you again, can't help the personal attacks, but it's okay, if you didn't get the intentional irony and sarcasm of the ops post, I could see how you may be a bit sensitive at this point.

May I suggest working harder on your own persona, and worrying less about mine?