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I Am Tired of Bogus Measurements

My expensive shoes have measurements but it doesn’t matter, all I want to know is will they fit. My expensive new suit has measurements but it doesn’t matter, all I want to know is will my expensive new shoes match.

The people being misled by measruements aren’t being led my manufacturers, they are being misled by reviewers. Idiotic rankings of digital gear based on measurements outside the range of human hearing. Cancelling entire brands who put out features customers actually want as they sell to humans, not bats. The worst of these websites will rant about their own superior $$$ equipment but mot even one person will ever use speakers in a klippel matchine, they actually put them in a room! The horror. The cancelling of brands, the talking down to the customers, is bogus.

You need to measure what matters! Are the customers actually happy? Is the warranty honored? Most importantly is their an in home audition period?
I don’t need someone to tell me if I could or should like a product. My room is not a test bench, or a klippel machine. Who cares what the component measures by itself because unless its a clock radio I’ll never use it by itself, I have to interconnect it in a "system" with "high quality" cables, (as in all cables are not the same).

If you want to measure something measure how your personal system of curated components interact with your room. That’s it. The rest of the stuff you could forget because these days if a brand overpromises and under delivers they will be following a formula for losing money, an no company likes that.

kota1
curiousjim's avatar
curiousjim
4,852 posts
 

Sheesh,

Another ASR battle. 
Love him or hate him, WE are here to have fun and share our stories.

I watched his videos for a while and did not find them useful and moved on, but I’m not going to call anyone names who still watch.

Sheesh.

kota1 OP
2,706 posts
 

@kota1 

third party measurements are there to validate manufacturer claims. But lots of people refuse to understand this basic fact.

That's what stereophile does but they don't hand out prizes or shame the product. 

Look at the critics shaming not only products but entire companies because of a measurement that has no bearing on how a product will act in MY chain of products.

kota1 OP
2,706 posts
 

I think the argument perhaps needs to be separated out into two strands.

That is a lot of arguing.

If your essential argument is that - measurements don’t reveal how a component sounds and that the reveal even less how a component will sound in a given system - then by and large, I agree with you

+1

The exceptions to the above are that certain measurements of amplifiers do correlate pretty well with subjective sound quality.

I agree that they sell power numbers on receivers with either two channels driven or all channels driven, this is inconsistent. As long as they state which one I wouldn’t say its bogus.

I still feel that it’s a leap of logic from there to concluding that measurements are not useful.

I am tired of bogus measurements, the publisher of the measurements can be matter of fact, like stereophile or simply foaming at the mouth with anger trying to shame not just the company, but their customers. It isn’t just ASR, audioholics does this too along with goldensound. You can find a product YOU like that didn't measure best in class. The opposite is also true. You have no idea how a group of products will sound when assembled, in various rooms, based on anything, especially bogus measurements.

 

waytoomuchstuff's avatar
waytoomuchstuff
1,157 posts
 

In the early days of consumer hifi retailing, we used a measurement that REALLY mattered: 

KPD -- "Knobs Per Dollar"

willywonka
275 posts
 

@coda1 A perfect example of what I'm talking about is in the March addition of Stereophile magazine. I know many people here don't respect that magazine, but I do respect John Atkinson's measurements. Just take a look at the measurements he did on one of the tube amplifiers and a pair of speakers in that edition. Also, I don't buy the parts tolerance argument. I'm a retired bench technician (Component level) and most audiophile grade equipment tolerances are very tight with many components within 1%, They are much more consistent than that especially when new! It might explain why a speaker's sensitivity is 1 dB lower or why a tube amps power it is a couple watts low but not when the power out is HALF or less than what is advertised or when speaker sensitivity is almost 8 dB low.

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