Carey Carlan wrote:
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in
:

Last week at the Home Entertainment Show in New York
Arny Krueger
participated in a panel discussion with John Atkinson,
editor of
Stereophile magazine. Arny is well known for his support
for the
scientific method to test what is audible and what is
not.

The scientific method is not foolproof.

Of course not, science is still based on human reason. Human
reason is fallible. If human reason were perfect, the need
to do experiments would drop precipitously.

Simply removing certain
obvious forms of bias does not mean the test results are
accurate or
are correlated to what we "actually" hear when we sit
down to listen.

Yes, it's incumbent on experimenters to do reasonable
experiments.

Absolutely correct. The scientific method systematically
proves or
disproves a single fact at a time within the limits of the
control
factors.

More correctly, the analysis of scientific experiments
confirm or deny hypothesis.

However, it is possible to confirm or deny more than one
hypothesis at a time with just one experiment.

It cannot be extended to say that no remaining untested
factors exist.

Yes, it's incumbent on experimenters to do reasonable
experiments.


I will put my faith in those facts proven by this method,
and leave
the rest to wallow in the "snake oil" category.

We should not forget that Sterephile has affirmed
postmodernist anti-science.

Given that John Atkinson has a degree in Physics, it's safe
to say that he has a fair idea of what science is, and has
chosen to go some other way.

Given that John Atkinson has a degree in Physics, it's safe
to say that he has a fair idea of what science is, and has
chosen to go some other way.

Not necessarily. Just because you've studied physics doesn't mean you've learned
anything about the philosophy of science or how to conduct a proper experiment.

Remember, The Stereophile began as a magazine that stood on the side of accurate
(rather than euphonic) sound reproduction, and would help readers make better
buying decisions by telling them what the major magazines didn't -- that there
were often large and significant differences in the sound of otherwise
similar-seeming components.

In my opinion, * amps and preamps of 40+ years ago, both tube and transistor,
were of lower absolute quality than those of today, and varied much more in
subjective character. These differences were great enough to swamp the
"perceptual noise" inherent in subjective testing. As a result, JGH's reviews
were probably close to the truth (if such can be determined).

I would like to see anyone with faith in ABX testing to round up some classic
amplifiers sold before, oh, 1975, make sure they're in proper working order, and
run ABX tests against either modern amps or a bypass. I'm reasonably confident
that there _will_ be audible differences, and these will be similar to those
reported by reviewers of that era. If so, it would greatly increase my trust in
the validity of ABX testing in which no differences are heard.

* Please note the IMO before you start jumping down my throat.

William Sommerwerck wrote:
Given that John Atkinson has a degree in Physics, it's
safe
to say that he has a fair idea of what science is, and
has
chosen to go some other way.

Not necessarily. Just because you've studied physics
doesn't mean
you've learned anything about the philosophy of science or
how to
conduct a proper experiment.

Given John's dabbling with postmodernist philosophy, point
well taken.

Remember, The Stereophile began as a magazine that stood
on the side
of accurate (rather than euphonic) sound reproduction, and
would help
readers make better buying decisions by telling them what
the major
magazines didn't -- that there were often large and
significant
differences in the sound of otherwise similar-seeming
components.

Agreed. JGH left Stereophile, didn't he?

In my opinion, * amps and preamps of 40+ years ago, both
tube and
transistor, were of lower absolute quality than those of
today, and
varied much more in subjective character.

I think that is a fact. Measure 'em, listen to 'em, they
were as a rule, not all that good. There were some good ones
but you got to pay for them.

These differences were
great enough to swamp the "perceptual noise" inherent in
subjective
testing. As a result, JGH's reviews were probably close to
the truth
(if such can be determined).

I agree. IMO, the current naive audiophile belief that
everything sounds different is a hangover from the days when
everything did sound different.

I would like to see anyone with faith in ABX testing to
round up some
classic amplifiers sold before, oh, 1975, make sure
they're in proper
working order, and run ABX tests against either modern
amps or a
bypass.


We did that, but with an amp that was somewhat older than
that.

http://www.pcavtech.com/abx/abx_pwr.htm

This page shows 4 amps that sounded the same, and 3 that
didn't.

I'm reasonably confident that there _will_ be audible
differences, and these will be similar to those reported
by reviewers
of that era. If so, it would greatly increase my trust in
the
validity of ABX testing in which no differences are heard.

Enjoy!

Ethan Winer wrote:
Folks,

Last week at the Home Entertainment Show in New York Arny Krueger
participated in a panel discussion with John Atkinson, editor of
Stereophile
magazine. Arny is well known for his support for the scientific
method to
test what is audible and what is not. John is known for, um, - well,
let's
just call it an anti-science bias.

You can read about the discussion and also download an MP3 file (30
MB, 1
hour long) he

www.stereophile.com/news/050905debate/

Way to go, Arny!

--Ethan

I listened to most of this (as a part-time engineer, a subscriber to
Skeptical Inquirer, and a long-time user of some of your software
products).

Clearly, if one can't tell the difference between two pieces of
equipment, then, for the purpose of that listener, the two pieces of
equipment are identical under those circumstances.

Those who criticise DBT testing on general principles are on such
non-scientific ground that they might as well join a church.

What I don't get, and what I thought that Atkinson was getting at until
he veered off into mysticism, is why the tests have to be conducted
with short pieces of sound. If Atkinson's claim is that he can
differentiate between different power amps when listening to them for
an extended period, then let's design an experiment that tests this
hypothesis, but remains double blind. How long does he need? A half
hour on each? Ten minutes? An hour? Shouldn't be difficult - certainly,
far more time has been spent arguing over this than would be necessary
to conduct a *scientific* experiment as to whether two pieces of
equipment can be differentiated under these circumstances.

Kudos to Arny, indeed, for perservering when most others would have
given up. I have long taken the view that the more idiots there are in
the world, the better it is for me, so I don't try to educate them. I
might even sell them some $2,500 power cables for them to plug into the
Romex cable feeding their power outlets.

wrote:

Ethan Winer wrote:
Folks,

Last week at the Home Entertainment Show in New York Arny Krueger
participated in a panel discussion with John Atkinson, editor of
Stereophile
magazine. Arny is well known for his support for the scientific
method to
test what is audible and what is not. John is known for, um, - well,
let's
just call it an anti-science bias.

You can read about the discussion and also download an MP3 file (30
MB, 1
hour long) he

www.stereophile.com/news/050905debate/

Way to go, Arny!

--Ethan

I listened to most of this (as a part-time engineer, a subscriber to
Skeptical Inquirer, and a long-time user of some of your software
products).

Clearly, if one can't tell the difference between two pieces of
equipment, then, for the purpose of that listener, the two pieces of
equipment are identical under those circumstances.

Those who criticise DBT testing on general principles are on such
non-scientific ground that they might as well join a church.

What I don't get, and what I thought that Atkinson was getting at until
he veered off into mysticism, is why the tests have to be conducted
with short pieces of sound.

They don't *have* to be. That recommendation comes from work in
psychoacoustics, where short snippets as samples were found to increase
discriminatory success, due to the nature of audio memory.
The whole idea behind using them is to *increase* the chance of detecting
real difference, not make it harder. But a testee is
certainly free to use longer
samples, long switchgn intervals, etc.
The only problem is that if those results turn out negative, then
one must retest for the possibility that those conditions themselves
masked a real difference (because scientific work suggests they can).

If someone *passes* a DBT using longer samples, though, there's no basis
for challenging the result due to the sample length. I think most
objectivists would be 'OK' with such a report. There's no 'rule' that
says the samples have to be short.


If Atkinson's claim is that he can
differentiate between different power amps when listening to them for
an extended period, then let's design an experiment that tests this
hypothesis, but remains double blind. How long does he need? A half
hour on each? Ten minutes? An hour? Shouldn't be difficult - certainly,
far more time has been spent arguing over this than would be necessary
to conduct a *scientific* experiment as to whether two pieces of
equipment can be differentiated under these circumstances.

I think the idea is that 'living with' the amps revealed a difference, that
doing an DBT while unfamiliar with the amps didn't show. Fine! By
all means, let's see if it made a difference. Now having formed quite
definite 'feelings' about the difference in sound..to the point of being
*sure* that one sounds better than another -- do another DBT. Should be
easy to pass if you're right! And if so, you have valid grounds to
start agitating for long 'acclimation' periods before doing DBTs
of audio stuff. (Actually, researchers already routinely recommend and
employ pre-DBT training sessions to sensitize the testees to differences...
Arny K also recommends this on his pcabx site)




--

-S
It's not my business to do intelligent work. -- D. Rumsfeld, testifying
before the House Armed Services Committee

On Thu, 12 May 2005 05:46:03 +0000 (UTC), Steven Sullivan
wrote:

wrote:

...

If someone *passes* a DBT using longer samples, though, there's no basis
for challenging the result due to the sample length. I think most
objectivists would be 'OK' with such a report. There's no 'rule' that
says the samples have to be short.


If Atkinson's claim is that he can
differentiate between different power amps when listening to them for
an extended period, then let's design an experiment that tests this
hypothesis, but remains double blind. How long does he need? A half
hour on each? Ten minutes? An hour? Shouldn't be difficult - certainly,

IIRC he lived with that transistor amp he hated for six months.

far more time has been spent arguing over this than would be necessary
to conduct a *scientific* experiment as to whether two pieces of
equipment can be differentiated under these circumstances.

I think the idea is that 'living with' the amps revealed a difference, that
doing an DBT while unfamiliar with the amps didn't show. Fine! By
all means, let's see if it made a difference. Now having formed quite
definite 'feelings' about the difference in sound..to the point of being
*sure* that one sounds better than another -- do another DBT. Should be
easy to pass if you're right! And if so, you have valid grounds to
start agitating for long 'acclimation' periods before doing DBTs
of audio stuff. (Actually, researchers already routinely recommend and
employ pre-DBT training sessions to sensitize the testees to differences...
Arny K also recommends this on his pcabx site)

If it takes long-term listening to show the difference, then do a
test using long-term listening.
How about having a large locked box (large enough for heat buildup
not to be a problem) in the listening room that contains the
amplifier. Once a day a 'maintenance person' comes in, and without the
testee seeing (send him to the shower or something), opens up the box,
spends five minutes doing something, tests the system so see that it
works, locks the box, notifies the listener that he is through, and
leaves until the next day. The listener then has 23 hours and 55
minutes of listening time until the maintenance person comes in again.
During each visit, the maintenance man might or might not have
changed out the amplifier (all amps used are precisely gain-matched).
He might swap it at every visit for a week, then go two weeks just
checking at each visit to see if the unit functions ok (off-site
records are kept of what amp is in the box when). This should give
adequate listening time at least for the listener to decided "like it"
or "hate it" as Atkinson said of the transistor amp he had for several
months that had passed a DBT (been indistinguishable from another good
amp). With that sort of time frame (especially several weeks at a
time) he should be able to say when the amp has been changed out.
Sorry, with the above, the maintenance person knows what's what.
Leave both amps in the locked box, make a switchbox driven by a
microcontroller, the maintainer turns a keyswitch to activate it, it
switches (inaudibly of course) or not, and displays a five-digit
number that encodes the switch setting, the maintainer writes it down
but doesn't know how to decode it into a switch setting. For longterm
listening (several days of one amp at a time), make the chances of
switching much less than 1/2. So it's a good DBT.

But then, what was that Presidential quote, "We have nothing to
fear but truth itself..."
And now I wonder why I just spent my time typing all that...


-----
http://mindspring.com/~benbradley

Or for that matter an automated system that switches (or not) between
units. It could be run from a PC with a form to fill out with your
opinions and ratings of the days listening. Pretty simple to implement.
Serial control of a couple good relays. You could test any reasonable
number of amps in a month. You could even make it interactive. As long
as the tester has no clue as to which amp it being listened to at any
time. Just ABC&D in a sealed black box and some sort of switching.

Clearly, if one can't tell the difference between two pieces of
equipment, then, for the purpose of that listener, the two pieces of
equipment are identical under those circumstances.

Exactly... "Under those circumstances." Double-blind testing, as it is currently
implemented, is not equivalent to simply sitting down and listening to music.
Nor is "subjective" testing, for that matter.


Those who criticise DBT testing on general principles are on
such non-scientific ground that they might as well join a church.

Not at all. Calling something "scientific" does not make it so. (The word itself
implies a degree of "truthfulness" that is not fully justified.) Simply because
double-blind testing is useful in other areas does not mean it provides useful
or valid results when judging hi-fi equipment.

What most people conveniently ignore when criticizing my views is that I don't
agree with either side in this issue. Both sides are "wrong," because their
testing procedures have not been proven to be correct. Simply removing bias does
not guarantee accurate, valid, or useful results.


What I don't get, and what I thought that Atkinson was getting at until
he veered off into mysticism, is why the tests have to be conducted
with short pieces of sound. If Atkinson's claim is that he can
differentiate between different power amps when listening to them for
an extended period, then let's design an experiment that tests this
hypothesis, but remains double blind. How long does he need? A half
hour on each? Ten minutes? An hour? Shouldn't be difficult - certainly,
far more time has been spent arguing over this than would be necessary
to conduct a *scientific* experiment as to whether two pieces of
equipment can be differentiated under these circumstances.

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit down and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would provide useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing. But such testing
would require many listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to implement
and run correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they want to believe.
People are uncomfortable changing their world views.


Kudos to Arny, indeed, for perservering when most others would have
given up. I have long taken the view that the more idiots there are in
the world, the better it is for me, so I don't try to educate them.
I might even sell them some $2,500 power cables for them to plug
into the Romex cable feeding their power outlets.

William Sommerwerck wrote:

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known
people who
agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people
simply sit
down and listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such
testing would
would provide useful information about "how" people
listen, what they
think they hear, and establish a baseline for judging
"subjective"
and "objective" testing. But such testing would require
many
listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement and run
correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists
and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they
want to
believe. People are uncomfortable changing their world
views.

FWIW most if not all the original ABX partners did exactly
what is described here. They picked out two components to
compare, did long-term ABX testing, and compared their
results to shorter term tests. There have also been some
more-formal tests that David Clark did with I think it was
Larry Greehill.

Bottom line - no joy from the long term tests. If you can't
hear a difference in a well-done short term test, listening
for hours, days or weeks per trial hasn't been found to
help.

In fact, long trials can be shown to hurt listener
sensitivity, because they temporally displace the listening
experiences being compared even more, and that is known to
be a bad thing.

FWIW most if not all the original ABX partners did exactly
what is described here. They picked out two components to
compare, did long-term ABX testing, and compared their
results to shorter term tests. There have also been some
more-formal tests that David Clark did with I think it was
Larry Greehill.

That's not at all what I'm suggesting. The listeners would simply be relaxing,
playing their favorite music, without any knowledge of the electronics in use,
and without any attempt to make distinctions.

In other words, we simply want to know what they think they hear.

After a few months (!!!), components might be substituted -- without the
listeners' knowledge -- to see how they react.


In fact, long trials can be shown to hurt listener
sensitivity, because they temporally displace the listening
experiences being compared even more, and that is known to
be a bad thing.

Agreed (more or less). But that's one of the reasons for running such a test --
to see how such things change.

On Thu, 12 May 2005 15:36:50 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

and without any attempt to make distinctions.

Another biscuit crux. The *attempt* itself is contaminating.
We might not (I would say experientially *do not*) listen/ hear
the same for enjoyment as for "testing".

An oft-observed fact is that eye witnesses to catastrophic
events are amazingly unreliable. We're bred to interpret
the world through a maze of models, assumptions and
imagination. This discussion is about those things; let's
just not forget the "bred" part's true relevance.

Good fortune,

Chris Hornbeck

William Sommerwerck wrote:
FWIW most if not all the original ABX partners did
exactly
what is described here. They picked out two components to
compare, did long-term ABX testing, and compared their
results to shorter term tests. There have also been some
more-formal tests that David Clark did with I think it
was
Larry Greehill.

That's not at all what I'm suggesting. The listeners would
simply be
relaxing, playing their favorite music, without any
knowledge of the
electronics in use, and without any attempt to make
distinctions.

Huh? That is what we did!

In other words, we simply want to know what they think
they hear.

Been there done that.

After a few months (!!!), components might be
substituted -- without
the listeners' knowledge -- to see how they react.

Tell you what William, if you can get anybody with a life to
play by these rules, give me a call.

In fact, long trials can be shown to hurt listener
sensitivity, because they temporally displace the
listening
experiences being compared even more, and that is known
to
be a bad thing.

Agreed (more or less). But that's one of the reasons for
running such
a test -- to see how such things change.

We did it and it kinda left this bad taste in our mouths.
Null results from lont-term listening when quick switching
gives positive results can do that to a person.

Arny Krueger wrote:
William Sommerwerck wrote:

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known
people who
agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people
simply sit
down and listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such
testing would
would provide useful information about "how" people
listen, what they
think they hear, and establish a baseline for judging
"subjective"
and "objective" testing. But such testing would require
many
listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement and run
correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists
and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they
want to
believe. People are uncomfortable changing their world
views.

FWIW most if not all the original ABX partners did exactly
what is described here. They picked out two components to
compare, did long-term ABX testing, and compared their
results to shorter term tests. There have also been some
more-formal tests that David Clark did with I think it was
Larry Greehill.

Nousaine has also conducted 'long term' tests, where
subjects were allowed to acclimate themselves for *weeks*
before actually taking the test.



--

-S
It's not my business to do intelligent work. -- D. Rumsfeld, testifying
before the House Armed Services Committee

"Steven Sullivan" wrote in message
...
Arny Krueger wrote:
William Sommerwerck wrote:

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known
people who
agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people
simply sit
down and listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such
testing would
would provide useful information about "how" people
listen, what they
think they hear, and establish a baseline for judging
"subjective"
and "objective" testing. But such testing would require
many
listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement and run
correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists
and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they
want to
believe. People are uncomfortable changing their world
views.

FWIW most if not all the original ABX partners did exactly
what is described here. They picked out two components to
compare, did long-term ABX testing, and compared their
results to shorter term tests. There have also been some
more-formal tests that David Clark did with I think it was
Larry Greehill.

Nousaine has also conducted 'long term' tests, where
subjects were allowed to acclimate themselves for *weeks*
before actually taking the test.


That has nothing at all to do with taking the test, per se.

William,

What is needed ... is long-term blind listening tests

I have to agree with Arny. I can't see why listening long term increases
someone's ability to discern small differences. If anything I'd say it's the
other way around. But even if that were so, if you have to listen for a
month to detect some tiny improvement, how important really is that
improvement?

I know that when I A/B stuff where the differences are very small (not
blind, just fooling around) I need to hear the exact same short passage over
and over. A friend once asked me to listen for a change in a song his client
sent out for mastering. The ME claimed he made it "better" but my friend
couldn't hear any difference. I couldn't either, but I also "couldn't tell
if I could tell" until we took both versions of the tune and lined them up
in his DAW. Before we did that, one version might be playing a verse while
the next was at the chorus. Just having a different chord was enough to
throw off any perception of low end clarity and fullness from one version to
the next. But once I set up each tune to play the exact same 5 second
passage - over and over while switching back and forth - I was then able to
conclude with certainty that there was no meaningful difference.

Also, it is well known that the ear adjusts to changes in sound pretty
easily. So if anything, long term listening (live with a new power cable for
a month) will tend to *mask* real differences rather than reveal them
better.

--Ethan

Ethan Winer wrote:
William,

What is needed ... is long-term blind listening tests

I have to agree with Arny. I can't see why listening long
term
increases someone's ability to discern small differences.

In a way it does. Sometimes you have to listen a long time
before you set the stage for the audible difference to be
maximually audible. Stuff like a certain rim shot, etc.

On Thu, 12 May 2005 12:02:10 -0400, "Ethan Winer" ethanw at
ethanwiner dot com wrote:

I have to agree with Arny. I can't see why listening long term increases
someone's ability to discern small differences. If anything I'd say it's the
other way around.
...
I know that when I A/B stuff where the differences are very small (not
blind, just fooling around) I need to hear the exact same short passage over
and over.
...
Also, it is well known that the ear adjusts to changes in sound pretty
easily. So if anything, long term listening (live with a new power cable for
a month) will tend to *mask* real differences rather than reveal them
better.

When I was designing equipment (for myself), and struggling daily with
the question of whether a tiny improvement was real, I came to the
following conclusion:

My brain is willing to suspend disbelief in any halfway decent
electronically created illusion of sound for about thirty seconds.
After that, it quickly begins removing trust in those aspects of the
illusion that are not sufficiently well reproduced. If I can A/B for
thirty seconds back and forth, I can (if there is a difference) hear
the increase and decrease in realism. (For awhile, then fatigue sets
in.)

If I listen to the less realistic sample for a minute or more, my
brain disables my ability to trust in those aspects of the illusion
that were changing. Both samples now sound the same, because I'm no
longer listening for those differences. It may take a half-hour or
more of listening to only the more realistic configuration (or only
real, not reproduced sound) before I can trust whatever aspect of
illusion was being varied.

So the procedure was listen for half an hour, make a change, and
decide within thirty seconds whether there was a decrease in realism.
If there was a decrease, go ahead and repeat the test in the other
direction, but don't be surprised when there is no audible increase in
realism.

Am I the only one whose brain works this way?

Loren

When I was designing equipment (for myself), and struggling daily with
the question of whether a tiny improvement was real, I came to the
following conclusion:

My brain is willing to suspend disbelief in any halfway decent
electronically created illusion of sound for about thirty seconds.
After that, it quickly begins removing trust in those aspects of the
illusion that are not sufficiently well reproduced. If I can A/B for
thirty seconds back and forth, I can (if there is a difference) hear
the increase and decrease in realism. (For awhile, then fatigue sets
in.)

If I listen to the less realistic sample for a minute or more, my
brain disables my ability to trust in those aspects of the illusion
that were changing. Both samples now sound the same, because I'm no
longer listening for those differences. It may take a half-hour or
more of listening to only the more realistic configuration (or only
real, not reproduced sound) before I can trust whatever aspect of
illusion was being varied.

So the procedure was listen for half an hour, make a change, and
decide within thirty seconds whether there was a decrease in realism.
If there was a decrease, go ahead and repeat the test in the other
direction, but don't be surprised when there is no audible increase in
realism.

Am I the only one whose brain works this way?

I doubt that you're unique, but the real issue is whether the differences you
think you hear really do exist. You are assuming that because you think you hear
a difference, you really do. You can't assume that, any more than those
supporting double-blind testing can assume it gives correct and complete
results.

What is needed ... is long-term blind listening tests

I have to agree with Arny. I can't see why listening long term increases
someone's ability to discern small differences.

I guess I'm not explaining things clearly enough to overcome your
preconceptions.

The purpose of long-term blind listening is not (initially) to make
distinctions, but to simply see how we listen, and how we react to a particular
system.

For example, if the system remains unchanged, but people report differences in
its sound (especially if different people report different differences), then we
start to have an idea, of the character and magnitude of what I call "perceptual
noise". This would be useful to know, as it has a significant effect on
subjective testing, and (I think) at least a little on ABX and similar
methodologies.

William Sommerwerck wrote:
What is needed ... is long-term blind listening tests


I have to agree with Arny. I can't see why listening long term increases
someone's ability to discern small differences.


I guess I'm not explaining things clearly enough to overcome your
preconceptions.

The problem is Arny thinks people's auditory memory is about 1/10 of a
second. I dunno, maybe his is. I can remember things I heard 40 years ago.

On Thu, 12 May 2005 15:43:34 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

For example, if the system remains unchanged, but people report differences in
its sound (especially if different people report different differences), then we
start to have an idea, of the character and magnitude of what I call "perceptual
noise". This would be useful to know, as it has a significant effect on
subjective testing, and (I think) at least a little on ABX and similar
methodologies.

It does make a lot of sense to work at establishing a noise floor
first. Glad to hear you're still working on the project; your new
posts sound very positive.

Chris Hornbeck

William,

The purpose of long-term blind listening is ... to simply see how we
listen, and how we react to a particular system.

Okay, fine. But long term, like a month, includes effects such as:

* Your spouse is in a bad mood lately and bugs you all the time with petty
complaints.

* The restaurant where you eat lunch every day hired a new chef who uses
more garlic than the last chef.

* One of your kids just got admitted to the college she wanted, but it's
going to cost you twice as much as the college *you* wanted her to go to.

And so forth. And Yes, I am dead serious with these examples, and I'm sure
there are many more in that vein. For balance you can also add a few
"positive" life changes to the negative ones I listed. Like you finally got
the big promotion you've worked so hard for, and it comes with a $10k salary
increase. Yep, those new speaker cables are starting to sound mighty good
now that they've finally "broken in."

if the system remains unchanged, but people report differences

Yes, I'm sure this is the biggest factor. It's why so many otherwise
intelligent people think a new power cord made a difference. It's why even a
pro mix engineer can sometimes tweak a kick drum EQ to perfection, only to
discover later he was adjusting the rhythm guitar track.

I've made this point before, and it needs to be made repeatedly: One of the
things that astounds me is how audiophiles - and especially magazine
reviewers - claim to be able to discern tiny changes while listening in a
room where fully half of the SPL is dominated by ambience and early
reflections. When I read a reviewer comment on a particular loudspeaker's
imaging, and I *know for a fact* that the reviewer has no acoustic treatment
at all, I have to dismiss everything else from that reviewer. And a lack of
even minimal acoustic treatment probably dismisses 95 percent of all audio
reviewers, no?

--Ethan

"Ethan Winer" ethanw at ethanwiner dot com wrote:

[...] I can't see why listening long term increases someone's ability
to discern small differences. If anything I'd say it's the other way
around.


I dunno...

When I first heard the Neumann KM184 I thought it might be the best mic
ever. The more I used it, the more I liked it.

Then, over time, I discovered some of its weaknesses. I also got past
the Honeymoon and realized that the top-end bloom was "exciting" at
first, but might be kind of annoying after a while.

I also thought the RNC was pretty lame the first time I tried it. The
more I used it though, the more I realized that what makes it a great
tool is the absence of characteristics that stand out in a short-term
test.

I can think of two or three more examples, but you get the point.
Getting familiar with a device can be really helpful in making valid
decisions about how it sounds.

--
"It CAN'T be too loud... some of the red lights aren't even on yet!"
- Lorin David Schultz
in the control room
making even bad news sound good

(Remove spamblock to reply)

Lorin,

Then, over time, I discovered some of its weaknesses.

I can't disagree with anything you said. But that is very different from the
notion you can't distinguish one piece of gear from another *at all* unless
you live with it for a while.

Those on the "other side" of this argument are saying two power amps might
sound the same in an A/B test, but after some extended time they can then
hear a difference. Of course, they're not even saying they can hear a
difference in an A/B test only after a while. They're saying, well, I guess
I don't know what they're saying. But in your case I'm sure you could hear
the difference immediately between one microphone and another, or one
compressor and another. What you're talking about is learning to
appreciate - or not - the *character* of some device over time. And to me
this is very different from being able to detect any change at all.

--Ethan

William Sommerwerck wrote:
Clearly, if one can't tell the difference between two pieces of
equipment, then, for the purpose of that listener, the two pieces
of
equipment are identical under those circumstances.

Exactly... "Under those circumstances." Double-blind testing, as it
is currently
implemented, is not equivalent to simply sitting down and listening
to music.
Nor is "subjective" testing, for that matter.


Those who criticise DBT testing on general principles are on
such non-scientific ground that they might as well join a church.

Not at all. Calling something "scientific" does not make it so. (The
word itself
implies a degree of "truthfulness" that is not fully justified.)
Simply because
double-blind testing is useful in other areas does not mean it
provides useful
or valid results when judging hi-fi equipment.

What most people conveniently ignore when criticizing my views is
that I don't
agree with either side in this issue. Both sides are "wrong," because
their
testing procedures have not been proven to be correct. Simply
removing bias does
not guarantee accurate, valid, or useful results.


What I don't get, and what I thought that Atkinson was getting at
until
he veered off into mysticism, is why the tests have to be conducted
with short pieces of sound. If Atkinson's claim is that he can
differentiate between different power amps when listening to them
for
an extended period, then let's design an experiment that tests this
hypothesis, but remains double blind. How long does he need? A half
hour on each? Ten minutes? An hour? Shouldn't be difficult -
certainly,
far more time has been spent arguing over this than would be
necessary
to conduct a *scientific* experiment as to whether two pieces of
equipment can be differentiated under these circumstances.

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who
agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit
down and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would
provide useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and
establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing. But such
testing
would require many listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement
and run correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists
and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they want to
believe.
People are uncomfortable changing their world views.

I don't know why you think that objectivists are against changing their
views. I certainly consider myself one, but if someone demonstrated
that they could consistently distinguish two power cords then I would
believe that there were audible differences between them. It is easy
enough to design an experiment to do this - it only takes 1% of the
effort that has been spent arguing about it.

"Objectivists" (or "rationalists", as I would call them) do not believe
that there are no differences between components, so we don't have any
"world views" to be uncomfortable changing. I believe very strongly
that there are big differences between speakers and microphones, for
instance.

It is not part of my weltanschuung (sp?) that there are no differences
between good power amps. I believe that there are audible differences
between mic pre amps, so I don't see why there wouldn't be audible
differences between power amps. But until people can distinguish good
power amps there's no reason to suppose that they sound different.








Kudos to Arny, indeed, for perservering when most others would have
given up. I have long taken the view that the more idiots there are
in
the world, the better it is for me, so I don't try to educate them.
I might even sell them some $2,500 power cables for them to plug
into the Romex cable feeding their power outlets.

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
Clearly, if one can't tell the difference between two pieces of
equipment, then, for the purpose of that listener, the two pieces of
equipment are identical under those circumstances.

Exactly... "Under those circumstances." Double-blind testing, as it is
currently
implemented, is not equivalent to simply sitting down and listening to
music.
Nor is "subjective" testing, for that matter.


Those who criticise DBT testing on general principles are on
such non-scientific ground that they might as well join a church.

Not at all. Calling something "scientific" does not make it so. (The word
itself
implies a degree of "truthfulness" that is not fully justified.) Simply
because
double-blind testing is useful in other areas does not mean it provides
useful
or valid results when judging hi-fi equipment.

What most people conveniently ignore when criticizing my views is that I
don't
agree with either side in this issue. Both sides are "wrong," because
their
testing procedures have not been proven to be correct. Simply removing
bias does
not guarantee accurate, valid, or useful results.


What I don't get, and what I thought that Atkinson was getting at until
he veered off into mysticism, is why the tests have to be conducted
with short pieces of sound. If Atkinson's claim is that he can
differentiate between different power amps when listening to them for
an extended period, then let's design an experiment that tests this
hypothesis, but remains double blind. How long does he need? A half
hour on each? Ten minutes? An hour? Shouldn't be difficult - certainly,
far more time has been spent arguing over this than would be necessary
to conduct a *scientific* experiment as to whether two pieces of
equipment can be differentiated under these circumstances.

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who agree
with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit down
and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would provide
useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and
establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing. But such
testing
would require many listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement
and run correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they want to
believe.
People are uncomfortable changing their world views.

Your points are in total agreement with the argument I have been carrying on
in RAHE for the last 1 1/2 years. I've sketched out a "control test" with
one phase exactly as you mention...actually first a sighted listening long
term evaluative stage...then a blind stage otherwise identical, then a blind
short-term evaluative stage in a neutral environment, and finally a
short-term blind comparative stage in a neutral environment. This was
designed to provide all of the bridges between long term listening for
enjoyment all the way to conventional a-b or a-b-x testing as it is promoted
and practiced by Arny and others. If the correlation broke down, we would
know where and accordingly most probably why. If it didn't, it would
convert most subjectivists to objectivists. The drawback: expensive,
difficult to stage, time-consuming, and requiring several hundred people.
Only one of the objectivists there would even consider such a test...most
denied the need for any test. They basically state, as Arny did at the
Stereophile show, that he knows dbt works because it gives the same
audiometric results as previous blind tests. Talk about being impervious to
the underlying assumptions......

Your points are in total agreement with the argument I have been carrying on
in RAHE for the last 1 1/2 years. I've sketched out a "control test" with
one phase exactly as you mention...actually first a sighted listening long
term evaluative stage...then a blind stage otherwise identical, then a blind
short-term evaluative stage in a neutral environment, and finally a
short-term blind comparative stage in a neutral environment. This was
designed to provide all of the bridges between long term listening for
enjoyment all the way to conventional a-b or a-b-x testing as it is promoted
and practiced by Arny and others. If the correlation broke down, we would
know where and accordingly most probably why. If it didn't, it would
convert most subjectivists to objectivists. The drawback: expensive,
difficult to stage, time-consuming, and requiring several hundred people.
Only one of the objectivists there would even consider such a test...most
denied the need for any test. They basically state, as Arny did at the
Stereophile show, that he knows dbt works because it gives the same
audiometric results as previous blind tests. Talk about being impervious to
the underlying assumptions......

It's nice that people are finally starting to understand what I'm talking about,
and contributing good ideas of their own.

William Sommerwerck wrote:

It's nice that people are finally starting to understand
what I'm
talking about, and contributing good ideas of their own.

Lavo?

No way!

I don't think he hears what others say at all.

Harry Lavo wrote:

They basically state, as
Arny did at the Stereophile show, that he knows dbt works
because it
gives the same audiometric results as previous blind
tests. Talk
about being impervious to the underlying assumptions...

Talk about distorting what you heard until it was what you
want to hear. I said other means - that they were also blind
tests would be yet another fabrication of your mind, Lavo.

The good news Harry is that I was able to reduce your
seemingly-endless post to just two fairly-brief sentences.

What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who
agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit
down and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would
provide useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and
establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing.

I think this is an important point. DBTs are great, and inarguably
valid from a certain point of view. But testers in these settings tend
to listen "hard", with the analytical part of their minds and their
sensory aparatus, and much less so with their intuitive, subjective,
emotional side. It's arguable that since music in particular is
generally consumed by listeners in the latter state, a rigidly
"objective" analysis may miss something.

It reminds me of some of my bad gear decisions through my life as a
music/audio enthusiast. Back in the 70s, I conducted a serious search
for better speakers to replace my very enjoyable but somewhat limited
KLH 17s (these were relatively affordable 60s era 2 way acoustic
suspension bookshelf speakers, well regarded but nothing particularly
special or expensive). After exhaustive research including many, many
hours of critical listening tests, dozens of magazine reviews and so
on, I chose the Advent "Large" speakers (their first product). They
sounded really wonderful to me, better than any of my other candidates,
and had received unanimously glowing reviews in the audio press. I
brought them home, set them up in place of the KLHs and prepared to be
very pleased. Initially, as I "evaluated" my choice, they proved to be
every bit as good as I had hoped; very wide frequency response, low
distortion, excellent dispersion and so on. I was rockin!

Or was I...

After passing my post-purchase evaluation process with flying colors,
of course the next thing was to just relax and enjoy music on them, and
that's where it all started to go wrong. No sooner had I switched off
my "objective", analytical mind when I began to realize I was no longer
enjoying my favorite music as much. Something was interfering with the
connection between the emotional intent of the musical performance and
my sense of it. Very disturbingly, the magic was somehow gone from my
favorite albums. I immediately isolated the speakers as the problem of
course, because they were the only element that had changed. The
curious thing though was that every time I put my analytical "hat" back
on. the Advents simply blew the KLHs away in every single way, and were
clearly excellent performers, as everyone else seemed to agree. Forget
the analysis though, put the "enjoy music" hat back on and...big
problem.

I never got past it, and ultimately sold the Advents and went back to
the KLHs. The magic came right back, and once again my favorite music
could take me to the joyous, transcendant places it had before. Similar
experiences happened other times with speakers and other hi-fi gear,
enough to make me painfully aware of the pitfalls of "critical"
listening.

There may also be an element in DBTs that, as a side effect of their
"objectivity", doesn't incorporate a level of sensory experience that
*transcends* the objective, and could thereby have significant
consequences in terms of judgements thus made.

Offerered respectfully for your consideration...

Ted Spencer, NYC

Ted:
I never got past it, and ultimately sold the Advents and went back to
the KLHs. The magic came right back, and once again my favorite music
could take me to the joyous, transcendant places it had before.

You found your happy place. You were tuned to those speakers over time
and they became your reference. Nothing wrong with that. My Genesis 22s
have become my reference. There are better speakers out there I assume
but they're pretty darn good and make me happy. I'm just glad there's a
former Genesis employee out there still making and reconing the drivers
or I'd have to change them.

wrote:
What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who
agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit
down and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would
provide useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and
establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing.

I think this is an important point. DBTs are great, and inarguably
valid from a certain point of view. But testers in these settings tend
to listen "hard", with the analytical part of their minds and their
sensory aparatus, and much less so with their intuitive, subjective,
emotional side. It's arguable that since music in particular is
generally consumed by listeners in the latter state, a rigidly
"objective" analysis may miss something.

It reminds me of some of my bad gear decisions through my life as a
music/audio enthusiast. Back in the 70s, I conducted a serious search
for better speakers to replace my very enjoyable but somewhat limited
KLH 17s (these were relatively affordable 60s era 2 way acoustic
suspension bookshelf speakers, well regarded but nothing particularly
special or expensive). After exhaustive research including many, many
hours of critical listening tests, dozens of magazine reviews and so
on, I chose the Advent "Large" speakers (their first product). They
sounded really wonderful to me, better than any of my other
candidates, and had received unanimously glowing reviews in the audio
press. I brought them home, set them up in place of the KLHs and
prepared to be very pleased. Initially, as I "evaluated" my choice,
they proved to be every bit as good as I had hoped; very wide
frequency response, low distortion, excellent dispersion and so on. I
was rockin!

Or was I...

After passing my post-purchase evaluation process with flying colors,
of course the next thing was to just relax and enjoy music on them,
and that's where it all started to go wrong. No sooner had I switched
off my "objective", analytical mind when I began to realize I was no
longer enjoying my favorite music as much. Something was interfering
with the connection between the emotional intent of the musical
performance and my sense of it. Very disturbingly, the magic was
somehow gone from my favorite albums. I immediately isolated the
speakers as the problem of course, because they were the only element
that had changed. The curious thing though was that every time I put
my analytical "hat" back on. the Advents simply blew the KLHs away in
every single way, and were clearly excellent performers, as everyone
else seemed to agree. Forget the analysis though, put the "enjoy
music" hat back on and...big problem.

I never got past it, and ultimately sold the Advents and went back to
the KLHs. The magic came right back, and once again my favorite music
could take me to the joyous, transcendant places it had before.
Similar experiences happened other times with speakers and other
hi-fi gear, enough to make me painfully aware of the pitfalls of
"critical" listening.

There may also be an element in DBTs that, as a side effect of their
"objectivity", doesn't incorporate a level of sensory experience that
*transcends* the objective, and could thereby have significant
consequences in terms of judgements thus made.

Offerered respectfully for your consideration...


I'l repost here what is relevent to this point

***********************
Taste. What tastes bad?

Suppose, when one is young, one eats something, but very shortly
afterwards, gets ill. What can happen is that that it can trigger a
dislike for that food. The body processing may attempt to link that food
taste with "bad", even if the correlation was incorrect, it may still do
this. There reason for this is that it is very difficult to have
hardware, i.e. genes, deal with all possible variations in the
environment. How does one know in advance that a certain taste should be
perceived as good or bad? evolution solves this problem by making all
perceptions and emotions, software programmable by the environment, i.e.
memes.
*****************

You have already been programmed as to what sounds "good" i.e. the KLHs.
If you had gotten your first shag while listening to the Advents rather
than the KLHs, things would have been different.:-)


Kevin Aylward

http://www.anasoft.co.uk
SuperSpice, a very affordable Mixed-Mode
Windows Simulator with Schematic Capture,
Waveform Display, FFT's and Filter Design.

You have already been programmed as to what sounds "good" i.e. the
KLHs.
If you had gotten your first shag while listening to the Advents
rather
than the KLHs, things would have been different.:-)


Kevin Aylward



Nah. I've spent my entire adult life as an audio professional. I've
encountered many "new and different" pieces of gear that *do* rock my
world musically, immediately, and only a few (thankfully) that fit the
description I made earlier. It's not a matter of what I'm "programmed"
to like. I appreciate a very wide spectrum of audio gear, and of music
for that matter, and I know how to qualify what I hear and feel.

Another case: there was a certain brand of very high end mic
pre/eq/compressor I was invited to evaluate a couple of years ago, and
it measured and "objectively analyzed" sensationally. It also got rave
reviews in the pro audio press and by many here. It just never passed
audio in a musical way to my ears. I was offered a *really* great price
on this $3000 piece, which had been sent to me brand new, and I turned
it down. It always made me feel like I was listening to *equipment*,
not music. That's the best way I know how to put it. Trust me on
this...please...

Ted Spencer, NYC

"Kevin Aylward" wrote:

You have already been programmed as to what sounds "good" i.e. the
KLHs. If you had gotten your first shag while listening to the
Advents rather than the KLHs, things would have been different.:-)


Interesting tangent, but essentially irrelevant to the point, which was:

Ted's "analytical ears" preferred one, while his "kickin' back" ears
preferred the other. The point is NOT that he preferred one or the
other, but that his preference *varied* according to his listening
"state." That has significant implications for how we evaluate audio
equipment.

Ted, I've had exactly the same experience, with opposite results. I
bought a pair of speakers for my girlfriend, which I set up against my
trusty old Energys. I thought mine sounded better, based on three or
four points. Now, as I sit here in Kathy's living room just *listening*
to the ones I bought for her (as opposed to "analyzing" them), I think
they may be more natural overall than mine. Different mind set,
different conclusion.

Of course, it could be the room...

....and so it goes.

--
"It CAN'T be too loud... some of the red lights aren't even on yet!"
- Lorin David Schultz
in the control room
making even bad news sound good

(Remove spamblock to reply)

Ted, one thing you might want to consider is that in the 1970s, you
presumably bought a phono cartridge that you liked the sound of when it
was used with your KLH speakers. Change the speakers, and that choice
of cartridge is no longer the same choice you would most likely have
made. The large Advents had a more forward sound than any KLHs that I
can recall from that period.

A more insidious hidden issue is your selection of recordings that
served as the touchstone for your emotional responses. Your KLH
speakers (with your existing phono cartridge) let you enjoy recordings
that, through less rolled-off sounding speakers, would have sounded too
bright or perhaps too closely miked. That's probably good--most record
producers like "hotter" sound than most record listeners, especially
listeners who attend classical concerts and have any idea what real
music sounds like in a hall. But by the time you've spent six months or
a year with the KLH-based system, your roster of favorite recordings
has been influenced by the combined sonic characteristics of your
particular cartridge and loudspeakers.

If you had started off with the Advents but used the same phono
cartridge as with the KLHs, then assuming that you're open to a wide
enough range of musical repertoire, you might have been more impressed
with flashier recordings that the Advents were effective at showing
off. For example, if you enjoyed listening to string quartets with the
KLHs, the Advents might have had you humming along to Mahler symphonies
or "The Planets." _Then_ if you switched to KLHs, you would miss the
color and presence of the Advents, with very little to compensate for
their loss, since the effectiveness of those recordings depends so much
on that presence and color. A mellow presentation of dramatic
large-scale pieces is a different taste that you might need to acquire.


Do you see what I'm getting at here?

--best regards

Thanks for your thoughtful reply. The problem is that, as I said, the
Advents passed all my "objective" listening criteria with flying
colors. There was no overtly empirical issue at all such as things
sounding "more forward" or "too bright or too closely miked". All those
criteia were just splendid to my critical ear. And my cartridge by the
way, if I remember correvtly, was a Shure V15-III, unless it was the
Shure M92E that I had before it. In any case though, perhaps I can add
a little more to the story about what bothered me.

To begin with, my musical taste then, as now for the most part,
revolved primarily around vocal pop, rock and folk-rock. I'm pretty
sure I bought the Advents in 1973, so I would have been listening to
James Taylor, The Eagles, Joni Mitchell, The Beatles, Neil Young,
Hendrix, Blind Faith...you get the idea. Searching my sense memory for
what the Advents lacked when I simply wanted to enjoy the music rather
than "analyze the gear", I recall that it was a sense of transparency
and realness in the midrange, especially on vocals - something I will
say that the KLHs presented very well despite their limitations. While
I'm working from long memory here, I'll say that the Advents (or at
least my pair) had some kind of phase issue in the heart of the
midrange, possibly to do with the crossover frequency or filter design
(just a guess). The effect was what ultimately turned out to be a very
distracting loss of clarity, focus and "integrity", if you will, of the
center channel vocal image. Since my listening was highly focused on
the vocal performance (it was after all the height of the "sensitive"
singer/songwriter era), although not at all to the exclusion of other
elements, this particular attribute was a deal-breaker for me. I just
didn't feel the connection to the singer's performance, and it happened
with my entire record collection.

I later bought and sold another pair of arguably excellent speakers
(ESS Heil AMTs - I forget the model but they were 2-way bookshelves
with an AMT and a 12" woofer)) due to another odd midrange issue that
spoiled the connection to vocalists as well. The center image on the
ESS's had a strong tendency to move around based on frequency content
(or something) and was extremely distracting to me. Similarly to the
Advents though, the ESS's passed "critical evaluations" beautifully,
and it wasn't until I began to "just listen" that the problem became
apparent.

I should add that I sold the Advents to my dad, who liked them just
fine (and in the much less critical, usually off-axis living room
listening environment, so did I), and I sold the ESS's to another
engineer (we were both at The Hit Factory at the time), and he liked
them fine too. I guess you could say that I'm a stickler for a specific
kind of midrange transparency, and it isn't always obvious in initial
"critical listening" how it will manifest itself later when enjoying
music in a more intuitive state. I need to be able to "feel" the
singer's...heart...soul...something...come through vividly,
undisturbed, and I've found that some otherwise excellent speakers
don't accomplish that very well. Most good ones do though, and I'm
perfectly ok with my Genelec 1030a/1092s, JBL L-100s (what I finally
replaced the KLHs with, and ultimately kept, in 1977, and still use in
my living room, mostly for movies, as fronts/LF for a 5.1 system), and
even the otherwise pretty annoying NS10ms I still use in the control
room for mix-check.

Ted Spencer, NYC


David Satz wrote:

Ted, one thing you might want to consider is that in the 1970s, you
presumably bought a phono cartridge that you liked the sound of when it

was used with your KLH speakers. Change the speakers, and that choice
of cartridge is no longer the same choice you would most likely have
made. The large Advents had a more forward sound than any KLHs that I
can recall from that period.


A more insidious hidden issue is your selection of recordings that
served as the touchstone for your emotional responses. Your KLH
speakers (with your existing phono cartridge) let you enjoy recordings
that, through less rolled-off sounding speakers, would have sounded too

bright or perhaps too closely miked. That's probably good--most record
producers like "hotter" sound than most record listeners, especially
listeners who attend classical concerts and have any idea what real
music sounds like in a hall. But by the time you've spent six months or

a year with the KLH-based system, your roster of favorite recordings
has been influenced by the combined sonic characteristics of your
particular cartridge and loudspeakers.


If you had started off with the Advents but used the same phono
cartridge as with the KLHs, then assuming that you're open to a wide
enough range of musical repertoire, you might have been more impressed
with flashier recordings that the Advents were effective at showing
off. For example, if you enjoyed listening to string quartets with the
KLHs, the Advents might have had you humming along to Mahler symphonies

or "The Planets." _Then_ if you switched to KLHs, you would miss the
color and presence of the Advents, with very little to compensate for
their loss, since the effectiveness of those recordings depends so much

on that presence and color. A mellow presentation of dramatic
large-scale pieces is a different taste that you might need to acquire.



Do you see what I'm getting at here?


--best regards

In article ,
"William Sommerwerck" wrote:


What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who agree with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit down and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would provide
useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and
establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing. But such testing
would require many listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement
and run correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they want to believe.
People are uncomfortable changing their world views.

How about an AB type switch box with a 1 day timer that flips randomly
at 3AM every day? Sit down and listen all day, then log what you think.
Afterwards, look for a statistical correlation between the listener's
log and the AB switcher's log.

On Sat, 14 May 2005 03:35:34 GMT, Ralph Barone
wrote:

How about an AB type switch box with a 1 day timer that flips randomly
at 3AM every day? Sit down and listen all day, then log what you think.
Afterwards, look for a statistical correlation between the listener's
log and the AB switcher's log.

This sounds really good to me. It's blind, the time frame is
probably spot on, and the log will hopefully be both non-threatening
and have a positive (will increase in usefulness/ validity with
practice) learning curve.

Great!

And for those who listen exclusively to a hard drive- convertable
source, it might even be a simple adaptation of Arny's existing setup.

For others, the switching hardware isn't impossible, and the
software is trivial for folks who do software. Definitely
do-able in 1981 Apple II Basic, for example.

Chris Hornbeck

"Ralph Barone" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"William Sommerwerck" wrote:


What is needed -- and I could name several well-known people who agree
with
me -- is long-term blind listening tests in which people simply sit down
and
listen for pleasure. Properly conducted, such testing would would
provide
useful
information about "how" people listen, what they think they hear, and
establish
a baseline for judging "subjective" and "objective" testing. But such
testing
would require many listeners, take a lot of time, and be difficult to
implement
and run correctly. Not to mention the fact that both subjectivists and
objectivists have a vested interest in believing what they want to
believe.
People are uncomfortable changing their world views.

How about an AB type switch box with a 1 day timer that flips randomly
at 3AM every day? Sit down and listen all day, then log what you think.
Afterwards, look for a statistical correlation between the listener's
log and the AB switcher's log.

Not a bad idea at all. Assuming the date and time were automatically
recorded as well as the random item chosen, and that the "log" could not be
tampered with after the fact. And that both items under test were always
on. Let's see: $500 - !000 to put on the market by somebody already in the
computerized equipment business?

I might even sell them some $2,500 power cables for them to plug into
the
Romex cable feeding their power outlets.

LOL It is laughable isn't it? The wire from the lcoal atation to the
outlet is likely worth less than those crazy poewer cable (min xformers
etc). "Look my Kia goes faster when I paint it Ferrari red!"