What Matters and What is Nonsense


I’ve been an audiophile for approximately 50 years. In my college days, I used to hang around the factory of a very well regarded speaker manufacturer where I learned a lot from the owners. When I started with audio it was a technical hobby. You were expected to know something about electronics and acoustics. Listening was important, but understanding why something sounded good or not so good was just as important. No one in 1968 would have known what you were talking about if you said you had tweaked your system and it sounded so much better. But if you talked about constant power output with frequency, or pleasing second-order harmonic distortion versus jarring odd-order harmonics in amplification, you were part of the tribe.

Starting in the 1980s, a lot of pseudo scientific nonsense started appearing. Power cords were important. One meter interconnects made a big difference. Using a green magic marker on the edge of a CD was amazing. Putting isolation dampers under a CD transport lifted the veil on the music. Ugh. This stuff still make my eyes roll, even after all these years.

So I have decided to impart years and years of hard won knowledge to today’s hobbists who might be interested in reality. This is my list of the steps in the audio reproduction chain, and the relative importance of each step. My ranking of relative importance includes a big dose of cost/benefit ratio. At this point in the evolution of audio, I am assuming digital recording and reproduction.

Item / Importance to the sound on a scale of 1-10 / Cost benefit ratio

  • The room the recording was made in / 8 / Nothing you can do about it
  • The microphones and setup used in the recording / 8 / nothing you can do about it.
  • The equalization and mixing of the recording / 10 / Nothing you can do about it
  • The technology used for the recording (analog, digital, sample rate, etc.) / 5 / nothing you can do about it.
  • The format of the consumer recording (vinyl, CD, DSD, etc.) 44.1 - 16 really is good enough / 3 / moderate CB ratio
  • The playback device i.e. cartridge or DAC / 5 / can be a horribe CB ratio - do this almost last
  • The electronics - preamp and amp / 4 / the amount of money wasted on $5,000 preamps and amps is amazing.
  • Low leve interconnects / 2 / save your money, folks
  • Speaker cables / 3 / another place to save your money
  • Speakers / 10 / very very high cost to benefit ratio. Spend your money here.
  • Listening room / 9 / an excellent place to put your money. DSPs have revolutionized audio reproduction
In summary, buy the best speakers you can afford, and invest in something like Dirac Live or learn how to use REW and buy a MiniDSP HD to implement the filters. Almost everything else is a gross waste of money.
128x128phomchick
Everything matters and nothing is nonsense or is it nothing matters and everything is nonsense, I can't remember. This stuff is so confusing.
fleschler
Thanks for input. I have enough experience to re do some PS caps and a few others as well a cord without messing up too bad. (Some switching supplies can be a bit touchy) Fortunately schematic is on HiFi Engine. Will be using mostly as transport but keeping noise down and plenty of juice to the laser makes sense. Likely will do some chasis damping and maybe the drawer.
I found an interesting CHOICE of "wasapi"  outputs in AIMP software, one labled "Schiit gen 2 USB".(!)  It did seem to improve things into the Bitfrost but am a "bit" confused because I thought bit perfect wasapi was one thing. Need to read more and invite knowledgeable commentary.
Out of respect to OP, moving my speakers a little and hanging some modestly priced absorbers, including behind speakers, makes the most difference. The rest  is mostly fun.
BTW intellectually I have a hard time really believing power cords make a difference but emotionally, a nice robust mechanically stable short as practical cable is quite satisfying. For 20 bucks, a nibbler and solder.
The Mapleshade modded Cambridge CD in the other set up came with what looks like Saran Wrap outer cover on power cord. It is a fun conversation piece if nothing else and the whole thing does sound good.

I choose not to engage with folks who state opinions unpleasantly but dont mind firm opinions, it  being a given that all such are combination of knowledge base, experience and internal synthesis. Most of y'all are great fun and I appreciate it.  A lot of the fun for me is that the stakes are low. It is a good escape from many of our jobs, or civic, political and personal engagements where stakes can be much higher. This is not really the place for that, me thinks.  It is intriguing that on line forums interaction is an evolving communication thing with its own linguistics, sociology, and signal to noise ratio.
What's that old saying about mind over matter?
If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.....