Why HiFi Gear Measurements Are Misleading (yes ASR talking to you…)


About 25 years ago I was inside a large room with an A-frame ceiling and large skylights, during the Perseid Meteor Shower that happens every August. This one time was like no other, for two reasons: 1) There were large, red, fragmenting streaks multiple times a minute with illuminated smoke trails, and 2) I could hear them.

Yes, each meteor produced a sizzling sound, like the sound of a frying pan.

Amazed, I Googled this phenomena and found that many people reported hearing this same sizzling sound associated with meteors streaking across the sky. In response, scientists and astrophysicists said it was all in our heads. That, it was totally impossible. Why? Because of the distance between the meteor and the observer. Physics does not allow sound to travel fast enough to hear the sound at the same time that the meteor streaks across the sky. Case closed.

ASR would have agreed with this sound reasoning based in elementary science.

Fast forward a few decades. The scientists were wrong. Turns out, the sound was caused by radiation emitted by the meteors, traveling at the speed of light, and interacting with metallic objects near the observer, even if the observer is indoors. Producing a sizzling sound. This was actually recorded audibly by researchers along with the recording of the radiation. You can look this up easily and listen to the recordings.

Takeaway - trust your senses! Science doesn’t always measure the right things, in the right ways, to fully explain what we are sensing. Therefore your sensory input comes first. You can try to figure out the science later.

I’m not trying to start an argument or make people upset. Just sharing an experience that reinforces my personal way of thinking. Others of course are free to trust the science over their senses. I know this bothers some but I really couldn’t be bothered by that. The folks at ASR are smart people too.

nyev
-- hilde45

3,914 posts

Amir really lives rent free in a lot of heads here.

I don’t understand the animus or energy directed against him or his site.

If it’s as ludicrous as you think, dismiss it and ignore it.

If it’s credible, at least in part, give some credit where that is due and then explain why it needs to improve.

--

This is a good take. It’s easy to bitch about competing sites/opinions, but at the end of the day, this is all internet noise. Even if it’s bad info, in your opinion, maybe it’s a good thing that "Science" site is furthering this ridiculous hobby in a way.

 

 

If anything this whole story validates the usefulness of plausible hypothesis and then measurements to verify perceptions that are surprising and unexpected.


The debate is about people's unverified hypotheses about why they're perceiving those differences. 

+1 @asctim , I think you hit the nail on the head.  It’s also about keeping an open mind.

There is some focus on something sounding better because it measures better. A bigger question to me is if you have gear that sounds better or worse than another is there a set of measurements to support the difference you hear? 

Some categorize equipment based on how it measures despite the odds that the inferior numbers may have little to do with anything a human may or may not hear as good or bad. 

I would say differences in design may well be a bigger factor even in the case where the 'better design' may have slightly worse specs (but still very good) compared with the runner up.

 

 

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The enjoyment should come from the music itself not the equipment.

Then why are you nowhere to be found ... I mean, if you were at least following the music threads and I’ll take a stab at that, we’d witness a post every "once" in a while.

@kenjit