Fas42’s Stereo ‘Magic’

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

6 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

The SQ I pursue is the absence of the "electronic" quality that, say, is so obvious at an audio show - walk into a room of very expensive gear, and it just "smells" of being a hifi rig; miles from fooling anyone that it's the "real thing". Now, just take the process of eliminating that distinctive whiff of audio components, in the sound, to the n'th degree, and you get what is possible from even low priced items - a feeling of "naturalness" in the music you listen to ...

 

Wow its hard to imagine a more obvious reverse snobbery bias against expensive gear. Maybe we should do some blind testing that includes sticking cotton wool up your nose to block the stench of high-end gear 😲

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

33 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

does that mean, that every expensive setup you've come across at an audio show always has that "fool you!" quality, every time?

 

This is irrelevant to your price bias and that among your magic talents you can smell audio quality 🤔

 

53 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

walk into a room of very expensive gear, and it just "smells" of being a hifi rig; miles from fooling anyone that it's the "real thing". Now, just take the process of eliminating that distinctive whiff of audio components, in the sound, to the n'th degree, and you get what is possible from even low priced items - a feeling of "naturalness" in the music you listen to ...

33 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

I've been to Audio Connection a few times in years gone by, and the standard of their most expensive rigs, on the floor, was pretty awful - if it's pricey, it should perform - no excuses ...

 

Confirmation bias works both ways. If it doesn't have your magic touch it will sound lousy to you.

 

I have heard fantastic and lousy sound at high end dealerships.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

7 minutes ago, fas42 said:

I was referring to the the fact that the signature of the rig is so overt, that you can almost "smell it".

 

and yet what you actually said was

 

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

 

walk into a room of very expensive gear, and it just "smells" of being a hifi rig; miles from fooling anyone that it's the "real thing".

 

I think what is clear here Frank is that if it doesn't have your scent on it, you won't like it. Its called Confirmation bias

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

2 hours ago, Iving said:

There are two overall forms of synesthesia:

 

projective synesthesia: people who see actual colors, forms, or shapes when stimulated (the widely understood version of synesthesia).

 

associative synesthesia: people who feel a very strong and involuntary connection between the stimulus and the sense that it triggers.

 

Nonetheless, whether synaesthetic or neurotypical, the distortion is driven by confirmation bias for Frank who smells expensive gear and hears bad sound.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

3 minutes ago, Iving said:

 

You know Frank far better than I do!

 

Iving, another way of looking at it is there is no need to invoke synaesthesia to explain confirmation bias. I don't think smelling audio gear as a method of judging sound quality will help Frank's credibility.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

28 minutes ago, Iving said:

Well - I am not invoking synesthesia to explain confirmation bias as such - although I suppose one could. I don't even know the Frank back story [just the mid-sentence exclamation!! marks]. All I read this morning was someone experiencing conflation/crossover sensory modalities. Given the "spatial" aspect to synesthesia, and the topic Title, one has to wonder.

 

Oh so Frank judges SQ with smell? Well of course that reads absurdly. OTOH the Wiki summary refers to a "semantic vacuum hypothesis" for developmental synesthesia and; later, says, "According to [ideasthesia], synesthesia is a phenomenon mediated by the extraction of the meaning of the inducing stimulus. Thus, synesthesia may be fundamentally a semantic phenomenon. Therefore, to understand neural mechanisms of synesthesia the mechanisms of semantics and the extraction of meaning need to be understood better. This is a non-trivial issue because it is not only a question of a location in the brain at which meaning is "processed" but pertains also to the question of understanding ... Thus, the question of the neural basis of synesthesia is deeply entrenched into the general mind–body problem".

 

So Frank's apparent or actual "confirmation bias" could be just one way of looking at how we all map meaning to experiences - only in this case with reference to a particular [spatially gifted?] person.

 

In the vernacular - in my own words - is it possible that Frank experiences High End equipment in Shows with quite a sense of awe - the first hand experience is replete with meaning. His own experiential background - what he already understands/believes as it were - maps to that new experience with a particular kind of interpretation involving auditory and olfactory experiences in a classically synesthetic way. Even if we still regard this as bias or even prejudice - it is still real - and Frank isn't making it up or hoping to wind everybody up.

 

I can't help it. I am just always generous about people. 🥰

 

I think there's a far simpler explanation. I sent a PM.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

17 minutes ago, Racerxnet said:

 

Most of us are not making unsubstantiated replies based on thin air. Franks relentless diatribe, repeated hundreds of times, has been asked for some proof and comes up empty, is a problem. WE ALL KNOW HE IS BULLSHITTING. He should give it a rest. 

Frank is what I would call a radical or extremist subjectivist. Although not as common as extremist objectivists there is an assumption (read bias) that he is correct about everything and his mission is to save us from ourselves.

12 minutes ago, sandyk said:

 

 There is always the IGNORE button  !

I stopped reading Frank's posts years ago because of the extraordinarily repetitive content and style of posting. I made the mistake yesterday of taking a glimpse. Yes I agree there is the ignore button. I have never used it once for anybody. besides the posts appear in other people's quotes.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

5 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

How does this apply to a comparison between two systems made several weeks or months apart under completely different internal and external conditions?

 

 

2 minutes ago, STC said:

 If it is real then it can be replicated. 

Hi ST, yes but memory is just not good enough to distinguish such differences over long periods....it is one of the claims against ABX testing and echoic memory failing after just seconds

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

15 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

17 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Again, most of you have heard "magic sound" from some, perhaps spectacularly ambitious, expensive or tremendously tweaked system - so all of you who have heard this at least once knows it exists ... the problem is, that you want this to be the result of enormous amounts of money thrown at it, and it disturbs you that it can be achieved via other means.

 

If you are only interested in achieving SQ below what's possible, that's fine - but the option is always there to getting those sorts of results, if you decide to pursue it ... it's up to you ...

Read more  

 

Straw Man Fallacy

exactly so! This is one of the reasons that these sorts of posts are so hard to ignore...... the "offender" will endeavour to not let you ignore. To get attention they simply invent an argument (straw man fallacy) which they attribute to somebody. Most reasonable people do not like to be misrepresented in this way. Yes of course you can ignore it and of course you can't stop to respond to every barking dog otherwise you never reach your destination. On the other hand when people are putting words in your mouth some members may assume that it's a true characterisation if you don't point out otherwise. 

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

35 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

1 hour ago, kumakuma said:

 

I'm not even sure what this logical fallacy is called.

A new one, maybe?😏

some of relevance addressing the magic referred to in this thread might include The fallacy of truth by assertion, ipse dixit, and a book written by Frankfurt "On Bullsh*t (2005)"

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

3 hours ago, STC said:

Solved!!!

 

The magic did not happen

 

Solved!

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

11 hours ago, STC said:

Typo- meant to ask why didn’t he pursue with the same system. 

Oh,haha. I thought you meant the thread was solved,specifically there is no "magic" in Frank's "rig", just his head. I was agreeing.

 

Frank's nonsense is driven by confirmation bias.

 

We all know that if we listened to Franks system,as described, it would likely sound terrible. Frank would of course think otherwise to which I say all power to him.

 

What I dislike is that Frank needs attention and therefore spams every thread with his magic beliefs.

 

8 hours ago, Confused said:

most people are tying to achieve the best possible sound within a limited budget.  There is always significant interest in something that is low cost but great for sound quality.

 

Exactly so, or I might change it to "achieve the best possible sound within their chosen budget" IOW the best bang for the buck as they perceive it and as they feel important by whatever criteria they have set.

 

Frank makes the most of very cheap components like laptop speakers or whatever. Fine. Tweaking to get the best sound is done by most audiophiles so there is nothing special and no magic in Frank's method. It is therefore not necessary to spam every thread with messages of his magic tweaking and absurd claims like he can make crappy recordings sound great and tiny little laptop speakers perform miracles that high end speakers do not.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

2 minutes ago, Racerxnet said:

I am surprised Chris allows him to thread crap all over the site. We all know his take on sound reproduction.

 

Only @The Computer Audiophile can answer this. On the whole Frank remains civil even if one dislikes the doctrinaire tone and absurd claims as judged by both objectivists and subjectivists alike.Perhaps Frank should get some sort of prize for alienating both sides of the divide.

 

There is the ignore button.I just don't read his posts except when they appear in others quotes.

 

What annoys me most is the straw man arguments in his replies like "Though, we all know Ferraris, say, are only worthwhile as a vehicle because they cost so much". Sometimes the assertion apples directly to who he is quoting and if seen is difficukt to ignore the mis-characterization lest others assume you imlicitly agree.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

21 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

Actually an accurate system does do this...

 

I'm sure you remember GIGO from your time in the computer industry.

 

I totally agree that if the playback makes everything sound pleasant it is adding coloration, sonic sunglasses.

 

That said, IMO, a great system can bring out the best in a recording to the extent that old favorites can be "rediscovered' but agreed, it will be warts and all.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

1 hour ago, sandyk said:

you appear to both see and hear things differently to most people, and you have conceded this too,which is fine, but it's not mainstream by any means.

 

I think we all see and hear things a bit differently, its part of being human.I am not concerned that anyone prefers or needs multi-channel or reduced cross talk to create the illusion of reality that others can approach with say Stereo.

 

I am also not concerned with Frank who needs to tweak his system to get optimal sound which in turn tweaks his sensibility to create an illusion of reality.

 

I am concerned pissed with someone preaching repetitively that they can produce magic results simply by doing what we all have already done, in truth likely better than Frank has done it!😲

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

3 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

I'd only support the exercise if it were done on a different site...

 

isn't he unwelcome on most other sites?

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

My POV is that the $100k rig needs sorting just as much my budget combinations - if everything is equally dealt with, then of course the higher quality of the more expensive gear will easily be heard to be superior to the cheap stuff. But if the exercise of resolving issues is not carried out, then the lower priced rig will win, in terms of making recordings satisfying to listen to.

 I have been following Frank's posts since CC suggested he review his posting habits....

 

So, the revelatory news is that expensive high end gear will sound better than lo-fi budget gear if both are optimally set up.

 

Hmmm Frank appears to be telling us that provided you can afford it, buy "the higher quality of the more expensive gear will (be) easily be heard to be superior to the cheap stuff".

 

You know Frank, I think some "cheap stuff" can sound very good indeed. You do have to know how to tweak it tho !🤣😲😁🤣

 

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

8 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Which is missing why I keep repeating the same message ... a chain of 100 links has 10 which are faulty in various ways - people tell stories here, and on other forums, about what they did to improve 2, 3, 4 of those links - and the chain still breaks ... I'm telling the story that all 10 links need to be 'fixed', for the chain to be strong enough - that's what creates the 'magic', and something that everyone can do ...

 

yeh but I already do this better than you do. Hey, I am telling the story that all 20 links need to be fixed 🤣

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

 

2 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

You forgot to throw in the condition, there, that the expensive gear has been, ummm, sorted ...

 

Not according to you....

 

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

My POV is that the $100k rig needs sorting just as much my budget combinations

 

seems even you have a need to disagree with yourself!

 

2 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

BTW, my comment about Ferrari has been largely misunderstood - irony doesn't go down well in audio forums, it seems ... of course the Ferrari is a special vehicle, worthy of the money - because enormous attention to detail has gone into the design, and its ability to function as a completely integrated system has been very carefully tested ... the very things that are often missing in ambitious audio rigs, 😉.

 

Nah this is just another disagreement with yourself, called contradiction!

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

32 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

Holden, not Gremlin

 

Sadly, Holden recently went out of business in Australia.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

Interestingly, I have the full range of people criticising me for my POV -

 

The world is trying to tell you something ? 😲😉

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

13 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Ahh, that NAD integrated is midfi - shame on Audio Connections selling the thing, they should be shot for that evil deed!

 

Stop referencing Audio Connections [High End Retailer]. Joe will send out the audio police for misrepresenting them. He would be the first one to tell you your gear is mid-fi and likely, so is the sound.He would however offer to optimize your system, fixing your mess, for very minimal cost.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

2 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

 but after some fine tuning now many years later,showed up why we picked them out of the crop, when they still had their showroom shine.

 

So, you are saying Joe sold you a fine budget system that has lasted for years.....but it just needed some magic tweaking. I don't think we would expect anything less from you Frank.

 

2 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Having visited Joe's store on many occasions, and having exposure to how his gear was sounding like on the floor ... I wouldn't be jumping up and down too much about what "he could do for me", 😉.

 

Frank, I think it has been already mentioned here but it is quite possible that your perception of what sounds good may be *very* different to everybody else. Specifically, It may be that your perception of lifelike reproduction may not accord with most other people.I don't think we can blame Joe for that !

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

Frank you constantly change your story and/or contradict yourself

 

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

my method is about revealing everything that exists on the recording, while adding the absolute minimum of  playback chain character - the recording is not 'fixed', rather, it's 'rescued'.

 

If you now say you cannot fix the recording, you are NOW in the same camp as everyone else except, you and you alone have the special powers to selectively ignore the bad bits apparently because you have improved on the good bits to the extent that magic happens. Now Frank, before you prattle on about 'how the brain works', knowing something about the subject myself, you are alone in your assertions. That has implications from a brain functioning point of view.

 

 

Quote

 

 

 for me, it's all about being immersed in the texture of the sound, where nothing ever irritates or strikes me as "not quite right" ... and I agree, this is not what a significant number of the people in the audio enthusiasts groups seem to be interested in, IME.

 

For the record (pun intended) you are NOT agreeing with me when you say "it's all about being immersed in the texture of the sound, where nothing ever irritates or strikes me as "not quite right" ... and I agree, this is not what a significant number of the people in the audio enthusiasts groups seem to".

 

Again Frank, you are only doing what everyone else already does but claiming magic outcomes which nobody else experiences.

 

45 minutes ago, fas42 said:

It is the tweaking that makes the difference -

 

Only for you Frank

 

Quote

 - ahh, much, much better! It was still obviously an early track, if you listened carefully for various signs of such - but the music now came through; the connection was back with what the musicians were creating.

 

Again Frank, you are doing just what everybody else does. Nothing special. Making the playback improved is distinctly different from being able to "rescue" all and any recordings by your so called "method", the same method that everyone employs.

 

 

Quote

Now, I am also certain that there will be a certain percentage of people who cannot, because of how their brains are wired, hear this behaviour - but amongst the people I mix with, I haven't found anyone who doesn't pick the improvement in listening, when I find the sound to be "correct".

 

"Improvement" is not "fix" is not "rescue" and bad recordings still sound bad.Only you perceive otherwise and this speaks more to how yours and yours alone, "brain is wired" as you put it.

 

 

28 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

The magic that happens

 

In your mind.

 

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

So, Bregman and all the people continuing research in the areas of brain functioning that he pointed to, are wrong, in your opinion?

 

You said -"Bregman and all the people continuing research in the areas of brain functioning that he pointed to, are wrong, in your opinion?

Well, obvious straw man - but, wrong about what Frank? That you have magic tweaks or that through rewiring your brain you can hear whatever you want?

 

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

You said, "your perception of lifelike reproduction may not accord with most other people.", and I said "I agree", because, I'm about "being immersed in the texture of the sound, where nothing ever irritates or strikes me as "not quite right" " ...... - make sense? 🙂

 

It makes sense that your perception of lifelike reproduction may not accord with most other people .

 

 

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

Yes, my overall intent is the same is everyone else - the "magic outcome" occurred completely unexpectedly - and, sigh, I keep pointing to the fact that a very small number of other people have also achieved this - but you don't want to acknowledge this ... because, it would get in the way of shutting down a nutter ... 😝.

 

Now you are presuming I have an ulterior motive because my experience accords with everyone else.... except you. Sounds a little like a conspiracy theory.

Oh which Nutter?

 

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

Improving the playback rescues the recording - this pattern consistently repeats, so at some point one gives in, and accepts what the universe is trying to tell you, 😉.

 

The universe is indeed trying to tell you something but you do not seem to be receptive.🙄