From http://home.earthlink.net/~busenitz/bs.html , with my commentary




13. How to Listen to Bose

Listening is key, and this section will provide a few pointers on how
to listen correctly and effectively.

To begin with, it helps to be aware of human psychology and how this
can bias your perceptions. Some of these include:

Expectations. If you expect Bose to sound good, it is likely to sound
good. Vice versa, if you expect Bose to sound bad, it is likely to
sound bad. Try to keep an open mind. Better yet, try to compare
speakers without knowing which brands you are listening to. In this
sense, the less you know about the speaker you're listening to, the
better.

Second Speaker Sounds Best. In a comparison of two items, people tend
to prefer the second item. This is one of the bases of the Pepsi
challenge --- present the Pepsi second. This effect is sometimes used
by dealers to favor a specific speaker.

The Louder Speaker Sounds Best. In a comparison of two speakers, people
tend to to prefer the louder one. Of course, this is not true if the
loudness difference is large. However, small differences in loudness
are not perceived as differences in loudness --- rather the louder
speaker is perceived as "better." This effect is sometimes used by
dealers to favor a specific speaker. This effect can be minimized by
demoing speakers at a variety of different volume levels --- fiddle
with the volume control as you listen!

The Speaker with more Bass and Treble Sounds Better. In a comparison of
two speakers, people tend to prefer the one with more bass and treble.
Again, like loudness, slight differences are not perceived as due to
frequency response differences --- the increase in bass and treble is
perceived as better. While increased bass and treble sounds better in
the short run, it can become fatiguing in the long ran. Some speaker
manufacturers build a slight contour into their speakers to help them
sound more impressive in short casual demos, but the purchaser drawn in
by this technique often lives to regret their decision. This effect is
also sometimes used by dealers to favor a specific speaker. Playing
with the bass and treble controls, and varying the volume (perceived
frequency balance changes with volume), can help overcome this effect.
If you find that, for some reason, you actually prefer increased bass
and treble, most receivers have a loudness switch, and bass and treble
controls, which can accommodate your tastes. However, if the bass and
treble boosts are built into the speakers, it is nearly impossible to
cancel them exactly using bass and treble controls if you later find
this contouring tiresome.

Room placement. The sound of a speaker is greatly influenced by its
location in the room, and its interactions with a room's acoustics. The
sound is also influenced by listener position and listener height. For
example, most speakers sound best if the tweeter is at the same height
as the listener's ears, or slightly lower. While most speakers are
designed to sit some distance from walls and other other obstacles, a
few are designed for placement near or against walls --- these are
usually smaller speakers using the wall for bass reinforcement. When
placing speakers for demo, the dealer should know and follow the
manufacturer's recommended placement guidelines.

Mood. In particular, it is more difficult to judge when nervous or
under pressure.

Other factors. Color, size, styling, lighting, etc. can affect your
judgements. I have even heard of dealers using small surround sound
speakers --- used properly, listeners will not perceive the additional
separate speakers, but will instead perceive the main speakers as
better.

The only way to ensure a completely neutral assessment is a
double-blind test, where neither the listener nor the conductor of the
test knows which speaker is being heard, and where the speakers are
heard in exactly the same location driven by exactly the same
equipment. Unfortunately, a proper double-blind test is out the realm
of practical possibility in most cases.

To summarize, while most dealers are honest, a few use human psychology
to push specific speakers, the ones which earn them the most money, or
perhaps the speakers that the salesperson honestly prefers, although
their tastes may differ from yours. Even when a dealer is not purposely
trying to bias the customer towards a particular speaker, it is
possible and likely for non-sonic aspects to greatly influence
judgements of sound quality. Being aware of possible bias factors, as
listed above, can help save you from making some common mistakes.

When auditioning speakers, its vital that you be familiar with the
music. In other words, BRING YOUR OWN MUSIC. If you allow the dealer to
choose the audition music, they may choose music which flatters the
speakers in question. At the very least, if the dealer uses unfamiliar
discs, you will have no idea what the music should sound like, and thus
you will have no way to distinguish the sound quality of the disc from
the sound quality of the speakers.

For myself, I try to bring one or two really good sounding CDs to test
for the ultimate capabilities of the speakers --- but don't be
surprised if CDs that sound good on your current speakers turn out to
be mediocre on better speakers, and that CDs which sound mediocre on
low quality speakers turn out to sound excellent on high quality
speakers. In other words, if you've never heard your CDs on first-rate
speakers, don't be surprised if your sonic judgements change as you
hear them on more and more speakers. I also try to bring several CDs
with known sonic flaws --- harsh treble, slight distortion on loud
passages, tape hiss, maybe even some 78 transfers with surface noise
---- to see whether the speaker exposes those flaws, while still
bringing out the better features of the music, so that the overall
sound is still enjoyable.

You might also want to bring a CD containing lots of low frequencies,
such as pipe organ music, to test the low frequency behavior of the
speaker. The biggest flaw with most speakers, especially smaller and
less expensive speakers, is either a lack of low bass or a poor quality
low bass, in that the bass has a one-note thumping quality, instead of
a continuous range of well-defined bass frequencies. If you can't
afford the cost or room (true high-quality low bass requires large
speakers and large rooms in which to play them) for a speaker with true
high-quality deep bass, you need to determine whether the bass response
is satisfactory on the types of music you listen to most often. Of
course, when it comes to bass, some people prefer enormous quantities
to quality, and I wish those people would stop driving by my house.

Having established some common pitfalls, now let us describe the proper
set-up for listening.

Placement. In most cases, the speakers should be placed well away from
walls and other speakers. Any nearby object or surface can affect the
sound quality of a speaker. This is especially critical in terms of
bass response --- speakers near walls or, especially, in corners will
have more bass, although the quality of the bass can be worse, since
the bass is reinforced at some frequencies and canceled at others,
resulting in a uneven bass response. Some speakers, especially small
speakers, are specifically designed to be placed near walls, and use
the bass reinforcement as part of their design.

The best demos are relaxed, preferably in familiar surroundings, such
as your own home.

Leave plenty of time. First impression are often wrong. Any change in
sound is often perceived as an improvement at first, and only extended
listening will tell for sure whether the change is for the better, the
worse, or just different.

The speakers should be hooked up separately --- they should not be
wired through a main switcher box. With more than two or three
switches, most commercial switcher boxes are notoriously poor in sound
quality, and will tend to make all speakers sound much worse than they
should, and may obscure important differences between speakers. The
store can use a *high-quality* switch between two or three speakers for
the purposes of blind testing, but this is quite rare. If a store
complains that it is too much trouble to wire the speakers
individually, there are other stores which do. I've seen stores
tediously and methodically disconnect and remove one set of speakers,
and connect a second set of speakers, so that the two speakers are
compared using the exact same system and in the exact same location.


I would make some comments.

One, although many people dislike records (LPs) I often prefer to
insist on listening to one or two album selections when auditioning
speakers. I have two reasons for this. One, no serious audio retailer
even today can be without a decent turntable, properly set up: if they
are, their seriousness has to be called into question. Even if they
sell few of them, it's a cost of doing business that acts as a filter
against md-fi schlock houses. More importantly, I like to play at least
one fairly noisy track because I find that the character of the noise
is a good tool for listening evaluation. The background noise has a
distinct feel, to the experienced, that communicates a lot about the
speakers. This is like the old test of jingling keys one foot from a
mic, then playing back the tape (or file) and A/Bing it immediately
with jingled keys one foot from your ear.

Also, the recordist should bring tracks he has recorded (on CD, unless
you've engineered albums...) so he may hear things he has heard live in
comparison to the speakers. One speaker designer , who is married to a
female vocalist, has an obvious advantage in this department: he can
simply bring her along.

wrote in message
ups.com...

From http://home.earthlink.net/~busenitz/bs.html , with my commentary




13. How to Listen to Bose

Didn't Nancy Reagan have the answer to this one?