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Audio Lessons Learned - post your best advice for the newer members!

Hi,
I thought it would be great to have our longtime audiophiles post their "lessons learned" along the way.

This is not a thread to start arguments, so please do not do that.
Just a repository where newer members can go to get a few good tidbits of knowledge.

I'll start - I have been an audiophile for 50 years now.

1. Learn about how humans hear sound, and what frequencies SHOULD NOT be flat in their response.. This should be the basis for your system. "Neutral" sounding systems DO NOT sound good to the human ear. You will be unsatified for years (like I was) until you realize this.

2. I do not "chase" DACS anymore.. (I went up to 30K Dacs before realizing the newest Dac chips are now within a few % of the high end Dacs.) Do your research and get yourself a good Dac using the best new dac chips. (about 1000.00 will get you a good one) and save yourself a fortune. - This was one of the best lessons I learned (and just recently) . It allowed me to put more of the budget into room treatment, clean power, and cables which are much more important.

3. Do you want a pleasant or unpleasant sounding system?
I had many very high end systems with NO real satisfaction, until I realized
why a certain company aimed for a particular sound..

4. McIntosh:
As a high end audiophile, I regarded McIntosh as just a little above Bose for about 40 years.-- (not good)
I thought I was an elite audiophile who knew way too much about our hobby to buy equipment that was well made, but never state of the art and colored in its own way.

This was TOTALLY WRONG, as I realize now.
McIntosh goes for a beautiful sound for HUMAN ears, not for specification charts. This is not a flat response, and uses autoformers to get this gorgeous sound. If you know enough about all the other things in our hobby, such as room treatments, very clean power, and very good cables, you can bring a gorgeous sounding McIntosh system to unheard of levels. I have done this now, and I have never enjoyed my music more!

Joe55ag


joe55ag

Showing 2 responses by antigrunge2

antigrunge2
1,331 posts
 
1. Learn to listen: compare different recordings of the same music, easiest done on classical music. Watch out for phrasing, room echo, dynamics etc.

2. Listen to learn: change speaker positioning gradually using the same piece of music. Change positioning of isolation feet under equipment (near the power supply, under output transformers, etc.)
Gradually change VTA and azimuth on your cartridge. Change tonearm cable (most important) as well as other interconnects as well as speaker cables. On digital try galvanic isolators for ethernet as well as USB.

3. Enjoy the music. Don‘t overdo the tuning
antigrunge2
1,331 posts
 

A few contentious opinions

1. Short cables are better than long cables

2. Solid core OHNO is better than litz

3. First clean up the power

4.Make sure everything has good grounding

5. Then fight RFI/EMI wherever possible

6. Put speakers on springs

7.use good footers/ support on all components

8.fine tune speaker and seat positioning

9. proper room damping on standing waves makes a big difference

10, listen listen listen

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