WHY IS THERE SO MUCH HATE FOR THE HIGH END GEAR ON AUDIO GEAR?


It seems like when I see comments on high end gear there is a lot of negativity. I have been an audiophile for the last 20 years. Honestly, if you know how to choose gear and match gear a lot of the high end gear is just better. When it comes to price people can charge what they want for what they create. If you don’t want it. Don’t pay for it. Look if you are blessed to afford the best bear and you can get it. It can be very sonically pleasing. Then do it. Now if you are also smart and knowledgeable you can get high end sound at mid-fi prices then do it. It’s the beauty of our our hobby. To build a system that competes with the better more expensive sounding systems out there. THOUGHTS?

calvinj

“ Well, I do have a BACCH in my 2 channel room. But, it’s kinda weak/flacid/quite lame in comparison to the latest acquisition for my multichannel room.”

 

would you have a screen shot of the measurements? You might not be getting sufficient XTC. Is your room lively?
 

“Get the Sony STR-AZ7000ES 360 reality audio receiver...it is truly a breakthrough in audio.”

I am always open to new tech. So far I have been very unimpressed with Dolby Atmos. Particularly with upmixes. Not sure what any tech can do better than the BACCH and the BACCH works with the vast body of stereo recordings in existence. No up sampling. And when I test it for accuracy it is pretty much perfect

Then we use the same ...And i never ask anybody here to be believed to pass a  public double blind test and not even a private simple blind test ... Guess why ? 😁

Double blind protocols may be applied with company sponsors or with costlier products ...

It make no sense for me in AN INCREMENTAL mostly acoustic process ...

 What is simple with a cable had no sense in a room with a cheap homemade device change  ... Simple blind test is enough in private ... Any advocating of Double blind test complex protocol AGAINST any audiophile claims value is preposterous and ideological ... I hope you see it ?

I dont need double blind test in official setting to test my cheap chinese modified Schumann generators location grid (each one on or off)  and their ability to change my perception of sound ... Unvolontary blind test by accident and chance and voluntary blind tests were enough ...  They happenned by forgotting to put some of them on or by conscious testing decision,  then I did them and it work perfectly well ...

It c would be impossible to organize that in any other room anyway , especially as a public show  for the sake of what objectivist call "science" at the singular which never exist in any other way than a belief ......( dont suggest to me cartoon comic objection as the way the earth is no more  seen as stationary )...

Then i read many double blind test mandatory  proposition as an ideological discussion about  divided groups opinions about the efficiency of  official or homemade products ...Because most of the times it will be a show , and a show  impossible to entertain and organize anyway for the average guy as myself ...

Simple blind test informal work totally well and are enough for each one of us in private ...

The aural memory is not located in a specific place in the body or brain but is associated with multiple places and more than that on multiple levels and associated like a set of gestures to all the body and not only the separated brain  and is associated  to an acoustic context too where it work then  optimally ... Then aural memory is more accessible in a routine habit in a very well known acoustic environment and in habitual relaxed circonstances ... Uprooting a listener is impeding the aural memory especially about debatable  minute sound details  separate meanings ...

But  multiple simple private blind tests  in the opposite to a  public singular double blind test protocol test are in my experience necessary and impose themselves without any ideological need  , simply by the nature and in the context  of a cumulative incremental step by step process of optimization ... Those who urge in a strong manner about Double public blind test are not in an optimization process which asked for a very  long duration in months  and years as mine was  and with hundred of changes , they are in an ideological  crusade...

It is very easy to verify by the appeal of any "crusader" to "science" in the singular mode...i trust science only in the plural modes ...Not ideology ... Sound quality is a complex phenomenon which cannot be determined by double public blind test in any way, they for sure can be and had been used in official acoustic experiments context but a laqboratory is not a stage ... ... Not understanding that is not understanding what is sciences ... Simple private blind test are enough and done by almost everybody unvolontarily or not ...There is no real debate here only subjectivists against objectivists... I put my interest in acoustics with an s ...

 

I use single blind protocols for the majority of my shootouts. Works perfectly fine for their purpose.

“ What is simple with a cable had no sense in a room with a cheap homemade device change  ... Simple blind test is enough in private ... Any advocating of Double blind test complex protocol AGAINST any audiophile claims value is preposterous and ideological ... I hope you see it ?”

no I don’t see it. There are programs that allow users to easily do ABX DBTs. And it’s not “against an audiophile’s claims.” ABX DBTs are not for or against any claims.

I did not need these programs because i only use homemade solutions and i dont buy cables or costly tweaks or costly gear upgrade...

It is way easier to use simple blind tests multiple time in the working optimization context way easier and more useful than ONE public stage show ... Anyway i see no valid reason to use that with my modified 10 bucks Schumann generators now for example ,save to convince you after a public test to buy some 😊...And anything is further from my intention than arguing with people about qualitative effect i gain from my device in specific constrainted acoustic context and pushing them toward expansive devices i ask for experiments in their private home at low cost ... I see it as a meaningless crusade asking for more for the average people out of a laboratory ... Sorry...

You answered all my argument save the main one : I favor multiple simple blind tests in the same acoustical context and relax routine of the listener-tweaker and i dont see the need for most audiophile of anything more save for the scientific laboratory of the industry or for objectivist crusaders show ...

You completely put aside my point about aural memory and routine behaviour in a known environment  and put aside completely the difference between a step by step incremental process of multiple changes of parameters and devices in a known acoustical working environment and a public stage show about a singular minute change out of any known habitual working context ... Simple ...

For aural memory and behaviour :

https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-023-04675-8

Common sense dictate such observations i made ... Repeating your line as a preacher dont change common sense ...

 

no I don’t see it. There are programs that allow users to easily do ABX DBTs. And it’s not “against an audiophile’s claims.” ABX DBTs are not for or against any claims.