Is a "Review" of a Component in an Unfamiliar System in an Unfamiliar Room Really a Review?
- Thread starter Ron Resnick
- Start date
Elliot I said nothing of the sort, so please stop misrepresenting what I said.
The speakers sounded “real” to Tom. They sounded “believable” to him, i.e. like live music. The thread has to do with the M7s - not the room, or the rest of the system. While everything affects the sound, that’s not what the review is about.
The music was like live music. That’s an impressive statement!
Are you really an audio dealer?
In my case, I am intimately familiar with the sound of the XVX system I used. Well over a hundred hours of listening. The only variable we changed was switching from the Vivaldi APEX to the Varese. So only one variable changed.
Elliot G.
Industry Expert
Elliot G.
Industry Expert
my answer Sir was a question there was no misrepresentation.
I have been an audio dealer for over 50 years and if you want to insult me you better bring more .
Elliot G.
Industry Expert
Well, at the risk of stepping into a heated discussion, I would suggest that in the context of walking into an unfamiliar room, with unfamiliar source, electronics, cables and speakers, it is still very possible to reach conclusions about the capability of the speakers if the system and room sound really good overall. It may well be that the speakers are sounding really good in significant part because of the room, and everything in front of them in the reproduction chain, but it is also true that we know the speakers are not making a good room and a good reproduction chain sound bad. So it is very possible and valid to conclude that the speakers are capable of sounding really good in that room with that reproduction chain. Certainly beats an otherwise equivalent scenario were the speakers do not sound good. Arguably, it also beats a review where the same speakers are placed into a less well designed and executed room, with less capable system components in front of them, and the reviewer never hears what the speakers are actually capable of achieving. That is not to say that other speakers put into the same room with the same system in front of them might not sound better, they well could. But other speakers could also sound much worse. YMMV
No one was trying to insult you. I simply asked you a question, which you took to be offensive.
Time to hit IGNORE.
That's a great point. Hearing M7 or M9 in the Magico purpose-built room allows one to hear the best case version of the speaker and be less in danger of poor optimizations by dealer and/or reviewer.
Exactly! Where I think the scenario we are discussing proves problematic is where one wants to draw comparisons with other speakers that have been heard in a different room with a different reproduction chain. However, since real head to head comparisons largely died with HP, who cares.
To identify it as a review only serves to cheapen their review standards… the story can be just as interesting and more authentic if they determine these as some initial listening impressions made while hearing them in the wild.
It can be expository, tease and create interest and awareness but then lead up to a proper review under objective listening conditions. That becomes a win/win for the process.
To call it a review when all done completely under the controls of the manufacturer just makes the line between marketing and journalism fuzzier.
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One other note worth adding here that arises out of Tom Martin's emphasis on using the word "vivid" in describing what he heard. I recently acquired the same Pilium Olympus pre-amp in use at the Magico demo room, and the Pilium Zues stereo amp, which is from the same product tier as the Pilium Atlas monos in use there, and "vivid" is an excellent word to describe the immediate and not subtle improvement I noticed when putting the Pilium electronics into service in my system. While I also have Magico speakers, they are the now 10 year old M Projects, which I would assume are many steps behind the newer M series designs. However, it appears that both M Projects and the M 7s allow the vividness of the Pilium electronics to show through.
This is illustrative of the difficulty of drawing accurate conclusions.
To me the big deal about ‘convenient’ reviews with shortcuts is only to view them as data points. ‘Wet your appetite’ kinda things, but not foundational feedback to build a case.
Unless a piece of gear is lived with for weeks or months hard to take a review conclusion too seriously. My own approach is multiple times (3 or 4) through my 100+ references and get to a point where I can allow my mind to be in a casual normal listening situation where I can understand how my whole array of my senses react in my regular listening situation. Forced listening shrinks the value of perceptions. Too much left brain effect.
Misses the bigger picture.
Unless a piece of gear is lived with for weeks or months hard to take a review conclusion too seriously. My own approach is multiple times (3 or 4) through my 100+ references and get to a point where I can allow my mind to be in a casual normal listening situation where I can understand how my whole array of my senses react in my regular listening situation. Forced listening shrinks the value of perceptions. Too much left brain effect.
Misses the bigger picture.
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This implicitly raises an interesting question. Without meaning to quibble about the words, maybe there is a spectrum:
"in-home review": review of an unfamiliar component in a very familiar system in a very familiar room
"impressions review" or "impressions report": report on an unfamiliar component in a somewhat familiar system in a somewhat familiar room as a result of repeat listening sessions
"visit report": report of an unfamiliar component in an unfamiliar system in an unfamiliar room. I think this should not be styled as any kind of report on a singular component in that system.
Visiting a familiar system in a familiar room once or twice a week for months seems like a pretty valid full review situation.
Perhaps this is something in between an in-home review and an impressions report?
Yes, the review is about the speaker. But is there any methodological legitimacy to that?
I think Tom's report should not have focused on the speakers. It should have been styled as his listening impressions of the system as a whole.
i think it's a mistake to tell a reviewer what to focus on. let the reviewer take 'his/her' direction, then accept it for what it is. no more, no less.
then judge the entirety of the writing and apply what you get out of it to your knowledge base.
i don't want reviewers steered. over time the best reviewers will have the most credibility. gentleman reviewers taking shortcuts will be viewed as on the margins. nothing wrong with that. it's a part of the picture. but pro's will be taken more seriously. it's a lot of work to do it right. and earn trust from all around.
i tried it once and realized it was too much work to learn the craft and spend the time to figure it out. easier just to be a shoot from the hip audiophile. no stress, just fun. i take my efforts of system building and reproduced music enjoyment seriously, but not my communications. i'm not, and don't want to be, on the spot.
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I believe it qualifies as a full review given that I know the system and listened over many weeks.
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