Understanding the Audiophiles community.

[STC]

6 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

For me it's about obtaining reproduction in my house as close as possible to the source material, but within reason. For others, it's about great sounding audio that gives them as much enjoyment as our systems give us. 

 

I don't see the big deal why people want to define every last bit for everybody. The world is gray, not black and white. 

 

If so then Sony lied. Or we are simply not audiophiles . But who cares about the misnomer as long we are happy doing what we like.

 

Quote

 

"You have a need to test out all of the latest audiophile gadgets for yourself; reading reviews simply isn’t good enough for you. Just as people switch out their wardrobes with each new season, you equip yourself with the newest headphones, speakers and sound bars every few months. 

The annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is the most magical time of the year for you. Looking at all the new goodies that will hit store shelves soon is better than Christmas. Learning about new products like the PS-HX500 turntable that enables users to record and edit vinyl records is one of your favorite activities. Geeking out over the latest advances in audio gear is something you do on a regular basis." 

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 minutes ago, STC said:

If so then Sony lied

 

Say it ain't so. First time for everything I guess. Oh wait, there's that whole Sony high resolution stair-step myth the company keeps promoting 😀

[fas42]

52 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I think that view is a bit skewed, but that's OK. Best is always subjective unless one is shooting for measurements. When listening is involved, the best depends on one's brain. Like I said above, I go for the best sonic quality or accuracy to the source, but I also don't go crazy. If someone came to me with a breadboard component and said it will sound identical to the source but it might blow up my house, I think I'll pass.

 

 

As STC said, it's the liveness that matters ... if you can put on a recording that's over a hundred years old. and you can 'hear', sense the people being in that space, and "putting on a show" - well, that's magic stuff . The quality of live music has an element which is largely missing in most playback - but it doesn't have to be missing.

 

Until it becomes standard fare for systems to be able to put together to deliver "special sound", it's up to fussy people to go the extra distance - and sometimes they only do the bare mimimum to get the results ... like myself!

 

BTW, some audio designers have said that the production unit never sounds as good as the breadboard prototype - lots of subtle tweaking went into that first, which they are not really aware of - and it doesn't get passed on ...

[Paul R]

5 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

Pure as the driven snow ...

 

Of course they can! A photographer may use the most finely tuned setup to take the best possible snaps of whatever; and also have a fine collection of cameras of all vintages, which still work - each pastime is equally valid, but he knows that the assortment of interesting gear on the shelf is not going to deliver the finest images ... what I see, in audio, is a confusion of the interest in the equipment with the belief that the "most interesting" will present the best version of the recordings' contents.

 

One thing I have learned in photography is that you always wind up using the camera you have with you. Often that winds up being your iPhone.

 

I think the same is true of audiophiles -  often you wind up listening on whatever player you have to hand. Which again, is often an iPhone.  

 

Some of my best photos were taken with an iPhone, and some of my best listening experiences too. I do believe if all I had in terms of equipment was an iPhone, I could be an audiophile or a photographer.  No reason at all to say me nay on that! 

 

 

[John Dyson]

I scanned this thread -- and my opinion might a little different than most.  This is as much of a rant as honest information (which I believe to be both.)  (Unlike some of the salescritters out there -- I am not always 100% accurate in my facts, but at least I admit it...  Read on...)

 

I do believe that 'audiophiles' are bifurcated into two primary groups:  those who listen to music, wanting to optimize the experience, and those who listen to their equipment but kind-of music.  The problem being in either group (in general) is that most do not know how to reliably improve the experience or improve their equipment.  Both groups are taken advantage of by somewhat misleading sales/marketing claims.

 

So, the problem for both the psuedo-technically oriented (those listening to their equipment) or the music listener (those listening to their music) is that many (most) do not really know how/what is needed to improve their listening situation.  Most people have three information (maybe more) sources:  those who really know, those who think that they know, and then those making claims to maximize profits.

The non-technical audiophile (of either sort) is in a difficult situation, because it is challenging to correctly evaluate the accuracy of each kind of information source.  All too many times (it has been a historical problem) that 'common knowledge' which has been repeated over and over again without ANY substantiation becomes 'the one and only TRUTH", however incorrect that truth might be.

 

All this said, except for a very few people, it is best to avoid 'gilding the lily' (perhaps more accurately: polishing some biological refuse -- paraphrased), and simply enjoy the music listening.

Here is a *fact*, improving the listening experience is a forever challenge, like peeling an onion -- BUT THE ONION IS INFINITELY DEEP!!!

 

I have been experiencing the 'forever'  fixing/improving problem in my own project.   Perfection is really impossible to attain.  It might be useful to improve the 'results' (however your hearing/ears perceive) UP TO A CERTAIN POINT.  After hittting a reasonable level -- listen to the music, and please don't waste your time. Don't get locked into a loop of continual upgrades because something doesn't sound quite correct.  PLEASE JUST ENJOY THE DARNED MUSIC!!! (On my own project -- thank God that I keep running into a CPU/real-time limitation, which stops the incessant improvement loop.  Also, I must move on to a new project..)

 

If someone gets locked into the hobby of 'forever improving their equipment', then it is best to simply get an EE/CS degree with expertise in DSP and analog design.   At that point (perhaps 2/3 of the way through the MS degree), you can really know enough to evaluate your own equipment.  Otherwise, it is a cr*p shoot...  Period...   Too much information in the 'Information ether' is not quite true, and will forever lock the audiophile into an endless loop of being unhappy -- trying to upgrade all of the time.

 

What I am trying to say (summing this up):  don't waste your time trying to re-engineer or put together something based on someone-elses ideas, expecting that something magic is going to happen.  (I keep thinking about the analogy of how long it takes a number of monkeys typing in a room creating Shakespeare?)   Hint:  even if you have 100000  monkeys for 100yrs, statistically then Shakespeare will not appear. (You'll have to wait for evolution, but even then...)   Actually, the result will never be the equivalent of Shakespeare, but rather the floor will need to be cleaned and sanitized.  More clearly -- hit and miss, just spending money/resources has serious limitations as to the benefit.  Focus on work smart, don't focus on spending money (working hard.)   IMO, with music listening -- working smart is more about enjoying the music, rather than spending resources on a futile goal.

 

Here is a plan for success:  set the goals reasonably for enjoying music.  Get competent equipment (as soon as I read 'gear' or 'rig' -- I gag), obtain music that you enjoy, and sit back (or jog or whatever) listening/enjoying the music.

 

A  'rig' (18 wheels?) or 'gear' is only something to polish, look pretty.  Equipment for the purpose of an enjoyable experience -- that is the actual goal, isn't it?  If you want to play with optimizing the equipment -- minimize the frustration,  just learn the equivalent of an MSEE (BSEE doesn't quite cut it nowadays -- too much  math), and start understanding what is ACTUALLY going on. One of the worst things going on is the 'misinformation' (or 'dysinformation').   ('dysinformation' is something that is insanely inaccurate, but plausible, so ingeniously wrong  that it can trick even the knowledgeable -- e.g. Gibbs 'ringing')   'Common knowledge' is not reliable.

 

So -- PLEASE focus on the listening -- not so much the 'rig' (I don't like the smell of diesel fumes anyway.)

John

[STC]

1 hour ago, John Dyson said:

On my own project -- thank God that I keep running into a CPU/real-time limitation,

 

Just curious. What processing you do to take up so much load on the CPU?  I run 94 convolution with fractional samples and it is about 86% of the i7-7700. Those two are the most CPU intense DSPs. Cant think of any other. 

[STC]

Real audiophile. 

 

 

Photo credit: Laurent Ferigo. 

[John Dyson]

6 hours ago, STC said:

 

Just curious. What processing you do to take up so much load on the CPU?  I run 94 convolution with fractional samples and it is about 86% of the i7-7700. Those two are the most CPU intense DSPs. Cant think of any other. 

 

About the math:  I cannot describe the high level of what the code is doing (proprietary), but the low level is 64 2 channel Hilbert transforms per sample and at least 128 2 channel FIR filters per sample (some filters can now be converted to delays, the purpose has degenerated, but the normal FIR filters are not the major CPU hog).

 

* WRT the Hilbert transforms, I have found that the Kaiser-Bessel window (I am using alpha=3.63 -- someone else suggested it -- I was already using 3.5 witih good results), and it has made a major improvement over the Blackman 92dB and the others..  Before, I was using a Blackman 92dB window, and even tried the Nuttall/Hamming/Hann variants also -- it seems like the Kaiser-Bessel is a big-time winner for my application!!!  The general sidelobes are a bit less important than the first sidebands -- so the Kaiser-Bessel seems to have done an incrementally better job.

 

  I know of NO shortcuts -- it isn't linear math, and it is an incremental nonlinear operation on a naturally nonlinear process.   No shortcuts.  Brute force.  The code is practically ALL SIMD (99% of the time is in SIMD code.) I have a nice sent of SIMD primitives (very very efficient), using high level C++ operations, is mostly portable (have compiled for ARM NEON also -- but not tested), and is adapatable to any reasonable SIMD architecture.  I am using CLANG right now, because g++ code isn't quite as fast (g++ stumbles in some of the SIMD code generation, while CLANG has been doing about as well as one can expect.)  The only thing that I miss in CLANG is that there is no vector ?: operation, but I have substituted with another (equivalent scheme) that is compatible with both CLANG and G++.

 

The software CAN run without the special module, but the results are not as good (still superior to the HW that it replaces.)  Without the incremental processing, the software runs about 5-10X realtime.

 

At 96k, it requires 3/4 of a Haswell (30% faster than realtime) (using processor affinity because hyperthreading causes troubles.)  The code dynamically adapts to whatever sample rate is being used -- doesn't need rate conversion.  At 96k the software requires more CPU than at 48k for example, but at 192k I needed to downsample/upconvert -- the BW is still 40k, which was the requirement.

 

John

[fas42]

9 hours ago, John Dyson said:

 

All this said, except for a very few people, it is best to avoid 'gilding the lily' (perhaps more accurately: polishing some biological refuse -- paraphrased), and simply enjoy the music listening.

Here is a *fact*, improving the listening experience is a forever challenge, like peeling an onion -- BUT THE ONION IS INFINITELY DEEP!!!

 

This is a very important concept - a corollary of "there is no such thing a bad recording!". The least interesting, messiest, most objectionable album you have can become one of your treasures - if you know how to lift the game of your rig to a level so that the finer points of what was captured are properly revealed.

 

9 hours ago, John Dyson said:

 

So -- PLEASE focus on the listening -- not so much the 'rig' (I don't like the smell of diesel fumes anyway.)

John

 

Where this comes undone is that the higher the level of tune of the playback, the easier it is to hear the remaining anomalies - and when these are time dependent it can become very frustrating. As an example, the CD player in my setup at the moment works nicely for a number of hours, and then starts to lose SQ; the treble dulls, natural sparkle fades. There is no easy answer that I know of - I have to bite the bullet, and do some experimenting to sort it out - it's impossible to just relax and "enjoy the music"; because my ears are very much aware that there's an issue.

[John Dyson]

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

 

Where this comes undone is that the higher the level of tune of the playback, the easier it is to hear the remaining anomalies - and when these are time dependent it can become very frustrating. As an example, the CD player in my setup at the moment works nicely for a number of hours, and then starts to lose SQ; the treble dulls, natural sparkle fades. There is no easy answer that I know of - I have to bite the bullet, and do some experimenting to sort it out - it's impossible to just relax and "enjoy the music"; because my ears are very much aware that there's an issue.

With the 'CD' player that you mention -- you JUST MIGHT be manifesting the same syndrome that has been driving me batty for the last few years...  My hearing changes vs. time of day/listening duration/fatigue/mood/etc.   This makes using my hearing very tricky when using as a measuring instrument.  I have made NUMEROUS mistakes when trying to use my hearing for measurement (esp in A/B comparisons with ANY time delay.)

 

Point being -- in my own case, practically any of the changes that I hear over time result from changes in my own hearing, not changes in my equipment.  It was incredibly frustrating to solve 'equipment' or 'software' problems until I finally had realized - the actual problem was the variability in my hearing.

 

One especially frustrating situation -- my hearing can become sensitized to certain kinds of distortion, which APPEAR to get worse and worse as my hearing trains more and more to listen for the defect.

 

Then....  All of a sudden (like this morning), everything is sounding perfect, and feeks like I couldn't discern 1% distortion right now.   The sound from my project is SOOO VERY BEAUTIFUL -- until probably later on today, then it will sound like h*ll.  (Actually, sounding the same in reality.)

 

This is another data point that supports my SUGGESTION (and suggestion only) to try to focus on the enjoyment, not so much the perfection (or not.)   If someone wants to join me in my listening h*ll, one last suggestion -- avoid joining me, but you are very welcome to vist -- with regrets.

 

John

[STC]

4 minutes ago, John Dyson said:

With the 'CD' player that you mention -- you JUST MIGHT be manifesting the same syndrome that has been driving me batty for the last few years...  My hearing changes vs. time of day/listening duration/fatigue/mood/etc.   This makes using my hearing very tricky when using as a measuring instrument.  I have made NUMEROUS mistakes when trying to use my hearing for measurement (esp in A/B comparisons with ANY time delay.)

 

Point being -- in my own case, practically any of the changes that I hear over time result from changes in my own hearing, not changes in my equipment.  It was incredibly frustrating to solve 'equipment' or 'software' problems until I finally had realized - the actual problem was the variability in my hearing.

 

One especially frustrating situation -- my hearing can become sensitized to certain kinds of distortion, which APPEAR to get worse and worse as my hearing trains more and more to listen for the defect.

 

Then....  All of a sudden (like this morning), everything is sounding perfect, and feeks like I couldn't discern 1% distortion right now.   The sound from my project is SOOO VERY BEAUTIFUL -- until probably later on today, then it will sound like h*ll.  (Actually, sounding the same in reality.)

 

This is another data point that supports my SUGGESTION (and suggestion only) to try to focus on the enjoyment, not so much the perfection (or not.)   If someone wants to join me in my listening h*ll, one last suggestion -- avoid joining me, but you are very welcome to vist -- with regrets.

 

John

 

Well said!

 

 

[fas42]

10 hours ago, John Dyson said:

With the 'CD' player that you mention -- you JUST MIGHT be manifesting the same syndrome that has been driving me batty for the last few years...  My hearing changes vs. time of day/listening duration/fatigue/mood/etc.   This makes using my hearing very tricky when using as a measuring instrument.  I have made NUMEROUS mistakes when trying to use my hearing for measurement (esp in A/B comparisons with ANY time delay.)

 

Of course that can be a factor - but this behaviour was something I was battling with my first rig that delivered convincing sound - 35 years ago. I was never able to solve it back then, and the frustration caused me to throw in audio for a good 10 years; car radio quality was good enough, because I didn't have to fight the damn thing ... .

 

There is always an easy fix. Power down the offending unit, let all the capacitance, etc, charges dissipate - and switch on again. Bingo!! Full SQ is restored ... and the cycle starts again ...

 

It is quite possible that I've managed to introduce this ingredient with one of my mods - but which one? And why does it occur?

 

10 hours ago, John Dyson said:

This is another data point that supports my SUGGESTION (and suggestion only) to try to focus on the enjoyment, not so much the perfection (or not.)   If someone wants to join me in my listening h*ll, one last suggestion -- avoid joining me, but you are very welcome to vist -- with regrets.

 

John

 

The answer is to get the setup into a state where the auditory behaviour over a full day is consistent - or, "it keeps getting better". This has been the case until just recently - so, more detective work needed.

[stuck limo]

On 4/8/2019 at 12:41 PM, esldude said:

I thought more of this until I owned some AT4033 microphones.  Alan Parsons very most favorite microphone.  He should have spent some time listening to his equipment.  (In his defense he had this opinion when anything better was far more expensive, 4033s were sort of the first affordable condenser that wasn't garbage.)

 

Alan Parsons never said this. It's a fake quote.

https://boingboing.net/2012/02/10/alan-parsons-on-audiophiles.html

On 4/8/2019 at 10:51 AM, mansr said:

 

[mansr]

13 minutes ago, stuck limo said:

Alan Parsons never said this. It's a fake quote.

It's still both accurate and funny.

[stuck limo]

On 4/8/2019 at 9:43 AM, Ajax said:

I have been purchasing high quality HiFi since the late 70’s. My goal has always been “to buy the best sound for the least amount”.

 

I am fortunate that I do not have Teresa’s financial restrictions but I still get a lot of pleasure finding bargains. Sometimes they are new items like my office system, Benchmark DAC + Active Adam A7 Monitors, I purchase new 10 years ago that did (& does) sound amazing for only US$2.5K. I added a $200 Acoustic Research sub I found in a pawn shop that sits under my desk. A simple and space saving system that connects via USB to my laptop.

 

Several years ago I purchased a demo Devialet Ensemble (Devialet 200 with ATOHM G1 speakers) for just $US7K. Source is an Auralic Mini with Tidal sub and a SSD drive installed , which is located in my living room. I then added 2 x SVS SB2000 subs. Under $US10k for serious sound and excellent features.

 

I purchased a Marantz PM5005 integrated amp with a surprisingly good bolt in DAC + Wharfdale bookshelf speakers + 2 subs second hand for $1000 for another system.

 

Anyone can throw money at HiFi gear and have a great system but IMO the art (and fun) is to use your knowledge gained from reviews and forums such as this to get the  best possible bang for your buck.

 

 

I've heard 1.5K, 2.5 and up to 5K systems that sound as good as 10K or 20K systems.

 

The specific 10K system I heard sounded amazing, but vs 1.5 - 2.5k system, I didn't think it sounded 8K better. 8K "different" Maybe/Probably...But not necessarily "better". (it did sound better, but not at 8k worth) It was very enjoyable though. It sounded like a 10k system.

 

The 20K system I heard was technically astounding, and you could tell was high dollar. However, the musical enjoyment compared to a 1.5- 2.5k or even the 8K system I heard wasn't even close.

 

I think about 5K is a sweet spot before the laws of diminishing returns start to kick in hard. That's not to say a 10 or 15k system won't sound like a 10 - 15k system. It just depends on how much further your 10 - 15K will take you vs a 5k system. (probably not a ton, but varying factors will have to be taken into account)

[Paul R]

16 minutes ago, mansr said:

It's still both accurate and funny.

 

It's not even close to accurate, at least not for most audiophiles. 

 

Everyone uses music to listen to gear when they are buying, selling, or otherwise evaluating the gear. 

 

But sitting at home, listening to the music is what most people do. 

 

 

[fas42]

One of the giveaways that it is accurate is when the obsession with getting the lowest bass kicks into high gear - real music doesn't have any of this stuff; I haven't heard bass guitars, tubas and pianos pumping out these frequencies, when playing music items; unless the composer had an especially weird perspective on things ...

[John Dyson]

4 minutes ago, fas42 said:

One of the giveaways that it is accurate is when the obsession with getting the lowest bass kicks into high gear - real music doesn't have any of this stuff; I haven't heard bass guitars, tubas and pianos pumping out these frequencies, when playing music items; unless the composer had an especially weird perspective on things ...

My own 'problem' is accurate sibilance.  It is so hard to find (especially on older noise reduced material.)  Sometimes the NR systems just couldn't handle sibilance very well.  Too often, the sibilance would have a 'kink' in it, or something seems time-retarded.   On the other hand, I do happen to like the overly sweet sibilance sound, as long as it isn't overbearing.  The sweet sibilance might be intentional, but the kinked sibilance is very likely due to NR system or poor compressor.  (Kinked -- my term -- sibilance is akin to a kind of lsip.)

Bass -- I can take it or leave it, as long as it isn't repressive/overbearing.   Much material from vinyl are cut below about 40Hz (there is still stuff down in the lower bass, it is just attenuated to make the material fit on the record.)

 

John

 

[fas42]

14 minutes ago, John Dyson said:

My own 'problem' is accurate sibilance.  It is so hard to find (especially on older noise reduced material.)  Sometimes the NR systems just couldn't handle sibilance very well.  Too often, the sibilance would have a 'kink' in it, or something seems time-retarded.   On the other hand, I do happen to like the overly sweet sibilance sound, as long as it isn't overbearing.  The sweet sibilance might be intentional, but the kinked sibilance is very likely due to NR system or poor compressor.  (Kinked -- my term -- sibilance is akin to a kind of lsip.)

Bass -- I can take it or leave it, as long as it isn't repressive/overbearing.   Much material from vinyl are cut below about 40Hz (there is still stuff down in the lower bass, it is just attenuated to make the material fit on the record.)

 

John

 

 

Ah, good ol' sibilance ... guess what? I don't have any recordings that give me a problem with that, either! If it's annoying, an easily heard irritation, then that's an instant giveaway, for me, that the playback system is adding far too much audible distortion - a marker that the rig is getting into a good zone is when all of one's recordings that highlighted this just disappear as being a problem - the sibilance is still there, but it's the natural, accurate version of it; our hearing is accustomed to hearing this when talking to people, and it doesn't strike us - unless the person has some speech difficulty, in real life.

[John Dyson]

24 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Ah, good ol' sibilance ... guess what? I don't have any recordings that give me a problem with that, either! If it's annoying, an easily heard irritation, then that's an instant giveaway, for me, that the playback system is adding far too much audible distortion - a marker that the rig is getting into a good zone is when all of one's recordings that highlighted this just disappear as being a problem - the sibilance is still there, but it's the natural, accurate version of it; our hearing is accustomed to hearing this when talking to people, and it doesn't strike us - unless the person has some speech difficulty, in real life.

You must not be listening to DolbySR or DolbyA?  They both have 'kinks' -- you can even hear them in the remastered HDtracks Carpenters album -- they are deep down because of the significant compression, but you can still hear the kinks.  (They have a more rounded sound because of the subsequent processing.)  The kinks are more obvious on the non-remastered material though -- because that material tends to be more clean.  If you are interested, I can cobble together an example -- doesn't even challenge the high end reproduction, it is apparently a burst of IMD or perhaps the uncompensated timing dither (it is more of a dither, it can be compesnated if the processing is sophisticated enough.)

 

One form of the kink happens when the calibration is set too high (that means the gain is too low), then the expansion curve misses part of the needed processing.  That is certainly ANOTHER kink, but it seems like the kink is very common on older material.  Maybe, just maybe it is a distortion problem on the earlier equipment -- all I know, it is there and not dependent so much on the playback equipment.

 

This is not the worst case -- but listen to the sibilance -- disturbing.  (BTW, that album IS dolbyA encoded, so I didn't even decode it to eliminate the variable.)

https://www.dropbox.com/s/p829w8ts1oc60sq/stutter.mp3?dl=0

 

 

John

[STC]

So far ....

 

 

 

[mav52]

3 hours ago, Paul R said:

 

It's not even close to accurate, at least not for most audiophiles. 

 

Everyone uses music to listen to gear when they are buying, selling, or otherwise evaluating the gear. 

 

But sitting at home, listening to the music is what most people do. 

 

 

That's what I do, since I actually listen to music on everything from a car radio, headphones, ear phones, my HT system and my 2 chl system and it can be any kind of music from anyone, so I guess I'm not an audiophile. Whew what a relief 

[Paul R]

1 hour ago, mav52 said:

That's what I do, since I actually listen to music on everything from a car radio, headphones, ear phones, my HT system and my 2 chl system and it can be any kind of music from anyone, so I guess I'm not an audiophile. Whew what a relief 

 

(grin) My mistake!  Calling audiophiles "people" - what will the world ever do?  

 

[Allan F]

5 hours ago, Paul R said:

Everyone uses music to listen to gear when they are buying, selling, or otherwise evaluating the gear.

 

I would say that, IMO, when buying people are primarily listening to the music to see how well its sound is reproduced by the gear. From that perspective, I don't really consider it to be listening to the gear. OTOH, when one is doing critical listening to directly compare two different system devices by concentrating on certain clues within familiar music, that is more akin to listening to the gear. When selling, apart from perhaps pointing out certain aspects, it is again the prospective buyer who is primarily listening to sound of the music produced by the gear.

 

IMO, anyone who is more interested in gear than in listening to music is not a true audiophile. Good music can be enjoyed on any gear. It is generally just that much more enjoyable when listening to the same music played back on better gear.

[fas42]

3 hours ago, John Dyson said:

This is not the worst case -- but listen to the sibilance -- disturbing.  (BTW, that album IS dolbyA encoded, so I didn't even decode it to eliminate the variable.)

https://www.dropbox.com/s/p829w8ts1oc60sq/stutter.mp3?dl=0

 

 

John

 

Sorry to disappoint you, John - but listening to that clip with my preferred player, just over laptop speakers, I don't hear anything wrong! Lots of sparkly lift to the music, but there is nothing offensive about the quality, to me - I just hear the qualities that make that type of music highly attractive.

 

Treble by itself doesn't disturb me - unless its intrinsic quality is tainted. Then all bets are off ...