Audio Blind Testing

[fas42]

2 hours ago, STC said:

 

Not the ear but brain is capable of recreating whatever you want to see or believe, be it 3D or height when it is non-existent.

 

That reminds me of an incident long ago. In a dark room, I dropped a coin/metal object and asked the listener to guess the exact location. 4 of us managed to get right give or take 1 meter except for the most experienced audiophile. He was consistantly pointing to a direction that was way off and one occassion on the opposite side.

 

I agree with you. Some are capable of extra ordinary hearing and I understand their predicament why they could not replicate or demonstate what they hear to others. It's unique experience only they could appreciate.

 

 

It's the ear/combo that does it - and at least for a significant number of people this works like a switch - the illusion is either on, or off. My first system that got this right constantly flipped from one state to the other - subjectively, chalk and cheese ... immensely frustrating at the time. Being on corresponds to a very high apparent quality  - music that someone "can't stand" becomes interesting to them, and they want to keep listening ... the best description is still that the reproduction has all the qualities of live acoustic music, all of them.

[sandyk]

22 minutes ago, STC said:

BTW, there is no height information in stereo although we may perceive with some good imagination.

 That is incorrect. It has even been measured by the author of the TAS 220 and 221 reports ( Dr. Charles Zellig.)

It has to do with Phase.

Also, the ever sceptical esldude (Dennis) has also discussed this aspect too

 

[fas42]

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

We seem to be talking apples and orangutans here. I.E., not communicating at all.

 

The lack of communication is in regard to what one listens for in audio playback - most people are totally locked into whether one thing sounds "better" than another; my interest is in whether any faults are detectable.

 

A little scenario to think about: you have to go for a fast drive on a rough country road; you have a choice between a full size MB, a full size BMW, or a small Korean hatchback. One slight problem: all the shock absorbers on the MB and BMW have been removed or disabled; the Korean cheapy is completely intact ... which car do you use?

[esldude]

3 minutes ago, sandyk said:

 That is incorrect. It has even been measured by the author of the TAS 220 and 221 reports ( Dr. Charles Zellig.)

It has to do with Phase.

Also, the ever sceptical esldude (Dennis) has also discussed this aspect too

 

I have, but Zellig's methodology is ridiculous.

 

I would say generally stereo will not have height info except by accident.  Also with minimal coincidental miking you might get a little effect which will convey height somewhat. 

 

Height is heard by comb filtering of outer ear reflections to the ear canal.  This creates a dip in response that allows one to sense height.  The sensations comes from 6 khz to about 11 khz.  Higher in frequency the response dip the higher the sound is perceived to have originated.  

[MetalNuts]

1 hour ago, Ralf11 said:

it was proven that cheap $5 wine tasted as good as $90 wine when you are falsely told the  price was $90

 

 

With respect, what proof do you have?  Are you saying that you cannot tell the difference between a $90 dollar wine from $5, that means that they taste as good and how do you define good without reference to one's subjective preference.

 

Wine tasting can be very profession and there are courses and training with different levels.  I learned from my friend who attended the course but fail to proceed to higher level,  the master need to tell the origin, say French wine or Chile, then further the district, i.e. Bordeaux, the year (may be not exact but the range), the kind of grape or multi-grape.  The whole process is a blind test without revealing the label of the wine.

 

The fact that one cannot tell the difference does not make make it a universal truth.  The science today cannot prove does not necessary mean that it is false.  We need to have an open mind and in particular when ourselves are not well equipped with the knowledge of that field unless you believe that only you know everything.

 

 

[esldude]

17 minutes ago, MetalNuts said:

With respect, what proof do you have?  Are you saying that you cannot tell the difference between a $90 dollar wine from $5, that means that they taste as good and how do you define good without reference to one's subjective preference.

 

Wine tasting can be very profession and there are courses and training with different levels.  I learned from my friend who attended the course but fail to proceed to higher level,  the master need to tell the origin, say French wine or Chile, then further the district, i.e. Bordeaux, the year (may be not exact but the range), the kind of grape or multi-grape.  The whole process is a blind test without revealing the label of the wine.

 

The fact that one cannot tell the difference does not make make it a universal truth.  The science today cannot prove does not necessary mean that it is false.  We need to have an open mind and in particular when ourselves are not well equipped with the knowledge of that field unless you believe that only you know everything.

 

 

You can find numerous tests about wine like described saying pricing, color and label have a much larger effect than the wine itself on which is judged superior.  I do mean numerous.  I'll not even bother to provide examples.  With google you have several in seconds if you wish. 

 

As for Sommelier training and certification one must identify 6 wines blind.  So few pass all this I even wonder if most passes aren't simply random luck involved.  Take such a thing often enough and a few guess right.  There are like slightly over 200 Master Sommelier's in the world in the past 40 years.  Maybe not luck, can't be sure.  With 99% of the people in the world, price name, and other factors effect their perception considerably.  

[sandyk]

13 minutes ago, esldude said:

I have, but Zellig's methodology is ridiculous.

 

 I don't agree with it either, but it is measurable, and can be encoded to some extent .

 Chesky has done a lot of work in this area, and the aspect of height in "The Storm" would have been due most likely to deliberate microphone choices and placement.

[MetalNuts]

1 minute ago, esldude said:

You can find numerous tests about wine like described saying pricing, color and label have a much larger effect than the wine itself on which is judged superior.  I do mean numerous.  I'll not even bother to provide examples.  With google you have several in seconds if you wish. 

 

As for Sommelier training and certification one must identify 6 wines blind.  So few pass all this I even wonder if most passes aren't simply random luck involved.  Take such a thing often enough and a few guess right.  There are like slightly over 200 Master Sommelier's in the world.  Maybe not luck, can't be sure.  With 99% of the people in the world, price name, and other factors effect their perception considerably.  

 

Everyone is different, so if others can tell the difference (I am not saying good or bad) then I can only regard myself do not have the talent or gift to tell the difference and dare not say the difference.  The Sommelier is different from normal wine tasting which the person has information of the wine before the tasting then affect its result.  The price of the wine relates to many factors, mostly demand and supply. 

 

If a person has no training or interest in learning the difference between different wine, of course he/she cannot appreciate the difference not to mention that the difference can be very subtle.

[Ralf11]

26 minutes ago, MetalNuts said:

... We need to have an open mind ...

 

 

We do experiments so our minds are not open like sieves

 

If you really want the citation to this study I can probably dig it out so contact me.

[Ralf11]

I don't think the Sommelier thing is just luck... people have done fNMR studies and found that when they taste wine the same brain regions are engaged as in novice tasters, but so are other brain regions, not used by the novice tasters (!)

[STC]

21 minutes ago, esldude said:

You can find numerous tests about wine like described saying pricing, color and label have a much larger effect than the wine itself on which is judged superior.  I do mean numerous.  I'll not even bother to provide examples.  With google you have several in seconds if you wish. 

 

Just helping out

 

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/jun/23/wine-tasting-junk-science-analysis

 

[MetalNuts]

5 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

 

We do experiments so our minds are not open like sieves

 

If you really want the citation to this study I can probably dig it out so contact me.

 

I mean to endeavor to adopt a open mind attitude, whether one can or cannot is beyond control.  We or at least myself cannot override the subconscious control of my mind.

[pkane2001]

1 hour ago, esldude said:

Yes good to see that brought up. 

 

Comedy Gold!

 

Comedy because Lavigne learned the wrong thing from this experience.  Doubled down on wrongness.  

 

Obviously a man that holds on to his conv...errr....biases

 

[MetalNuts]

Regarding of wine, I am very happy that if most would believe that a $5 bottle of wine will be the same as $90 or even higher price bottle.  My friend and I will surely benefit from it and we may be able to pay less to get those appeal to our taste (which is subjectively bias to oneself) and preference. 

 

Thank you very much for spreading your belief to others.

[MetalNuts]

47 minutes ago, esldude said:

With google you have several in seconds if you wish. 

 

So, you selectively accept the result of google search to be the truth.  I search MQA and on the 1st page, only Linn commented the negative of MQA.  So, is MQA really good?

[esldude]

9 minutes ago, MetalNuts said:

 

So, you selectively accept the result of google search to be the truth.  I search MQA and on the 1st page, only Linn commented the negative of MQA.  So, is MQA really good?

That is a tallywhackers and groundhogs comparison there.  

 

STC provided a good starting article.  There are many more where that came from.  

[marce]

On 09/01/2018 at 7:19 PM, Albrecht said:

Well if it's years of comparing lo-fi, consumer products to each other, - then you're likely missing the point. And of course, (not sure if you've explained anywhere what you mean be perceptions. In fact, I think that everyone would do better to take a step back and THINK before they knee-jerk the tired cliche of our hearing ability sucks and cannot be trusted). If one is engaged in comparative listening tests with plenty of controls, - one comes to an understanding fairly quickly that whole systems vary significantly in performance.

Yawn, yawn yawn... You and GUTB could be twins.... Patronising.

No more to be said from me, sick of the patronising attitude of some, who presume because of what kit you have now means you've listened to lo-fo instead of high end which is more often than not not true fidelity, to many systems voiced... LOL

[MetalNuts]

49 minutes ago, esldude said:

That is a tallywhackers and groundhogs comparison there.  

 

STC provided a good starting article.  There are many more where that came from.  

I wonder whether you have actually read and understand that Guardian article.  It appears to me that a wine producer of California (excuse me, I rarely drink wine of US) was grieved and considered that the judges had been inconsistent (apparently he did not get the award), it seems to me that only the competition is for US wine only.

 

The reporter wrote " A wine deemed to be a good 90 would be rated as an acceptable 86 by the same judge minutes later and then an excellent 94" and try to present the judges are inconsistent.  The fact that a bottle of wine once opened will change with the contact of oxygen.  Most will become better in terms of scent and taste over time after being opened and the period varies with wine.  So with the passage of time, the wine changes and the score of the judge changes, what's wrong with that.  I would say if the judges give the same score for the same wine on the second or third sip minutes later must be wrong and the result may have been fixed already.

 

The reporter further wrote: "Hodgson went on to analyse the results of wine competitions across California, and found that their medals were distributed at random" trying to show the inconsistency.  I can only see the concerned US winery cannot consistently produce wine to the standard though not necessary their fault.  The quality of wine apart from the "you-know-how" of the winery depends on the grape.  It is quite common for the wine in a particular year good and another year not so good and the price of an earlier year may not be as expensive as a subsequent year.  Again, I cannot see there any inconsistency proved.  All I can see is the lack of knowledge of the reporter in screening what he reported and the disregard of accepted trade knowledge of the winery by Hodgson and alleged through the article that his wine is as good as those having awards and consumers should disregard the awards and buy his. Will it be more questionable to Hodgson and others if the awards goes to the same winery years after years?

 

What the reporter and the wine producer used in presenting the inconsistency are in fact the undisputed knowledge of wine known not only to their profession but to a normal consumer like me and it can only show the consistency of the judges and the reason why the award is random.

 

Saying that people choose the wine by the price may to a certain degree true but confined to those who cannot tell the subtle difference of different wine.  For those who do not buy the wine from the shelve of a shop but choose from trusted wine merchant/cellar, they would not simply rely on the price to determine which wine to buy.

[marce]

23 hours ago, sandyk said:

Hi Marc

 Seems like you have the right priorities already.

The main thing is that you are enjoying the music .

All the best for the future.

 

Kind Regards

Alex

 

Cheers and as I have said when we move I have my own Man cave for the first time, so I will get the room treated and set everything up and will be upgrading... To what I don't know yet, so many options so many opinions...

[mansr]

4 hours ago, MetalNuts said:

Are you saying that you cannot tell the difference between a $90 dollar wine from $5

Almost any two wines will taste differently regardless of price. While some characteristics are more commonly found at one end or the other of the price range, correctly identifying which is which from a single cheap/expensive pair is fraught with peril. There simply isn't enough correlation.

[gmgraves]

10 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

The lack of communication is in regard to what one listens for in audio playback - most people are totally locked into whether one thing sounds "better" than another; my interest is in whether any faults are detectable.

 

A little scenario to think about: you have to go for a fast drive on a rough country road; you have a choice between a full size MB, a full size BMW, or a small Korean hatchback. One slight problem: all the shock absorbers on the MB and BMW have been removed or disabled; the Korean cheapy is completely intact ... which car do you use?

 

Faults are, and always will be, detectable. There is no such thing as a stereo system that sounds like live instruments playing in a real space, and I doubt that there ever will be. Therefore you can spend all the money in the world on the finest audio equipment possible and still won't sound as good as an evening at the symphony. But that should be the goal. A system that sounds like real, live music, all music, no matter what kind. That's my goal. 

 

You car analogy is as non sequitur as it is obvious.

[audiventory]

16 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

system that sounds like live instruments playing in a real space

 

Unfortunatelly, single instrument sound differently at:

1. different locations of same concert hall;

2. different concert halls.

 

In the best (impossible [in exact demands] at current technical level) case we can reproduce how it sound at:

    given location of

    given concert hall for

    given capturing device (currently, it is microphone).

 

Read more https://samplerateconverter.com/content/where-limit-audio-quality

[gmgraves]

5 hours ago, audiventory said:

Unfortunatelly, single instrument sound differently at:

1. different locations of same concert hall;

2. different concert halls.

 

That's irrelevant. A system that sounds exactly like music would sound like a piano or a violin or a trumpet no matter where in the concert hall it was. If the instruments were close-up, the system would sound like those instruments close-up, if the instruments were at a distance, the system would sound like those instruments at a distance. I find it interesting that people are having so much trouble understanding this simple concept, that they are willing to argue about it.

 

5 hours ago, audiventory said:

In the best (impossible [in exact demands] at current technical level) case we can reproduce how it sound at:

    given location of

    given concert hall for

    given capturing device (currently, it is microphone).

 

Again, that has nothing whatsoever to do with "a system that sounds like live instruments playing in a real space". No reproduction system is so good that it would fool anyone into thinking that they are listening to live musicians playing in a space where there is nothing between the musicians playing and the listener's ears but air. T'ain't gonna happen!

[fas42]

6 hours ago, gmgraves said:

 

Faults are, and always will be, detectable. There is no such thing as a stereo system that sounds like live instruments playing in a real space, and I doubt that there ever will be. Therefore you can spend all the money in the world on the finest audio equipment possible and still won't sound as good as an evening at the symphony. But that should be the goal. A system that sounds like real, live music, all music, no matter what kind. That's my goal. 

 

You car analogy is as non sequitur as it is obvious.

 

OK, if a system doesn't sound like live instruments playing in a real space, then there are audible faults - you may not have experienced one working at that level, or been aware that you have, but that's the situation for most "audiophiles" - and they don't get it happening, because they are not concentrating on the right issues ... a key point is, that it no longer sounds like an "audio rig"; it just sounds like music - it's not impressive, in a "look at me!!" sense.

 

The "finest gear possible" is relatively irrelevant - it's how well the assembly, the complete system has been sorted, after acquiring - "plug n' play" is a complete nonsense in the audio world, because the importance of the "little things" is not taken into account - and the sound suffers.

 

The goal of sounding like real, live music I achieved over 30 years ago - and in the interim I been doing experiments to understand some of the factors that matter. And almost none of them are what audiophiles worry about - the sad truth is, "the devil's in the details" - which is just not exciting enough for many people ...

 

When I listen to very ambitious, expensive rigs they normally sound like a BMW with no shock absorbers - they're screamingly flawed, and I would happily take them to the rubbish tip and dump them in the mud - they're worthless to me, in the state they present themseleves.

[fas42]

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

Again, that has nothing whatsoever to do with "a system that sounds like live instruments playing in a real space". No reproduction system is so good that it would fool anyone into thinking that they are listening to live musicians playing in a space where there is nothing between the musicians playing and the listener's ears but air. T'ain't gonna happen!

 

Luckily, t'is otherwise ... I know that, but you don't know - because you haven't experienced it ...

 

What makes it hard is that the human hearing system is very fussy - it can easily pick a poor effort, and immediately rejects it, because the playback keeps reinforcing the fact that it's 'fake'. But there is a line of quality which is good enough for the ear/brain to accept being fooled, and it then goes with the illusion. To the point where one's hearing refuses to give up believing in it, it can't be shown the error of its ways! Truly remarkable, is the human mind ...