I believe that the scope of this page clearly on sources should exclude MP3 (regardless of sampling rate) and portable digital audio players. I would argue that no more than a cursory mention is merited, as these are not generally considered audiophile sources at the present time. Likewise, MP3 is not considered an audiophile file format. I have thus made the distinction between 'serious listening' and 'casual listening'.
There is a small but growing segment of Hard disc based music storage systems being used as surrogate sources, and this could be mentioned in the 'trends' section. Ohconfucius06:19, 11 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Asian Culture
218.103.34.213 dropped in a note about Asian audiophile culture. I moved it to a slightly more comfortable location in the article, but it seems very broad-brush, overgeneralized, un-sourced. One might even say it's verging on bigoted. I'm considering taking it out; can someone figure out how to improve it? Tim Bray20:22, 14 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The note was added following a discussion which took place on pink fish media on the habits of audiophiles, particularly in Hong Kong. I thought that the place of insertion was appropriate as it dealt with an extreme manifestation of subjectivist behaviour as it follow on from 'cultish behaviour', which I consider this to be. The tendencies have been commented on in local discussion fora, where some audiophiles confessed to the fact that music was indeed incidental to the enjoyment of the hobby of hi-fi ownership. Whilst I confess that the comments were perhaps too generalised ie not applicable to all Japanese and Chinese, the tendency is certainly more common than in Europe or America. Anecdotally, one of my correspondents has visited the homes of a number of these audiophiles, to find a distinct lack of correlation between the number of discs owned and the value of the hi-fi system in question. This is without even mentioning the number of hours spent listening to and exploring diverse music material as opposed to evaluating and re-evaluating pieces of equipment by playing brief snippets repeatedly. Articles appearing in local hi-fi magazines which feature readers' systems and music collections also bear witness to this. I am not adamant about the inclusion/excision of the paragraph, but believe that it does shed light on regional behaviour of audiophiles. ohconfucius 15 June 2006
Why subjectivism?
I think a lot--not all--of the blame goes to magazines like Stereophile and The Absolute Sound. They are just glossy and very large brochures disguised as magazines that do whatever they can to help some unethical high-end companies sell their products, accessories, and treatments. I think there are few professors of electrical engineering or audio researchers that take subjectivists and their magazines seriously. Part of the blame must, of course, go to the subjectivists themselves. Many are gullible, because they do not have the technical knowledge to make an informed buying decision.
Another problem is that once they have spent many thousands of dollars on their system--perhaps more than $200 000 US--they may hate being told that they have been taken for a ride. I know that if I spent more than $100 000 for a pair of vacuum-tube monoblocks and was presented with evidence that they sound the same as a $200 receiver, there is a good chance that I would refuse to accept the evidence. To accept the evidence would mean a devastating blow to my ego. Magazines like Stereophile and The Absolute Sound have used this to their advantage to keep the myths alive.
The article "Audiophile" would be much better if it rebuts all the myths thrown up by the subjectivists instead of allowing both sides equal time. Allowing both sides equal time is like an article on cosmology giving equal time to those that believe in a flat earth. An encyclopaedia article should never have room for myths unless, of course, the article is supposed to be about myths--for example, ancient Greek myths.William Greene22:05, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
That's a tough distinction to draw. I agree with the idea of scientific POV == NPOV when dealing with such matters, but a great many Wikipedia editors don't. It's definitely a source of tension, and you're right that a lot of subjectivist magazines serve only to reinforce subjectivist prejudices. (In a way, it rather reminds me of a former roommate of mine who simply refused to believe that chess could be played on a purely mathematical models, despite the outcome of the Kasparov v Deep Blue challenges. In a way it's a sort of vitalism, perhaps logically akin to the God of the Gaps argument.) Another issue is the problem of "musicality" in amplifiers -- while to an objectivist distortion is only desirable in situations such as a guitar amp, a subjectivist will not only demand subtle distortion, but might insist that it actually increases the fidelity of the sound. (On that count, such subjectivists are fooling themselves.) As for myths... well, the audiophile world is full of them. Haikupoet06:46, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Literal meaning of audiophile
According to Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary,audio comes from the Latin audire, to hear. So audiophile literally means one who loves to hear.William Greene14:27, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This article is fundamentally flawed
This article is based on the most simple definition of an "audiophile" being defined as someone who desires to reproduce the most literal sound, or closest to the original version. However, every single time I have heard the word used it is used to describe those who have irrational viewpoints about sound, specifically the subculture which advocates listening to music turntables with diamond needles.
Now even though this may be a massive stereotype, and describe only a minority of self-described audiophiles, not making big distinctions about this in the article is inherintly a NPOV/Original Research problem. This would be like if the article on first person shooters was equally about battlezone and rail gun games as it were about what everyone calls an fps. While this would be correct from the most literal definition of the title, it would misrepresent the subject entirely.
I'm about to drop in a massive rewrite. This article currently fails on two fronts: first, its take on the audiophiles-vs-skeptics fails to achieve NPOV. Second, it is extremely thin on information on what audiophiles actually believe and do. Tim Bray 01:46, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Response: I've been kind of goofing around with the prior version, inserting hyperlinks everywhere and statements here and there, but the article was in need of this type of rewrite. Looks good. LGreen 20:12, 13 Mar 2005
Hey LGreen, good stuff, improvements all round. Tim Bray 06:30, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
One definition
People who have somehow decided that the audio equipment they purchase and use must be much more expensive and have fewer features than the average ones.
In extreme cases they will even spend $5000 for a roll of speaker wire that calls itself bi-directional copper. There are a few specialty stores that carry this wire, and they actually sell a few.
Tubes for distortion or fidelity?
"This tendency however pervades the entire professional sound engineering and production industry, which to this day heavily uses analogue tape and vacum tube equipment because it sounds "warmer"."
Yes, but sometimes they use it to get a specific sound, which is a "valid" concern. Audiophile deals more with people who want a "pure" "unchanged" sound, and yet their sound is not unchanged. But using analog tape saturation to compress drumbeats or vacuum tube responses to shape guitar waveforms is not really the same thing. - Omegatron 03:18, Jul 8, 2004 (UTC)
Yes, but it is sometimes used to get that sound ON PURPOSE, using saturated tape recording and tube amplifiers to get the "warmer" sound on a guitar signal or whatever, which is different than the audiophile ideal of trying to get perfect sound reproduction. Please clarify this in the article. Or I guess I will... :-) - Omegatron 20:37, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
The problem is this: I believe this article uses possibly an original research definition of audiophile, meaning one who strives for perfect fidelity to the original sound. However, I have almost always seen the term used in a pejorative sense to describe only those who use irational means to improve their sound.
An audiophile is a person who strives for high-fidelity sound, regardless of whether they are chasing imaginary problems. Just because you've only heard it used in the pejorative doesn't mean that that's the only connotation of the word. There are self-professed audiophiles, such as... Audiophilia magazine, which disproves your premise. — Omegatron00:04, 30 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I can attest that a back-to-back comparison of two large guitar amplifiers, one solid state the other tube, used as a monitor in a noisy (crowded) live performance, demonstrated that the tube amp was "punchy" and clear while the solid-state amp essentially produced only hiss and white noise.
My friend swapped the solid-state amp during the middle of my set, and I had to drag the tube amp back because I literally couldn't hear what I was doing.
This is backed up by some studies which say that tube amps perform better under clipping scenarios, which is your first lesson that analog reproduction is basically unlimited (soft clipping) whereas digital reproduction is designed around limits (hard clipping). Broodlinger07:42, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
People see beauty in different places
People see beauty in different places. To someone who hears music as the most perfect art, thousands of dollars for a stereo system is no different than spending money on a nice car, house, or vacation.
Thanks for your money. - Omegatron 23:35, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
It's your choice. You can also buy snake oil if you want, it's a free country. As I see it, the first $100 spent will buy you a system with a certain performance, we'll call it 1.0. The next $1000 might improve it to 2.0 The Next $10,000 will improve it to, ooh say 2.1... so there's some exponential at work there. Still, it's your money... earn it how you want, spend it how you want. Graham 02:29, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I have no problems with people spending lots of money on their gear. I have problems with people reinforcing myths. There may be some panache to owning a Patek Philippe. But did you ever hear of a watch collector claim that his Patek was more accurate than a Casio?William Greene22:32, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Removed assertion.
There is one well-known case of a substantial double-blind test failing to detect a flaw in a digital archival format that was obvious when pointed out by an educated listener.
I'm a little incredulous at this. I don't see anything in the 'external links' section to back it up, so it's going to stay here until someone sources it. grendel|khan 13:39, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)
Fair enough. It was the Swedish national broadcaster; they were selecting a digital format for long-time archiving and did a big double-blind study on the winner, with excellent results. Then some record producer who heard it said "Gack, you've got a problem in the high midrange" and it turned out that yep, there was a digital filtering error. I read the article and actually emailed with a guy at ATT who consulted to the study; mind you this was in about 1988... anyhow, I should be able to dig it up. Tim Bray 06:30, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Connectors vs cables
Removed:
"Measurable differences in the quality of the connection (i.e.phono plugs) are tremendously greater than those seen in the actual cables themselves; in fact, the improvement made by soldering the interconnects directly between components is hugely greater than any differences between cables."
Triboelectric effects cause significant noise in poorly made cables when they are bent, the capacitance of the cable can cause filtering of high end while using low-output impedance sources, etc. Connectors you really just have to worry about the reliability of the connection. Will it lose contact if you touch it? Will it corrode? - Omegatron 23:35, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
All equipment at 16 kHz?
"n 20 kilohertz, even though most recording equipment will not reproduce anything higher than 16 kilohertz."
which recording equipment is this?? besides vinyl, i mean... :-) - Omegatron 00:25, Apr 27, 2005 (UTC)
This came from a talk some recording engineer guy gave to a bunch of audiophile/engineer types I attended. He basically made the point that the equipment doesn't record anything above 16K 'How do I know this? Because I designed a lot of it'. The audience was abuzz. Given that I don't have any other evidence on the topic, I guess I can't stake much on it's being true.Gzuckier 14:59, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)
In my experience, most "professional" equipment -3 dB point goes significantly above 20 kHz, so I would say the 16 probably only goes for very cheap or old equipment. Things like AM radio (~5 kHz! (10 kHz per channel)), cassettes (~15 kHz), and vinyl records (~15–18 kHz) probably, but not any modern formats or equipment.
Whether the typical person can hear above 16 kHz, on the other hand... - Omegatron 16:48, Apr 27, 2005 (UTC)
Hey. I can't hear above 16 kHz, and I'm not even close to middle aged. But check the Equal-loudness contour. It only goes up to 11 kHz! - Omegatron 23:03, Apr 27, 2005 (UTC)
Many audiophiles cannot even hear up to 15 kHz. This is especially so for middle-aged or older males. This is even worse for those that have listened for a long time to music at average levels above 85 dB.William Greene20:22, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I carry out tests on loudspeakers, to check the frequency response, and we can measure up to 30KHz. We do it repeatably and can check the variation between different speakers. I believe the kit works up to 30Khz at least. Furthermore, whilst when carrying out tests on listeners hearing range where you play a sine wave up to high frequencies to determine where the treshhold of hearing is, people can only hear up to 20KHz max, and most people far below that. In the context of listening to music rather than a single frequency sine wave, humans can detect a difference between sound that has a roll on at 16KHz and a roll on of 30KHz, its just really subtle.--Manc ill kid15:11, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Phase shift rebuttal
I removed: What the skeptics often forget in this case is that the filters (intentional or not) which prevent higher frequencies from passing (lowpass filters) have significant phase shift in the passband even when the attenuation is minimal. While the human ear is basically a frequency analyzer, phase shifts are still audible as a decoherence of transients. It's not that this isn't a possibly valid point, but that it didn't belong as a rebuttal in the skeptics' case section. Let each put his case - I think a point-by-point rebuttal is likely to be to the great detriment to the article. This is not the place to HAVE the argument, it's a place to PRESENT the arguments, coherently and neutrally, and let the reader make their mind up. Thus the current wording "what skeptics often forget..." sounds like having the argument to me, not presenting the arguments. If the writer of this bit, or an audiophile who understands the point would like to have another go and find a home for it in the audiophiles' case section, I certainly have no objection, provided it is done in the spirit of presenting the argument as part of an encyclopedia article and not scoring points.Graham 12:05, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Don't remove things; improve things. (My new motto that I invented just for you!) :-)
I wrote it, and I am one of the "skeptics". The "Audiophile rejoinders" section has double bullet rebuttals, too. See articles like Arguments for and against drug prohibition#Point-counterpoint against drug prohibition for examples of similar formats. I am all in favor of choosing a different format as long as all the information is covered. The article needs a lot of cleaning up. - Omegatron 13:33, Apr 27, 2005 (UTC)
Actually, the current setup "skeptics' case" and "audiophiles' rebuttal" is kind of inherently lopsided. Probably should be "skeptics' case" and "audiophiles' case", no?Gzuckier 14:59, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I certainly want to improve things - I just couldn't quite see how to do that simply by cutting and pasting the section to another place, as it rebuts a specific argument. (Incidentally, improvement and removal are not mutually incompatible ;-) However, I stick to my point that it should go in the audiophiles' case section, not as a rebuttal in the skeptics' case. I think this goes for the other double-point rebuttals too - the skeptics have made their case, they don't need to rebut the audiophiles' case and vice versa. Thus all these double-point rebuttals need to be reworded and moved to the appropriate section. FWIW, I'm a skeptic too - but that shouldn't bias the way we present the arguments here. Graham 02:19, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Digital versus Analogue
I found this citation on high-endaudio.com which seems agreable to me:
The sonics on this album are truly amazing. It is extremely immediate, pure and clean; to the point of being "stunning". The dynamic qualities are also superb, and there is incredible precision and detail. The sound is also very natural, with excellent harmonic structure, but this is a digital recording, with at least a few of the unavoidable problems. The decays are a little shortened, and the performance space is not fully developed, so it almost sounds like it was recorded in a small, dead studio. The (soprano) voice is also not as successful. It is decently captured, but it is veiled and there is an occasional strain at high volumes, plus it noticeably "drops out" at very soft volumes. This album would be in the top two classes if it weren't for these downsides, but it still makes the Basic List.
I'd like to go beond the Digital/dynamic, Analogue/warmer debate since warm or cold is just a question of frequence respnice, and the content of this text seems to fit well to this purpose (on the side of the analogists).
Opinions?
Sure. Digital recording involves sending an audio signal through a calculator. As we all know, this results in a "flatter frequency response" and "improved dynamic range." Huh? Is there something about measuring an audio signal that inherently proves you're measuring it properly? Analog recording dispenses with the measurement process and simply attempts to capture as much of the signal as possible.
In some cases, you can capture more than what the spec was designed for (three channels on a VHS tape can be saturated with two audio channels and no video). At the very least, you will capture it with more soft, rounded clipping, which is impossible in the digital domain. Broodlinger07:42, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
FaZ72 26/08/2005
p.s. how do you make a signature with link, time and date?
You can easily "sign" your talk posts by ending them with four tildes (~~~~). When you press (Save page), these will be replaced by your username (or IP address) in a handy Wikilinked format. This will also contain a timestamp for your posting.
The article uses the word "clipping" a couple of times:
- "Tube amplifiers are heavily used in music production ... because of their distinctive "soft clipping" when overdriven."
- "transistor-based amplifiers are often frowned on for guitar use due to the harsh clipping artifacts"
Could somebody please put in a quick definition of "clipping" for those readers who, like myself, have no idea what this means?
(And for that matter, a quick definition of "overdriven", as used in the first example here)
Thanks -- 11 October 2005
Clipping is easier to explain in terms of pictures than words, but basically imagine a sine wave. The top-to-bottom width of the waveform is the amplitude or loudness. If the amplitude gets too wide, it will hit a point where the circuit reproducing it can't handle the full strength of the signal and will only pass as much of it as it can. The result is that, at the points where the amplitude crosses the limits of the circuit, the extra signal is cut off, generating distorted waveforms that manifest as harmonic distortion in the sound. Clipping, in other words, is basically what happens when you overdrive something.
The difference in clipping characteristics between tubes and transistors is that when a signal is overdriven, the transistor will cut off the signal completely at the amplitude limit, while the tube will attenuate but not completely cut off the signal, resulting in less harsh distortion, which is sometimes percieved as "more musical". In practice, it isn't necessarily an issue for a well-designed amp since such an amp has as wide an amplitude range as possible to create more faithful sound reproduction. There are times, however (guitar amps mostly), where you want the circuit to be intentionally easy to overdrive to create that distorted sound, and tubes generally produce what is percieved as smoother, "more musical" distortion. That's the basic story. Haikupoet02:53, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Sometimes??? Get yourself on an analog synth that has sine, triangle, and square wave options. You will quickly discover that square waves produced by a clipping amplifier are musically useless. Think about it...square waves are essentially a DC signal.
It's also dangerous to say that solid-state amps have enough overhead to make clipping a non-issue. If clipping was a non-issue, then we wouldn't be talking about it. Broodlinger07:42, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Negative feedback
"... the universal acceptance of the fact that, while this technique was indeed beneficial to amplifier stability and test results using steady-state waveforms, it was inherently problematic for constantly changing waveforms as in real music..."
Negative feedback is good to linearize amplifier response. But a crappy and slow amplifier with lots of negative feedback won't make a very good amplifier, leading to poor transient response and great high-frequency distortion. That was that happened with some early negative feedback audio amplifiers. But this was hardly an unknown issue for the people that developed negative feedback applications to electronics. However, it seems it was for part of the audio industry. Today, negative feedback is usually used properly in audio amplifiers, and is not problematic at all with any kind of audio signals.
"...and resulted in amplifiers that tested well and sounded bad."
This was because "standard" measurement practices in audio industry on those years did not include high frequency distortion measurement. KikeG16:50, 15 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
About double-blind tests
"There are problems in applying double-blind methods to comparison of audio devices; audiophiles assert that a relaxing environment and sufficient time, measured in days or weeks, is necessary for the discriminating ear to do its work;"
However, many times audiophiles don't need such long periods of time to make claims about great sonic differences when doing sighted comparisons. Also, double blind testing doesn't exclude long time testing.
"further, that the introduction of the switching apparatus, involving as it does either another metal connection at the switch or another level of electronic processing with solid state switches, obscures the differences between the two signal sources being tested."
There's no need to use switching apparatus to perform double-blind tests. Just the help of an assistant or two. Quick switching apparatus is used just to ease the process. However, audiophiles don't use quick switching when performing sighted comparisons. KikeG17:16, 15 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The most important aspect of a double-blind test is bi-directionality. That is, if you go from 1-->2, you must go from 2-->1 to account for human memory and curiosity. It is not a small thing to say that humans frequently prefer experiences that are worse out of pure curiosity. For example, why gasoline sometimes smells "good." If you just go from 1-->2 then human curiosity becomes overwhelming to prefer whatever signal is the least familiar. Broodlinger07:42, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Professional Practices
"Audiophiles tend to hold commercial music recording practices in low regard. Particularly in the pop-music domain, most recordings are based on the heavy use of multitrack technology, the studio dominated by a huge mixing board with as many as eighty channels, each channel operating in the digital domain and subjected to a wide variety of tonal and "effects" processing. Audiophiles believe that this complex signal chain degrades the quality of the signal and lessens the spontaneity and integrity of the musical performance. There are some professional musicians and audio engineers that agree with this view. Currently-active recording artists who apply audiophile recording principles include Neil Young, the Cowboy Junkies, and the White Stripes."
What are you saying? I only listen to Ween, they hold Leonard Cohen in high regard. I have no idea about Cohen's music or his preferences for recording formats. Broodlinger07:42, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Current trends
"Because manufacturers have failed to agree on a single format and because there are relatively few releases in these formats, acceptance so far has been limited."
Unfortuately, although the Compact disc, now over 20 years old, are still going strong, these newer formats (only about 10 years old and still not catching on, at least here in Australia) are already "on their way out." The reasons may be found on this page
One cannot fool all the people all the time. I think consumers have realized that the "improvements" in sound quality of SACDs and DVD-Audio discs are minor or just not worth the expense. If a person already has a large CD collection, why replace it with SACDs or DVD-Audio discs? The better sound, convenience, and portability of CDs compared to records, however, did justify the replacement of records with CDs. For lovers of classical music, I think a good signal processor along with, say, six to eight channels of amplification and loudspeakers is a much better value than replacing a huge collection from scratch.William Greene20:56, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The better sound of CD's over vinyl is the biggest canard in all of music history. Fact is, anything you hear about "pops" and "distortion" from vinyl recordings is based on the idea that testable vinyl recordings were made 20 years ago.
Dance clubs prefer vinyl for a good reason, it has a wider frequency response and greater detail. Granted, CD's often have crisper treble response, but I have a $5 vinyl cartridge and a $75 scratch cartridge. Ask me again when I get Ortofon NCE's (sharper needle, $3-400/pair).
The biggest blockbuster to this myth is that vinyl records of the last ten years (since dance music got big) sound amazing. And the difference is huge between a vinyl record played for the first time and played for the 50th time (after the grooves wear down). In short, there is a great deal of dynamic range on vinyl being ignored by the pro-CD crowd, who harp on pops and hisses that are mostly artifacts from the 1960's.
Another damning statement is that when my vinyl pops (dust on the album), and I record it to CD, I don't hear the pop anymore. Surprise! Reduced fidelity in digital formats.
ok to all the people in the world let me tell you. I have spent over 5 million dollars on audio !!!
I have had every untra- high end speaker( be it panal, electrostat. , or horn) every type of amp(SE, PP ,solidstate, tube, Class D, experimental, DIY, cross bread) and all kinds of sources best and worst turntables, best Dac's, transports, you name it....
I have come to one conclusion..
If your setup cant reproduce 10Hz its junk.
SE is the only way to go(DHT all the way--driver DHT,ect.)
DHT preamps are best..
Solid state electronic suffer high resistance kill music taste( the path of least risistance is achived via a vacume!!!!)
All 12ax7, , el 34, twin triodes, and "golden age of audio" tubes are crap!!!
Negative feedback is the BIGGEST PROBLEM!!!! I have tested it -- i have had every setup imaginable --
300B is nothing compared to the experimental ultra-ultra-high end tubes.
Good records are rare--- Good Cd's are ultra rare---
electrostatic speakers will kill the energy of your living space
Photovoltic power is the onlyy way to get quiet hummmless music..
THe room must be an extention of yourself---- dont do basements,-- the ground has a 60 HZ humm that will get into yor system even if you dont hear it..
PURE silver from Tube base to speaker winding....
wirewould risistors-- custom build by NASA or MIT(higher QT if you give them enought money) only---
THE SPEAKER IS THE WEAKEST LINK IN YOUR SYSTEM --spend the most money there----
THE MAGNET IS THE LEAKEST PART OF A DRIVER!!!!!!!!!
EI core trans pooor efficency-----only use Trodial!!!!
the midrange should not have a X-over
the woofer should not have a X-over
the tweeter should
.....
NANO technology and TUBE's are the future!!!!
I have made plans with CERN to biggin a project into creating the Perfect tube!!!(more to come on that later- you all will deffinetly hear about it in the next 2-3 years)
Love music not your system
Re-evaluate your needs, desired every 3mo.
Understand who you are, were you came from,,who you are competing with!
And dont do drugs when you listem to music,
Dont drink when you listen to music,,
and dont think!!!!!!!!!!!
Live inside the music!!!
If you dont have money you are not a happy person... cant affort that music system-don't put a 2nd morgage on your house to buy that new turntable that cost more then your car.. buy a nice car, and keep the cheep Turntable-- you will be happier.
Was this meant to be a joke? It is hilarious. If this was meant to be taken seriously, it is even more hilarious.
This is the best rebuttal of so-called "subjectivists" I've ever heard. Ridiculous.
This article is starting to show the world just how crazy audiphiles are.
Doesn't it though? BTW, for those of you reading this as I'm posting it, James Randi is talking audiophile yahoos again on his newsletter at randi.org. Haikupoet06:37, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Just ran across an information-rich site which includes a good deal of stuff about audio, including this little gem:
... we appear to be in the paradoxical situation that the most expensive equipment provides the worst objective performance.
(You can find this here. He includes specs that back up this observation.) The man is obviously a diehard objectivist. I find this fascinating: that more and more deluded audiophiles are paying more and more money ... and actually getting worse performance for all their troubles! Hey, maybe someone can work this into the article somehow. ILike2BeAnonymous06:39, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't have an argument with it myself, but it seems that in a postmodern world such as this scientific POV != neutral POV. The diehard subjectivists are so wedded to their position that it's unlikely you'd sway many of them. I'm reminded somewhat of an old roommate of mine who steadfastly maintained that chess is a deeply psychological game that can never properly be mastered by a computer. Not long after that Deep Blue beat Garry Kasparov playing chess strictly by the numbers. I don't know what his position is on the matter now, as it's been years since I've spoken to him. Haikupoet06:57, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Identifying bias through comedy
From the article:
Subjectivists....prefer this analog sound even though digital sound has no clicks, pops, wow, flutter, audio feedback, or rumble, has a higher signal-to-noise ratio, has a wider dynamic range, has less total harmonic distortion, and has a flatter and more extended frequency response.
Wow! Sounds like subjectivists are idiots. Now let's turn to the Wiki article on Texans:
Texans....prefer this small-town diner hamburger even though McDonalds burgers have no char, fat, protein, or pink color, attending waitstaff, or restaurant atmosphere, has a higher carbohydrate ratio, has a wider profit margin, has less total nutrient content, and has a flatter bun and an extended gastrointestinal presence.
Damn Texans are stupid too! Who could possibly turn down a McDonalds hamburger when it's obviously so much better?
Point being, both articles are full of a heavy dose of fundamentalist religion. For starters, some of the things they're saying about McDonalds aren't even correct. McDonalds doesn't have a higher profit margin than a diner, their burgers are sold practically at a loss. But even if they did, why would this be good for the customer?
In conclusion, apparently McDonalds hamburgers have some kind of magical quality that makes all known problems disappear and yet...I'm not sure I'd want one.
Deleted the sentence "To an audiophile, any loss is considered unacceptable."
This sentence is inconsistent with the rest of the article in not one, but two big ways:
Firstly, this sentence was supposed to explain why audiophiles don't convert .wav files to .mp3 format - and yet .wav is a lossy format, so this explanation makes no sense.
Secondly, in the beginning of the article it is stated that everyone agrees current equipment falls short of perfect sound reproduction. Thus, all audiophiles realize they are dealing with loss, and their hobby is based around trying to minimize that loss.
I could go on, actually. In another part of the article, it is stated that exactly what the human ear can and cannot hear is debated; thus, an audiophile who believed a certain upper freqeuncy range was inaudible to the human ear would not care if there was loss in that frequency. But I think by now, I've proven my point.
