I don't believe cables make a difference, any input?

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I think John's, perhaps inadvertently, pulling your chain.

He has said in the past that when he's got something he thinks is good, or an improvement, and it measures and sounds right to him, that he sends it to people he trusts and they get to listen and play with it and tell him what they think, because he doesn't trust his own ears.

It's a sort of informal DBT - should work pretty well since he's not there.

Naughty, naughty, John :nownow:

Mind you, he's right about the mags. I stopped reading those hifi mags over 30 years ago because I had the impression they were taking in each others' washing.

The last couple of decades AES has perhaps published a lot more research having to with developing 'OK' sound with minimal resources - CODECS and so forth - rather than publishing bleeding edge research on very best sound quality and how to achieve it. I suspect this is because not a whole lot of research is going in that direction - where is the money for it going to come from?


Am I the only one befuddled by this statement?

Controlled testing is less "serious research" than subjective impression?

How will we go about designing better audio without a theory as to how to create it?

How do we know when we have actually found "better" audio w/o testing? And how can you eliminate bias without it being double blind? Seriously.

All this "DBT is bad" c**p is insane. How else is bias eliminated? Why is it the gold standard for all testing except audio, dowsing and fortune telling?

How do you propose to "progress" in your research when you have no idea if what you wish to measure even exists beyond your perceptions, (Biased and variable perceptions at that. Assuming you're human and all...), much less how to define it?

Even if you are sure you hear a difference and all you are trying to do is figure out how to measure it, you are unqualified to do any testing until you prove your bias is not going to affect the test.

Seems to me, no matter how you look at it, trying to ascertain cause w/o quantifying effect first, is putting the cart before the horse.

Eric
 
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Problem is if you trust DBT's (considering the way they are done) more than your ears then mid-fi should be the ultimate sound. Your choice.

I don't get that Andre. First of all, DBT's are all about listening - the ears, remember?
Secondly, what's the connection between DBT and mid-fi? I don't understand that. Care to explain?

jd
 
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TG,

It's not often that I feel personally offended by a poster, but you pulled it off. In a previous post you called me intellectually dishonest for calling attention to expectation bias in uncontrolled testing.

Again in this post:
[snip] "the rationalist folks" when they seem to be incapable of having an intelligent discussion/debate/arguement without the need to resort to calling me and those others who believe like I do, irrational, or claim I/we probably also believe in magic, leprechauns, Santa Claus and/or the Easter bunny simply because we can hear things that are not ---{presently}--- explained by the types of testing they believe "should" be sufficient enough to define what we're hearing![snip]

you accuse the rationalists (and I count myself among them) as unable to have an intelligent discussion. Well, read the posts here by the rationalists. Aren't they reasonably intelligent? Your are unfair to all those that clearly try to have an intelligent conversation.
Also we do not call you all those things. We only try to convince you to do a certain type (controlled) tests so we can all know where the beef is. You may not agree to all that, fine. But try to stay at least as honest as you want us to be.

jd
 
Jan, people that hear differences in cables will always be acused to be unscientific. It simply can not be proved to make a difference. I measured differences in cables and i got so much hate mail that i thought this poor souls must have been really cheated many times. i gave up to measure cable a long time ago but i still try to improve my cooking.
I use too much salt though most of the time.
 
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Jan, people that hear differences in cables will always be acused to be unscientific. It simply can not be proved to make a difference. I measured differences in cables and i got so much hate mail that i thought this poor souls must have been really cheated many times. i gave up to measure cable a long time ago but i still try to improve my cooking.
I use too much salt though most of the time.

I understand that Joachim, but I don't see why I should accept being called intellectually dishonest or unwilling/uncapable to have an intelligent discussion when it is clear to anyone that that just isn't true.

jd
 
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