Nearly all manufacturers do not advertise/exhibit their product measurements? Why?


After my Audio Science Review review forum, it became apparent that nearly the only way one can determine the measurements of an audio product is wait for a review on line or in a publication.  Most equipment is never reviewed or is given a subjective analysis rather than a measurement oriented review.  One would think that manufacturers used tests and measurements to design and construct their products. 

Manufacturers routinely give the performance characteristics of their products as Specifications.  Those are not test measurements.

I searched the Revel speaker site for measurements of any of their speakers and could not find any.  Revels are universally lauded for their exceptional reviewed measurements.  Lack of published manufacturer measurements is true for nearly every speaker manufacturer I've searched for on line, perhaps several hundred.   Same is true for amps, pre-amps, DACs, transports, turntables, well you get the picture.  Do they have something to hide?   I doubt the good quality products have anything to hide but poor quality products do.  

ASR prides itself in providing "true" measurements that will aid in purchase decisions.   Why don't the manufacturers provide these measurements so that reviewers can test if they are truthful or not?

Then there are the cables and tweaks for which I suspect that there are inadequate tests available to measure sonically perceived differences but which objectivists believe don't exist or are "snake oil."  

Well, please chime in if you have some illuminating thoughts on the subject.   

I would have loved to see manufacturers measurements on my equipment and especially those that I rejected.  

fleschler
Post removed 

@glatzj 

Some more good points raised in a thread that's threatening to go off the rails.

 

Without standardized test methods, test equipment, and multiple people doing the same testing (to minimize bias and error), meaningful comparisons between equipment are difficult to achieve.

Apparently Amir's Klippel diagnostics system is amongst the most advanced in the world.

Many of the standard tests seen on ASR are now being seen on other sites too.

 

Marketing people love to claim cherry-picked specifications to try to get an edge for sales purposes. 

Business is often a cut throat dog eat dog world where the slightest edge can mean the difference between survival and death.

We rarely get to hear some of the heartbreak stories of what happens behind the scenes.

However there is one infamous case that actually spilled over into public consciousness - the notorious Linn v Ariston legal battle.

 

 

I'd like to see key reviewer get together and agree on how they are going to collaboratively test audio components - but that is not likely to happen.

No, it's not. Reviewing is also a dog eat dog world. There's only room for so many.

Especially not since most of them are merely peddlers of the following point you raise.

 

Then there is the subjective measurement/opinion ......

OK, mostly only the purely subjective side.

And this is where ASR and their like come in.

The definition of "subjective" is misconstrued in audio. Intellectual honesty is required to find out the truth. 

If you can't trust your ears, what makes you think you can trust measurements?

@mastering92 

What success? 

A failed tech executive at Microsoft, worked at Sony for a while, made no meaningful contributions that stand today. No one from his generation knows who he is or what he does.

Man, that is a meanspirited thing to say.  Are you this way in real life?  Someone disagrees with your audio views and you get personal this way?  

That aside, I am sure there are executives or managers with better credentials and notoriety than me.  I am however, proud of the accomplishments of my teams and my personal contributions to many of them.  Here are some examples:

1. Technologies developed in my team ship in billions of devices a year.  Not millions but billions. Every few weeks I run into specs of a device that has technology from my team in all manner of products and software.

2. Our video technology is mandatory in Blu-ray format and was responsible for advancement of competing standards to catch up to same.  Without our involvement, Blu-ray format would have only supported the ancient but expensive (see below) MPEG-2 video codec.

3. We worked hard to make the cost of your AV products lower.  While royalties for MPEG-2 video codec was $2.50 per device with no cap, we pushed and achieved cost of less than 50 cents with caps for advanced codecs such as H.264.

4. Speaker of H.264 and other ITU/MPEG standards, we chaired the development of them at those organizations.

5. I came to Microsoft as part of an acquisition of our start up where we significantly innovated in delivery of video on the Internet.  We managed to do this by inventing such as schemes as MBR: multibitrate Audio/video.  Every video you watch on the web today uses the same scheme as you see the quality go up and down based on your connection speed.

6. Technologies developed by my team have been recognized by no less than three Emmy awards.  The first two predate the Internet as we know it today but the last one is well documented (for advancements in delivery of video on the Internet).  Here is a picture of me holding the statue: 

7. I created relationships with many enemies of Microsoft.  This included the top CE companies such as Panasonic.  My contact has been the CEO of this company now for many years.

I could go on but it should be clear that your assertion is incorrect.  But sure, maybe in the next post you show us your accomplishments and that of other reviewers covering audio.