What is an audiophile?, Does an audiophile collect music or audio components? Options

[Richard Greene]

From dictionary.com, an audiophile is "a person who is especially interested in high-fidelity sound reproduction".

Since the 1960's I've considered audiophiles to be people who enjoy listening to recorded music. Of course an audiophile needs an audio system to hear his or her music, but after buying that system, does a "real" audiophile have to care about audio hardware ?

I'm bringing up this subject to clarify the prior thread on audio and gender. I know some females who collect and love recorded music, but have little interest in audio equipment. And I've met some males who seem to be audio component lovers, with surprisingly small collections of "audiophile" records to play on their expensive audio systems.

To me a woman with over 1,000 CDs that she plays on a $300 system is more of an audiophile than a man with 60 "audiophile" records that he plays on a $10,000 system. One person is very interested in music while the other is very interested in audio components. Is there some dividing line between "music collector audiophile" and "audio component collector audiophile", based on the percentage of total audio spending for hardware (components), versus the percentage of spending on software (recordings)?

I believe some or many males who consider themselves to be audiophiles, would not consider a woman with over 1,000 CDs that she plays on a $300 stereo to be an "audiophile" ... while a man who spent $10,000 on audio equipment, which he continually tweaks and upgrades, is automatically an audiophile even though he seems far more interested in listening to "sound quality" than listening to music.

How would you define an "audiophile"?

[DigitalMan]

Purely my opinion - an audiophile is someone who loves good sound reproduction. "Good" is subjective of course (pleasing vs. accurate, placebo vs. real, etc.), and I would leave music out of the definition. They may be film buffs and most interested in voice and / or special effects / surround soundstage reproduction vs. music per se. I suppose they could even really be treating high quality recordings as test signals and not really have an emotional connection to the music.

This post has been edited by DigitalMan: Nov 6 2009, 17:24

[botface]

Richard,
I think I am, or have been, an audiophile by both definitions. My real love is for music. It's almost like a drug. I can't live without it. But I did at one time spend an obscene amount of money on hardware. However, I don't think it was for the sake of the hardware itself. What I was looking for was a new piece of equipment that could let me hear some nuance of the performance I hadn't heard before or deliver more of the "music" and less of the recording. I did wrestle with my conscience however. How could I spend so much on equipment when people were starving in the world? How could I justfify needing £2 or £3 of equipment for every recording I owned just to play it back? I haven't resolved those questions but I have sold most of my expensive equipment - as an aside, I got almost what I paid for most of it and more than what I paid for some of it so "audiophile gear" isn't a bad investment - and I still get the emotional kick I was looking for even with modest equipment

[Etienne]

An idiot. They do collect audio components and blubber about the sonic influence of cable XY rather than listen to music.

Those "audiophile" people believe that evering sounds different. They read those stupid fanzines and pay to much for crappy equipement. That is because, for me, the word "audiophile" has become an insult. Long ago I have been one of them.
More about this topic: Click me and also click me. If you want to read, have a look at pages like audioasylum.

P.S: Such definitions are useless either way

This post has been edited by Etienne: Nov 6 2009, 18:11

[botface]

An idiot.

Those "audiophile" people believe that evering sounds different. They read those stupid magazines and pay to much for crappy equipement.

Thanks Etienne. But at least I can spell ( for the most part)

[Etienne]

(...) but I have sold most of my expensive equipment - as an aside, I got almost what I paid for most of it and more than what I paid for some of it so "audiophile gear" isn't a bad investment - and I still get the emotional kick I was looking for even with modest equipment

You are not an audiophile, you do think.

[pawelq]

Richard, you basically gave definitions in the original post.

The joke
A music lover has a $300 music system and 10 000 CDs
An audiophile has a $10 000 music system and one Checky Records CD.
i pretty old and not far from the truth.

[extrabigmehdi]

For me an audiophile is someone that loves music and realize that sound quality matters.
Hence the audiophile will do anything to improve sound quality.

[DVDdoug]

I sort-of consider myself 'an "audiophile on a budget". It I hit the lotto, I'd spend more on equipment, but I wouldn't buy "audiophile cables", or a CD demagnetizer, and I still wouldn't listen to vinyl!

How could I spend so much on equipment when people were starving in the world? How could I justify needing £2 or £3 of equipment for every recording I owned

Some of those people might not be starving if they had a job in a factory producing audio equipment!

[Cavaille]

How could I spend so much on equipment when people were starving in the world? How could I justfify needing £2 or £3 of equipment for every recording I owned just to play it back?

For me, there´s only one answer to this particular question: it doesn´t matter. It´s the same as when a mother tells here child: "Eat up because you have to think of all the people in the third world. They don´t have anything to eat."

Nonsense. If I eat up or don´t eat up I won´t change the fact that those poor people are still hungry. The same with buying stuff like fancy cables. I hope you now invest this formerly fancy money for charity? Not to start another discussion here and I don´t want to insult you. You´re probably an idealist. If I consider that possibility I understand that sentence.

I myself have approximately 600 CDs. Around 150 of them are from TELARC (and I don´t consider them to be audiophile - they are just good sounding). I don´t know anymore where to put all the CDs. Several are stored in the cellar, others in the bedroom. Even some "audiophile" CDs. I have around 30 Vinyls from the time when I started to collect music and occasionally I even buy some more (once a year or so). I listen to music all the time.

But I´m also interested in very good sound quality. My listening equipment consists of a headphone, a headphone amp and an external soundinterface. Together it would make 700,- Euro (including cables). For just listening with a headphone I find it pretty expensive. When I´m not listening with my headphone I use a 10 year old indestructable Sony amplifier (STR-DB 830 QS which cost me 500,- Euros back then) and loudspeakers from HECO (Victa 500), an older CD player from Kenwood (DP-5090). All of this is not expensive stuff - you can clearly see that this is not my preferred way of listening to music.

I do everything to make the sound better - even things most of you would find hilarious. I indeed would myself consider an audiophile. First and foremost I became an audiophile because I love listening to music. And I want to hear every nuance a recording of music can offer. I always was under the impression that music will be better appreciated when it sounds good or better. It just makes for fun that way.

This post has been edited by Cavaille: Nov 7 2009, 00:13

[trout]

It seems to me that "audiophile" is not a very specific term, and it is a mistake to judge every self-described audiophile with one simple description. Who is "more of an audiophile" or "a true audiophile"? Who cares? Such a debate is silly.

[esa372]

What is an audiophile?

One who loves sound, hearing, and listening.

From the Latin, audìre: to hear
and the Greek, philos: beloved, dear, loving

[MichaelW]

The only real answer is to the question "What do we mean by the word audiophile?"

On HA it varies between "person with a rational interest in high-quality sound reproduction" and "person spending too much money on mostly useless gizmos," with a tendency for the latter meaning to be dominant. Sometimes "audiophool" is used for the latter meaning, to make it clear.

Elsewhere, meaning 1 is perhaps more common, though in some places the notion of a distinction between the two meanings doesn't exist.

The other phenomenon is perhaps best described as "a music lover with a big collection of recordings."

Trying to determine "what an audiophile really is," is going to produce answers that are not even metaphysics.

[ghebert]

I would define an audiophile as someone who has a very deep appreciation for audio playback that is of the highest quality. Someone who has 1000's of cd's of poorly recorded music to me is not an audiophile, someone who has 100,000 mp3's at 128kbps bitrate playing on their computer speakers...not an audiophile. The amount of music one owns or has in their collection does not make them an audiophile. The person who cannot tell the difference between a high resolution uncompressed recording VS a lossy mp3 of the same song or does not care about the difference is not an audiophile regardless of how much music or what equipment that person might possess.

Large music collections and high priced equipment does not make a person an audiophile...it's all about the person's desire to hear the most lifelike representation of whatever it is they are listening to.

[Pike84]

The person who cannot tell the difference between a high resolution uncompressed recording VS a lossy mp3 of the same song ... is not an audiophile...

Oh, this is going to be fun

[andy o]

I would define an audiophile as someone who has a very deep appreciation for audio playback that is of the highest quality. Someone who has 1000's of cd's of poorly recorded music to me is not an audiophile, someone who has 100,000 mp3's at 128kbps bitrate playing on their computer speakers...not an audiophile. The amount of music one owns or has in their collection does not make them an audiophile. The person who cannot tell the difference between a high resolution uncompressed recording VS a lossy mp3 of the same song or does not care about the difference is not an audiophile regardless of how much music or what equipment that person might possess.

Large music collections and high priced equipment does not make a person an audiophile...it's all about the person's desire to hear the most lifelike representation of whatever it is they are listening to.

What about someone who loves to go listen to the philharmonic, and live concerts (you can't get more "lifelike" than that), but doesn't mind having thousands of mp3's, and also thinks "high resolution uncompressed" consumer formats is based on a bunch of audio woo, when CD is perfectly good?

[Gag Halfrunt]

I suspect there's a continuum of people who could be squeezed into the audiophile subset. It's disingenuous to label someone 'audiophile' (in a pejorative sense) simply because they spent too more than they needed to on their audio equipment. They could have simply gone a specialist, heard something 'good' and slapped down the credit card without delving deeper into the subject. Many of those will likely end up buying some sort of aftermarket cables, equipment tables and speaker stands at the time of purchase, simply because the salesperson upsells them, helped by the low level of understanding of the subject in the wider population that makes a glib but nonsensical statement about cables appear to have 'truthiness' about it.

To such a casual audio buyer, everyone posting here is a rabid audiophile.

I know a few audio buffs in the real world. They range from the kit collector, obsessed with the technology and audio quality, who has a tiny collection of obsessively-well recorded 'audiophile' albums from Reference Recordings and Chesky, to the record collector who has spent a vast amount on his LP replay system, but that sum is dwarfed next to the three rooms full of LPs he seems to spend his evenings working through systematically.

Most are somewhere between these two points.

This post has been edited by Gag Halfrunt: Nov 7 2009, 21:32

[hlloyge]

Well, I am not. I am listening to music on my Magnat speakers through Yamaha low end integrated amp - I don't have dedicated expensive cables, Quadribeams, gold pressed CD's or glass CD's, I don't have expensive interconnects. I can't hear the differences in sound with my el cheapo speaker cables and more expensive ones. Audiophiles hear these differences. I don't hear the difference between my el cheapo interconnec vs. expensive ones. Audiophiles do. I can't ABX original and 160 kbit mp3. Audiophiles can hear differences between wavs and 320 kbit mp3s.
But I do love the sound I am getting from these speakers, and I enjoy listening to music on them. I find the sound nice to my ears. But - I am not audiophile.

And if the abovementioned traits of an audiophiles are standard, I don't want to be called audiophile.

[Gag Halfrunt]

Well, I am not. I am listening to music on my Magnat speakers through Yamaha low end integrated amp - I don't have dedicated expensive cables, Quadribeams, gold pressed CD's or glass CD's, I don't have expensive interconnects. I can't hear the differences in sound with my el cheapo speaker cables and more expensive ones. Audiophiles hear these differences. I don't hear the difference between my el cheapo interconnec vs. expensive ones. Audiophiles do. I can't ABX original and 160 kbit mp3. Audiophiles can hear differences between wavs and 320 kbit mp3s.
But I do love the sound I am getting from these speakers, and I enjoy listening to music on them. I find the sound nice to my ears. But - I am not audiophile.

And if the abovementioned traits of an audiophiles are standard, I don't want to be called audiophile.

Problem is, because you know enough about your audio system to be able to list its constituent parts on an forum about audio, that you know MP3 comes in different bit rates and that you know enough about those different rates to have performed an ABX test on yourself... that kind of marks you out as an audiophile.

In fact, that we are discussing such things on a forum with the word 'audio' built into the title marks us all out as audiophiles. To the outsider, there's not a great deal of difference between someone spending hours listening to different types of EL34 power tubes and someone spending hours listening to different bit rates. That we have a scientific set of test criteria on our side doesn't really matter, the very fact that we are spending those hours running those tests put us firmly in the audiophile camp. Just a new variation on the same theme.

[Robertina]

An audiophile is, in my eyes, someone who loves to listen to music but his main interest is first and foremost the technical or optical side of it, not the musical aspect.

He invests a greater part of his salary on his technical equipment than the average does and he is able to hear the difference between two similar amplifiers from the same manufacturer (if there is one).

An audiophile knows how an organ, a piano, a bass, a cymbal, a brass instrument or woodwinds sound in nature and he wants to reproduce this sound as best as possible with his appliances, that is what he is living for, that is his passion.

And the real audiophile is no showman, he buys his tools for himself, not to impress others although he never becomes tired of talking about technical equipment features or the optical elegance of his devices.

And the music itself? Is needed because otherwise the audiophile's equipment would be senseless, wouldn't it?

An audiophile never will discuss the musical quality of the latest CD he bought - because he is not able to. A Jazz vocalist's phrasing? "Yes, surely, it's nice." The complexity of a musical arrangement? "Okay, may be". A Hammond organist playing the hottest riff ever heard on a B3? "If you say so."

As musician and composer I like audiophiles. Very much. All the time. I swear. 

[Cavaille]

An audiophile knows how an organ, a piano, a bass, a cymbal, a brass instrument or woodwinds sound in nature and he wants to reproduce this sound as best as possible with his appliances, that is what he is living for, that is his passion.

And the real audiophile is no showman, he buys his tools for himself, not to impress others although he never becomes tired of talking about technical equipment features or the optical elegance of his devices........ An audiophile never will discuss the musical quality of the latest CD he bought - because he is not able to. A Jazz vocalist's phrasing? "Yes, surely, it's nice." The complexity of a musical arrangement? "Okay, may be". A Hammond organist playing the hottest riff ever heard on a B3? "If you say so."

Is that so? I consider myself an audiophile and though I can´t read any notes (damn it) I can spot a good performance from a bad or mediocre performance.
I´ve said it before that I became an audiophile because of the music I was listening to. And I mentionend that one of the first good CDs I´ve heard was "Time Warp" on TELARC. On it you have some interpretations from Jerry Goldsmith, John Williams, Stu Philips etc. and this CD let me know for the first time that Mr. Goldsmith composed the music for the first Star Trek motion picture - needless to say that I found that Main Title very impressing. Obviously I own know the original recording done by Goldsmith himself and the interpretational quality is way better than Erich Kunzels version. I even can say why: the original is much faster and though the orchestra is not that precise as the Cincinnati Pops the piece "swings". The TELARC version suffers from its broad cinemascope sound and the uninspired conducting by Erich Kunzel.

I know when I hear an offbeat, a synkope and mostly I can spot when a composer changes tonality. I know when I hear a modulation or a variation. I know when I hear atonal music or 12-tone. This started years before because I wanted to know what Mr. Goldsmith was doing. He had the constant ability to confuse me with musical things I´ve never heard before (or things I seemed not to know). He employed a lot of techniques to confuse the moviegoer. He used additive rhythms a lot, polyrhythms, 5/8, 7/8, etc.

[Robertina]

Is that so?

With my post you are referring to I stated my subjective point of view to the OP's question "How would you define an audiophile?". It is based on my personal experience with people who call themselves audiophiles but of course I do not make a claim for covering all different shades of opinion with my weighting in this context.

I am pleased about your (basic or extended) knowledge in music theory. I am working together often with audio engineers and most of them have studied music themselves for several years and play at least one music instrument. Unfortunately this only means that they are able to classify music-theoretically what they are recording or hearing, it does not mean that they automatically would be able to say something about the music's quality.

I do not keep from you the fact that I bought one of the first CD players available, also I had appliances from Accuphase, Revox, Studer, T & A and others. And please do not ask me how much money I had spent for my speakers...

So I hope I am able to regard this topic from different point of views and needless to say I respect your attitude and therewith your counter question.

So thank you for your feedback.

Robertina.

[bldrcr]

Some notes about the subject.
Some years ago, two male colleagues of mine where talking about some cables, saying: "when you enter them, you hear a 'smop' sound!" and their eyes were shining. A female colleague shouted: "you're not music lovers, you're electricians!".
Another. I was almost in Paradise, while listening to a C60 audio cassette with the recording of one of my then favourite LP's; at the end of the last part, still excited, I suddenly realized: "it's a #£!?"*# recording!" (the word #£!?"*# was in Italian and I do not know a good translation). After then, I remember having listened again to that cassette, aware of its bad quality, enjoying it nonetheless, but I managed to find a better quality version as soon as I could.
I usually listen to MP3's, FLAC's, APE's, taken from my CD's, on my computer speakers, ranging from Middle Age to R'n'R, maybe I am not an audiophile. My father used to say: whatever you give to eat, is good to the hog. He wasn't talking about me, though. ;-)
Riccardo

[Canar]

Normal people listen to music using equipment.
Audiophiles listen to equipment using music.

That's how I see it anyhow.

[DocBeard]

Being interested in the technology and technique of recording and playing back music is about the most neutral definition of the term I can think of, and a neutral definition, rather than a pejorative one, is probably desirable. Leave aside the crazy $6000 cable stuff; every hobby has its lunatic fringe, and no hobby deserves to be defined by that lunatic fringe.