The baseline, or reference has to be accuracy, in my opinion, or the problem becomes subjective and there is no answer or any measurements that could ever define someone subjectivity. But accuracy is definable and measureable. The more that one can remove subjectivity from the measurements and the interpretation the better. Of course we all see through our own eyes even when we look at "data", so some subjectivity remains. But not agreeing that subjectivity is a "problem" to be overcome and placing it as the "baseline" will never lead to anything useful - its highly individual and usually a moving target. You end up going in circles.
That research continues to this day, and a lot of the important findings did not take place until both worked at Harman
And i bet that as speakers strive to do well in the metric they came up with, that the metric will need to be further extended.
dave
I believe all the research took place in Canada & the US so that is a distinct possibility.
dave
I'm in big trouble here because I can't find the reference, but IIRC a music company did tests (DBT) to determine whether it was worthwhile releasing a catalogue of high definition material. In particular, going back to masters and digitizing.
Once again, IIRC, they used the same material for a group of approx 100, randomly selected (how was that done??) subjects.
It was presented as mp3, a bit worse than mp3, something between mp3 and CD, CD, and high def.
The majority of subjects couldn't reliably tell the difference between any of them. Something like eight subjects could reliably tell the difference between all of them.
(Interestingly, some data was collected before hand, not known to the testers, to find out hobbies, interests etc. Those eight apparently had indicated they were either, or both, musicians or hi-fi buffs).
Would a valid subjective/objective trial be to take 1000 subjects, find the 80 or so who can tell the difference, and use them as the DBT group for a more accurate assessment of things audio? Or was the sample group sufficiently large in Toole and Olive's study?
The company is apparently not going ahead with high def
.
Once again, IIRC, they used the same material for a group of approx 100, randomly selected (how was that done??) subjects.
It was presented as mp3, a bit worse than mp3, something between mp3 and CD, CD, and high def.
The majority of subjects couldn't reliably tell the difference between any of them. Something like eight subjects could reliably tell the difference between all of them.
(Interestingly, some data was collected before hand, not known to the testers, to find out hobbies, interests etc. Those eight apparently had indicated they were either, or both, musicians or hi-fi buffs).
Would a valid subjective/objective trial be to take 1000 subjects, find the 80 or so who can tell the difference, and use them as the DBT group for a more accurate assessment of things audio? Or was the sample group sufficiently large in Toole and Olive's study?
The company is apparently not going ahead with high def
.
Even in that kind of region, there is a great diversity of preferences. However, some large manufacturers noted US market generally like more boom to the sound. This could also be related with the way houses are built.
If there is a way to calibrate optinions or preferences, I would certainly be interested in participating in the process to see what the result is. Boom!!!You have data indicating otherwise, of course.
[Or is this just another uncalibrated opinion...?]
There is of course no way to calibrate individual opinions and prefrerences, which is what makes them useles. And I didn't know that "accuracy" differed from place to place.
Fiction, according to this work -- uncalibrated opinion. (Toole's words, BTW.)
What Earl is saying; if we listen to that it goes nowhere of utility but to empower subjectivist blather.
The metric specifies accurate, extended bass.
[JBL designs built to the T&O prescription are doing very well in Asia of late....
]
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Probably not. There are those (including me) who can detect those differences in DBTs but seem to be unable to hear all of those magic (but claimed to be stunningly obvious) differences in wire, capacitors, resistors, CD demagnetizers... So clearly, these are non-valid tests.
Then there are those who can detect differences in DBT's and ARE able to detect differences in various tweaks....So clearly, there is a disconnect between that sampling and yours.
YMMV as they say....
You'd be surprised what a JBL supplier would say. So 90% of audio discussions is blabber. What I think we have choices to make: deliver what we consider accurate, or deliver what a direct constomer wants regardless whether it's considered accurate or not since there isn't a standard definition that will gain worldwide concent of what is accurate, only what are more likely ingredients in defining what may be closer to being accurate.Fiction, according to this work -- uncalibrated opinion. (Toole's words, BTW.)
What Earl is saying; if we listen to that it goes nowhere of utility but to empower subjectivist blather.
The metric specifies accurate, extended bass.
[JBL designs built to the T&O prescription are doing very well in Asia of late....
I didn't know there was a consent on how to define what is more accurate in audio. There seems to be lots of continued effort to do so though. Maybe we are getting closer.
OH, yeah, we're going to get somewhere with hearsay innuendo here?
Generally speaking, mainstream manufacturers are in large part "with the program," and the "my way" fringe relegated to $10,000+ boutique niche designs.
[Many of which measure poorly with respect to the T&O metric....
]
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I gotta admit, I don't get it. Guess I'm not that logical or perverse.
As far as accuracy goes, I didn't realize it was so hard to define. Seems pretty simple. "Accurate enough" may be harder to define though easier to achieve.
Dan
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Problem is, this simple concept undermines the core tenets of the traditional belief system.
[Not to mention the entire industry segment still relying upon denial of fact for their livelihood...
]
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One of the results of Toole's 30 years of study was that once visual stimulus was removed, preferences were surprisingly similar.
dave
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