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On Monday, December 10, 2012 6:17:06 PM UTC-5, Audio_Empire wrote:

The SR reviews are suspect due to SR's editorial policy which was=20
that everything printed in SR must serve the advertisers/potential
advertisers.=20

Science doesn't rely on editorial policies. Science relies on proper test m=
ethodology. Anyone interested can seek out the articles (try either major u=
rban public libraries or technical academic libraries) and see for themselv=
es how well these tests were carried out.

That meant no critical evaluations of anything. Ever=20
wonder why SR never published a negative review from Julian
Hirsch? Because it was SR policy to not publish negative reviews.
That didn't mean that Julian never came across a piece of equipment
that didn't meet its public specs. It simply meant that SR didn't run
the review, that's all. You see, it was their editorial policy to cater
to the industry, not the consumer. It is because of this policy that
the late J. Gordon Holt founded Stereophile. His stint at High-Fidelity=
=20
Magazine (and I believe that he also worked at SR for a time too)
convinced him that these magazines weren't serving the interest=20
of the consumer. That's also why that no one should be surprised
that SR's tests on the audibility of components, including CD players,
show no differences in audible performance. It's also where the joke
"quote" from Julian Hirsch goes like this: "of all the amplifiers that I
have ever tested, this was one of them" That "quote" applies to=20
tuners, CD decks, preamps, receivers, you name it. And no, Julian=20
never really said that, but if you read the sum-total of his work,=20
including going back to "Hirsch-Houck" labs before Julian went off
on his own, you will see that he never had an opinion. He just=20
measured the equipment against its published specs, and if it met
them, it was good for go. If not, that fact was never mentioned (as
far as I know and I subscribed to SR for decades!) and the reviews
were not published. The fact that to SR, everything sounded the same
was sacrosanct. I don't wonder that all of those "DBTs" showed no=20
difference in CD players.
=20
Subsequent research has pretty much vindicated Hirsch, but that's the subje=
ct for another thread.

BTW, the idea that a guy who thought all properly functioning amps sounded =
alike was serving his advertisers is ridiculous. For service to advertisers=
, Stereophile (along with TAS) takes the cake.

snip

As for the early Philips (Magnavox) players sounding "different" in=20
one of those tests, I agree. It did sound different from the early
Japanese players. It was listenable, the early Sonys, Kyoceras,=20
and Technics players were not and that's MY opinion.

The biggest trouble with high-end audio ever since the term was coined is t=
he mistaken confusion of opinion with fact.

bob