Are we being cheated?


I hereby maintain that all high end speakers are basically THE SAME.

The real differences are negligible and the differences that are not negligible are in fact fabricated by the speaker companies to make us believe that we are hearing an improvement and to ultimately increase their profit. Some differences we hear are psychological and non existent. Audiophiles are blinded by the lack of unbiased testing methods and rely on invalid comparisons. It is a common trick to shape the response in one way or another when designing the crossover. The differences we hear are then interpreted to be better or worse. The bbc dip is one example. Different parts of the response can be boosted or cut to enhance detail and depth of image. These are not improvements that justify upgrading your loudspekers. These are simple tweaks that could be done using dsp by the end user. There has NEVER been any evidence that any speaker is actually better than another. There is no consensus on the definition of a better speaker. We are being sold multiple variations of the same basic thing. No speaker company has ever produced a speaker product line where each speaker differs from the next by only one variable. Its always multiple variables being varied in order to obscure the differences. If Magico are confident in the superiority of their cabinets they need to make two versions of the same speaker where one differs from the other only in cabinet material. 

I hereby maintain that the differences we hear are due to invalid tests, invalid comparisons, poor room acoustics, comparing multiple variables simultaneously, non blind tests, and mental illness i.e psychological and fabricated or imagined. 

In order to hear the difference between one speaker and another, we must pick the variable we wish to compare and fix all the other variables in both speakers and then use blind testing or any other reliable test method. Since audiophiles do not do this, their conclusions are spurious. 

We are being cheated by the speaker companies but we are also cheating ourselves. The lack of consensus and divergence of opinions within the audiophile community about what we hear is proof of this. 
kenjit
It actually is true. They all play music. So what? so the are all the same? who cares? not me. If they can stay in business, not my problem. If this guy thinks he is being cheated? Also not my problem.
I think I got a great deal, being able to buy the speakers I own for only $14,000. If he thinks I got ripped off? not my problem.
I cant believe I took the time to read the entire original post. His conclusions are ridiculous. 


Yeah, I've notice that they are all pretty much the same--you need two of them for stereo, they all come in colors that are in the visible spectrum for humans, they all have mass (though some claim that certain parts are virtually mass-less).
audiophiles need to be given the opportunity to decide for themselves whether theres a difference and if so how important it is.