I don't want to beat a dead horse but I'm bugged.

I think you answered your own question.

If a reviewer bases his/her opinion on only tech specs,-which is something you believe are not the end all- then why should you bother to consider his opinion?

There are plenty of people on the internet who seem to believe their opinions are valid. Only you can decide whether to take them seriously or not.

B

Some individuals need to understand or want to believe everything in existence can be understood purely in objective terms. I understand the desire, need and validity of objective inquiry, I don't understand entirely discounting the value of our human senses.

Thats like a restaurant critic looking at a plate and not tasting it.....   Some of my worst measuring gear sounds great, so who cares.   They literally don't care what it sounds like.  Measures bad?  Must be bad..   Measures great?  It's the best....

I have zero interest in ASR

I think that in the not too distant future we are going to learn that there are many dimensions of our perception that don't align with current systems of measured performance.

I'm not familiar with AVS, but I had no idea that there were any on line reviewers who did measurement reviews without and accompanying listening test. That makes no sense.  

If you want to simply trash products based on measurements the last thing you want to do is listen to them and realize they actually sound good. It's pure self defense.

My ears are my ultimate measuring device.   My systems are built around what makes me happy, not some guy on the web that takes “audio” gear,and doesn’t “listen” to it. To me,that makes no sense.  That would be like writing a car review based on a dyno run,without ever driving it. 

I understand the desire, need and validity of objective inquiry...

Thanx, that helps.

                                        Didn’t you get the memo?

     Today, if you dare to believe what your eyes, ears, mind and bank account tell you; there MUST be something wrong with YOU!

 Those, "authorities" are there to protect you from your faulty senses, broken/misguided mind and the dangers of things like facts, truth and whatever else they might find discomfiting, at the moment (their b_tch de jour).

     Just get in line, do and believe what you’re told, like good little sheeple.

"Help me package that so I can at least understand what they are thinking without dismissing them completely as a bunch of mislead sheep."

"I don’t understand entirely discounting the value of our human senses."

@russ69 

this is why i pay no attention to the clowns at asr (site operator and fan boys), they are idiots because they miss entire plot

that that site has some success and followers really befuddles me... but whatever floats your boat as a far as hobbies go...

@rodman99999 

Your assessment is correct. This is where we are as a society. The problem is that many have bought into the idea that science is the final arbitar of all truth. The bigger problem is that these same people do not adhere to sound scientific procedure. In this instance the science is incomplete because it failed to observe and analyze all aspects of the amp. 

I believe a case can be made that they are not interested in science as a tool to find truth. If they did, they would observe and analyze all facets of the amp in order to arrive at the truth. Instead, they see science as something much higher... something to be adored, similar to a god. And this is why they rush to the defense of their perceived science if and when it is threatened. Iow this is Scientism

jjss49 +1

What is the purpose of an audio amplifier? If you don't review it doing it's intended purpose, have you reviewed it?

@russ69  - Don't Worry, Be Happy. You have a system that you enjoy and that's what it's all about...

Ideology trumps all for some. 

Where do measurements count?
Distortion: 1-10% depends on load and volume. There is a number to deal with.
I'd take a deep breath before I listened if I would at all. Some tube systems are very close to those specs. 

True story:

A guy I know locally, bought a DAC a few years ago. He loved it. It sounded very good. For about 6-8 months, until one of those measurements sites posted a measurement based review. Very poor measurements apparently. At which point, that guy decided the DAC sounded very bad, and sold it.

:-)

The greatest issue I have with pure measurement crowd is their failure to acknowledge we haven't yet developed a measurement protocol or equipment to replicate the human experience of listening to the reproduction of music through an audio system. ASR posters actually admit to as much when they do post their listening impressions.

Still, I'd say the thing that most bugs me is how often I observe people trying to OBJECTIFY sensory perception. The one thing I observe audiophiles arguing about more than any other on audio forums is the dismissal or discounting of other's perceptions of what they hear when listening to a particular piece of equipment. One person enjoys this certain piece of equipment, other's find the sound quality of that piece less enjoyable or dismiss it entirely. Perhaps they did hear that piece in some other system and didn't enjoy what they heard, but that doesn't take negate the other person's enjoyable experience. First of all, it is nearly inevitable the two systems were entirely different, second, it fails to acknowledge differences in sensory perception. Sensory perception is just that, it is our perception or interpretation of our senses, this is entirely unique and/or subjective.

While I don't take issue with others posting differing perceptions of a particular component, I do have a problem when others dismiss or degrade the other's sensory experience. You often hear this dismissal is the form of calling another a tin ear. The other attack takes the form of stating objective faults with human senses, things like confirmation bias or failing to do double blind tests. Some can't accept others perceive and/or interpret things differently than they do. I see far more tyranny from objectivists posing as subjectivists, they've elected themselves king golden ears.

Measurements tell me how many pages the story is. Listening tells me the plot, and all the little details that keep me interested in finding out the ending.

Great comments!

**** I think that in the not too distant future we are going to learn that there are many dimensions of our perception that don’t align with current systems of measured performance. ****

Bingo! I would take it a step further. I don’t think we will ever be able to “fully align our perceptions with measured performance”. And, you know what? I like it that way. Notice how there is always one very important word missing from these discussions, particularly on the part of the objectivists: MUSIC.

How does one quantify the reason that one drummer can lay down a fantastic groove; while another sounds accurate, but like a machine? Or, the sense that he and the bass player are in total musical sync, as opposed to in their own musical universes? Or, the subtle, but crucial feeling of tension, like a coiled spring, that an orchestra’s string section brings to the performance of a musical passage when they make a beautiful and seamless crescendo from ppp to fff ? What measurements exist that explain the perception of these very real things? And, aren’t these things what ultimately make the listening experience enjoyable? As in music, those are the things of the ART of audio electronic design; some designers have it and way too many don’t.

Didn’t you get the memo?

@rodman99999

Today, if you dare to believe what your eyes, ears, mind and bank account tell you; there MUST be something wrong with YOU!

Those, "authorities" are there to protect you from your faulty senses, broken/misguided mind and the dangers of things like facts, truth and whatever else they might find discomfiting, at the moment (their b_tch de jour).

Just get in line, do and believe what you’re told, like good little sheeple.

An excellent summation as to where we currently in many instances. Many other  terrific and on the bullseye comments here. There's hope after all. 

Charles

What the OP is stating is that the website known as ASR and Amir himself, are both severely out of balance. Dangerously out of balance. This was announced via the stated point of Amir ’not actually listening to the given DUT’. (device under test)

There is a chance he did it purposely as a dig, as a poorly veiled spitting upon, as it were. Monkey talk. Purposeful escalation.

Importantly, one who does not use measurements at all, is also ’potentially’ out of balance.

’Potentially’ as they must understand that measurements DO count for something, even if that given gauge (ie, tool) or measurement system is not fully connected to the ear/brain aspects, as it is all currently understood. Ie, that we argue it, meaning it is not at all clear - as question and answer sets may go.

Discussion of realities begets solutions, which, to possibly bother some, via saying it... is why Musk is trying to buy Twitter. To prevent further slide into fascist psychological gaming ideology - being practiced upon us, via the window of Twitter. To enable actual discussion, not the current psychological manipulative directive where social media is being sculpted into being a hammer - by forces not recognized by the masses.

We’ve already seen the response, it is swift and outsized, which denotes panic. Which is inherently dangerous. Those who feel threat will commit to wild dangerous swings.

One theory is as good as the next I guess. You can manufacture conspiracies and ulterior motives in everything if you want to. Personally, I go for the simplest explanation first. All the measurement guys are telling you is that the product has poor measurements. OK. Thanks for the information. I’ll take it from here. 

So, I head over to AVS and read Amir's review

the website known as ASR and Amir himself

My bad, I am referring to ASR not AVS but they are both of the same ilk. 

@russ69

Can anybody provide some insight to why some people are stuck on audio measurements?

Because this is the way that the equipment we all love so much has been designed and built for decades and decades now.

We can trace this lineage way back to the likes of the great Peter Walker (legendary Quad designer) who claimed he didn’t need to listen to an amp to guage how it sounded if he could just see how it measured.

This was over 60 years ago.

So as far as the designer is concerned, the listening part is almost academic nowadays.

Quality control, when it’s actually done, is carried out by measurements and not by listening.

I hope this goes some way towards answering your question.

No one is saying that the consumer cannot make their buying decision on listening alone, certainly not Amir of ASR, but subjective listening is a completely different thing from objectively building something to perform as accurately as possible.

Unless accuracy is important to you, you can simply ignore factual data as you wish. That’s your choice.

It certainly would be a shame if your previous enjoyment of the Rogue Sphinx V3 is spoilt by factual data, but unfortunately that’s how many of us tend to behave that way.

I used to mainly buy equipment based on largely subjective reviews and that hardly ever worked out either.

This is the risk you took by heading over to the ASR website review. Amir is in the business of telling it like he sees it, based on concrete measurement far more than opinionated listening, and many of us are grateful for that.

In any case, here is a link for anyone who wants to read the original review.

People shouldn’t get so offended by measurements. Especially audiophiles who are supposedly more in the know. It makes one sound insecure. Without measurements there would be nothing to judge. Zealots on the other side of the fence would be well advised to take a chill pill too.

Of course nothing will change as usual. People love to rant and declare how wrong everyone else is.  That’s it in a nutshell. 

I don't think anyone gets offended by measurements. I do think people get offended when the measurement crowd poops in their subjective (read: personal preferences) enjoyment of music and good audio by declaring placebo, hallucination, "prove it to me", double blind test, evidence, and that kind of stuff.

If distortion is < then 1% and signal to noise > 90dB it is worth a listen for me 😀

Welcome to the world of "alternative facts" folks. It's been happening for some time now. People with an agenda will resort to all manner of lies and deception to win over the unwashed masses. 

Those of the "measurements are the only thing that matters" crowd have their own agenda  (I don't even want to entertain what motivates them). They claim that measurements are the final arbiter of truth. That there is no higher learning and that it's absolute, nothing higher or better to judge by. Hogwash. 

As time goes on, there will be better ways of measuring and knowing what to measure, instead of relying on some biblical electrical codex, like they were stone tablets brought down from on high. They've framed the argument that way as it's something we can all innately relate to, but it's a very faulty premise. Too bad it's developed as large a cult following as it has but that's human nature: to belong to something larger than yourself, and as we all know, we don't make mistakes, do we? 😄

All the best,
Nonoise

John Atkinson measured the Border Patrol dac that Herb Reichert reviewed, who found it to sound magnificent. John found that it did not measure well. I’m not certain if he even gave it a listen. I believe he was bewildered as to what Herb heard. Anyhow, that is just one example. There are countless reviews both individual consumers and pro reviewers that found that the Sphinx integrated V1-V3 sounds terrific. So, unless lots and lots of people have awful hearing or frequently suffer hallucinations, then it must sound pretty darn good. I'm actually contemplating buying a V3, not that I need one. Herb mentions in his review of the V3, that it is destined to be a classic, just like the NAD 3020....

Measurements are for designers to ensure that a component works to specification and to improve on areas where they feel that those degrade audio quality.

All measurements are objective but have credit and a meaning only when comparing apples to apples but even then do not show the whole story.

We the rest judge by experience and that is what drives this hobby since its birth.

@nonoise :

Those of the "measurements are the only thing that matters" crowd have their own agenda

More like a marketing tool, a sales pitch. No different than other sales pitch.

I don't even want to entertain what motivates them

At the top of the list.... money. As with everything in life. Right below, my guess is, things like ego, fame, popularity.

Some engineers don't listen or want to. Many are in it only in it for the specs, not the music. The special designers with golden ears are a rare breed any more.  

OP,

Yes, good observation. I have managed technical people all my life. As one example, programmers… they love to program… so if you are not careful… as soon as they hear what is wanted… they happily roll up their sleeves and start programming, only to later find out they really didn’t fully understand what the requirements were. This is one aspect… doing what he likes to do. Well, many engineers love to measure things and make pretty charts. Amir loves this view into the world of electronics. Unfortunately, this just doesn’t reflect how equipment sounds.

Second, I have worked with hundreds of electrical engineers, they tend to think (I’m sorry) they know it all and that the real world conforms to their technical understanding of it. So, they simply refuse to believe the charts do not tell all. Engineers tend to be really stubborn in this.

So, add the two together and you get Amir’s site. It sounds logical, the charts are pretty. He is having a great time showing how full of bunk the audio world is. 

This is one of the reason that good audio designers are fairly rare.

Acoustic sound experience is subjectively registered FIRST and studied with objective measured implementation only after that...

Musical interpretation CANNOT be tought to an artificial Intelligence why?

Because it take a body rooted in the earth soil to make music meaningful experience...

Without a living heart sound cannot be an emotion... An emotion dont live in time but GENERATE his own time into the body metabolism by the way...

In acoustic and psycho-acoustic we not only try to replicate human hearing up to a point, but we study what make human hearing IRREPRODUCIBLE in the phenomenon called musical interpretation and perception...

Measuring gear and thinking that it is valuable to pick a piece of gear without listening to it is pathetical move...Ignorance to the third power...

😁😊

Physics is born with music and Pythagorean school in Greek time...There is no objective descritption and explanation of tonal playing perception even now...

And the geometer Fields medallist Alain Connes just connected music, primes numbers distributions and the deepest mysteries of quantum physics together...

And someone think that we can reduce sound experience to few measured tools? and what about music experience which even transcend sound itself ? why?

Because say Alain Connes "music"  reflect the non commutative geometry behind TIME experience itself...What is this source of diversities and variations behind time? it is a moving consciousness out of time...Emotion generate his OWN time out of time...

The musical tone scale is non commutative...

Musical time and tempo cannot be measured by a clock BY DEFINITION...

It is the reason by Valery Gergiev say that no one succeeded to imitate Furtwangler tempi...They emerge from music they are not put over the notes externally by a mechanical clock.....These tempi cannot be measured they only can be feeled in a body resonance effect... Call it ectasy or emotions...

Then Amir disciples are deluded crowd to the extreme... They are separed from reality by three qualitative gap: sound experience....music experience.... spiritual experience...When we listen we reunite these three gaps in one body/emotion

Anybody can hear but we must learn to listen....

I guess for some folks, having a super-precise instrument/piece of gear is of more importance than how it sounds.

As long as each side respects the other, seems equally valid to me, though I'm into sounds myself, not measurements. 

Bingo! I would take it a step further. I don’t think we will ever be able to “fully align our perceptions with measured performance”. And, you know what? I like it that way. Notice how there is always one very important word missing from these discussions, particularly on the part of the objectivists: MUSIC.

How does one quantify the reason that one drummer can lay down a fantastic groove; while another sounds accurate, but like a machine? Or, the sense that he and the bass player are in total musical sync, as opposed to in their own musical universes? Or, the subtle, but crucial feeling of tension, like a coiled spring, that an orchestra’s string section brings to the performance of a musical passage when they make a beautiful and seamless crescendo from ppp to fff ? What measurements exist that explain the perception of these very real things? And, aren’t these things what ultimately make the listening experience enjoyable? As in music, those are the things of the ART of audio electronic design; some designers have it and way too many don’t.

Great post  indeed that reflect also my experience...

Thanks

It's hard to imagine Amir grasping the beauties of tube amplification.

Let both worlds exist. Let the arguments continue to play out. Hope that laws aren’t passed that make it a crime to submit to one side or the other. I see the bumper stickers now. "Love a tube amp. Go to jail.".

So as far as the designer is concerned, the listening part is almost academic nowadays.

I think that is the way mass market audio is designed. It is designed to a cost bracket and a specification requirement. But I understand for quality audio gear that is only the starting point and extensive listening tests are conducted and the component values are changed not to perfect the specifications but to make the product sound right. And that is where the two camps diverge. One camp thinks they are finished after the measurements take place and the other camp starts going to work after that point. 

Measurements are certainly important, but I don't think they tell the entire story.

One man's trash is another man's treasure.

But if you're looking for accuracy in terms of audio fidelity, I think measurements are very important.

Electrical measurements are important for the DESIGNER of the product...Less so for the listener who cannot interpret anyway most electrical measures...

Acoustical measurement are way more important for the LISTENER in his room...Alas! way less important sometimes for many designers...But some designer know acoustic for sure, the best one...

Confusing the two  situations with the same word: " measurement" then means nothing...

One man’s treasure is sometimes trash for everyone else ...

Measurements are certainly important, but I don’t think they tell the entire story.

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.

But if you’re looking for accuracy in terms of audio fidelity, I think measurements are very important.

@russ69 ..."One camp thinks they are finished after the measurements take place and the other camp starts going to work after that point."

Exactly. I too see it as a starting point for the designers with a different passion. Those who design, refine, and iterate until they truly reach engaging sound. Once they get there, it can actually measure a little worse and sound better, or only to those with open minds and ears, setting the graphs aside for a moment to listen more.

Making decisions solely on measurements is akin to judging meals only on salt content. If they have to the same salt content they must taste the same right?

My favorites are the anti tube guys saying they don’t want distortion in their system. Unless you are listening to a tone generator the distortions are what allow you to determine if the same note is coming from a trumpet or clarinet. Distortions are what cause the tonal differences between the same instruments.

Measurements are guidelines not rules of superiority. Steve Deckert at Decware is designing a new 300b amp. (I guess a two year wait just isn’t enough) He talks about his design process and while a specified circuit provides the proper current and voltage it doesn’t necessarily sound good, There is an art to this that measurements can’t provide.

In conclusion, how can what we hear be measured?  In medieval times the minor chords were knows as the Devils Chord because of the feeling it evoked. How can the feelings of emotion that music brings that be measured?

https://aleteia.org/2018/10/25/a-medieval-forbidden-musical-sequence-the-devil-in-music-or-the-devils-chord/

Great post! thanks very much...

In conclusion, how can what we hear be measured? In medieval times the minor chords were knows as the Devils Chord because of the feeling it evoked. How can the feelings of emotion that music brings that be measured?

https://aleteia.org/2018/10/25/a-medieval-forbidden-musical-sequence-the-devil-in-music-or-the-devils-chord/

May have to rename the site Audiokarens.

It's a measurement. It has no emotion. Amir didn't call your favorite piece of audio equipment ugly, the measurement did.

I ordered a pair of the Fiio 5 IEMs that he reviewed with very low distortion. So far I am impressed. I have also owned tube amps. I liked them too. I am not emotionally attached to any of it.

The acoustic engineer who did my listening room took a ton of measurements. It sounds fantastic. Well worth the money.

His measurements seem competent. Not scientific lab quality but competent. It's unemotional. It just is. I am sure many of you have been in a room where the person said "this sounds great" and you were thinking "this sounds awful". Do you need another person's opinion that is not your own? Why does Amir's opinion matter so much?

Let it go.

I personally find some of the measurements fascinating on speakers and headphones/IEMs. It is interesting to see the measurements and try to relate that to what I hear. They got me into equalizing headphones and IEMs too. What a difference!

It's a human thing: when it's written in stone, it becomes objective and sacred. It needs no further validation... (who cares about listening.) Judgements can be made, and people will fall in line. Who cares about the art, beauty, music, humanity.... let's turn our fascination of art to a fascination with number-crunching.

Sadly, people often neglect the fact that the EASIEST THING ON THE PLANET FOR _ANY_ even HALF-WAY COMPETENT ENGINEER is to design and build  a product that produces stellar measurement on the LIMITED SET OF MEASUREMENTS USED TO TEST AUDIO GEAR.

Great measurements will only establish 1 thing:

The product was designed to be a mainstream poster-child, most likely without any respect on how it sounds. If it measures absolutely perfectly: RED LIGHT, RUN AWAY!

Every amplifier and loudspeaker designer (worth his salt) will agree with the words above...

These measurements tell us these two things, and absolutely nothing more:

1. The equipment is functioning according to design parameters.

2. The equipment has been SPECIAL TUNED TO EXCEL AT THESE MEASUREMENTS. Excelling at certain measurements is EASY with certain tricks (eg loops of feedback). Yet, using such tricks skews other performance parameters, that ARE NOT MEASURED as pat of the standard measurement sets, yet still COUNT. We are routinely testing maybe 1-5% of all the parameters that are needed for accurate sound reproduction, and eve those measurements are MASSIVELY FLAWED. For example, we test how an amplifier drives a resistor, which has very little to nothing to do with how it drives a loudspeaker!

If an amplifier measures perfectly it means that the product is a PERFECT PRECISION HEATER. However, tells next to NOTHING about its sonic virtues.

Well reasoned arguments are countered by the ultimate troll.
Who'da thought?

We've been telling him to "let it go" for ages under all his past incarnations and he has the audacity to take our advice and use it as his own.

All the best,
Nonoise

Yet, using such tricks skews other performance parameters, that ARE NOT MEASURED as pat of the standard measurement sets, yet still COUNT. We are routinely testing maybe 1-5% of all the parameters that are needed for accurate sound reproduction, and eve those measurements are MASSIVELY FLAWED

@realworldaudio , I feel most of what you wrote is made up. I don't think you will be able to clearly articulate what is missing from the measurements and certainly not 95% of the things that are missing. Perhaps this is the issue. This sounds more like outrage mob mentality that reasonsed criticism. I am welcome to be proven wrong.

@realworldaudio , I feel most of what you wrote is made up. I don’t think you will be able to clearly articulate what is missing from the measurements and certainly not 95% of the things that are missing. Perhaps this is the issue. This sounds more like outrage mob mentality that reasonsed criticism. I am welcome to be proven wrong.

What is missing from the meassurements is the way the gear will interact with the other piece of gear in a specific room for specific ears...Listening is mandatory here...And what is missing are the unknown or/and   the non selected possible measures too...No one selected ALL POSSIBLE measures...Which one set matter is not absolute certainty in all case...

 The "Selected"  by Amir  isolated measures from a single piece of gear means not much for the final listening test...Save for the designer itself going on with his engineering designing standards confronting them to Amir own results.....

By the way you cannot be proven wrong because you COULD not be even wrong ever in this case : if from Amir measures you deduced " an hypothetical sound quality level" which will never be proven to exist IN ITSELF without linking this piece of gear to some other interacting system parts in some controlled or uncontrolled room and to some specific ears in a LISTENING EXPERIMENTS ...

Room are also like headphones, ultimately they can be fit for one pair of specific ears ...Studio acoustic is not Hall acoustic and neither of them is small room acoustic...Why? geometry, size, topology, acoustic content and in the case of a small room ONE listener with specific hearing history and taste not many recording engineers or a crowd...

I am certain I asked the question of @realworldaudio . Would it not be appropriate to let him/her answer?