The Audiophile Debate

[DavidW]

At the time, the wife told me that they wanted to listen to their CD collection again (which I'm pretty certain wasn't that large). 

In that case the best thing to do is rip them and load them on their phone.  Then they can listen to it anywhere.  They can buy a bluetooth speaker for when they don't want to listen to headphones.

[DavidW]

Are you using drugs? That's possibly the craziest post I have ever seen on this discussion board.

Please keep it respectful.

[drogulus]

    I'm ancient and have typical ears for my age. Therefore I can't hear some differences others can. But I think there are processing differences that may also muddy the waters a little. For instance I can identify the actors who do voiceovers on commercials, not just the easy ones like Donald Sutherland and John Cusack, but harder ones like Josh Brolin and Brian Cox (who does Americanese on his). It's clear that there's more than frequency response involved in some discriminations.

    I don't think this alters the case for/against audiophile claims which involves information that is measurably identiucal, unlike the identifiable characteristics of voices which differ greatly. I only bring it up to rabbit trail pointlessly.

[Atriod]

FR for headphones need to be taken with an enormous grain of salt.  They are usually based on taking an average preference as a standard since no standard exists.  There is a wide variety of ear shapes, but also the average person liking more bass doesn't make it an objective fact that the T1s are bass lite. 

I personally find that the Harman target doesn't fit my own ears at all.  And if it was a good predictor of SQ then the akg k361 should certainly sound better than the really off beyer dt1990s but they absolutely do not.

Another problem I have with these FR graphs is that they are effectively lies due to octave smoothing.  It is the narrow resonance curves that really give a headphone its sound characteristic which is exactly what the plots wipe out.

An fr plot can give you a vague sense of the sound profile, but that is it.  You have to listen with your own ears.

This is in stark contrast to speakers which should be designed to measure flat (at least before room response is taken into account).

So it looks like this got split off into a new thread, seeing this because it showed up in my notifications.

Maybe there are some differences of opinion with speaker vs headphone measurements.

But if even you assert that Harman/B&K target is "not for you" the measurements of the T1 are garbage, here is the full thing: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/beyerdynamic-t1-review-v2-headphone.20192/

The measurement system is flat it does not care about any curve, the target curve is overlayed on top of the headphone's frequency measurements. The T1 has some nasty emphasis well within the audible range, if you have presbycusis in that 5k-10k Hz range then you have no business spending let me correct myself not $900 for these headphones but a laughable $1300 (Amazon has a great price matching algorithm and dropped it down probably because of the sale on Beyerdynamic's website). Though looking at Beyerdynamic's page for them they sprinkle it with some clever marketing like Tesla this and Tesla that.

Additionally look at the very high distortion in the most sensitive range of our hearing. Amir can hear it and even says the headphone can't be saved with EQ.

I hear you on the point about overly smoothed frequency response charts, you always see these on speaker manufacturer's pages. You can make even a Lowther look like it measurements flat anechoic with enough smoothing. That is not what what's happening here, if it were Amir's measurements would be much lower fidelity and mask the issues.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

In that case the best thing to do is rip them and load them on their phone.  Then they can listen to it anywhere.  They can buy a bluetooth speaker for when they don't want to listen to headphones.

I'll suggest that to them though I suspect that they aren't the type to want to do any ripping (They are in their over 70's) and own their own home so I suspect that they also aren't into headphone listening (just judging on what I know of them).  But, who knows, I could be wrong!  In any event, I'll suggest it to them....thanks! 

PD

[Atriod]

I don't think this alters the case for/against audiophile claims which involves information that is measurably identiucal, unlike the identifiable characteristics of voices which differ greatly. I only bring it up to rabbit trail pointlessly.

Every single person posting to the original thread is an audiophile. An audiophile is someone that cares about sound quality, whether that means listening to expensive junk measuring headphones, SOTA measuring Genelecs, Nordsot Thor cables or earbuds connected to an iPod that comments on the sound quality of those earbuds/iPod or recording quality of the albums they're listening to.

An example of someone who is not an audiophile - my best friend's mother who is a professional violinist that listens to a (I think?) Sherwood tower speaker system that buzzes on the low bass at louder levels. Either from the surrounds deteriorating or us damaging one of the drivers from a house party. She does not care and has never commented on this. She was more upset about people leaving empties on the piano 

[Todd]

Every single person posting to the original thread is an audiophile.

Bold type does not make something more true.

[Atriod]

Bold type does not make something more true.

You're an audiophile, even if you like to emphasize the word in a denigrating manner. Maybe some of the moderators that intervened with some of the posts aren't, but everyone commenting on sound quality is, which was everyone before they stepped in.

[Todd]

You're an audiophile, even if you like to emphasize the word in a denigrating manner. Maybe some of the moderators that intervened with some of the posts aren't, but everyone commenting on sound quality is, which was everyone before they stepped in.

Um, nope.

[DavidW]

So it looks like this got split off into a new thread, seeing this because it showed up in my notifications.

Maybe there are some differences of opinion with speaker vs headphone measurements.

But if even you assert that Harman/B&K target is "not for you" the measurements of the T1 are garbage, here is the full thing: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/beyerdynamic-t1-review-v2-headphone.20192/

The measurement system is flat it does not care about any curve, the target curve is overlayed on top of the headphone's frequency measurements.

I knew about the Beyer 8 kHz spike but on that headphone it is truly astounding!  The 1990s on the balanced pads also have it, but it is balanced by the bass which it seems to have much more of than those T1s.

[Atriod]

Cables are among the most stupid things to waste money on. That's just how it is. People who claim to hear differences are victims of snake oil marketing and placebo effect. If I come to your house and switch your pricy cables to coat hangers, are you sure you can tell them apart without KNOWING which one is connected? Yes, that has been tested and it turned out it is not easy to tell coat hangers apart from audiophile cables.

Unfortunately all the images in my Photobucket account are deleted, I had a picture of the inside of an MIT cable box that had electrolytic caps hot glued together. Looked like someone just threw them in there and went to town with the hot glue. I couldn't find the picture on Google Image Search.

[Atriod]

It seems to be pretty clear. Todd likes the sound of the Beyer T1, and wants to like the sound (or level of performance) of other components in a similar way. Measurements have nothing to do with it. Humans like the sound, not measurements.

On the contrary, it's audiophiles that fight so vigorously against being labeled an audiophile and instead preferring vague terms like "music lover." I assure you there are people that actually know what measurements mean and how they correlate with sound. Don't confuse a single person's incongruity in thinking with some truth that you've found.

If you're open to it get the third edition of Toole's book: https://www.amazon.com/Sound-Reproduction-Psychoacoustics-Loudspeakers-Engineering/dp/113892136X/

He has made a very successful career out of sound reproduction research, and has plenty of people, including myself that have followed his writing and AES presentations, so you're wrong about all humans not liking measurements.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Unfortunately all the images in my Photobucket account are deleted, I had a picture of the inside of an MIT cable box that had electrolytic caps hot glued together. Looked like someone just threw them in there and went to town with the hot glue. I couldn't find the picture on Google Image Search.

I just found a picture on a Reddit thread.  Is this the one to which you were referring?  Note:  I have no idea whether or not someone just made this up.

https://www.reddit.com/r/audiophile/comments/1fivn2/ever_wondered_what_was_in_the_mit_speaker_cable/

PD

p.s.  The image is at the top of the thread.

[71 dB]

Unfortunately all the images in my Photobucket account are deleted, I had a picture of the inside of an MIT cable box that had electrolytic caps hot glued together. Looked like someone just threw them in there and went to town with the hot glue. I couldn't find the picture on Google Image Search.

It must be musical glue containing stardust extracted from unicorn urine... 

[Todd]

I just found a picture on a Reddit thread.

Reminds me of some Wilson crossovers which were filled with epoxy, fully covering all components.  It makes the sound more something.

If you're open to it get the third edition of Toole's book: https://www.amazon.com/Sound-Reproduction-Psychoacoustics-Loudspeakers-Engineering/dp/113892136X/

You must be horn speaker/waveguide person with a new user name.

[Spotted Horses]

You may dream that you see Beethoven drinking beer with Brahms. In the dream you will have full confidence that you are seeing an objective event. However, everything will be happening in your head only, i.e. in your subjective knowing.

Everything that exists in your knowing under the label of science is just your dream. You are, the rest is smoke.

Your views are reminiscent of notions that 'the entire universe could just be a dream I am having.' While it is obviously impossible to disprove this (people trying to convince you otherwise are just part of your dream) it is an absurdly narcissistic outlook. Apparently you regard yourself so highly that Einstein's theory of general relativity is something you dreamed up, even though you also dreamed that you have trouble understanding your phone bill.

In science, in particular, a scientist will put forward a result until he or she has collected extensive data under controlled circumstances, compared with mathematical models, analyzed to determine that the result cannot be explained by statical fluctuations, and will not be published until it has been reviewed by one or more peers. It would not be generally accepted until numerous other scientists have repeated the experiment or calculation and obtained similar results. If you call this a dream, it is a strange kind of dream. I cannot think of an instance when a scientific result which has passed this test has been invalidated, although they are often generalized or refined.

[AnotherSpin]

Your views are reminiscent of notions that 'the entire universe could just be a dream I am having.' While it is obviously impossible to disprove this (people trying to convince you otherwise are just part of your dream) it is an absurdly narcissistic outlook. Apparently you regard yourself so highly that Einstein's theory of general relativity is something you dreamed up, even though you also dreamed that you have trouble understanding your phone bill.

In science, in particular, a scientist will put forward a result until he or she has collected extensive data under controlled circumstances, compared with mathematical models, analyzed to determine that the result cannot be explained by statical fluctuations, and will not be published until it has been reviewed by one or more peers. It would not be generally accepted until numerous other scientists have repeated the experiment or calculation and obtained similar results. If you call this a dream, it is a strange kind of dream. I cannot think of an instance when a scientific result which has passed this test has been invalidated, although they are often generalized or refined.

Are you really interested in how I regard myself? But why? Isn't there anything more interesting and important in your life? Like your own self?

[Spotted Horses]

Are you really interested in how I regard myself? But why? Isn't there anything more interesting and important in your life? Like your own self?

I'm not too interested in how you regard yourself.

To quote Carl Sagan

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.

I think it is important to prevent misunderstanding of the methods and contents of science and technology research.

[AnotherSpin]

I'm not too interested in how you regard yourself.

Then why are you writing about it?

Wouldn't it be better to focus on your self? Just look -- you know your self for sure, and this is the only knowledge that remains constant and unchanging. While each and all apparent things come and go like the morning dew, without the slightest exception. Is not your Self the only real treasure you possess? You may or may not know what Einstein said, but you cannot unknow your self.

[Florestan]

You are, the rest is smoke.

Including the Russian war on Ukraine?