How Hi Fi Has Become a Standard Unto Itself

[bonzo75]

System videos are also a very interesting recent shift. It seems that WBF is starting to represent more and more different points of view. The departure of Amir, and now Ack, seems to also correspond with slightly less focus on measurements and more on listening and observing. A few of us keep repeating the same old song about live unamplified music being the reference. Dust ups can break up the repetition and entertain, but there does seem to be a slight shift away from or expansion of what was once the standard. I think it is healthy and refreshing.

Ack left? Did not know that.

It will never move more to listening and observing. Unfortunately, the way this hobby is, it comes after jobs and family. For those with kids etc, best is to go to the one odd show per year, visit nearby friend or dealer. Or flow with latest forum product that attracts your attention. That's why Davey's survey showed that most cartridges are bought blind without prior listening. And the volume of recommendations is not high, like for a restaurant, so you can't take a punt on the scores easily. Also if you see a high rated restaurant, trying it out is much cheaper, cost of failure is low. Hence this will hobby, by nature, will mostly be riddled with decisions based on lack of observations.

 

[Atmasphere]

Beware also of so-called audio experts who pride themselves in being able to create a perfect mix of components that offset each other’s weaknesses and strengths.



In a future thread, we will discuss further why live, unamplified music played in a natural acoustic environment should be the gold standard for evaluating sound regardless of your music preferences and why long-term listening is really the only way to evaluate a system change.

I've been telling people for decades that putting together systems based on synergies (such as a dark sounding preamp with a bright sounding amp) isn't the way to go- you'll just wind up with more colorations and less transparency. Each part of the system should stand on its merits.

The second statement is a good ideal. Alternatively since most people listen to some form of media, IMO/IME its a good idea to make a recording of your own so that you were there at the recording session and know exactly what the musical event sounded like- and then have that recording on a media form that you commonly use. In my case I have LPs and CDs I've recorded and mastered. They are crazy handy for knowing what I'm hearing when I evaluate a system or room situation! All you need are two good mics and a decent recorder....

 

[bonzo75]

I've been telling people for decades that putting together systems based on synergies (such as a dark sounding preamp with a bright sounding amp) isn't the way to go- you'll just wind up with more colorations and less transparency. Each part of the system should stand on its merits.

Most people do not have the means to line up equipment before making a choice. When budget allows, they buy one thing. That's how they keep mixing and trying to match. Before they finish the chain, there is always something new that they absolutely itch to try, as that is the hobby.

 

[tima]

Tim, I understand what you mean about recent interest in horn speakers from a few vocal and enthusiastic members. Brad and Bonzo love their horns. But Keith’s speaker thread which is one of the longest and most active on the forum is primarily about cone speakers.

I think your 'But' misses the point. My comment was about repetitiveness and that repetition is not unusual. Were you sensitive to my using horn speaker discussion as an example? It was not about horn speakers.

Not sure what you mean by 'recent' interest in horn speakers. I do understand your personal interest is greater relatively recently.

Edit: I suppose I could have used the repetitive less than positive comments about Magico and Wilson speakers as examples.

 

[tima]

IMO/IME its a good idea to make a recording of your own so that you were there at the recording session and know exactly what the musical event sounded like- and then have that recording on a media form that you commonly use. In my case I have LPs and CDs I've recorded and mastered. They are crazy handy for knowing what I'm hearing when I evaluate a system or room situation! All you need are two good mics and a decent recorder.

Sounds a like a fun demonstration for an audio show. You could sell/send copies to attendees of the demonstration. Maybe a string quartet or jazz trio. Maybe Transparent Audio could be a sponsor!

 

[Ron Resnick]

Do you guys realize we keep reading writing the same messages in just different wording over and over. This thread is going to be just that. Nothing is new except a new thread.

Reading Micro exchanges words with the regulars, seeing him fight ten against one is actually much more interesting for me coming to WBF these days.

Dear Tang,

A thoughtful and well-written essay imbued with wisdom distilled from decades of experience in our industry is the opposite of the same message repeated in different wording.

I hope you will join me and Steve and Tom and the other posters on this thread in warmly welcoming to WBF a titan of the high-end audio industry.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Dear Karen,

Thank you for your beautifully-written and insightful first essay. By focusing on musical enjoyment and live, unamplified music as the compass you are speaking the audio "love language" of many of us! It is, indeed, ironic that some of the modest, simpler and less expensive systems popular in prior decades can better connect some of us emotionally to our favorite music than can some of the highly evolved and expensive systems of today.

I agree with you that each component should be chosen for neutrality (putting aside the debates about that term), and not to balance the weaknesses of one or more other components. I agree that "once something is lost in a signal path, it is never truly regained."

Thank you very much for joining us here! I look forward eagerly to your future essays!

 

[microstrip]

Someone today may want to put together a better than average hi fi system for reasons that did not exist 50 or 60 years ago in the golden-age of audio. Back then, everyone wanted a decent hi fi system to listen to music. (....)

Thanks for a very interesting starting post . There are several lines of thought I will appreciate to see being developed and discussed in WBF.

I was particularly interested in your sentence "I believe we are on the verge of experiencing an even greater golden age of audio, but there are barriers standing in the way. This thread is the first of a series where I will try to help some of you get beyond these barriers." I have since a few years ago felt that we need a new way of audio audio behavior to fully enjoy and understand the current golden age of audio.

 

[Tango]

I've been telling people for decades that putting together systems based on synergies (such as a dark sounding preamp with a bright sounding amp) isn't the way to go- you'll just wind up with more colorations and less transparency. Each part of the system should stand on its merits.

Most people do not have the means to line up equipment before making a choice. When budget allows, they buy one thing. That's how they keep mixing and trying to match.

These two points are the essence and a dilemma. Pity everyone must go through the journey pay for the learning curve and lost a lot of money to really understand. Watches make money. Audio is a losing money hobby.

 

[Tango]

Dear Tang,

A thoughtful and well-written essay imbued with wisdom distilled from decades of experience in our industry is the opposite of the same message repeated in different wording.

I hope you will join me and Steve and Tom and the other posters on this thread in warmly welcoming to WBF a titan of the high-end audio industry.

Of course Ron. Stupid me I did not know the thread starter is a prominent industry icon. We definitely should appreciate her presence in the WBF. I will just stay in the Shoe thread and ...? ..yes..shine shoes.

 

[kodomo]

Sounds a like a fun demonstration for an audio show. You could sell/send copies to attendees of the demonstration. Maybe a string quartet or jazz trio. Maybe Transparent Audio could be a sponsor!

This is what we did at my hotel. We recorded a string quartet and a jazz trio acoustically with just two mics while we were at the recording. Then we played back the music and listened with the musicians at the same venue through different sponsored sound systems. For later reviewing of their own systems, the attendees left with two mixes from two different engineers using the exact same recordings. I also wanted to make people see that even what we call neutral recordings and no dynamics processor involving mixing creates different sounding results through different engineers.

 

[tima]

This is what we did at my hotel. We recorded a string quartet and a jazz trio acoustically with just two mics while we were at the recording. Then we played back the music and listened with the musicians at the same venue through different sponsored sound systems. For later reviewing of their own systems, the attendees left with two mixes from two different engineers using the exact same recordings. I also wanted to make people see that even what we call neutral recordings and no dynamics processor involving mixing creates different sounding results through different engineers.

Congratulations! That is so cool.

If you can generalize across the different engineers, what were the biggest differences that stood out between live listening and the reproduction? What did the musicians comment?

 

[kodomo]

Congratulations! That is so cool.

If you can generalize across the different engineers, what were the biggest differences that stood out between live listening and the reproduction? What did the musicians comment?

We all agreed that a reproduction is a reproduction and live music is live music, especially un-amplified! These are two different experiences and each has its own qualities and I don't even want to say strengths and weaknesses. These are qualities that make them what they are. We have also learned that different mics, mic. positions, preamps, recording venues and mixing down, mastering all bring different points of views -be them a little or a lot- on the recorded event. There is no one view of an event happening. I still think un-amplified acoustic music is a good reference but I think test signals and measuring are as important and a combination of both are needed. Fidelity to the signal is important but enjoyment of the system and the involvement it can create are also very important qualities and these are completely personal.

The event was really very fun, the attendee number was kept under 40 including engineers and musicians and the hotel was completely closed to outsiders for absolute silence for this weekend. We had time to listen to live and recorded music through a few different systems, sources and chat with musicians, recording engineers. There were presentations by an architect that works on his phd on concert hall acoustics and a jazz historian.

Musicians had a ball and came up with creative ideas for the enrichment of ours and their experience. They invited us to stand next to them one by one and hear what they are hearing on stage. The jazz trio led by Ferit Odman had another idea inspired by my music listening habits. He knows I like to listen to music in dark, so he suggested playing one song in total darkness. It was very interesting and tells you a lot about live music experience and its visual component. Complete black out in live music brought me some qualities of home listening. We listened back that song with lights out as well. Musicians were also interested to see what people are interested in and how we listen to them. All in all it was great, I had all the bands and engineers booked for the second one and the covid hit so we couldn't do it. Hopefully next year, I will try and do the second one.

 

[Jake Purches]

Thank you Karen for your opening article. Another aspect of the audio listening chain is the recording process. I have been building up a small recording label for the last 5 years but by day I am an associate of Vivid Audio loudspeakers and before that I spent many years with Bowers and Wilkins in the research department back in the early 90s. In one way or another I have had a professional life in Audio for 35 years and before that an amateur one going back till I was old enough to switch on the radio-gram. I spent time in my 20s in Abbey Road recording studios and field recording too, on Reel to Reel and DAT when it came along. I also play the piano and the pipe-organ and listen to a lot of classical music.

To cut to the chase - when we desire to listen to music at home we have the music itself, which was recorded from live musicians, or electronic synth, or studio, miked, multi-tracked, mixed, listened to through monitors that range from dire, average to, with a few exceptions, brilliant, by producers on a time and budget schedule and engineers who listen too loud, all passed through ordinary balanced cables not audiophile ones, and then cut to a lacquer for LP processing digitally or by analogue (and if so via tape to tape to tape copies, Dolby systems etc), through a whole load of processes, or stamped to CD / SACD. So by the time your music gets to your turntable or CD player (or streamer and all its codecs and compression) the music from the mic to your HiFi has had a pretty torturous ride. Hence the vast difference in recordings there are out there, ranging from the superb to the excruciatingly awful.

THEN we have the multitude of variations in HiFi equipment till the signal gets to your speakers, which, are the last component to mess up your audio before your room does! Is it any wonder there is so much to go wrong, before it goes right? Karen has already detailed that side of things.
Hence the reason I decided that I had to control the recording stage as well as the reproduction stage, and use the VIvid Audio system as a reference, with reference quality microphones and a very simple digital system to do the conversion process, or straight to Reel to Reel as another option. Then you can complete the circle, and really get to hear what is possible. There are quite a few of us who do this of course, but not many who are part of the recording and reproducing chain like I do. Usually they are totally separate entities and don't talk to each other much. Just like TV production companies don't make television sets - with the exception in the old days of Sony - who made the entire chain from cameras to video recorders to Television sets. But I believe that is gone now.

 

[Cycles2]

Karen, your views on how the audio industry has become a slave to reviewers is so correct, many of your points should be considered truisms. I think one of the problems is that with the explosion of the Internet and social media, anyone can have a YouTube channel and call themselves a reviewer. They all tend to use the same musical selections which sound great through a transistor radio. They've invented and repeatedly use words and phrases such as 'slam', 'grunt', 'air around the players', 'veil over your speakers'. I guess some reviewers are like baseball radio announcers and feel compelled to use their own vocabulary to describe what they're hearing.

Most industries have certifications that are aimed at qualifying individuals to pass on their opinions and reviews. Many so-called reviewers don't own or are unaware of qualitative books such as Robert Harley's 'The Complete Guide to High-End Audio'. I find books like this help explain the differences in amp, preamp, DAC and speaker designs that provide some insight on how to pair components together.

I'm constantly amazed at how many reviewers will also tend to review amps and pre-amps made by different manufacturers in hopes of finding something magical and never mention amp / pre-amp impedance matching considerations. Case in point, I spent a year with dealers trying to convince me of which preamp to use with my Gryphon Antileon amp. Their pre-amp suggestions were likely based on the brands they sell. I was recently introduced to someone that suggested the obvious - use Gryphon's Pandora pre-amp as they're designed to work together. I took his advice and the result is magical.

Unqualified reviewers likely driven by which components they can get their hands on have made us think that a great amp manufacturer can't possibly build a pre-amp of matching sonic quality.

 

[andromedaaudio]

Here is another great initiative ( where it not that they state cables do matter, lol )

6moons.com - industry features: A special Zanden Audio event In Hong Kong

But did everybody buy a Zanden / ascendo system ??
No , i dont think so, does it matter ...not really .
Should you just buy what makes you feel good and you like to listen too , .... 100 %

 

[Elliot G.]

Karen, your views on how the audio industry has become a slave to reviewers is so correct, many of your points should be considered truisms. I think one of the problems is that with the explosion of the Internet and social media, anyone can have a YouTube channel and call themselves a reviewer. They all tend to use the same musical selections which sound great through a transistor radio. They've invented and repeatedly use words and phrases such as 'slam', 'grunt', 'air around the players', 'veil over your speakers'. I guess some reviewers are like baseball radio announcers and feel compelled to use their own vocabulary to describe what they're hearing.

The review process has , IMO, come full circle. What Gordon Holt and Harry Pearson railed against has gone around the mountain and came right back to where it began. If a reviewer is not a critic then what is his or her purpose? Stereo Review was just a way to pontificate about gear and say things like "certainly a product you should consider when buying _______ fill in the blank. This is come back and IMO its not a good thing. The world lives in a loss of the facts era and the audio business/hobby is not exempt from this.

 

[Al M.]

I'm constantly amazed at how many reviewers will also tend to review amps and pre-amps made by different manufacturers in hopes of finding something magical and never mention amp / pre-amp impedance matching considerations. Case in point, I spent a year with dealers trying to convince me of which preamp to use with my Gryphon Antileon amp. Their pre-amp suggestions were likely based on the brands they sell. I was recently introduced to someone that suggested the obvious - use Gryphon's Pandora pre-amp as they're designed to work together. I took his advice and the result is magical.

Unqualified reviewers likely driven by which components they can get their hands on have made us think that a great amp manufacturer can't possibly build a pre-amp of matching sonic quality.

Second that. My own preamp/amp combo is with both components from one manufacturer, and for most of my audiophile friends it is the same.

 

[Atmasphere]

Sounds a like a fun demonstration for an audio show. You could sell/send copies to attendees of the demonstration. Maybe a string quartet or jazz trio. Maybe Transparent Audio could be a sponsor!

One thing we found out really quick is that you can't play back a recording in the venue in which its recorded as you get the acoustics of that venue in the recording and then again in playback. It won't sound right. Quite literally you have to move the recording off site (which is why there's a recording booth in a recording studio).

 

[Mike Lavigne]

I'm constantly amazed at how many reviewers will also tend to review amps and pre-amps made by different manufacturers in hopes of finding something magical and never mention amp / pre-amp impedance matching considerations. Case in point, I spent a year with dealers trying to convince me of which preamp to use with my Gryphon Antileon amp. Their pre-amp suggestions were likely based on the brands they sell. I was recently introduced to someone that suggested the obvious - use Gryphon's Pandora pre-amp as they're designed to work together. I took his advice and the result is magical.

i agree that the idea is that the whole exceeds the sum of the parts. and for music reproduction, the preamp <-> amp synergy can be transformative in musical expression. my darTZeel pre and amp with it's 50 ohm 'zeel' interface takes this to a new level. Mr. Fremer has used this pre-amp combo for years too.

there is more to pre <-> amp synergy than the interface and impedance, but the flow of the music is affected by mismatches. sources and speakers are both limited or enhanced by getting this right. when you are trying to judge things, this can be a significant influence and distort judging cause and affect of the performance.