The Death of the Home Stereo System

[Bob Stern]

Funny thing was that a statistically significant number preferred the mp3, despite claiming the contrary. Of course, that actually suggests they can hear a difference.

 

Maybe they was born thinking MP3 SQ is as music must sound...?

 

Amar Bose did experiments in which untrained listeners could adjust the frequency response and distortion of a playback system. He claimed that most people preferred to adjust it to sound like a cheap portable radio rather than high fidelity because that's what they were used to.

[crisnee]

One thing for certain is that dedicated 2 channel listening at home in General is a dying activity. Simply put, there's far more interesting and for some, satisfying activities now that we are all pretty much socially connected or ' plugged in'. And for this reason, I don't see audio getting back any lost ground anytime soon. Young people are networking socially and economically more and more each day with even personal, solitary time often including texting, surfing, gaming, etc. Music has become a background activity to almost everything, but primarily still,........background.

 

Yes. It's not only young people though. Multi-tasking and continuous-tasking has reached well into middle-age, and it is anathema to music listening. But music as background is fine, necessary as a matter of fact, part of modern, do as much as possible at all times, life (how many public places don't have background "music" playing?). And that is an added problem, as the constant barrage of sound tires mind and soul, renders one too worn out to listen actively if one were otherwise so inclined.

 

When I was much younger I used to listen to music with friends and do very little else while doing so--a little dope maybe. We might talk a little now and then but mostly we'd listen for an hour or two. Now-a-days I'm lucky to get friends, who claim to like music, to listen to more than a track or two of something I find to be interesting or particularly good, and even then they pretty much want to talk or do something else throughout. Oh well.

 

Chris

[crisnee]

Amar Bose did experiments in which untrained listeners could adjust the frequency response and distortion of a playback system. He claimed that most people preferred to adjust it to sound like a cheap portable radio rather than high fidelity because that's what they were used to.

 

That explains the sound of the Bose headphones.

 

Chris

[firedog]

Or maybe "psycho-accoustic" processing produces an agreeable result.

 

I think that is true; mp3 tends to round off sound extremes sort of boost mids - and many people would find that euphonic. I agree that for the higher bit rate mp3's the difference in listening to them vs lossless IS subtle - it is mostly with very high or low frequencies, and with percussion - and I can tell the difference, but I have to be paying attention. I don't think on most portable setups the difference would be very noticeable, and especially not when you are in a distracting or noisy environment.

 

But if I remember the test accurately, the group with equipment costing over $6000 did prefer the lossless files.

[Audio_ELF]

Amar Bose did experiments in which untrained listeners could adjust the frequency response and distortion of a playback system. He claimed that most people preferred to adjust it to sound like a cheap portable radio rather than high fidelity because that's what they were used to.

Of course one questions what Amar Bose actually thought High Fidelity sounded like...

[Savage]

I think that is true; mp3 tends to round off sound extremes sort of boost mids - and many people would find that euphonic. I agree that for the higher bit rate mp3's the difference in listening to them vs lossless IS subtle - it is mostly with very high or low frequencies, and with percussion - and I can tell the difference, but I have to be paying attention. I don't think on most portable setups the difference would be very noticeable, and especially not when you are in a distracting or noisy environment.

 

What appeals to us immediately sound-wise may not be what we prefer in the long term. An easy term for it is listener fatigue but I am not sure that is all of it.

[crisnee]

Amar Bose did experiments in which untrained listeners could adjust the frequency response and distortion of a playback system. He claimed that most people preferred to adjust it to sound like a cheap portable radio rather than high fidelity because that's what they were used to.

 

It's amazing how well one's mind can fill in the sound. People since the beginning of recorded music have claimed that recordings sounded very much like the real thing, I'm talking Victrola days. I know it's been refuted by some, a phony advertising campaign, whatever. But I think there's some truth in it, both from personal experience and from things like great musicians who got their start because they were so taken by what they heard on transistor radios, or the old mono 78's.

 

Maybe all the differences people speak of where it comes to mp3 vs. cd sound vs. hi-rez and the like is the ability or willingness of folks minds to fill in the missing signals. So a person that doesn't hear a difference really hears everything at the highest level--hi-rez (fills in all the signals from the cues in the music) while the one who hears the differences does not fill in.

 

I know, most of you will think that is preposterous but consider how much better you can make a crummy system, even a transistor radio sound if you're really into what's playing when you let your mind go. Or take it a step further, for those of you who've partaken in mind expanders, let's call them, how they can make a bad system sound grand.

 

The best I ever hear Greg Allman sound was on just such a system with said expanders. This was back then when he was popular, and I can still remember how he sounded to this day. At least the outlines of his voice were coming through on that record player and my brain (with a little help) filled in the details (to the extreme). I still have occasional days like that without drugs (no they're not flashbacks), and although I have a much better audio system then I had back then, it doesn't suddenly get better one day and then go back to whatever the next. So....

 

Chris

[Audio_ELF]

This -- We Don't Get No <I>Respect</I> | Stereophile.com -- on Stereophile sums it up...

[paul1970]

This -- We Don't Get No <I>Respect</I> | Stereophile.com -- on Stereophile sums it up...

Could this be why?

Listening #113 | Stereophile.com

[Jud]

Could this be why?

Listening #113 | Stereophile.com

 

Oy.

[Audio_ELF]

Oy.

... and your point is?

[Jud]

... and your point is?

 

The link was to a review of Belt products. I'll just quote a snippet from the review, emphasis mine:

 

The Belts believe that there are various energy patterns both inside and outside every living animal—ourselves included—and that our senses work, in part, by comparing asymmetries in our internal energy patterns with asymmetries in our external energy patterns. That sounds tame enough, but here's the strange part....

 

Oh. So the thing about our senses working by comparing internal and external energy patterns isn't the "strange part"?

 

Like I said: Oy.

[mav52]

The link was to a review of Belt products. I'll just quote a snippet from the review, emphasis mine:

 

 

 

Oh. So the thing about our senses working by comparing internal and external energy patterns isn't the "strange part"?

 

Like I said: Oy.

 

Hey Jud, maybe that quote you noted is describing our senses a.k.a 'Hearing' and another lesser known 'Synesthesia'. Sound does produce energy in the form of sound waves that can be felt.

[wgscott]

... and your point is?

 

vey

[souptin]

Hey Jud, maybe that quote you noted is describing our senses a.k.a 'Hearing' and another lesser known 'Synesthesia'. Sound does produce energy in the form of sound waves that can be felt.

 

Looky here: The professor was way ahead!

Audiophiles = Synesthesiaists ? - Blogs - Computer Audiophile

 

Also, on sound being felt, the Scottish percussionist Evelyn Glennie:

Evelyn Glennie - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

"Glennie has been profoundly deaf since the age of 12, having started to lose her hearing from the age of 8. This does not inhibit her ability to perform at an international level. She regularly plays barefoot during both live performances and studio recordings in order to feel the music better.[4]

 

Glennie contends that deafness is largely misunderstood by the public. She claims to have taught herself to hear with parts of her body other than her ears. In response to criticism from the media, Glennie published "Hearing Essay" in which she discusses her condition."

 

These will be on the end of week test, so read carefully, children.

[Jud]

vey

 

is mir.

[bluesman]

Oy.

vey

is mir.

... and your point is?

...that Yiddish is natively high res - look how much it communicates with a bissel of letters.

[Allan F]

...that Yiddish is natively high res - look how much it communicates with a bissel of letters.

 

Azoy?

[bluesman]

Azoy?

Azoy gait es! (We probably want to stop this before it gets ugly - we've now used every mellifluous word in the Yiddish manguage.

 

[wgscott]

Oh, come on. There must be at least 10,000 words for schlong.

[Jud]

Oy.

vey

is mir.

... and your point is?

...that Yiddish is natively high res - look how much it communicates with a bissel of letters.

 

Shorter Eloise: Nu?

[bluesman]

Oh, come on. There must be at least 10,000 words for schlong.

...none of which is as mellifluous as schlong. I use it as a test of upper midrange response - when all is right, it sounds as though it rolled off the tongue with a smoothness equaled only by the finest gelati. And when it's other than perfect, it vaults out of the speakers with a harshness reminiscent of Danny DeVito's saying the word "Buick". Further, I can't think of another word in any language that conveys so much meaning in so few letters. And best of all, it's not just a noun.

 

Q.E.D.

[Jud]

Oh, come on. There must be at least 10,000 words for schlong.

 

An old Jewish man in Miami is lonely. In order to meet people, he decides he will ride a horse up and down the beach. But horses are too expensive. It's sand anyway, so he manages to find a camel cheap.

 

Every day he rides his camel up and down the beach. And he finds that he does come to the attention of many people and is no longer lonely.

 

One day he goes to saddle up the camel and finds it has been stolen. Distraught, he calls the police. Among the questions they ask is whether it is a male or female.

 

"Male or female? I never even looked!" Then, after a minute he cries "Wait! It was a male camel!"

 

One of the policemen says "If you never looked, sir, how do you know that?"

 

The old man replies triumphantly "Because as I went by I could hear people shout 'Look at that schmuck on the camel!'"

[esimms86]

...none of which is as mellifluous as schlong. I use it as a test of upper midrange response - when all is right, it sounds as though it rolled off the tongue with a smoothness equaled only by the finest gelati. And when it's other than perfect, it vaults out of the speakers with a harshness reminiscent of Danny DeVito's saying the word "Buick". Further, I can't think of another word in any language that conveys so much meaning in so few letters. And best of all, it's not just a noun.

 

Q.E.D.

 

Sorry bluesman, I know that you're talking about sound, not sight, but I'm trying to get away from the visual of a schlong rolling off the tongue like the finest gelati (not that there's anything wrong with it). And, yes, I apologize in the event that anyone here is offended.

 

Esau

[wgscott]

I was going to make that comment too, but in a rare act of restraint, refrained.