The Noob Linearity factor

[Carlos269]

A newbie is a beginner. A Noob is a derogatory term. That is pretty simple. Now I am not talking to Ked here who clearly isn't interested. No problemo. I'm talking openly on an open thread in an open forum for anybody to agree with, disagree with or ignore.

A newbie will introduce himself as one and would be insulted if he was called a noob. Condescension brings short term release in its wielder but then opens him up to the very standard he sets on others. In street talk, bull shit will be called and bullshit is personal.

I'm all for a good rant. It can be helluva educational or at least entertaining. So I'm about to go on one! I'm not counting on this being either.

I'm pretty sure every single person in this forum is or has been a pro at friggin' LIFE. We're all here enjoying a hobby that is small because we are the only people that really care about how well our favorite music is played AND actually ENJOY it.

Who the hell here has the friggin' right to judge anybody else's choice of music or how he wants it to be served up? Raise your hands.

Who thinks this is a contest? Raise your hands.

How about this?

Guys that want to make it a contest.........Seriously, wake up. Audio if it were a sport would be one you played against yourself. It adds nothing to our status, is questionable when it comes to FINANCIAL status LOL It even makes us look like absolute nut jobs even to musicians! What exactly would a "winner" look like? LOL

I kind of draw the line of bad taste when tribalism starts to appear. I have no problem if it is a group of guys who are friends outside of the forum but "us" who is "us"? What is this group that is being so offended.

I'm here as an adult individual. Adult not in the sense that I am of age but rather what that age presumes. That I know responsibilities as a whole. I am not here to be part of a crew. I'm here because I want to interact with other adult individuals that we might mutually benefit with the exchange whether agreement is met or not.

Sniping by starting anonymous threads. What can I say? Oh yeah I remember.

I call Bull Shit.

I will take a personal slant on this topic. For starters, I don’t often agree with Bonzo, but it is apparent that he has heard enough that it is he that is calling out the “Bull Shit!”

35 years ago I was Jay from Jay’s Audio Lab and Mike Levigne. Although I could not afford it back then, I was dazzled and mesmerized by the price tags and size & weights of the components! As I started building my system, I looked for the most expensive and biggest & heaviest items that I could afford. Flea power SET amplifiers were of no interest to me because they were small, light and relatively inexpensive.

On top of my desire to own the flavor of the month and Stereophile Class A rated components, I was under the belief that there was an Absolute Sound that we were all striving to achieve. There was a goal out there that if you spent more money and bought the latest and greatest you could one day achieve.

One night while listening I noticed that I had two different versions of the same CD and that they sounded different. How could this be? What made them different. I discovered that they were mastered by different mastering engineers and one was a remastered version of the original. That led me down a path that took me to the mastering studio world, where I lived for 7 years learning all and everything that I could. I will stop that part of my story there.

As I mentioned above, I had no interest or desire for flea power SET amplifiers or horns because they were not on the glossy pages of Stereophile and the Absolute Sound. I also knew that the speakers that I owned and liked, Magnepan MG-III and Martin Logan CLS series II needed current and power so I never bother to look in that direction.

One day while surfing the Audioweb site late at night; who here remembers Audioweb and AudioMark? I came across a pair of the Melos Audio RWT-70 Monoblocks, which I still own. RWT stands for Real World Triode. I liked the way that they looked, I still do, massive! I bought them and they were a revelation. I had not experienced tube amplification and was always spouting off about the virtues of solid-state amplifiers over tubes. I couldn’t believe how good the Melos monoblocks sounded. I then found a pair of KR Enterprise’s VT-6000 BM monoblocks, which belonged to Ricardo Kron, on rec.audio.high-end, remember that message group? With the help from Eunice I imported them. Then I bought a pair of Miles Nestorovic’s Alpha-1 monoblocks. These magnificent tube amplifiers would lead me to ask myself, is there something to the SET and horn movement? Is there something that I’m missing out on? At the time I had acquired the one of a kind Krell KRS-400, used for the release of the Martin Logan Statement speakers at CES in Chicago. I had the biggest, heaviest and baddest amplifiers at the time and still found myself listening to the Melos, Nestorovic, and the KR amps more.

It would take too long to chronicle my journey so let’s fast forward 30 years later. I now own what is perhaps the greatest collection of DHT and SET amplification and horn speakers. I have explored and investigated every faction of this hobby, including field-coil drivers, open baffle speakers, full range drivers, chipless true 1 bit high rate DSD dacs and adc’s, plasma tweeters, horn/cone/planar/bi-pioles/di-poles/mono-poles/true-ribbon/AMT/ line-array/point source/line source speakers of every variety. If it is a faction or out there in audio I either own it or have listen to it. This broad exposure to all the different approaches in audio and my time in the mastering studio world have shaped the way I think and approach audio today.

The take aways for me are that money doesn’t buy you quality sound, it buys you status, don’t overlook something because it is not on the pages of Stereophile or The Absolute Sound, or because it is not expensive, there is no finish line with a prize at the end, the only one you really need to worry about pleasing is yourself, in the end musically and enjoyment are more important than accuracy, as accuracy cannot be validated.

Don’t get stuck in a rut! Explore the audio world, as you may very well be surprised by what you hear.

 

[Maril555]

while i respect that you have well meaning intentions about this line of discussion, i think it's mostly disrespectful as a topic, and blatantly elitist. don't like where this might end up going.

not that stuff like this kind of labeling does not enter plenty of threads, but this is a bit 'in your face'. it does not pass the smell test. it will alienate a certain part of our community.

i only speak for myself. maybe i'm wrong.

while i respect that you have well meaning intentions about this line of discussion, i think it's mostly disrespectful as a topic, and blatantly elitist. don't like where this might end up going.

not that stuff like this kind of labeling does not enter plenty of threads, but this is a bit 'in your face'. it does not pass the smell test. it will alienate a certain part of our community.

i only speak for myself. maybe i'm wrong.

Mike, I’m not sure why you consider Kedar’s point of view “elitist”, being different from a fairly common approach to system progression doesn’t make it an elitist, at least not in a derogatory sense.
The topic is 100% valid and I personally do not find it neither disrespectful nor elitist.
Just to offer a different perspective, one can as easily call reports on your system progress “elitist” as the prohibitive to many cost of your equipment makes it unattainable, therefore “elitist”
And any appeal to potentially hurt feelings of some “sensitive” members should not be a part of any of the pretty technical discussions of this forum.
If the topic doesn’t pass your smell test, the argument you make might evoke “cancel culture” connotations in another group of members.
Just my opinion, of course.

 

[morricab]

Kind of. Ah ha is more of an epiphany, so I would not say Ah ha moment, but some conclusions. Big speaker weight and scale is an obvious one. We think at various times we have discovered something, the next thing. the early discoveries are what some people keep upgrading on as if it is obvious because it happened in their audio childhood, it will happen now. They don't veer off the early path much (in terms of conclusions), kind of showing they have not had exposure after that early period or seek not to.

My early experience got me into hifi…my ah ha moments set the course. My first was dynamics of horns in college (Klipsch La Scala), my second was electrostats…either of which can potentially bring quite nuanced and realistic music to life. The third was importance of electronics and the fourth of power.

 

[Ron Resnick]

I was dazzled and mesmerized by the price tags and size & weights of the components!

From the very beginning I don't think I was dazzled and mesmerized by the price tags and by the size and weight of components. I couldn't afford them, so why stress about it?

I looked for the most expensive and biggest & heaviest items that I could afford. Flea power SET amplifiers were of no interest to me because they were small, light and relatively inexpensive.

Even from the beginning I never chose components based on size and weight.

On top of my desire to own the flavor of the month and Stereophile Class A rated components

I was not concerned that I was unable to afford Stereophile Class A rated components.

I was under the belief that there was an Absolute Sound that we were all striving to achieve.

I decided very early on that the hobby is about achieving a sound I personally happen to like.

There was a goal out there that if you spent more money and bought the latest and greatest you could one day achieve.

I had no interest or desire for flea power SET amplifiers or horns because they were not on the glossy pages of Stereophile and the Absolute Sound.

I have never believed that "if you spent more money and bought the latest and greatest" you would reach audio nirvana. I definitely have never been a box swapper, often seeking some upgrade or marginal improvement. I had the same exact system for 18 years.

I liked the way that they looked

I have never bought components on the basis of the way they look. I remember thinking that my first amplifier, Manley 150s, sure weren't pretty.

I had not experienced tube amplification and was always spouting off about the virtues of solid-state amplifiers over tubes.

At the very beginning of my audio journey I compared tube electronics to solid-state electronics, and realized I preferred tube electronics.

You spouting off the virtues of solid-state over tubes was a simple case of you didn't know what you didn't know.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maybe I'm a simpler person psychologically, or maybe I was lucky to discover my high-end preferences early on, or both, but I did not suffer from these distractions you are reporting here which caused you to take a long time to find the path you now enjoy. The important thing is that you finally found it, and that you now are very happy!

Maybe your personal experience and journey is causing you to assume other people require this much time and have this much difficulty finding their own personal audio nirvana?

 

[morricab]

Carlos is covered for critism .
For every question/ critique he s got an answer system

Does he even have a pair of your speakers?? …will wonders never cease…

 

[Carlos269]

From the very beginning I don't think I was dazzled and mesmerized by the price tags and by the size and weight of components. I couldn't afford them, so why stress about it?


Even from the beginning I never chose components based on size and weight.


I never suffered a self-esteem problem from not being able to afford Stereophile Class A rated components.



I decided very early on that the hobby is about achieving a sound I personally happen to like.


I have never believed that "if you spent more money and bought the latest and greatest" you would reach audio nirvana. I definitely have never been a box swapper, often seeking some upgrade or marginal improvement. I had the same exact system for 18 years.



I have never bought components on the basis of the way they look. I remember thinking that my first amplifier, Manley 150s, sure weren't pretty.



At the very beginning of my audio journey I compared tube electronics to solid-state electronics, and realized I preferred tube electronics.

You spouting off the virtues of solid-state over tubes was a simple case of you didn't know what you didn't know.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maybe I'm a simpler person psychologically, or maybe I was lucky to discover my high-end preferences early on, or both, but I did not suffer from these psychological and self-esteem maladies you are reporting here which caused you to take a long time to find the path you now enjoy. The important thing is that you finally found it, and that you now are very happy!

Maybe your personal experience and journey is causing you to assume other people require this much time and have this much difficulty finding their own personal audio nirvana?

Ron, I’m not sure why you interjected yourself into my story. This was not about you. If you have insecurities don’t project them onto me.

 

[PeterA]

Ron, I’m not sure why you interjected yourself into my story. This was not about you. If you have insecurities don’t project them onto me.

I also found that curious. Especially the inference that you suffer from self-esteem issues. That’s the exact opposite of my impression based on reading your posts.

I do think that the various paths different audio files choose to follow is actually a pretty interesting topic. Why do they make the choices they make, and why do they either move in the same direction or change direction to some point in the hobby. What makes them change direction or why do they decide not to change direction?

I do agree with those who have said it’s not really for anyone else to judge the choices fellow hobbyists make. And I agree with Carlos that the only person each of us really needs to please is himself. It is a fascinating and curious hobby and there is a lot to learn if we are so inclined.

 

[Al M.]

Dear Kedar,

[...]

Another problem is that almost every time, if not literally every time, someone does not see things your way you conclude it is because they do not have sufficient experience auditioning certain loudspeakers which you consider to be instructive.

Exactly.

I think your opening post largely is subjective personal preference masquerading as a theory.

Precisely.

I think you are implicitly suggesting that however people begin their audio journeys if they do not wind up on a path close to yours, then they have never graduated from the noob stage, and have not discovered or learned what you now believe, and thus have not attained the rank of professor in high-end audio which you believe you have attained.

Exactly.

Kedar may not be a Noob but he is a SNoob, erm Snob.

 

[Lagonda]

I also found that curious. Especially the inference that you suffer from self-esteem issues. That’s the exact opposite of my impression based on reading your posts.

I do think that the various paths different audio files choose to follow is actually a pretty interesting topic. Why do they make the choices they make, and why do they either move in the same direction or change direction to some point in the hobby. What makes them change direction or why do they decide not to change direction?

I do agree with those who have said it’s not really for anyone else to judge the choices fellow hobbyists make. And I agree with Carlos that the only person each of us really needs to please is himself. It is a fascinating and curious hobby and there is a lot to learn if we are so inclined.

What is the opposite of low self esteem ?

 

[Carlos269]

What is the opposite of low self esteem ?

Confidence! The irony is that in my story I made myself vulnerable by stating that like everyone else I also started off in this hobby naive and ignorant. I admitted that I have learned a lot and reversed course on a number of things these past 35 plus years. Instead of commending me for my honest and open account, Ron starts attacking and projecting his insecurities onto me. Go figure? Ron must find this thread very triggering and is conveying to us all that he feels that Bonzo started this thread with him in mind.

I wonder how long Ron has actually been in this hobby? Ron’s level of experience appears to me to be very shallow.

 

[Tiltedfault]

I don’t see any problem with being a “noob” even if it is derogatory. I consider myself a noob in the sense I’m always open to new experiences or ideas without forgetting what I’ve learned in the past. So much in audio is more rules of thumb or even suggestions than iron clad laws and I’m sure most of us have had experiences where a preconceived idea about audio was dashed to the ground by something, smaller, less sexy, and cheaper. I think it’s good to be a noob in the sense of always being a beginner. As for noob linearity, say someone starts out with panels and sticks with them to the end. Presumably after a long period with them he knows something about their strengths and weaknesses, but likes what he hears and over time his panels have gotten bigger along with his amplification. He qualifies as a linear noob, I suppose, but this to me isn’t a bad thing. If you have issues with people playing the same things over and over, or falling into the audiophile vortex of bigger is better because they really haven’t been exposed to viable, more musically compelling alternatives, then I think the issue is not of noob linearity but of noob ignorance.

I’ve had tube amps and ss as well as high and not so high efficiency speakers along my journey and have made many mistakes or less than optimal choices. Fortunately, I think I learned from them so I guess this makes me a non-linear noob. Learning coexists with ignorance, and while some here have a tremendous amount of experience, and may have taken a serious detour or two in their audio thinking, it’s still a mostly linear ascent to one’s Socratic ideal of sound reproduction. Whether that leads to Mt. Analog/dht is another question entirely.

Matt

 

[Al M.]

I wonder how long Ron has actually been in this hobby? Ron’s level of experience appears to me to be very shallow.

Seriously?

Ron has heard tons of different systems, and drawn his own conclusions.

If these don't agree with everyone, well guess what, no one's conclusions agree with everyone. That includes mine and yours as well. This is and remains a personal, subjective hobby.

 

[Lagonda]

Confidence! The irony is that in my story I made myself vulnerable by stating that like everyone else I started off in this hobby naive and ignorant. I admitted that I have learned a lot and reversed course on a number of things these past 35 plus years. Instead of commending me for my honest and open account, Ron starts attacking and projecting his insecurities onto me. Go figure? Ron must find this thread very triggering and is conveying that Bonzo started this thread with him in mind.

I wonder how long Ron has actually been in this hobby? Ron’s level of experience appears to me to be very shallow.

We all have our separate paths in this hobby of ours ! I salute you for having found what pleases you most and find your mastering approach very interesting and not without merit. Even though it is probably going in polar opposite direction of the mainstream purity of horns and SET trend that is so highly praised by its followers on WBF. As for Ron, he seems to follow his path by curating a system put together by components that present sound the way he prefers it, nobody is right or wrong, except Ked of coarse !

 

[Carlos269]

If these don't agree with everyone, well guess what, no one's conclusions agree with everyone. That includes mine and yours as well. This is and remains a personal, subjective hobby.

nobody is right or wrong!

I think that we can all agree with the two statements above.

My point is about knowledge gained from experience or lack of it. There is no way to dispute that.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Ron starts attacking and projecting his insecurities onto me.

Attacking? I find it amusing how often the people who are the harshest on the outgoing are snowflakes on the incoming.

I edited my post. I apologize for offending you.

 

[Robh3606]

I started this hobby because of my dad who always had the music playing when he was home. So I had a leg up from him. Was reading the stereo mags for years before I purchased my second system.

My first was a had me down. A Sony stereo RTR with 2 5X7 speakers where the sides open and acted as reflectors for the speakers.

My first Ahaaa moment setting up my second stereo. Sansui 2000X receiver Garrard Turntable and Shure M97 with JBL L25 Prima's. Damn near fell out of my chair!

Second Ahaaa was Phase 4000 preamp Dynaco ST 400 kit built the Dynaco 10 channel EQ also kit built. JVC direct drive with Shure V15 and JBL L100's and Koss ESP 9's.

Staid there for years then got into HT and then horns. Still doing upgrades. So I guess I am still a noob which is fine by me.

Rob

 

[PeterA]

What is the opposite of low self esteem ?

Confidence, based on knowledge and experience. A few former members exhibited this.

I think Bonzo is simply suggesting that not everyone is an expert.

I disagree that there’s anything about this hobby that is linear. People I have run into tell me their learning curves are all over the place. There are periods of great learning, and then periods of stasis. That is my experience too.

 

[JackD201]

I will take a personal slant on this topic. For starters, I don’t often agree with Bonzo, but it is apparent that he has heard enough that it is he that is calling out the “Bull Shit!”

35 years ago I was Jay from Jay’s Audio Lab and Mike Levigne. Although I could not afford it back then, I was dazzled and mesmerized by the price tags and size & weights of the components! As I started building my system, I looked for the most expensive and biggest & heaviest items that I could afford. Flea power SET amplifiers were of no interest to me because they were small, light and relatively inexpensive.

On top of my desire to own the flavor of the month and Stereophile Class A rated components, I was under the belief that there was an Absolute Sound that we were all striving to achieve. There was a goal out there that if you spent more money and bought the latest and greatest you could one day achieve.

One night while listening I noticed that I had two different versions of the same CD and that they sounded different. How could this be? What made them different. I discovered that they were mastered by different mastering engineers and one was a remastered version of the original. That led me down a path that took me to the mastering studio world, where I lived for 7 years learning all and everything that I could. I will stop that part of my story there.

As I mentioned above, I had no interest or desire for flea power SET amplifiers or horns because they were not on the glossy pages of Stereophile and the Absolute Sound. I also knew that the speakers that I owned and liked, Magnepan MG-III and Martin Logan CLS series II needed current and power so I never bother to look in that direction.

One day while surfing the Audioweb site late at night; who here remembers Audioweb and AudioMark? I came across a pair of the Melos Audio RWT-70 Monoblocks, which I still own. RWT stands for Real World Triode. I liked the way that they looked, I still do, massive! I bought them and they were a revelation. I had not experienced tube amplification and was always spouting off about the virtues of solid-state amplifiers over tubes. I couldn’t believe how good the Melos monoblocks sounded. I then found a pair of KR Enterprise’s VT-6000 BM monoblocks, which belonged to Ricardo Kron, on rec.audio.high-end, remember that message group? With the help from Eunice I imported them. Then I bought a pair of Miles Nestorovic’s Alpha-1 monoblocks. These magnificent tube amplifiers would lead me to ask myself, is there something to the SET and horn movement? Is there something that I’m missing out on? At the time I had acquired the one of a kind Krell KRS-400, used for the release of the Martin Logan Statement speakers at CES in Chicago. I had the biggest, heaviest and baddest amplifiers at the time and still found myself listening to the Melos, Nestorovic, and the KR amps more.

It would take too long to chronicle my journey so let’s fast forward 30 years later. I now own what is perhaps the greatest collection of DHT and SET amplification and horn speakers. I have explored and investigated every faction of this hobby, including field-coil drivers, open baffle speakers, full range drivers, chipless true 1 bit high rate DSD dacs and adc’s, plasma tweeters, horn/cone/planar/bi-pioles/di-poles/mono-poles/true-ribbon/AMT/ line-array/point source/line source speakers of every variety. If it is a faction or out there in audio I either own it or have listen to it. This broad exposure to all the different approaches in audio and my time in the mastering studio world have shaped the way I think and approach audio today.

The take aways for me are that money doesn’t buy you quality sound, it buys you status, don’t overlook something because it is not on the pages of Stereophile or The Absolute Sound, or because it is not expensive, there is no finish line with a prize at the end, the only one you really need to worry about pleasing is yourself, in the end musically and enjoyment are more important than accuracy, as accuracy cannot be validated.

Don’t get stuck in a rut! Explore the audio world, as you may very well be surprised by what you hear.

So based purely on what you've seen of Mike and Jay online you assume they haven't been around the block or as you put it are stuck in a rut? What about what they do not post about? Have you not seen Mike go down in price like when he let go of his Studers because he liked another Machine(s) more? He's done the same with turntables and arms too.

Mike and I have had our disagreements on concepts and while superficially they are of the same feather but if one looks closely, when it comes to design ethos' our components differ quite a bit. What we have in common is that we both have direct access with the designers and manufacturers of our gear and that gives us a bit more insight than those that rely solely on published reviews. I don't think we have a single piece of gear in common except a speaker a dozen or so years ago. We never questioned each other's preferences though. So no, I will not categorize him as a mag trophy hunter nor a Mo' dolla, Mo' Betta guy because that is not what the evidence shows. That isn't the issue. The issue is that Mike purportedly talks about his gear and what they do for him a lot. So what? It's what you and Ked do too.

I don't agree with your blanket statement that room acoustics don't matter but I don't think you're a Noob. I figure you might just be lucky as far as your space is concerned and YOU don't need it and that's fine by me. I do know anybody living in the pacific rim like I do have houses built in concrete and stone without any drywall or insulation save maybe the ceilings will need to at least smartly furnish their rooms. I might be the only guy here that enjoyed your "mastering" of your line source system because I too believe that there is too much dogma in this hobby and that one SHOULD be an active participant in the reproduction process. It's not what you do in your system it's your assumption that there is a shortage of experience and passion on a pandemic scale and only those that agree with you have a stockpile of it. Nobody here is asking to be saved especially by someone who has a signature that uses the word fool not once but twice.

 

[Carlos269]

Attacking? I find it amusing how often the people who are the harshest on the outgoing are snowflakes on the incoming.

I edited my post. I apologize for offending you.

No snowflake here. Please feel free to swing away…..if you think that I’m going to break, it’s going to take more than you have.

I was Just confused by your comments as they seemed out of place and not appropriate to my story.

 

[Carlos269]

So based purely on what you've seen of Mike and Jay online you assume they haven't been around the block or as you put it are stuck in a rut? What about what they do not post about? Have you not seen Mike go down in price like when he let go of his Studers because he liked another Machine(s) more? He's done the same with turntables and arms too.

Mike and I have had our disagreements on concepts and while superficially they are of the same feather but if one looks closely, when it comes to design ethos' our components differ quite a bit. What we have in common is that we both have direct access with the designers and manufacturers of our gear and that gives us a bit more insight than those that rely solely on published reviews. I don't think we have a single piece of gear in common except a speaker a dozen or so years ago. We never questioned each other's preferences though. So no, I will not categorize him as a mag trophy hunter nor a Mo' dolla, Mo' Betta guy because that is not what the evidence shows. That isn't the issue. The issue is that Mike purportedly talks about his gear and what they do for him a lot. So what? It's what you and Ked do too.

I don't agree with your blanket statement that room acoustics don't matter but I don't think you're a Noob. I figure you might just be lucky as far as your space is concerned and YOU don't need it and that's fine by me. I do know anybody living in the pacific rim like I do have houses built in concrete and stone without any drywall or insulation save maybe the ceilings will need to at least smartly furnish their rooms. I might be the only guy here that enjoyed your "mastering" of your line source system because I too believe that there is too much dogma in this hobby and that one SHOULD be an active participant in the reproduction process. It's not what you do in your system it's your assumption that there is a shortage of experience and passion on a pandemic scale and only those that agree with you have a stockpile of it. Nobody here is asking to be saved especially by someone who has a signature that uses the word fool not once but twice.

Fair enough. I accept all your comments. Doesn’t mean that I agree. But there’s not enough there worth me arguing about. I actually agree with many of the points you made but not all of them.