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    The Computer Audiophile

    Editorial: What's Wrong With You?

    I'm not a fan of writing editorials because this site isn't about me or any ministers of information. It's about the community and everyone who has helped, over the last 11 years, create what this site is today. Perhaps a couple forum posts have irked me enough to need this cathartic outlet. 

     

    Anyway, what's wrong with you? If you listen to people online or at audio shows you'll think you need medication quickly. Since I started this site I've often wondered what's up with all the audiophile hatred, judgement, and categorization. It usually takes this form:

     

     

    1. Audiophiles like gear more than music.
    2. Audiophiles don't listen to music, they listen to gear.
    3. Audiophiles are always looking for the next piece of gear.
    4. Audiophiles are foolish because ...
    5. There's music audiophiles and gear audiophiles.

     


    Wait what? Why do people care? I submit that if you're judging people by their motives for increasing their own enjoyment in life, if you're categorizing groups of people based on what they enjoy, or if you just dislike audiophiles, then you're the one with issues. There's nothing wrong with issues, I have plenty, but stop projecting yours on to audiophiles. 

     

    The ole gear loving audiophile "just doesn't like music" thing. Again, who cares? I don't care at all if someone is happy collecting HiFi gear. Jay Leno owns 150 cars including a 1994 McLaren F1 valued at $12,000,000. Oh the horror. What a loser, he must just love cars and not the experience of driving them like all the people with pure motives for purchasing cars. Only kidding. Who cares if he has 150 cars and some that are priced outrageously? I bet it isn't the same person who cares about audiophile motives because cars are cool man (said tongue in cheek).

     

    When I first started writing about HiFi I was told by a publisher that he knew a guy with six CDs and a million dollar system. This million-dollar-system-guy was the butt of many jokes and was even blamed for many problems in HiFi. Heck, this specific publisher had an infatuation about guys like this and always talked about himself as being "in it for the music man." As if there should be a podium for music loving audiophiles that anyone else who enjoys this hobby equally or more shouldn't even look at. 

     

    In fact, the snobbish level of people who view themselves as superior audiophiles because they like music more than gear is no different than the people who just rail against audiophiles for the heck of it. 

     

    Then there's the infamous Alan Parsons quote.

     

    "Audiophiles don't use their equipment to listen to your music. Audiophiles use your music to listen to their equipment."

     


    Talk about pompous. Sure, we can purchase his works of art, but god forbid if we listen to them in a way he doesn't approve or for reasons with which he doesn't agree. Who cares if what he says is true for some people? Who is anyone to judge how others have fun in life. I feel very excited for people who increase their enjoyment in life through HiFi. Whether that's because of a gear fascination or music fascination of a combination of the two. If you're happy, I'm happy for you. 

     

    This also brings up the black or white issue. As if audiophiles can only be gear enthusiasts or the so-called better audiophiles, the music enthusiasts. Like politics and the endless objective / subjective debates, there's a continuum on which audiophiles land. On one end is the gear junky and on the other end is the music junky. Based on no objective data, I'm willing to bet most audiophiles fall more toward the center than the extreme poles. I don't care where one is on this continuum, but let's not succumb to those who like to categorize us as music or gear or music first, gear second. The world is gray, many of us like both well designed audio components and well played music. 

     

    Speaking go well played music, do you only listen to Scottish nose whistle recorded at 32/384 or DSD1028? If you're happy doing that, I'm happy for you. Wasting precious brain cycles to think about or judge someone in the Scottish nose whistle camp is the epitome of foolishness. Life is too short. Crank some Rage Against the Machine and move on.

     

    Oh shoot, I forgot Rage isn't a certified group for the other end of this preposterous judgmental spectrum. Like the dealer who laughed at me because I purchased MartinLogan ReQuest speakers to play Pink Floyd when I was fresh out of college in 1999. That's a great way to win over new customers and encourage a younger audience to value and understand dealer markup. Yeah right. That's perhaps a story for another editorial that I'll never write. 

     

    OK, lastly before I get off my editorial soapbox, why do people also care about audiophiles who value fine craftsmanship, made in country ABC production, and limited editions of products? When it comes to cars, watches, houses, or even alcohol that goes down the hatch only to be pissed out an hour later, all the elements of craftsmanship are highly desirable. It's even OK to love the bottle in which one's Booz is transported. However, when it comes to audio, if you like the big McIntosh meters or the copper D'Agostino amplifiers or the bling of Mbl, you're somehow a lesser audiophile not worthy of those who value music first. 

     

    I say bring on the bling, bring on the breadboards, bring on the Patricia Barber, and bring on the Beatles. It doesn't matter to me what you like or why you like it. I don't believe it should matter to anyone else either. Gear collector? Fine with me. Music collector? Fine with me. Both? I hope you live in a big house. 

     

    I'll close with a quote from Sheryl Crow, "If it makes you happy, it can't be that bad."


    P.S. Along similar lines is the judgement of those who spend "outrageous" amounts of money on HiFi components, by people in the same music first group (not all but some). Speakers that cost $250,000 or even $700,000. Amps that cost $100,000 or $250,000. I can hear it now, you can get better performance for a fraction of the price! Let me repeat, who cares? It's the buyer's money to spend however she wants. I certainly don't want someone going through all my receipts and telling me I could've purchased far better peanut butter for less money. I can't afford a million dollar system, but I don't care if you can. I enjoy finding bang for the buck products, but I don't care if you don't enjoy the same.

     

    P.P.S Where am I on this continuum? Smack in the middle. I love great gear designs, both inside and out, both cosmetic and electrically engineered, and I love music. I'll take Pearl Jam on an AM radio if that's all I can get, but on a beautiful HiFi system that sounds spectacular, all is right with the world. 

     

     

     

     

     




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    27 minutes ago, Axial said:

    Sing in your room in front of a quality microphone recording your voice

     

    What type of microphone would you recommend. I mean stereo or mono?

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    49 minutes ago, fas42 said:

     

    In the same area as the earlier Tchaikovsky clip - plenty going right, but the edginess is far too intrusive, there is a "cutting" quality to the SQ ... a good round of solid tweaking is needed, to eliminate that quality from the playback.

     

    This one contains noise contamination on the recording (vinyl) itself.

    You know the tune Frank; noise in, noise ... or you cut the music from its main essence. 

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    32 minutes ago, Axial said:

     

    I want them speakers, that system setup, that matching synergy, that magik musik trick.

    Can I? 🤹‍♂️

     

    Is it available from a music server, a CD player, a turntable, a tape machine deck, a computer? 

     

    From a sorted system ... ^_^.

     

    As an example of what I aim for, here is the original recording, per the source,

     

     

    Some time ago, I had a first go at recording what the Sharp boombox speakers were putting out, on my partially sorted NAD rig - single, cheap USB mic about a metre away - from my YouTube channel,

     

     

    Note that the volume of my copy is down compared to the original, since I didn't want any clipping happening - but I reckon it's a half decent facsimile, considering the cost of the speakers and that the system was nowhere near fully tweaked.

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    45 minutes ago, STC said:

     

    What type of microphone would you recommend. I mean stereo or mono?

     

    Are you a member @ Gearslutz? 

    • https://www.gearslutz.com/

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    45 minutes ago, Axial said:

     

    This one contains noise contamination on the recording (vinyl) itself.

    You know the tune Frank; noise in, noise ... or you cut the music from its main essence. 

     

    Nope, the "noise contamination" is from the playback chain - I've been here so many times, and one can always "denoise" what you hear - at times it's staggering how impressively "miserable" recordings can come across; eg., needle drops from ancient shellac emerge doing high kicks - "rescuing" unlikely recordings is part of the fun ...

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    8 hours ago, fas42 said:

     

    Just go back to having a real musician playing an instrument in that room which keeps exciting those room nodes; a note is played throughout a piece which is bang on a "problem frequency". Do you cringe every time he comes to that note - or does your hearing gracefully compensate for the 'irregularity'? Personally, I just hear the music being made by that live person, not a constant series of irky resonances.

    In my experience musicians, while first entering a room, will test the acoustic response, and try to adapt to it.

    I've heard a soprano hitting a particular frequency that really gained waaaay too much energy in small church. During the performance that never happened. She adapted to it.

    I'm sure you've also noted that a lot of bands mention their sound-guy. There is a reason they bring him along.

    My music collection is not as adaptive as a musician or a soundguy, so I myself had to take care it. Luckily DSPs these days are very capable, and I have to admit I had a soundguy doing it for me.

     

    As for cringing; if you have a track where there are 2 bass notes 'bung and bunng', close together, but everytime you play it, it sounds like 'bung BUNNNGGG bung BUNNNNGGG', yeah, I cringe. There are obviously other less intrusive  nodes in my room that are just part of the scenery, but this particular one, really was annoying.

     

    If you are happy with your room and what goes on in your head, that is obviously fine with me, and likewise you shouldn't question my room and what goes on in my head. I don't know if you read it, but there is this nice editorial at the beginning of this thread.

     

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    2 hours ago, fas42 said:

     

    Nope, the "noise contamination" is from the playback chain - I've been here so many times, and one can always "denoise" what you hear - at times it's staggering how impressively "miserable" recordings can come across; eg., needle drops from ancient shellac emerge doing high kicks - "rescuing" unlikely recordings is part of the fun ...

     

    Okay - you caught my interest. Damaged record from 1954. Ultrasonic cleaning, followed by vacuum cleaning, followed by a treatment with a roller buddy. Lots. Of. Noise Contamination, groove damage, and of course thousands or 10’s of thousands of clicks and pops. 

     

    How to optimize a system to get to get rid of that? Me? I clobber it with iZotrope RX7. WD40 did not work. :)

     

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    2 hours ago, fas42 said:

     

    Nope, the "noise contamination" is from the playback chain - I've been here so many times, and one can always "denoise" what you hear - at times it's staggering how impressively "miserable" recordings can come across; eg., needle drops from ancient shellac emerge doing high kicks - "rescuing" unlikely recordings is part of the fun ...

     

    Here's what the owner had to say about that one (post #140 from the previous page):

     

    "Here is a mono Kogan album, Russian label, come in two vinyls one on Brahms and the other on Lalo. I like Kondrashin for conductor. Imo, it is a good buy. Live recording in 1959 gives special feeling. I have quite a few albums from this Russian Melodiya. Many of them are quite good. This particular album has more surface noise than audiophile vinyl though. The coughing and some weird noises are from the recording."

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    1 hour ago, STC said:

     

    Yes. 

     

    I think a bunch of us, musicians and audiophiles with style are.

    You have all the best mic recommendations and in all price ranges and for both XLR and USB connections.

    ...Less than $50, less than $100, less than $500, the top ones in the four digits. 

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    1 hour ago, Tin said:

    In my experience musicians, while first entering a room, will test the acoustic response, and try to adapt to it.

    I've heard a soprano hitting a particular frequency that really gained waaaay too much energy in small church. During the performance that never happened. She adapted to it.

    I'm sure you've also noted that a lot of bands mention their sound-guy. There is a reason they bring him along.

     

    If a band is using a sound guy, then it's going through a PA - the sound is now dead meat, bearing little relationship to what anyone on stage is actually producing - some modicum of sanity can be restored to this mess, by 5,000 bits of fiddling ... not something I have much interest in, as a pleasurable experience.

     

    This being the main reason I stopped going to any shows - I wasn't going to pay good money to be assaulted by terrible sound ...

     

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    6 minutes ago, Axial said:

     

    I think a bunch of us, musicians and audiophiles with style are.

    You have all the best mic recommendations and in all price ranges and for both XLR and USB connections.

    ...Less than $50, less than $100, less than $500, the top ones in the four digits. 

     

    Ok. Thanks. I was looking for a better understanding of the type of mic to be used to record vocal because most recommend only mono mic. 

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    1 minute ago, fas42 said:

     

    If a band is using a sound guy, then it's going through a PA - the sound is now dead meat, bearing little relationship to what anyone on stage is actually producing - some modicum of sanity can be restored to this mess, by 5,000 bits of fiddling ... not something I have much interest in, as a pleasurable experience.

     

    This being the main reason I stopped going to any shows - I wasn't going to pay good money to be assaulted by terrible sound ...

     

    I'm almost tempted to get into a discussion with you, as I notice some others are trying, but per the subject of this thread, I'm not going to.

    I wish you all the best.

     

     

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    27 minutes ago, Paul R said:

     

    Okay - you caught my interest. Damaged record from 1954. Ultrasonic cleaning, followed by vacuum cleaning, followed by a treatment with a roller buddy. Lots. Of. Noise Contamination, groove damage, and of course thousands or 10’s of thousands of clicks and pops. 

     

    How to optimize a system to get to get rid of that? Me? I clobber it with iZotrope RX7. WD40 did not work. :)

     

     

    The basic principle is to lift the quality of the playback chain, so that the brain gets enough data to sort the wheat from the chaff - not intuitive with audio, but that's how it works; it seems pretty amazing, but it works every time - I shaken my head many, many times at the ability of the mind to filter out crap in the recording, if the underlying replay SQ is in place.

     

    Thought experiment: the cocktail party, everyone is yabbering away; you still can pick up what the person in front of you is saying. Now, replace each person with a just OK mini PA relaying what they're saying; the room is full of loudspeakers filling the room with a jumble of sound; rather than live people. How do you think your ability to sort out the key conversation you're in would go? ... this seems to be the principle in operation, with regard to human hearing.

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    11 minutes ago, Tin said:

    I'm almost tempted to get into a discussion with you, as I notice some others are trying, but per the subject of this thread, I'm not going to.

    I wish you all the best.

     

     

     

    Other people's thinking about whether the SQ is good enough does affect me - as just said, a whole lot of entertainment is off limits for me; because I'm not going to put up with the poor standard being dished out  - I can't switch to the "high quality" channel, because, it just ain't there!

     

    The mediocrity is everywhere - so what's wrong with me is that I'm pissed off that there are very few alternatives, if I want to listen to music in most public places.

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    4 minutes ago, STC said:

     

    And how do i apply this to what you suggested earlier?  Do I also capture the ambiance or just the vocal alone since I am using the recording to check the speaker’s accuracy?

     

    If you want the most accurate vocals reproduced by a mechanical loudspeaker, do you also want the room ambiance with it?

    Do you want a singer recorded live in the room or in a booth? We're talking real live vocals here in the room where your stereo speakers are reproducing the music playing, the vocals. Your room is part of the chain. 

    Invite a friend professional singer in the room where you listen to music. Ask her to sing and record her with a condenser mic with large diaphragm cardioid pickup pattern. 

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    1 minute ago, Axial said:

     

    If you want the most accurate vocals reproduced by a mechanical loudspeaker, do you also want the room ambiance with it?

    Do you want a singer recorded live in the room or in a booth? We're talking real live vocals here in the room where your stereo speakers are reproducing the music playing, the vocals. Your room is part of the chain. 

    Invite a friend professional singer in the room where you listen to music. Ask her to sing and record her with a condenser mic with large diaphragm cardioid pickup pattern. 

     

    Thanks. 

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    In music playback as in music recorded it's all about experimenting, because no two rooms sound the same and no two people listen the same. The goal, through experimentation and measurements is to get the speakers sound like real singers that sang live in that exact same room earlier. Each room will have have its own each pair of speakers designed for it to sound best. ...No? 

     

    Can the best designed speaker (vocals reproduction) sound the best in all rooms? In general yes. 

     _____

     

    Tropic: Altitude and heat temperature (humidity, dryness, coldness, ...) all have an influence on sound.

     _____

     

    Topic (general): Living atop a mountain in a mansion with view on the ocean doesn't need a multi million dollars stereo system, but it sure fits the bill and the decor.

    Living in a trailer from the most dilapidated neighborhood of wetlands the same; an AM/FM radio fits better the bill and the environment. 

    Mix those two audiophiles' styles in the same audio forums of the Internet and we might encounter some differentiations once in a while, plus the occasional thread like this one with a similar editorial. 

    It doesn't matter much the gear, the style serves the end...the love for the music playing, the joy of listening. 

    Everything else IMO is preconceptions and classes separations. It can lead to conflicts.  ...Yes? 

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    4 hours ago, fas42 said:

     

    The basic principle is to lift the quality of the playback chain, so that the brain gets enough data to sort the wheat from the chaff - not intuitive with audio, but that's how it works; it seems pretty amazing, but it works every time - I shaken my head many, many times at the ability of the mind to filter out crap in the recording, if the underlying replay SQ is in place.

     

    Thought experiment: the cocktail party, everyone is yabbering away; you still can pick up what the person in front of you is saying. Now, replace each person with a just OK mini PA relaying what they're saying; the room is full of loudspeakers filling the room with a jumble of sound; rather than live people. How do you think your ability to sort out the key conversation you're in would go? ... this seems to be the principle in operation, with regard to human hearing.

     

    So you are saying two contradictory things here. First “lifting” the playback chain may reduce some of the noises, but will greatly increase others. The chain will faithfully reproduce whatever errors are there.  But then you seem to be saying, just live with and pay selective attention to the music and ignore the noise. 

     

    Either path can work, though in this case, lifting the playback chain means inserting software manipulation to declick, decrackle and perhaps equal8ze some of the sound. Ignoring it is also an option, but an easier option to swallow if you remove the gross errors first.  :)

     

    I am am afraid I will have to disagree with some of your conclusions about the quality possible from low end equipment. Just because AM radio can actually be listenable does not mean other things, say FM are not inherently better. I think you are having a lot of fun doing what you do though, and honestly? That *is* what counts at the end of the day. 

     

     

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    24 minutes ago, Paul R said:

     

    So you are saying two contradictory things here. First “lifting” the playback chain may reduce some of the noises, but will greatly increase others. The chain will faithfully reproduce whatever errors are there.  But then you seem to be saying, just live with and pay selective attention to the music and ignore the noise. 

     

    Anomalies that are introduced by the playback chain are reduced. What you can hear in finer detail in the recording is improved - which are what the microphones, in normal recordings, picked up; as well as artifacts of the recording process and storage imperfections. It just turns out that the important content - the musical event - makes so much more sense as a listening experience, than all the niggling problems of the recording medium, provided that the playback doesn't add another layer of distortion and artifacts.

     

    Yes, it's selective attention, but it's completely instinctive - you don't "decide" that it's nicer to pay attention to the music; rather, you can't stop your hearing tuning into the music - it would take quite a degree of deliberate determination to then switch focus, and carefully note every recording defect as they come along. I use the light switch analogy to describe the difference - because it is as stark as that.

     

    24 minutes ago, Paul R said:

     

    Either path can work, though in this case, lifting the playback chain means inserting software manipulation to declick, decrackle and perhaps equal8ze some of the sound. Ignoring it is also an option, but an easier option to swallow if you remove the gross errors first.  :)

     

    A Glen Miller album I have with some denoised tracks, professionally done, has exciting tracks, and, dead, army blanket over the speakers efforts - guess which are which?

     

    24 minutes ago, Paul R said:

     

    I am am afraid I will have to disagree with some of your conclusions about the quality possible from low end equipment. Just because AM radio can actually be listenable does not mean other things, say FM are not inherently better. I think you are having a lot of fun doing what you do though, and honestly? That *is* what counts at the end of the day. 

     

     

     

    The same ol' problem - money magically transforms the quality possible ^_^ ... the critical components that low end gear uses are only slightly "less good" than what really expensive stuff includes - what the money brings in are better auxiliary elements, like more beefy chasses, and switching componentry; and of course, bling ... if one knows how to identify the key shortcomings in cheaper stuff, then those areas can be sorted adequately.

     

    At one stage I spent months and years listening to every "high end" rig I could access - universally, in the range from awful, to tolerable in small doses - so far from evoking the sense of listening to the "real thing" ... I gave up trying to track down a reasonable one.

     

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    50 minutes ago, fas42 said:

     

    A Glen Miller album I have with some denoised tracks, professionally done, has exciting tracks, and, dead, army blanket over the speakers efforts - guess which are which?

     

     

    Yep, too much processing equals dead sound. Just right though, is magic. And fun to make happen as well. 

     

     

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    Humor only, nothing's wrong with that (too many people are just not serious enough) ... should they? ...Like Theranos with Elizabeth Holmes and her ex-boyfriend Sunny Balwani. ...What a bunch of clowns everyone who have bought into it; high caliber people too. ...Intelligent? Are you kidding! ...Blindfolded by a scam artist believing their investment would generate high yields. They were bloody wrong. 

     ___

     

    What's wrong with my wife? ^

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    On 4/12/2019 at 6:07 AM, Ralf11 said:

    Let's go with vintage racing -  a hobby.  Tires are still important.

     

    What's this F1, etc, nonsense ...

     

     

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