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Topic: Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1) (Read 21389 times) previous topic - next topic
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Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #25 –
Quote from: puntloos on
A bad ($100?) cd player will probably a/ have bad error correction/recovery (I know, I said let's discount that here!), and b/ low quality DA conversion chips that for example don't smooth/filter and so forth.


If you wan't to consider error correction, I'm more inclined to believe there might be audible differences; however, as for DA conversion, the tests I have read about suggest that all CD players sound the same, with the possible exceptions of the earliest models, really cheap off-brand stuff, and cheap portables.  Again, I'm willing to consider any evidence to the contrary; I don't mean to represent my beliefs about amps and CD players as definitive.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #26 –
Quote from: Thelonious Monk on
define "properly designed". are you an engineer? do you have any idea what you are talking about? do you know anything about d/a conversion?


I can't define "properly designed" and in that regard, no I don't have any idea what I am talking about.  No, I am not an engineer, and I don't know anything about D/A conversion, either.  As for determining what is a "properly designed" amp, I rely on design philosophy (e.g. no nonsense) and reputation.

My previously declared beliefs are based on the conclusions of those sources which seem most trustworthy to me and on the reports I have read about carefully controlled listening tests which support those conclusions.  I don't recall ever reading about any listening tests which contradicted those conclusions, however, I realize that record in this regard is less thorough and complete than one could hope.  As such, I remain willing to concede that these conclusions could still be disproven.  I rest my beliefs solely on the weight of the evidence I have seen so far.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #27 –
Quote from: Thelonious Monk on
define "properly designed". are you an engineer? do you have any idea what you are talking about? do you know anything about d/a conversion?



I am.

He's right.

Any properly designed DAC should sound the same as any other DAC doing the same conversion. Any change WHATSOEVER means that one or the other DAC is broken .

And if you don't like ABX tests, you can use ABC/hr tests, or any number of other double-blind test methodologies.
-----
J. D. (jj) Johnston

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #28 –
Some comments before answering the main question.

Quote from: Lyx on
Quote from: b3n on

Using science to disprove audiophile concepts and or principles is akin to using science to disprove god. Audiophiles, much like religious peoples rely heavily on faith and personal perception rather then hard science to give evidence to their claims.

What you mean is right, but the words are choosen a bit unlucky. Believers actually do NOT rely on their perception and instead on their ability to manipulate their perception to their liking. Or simpler: they rely on fantasy - believing is compensating deficits with fantasy


I don't think that this reflects how audiophile behave at all. These points of view seem very forum-biased in my opinion.

An audiophile do not claim that cables or cd players etc can make a difference because is has been told so, and he does not want to believe science rather than voodoo. That would be relying on fath or on fantasy.
An audiophile claims that cables or cd players etc can make a difference because he hears it. And as any sensible people, he believes what he hears.

Sonic illusions have been documented, and we can see them occuring often in ABX tests. A good example is given in http://www.auricles.com/Kiang_Power_cable_test(2).xls (final result of http://www.hifiwigwam.com/forum1/1614.html ), listener 3.
Or listener 5 group 1 of http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_11_4...ds-12-2004.html

In a discussion forum, people use arguments in order to exchange point of views. That's why they seem to rely on fantasy in this context, but in reality, they rely on what they hear.

I'd be curious to see the result of an opposite experiment : having a skeptic listener listen to alledgedly different speakers, or different codecs at 64 kbps, while they are actally the same. There is no reason to believe that the rate of sonic illusions would be lower than among audiophiles.

Quote from: Lyx on
To get back on topic: I agree that it is useless to disprove believers with science (except if the goal is learning yourself something from your investigation, instead of "converting" believers). The reason for this is the same as above: believers dont need reality and truth to justify their judgements - their worldview is based on fantasy... you cannot take fantasy from them, therefore you cannot destroy their worldview - their worldview exists completely independent of reality (thats the whole point about believing in the first place - as i said "compensating deficits with fantasy".


This may be true in some cases, but I've been in touch with several people who were different.

Quote from: puntloos on
As for the whole 'meta discussion'.. I wholly sympathize (hence this topic). There was some french audio group who did an actual double blind test with one hidden guy switching speaker cables (E0.5/m, E10/m, E500/m) and 4 guys sitting in a row. Noone could distinguish between them, which makes sense to my microelectronics mind.


Do you have an account of this listening test ?

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #29 –
Quote
Quote from: puntloos on
As for the whole 'meta discussion'.. I wholly sympathize (hence this topic). There was some french audio group who did an actual double blind test with one hidden guy switching speaker cables (E0.5/m, E10/m, E500/m) and 4 guys sitting in a row. Noone could distinguish between them, which makes sense to my microelectronics mind.


Do you have an account of this listening test ?


You should already have it. - you were one of the participants I think.

http://www.homecinema-fr.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=29781210

(I pointed to this URL in one of my earlier posts in this topic)

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #30 –
Quote from: Pio2001 on
An audiophile do not claim that cables or cd players etc can make a difference because is has been told so, and he does not want to believe science rather than voodoo. That would be relying on fath or on fantasy.
An audiophile claims that cables or cd players etc can make a difference because he hears it. And as any sensible people, he believes what he hears.

What you are describing seems to be "naive realism":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Na%C3%AFve_realism

The topic-relevant aspect of it is: "My perception and interpretation is perfect. Things are indeed as i perceive them."


This is contrasted with "critical realism":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_realism

The topic-relevant aspect of it is: "My perception and interpretation is imperfect. Things may not always be as i perceive them."
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #31 –
Quote from: puntloos on
Quote

Do you have an account of this listening test ?


You should already have it. - you were one of the participants I think.


Ah yes.

But it was an interconnect listening test, not speaker

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #32 –
Quote from: Lyx on
What you are describing seems to be "naive realism":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Na%C3%AFve_realism

The topic-relevant aspect of it is: "My perception and interpretation is perfect. Things are indeed as i perceive them."

This is contrasted with "critical realism":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_realism

The topic-relevant aspect of it is: "My perception and interpretation is imperfect. Things may not always be as i perceive them."


That's true, but it is quite rare for an audiophile to consider how things are.
They usually consider only how they perceive things, no matter how they are.

Subjectivist listeners usually doesn't consider that his or her hearing can change. They assume that if they hear an illusion now, they will hear it all their life. Thus if the illusion needs a 1000 $ power cord to appear, then a 1000 $ power cord is needed. Otherwise, the illusion doesn't work and the sound is not perceived as good.
At this point, the discussion becomes useless, and only real listening tests can lead the matter ahead.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #33 –
Pio2001 - I would respond that a person can hear something that isn't there. Even more so when he or she has been told it's there.

Further problems exist when several professional audiophiles or seasoned editors of audiophile magazines all listen to the same thing and come away describing it in different ways. The same hardware being described  using contradicting terms by different people. This is discussed in the editorial I linked in my first post in the thread.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #34 –
Quote from: puntloos on
What I am very confused about is the actual relative impact of all these effects when appreciating sound quality in practice.


As we saw above, all of these factors can affect the appreciation of sound quality through psychological effects. Even if the listener is an engineer.

But the stereo system itself doesn't need to be modified for the perception to improve. The listener just have to believe that the system has changed.

Therefore the actual content of the system components only matters if it has a real effect on the sound.
From this point of view, we can consider the effect of various parameters on sound through double blind listening tests.

Here are all the blind listening test that I know on the web :

http://chaud7.forumactif.fr/1ere-categorie...s-ABX-p2557.htm
Some of the links in this page redirect themselves to other lists of blind tests.

From all those results, we can tell the following :

- Power cable quality
- Power noise filtering
-> No effect so far in double blind tests, even carefully designed ones.

- Jitter compensation/prevention
- Digital Interconnect Quality (between medium reader and DAC)
- Digital Interconnect system (USB/SPDIF/TOSLINK/AES)
->Never tested to my knowledge in blind listening test. However, in Dunn, Dennis and Carson's study about the sound of CDs, a profesional DAC shows its ability to remove all trace of measurable jitter effets in its analog output.
In the homecinema-fr.com forum, GBO suggests to simulate jitter in digital samples.

- Quantisation Noise
- Source Bit Depth
->According to the tests that I just added at the bottom of the main compilation (Ethan Winer's test), for most people, 13 bits are already enough. However, some isolated results (*), yet to be reproduced, seem to show that 16 bits quantization noise can be audible.
(*)in Ethan Winer's test, ff123, what was the conclusion of your analysis ? And in the 24/96 challenge too.

- Source Sample Rate - DAC internal Bit Depth (upsampling)
- DAC internal Sample Rate (upsampling)
- DAC chip brand/type 'Burr Brown.. '...
-> Same as above. They sound the same for most people, but the existing ABX success should draw our attention. If they are not all flawed, either 44.1 kHz 16 bits is borderline for transparent quality, either DACs or ADCs can be improved.

- Analog Interconnect Quality (between source and Pre)
->Negative results in carefully designed tests about RCA. Measurments show an extremely small effect (0.02 dB attenuation at 20 kHz through 5 meters of cheapo cable).

- Analog Interconnect Type (XLR, Rca, jack?)
XLR is unlikely to be worse than RCA. I don't know about jack.

- Type of Pre-amp (passive/active)
->Not tested to my knowledge.

- Analog Amp Connect Quality (between pre and power amp)
- Analog Amp Connect Type (XLR, RCA, Jack??)
->Not tested to my knowledge.

- Amplifier class (discrete class A AB AC AD.. )
->Amplifier tests show success in transistor vs tube double blind comparisons, but not between transistors.
But I don't know if different classes have been compared, and the amplifier double blind tests that I know are not well documented.

- Power headroom (a 400W amp driving a 100W max speaker set?)
->The maximum power of a speaker set is a mostly commercial characteristic. The real maximum power depends on frequency in various ways from speaker to speaker.

- Speaker Cable Quality
->The main quality factor seems to be the inductance, and for standard cable, it is minimal around 4mm2. The two conductors should be as close as possible from each other and should not lie on a conductive ground (like concrete) (1).
The successfull ABX result opposed a standard cable with a complex audiophile setup with a lot of conductors. I don't know of ABX success between standard cables, but according to the measurments, the effect of the cable should become quickly audible as the cable lenght rises above 10 meters.

- Geometric considerations (Room layout, speaker positioning)
- Echo (due to the type of room)
->Extremely strong influence. Can produce peaks as high as +20 dB in the frequency response !

- In/output stage impedances of the various subsystems.
->Never tested to my knowledge.


Footnote (1) : this gives credit to one of the most incredible audiophool tweaks : the cable stands, that prevent speaker cables from touching the floor !

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #35 –
Quote from: Pio2001 on
Subjectivist listeners usually doesn't consider that his or her hearing can change. They assume that if they hear an illusion now, they will hear it all their life. Thus if the illusion needs a 1000 $ power cord to appear, then a 1000 $ power cord is needed. Otherwise, the illusion doesn't work and the sound is not perceived as good.
At this point, the discussion becomes useless, and only real listening tests can lead the matter ahead.

And thats when believing often DOES become an issue. Naive realism, idealism and believing are all very close connected to each other. In your example the person typically did invest alot of money, mental stability and self-confidence on this illusion. Thus, since he/she is already in the subjective-bias corner (yes, "objective-bias" is also a form of corruption - typically found among narrow-minded scientists), he or she typically will not like the idea of accepting that all those investments were worthless, thus accepting a significant personal loss. Instead, such people go into denial-mode and start turning their illusions into beliefs. Maybe this is to some extend a reason, why audiophiles appear like believers on discussion-boards, when their arguments get rationally criticized.

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #36 –
@Room101
There is no need for an ABX-test in the amp-sector. Audible differences between amps may be sometimes anything but subtle. However, ABX-tests with your Home-speakers are not easy to accomplish (you can't do it alone). A provider of professional Studio-Equipment will probably have several Speakers but only one amp (for testing) with most Studio-Speakers having built-in amps anyway. You might bring-in your own amplifier if you make it believable that you will buy something. It's a pity if you don't have this chance for testing.

The aspect of audible quality differences between CD-Player may be way overrated, but is anybody here seriously suggesting you could replace any CD-Player with a 30 Dollar DVD-Player without quality loss 

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #37 –
Quote from: henkersmahlzeit on
There is no need for an ABX-test in the amp-sector. Audible differences between amps may be sometimes anything but subtle.


The need for ABX is not related to the amplitude of the perceived difference.
How many times have I seen people claiming that ABX was unnecessary because the difference was so obvious that anyone could hear it without effort, then not performing better than chance in ABX ? Well, several times already !
ABX is typically unnecessary when measured difference are far above what have been ABXed before. And measured differences between amplifiers are rather below the audible threshold than above.

In the amplifier domain, many tests have shown that heard differences are nowhere near real differences. You can find several ABX test in the list above that have failed (especially in Matrix-hifi and David Carlstrom sub-lists).

Quote from: henkersmahlzeit on
The aspect of audible quality differences between CD-Player may be way overrated, but is anybody here seriously suggesting you could replace any CD-Player with a 30 Dollar DVD-Player without quality loss 


I don't know.
Some tests have failed to show an audible difference between a regular cd player and a portable player (example : http://www.matrixhifi.com/contenedor_sonydiscman.htm ).
Other tests have shown a difference. Example : http://www.homecinema-fr.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=169329500
Another test have shown a difference between a portable player and a high-end audiophile cd player, but all listeners found the portable player to sound better than the high end player (they did not know which was which) !
http://www.matrixhifi.com/contenedor_discmandac3.htm

And here are measurments made on what we are talking about : a 29.90 € DVD player (Akai) : http://forum.hardware.fr/hfr/VideoSon/HiFi...98.htm#t1225121

The measured performances are really bad.
Is the distortion audible ? Maybe.
An ABX test should be performed in order to answer this question.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #38 –
Quote from: henkersmahlzeit on
There is no need for an ABX-test in the amp-sector. Audible differences between amps may be sometimes anything but subtle.

ABX test is always needed. Especially if a lot of people are living in a pre-learned mindset that 'the differences are obvious.' Like in the case of amplifiers.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #40 –
Quote from: Pio2001 on
Here are all the blind listening test that I know on the web :

http://chaud7.forumactif.fr/1ere-categorie...s-ABX-p2557.htm


Wow, awesome link!  Even though I don't know a lick of French, there's plenty to keep me busy for a while.

One group of highly interesting tests I didn't see mentioned were those conducted at the NRC in Canada by, e.g. Floyd O'Toole.  Perhaps these are slightly off topic since they were aimed at determining preference rather than establishing audible differences, however, it was blind testing nevertheless.  The conclusion I found so interesting was that, under controlled conditions and blind testing, loudspeaker preferences corresponded very well to what would be considered theoretically better measured performance characteristics.  That is to say, designing loudspeakers is a science, not an art.  Of course, that conclusion becomes far more hazy when you leave the idealized conditions of the NRC listening room and bring the speakers into your own home.
 

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #41 –
Quote from: Pio2001 on
An audiophile claims that cables or cd players etc can make a difference because he hears it. And as any sensible people, he believes what he hears.


That's where psychology kicks in ... the human ear/brain system is the most powerful and versatile sound processing system known to mankind (although Creative's marketing guru's will surely disagree and tell you how much transistors are attached to the X-Fi series).

In short terms ... audiophiles who spend lots of serious cash on scientifically unnecessary equipment actually want to hear the difference of their precious investment. Their brain will - as a consequence to these wishes - then adjust their hearing experience accordingly to make them believe through hearing.

Additionally, we all know that any given person's specific listening experience depends upon these person's state of concentration during listening. Getting used to environmental circumstances plays a great role in listening experience, too.

I repeatedly made the following experience:

If I concentrate/focus on the music content using e.g. cheap computer speakers with a limited frequency range, my brain will - after some time - adjust and add e.g. missing low frequency content (that I'm sure the speakers physically can't transmit) to my listening experience to make the music sound good to me. If I switch to my fullrange speakers afterwards and play the same kind of music, these speakers will sound terrible to my ears at first ... I experience overemphasized low frequency content that physically isn't there. After some time, this experience will vanish and I'm happy with my stereo setup again.

This leads me to the conclusion that - talking sound quality - the influence of human perception is totally underrated. It's all in our heads and not in our playback hardware. Your hearing system can and will adjust extremely fast to what you wish to experience. For me, this could be tricky when choosing a stereo system through comparison and listen too long to single components.

As a side note: if I - instead of concentrating on the music - try to concentrate on the sound or recording quality of the playing music, I sometimes have to rewind because I simply missed my favourite guitar or sax solo ... very strange in my opinion.
The name was Plex The Ripper, not Jack The Ripper

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #42 –
Quote from: JeanLuc on
I repeatedly made the following experience:

...

Interesting. Even though it doesnt surprise me, because the effect (interpolation and sense-relativity) isn't new, this is a scenario which i didnt consider yet. Thanks.

Quote
As a side note: if I - instead of concentrating on the music - try to concentrate on the sound or recording quality of the playing music, I sometimes have to rewind because I simply missed my favourite guitar or sax solo ... very strange in my opinion.

Sounds like focus-shift to me. What makes a song sound "polished" typically are many minor details. Music does exist which even makes extensive use of this effect (most popularily known with "overtone"-singing) - the foreground gets unfocussed and the details and the "in-between" gets the focus.

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #43 –
The most absurd audiophile claim to date is:

"A (silver) power cord can make your system sound better"     

I used to go to an audiophile forum where I was not allowed to talk about power cords (because of my opinions.) And nobody was allowed to talk about ABX!!!

Audiphiles don't like ABX because they know in the back of their minds that it will prove they have wasted thousand of dollars in their equipment without any sound improvement.   

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #44 –
Quote from: Light-Fire on
The most absurd audiophile claim to date is:

"A (silver) power cord can make your system sound better"     


NO

Here is a sincere, non-commercial audiophile claim found on a french forum :

Palladium-plated mains plugs take longer to break-in than rhodium-plated mains plugs.

In case you don't believe me, here is the original claim : http://www.homecinema-fr.com/forum/viewtop...01905#169401905

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #45 –
I think the real issue is how do you define a scientific test for the audiophile?

Lets get it to the lowest level with only two variables.  Light in room on. light in room off.  I don't think anyone would say either would be better.

Second test with two variables: Electricity on and electricity off.  I don't think anyone would say that there is no difference.

Now how do we collect all the variables involved from the initial analog/digital bits throughout the audio chain until you have the sound processed in the brain and then we may be able to have a conclusive A/B test. But that test is only possible with a single person.  Why, because somewhere along that train individual people come into play, usually at the ear opening most of the time.  After that it gets really subjective.  No longer is it possible to do an A/B session with more than a single person involved.  Each session becomes a different test since the audio train chances with each person every time.  And sometimes depending on how that person is feeling the individual test changes across time with the same individual.  How do you measure the audio train after the sound enters the ear?

Therefore, that is the issue with Audiophiles and their subjectivity.

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #46 –
With this issue, you position yourself in the perspective of describing objectively the totality of what a given person hears during a given listening session.

In this topic, related to "audiophile claims", I rather start from an audible difference between two hifi systems, then look for the origin of this difference : the listener, or the hifi system.

If the difference is caused by the listener, who imagines things, then
1 - The experience of the listener is entirely subjective and doesn't give me any information about the change in the system.
2 - Wether the listener wants to investigate further is his own business.

If the difference is caused by the change is the system, then
1 - Can it be measured ?
2 - What is the technical parameter that causes the difference ?
3 - How to get information about this parameter from a given commercial hifi system ?
4 - What's the perceived amplitude of the change, and how does it positions itself in order of importance among other known changes ?

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #47 –
I wonder if many of the differences people claim they hear are not due to the thing they attribute it to (ie silver power cords) but other factors introduced in the testing/switching.

Or, if such factors are controlled, perhaps some improvements are extremely environmentally specific - they work in one case for reasons that have nothing to do with "audiophileness" of the component but rather environmental factors - poor grounding, grid power leaking into the ground, materials or construction that are transparent or inductive to a particular radio frequency, "dirty" or widely fluctuating AC.

In such a cases, they may see an improvement, but not for the reasons they think and it is not generalizable.

For example, in my neighborhood, souped up CB's and car car service radios are very popular. Most of the boost jobs are sloppy and they blast RF noise over a wide spectrum. Some interconnects, even relatively high end ones, I've used are poorly shielded and the this stuff bleeds into the system. One particular brand never has this problem.

I could see where RF noise like this from utility transformers, broadcast towers and even solar flares could degrade a listening experience if a particular cable was sensitive. And the difference would be ascribed to the esoteric nature of the cable rather than the real problem addressed.

I saw a  similar thing with one of my outlets where a heavier gauge power cord provided dramatically better sound. A closer examination of the outlet determined that the ground was never properly connected to the 3rd prong. Fixing that not only improved the sound, but made both power cables sound the same.

In both cases, I did in fact hear an "improvement" but it was not generalizable and had nothing to do with the  exotic materials or construction.
EAC secure | FLAC  --best -V -b 4096 | LAME 3.97 -V0 -q0 -b32

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #48 –
Quote from: UrbanVoyeur on
I wonder if many of the differences people claim they hear are not due to the thing they attribute it to (ie silver power cords) but other factors introduced in the testing/switching...


When I mentioned power cords affecting sound quality I wasn't talking about line noise. There are (lots of) people out there that believe a silver power cord will provide "brighter" high frequency sounds, while a copper cable will provide you "warmer" "well round" bass! 

I know it sounds ridiculous but there are people out there that believe it and are not ashamed to express their opinion.   

Scientifically cutting through Audiophile claims (phase 1)

Reply #49 –
I'm with you guys: however, the only way to get 'audiofools' to cease and desist once and for all would be to place them in a situation where they were:

1) In their own homes
2) Listening to their own systems
3) With their favorite music that they knew intimately
4) In a mood for listening
5) Comfortable and happy

...and get them to listen to whatever cable or tweak they choose, for as long as they choose, in whatever order they select.  Do this, but have the loudspeakers in the room they select, and the reproduction equipment in an adjacent room with a solid door closed between the rooms.  It needn't be a rigid double-blind evaluation, just an 'unsighted' one.  Keep track of how you swapped whatever around and compare notes in the end.

Guess what, you may just help someone see the light!  If it wasn't for the global, 'most forum members don't get to meet one-another' kinds' scenario we deal with online, we could have this BS filled hobby cleaned up in no time!

Andrew D.
www.cdnav.com

PS: Applicable tune of the moment: Nomeansno ~ All Lies

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