The true experimental tweak thread

[fas42]

Once a system is lifted to a certain level of performance then just about anything you do, in any area, will cause some audible difference. Then the focus needs to change - one has to become aware of any and everything that the system is doing wrong - lose the concept of "better", and replace it with "absence of perceptible faults". Then the value of a change made becomes far clearer - have I reduced the level of defects, or merely altered the nature of them?

 

How to monitor the defects? ... Easy ... just use a 'difficult' recording, one that's irritating, at the edge of being unbearable, that type of thing - the things that are totally useless for this exercise are your "favourite recordings", or the audiophile "perfecto" items ...

 

Doing this in an incremental fashion gradually weeds out the nasties - and the result is that every recording then becomes thoroughly enjoyable to listen to - a well worthwhile goal, IMO.

[fas42]

In audio there appear to be two approaches to tweaking, to grossly simply the situation ... the first takes delight in modifying the signature of the recording, so that it's more pleasant, or interesting for them to listen to - "tube rolling" is a classic example of this; the second focus aims to get closer to what the recording actually contains, to eliminate entirely any audible contribution by the playback chain ... I happen to fall in the second category.

 

Either is perfectly 'acceptable' - if the intent is to have audio as a hobby, or satisfying journey of exploration. Where there is confusion, or even a situation where people become upset, is when these approaches are not understood to be mutually exclusive - they're aiming for results which conflict.