I just ripped my first CD to Lossless!

[petrarch]

Well, I'm sure some people can't hear any difference, but I sure can and there's even a bigger difference with SACD.  I'm glad there's some people who like the poor quality of MP3, but those that know real sound quality aren't going to put up with the poor quality.

+1

[DavidW]

Ya, and Wikipedia is a "great" source of information.  Sorry, if you have a decent setup, you can hear the difference.  I'm not interested in someone who has $500 system.

Meyer and Moran Audibility of a CD-Standard A/D/A Loop Inserted into High-Resolution Audio Playback

See http://www.aes.org/journal/online/JAES_V55/9/

These involved many people and no setup was a "$500 system", see http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/explanation.htm for the gear used.

You can apologize all you want, but I have more faith in the power of expectation bias than I do that you can hear the difference.

[North Star]

Meyer and Moran Audibility of a CD-Standard A/D/A Loop Inserted into High-Resolution Audio Playback

See http://www.aes.org/journal/online/JAES_V55/9/

These involved many people and no setup was a "$500 system", see http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/explanation.htm for the gear used.

You can apologize all you want, but I have more faith in the power of expectation bias than I do that you can hear the difference.

Hear, hear!

[petrarch]

Meyer and Moran Audibility of a CD-Standard A/D/A Loop Inserted into High-Resolution Audio Playback

See http://www.aes.org/journal/online/JAES_V55/9/

These involved many people and no setup was a "$500 system", see http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/explanation.htm for the gear used.

You can apologize all you want, but I have more faith in the power of expectation bias than I do that you can hear the difference.

Ergo, all players used sounded exactly the same with and without the recorder that performed the A/D/A step in the chain. I find that curious.

[Mookalafalas]

Ergo, all players used sounded exactly the same with and without the recorder that performed the A/D/A step in the chain. I find that curious.

   You shouldn't.  The receiver/amp is just supposed to send out the music accurately.  The idea that a 50K amp will make the signal become "better" just doesn't make much sense, unless it's adding some new chords to a piano sonata it considers dull.  The technology for amplifying sound production long ago reached a point where "improvements" are outside the range of human hearing.  Now SPEAKERS, that's a different issue.   People who argue their cables and "table" and power chord (and for the lat 15 years) their DAC improve the sound in a noticeable way...well, I won't argue with them, because it's impossible.  When someone spends over 10K on those elements of their system, reason can no longer part of the equation.  The placebo effect in sound system evaluation is enormous and well-documented.  It's not a coincidence that the "golden ears" reviewers refuse to participate in ABX testing...

[petrarch]

   You shouldn't.  The receiver/amp is just supposed to send out the music accurately.  The idea that a 50K amp will make the signal become "better" just doesn't make much sense, unless it's adding some new chords to a piano sonata it considers dull.  The technology for amplifying sound production long ago reached a point where "improvements" are outside the range of human hearing.  Now SPEAKERS, that's a different issue.   People who argue their cables and "table" and power chord (and for the lat 15 years) their DAC improve the sound in a noticeable way...well, I won't argue with them, because it's impossible.  When someone spends over 10K on those elements of their system, reason can no longer part of the equation.  The placebo effect in sound system evaluation is enormous and well-documented.  It's not a coincidence that the "golden ears" reviewers refuse to participate in ABX testing...

My experience tells me otherwise wrt amplifiers, but I was actually talking about the A/D/A step to down-convert to CD format, which I gather you see as even more contentious. Oh well, we all have our blind spots.

[flyingdutchman]

Meyer and Moran Audibility of a CD-Standard A/D/A Loop Inserted into High-Resolution Audio Playback

See http://www.aes.org/journal/online/JAES_V55/9/

These involved many people and no setup was a "$500 system", see http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/explanation.htm for the gear used.

You can apologize all you want, but I have more faith in the power of expectation bias than I do that you can hear the difference.

I wasn't apologizing, I was telling you that you were wrong.

[drogulus]

     Sensitivity to audiophile differences in electronics, after one graduates from it, comes to seem no more genuinely sophisticated and discriminating than the worship of luxury brands in cars and clothing. Don Draper would totally approve of that indefinable and therefore endlessly marketable notion of quality. You'd think audiophiles would be able to resist such status-y notions. But no, no one is entirely immune.

     Subtractive tests can be done by summing the signal of the "good" amp with a Yamaha receiver from Best Buy. Never mind hearing the difference under test, what difference is there when that's all you can hear?

     The test was first proposed by Baxandall in the '70s.

     

     The Hafler test is from 1986.

     

     Subjectivists claim the switching equipment masks the differences. Note that this form of argument leads to a regress towards ever more distant sources of difference, ever more difficult to detect and explain. But that would be the point, to make differences unexplained and unexplainable, permanently beyond discovery, reason and evidence.

     Here's an article from 1988 that gives a good overview of the emergence of audio mysticism.

     Science and Subjectivism in Audio
     

[Gurn Blanston]

I love that line: cars do not go faster with platinum pistons.   

[petrarch]

The idea that a 50K amp will make the signal become "better" just doesn't make much sense,

     Sensitivity to audiophile differences in electronics, after one graduates from it, comes to seem no more genuinely sophisticated and discriminating than the worship of luxury brands in cars and clothing. Don Draper would totally approve of that indefinable and therefore endlessly marketable notion of quality. You'd think audiophiles would be able to resist such status-y notions. But no, no one is entirely immune. 

The category error is the notion that in the minds of audiophiles higher price always translates to better, and therefore more enjoyable, equipment. In my own experience (disclaimer: I consider my hi-fi equipment as audiophile-grade), that correlation doesn't always apply, as I have heard expensive units (amplifiers, CD players, DACs, cables, etc) that I didn't like and I have heard less expensive ones that I liked.

To claim there is no perceivable difference is completely contrary to what I have experienced in my system, having had the opportunity to carefully listen to at least three different amplifiers in my current set up (i.e. with all other variables fixed) for extended periods of time (15+ days each). Sometimes things just sound 'different', not intrinsically better or worse, but often just more or less appealing or engaging--e.g. the sound of tubes, quantitatively worse than transistors, but more satisfying to my ears.

At the end of the day, all that counts is listening to the music (in the absence of a live performance) in the most pleasurable way...

[mn dave]

The times I've gone to see a live orchestra, I wished I could turn it up. 

[DavidW]

The times I've gone to see a live orchestra, I wished I could turn it up. 

That's funny because I always wished that they could play softer!   My loud days are over, I prefer it to be only loud enough that I can just hear the softest passage.

[Karl Henning]

Aye, I love those catch-your-breath moments of the band playing at their softest!

[North Star]

That's funny because I always wished that they could play softer!   My loud days are over, I prefer it to be only loud enough that I can just hear the softest passage.

+1, except maybe when it's flu season..