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Maybe being discerning isn't that good for us?

A topic I touch on now and then, I think about what the average person hears, what I hear, and what it means to be discerning. What good is it for us, our community, and the industry?

I’ll touch on a couple of clear examples. I was at a mass DAC shoot out and spoke with one of the few ladies there. To paraphrase her, she said this:

Only with DACs made in the the last few years can I listen to digital music without getting a headache.

I never had that problem, but we both experienced a significant improvement in sound quality at about the same time. Lets take her statement as 100% true for this argument.

On the other hand, I am completely insensitive to absolute phase issues which some claim to be. I’m also VERY sensitive to room acoustics, which many fellow audiophiles can completely ignore.

Lets assume the following:

  • The lady really did get headaches due to some issue with older DACs
  • There really are people very sensitive to absolute phase.

I’ve also found the concept of machine learning, and neural networks in particular truly fascinating. In areas of medical imaging, in specific areas such as breast cancer detection, neural networks can be more accurate than trained pathologists. In the case of detecting early cancer, discernment has an obvious advantage: More accuracy equals fewer unnecessary procedures, and longer lives, with less cost. Outstanding!!

Now what if, like the trained neural networks, I could teach myself to be sensitive to absolute phase? This is really an analog for a lot of other things like room acoustics, cables, capacitors, frequency response, etc, but lets stick to this.

Am I better off? Did I not in fact just go down a rabbit hole which will cause me more grief and suffering? Was I not better before I could tell positive vs. negative recording polarity?

How do you, fellow a’gonner stop yourself, or choose which rabbit holes to go through? Ever wonder if you went down one too many and have to step back?
erik_squires
genez
220 posts
 
Detecting absolute phase (polarity) depends on how accurate your speakers are. If you have crossovers placing the different drivers out of phase with one another, the speaker is not phase coherent.  Polarity detection requires a phase coherent speaker to hear the benefits best.  Crossovers can often times be wired out of phase between tweeters and the other driver.
Its why I always look for a first order crossover if the speakers are to have one.  My current speakers are crossover-less and full range..  I hear a difference when switching polarity with either speaker type.  One noticeable area is how the bass impacts the sound. When a bass note should be pushing towards you, reverse polarity will have the speaker pulling instead.
When in correct polarity = extrovert.
When in reverse polarity = withdrawn.
When not a phase coherent speaker?  Schizoid effect when reversing polarity.  What's heard can not be about realism, but rather about taste for whichever effect one prefers.  May get masked depending on how crossover is effecting drivers.  Bass might be better in one setting, but high and mids withdrawn a bit.  
fleschler
1,911 posts
 
Until I moved into my new home with its high end custom listening room, my wife would not listen to flutes, piccolos, vibraphones or other high pitched sharp transient music.  It hurt her hearing these.  Now, with an extended and controlled frequency sound, she is not adverse to listening for extended periods to any type of music and sound.  Yes, it's a high end system in an even higher end room.  It supports the point that women are more sensitive to high frequencies, especially if there is a brightness to them (dozens of my male friends never had a problem in the old room).  

It's peculiar that playing 78 rpm records translate in a room filling, full sound, as if there are no wall boundaries.  Too often CD transfers have the sound compressed in the middle between the speakers and stacked rather than spread out.  I also dislike early stereo recordings with hard left-right imaging, sometimes with a soloist in the middle.  Despite my great affection for Contemporary jazz recordinsgs, this is the only aspect that I dislike about them.  Many modern recordings, especially classical have the opposite problem of too deep a soundfield with mics set back in an auditorium or chamber music recorded in too large a hall.  
erik_squires OP
15,647 posts
 
FTR: You don't have to spend a lot of money to have good room acoustics, but it doesn't hurt. :)
fleschler
1,911 posts
 
The built in activated carbon room walls (16" thick) eliminated any bass problem and I hear my Focus speakers only 3 db down at 25 Hz (it's half the size of my former music room so was limited to 25 Hz).  Plus the room is no longer an issue.  My audio system now sounds high end without costing as much (only the DAC, cabling and tweaks are new, the rest of the equipment is from 1989 to 2006).  
chazzzy007
540 posts
 
I choose the rabbit holes that maximize the pleasure of my listening experience given a reasonable return of investment. I choose as starting points the #1 weakness in my system taking into consideration the limitations of my listening area. YMMV
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