The Audio Science Review (ASR) approach to reviewing wines.
Imagine doing a wine review as follows - samples of wines are assessed by a reviewer who measures multiple variables including light transmission, specific gravity, residual sugar, salinity, boiling point etc. These tests are repeated while playing test tones through the samples at different frequencies.
The results are compiled and the winner selected based on those measurements and the reviewer concludes that the other wines can't possibly be as good based on their measured results.
At no point does the reviewer assess the bouquet of the wine nor taste it. He relies on the science of measured results and not the decidedly unscientific subjective experience of smell and taste.
That is the ASR approach to audio - drinking Kool Aid, not wine.
@laomanInteresting product. Thanks for bringing it up. Bruno is a measurement-first engineer. Anything he makes is guarantee to measure well, but is not a guarantee they will sound good.
There is so much discrepancy between how the Tambaqui sounds, vs its pricetag, vs its measurement. I’m gonna make an argument and say it’d have made more sense for everyone, Amir included, if the Tambaqui measured bad instead.
Full disclosure: I have not heard the Tambaqui
1) Based on owners impression and reviews. The Tambaqui performs on the level of Chord Dave, and DCS Bartok. The pricetag reflects their performance as well. Chord Dave - $14,400. Tambaqui - $13,400. Bartok $20,950. Bartok is 50% more but I digress (I've been told Bartok used to be very close in price to the Tambaqui).
3) Topping D90se - $900. Measures GOOD. It measures so good that it is nearly identical to the Tambaqui. $900 vs $13,400. Nearly the same measurements. Huh?
4) I’ve owned the D90se. It sounded bad, subjectively bad. There is just no way the D90se would sound as good as the Tambaqui despite the measurements. The measurements for these 2 products make no sense, no sense in price, no sense in performance.
So to conclude, the measurements make no sense, Amir once again proves his data is meaningless. 3 products of similar performance, 2 measured poorly, 1 measured great. Makes no sense. Logical conclusions cannot be found at ASR nor from Amir. The only thing that made sense here is the pricetag (kind of).
Erin showcased a significant problem with himself and with ASR. For those that don't know, Erin is a part of ASR. He's also purely a measurement guy, with a bit of subjective listening in his reviews.
Here's what happened. There's a Mcintosh amp and a pair of Mono class D amplifier that are db-tuned. Cannot be more different on measurements. Virtually apples and oranges. And the issue? Erin cannot tell the difference. Not a single difference.
What is the point of all these data when the end user can't tell the difference? You might say, well it's just Erin, but I've come across many people that can't tell the difference. People at AVS.
Respect to Erin, at least he doesn't try to hide the truth and says it like it is. HUGE RESPECT. If Amir did the same test he would fail just as miserably.
@oberoniaomnia You mention a point where I just want to bang my head against a refrigerator every time I hear it. Something ASR loves to use as their defense also.
This is one of ASR biggest problem.
"If it measures the same, it sounds the same".
"if it measures different, it’s beyond human hearing, so it also sounds the same".
Like come on give it a break.
1) Cables sound different and you guys measure it to be the same.
2) Told you guys to measure capacitance and inductance of a cable and you say it’s not audible.
3) ASR says they are calling out the BS in the industry but they have become the same demons they repelled. ASR promotes a bunch of mediocre sounding Topping products as world-class.
4) We have good sounding products and you measure it bad
5) You guys measure bad sounding products and say it’s amazing.
Hear me out, what if a poorly measured product is actually a great technical product and hence it sounds good? That’d actually make more sense.
@mdaltonProviding consistent measurement for DACS, but the data doesn't seem useful. I or you can't look at the data and say this better measured one will sound better. Which is where I question its usefulness. If I can't predict the sound quality based on the measurement, then what good is the measurement?
i’ve never thought about it in that way and that’s an interesting perspective. Not sure I completely agree with the conclusion, but certainly an interesting premise
What are the possible aspects of music you can hear?
Frequency
Amplitude
Duration
Accuracy to original signal
These are exceptionally easy to test, the flavor of wine is impossible to test we don't even know exactly how taste or smell actually work.
Audio is simple to test and duration is the part of physics that mankind is the most adept at, musicality, fluffy descriptions of ambiguous terms only cost you money and show how gullible we are.
ASR provides a helpful ’yardstick’ of objective measurements. In a world where many are either forced or choose to buy components that they cannot audition, I believe ASR provides a valuable service. And even for those of us who have had a chance to audition prospective purchases, when caught betwixt and between two pieces of gear based on our subjective evaluations, again, ASR provides a helpful yardstick. Cheers!
LOL! ASR s faulted for evaluating equipment based on measurements (which are actually relevant to audio such as frequency response, distortion), and then you adduce measurements that are INaudible (capacitance, resistance, maybe also color?) to support your claim of differences? LOL!!! Can you tell from listening that cable has 10 µOhm/m vs 20 µOhm/m? (no idea about actual values, as they are irrelevant to audibility).
The real question is, are those different values audible, i.e. human perceptible? ASR makes excellent case that they are not, based on measurements that are RELEVANT to audio. That is why Amir makes frequent reference to threshold of hearing to put measurements into context of human experience.
Yes, Amir uses equipment that can measure differences way below the threshold of hearing, which is good scientific practice. Make sure you can possibly show differences relevant to the question at hand above noise floor of measuring equipment. I use scanning electron microscopy to look at 1–10 µm structures, although light microscopy could theoretically resolve down to 250 nm; in practice less due to diffraction, but that's a different story.
Re burden of proof, of course, nobody HAS to do anything. This is in context of scientific hypothesis testing, and there H0 is always no difference. Without having to show anything, scientifically there is no difference. QED.
While I wouldn’t characterize myself as “ an ASR supporter”, I do think ASR has provided valuable insight in several areas.
1) DACs - Providing consistent measurements for every DAC they test is helpful, though as others have suggested, these are useful data points that are certainly not exhaustive with respect to how DACs actually sound.
2) Power conditioning products - As I mentioned previously, this is an area of the industry where I believe there is a fair amount of misinformation and even fraud. So I think some of the work ASR has done here has helped prevent some audiophiles from spending money on products that may have no - or even negative - effects on the sound of their systems.
3) Network switches - Same as power conditioning products, only more.
@samureyex
As much as I dislike the cult like behaviour of ASR, the Mola Mola Tambaqui did measure very well and is regarded as a very high quality Dac.
@oberoniaomnia"So the burden or proof is with those who think there is a difference"
There should be no "burden of proof" in these matters. The burden of proof is for the individual to decide. Not for us to prove to the rest of the community what we can clearly hear.
Luckily for us that can hear the differences, we have gone beyond standard testing and used our own ears to decide what we can hear. Shocking really! And when these differences can be repeated numerous times and we hear the same difference when gear is changed. And when even non "audiophile" friends and family can admit they hear a marked difference when it comes to cabling, power conditioning and amplification, then clearly we don't need empirical data to tell us there is a difference.
The "burden of proof" is on the engineer to use their technical knowledge to create a product that creates a value added proposition to the end user. The only burden of proof we need is with our own ears.
But the reason why we call out establishments like ASR is because some people take their opinion and measurements as reality and as the sole place to make decisions regarding their gear. When in fact, it is far from the entire understanding of what is happening in an audio system. Valuable information? Yes. Contains every variable to help you decide the right gear for you? No
To be fair I still can't tell much of a difference in interconnects...
My original comment was about Penfolds's Grange which was rejected by French critics until it was tasted blind, as related in the DVD. I accidentally quoted about a second Australian wine because I thought it was the same occasion but sometimes history repeats and I got it wrong!
I tend to agree with you about Grange - it is not a wine I have ever bought, but it sometimes featured in our monthly blind tastings against three similar reds. Every time, it was ranked bottom, to the chagrin of our host, by all attendees and across two bottles.
Now I do have a couple of magnums of Henshke Hill of Grace in my basement ...
"@richardbrandthat's a cute story. Are you making that up? 🤔"
That story is just that - a story. It is not correct.
By the way, even though Grange is the dearest Aust wine it is by far not the best.
@richardbrand Ain't no way the binding post will even up your bumps. Even if it did, you still wouldn't want a pure copper spade, the oxygen and humidity will destroy it over time.
So this circles us back to the initial point. A good connector would have a mix of different metals, which will inevitably cause different degree of signal degradation. How much will depend on the technology and alloy involved.
Now you have 2 cables of varying signal degradation, in which universe would you expect them to measure and sound the same?
Are you telling me silver and copper sound the same? They have different electrical properties, different capacitance and inductance, so the question is, do you think they both sound the same?
No, I am just suggesting that your assertion that speed is faster in silver is wrong.
Capacitance and inductance are primarily characteristics of the cable construction.
If we narrow the debate to speaker cables (that is high current, low frequency domain), in my opinion there should be an audible difference between cables if they differ in say resistance (as copper and silver cables of the same diameter would).
The primary reason is that loudspeaker impedances vary greatly with frequency, especially in cross-over regions. The impedance of the speaker and the resistance of the wire are in series. Changing the wire resistance means relatively more or less power is delivered to the speaker over different parts of the audible spectrum, changing the tonal balance for those with golden ears.
Also pure copper is far from an "excellent connector". For the same reason you stated, its softness and malleability, the opposite of what a good connector represent.
The malleability of pure copper means that those ’uneven’ bumps present on any surface get squished into the holes, providing more contact area especially in spade configuration. The ideal connector has no discontinuities and no contamination - I am thinking of friction or pressure welds.
Here’s another video of Erin with even more amplifiers. A traditional Mcintosh with a house-sound and piss-poor measurement, vs a pair of Mono class D with "better" measurements with a focus on pure neutrality.
What’s the listening result? He cannot hear a difference. Only past 95 db where he starts to feel the Mctinosh has an edge in power.
Makes you wonder why even bother with Sinads and THD in the first place. Between you and me, I’m willing to bet Amir can’t tell the difference between a tweeter and a bird.
@richardbrand Are you telling me silver and copper sound the same? They have different electrical properties, different capacitance and inductance, so the question is, do you think they both sound the same?
Also pure copper is far from an "excellent connector". For the same reason you stated, its softness and malleability, the opposite of what a good connector represent.
Silver is 6% faster than copper, you think that doesn’t change the sound?
Really? Silver may have 6% lower resistance than copper, when compared by volume, but do you really think that makes the signals it conducts travel 6% faster?
Electrical signals travel at close to the speed of light. Copper is entirely capable of transmitting Giga-Hertz digital signals, for example high speed Ethernet, using thin, unshielded, twisted wire pairs.
Maybe you think that halving the resistance of a copper wire (by doubling its cross-section) doubles the speeds of the signals it carries? No, it doubles the current it can carry for the same voltage drop.
Pure copper, because of its softness or malleability, makes an excellent connector but does tarnish over time.
A brain exercise for those who think all cables sound the same because ASR measured them to be the same:
The terminal connector of a cable cannot be pure copper, because copper cannot hold a shape well enough. It's usually a mix different metals along with copper. This will degrade the signal.
The actual brain exercise, If you have a cable that degrades the signal, some will degrade less, some will degrade more. Assume you have 1 cable of each, you think they would sound the same?
This is just the terminal connector we're talking about, there are a lot more aspects that haven't come into the picture.
@oberoniaomniaRegarding cables, all you need to know is the capacitance, the inductance, the purity, and the quality of the terminal connectors, and the method in which the wire is meld with the connector. You think these things, on an individual level and as a whole don’t matter to the sound? That’s a tough pill to swallow.
Silver is 6% faster than copper, you think that doesn’t change the sound?
@devinplombierI have evidence, straight from Erin’s mouth that clearly stated he cannot hear a difference between any neutral sounding amplifier. Imbecile or not. I am not surprised. At least Erin has the balls to admit it.
It is in this video. Forgive me I forgot the exact timestamp. He stated the only reason he heard a difference between said tube amp vs his neutral amplifier was because the tube amp was not neutral. He also stated he cannot hear a difference between 2 neutral amplifiers. As we all know, an amplifier contributes to the sound much more than how neutral or not neutral it is. And if said reviewer only relies on the neutrality to spot a difference, well that's bad. But at least he admits his limit which I can respect.
@samureyex I agree with you that there are differences. The question is, do they matter? Are they audible? In any scientific test, the null hypothesis is no difference. So the burden or proof is with those who think there is a difference. If you think there is something to cables that is not measurable, then show it with a controlled double blind test of listeners.My preliminary data with vastly different cables and one listener is that there is no difference. Doing a pilot study with something that should show something is the typical way to start a project. If AWG14 vs 5–6 does not show a difference, that is a good indication that there will be none with other cables either, at least for this listener (inductive reasoning).
@knownothingRe the name, if that is your hangup. As I said ASR is *more* scientific than TAS and SPh etc. combined. ASR certainly provides novel data with measurements that are objective and repeatable. Re NSF, a good chunk of science is done without grant support. Neither of my two NSF grants had anything to do with hypothesis testing (one MRI, one TCN, both in DEB).
Only an imbecile would state that they cannot hear a difference between amplifiers, and Erin is not an imbecile. It is therefore doubtful that Erin actually said that, unless of course you can provide a link. Thanks
@oberoniaomnia I respect your opinion. As a marine biologist do you think that Amir testing commercially available audio gear is in the same category of scientific work as an NSF funded project to understand how physical, chemical and biological processes mediate carbon transfer in and out of the sea surface, or a Sea Grant funded study of how plankton might affect oxygen levels in eutrophic coastal waters? I suggest that if Amir were to submit a proposal to a competitive science or engineering funding organization claiming what he does on ASR somehow qualifies as “science” he would not get past the first round.
I read Amir’s reviews and look at his charts comparing different components and find it interesting. But it is not “science”. I never said that TAS reviews are remotely scientific, or even unbiased. Stereophile often combines subjective reviews based on listening with independent machine measurements - is that “kinda scientific”? No, it’s not, it’s just a combination of subjective and objective measurements. I find the name “Audio Science Review” pretentious, inaccurate and mistakenly bestowing the reviews with the mystique of expanding the boundaries of our understanding when in fact Amir is just functioning as a dude with some measurement devices and a lot of time on his hands. His professional work for Microsoft and others advancing digitally reproduced sound may more rightly qualify as “science”, I don’t know enough about it. His work at ASR, not so much.
if you tried different cables and they did nothing for you, be happy, you are saving a lot of money. As for me, I’m going to turn off my phone, open a bottle from the bottom shelf of my wine rack with the sticky note on it that says “ask” and enjoy drinking it while listening to my digital front end without reminding myself that it measured well in Amir’s tests or that the new power cable on my power conditioner is making everything sound better.
There are thousands of people like you, Amir & Gene & Erin included, that cannot hear a difference with cables. Doesn’t mean there isn’t. Different metals of cables, purity, capacitance, inductance, quality of connectors, length, geometry, type of shielding, thickness. All of this come together to form a cable. To say cables have no difference is saying all of these aspects don’t matter. Which if you give it 2 minutes to think about, is quite ludicrous. Especially for a "no-nonsense scientist" such as yourself and Amir.
Erin has stated he cannot hear a difference between amplifiers, does not mean there’s no difference.
Leave the idea of cables aside for a minute. I’ve encountered hundreds, and perhaps even thousands of people that have said they cannot hear a difference between DAC, AMP, and pre-amp. These people, like you, truly believe there’s no difference with certain components.
The facts remain. If you cannot measure a cable, what can you really measure?
No, not entirely! I am not smart enough to make stories up ...
There was a brilliant DVD documentary about how the Australian wine industry got its foot into the European market. The DVD is unfortunately titled "Chateau Chunder" see Chateau Chunder: A Wine Revolution - The Education Shop. I leant my copy but never got it back. The story in the DVD is that a couple of Australian winemakers and a marketer organised wine tasting dinners for French wine critics. The top drop was underrated until it was tasted in a blind comparison, when it won.
It is Penfold's Grange. I quote from the link I gave earlier "The great 1955 vintage was submitted to competitions beginning in 1962 and over the years has won more than 50 gold medals. The vintage of 1971 won first prize in Syrah/Shiraz at the Wine Olympics in Paris. The 1990 vintage was named 'Red Wine of the Year' by the Wine Spectator magazine in 1995, which later rated the 1998 vintage 99 points out of a possible 100".
I accidentally conflated with another wine from earlier days: "At the 1873 Vienna Exhibition the French judges, tasting blind, praised some wines from Victoria, but withdrew in protest when the provenance of the wine was revealed, on the grounds that wines of that quality must clearly be French."[15]
Australia’s top drop is around $1,000 a bottle and we get peeved when others, flaunting their affluence, mix it with coke. When it won a prestigious French competition, it was disqualified because it was so good, it just had to be French (in the minds of the judges).
@richardbrandthat's a cute story. Are you making that up? 🤔
Love the wine analogy! I have often said that good HiFi is like good wine – you pay more for what you don’t get. Nasty sounding distortions and nasty tastes.
The biggest differences are that wine comparison thrives on blind tasting, there is a defined point-scoring system, but there is also no objective standard (comparison with live performance).
Both ‘hobbies’ have had technological breakthroughs like SS. Stainless steel for wine, solid state for sound. I would argue wine also has a digital transformation, in the Stelvin cap which converted porous ‘analog’ cork stoppers into binary on-off bottle tops.
Science and technology underpin each!
Australia started with cuttings transported on the First Fleet and established its first wine college in 1897. Where I live in Canberra there are over 140 vineyards and 40 wineries. Many are run by scientists including Nobel prize winning physicist Brian Smidt, who now heads our leading university. Many others are chemists from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) which invented WiFi using its expertise in fast Fourier transforms from radio astronomy.
The Canberra District does not even get a mention amongst the 60 designated wine growing regions Australian wine - Wikipedia and we locals hope to keep the secret.
Australia’s top drop is around $1,000 a bottle and we get peeved when others, flaunting their affluence, mix it with coke. When it won a prestigious French competition, it was disqualified because it was so good, it just had to be French (in the minds of the judges). In my opinion, the least good Aussie wines come in half way up the French scale.
While audiophiles debate the effects of room shape, wine sensations are dramatically changed by the shape of the glassware! Try it!
@knownothing Science is about looking at data and making the best possible inference with the least ad hoc assumption (Parsimony, Mach's Principle of Economy, Ockham's Razor). It needs not to be predictive or testing as is shown in e.g. medical diagnostics using adductive inference (see Josephson & Josephson, 1996: Abductive Inference: Computation, Philosophy, Technology). Popperian hypothetico-deductivism is not the only scientific inference. In fact, it is rather limiting, one could even say boring, as it is not ampliative. Popperian approach cannot find anything new, it can only reject something that is already there. I find and describe new species and that is certainly science and definitely not Popperian.
Amir's approach is certainly more scientific than TAS or SPh etc., which is nothing but fanciful storytelling.
I have watched quite a few of Amir's videos, and have also corresponded with him briefly over email. He is a no-nonsense scientist, like myself. One should not mistake clear articulated words as a sign of arrogance. I find him actually quite deferential.
@samureyexRe cables, the biggest difference should be from bargain basement to something better. I have tried that with speaker cables and interconnects, and have not found any difference between a Cardas 101 AWG 14 cable and a PearlAcoustics AWG 5-6 cable. Hooked up at same time on A-B speaker outs, so could switch in an instant. Same with interconnects. Re system, see my virtual system. Based on my personal listening experience, I cannot hear any difference between any cable I ever tried. This fits well with Amir's measurements, as well as Gene with Audioholics for that matter.
devin I cant remember where I saw a photo of his system. It may have been when Amir was responding to ASR related posts on Audiogon and I may have found it clicking on his monicker and then system specifics. All I can tell you is that it appeared to me that he placed his system along a long vacant wall, not purposefully, and that he had a big screen TV between the speakers.
Being against ASR is not the equivalent of being against measurement. Hold up a dac in your hand. It is a product of pure science, and engineer. To say that we don't trust science or data is pure nonsense.
I said it in one of my earlier post, everyone at ASR wants data and measurement but then something magical happen, they wait for subjective reviews and user experience.
Let's go back to the extreme basic. In Amir's testings, all cables proved to be the exact same. To be as frank as I possibly can, anyone with a decent system and 2 functioning ears would know this to be false. CABLES DO MATTER and if your test says otherwise, your test is wrong.
If you can't do a cable measurement. What exactly can you reliably measure?
I have several problems with the site and with Amir, but mainly it is the name “Audio Science Review”. Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. What hypothesis is Amir testing about the universe, the designer’s hypothesis that their device sounds good when listened to with our ears only tested through, say, an APx555?
I suggest “ASR” is not pushing the boundaries of “knowledge” or “science”, but is applying engineering principles that are 50 or more years old as a proxy to “review” audio gear in isolation and in place of careful listening. This is not “science”, and it is barely a “review”. It is “measurement”, or “testing” or “applied engineering”, but it is not “science”, and labeling it as such should be an embarrassment.
I do believe there is a relationship between measurements and experienced sound of audio gear, but I definitely do not believe the line is linear nor the relationship conservative across all gear and all applications, ESPECIALLY when you place that gear in your system in your room with your ears in your seating position. No way.
I would be a lot more comfortable if the site was called “Audio Measurement Inferred Review”. See what I did there?
Not an accurate analogy. If you want to be accurate you would have hundreds of blind reviewers and take the aggregate like Harmon-Karden and Floyd Toole did. Only then can you know the "probabilities" of someone liking something. ASR is using the measurements defined by studies such as this.
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