Audio Proz Service and Sales

About the Esoteric Audiophile Gear. Is it indeed what it is supposed to be?

(Educational)

Jul 24th, 2015

We get many letters and phone calls asking about certain high dollar audiophile gear, which all basically boil down to - does this unit do what they claim it does?

Many manufacturers make remarkable claims of amazing fidelity. Are these electronic designs capable of revealing or creating more lifelike imaging or depth of detail when amplifying pre-recorded music? Does the use of super special capacitors, wiring, and connectors by esoteric manufacturers create euphonic nirvana? Listeners are so cleverly convinced of the quality of sound reproduced by a fancy built and expensive device, they will defend their choices quite adamantly. The problem is they are not really making a fair comparison of all existing technology at any price point low or high. No doubt there are some beautifully built and well thought out designs, with the best intentions to faithfully amplify the audio or in some cases to effect the audio sound staging to be enhanced somehow. Indeed certain combinations of speakers and amplifiers and related equipment do create a particular sound quality of being more powerful or detailed or simple so subtly euphonic. However, be aware such effects can be created for $200 as well as $2000. I’ve heard such effects myself and it’s true that we music listeners will pursue and build a certain stereo system with our preferred sound character in our personal listening situation. But here’s the problem. I’ve been in this business of Audio electronics for 30 years (with experience working in product engineering, servicing and selling etc.) and I am not seeing enough of this high priced stuff live up to it’s price tag. Don’t get me wrong, some of it does have it’s merits and I would recommend such electronics which perform well and are built to last. Definitely consumers should get the longest lasting and consistent performing products. I’ve seen too many serious audiophiles waste their money on clever looking or special claims of performance in a product which have design defects or problems of operating well under serious use. I’ll explain more about this later. Use your common sense when specious claims are made. For example, one manufacturer claimed to use a fancy name copper wire which was 90% more efficient than regular wire. Wooow!!! Does that mean all the electrons are being distorted somehow in all other wire made previously. Simple logic would lead us to believe that all copper wire used all over the world is terribly inefficient (losing 90% of their important electrons). This is science fiction. Believe me, why would any electric company want to lose 90% of the energy it generates! Manufacturers make strange claims, (more in the esoteric realm). The point to mention here, and it should ring out like a bell, is that I’ve heard $200 things sound much better than $2000 things way too often. If people are curious, I’ll make up an interesting list of strange manufacturers claims, but probably can’t be up to date (the threat of litigation looms if you let the cat out of the bag - I recently lost my cat by the way, I’m hurting to get a new one. FYI.)

The point I am making, and the real tragedy is that so many audiophiles could be purchasing really good things which do more and are quickly flexible to adapt to different music. Another obvious question to ask: Is it possible a $2000 preamp with volume control, and a few switches has some magical capability to make classical, rock, jazz, country, vintage, modern, etc. sound specifically better? I don’t think so. I’ve never recognized such a thing. What I have seen that works are improvements in speaker design and use of enhancement devices such as equalizers and image correction devices. Why an audiophile will not learn or consider to use an equalizer to fix basic sonic imbalances of the mix created in the studio and is suspicious especially because most music has been altered for media appeal. I know improvements can be made and it is frustrating to one who has used such devices. Certain processor products are easy to use and they make a truly obvious difference, usually for the better if a knowledgeable salesman demonstrates. Consumers should realize that for both better and worse all of our media products from film to stereo are manipulated in some strange way before we get it. Point to be made is even a basic audio preamp with a little tone control can quickly adjust music to your taste, brighter or thicker to be simplistic.

Obviously if you feel your music is too thin sounding, advancing the bass can thicken and warm or add power and definition to the bass. If your music sounds too bright or edgy, lessening the treble level can create a warmer sound. The important effect now to realize is that psycho acoustically more detail in music will appear because you’ve lessened the troublesome character which annoys your. Of course this does not solve all the problems but suddenly a favorite piece of music becomes listenable. I strongly emphasize this possibility to alter music to your taste because so many recording, CD, records, etc. have great performances and music on them. Why toss them just because you don’t like the sound.

Thanks for your interest.
-Vince


Update 2008-01-12 Vince got a new cat. They have been getting along famously. All is well.

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