Andrew Quint - The Audiophile Ecosystem (Editorial)

[firedog]

http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/the-audiophile-ecosystem/

editorial

 

 

[botrytis]

Andrew Quint has it wrong - the Audiophile press an audiophiles ARE NOT on the same team. MQA is a classic example of that. I do agree there is room for different tastes but when we read, ' That MQA is EVOLUTIONARY in sound and quality' and the press continually waxes poetically about it without so much as doing any testing, it makes them part of the problem and not the answer to the problem.

[mansr]

4 minutes ago, botrytis said:

Andrew Quint has it wrong

The sky is blue.

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

10 minutes ago, botrytis said:

Andrew Quint has it wrong - the Audiophile press an audiophiles ARE NOT on the same team. MQA is a classic example of that. I do agree there is room for different tastes but when we read, ' That MQA is EVOLUTIONARY in sound and quality' and the press continually waxes poetically about it without so much as doing any testing, it makes them part of the problem and not the answer to the problem.

Absolutely correct. They reinforce OCD, comparing vs actually listening to music, gear worship, and other nonsense that has nothing to do with listening to a stereo for enjoyment. End of story.

[botrytis]

9 minutes ago, Ishmael Slapowitz said:

Absolutely correct. They reinforce OCD, comparing vs actually listening to music, gear worship, and other nonsense that has nothing to do with listening to a stereo for enjoyment. End of story.

 

Well, the gear grind is what keeps the industry moving. I mean, My 2 main amps (a Pioneer M-22 and my Kenwood L-07M monoblocks) were built in the latter 70's. I did have them restored before I started using them. They will last a long time.

 

I agree wity your point that chasing the latest and greatest is what Audiophiledom has become and that is in part to the audio press pushing it.

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

13 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

Well, the gear grind is what keeps the industry moving. I mean, My 2 main amps (a Pioneer M-22 and my Kenwood L-07M monoblocks) were built in the latter 70's. I did have them restored before I started using them. They will last a long time.

 

I agree wity your point that chasing the latest and greatest is what Audiophiledom has become and that is in part to the audio press pushing it.

..to add.. their greatest contribution to destroying the enjoyment of the hobby is their ultimate party line.

EVERYTHING makes a difference. A knot on the wall. A lamp turned on a block away. A fart in the next room...

[Ralf11]

it is not surprising that the Absolute Clown would promote the Audiophile Egosystem

[Samuel T Cogley]

49 minutes ago, Ishmael Slapowitz said:

Absolutely correct. They reinforce OCD, comparing vs actually listening to music, gear worship, and other nonsense that has nothing to do with listening to a stereo for enjoyment. End of story.

 

Imagine that?  Makers of consumer products leveraging psychology in an attempt to manipulate people into making purchases they otherwise don't even want, let alone need.

 

And the worst of it is that "influencers" like Mr. Quint pretend this psychological manipulation is just a figment of critic's imaginations.  The Confidence Game on display in its most grotesque form...

[daverich4]

33 minutes ago, Ishmael Slapowitz said:

..to add.. their greatest contribution to destroying the enjoyment of the hobby is their ultimate party line.

EVERYTHING makes a difference. A knot on the wall. A lamp turned on a block away. A fart in the next room...

 

Enid Lumley, who wrote for TAS during the 80’s, used to advocate listening in the nude as your clothes affected the sound. This has been going on for a long time. 

[gdpr]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

The sky is blue.

 

But sometimes clouded by rainclouds.  

There are many types of rain clouds, including the three most common types: stratus, cirrus, and cumulus. From there, you can get variations of rain clouds like stratocumulus, nimbostratus, and cirrostratus and more. https://sciencetrends.com/the-types-of-rain-clouds/.

These are all the kinder ones.

 

And then you have the more persistent ones such as  MQA, TAS, Sterophile, etc......

 

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

1 hour ago, daverich4 said:

 

Enid Lumley, who wrote for TAS during the 80’s, used to advocate listening in the nude as your clothes affected the sound. This has been going on for a long time. 

Yes, and it is incredible that readers still took HiFi magazines seriously after this type of nonsense.

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

1 hour ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

 

Imagine that?  Makers of consumer products leveraging psychology in an attempt to manipulate people into making purchases they otherwise don't even want, let alone need.

 

And the worst of it is that "influencers" like Mr. Quint pretend this psychological manipulation is just a figment of critic's imaginations.  The Confidence Game on display in its most grotesque form...

Spot on. 

[tmtomh]

He's wrong, but more than that, the editorial strikes me as more vapid than anything else. It seems quite thin to me and unlikely to have much of any impact on anyone, regardless of where they stand on the issues he references.

[One and a half]

Topic ignored, TAS does nothing for me; never has, so nothing’s new.

[sandyk]

6 hours ago, botrytis said:

My 2 main amps (a Pioneer M-22 and my Kenwood L-07M monoblocks) were built in the latter 70's. I did have them restored before I started using them. They will last a long time.

 

 Even restoring amplifiers built in the late 70s will not make them sound as good as can be achieved 40 years later .

Electronics design hasn't stood still in the meantime, and many components have also been vastly improved since then

[Rt66indierock]

9 minutes ago, sandyk said:

 

 Even restoring amplifiers built in the late 70s will not make them sound as good as can be achieved 40 years later .

Electronics design hasn't stood still in the meantime, and many components have also been vastly improved since then

 

The designer of my Nikko NA-550 would disagree with you.  I met him at RMAF 2017. And my NAD 3020 still  is the amp to beat with my Heresy speakers.

[John Dyson]

6 hours ago, daverich4 said:

 

Enid Lumley, who wrote for TAS during the 80’s, used to advocate listening in the nude as your clothes affected the sound. This has been going on for a long time. 

Getting in that state, would rather be 'next' to my girlfriend.   I like listening/audio/etc, but not THAT much. :-).

 

[sandyk]

36 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

The designer of my Nikko NA-550 would disagree with you.  I met him at RMAF 2017. And my NAD 3020 still  is the amp to beat with my Heresy speakers.

 

 There are quite a few types of Distortion that have been discovered since then by researchers such as Douglas Self and Bob Cordell, with methods shown to reduce or eliminate them. 

 

The specifications of the Nikko NA-550 are very poor by today's standards.

 

Specifications.

Power output: 50 watts per channel into 8Ω (stereo). Frequency response: 10Hz to 50kHz. Total harmonic distortion: 0.08%. Damping factor: 60.

 

[Rt66indierock]

13 minutes ago, sandyk said:

 

 There are quite a few types of Distortion that have been discovered since then by researchers such as Douglas Self and Bob Cordell, with methods shown to reduce or eliminate them. 

 

Rob Watts of Chord started the conversation in his presentation about dac design. The transistors are excellent sounding even today sorry Alex.

[fas42]

The "Everything matters!!" mantra has two sides to it - if you're used to listening to rigs which inject far too much distortion into the playback; the polite term for this is "system signature", - then every tiny variation alters the subjective distortion, and hence the "pleasantness", acceptability of the SQ - so, yes, here you are adjusting the distortion quotient added by the playback - interesting hobby, that ... .

 

The other side is to improve system integrity to the point that you're only aware of what's on the recording - from then on making changes to the setup has marginal or zero impact on what you hear ... but to get to that point you have to consider every area of the playback chain as possibly contributing to audible anomalies - this is where you can say, everything may matter - until 'proven' otherwise ... the unfortunate aspect is that the closer one gets to not hearing the rig, the more one has to worry about things that appeared not to be relevant, up to that point.

[botrytis]

3 hours ago, sandyk said:

 

 Even restoring amplifiers built in the late 70s will not make them sound as good as can be achieved 40 years later .

Electronics design hasn't stood still in the meantime, and many components have also been vastly improved since then

 

The M-22 was and still is the standard bearer of Class A design topology. I have yet to hear one sound as good as it. (that includes amps from Nelson Pass who I really respect).

 

The Kenwoods were a unique design and is still one today. They sound amazingly good with my Wharfedale Linton Heritage speakers.

 

There are good and bad designs both new and old. Just because it is an older design, do not think it is not up to snuff. 

[Ralf11]

ok, your profile says L-07M...

[sandyk]

Quote

There are good and bad designs both new and old. Just because it is an older design, do not think it is not up to snuff. 

 

I am not saying that a much older Class A design is not up to snuff, just that they can normally be further audibly improved using new techniques and especially more recent semiconductor devices.

My own DIY 15W/Ch. Class A amplifier for example, has <.0006% distortion and almost certainly quite a bit  higher S/N ratio than designs from the 70s and 80s.

[4est]

6 hours ago, sandyk said:

 

I am not saying that a much older Class A design is not up to snuff, just that they can normally be further audibly improved using new techniques and especially more recent semiconductor devices.

My own DIY 15W/Ch. Class A amplifier for example, has <.0006% distortion and almost certainly quite a bit  higher S/N ratio than designs from the 70s and 80s.

This is more difficult than you make it out to seem. The circuit will always trump parts and the wrong part changes the circuit. If you can discern the difference between .006% and .0006% distortion, you have me beat.

[sandyk]

1 hour ago, 4est said:

This is more difficult than you make it out to seem. The circuit will always trump parts and the wrong part changes the circuit. If you can discern the difference between .006% and .0006% distortion, you have me beat.

4est

 The Nikko NA-550 mentioned previously has a quoted distortion of .08% which many would  notice compared with

.006 %.  Hearing the difference between .006% and .0006% is an entirely different matter, although amplifiers with similar distortion figures below even .006% can often sound quite different.

For example, many older Class A designs used output devices with an Ft of 4MHZ or less.

Most modern amplifiers these days use O/P devices of 30 to 50MHZ. The later devices usually sound better, and often have considerably higher HFE as well which reduces the loading on the previous stage.

They also have less Beta Droop into  4 ohm (or less) loads.

Even different types of input capacitor can make an amplifier sound quite audibly different.