Did Amir Change Your Mind About Anything?

@soundfield you heard the man. Show us some measurements. It is odd I couldnt find any checking now. 

To be fair to both of you, you both are to me, the worst that audio has to offer. Neither of you have provided answers. 

@amir_asr still hasn't answered why he closed the thread. AJ needs to post some proof his speakers are worthy of ASR. LOL

@amir_asr ​​​​​​

Double Blind tests *did* show amplifiers to sound different 

Do you believe the same about cables? 

@amir_asr You remind me a little of a very good friend of mine who is a highly respected mechanical engineer. My friend is 100% certain that all cables sound exactly the same, and that there is absolutely no reason to spend money on power cables that are anything beyond a certain gauge necessary to supply enough current. I have had him over to listen to my system and to tell me if he can hear differences when I swap in cables. My friend tells me that he can, but these things are all due to his poor memory of the sound before and after, plus he believes that only a ’blind’ test would allow him to state that there are no differences.

This is the thing, I have run into many folk who are not that much into music, and as such their interest level in this hobby is minimal, at best. They like other aspects of sound reproduction, maybe they enjoy the technical aspect ( like the well known gear designer I referenced in a prior post, who hated music), or maybe they like the visual aspect of the gear, but the actual reproduction of music and the ability of the gear to get us as close to possible to what we hear as ’live’ is not something they truly value. It is my belief that you are a techie first, second and foremost...and that music really is not that high on your list, you just like the science. Maybe i am wrong about you, but to me ( as a musician and an a’phile), your ASR forum is one of the last places I would want to be, because the folk that seem to post there are absolutely into the tech side-- and really not the music.

BTW, you state that if a speaker measures poorly and sounds great, then the measurements are in fact what we need to be looking for and as a result are good? I submit that the measuring devices are simply not able to measure the very thing that makes the speaker sound great to the listeners ears, instead measuring aspects of the sound that do not correlate with what we hear. This is something that I know you will not accept as a possibility.

This is the thing, I have run into many folk who are not that much into music, and as such their interest level in this hobby is minimal, at best.

Which couldn't be farther from truth for me.  I got into hi-fi in 1960s when I was barely a teenager.  I love music and aspire forever for perfection of its reproduction.

They like other aspects of sound reproduction, maybe they enjoy the technical aspect ( like the well known gear designer I referenced in a prior post, who hated music), or maybe they like the visual aspect of the gear, but the actual reproduction of music and the ability of the gear to get us as close to possible to what we hear as ’live’ is not something they truly value.

I don't know anyone like this.  Every audiophile regardless of which camp they are in, share the love of music with interest in audio hardware.

It is my belief that you are a techie first, second and foremost...and that music really is not that high on your list, you just like the science. Maybe i am wrong about you, but to me ( as a musician and an a’phile), your ASR forum is one of the last places I would want to be, because the folk that seem to post there are absolutely into the tech side-- and really not the music.

Your belief is an insult and attempt at misdirection.  The largest thread on ASR Forum is about music we enjoy: 

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/what-are-we-listening-to-right-now.40/

It has *930* pages currently.  It is linked to from the home page as a feature.  When I went to Pacific Audio Fest last week, one of my top goals was to gather what music was being played and share it with the membership.  Much new music was discovered and members went as far as creating playlists for them.

I assume you also like to listen music although I don't recall ever hearing you discuss that on either forums I have known for you.

What is different between us is that I am dedicated to understanding the technology that produces music.  This is enabled by me having professional experience as both an engineering and trained listener for literally decades in audio.  While you were perhaps spinning an LP, I was streaming music from cloud and reading research papers to advance my knowledge.  You sit there and hypothesize what makes a difference in sound reproduction.  I get to test literally thousands of pieces of new audio and get to talk to top luminaries in our field.

You talk about cables making a difference.  I have tested a number of them and not just by measurements but performing null tests with music.  The difference is nothing.  Not a thing.  The engineering says they shouldn't make a difference and they don't.

The fact that you hear a difference is because you are a human.  I too hear such "differences."  But just like your friend, I know that our hearing is variable and bi-directional.  Our brain can instruct our hearing system to dig in deep in music, or not.  Certainly when sitting back and enjoying music,  you are not doing that.  But when you compare things, you allow your brain to hear things differently in A vs B.  When that happens, you think there is a difference even when there is none.

We can prove the above just like you friend said: take away your eyes and knowledge.  But you didn't want to submit to that test, did you?  Fact is that you don't want to know.

Mike Lavigne whom you know, swore that he could easily hear the difference between his MIT Oracle cable and another one.  When tested blind against monster cable, he failed miserably to tell them apart.  

"in my mind i am not confident that i will ever be able to hear reliable differences between the Monster and the Opus to pass a Blind test. OTOH i am also not sure i won't be able to do it.""

Take away his eyes and all of sudden his ears don't do what he said they do.

You walk around claiming that some knowledge of music creation helps you with magical powers when it comes to sound reproduction.  That against incredible body of audio science and engineering, you know better.  Well fine.  Do the blind test with your friend and repeat 10 times and see if you can get 9 out of 10 right.  If you are unwilling or can't pass the test, then please spare the insults that those of us who believe in audio science somehow don't enjoy music.  

Really, I expected more from you.  Much more.

BTW, you state that if a speaker measures poorly and sounds great, then the measurements are in fact what we need to be looking for and as a result are good? I submit that the measuring devices are simply not able to measure the very thing that makes the speaker sound great to the listeners ears, instead measuring aspects of the sound that do not correlate with what we hear. This is something that I know you will not accept as a possibility.

No, I don't take advice from Joe audiophile who has not conducted a single proper test to arrive at claims they make about sound fidelity.  I rather trust the people who have.  And those people who have literally dedicated their lives to this question have proven conclusively that what you said is wrong, dead wrong in majority of cases.  

Of course you want that to be true.  So that when you claim this speaker is heaven's give to mankind and measurements show it to have strong resonances and coloration, you don't look embarrassed.  The solution isn't to make up a new theory to fit your poor judgement.  The solution is to learn the science, realize how compelling it is, and start to invest your dollars that way.

I have now tested some 300 speakers.  And I measured all of them based on best the research has to offer as far as predicting listener preference.  You haven't done any of this, right?  My experience has proven in vast majority of the cases that a neutral speaker is the best speaker -- just like research predicts.

The notion that some speaker with screwed up frequency response where it colors the tonality of everything you play through it means we should change how we measure it is just absurd.  Sadly, you have many friends who look at the cost, size and brand of a speaker and convince yourself that it must sound great.

To be sure, some statement speakers bring incredibly capability as far as dynamics is concerned.  That aspect costs money and so is justified.  What is not is having a speaker tuned by some designer by ear with obvious flaws in its response.

Sadly ideas like yours keep these companies in business.  They love that you defend them and create FUD around proper measurements of their products.  You can do that but know that I am here to provide the transparency that they don't.  Smart companies will learn and start to follow the science as many of their competitors have.  Others will just sit there thinking everyone is like you.

As ASR has grown, so has importance of proper engineering and measurements.  This isn't a trend you kill by claiming we don't listen to music or we don't know how to measure.  All that does shows that you rather have your head in the sand that spend a minute learning something about audio.