What’s your vote for the most ridiculous, overpriced, and useless tweak?


My vote: Furutech Outlet Cover 105 NCF $220, with “special crystalline material that has two “active” properties.” https://www.thecableco.com/outlet-cover-105-ncf.html

glow_worm
whostolethebatmobile
Could there be two broad categories of tweak? One which reveals something new in the sound/music which you have never noticed before, and one which increases pleasure but does not necessarily reveal anything new or previously un-noticed. I don’t think the PWB free tweaks revealed anything new to me about the recording, even though I was enjoying the listening experience more than usual.

>>>>The short answer is yes, you could have tweaks that affect the audio signal directly and those that affect the sound indirectly or subconsciously. But there is no difference *subjectively* between a PWB tweak and a amplifier or a better speaker cable or room treatment. I’m not sure I agree tweaks are supposed to hit you over the head. Wouldn’t it be great if they always did? A lot is system and listener dependent. An experienced audiophile would be hard pressed to determine what produced changed in sound X. Was it a better cable, better fuse, room treatment, CD treatment or PWB tweak? We all have our own ideas of what SHOULD produce big results and those that won’t produce any results, or very subtle results. There isn’t any difference between “the sound” and “the perception of the sound.” There’re the same thing. It’s not that easy to define musicality. We all have our theories of what that means.

If you did not hear a change in the sound why else would you experience the experience as better? Were you high?

When May says the sound was in the room all the time and that you just couldn’t hear it completely or accurately until you trying PWB Tweak X it because your subconscious is involved with how you hear, I.e., your sensory perception of sound. Thus, hearing is not (rpt not) simply the result of acoustic waves in the air striking the ear and traveling up to the brain. It’s much more complex than that. That’s so mundane. Much of it involves the subconscious, which is how most PWB tweaks work. They do not affect the audio signal somewhere in the system or room like almost all tweaks. PWB tweaks affect the sound indirectly, you could say. It’s not “psychological” or random because PWB tweaks are repeatable and transferable. That’s a very quick summary of a concept that is very complicated, so please cut me some slack. 😛
bdp24
Listening to the same J.S. Bach or Mozart piece twice in a row increases my pleasure in hearing it, as I better understand it. And it’s free!

>>>>One man’s pleasure is another man’s torture. 😩
I judged the experience "better" because I was more relaxed than usual and found my mind wandering away from sound quality considerations and towards the fun aspect of the music, the talent of the players, the songwriters and the spirit of the era (1965). After all, I had been instructed to listen for pleasure, not technical perfection. I took May's instructions literally. But that's because I'm a beginner.

I better understand the "morphic resonance" concept (philosophy?) behind many PWB products after viewing this short youtube clip of Rupert Sheldrake

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_RGEpJSr6s



"Since the entire building and everything in it is moving..."
In practice, pretty erroneous statement, geoffkait.