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Gurz
Sep 9, 2000
THE 12" DILDO IN MY ASS IS ONLY A PLACEHOLDER FOR PULSATING HOT COCKS
I just ordered a DAC/headphone amp, and the particular brand borders a bit into audiophile territory. I tend to buy good bang for the buck pr0sumer (music production, studio) stuff, and this was a first for me. Wanting to reduce buyers remorse and raise excitement for the soon to be shipped piece of gear, I started reading some forum posts about it, since I have known for a very long time that forums on the internet can provide very insight- and helpful information.

Reading the below exchange in a thread about my amp made me post here:

quote:

:words: Well I just swapped out the stock psu for a Yuasa lead acid battery (Reading 13.6v)and the sound just got kicked up a notch! Never thought the difference would be so pronounced, the soundstage has now lept further from the speakers and instruments have more weight and air around them, the sound really is more dynamic now, and the difference was better still through my Grado's. A very good upgrade until the new psu is released.

quote:

:psyduck: No offense but you guys must have incredible ears , Its very difficult (for me) to hear the diff between the 7520 and my old CA AZUR cd player , i can hear it but only just.
And for your info ,i work as a pro piano tuner and musician so my ears are fairly good at listening.

quote:

:colbert: A set of good ears for 'live' instruments doesn't necessarily mean a good set of ears for speakers generated audio reproduction.

This is the thread: http://theartofsound.net/forum/showthread.php?t=2160

Of course, not everything in it is ridiculous, but apparently there is a line of varying breadth that waits to be tripped over whenever encountering high end/audiophile aficionados.

If you are so inclined, post your opinions, insights, experiences and examples regarding this delicate matter into this thread.

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mediaphage
Mar 22, 2007

Excuse me, pardon me, sheer perfection coming through
I am always reminded of the coat hanger post: http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/showpost.php?s=97d4a3c39d247bf955a57b3953326a34&p=15412&postcount=28

qirex
Feb 15, 2001

One of my favorite pieces of insanity is people going nuts for original model Playstations as audiophile CD players.
http://dogbreath.de/PS1/index.html
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=31123&perpage=25&pagenumber=1

butterypancakes
Aug 19, 2006

mmm pancakes

quote:

...the sound really is more dynamic now, and the difference was better still through my Grado's

Reading this while wearing a cheaper pair of Grado headphones just makes me feel dirty.

koren
Sep 7, 2003


My cat tore up my Virtual Dynamics Power 3..

This is one of my favourite audiophile stories. A Cat chews up some dudes $300 power cable and it turns out to be a hosepipe filled with metal shavings and building cable. Check out that head-fi thread if you want to watch idiots trying to defend it, or just click the below link for fun pictures.

http://www.audiojunkies.com/blog/1197/virtual-dynamics-power-3-2000-profit-margin

knifehitz
Apr 22, 2005

ys rly

qirex posted:

One of my favorite pieces of insanity is people going nuts for original model Playstations as audiophile CD players.
http://dogbreath.de/PS1/index.html
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=31123&perpage=25&pagenumber=1

That's hilarious... I had no idea that when my discman broke 10 years ago I was trading up to audiophile grade equipment. My PS1 was the only cd player left in the house.

xarph
Jun 18, 2001


qirex posted:

One of my favorite pieces of insanity is people going nuts for original model Playstations as audiophile CD players.
http://dogbreath.de/PS1/index.html
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=31123&perpage=25&pagenumber=1

Thank you for this, as now I found a gullible ebay market for my original 1001 which no longer plays games but can play audio just fine!

Acc-Risk
Sep 28, 2001
I compare a lot of the audiophile stuff to kitchen utensils.

An Oxo spatula can cost $10-$15. A WalMart brand spatula can cost upwards of $0.32 Both will flip your pancakes just fine, yet I buy Oxo. My pancakes don't taste better.

A while ago, I was auditioning a pair of homemade elctrostatics. This guy was the streotype audiophile who counts the copper molecules in each cable. But while listening, all I could hear was the traffic outside, the water running in the walls, etc.

Now call me crazy, but wouldn't a better audio upgrade be to stop the dishwasher, turn off the sprinkler system, close the windows, stop the wife from vacumming and soundproof? I can't hear the difference between cables but I sure as hell can hear the interstate traffic in the distance.

P.S. Every cable I own came from MonoPrice and Jeff didn't blink an eye when he saw them.

Mako
Apr 22, 2001

Acc-Risk posted:

I compare a lot of the audiophile stuff to kitchen utensils.

An Oxo spatula can cost $10-$15. A WalMart brand spatula can cost upwards of $0.32 Both will flip your pancakes just fine, yet I buy Oxo. My pancakes don't taste better.

That's a great comparison if you discount the fact that in many audiophile components the improved fit-and-finish of your oxo is not visually or tactility obvious. Whether its hidden, in the case of many interconnects or superfluous internal component upgrages, or solid wood non-resonating volume knobs that are uglier than the original, the benefit you get from that fancy flipper of yours is not translated to this case.

When it comes to the critical components like speakers and amplification and processing i dont blame these folks for going a bit nuts. But their insane upgrades to wiring and things of that nature shock me every time.

coolskillrex remix
Jan 1, 2007

gorsh

anyone who uses a pair of coathangers is retarded thats a great way to have metal touching metal and trip your amp (or if your amp doesnt trip it just totally destroys it).

Doc Spratley
Mar 4, 2007
Miskatonic U. Alumni

Omegaslast posted:

anyone who uses a pair of coathangers is retarded thats a great way to have metal touching metal and trip your amp (or if your amp doesnt trip it just totally destroys it).

The use of coat hanger wire in that test was to prove a point. No one should run bare wire leads in day to day listening of course.

Also,

CABLE ELEVATORS PLUS



'Elevate' your musical experience with the best cable supports on the market! You can gain significant improvements in the sound of your audio or home theater system by elevating your speaker and power cables off the floor. The improvements you will hear in detail and dynamics are not subtle. Many of you have already reported tremendous increases in clarity, tonal accuracy, and dynamics with Cable Elevators in place.

'The drat things do lower noise, increase dynamics, remove haze, and open up the top octaves. Once you listen to their effects, even a skeptic like me has to admit that it is hard to take them back out of the system. Music sounds more like music with the Cable Elevators in place. I recommend them strongly, especially given their price!' — Jonathan Valin, The Absolute Sound

But Pfff, ceramic is so low buck, the discerning audiophile needs some bling.

Doc Spratley fucked around with this message at 07:16 on Jul 8, 2009

Doc Spratley
Mar 4, 2007
Miskatonic U. Alumni


The Acoustic System Phase Corrector may look like a simple instrument grade maple block but its inner workings are more complex. When you walk around your listening room you will notice pockets of greater energy density. One of these energy pockets occurs between the loudspeakers and is concentrated at the interface between the floor and the front wall. From the listening position the result is a blurring of the phase coherency. The phase corrector, as its name suggests, attempts to correct this phenomenon by disrupting the energy pocket near the floor/front wall interface through a combination of resonance and diffusion. The degree of resonance can be altered by varying the distance between the phase corrector and the front wall.



This is a basic package of 10 resonators and one diffuser. You can vary the package and upgrade as budget allows.

A bargain at $2450

dealmaster
Dec 24, 2005

Somebody call for an exterminator?
I can't believe people are stupid enough to buy poo poo like that.

SnoPuppy
Jun 15, 2005

dealmaster posted:

I can't believe people are stupid enough to buy poo poo like that.

I can't believe there aren't more people selling that poo poo to idiots.

At those prices, even if you sell just one...

butterypancakes
Aug 19, 2006

mmm pancakes

SnoPuppy posted:

At those prices, even if you sell just one...

This thread needs to develop it's own product line. We'll be internet millionaires.


Acoustically correct socks?
All that walking around dents the floor and that disrupts sound waves while also generating nasty static electricity.

qirex
Feb 15, 2001

See the thing is that you need to not just develop some stupid tweako bullshit product but you need to market the crap out of it including bribes er I mean ad buys in well respected audio magazines and getting space at trade shows and stuff.

Applebees Appetizer
Jan 23, 2006


This quote from the thread pretty much sums up audiophiles.

quote:

Just goes to show you how Virtual Dynamics and other similar companies sell snake oil and rely on the gullibility of audiophiles and their unprecedented susceptibility to placebo.

Gurz
Sep 9, 2000
THE 12" DILDO IN MY ASS IS ONLY A PLACEHOLDER FOR PULSATING HOT COCKS

qirex posted:

See the thing is that you need to not just develop some stupid tweako bullshit product but you need to market the crap out of it including bribes er I mean ad buys in well respected audio magazines and getting space at trade shows and stuff.

You also need well-managed fake accounts on all the relevant enthusiast forums where you cautiously and "objectively" praise your own and subtly diss your competitors' products

Sunesis
Apr 17, 2003

RANPHA IS MAD LOL
I love reading audiophile stuff. I cant believe that people buy this crap, and think it makes a difference. If you want to listen to it "how its sposed to sound" then get a setup the same as the studio that recorded and mastered the CD.

Whats more, these crazy power cable stuff really gets me. If the wires running through you house are crappy cheap 20 amp stuff (like in Aus, double that i guess for the US) used by builders and electricians, what makes you think that 2 meters of your special cable is going to make a difference to the sound.

Do bigger speaker cables sound better? Absolutely. Is there a point of no return? Yep, there is. Does running stuff of batteries sound better? Yep, it will. Is it practical?? Hell no. Does changing your knob on your Hifi from metal to wood make a difference? Hell no. Does raising your speaker cable off the ground, or buying crazy interconnect cables from your CD player to your amp, or any of the other dozens of stuff make a difference?

You will never see the pros in music production and mastering using this crazy rear end stuff, so why should the end user? But i guess even pro audio has it audiophiles who chase down decades old Neve gear and treat it like its the holy grail of sound.

butterypancakes
Aug 19, 2006

mmm pancakes

Sunesis posted:

You will never see the pros in music production and mastering using this crazy rear end stuff, so why should the end user?

If most audiophiles understood the way records are recorded they wouldn't bother with all that excess. Any decent sized city has a studio, owned by couple guys who make radio jingles, where a band you've heard of recorded a few songs while on tour.

Most people who do mastering do it in their basement and they have the best equipment a couple hundred bucks an hour can afford.

Twiin
Nov 11, 2003

King of Suck!
I'm especially fond of how AV boards that are otherwise sane and rational will have a cables forum that is an 'ABX-free zone'. If you talk about double-blind testing, you're banned.

qirex
Feb 15, 2001

Twiin posted:

I'm especially fond of how AV boards that are otherwise sane and rational will have a cables forum that is an 'ABX-free zone'. If you talk about double-blind testing, you're banned.

:ssh: head-fi is neither sane nor rational

Lazlo Nibble
Jan 9, 2004

It was Weasleby, by God! At last I had the miserable blighter precisely where I wanted him!

Sunesis posted:

I love reading audiophile stuff. I cant believe that people buy this crap, and think it makes a difference. If you want to listen to it "how its sposed to sound" then get a setup the same as the studio that recorded and mastered the CD.
Ah, but what if the CD was pressed at the wrong pressing plant? As many audiophiles are well aware, it's possible for CDs with the exact same bits on them to sound different from each other on the same player depending on where they were pressed. So even if you play it back in the studio where it was mastered, you might not be hearing what the mastering engineer heard.

(Because, you know, we still haven't figured out how to get data off a CD and into an A/D converter reliably...)

Twiin
Nov 11, 2003

King of Suck!

qirex posted:

:ssh: head-fi is neither sane nor rational

It's a relative measure.

VOR LOC
Dec 8, 2007
captured
I was huge into audio and stereo when I was in my late teens/early twenties. I bought into all the crap and thought that everything in Stereophile and The Absolute Sound was gospel.

That is, until a group of readers spammed the reader mail section for months about an ad that featured a woman listening to the advertisers gear with various jazz records strewn around the floor. This was obviously staged by the photographer who shot the ad because it looked cool, but readers had such a assburgers moment about it that I swore off that hobby for a very long time.

Now I look at the snake oil that these people sell and I can't believe that I ever thought that any of this would have any impact on the sound coming from my speakers. When I think of all the money I spent on lovely cables and gold plated connectors when I could have been spending that money on actual music I :psyduck:

wolrah
May 8, 2006
what?
My favorite audiophile bullshit aside from the obvious easy target of wire huggers is their CD players (oh I'm sorry, I mean "optical transports").

It's a simple digital bitstream being read off a disk and then fed right out a S/PDIF port unchanged, seek time is pretty much the only thing that differentiates the things anymore and even there it's always too fast to matter. There is literally nothing different between the audio output from the cheapest PC disk drive and the most expensive "audiophile" unit yet some of those fools let themselves be convinced there is a reason to buy a single-disc unit that costs more than $100.

I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt when discussing the difference between two devices that handle analog signals, but when we're talking simple playback of the same digital content through only digital connections all properly functioning devices should have identical quality.

wolrah fucked around with this message at 02:22 on Jul 12, 2009

Pibborando San
Dec 11, 2004

oh yes. two kinds... of dances

wolrah posted:

My favorite audiophile bullshit aside from the obvious easy target of wire huggers is their CD players (oh I'm sorry, I mean "optical transports").

It's a simple digital bitstream being read off a disk and then fed right out a S/PDIF port unchanged, seek time is pretty much the only thing that differentiates the things anymore and even there it's always too fast to matter. There is literally nothing different between the audio output from the cheapest PC disk drive and the most expensive "audiophile" unit yet some of those fools let themselves be convinced there is a reason to buy a single-disc unit that costs more than $100.

I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt when discussing the difference between two devices that handle analog signals, but when we're talking simple playback of the same digital content through only digital connections all properly functioning devices should have identical quality.

You're forgetting about jitter, which audiophiles definitely blow out of proportion but it does matter I guess.

Twiin
Nov 11, 2003

King of Suck!

Pibborando San posted:

You're forgetting about jitter, which audiophiles definitely blow out of proportion but it does matter I guess.

Timing jitter is theoretically audible when listening to a CD if it's above 400ns. If you have 400ns of jitter, your gear is broken. It is impossible to tell the difference between a perfect magical cable with 0ps jitter and an off-the-shelf sweatshop-labour radio shack cable with 2ns jitter.

porksmash
Sep 30, 2008

Twiin posted:

Timing jitter is theoretically audible when listening to a CD if it's above 400ns. If you have 400ns of jitter, your gear is broken. It is impossible to tell the difference between a perfect magical cable with 0ps jitter and an off-the-shelf sweatshop-labour radio shack cable with 2ns jitter.

How the hell do cables cause timing jitter? Jitter is caused by the digital circuits and discrepancies in timing crystals or something.

King Hotpants
Apr 11, 2005

Clint.
Fucking.
Eastwood.
With all the placebos these people take, it's surprising that all audiophiles aren't four hundred pounds and diabetic.

That Genuine Stank
Apr 25, 2004

King Hotpants posted:

With all the placebos these people take, it's surprising that all audiophiles aren't four hundred pounds and diabetic.

That's funny, I just assume that they are all fat. I never thought about why I think that though.

I have noticed that many of these guys with tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment do not use any sort of table or bench to put their equipment on, they just put it on the carpet. Are they concerned that the table might resonate?

coolskillrex remix
Jan 1, 2007

gorsh

stizu posted:

That's funny, I just assume that they are all fat. I never thought about why I think that though.

I have noticed that many of these guys with tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment do not use any sort of table or bench to put their equipment on, they just put it on the carpet. Are they concerned that the table might resonate?

im not sure what you mean, anyone with thousands of dollars in cables is going to put that poo poo on magix/rack of silence which also cost a cool 1-2 grand

Pibborando San
Dec 11, 2004

oh yes. two kinds... of dances
When you see those rigs with the processors and amps seemingly sitting on the floor, they've almost always got them coupled to platform risers like these.

That Genuine Stank
Apr 25, 2004

Pibborando San posted:

When you see those rigs with the processors and amps seemingly sitting on the floor, they've almost always got them coupled to platform risers like these.

That must be it, the last example that I saw of this was of a listening room that was in its own guest house looking building.

I suppose that it has something to do with my age and such, but I just cannot fathom sitting down with the sole purpose of listening to music. Although I do find myself doing way too much of the, "I wonder what this song sounds like through these speakers?" bullshit. Even so, I don't think that I will carry it much further than upgrading/trading amps and speakers.

coolskillrex remix
Jan 1, 2007

gorsh

stizu posted:

That must be it, the last example that I saw of this was of a listening room that was in its own guest house looking building.

I suppose that it has something to do with my age and such, but I just cannot fathom sitting down with the sole purpose of listening to music. Although I do find myself doing way too much of the, "I wonder what this song sounds like through these speakers?" bullshit. Even so, I don't think that I will carry it much further than upgrading/trading amps and speakers.

sometimes it can be fun to just sit down and purely listen to a song or two but they have to be very very good songs. what most audiophiles listen to would probably put me to sleep

Twiin
Nov 11, 2003

King of Suck!

porksmash posted:

How the hell do cables cause timing jitter? Jitter is caused by the digital circuits and discrepancies in timing crystals or something.

It takes light 3ns to travel 1m.

That Genuine Stank
Apr 25, 2004

Omegaslast posted:

sometimes it can be fun to just sit down and purely listen to a song or two but they have to be very very good songs. what most audiophiles listen to would probably put me to sleep

I listen intently occasionally as well, I don't sit down for hours at a time though. If I were to build an extra house to listen to music, I could only justify it by listening to music for hours at a time. On the other hand, a house with just a stereo and a chair in it does sound nice.

On the other end of the spectrum, the vintage guys are a hoot. I saw a picture of a pair of Altec Lansing Voice of the Theatre A5's in a living room that couldn't have been much more than ten feet wide with a chair that barely fit in between the speakers.

SnoPuppy
Jun 15, 2005

porksmash posted:

How the hell do cables cause timing jitter? Jitter is caused by the digital circuits and discrepancies in timing crystals or something.

The only possible way for cables to cause jitter is through cross talk, which would cause localized speeding up/slowing down of edges by a very, very small amount (on the order of 10-100's of ps). This can be a problem when you're talking about something like a 1 GBit/s data stream.

This is also only relevant for signals with very fast edges, or very long cables, such that they need to be transmission lines. Which audio signals are most certainly not.

Audiot
May 18, 2006
Brilliant Pebbles!
Just tape the little bag of rocks and sand to whatever needs to sound better.



http://www.machinadynamica.com/machina17.htm

Also, component dampening. I'm just not into music enough to fill something I spent money on with calk.

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porksmash
Sep 30, 2008

Audiot posted:



Just... wow.

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