I Now Consider The Stereophile Staff Snake Oil Salesmen

[firedog]

7 minutes ago, Alcap said:

Sorry to barge in but what are “listening skills” ? I don’t think I have those,

I hear music  playing on a system, I like it......no skill required.

There’s definitely something called listening skills. Both Harmon and Philips have online listening skills courses you can take for free and shapen your listening skills.

 

There’s hearing and listening. There are people that can hear better than me but can’t tell the difference between a 128k MP3 and a CD. We are all hearing the same music; I’’ve cultivated some listening skills so I can perceive the difference; they haven’t.

There are lots of examples. People who are into electric guitar can differentiate between different guitars; other people just hear “an electric guitar”. 

 

Listening skills are developed: you train your brain to notice differences that you wouldn’t notice otherwise. The result is that you can “hear” more of what’s there. 

[davide256]

2 minutes ago, firedog said:

There’s definitely something called listening skills. Both Harmon and Philips have online listening skills courses you can take for free and shapen your listening skills.

 

There’s hearing and listening. There are people that can hear better than me but can’t tell the difference between a 128k MP3 and a CD. We are all hearing the same music; I’’ve cultivated some listening skills so I can perceive the difference; they haven’t.

There are lots of examples. People who are into electric guitar can differentiate between different guitars; other people just hear “an electric guitar”. 

 

Listening skills are developed: you train your brain to notice differences that you wouldn’t notice otherwise. The result is that you can “hear” more of what’s there. 

 Education music majors have multiple semesters of music listening lab courses. ( in 6 bars or less name the composer, the key, the instruments, the piece etc and repeat ad infinitum during the lab hour). Quite a few fail at the more demanding schools and change their major.

[mansr]

4 minutes ago, davide256 said:

Education music majors have multiple semesters of music listening lab courses. ( in 6 bars or less name the composer, the key, the instruments, the piece etc and repeat ad infinitum during the lab hour). Quite a few fail at the more demanding schools and change their major.

That doesn't sound like fun at all.

 

On a related note, Monty says that in the early days of mp3 he could tell which encoder had been used just by listening. I believe him.

[The Computer Audiophile]

3 minutes ago, mansr said:

That doesn't sound like fun at all.

 

On a related note, Monty says that in the early days of mp3 he could tell which encoder had been used just by listening. I believe him.

You believe him without a blind test and longitudinal study?

 

:~)

[eclectic]

4 minutes ago, mansr said:

That doesn't sound like fun at all.

 

On a related note, Monty says that in the early days of mp3 he could tell which encoder had been used just by listening. I believe him.

 

I remember those days.  The Xing encoder was said to be particularly bad. All the cool people used the Blade encoder then latterly the Lame encoder. I reckoned I could tell the difference. Now, I think I was deluded or boasting. Probably boasting..  

[mansr]

Just now, The Computer Audiophile said:

You believe him without a blind test and longitudinal study?

I've heard the differences myself, just never spent enough time listening to different encoders to learn the signature of each.

[patagent]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

No matter how implausible, his story is still more believable than Bob Stuart's.

 

What are the odds two different listeners would prefer (at 100% rate) the at least 50 non-MQA tracks that were played during the purported 8-10 hours blind listening test?  Amino acids in a primordial soup had better odds.

[mansr]

4 minutes ago, patagent said:

What are the odds two different listeners would prefer (at 100% rate) the at least 50 non-MQA tracks that were played during the purported 8-10 hours blind listening test?

Better than the odds of Stuart finding a flaw in the sampling theorem.

[Spacehound]

1 hour ago, Alcap said:

Sorry to barge in but what are “listening skills” ? I don’t think I have those.

You've got the right attitude. I'll leave you  to figure out what for .

 

 

[Brinkman Ship]

12 minutes ago, patagent said:

 

What are the odds two different listeners would prefer (at 100% rate) the at least 50 non-MQA tracks that were played during the purported 8-10 hours blind listening test?  Amino acids in a primordial soup had better odds.

Considering, MQA is a lossy, amateurish application of DSP that sounds like fake surround, or a loudness button on a shitty AV receiver,..UH...100%?

[Brinkman Ship]

"When I visited Michal Jurewicz's mastering lab and studio in Greenpoint, we compared a lot of files: first without, then with MQA. In every comparison, MQA made the original recording sound more dynamic and transparent, but only sometimes more temporally precise. After a while, the MQA versions began to remind me of those old Loudness Contour buttons on 1960s receivers, which used equalization to compensate for the loss of treble and bass at low listening levels. Consistently, MQA sounded as though it was tweaking the EQ in the presence region (footnote 2). I noticed that most of the MQA versions sounded rounded off and smoother than the originals, and asked why that was. Jurewicz said he wondered about that."

https://www.stereophile.com/content/mytek-hifi-brooklyn-da-processorheadphone-amplifier-herb-reichert-may-2017#hflMIXbcmleEX18t.99

 

So despite a totally artificial presentation, as noted above, major cluess shilling takes place.

 

That is exactly what I want from my hirez digital..boosted treble and bass, and a "rounded off sound".

 

Great Herb!

[Spacehound]

46 minutes ago, davide256 said:

 Education music majors have multiple semesters of music listening lab courses. ( in 6 bars or less name the composer, the key, the instruments, the piece etc and repeat ad infinitum during the lab hour). Quite a few fail at the more demanding schools and change their major.

Do they have to play an instrument? Or is it like this "History of  Art" stuff?

[eclectic]

5 minutes ago, Brinkman Ship said:

"When I visited Michal Jurewicz's mastering lab and studio in Greenpoint, we compared a lot of files: first without, then with MQA. In every comparison, MQA made the original recording sound more dynamic and transparent, but only sometimes more temporally precise.

 

What does "temporally precise" actually mean?

 

I never got the PRaT thing. Is this the same?

[patagent]

8 minutes ago, Brinkman Ship said:

Considering, MQA is a lossy, amateurish application of DSP that sounds like fake surround, or a loudness button on a shitty AV receiver,..UH...100%?

Except Archimago already conducted a test where listeners slightly preferred PCM over MQA (roughly 55% to 45%).  If you were smart, you would have said you compared 10 albums and preferred non-MQA files 80% of the time.  That could have been believable. 

[patagent]

20 minutes ago, mansr said:

Better than the odds of Stuart finding a flaw in the sampling theorem.

 

Not defending Stuart in any way but there is at least one exception to the sampling theorem.   The sampling theorem is not an incontrovertible law of nature that has no exceptions.

[Brinkman Ship]

14 minutes ago, patagent said:

Except Archimago already conducted a test where listeners slightly preferred PCM over MQA (roughly 55% to 45%).  If you were smart, you would have said you compared 10 albums and preferred non-MQA files 80% of the time.  That could have been believable. 

Your condescending tone is getting you no where.

 

Archimago's test had no relation to what I did. Virtually none of the participants had MQA DACs, and he use a capture of a stream. This will clearly blur the differences (no pun intended). I am big fan of his write ups, but that particular test proved nothing.

 

..now...try again...

[Brinkman Ship]

16 minutes ago, eclectic said:

 

What does "temporally precise" actually mean?

 

I never got the PRaT thing. Is this the same?

Maybe this helps?

 

____________

 

bull·shit

ˈbo͝olˌSHit/

vulgar slang

noun

1. 

stupid or untrue talk or writing; nonsense.

verb

1. 

talk nonsense to (someone), typically to be misleading or deceptive.

[eclectic]

12 minutes ago, Brinkman Ship said:

Maybe this helps?

 

____________

 

bull·shit

ˈbo͝olˌSHit/

vulgar slang

noun

1. 

stupid or untrue talk or writing; nonsense.

verb

1. 

talk nonsense to (someone), typically to be misleading or deceptive.

 

Thank you. Very helpful, though I prefer the more polite description "Male Bovine Excrement". Wouldn't want to offend anyone's sensibilities after all. 

[Brinkman Ship]

1 minute ago, eclectic said:

 

Thank you. Very helpful, though I prefer the more polite description "Male Bovine Excrement". Wouldn't want to offend anyone's sensibilities after all. 

glad i could help!

[Samuel T Cogley]

2 minutes ago, eclectic said:

 

Thank you. Very helpful, though I prefer the more polite description "Male Bovine Excrement". Wouldn't want to offend anyone's sensibilities after all. 

 

FWIW, I share your experience with the elusiveness of PRaT.  The consistent read that I've gotten from audiophile forums is some variation of, "if you can't hear PRaT, your system is not resolving enough".  I just lumped it in with danceable cables.

[Spacehound]

26 minutes ago, patagent said:

 

Not defending Stuart in any way but there is at least one exception to the sampling theorem.   The sampling theorem is not an incontrovertible law of nature that has no exceptions.

They aren't really 'laws'

They  are the results of observations, including measurements,  and some hard sums (which aren't real either,  there not being '3' of anything in reality). They   will do until something doesn't fit, which is how 'science' works.

 

Rocks  and hot gas don't 'obey' anything we dream up. And Jupiter won't be fined if  it breaks our  'laws'. 

[mansr]

35 minutes ago, patagent said:

Not defending Stuart in any way but there is at least one exception to the sampling theorem.   The sampling theorem is not an incontrovertible law of nature that has no exceptions.

It's a mathematical theorem with a simple, solid proof. That's far better than an empirically determined "law of nature."

[Shadders]

4 minutes ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

 

FWIW, I share your experience with the elusiveness of PRaT. 

You are aware, that there are services online, and in the phone book to remedy this. Not too costly either. Apparently. So i am told.

[Spacehound]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

It's a mathematical theorem with a simple, solid proof. That's far better than an empirically determined "law of nature."

True. But all it means  is that a popular game we  invented  is consistent. There aren't 'six' crows flying by, there are  'some' crows.

[Samuel T Cogley]

4 minutes ago, Shadders said:

You are aware, that there are services online, and in the phone book to remedy this. Not too costly either. Apparently. So i am told.

 

I'm assuming this is some attempt at humor...