Audio Science Review = "The better the measurement, the better the sound" philosophy
"Audiophiles are Snobs" Youtube features an idiot! He states, with no equivocation, that $5,000 and $10,000 speakers sound equally good and a $500 and $5,000 integrated amp sound equally good. He is either deaf or a liar or both!
There is a site filled with posters like him called Audio Science Review. If a reasonable person posts, they immediately tear him down, using selected words and/or sentences from the reasonable poster as100% proof that the audiophile is dumb and stupid with his money. They also occasionally state that the high end audio equipment/cable/tweak sellers are criminals who commit fraud on the public. They often state that if something scientifically measures better, then it sounds better. They give no credence to unmeasurable sound factors like PRAT and Ambiance. Some of the posters music choices range from rap to hip hop and anything pop oriented created in the past from 1995.
Have any of audiogon (or any other reasonable audio forum site) posters encountered this horrible group of miscreants?
That happens here, too, and it always activates my inner BS alarm. If you're going to accuse someone of fraud, you should have real proof. And if you have real proof, you should take some kind of legal action, however small. ASR is just a place for measurementalists to gather. They can talk hi-fi without ever having to actually listen. It's very convenient. |
Anyone who has ever had the pleasure of enjoying good quality tube amp and/ or preamp in a good quality system knows that measurements, by themselves definitely do not tell the whole story. Generally, most tube electronics, including the the high end ones, do not measure as well as even mediocre quality solid state ones but can sound way better & much more like real music. From what I usually read from John Atkinson of Stereophile, he seems to not agree e we other this & generally disses on tube stuff. Imo, he’s missing out on some of the nuance & overall presentation that few but the really good solid state amps can produce.
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@lanx0003 I was banned from ASR because I was contrarian and annoying to them. Amir is definitely a dictator on his own forum. His opinion is the law. @cleeds I can't get over how ASR members judge equipment just by looking at it: - Tube amplifiers = trash - Fullrange drivers = trash - Horns = trash - REL = trash - Klipsch = trash - SMSL/Topping = great - GENELEC/REVEL = no-brainer. Buy that, you'd be a moron otherwise. ASR are the biggest snobs out there, change my mind. |
russ69 Absolutely agree-I enjoy music in a car if the music communicates with me. I don’t judge a system by its’ cost but by its value in reproducing the recording (as music, not just sound). kokakolia That is exactly what happened to me. You nailed it. They are similar to a religion of believers who dismiss any one else having an alternative thought, or even an alternative device they don’t approve of. Fascist mob mentality. I brought up in an intelligent and well reasoned manner my equipment, tweaks that I rejected, cabling I use and how often I compared differences in them. Your list of what they hate, that’s what they automatically rejected. Cleeds When I mentioned my 40 year history as an amateur recording engineer at Royce, Disney, Ford, etc. with 300 recordings, 1000 performances at those and other venues, they came up with when they had their first beer and that I am bragging. I only wanted to indicate my devotion to music and acoustics. It is apparent that they don’t listen to music and the music they listen to is so bereft of acoustic information that they couldn’t judge on their cheap equipment what it could sound like. Jonwolfpell Atkinson gives me an idea if there are gross sonic errors (very high THD, speakers with wild frequency response and difficult loads versus phase angles, etc). My primary listening system is comprised of exotic tube gear using subminature tubes (6 in pre-amp and 8 in phono) with 100,000 hour lifespan, fantastic audio qualities (short distances internally, no vibration) in a design that decouples the stepped resistor volume control from the signal. The Altec 1569 monoblocks (and my second system Dynaco 70) are voltage regulated, not ultralinear, pentode or triode. It is based on a very sophisticated version of Audio Research’s rudimentary voltage regulation found in their modern amps. Same with it’s bias circuit, Only the transformers remain on the Altecs. A pair of 3” X 7” storage caps reside on the Altecs with a combo of 6gu7 tubes, a 6SN7 and 6 6bg6 output tubes for 125 watts. This is an example of the care I took in obtaining part of my audio systems without spending an arm and a leg. However, I do have some high end equipment such as the Zesto Allesso SUT while preferring the inexpensive Dynavector 20X2 L on a highly modified SME IV/VPI TNT VI. I find that the Dynavector happens to work great on nearly my entire LP collection of 28,500 albums versus my former Benz Ruby 3, which I loved, but was great on many but not most of my collection. I have tweaks in my system-analog sits on a Townshend Seismic Sink for example. Audiogon forum has many posts concerning my custom built listening room which took precedence over the equipment in cost because once built, will never require adjustment and is permanent. The comment concerning the actual cost of equipment is telling What could be in a $500 integrated amp? Most higher end gear have higher costs involved and sell for maybe 2X to 3X with a 40-60% mark-up at the retailer. |
