A sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from voodoo.
You can lock five PhDs in a room for a week with any of these audio things and they won’t be able to figure them out,
Silver Holographic Foil
A bag of crystals
Schumann frequency generator
Freezing CDs
Demagnetizing CDs
Marking CD edge with purple pen
You can lock five PhDs in a room for a week with any of these audio things and they won’t be able to figure them out,
Silver Holographic Foil
A bag of crystals
Schumann frequency generator
Freezing CDs
Demagnetizing CDs
Marking CD edge with purple pen
At least 3 of this 5 things are pure fantasy ( edge of cd marking, bag of crystals and freezing cd - this one can have positive results on scratched cd though not repeatable and depend on severity of scratches).
And i can tell as i once been guinea pig of test a out this in an audio engineering school i worked for (ABX of course).
I suppose the others can be too but until you talked about them i didn't heard about...
Likewise Geoffkait your comment about outdoor or bigger room relative to cellphone... i identify one thing in common, by moving to such listening area you usually lower the effect of ER, change ratio of direct sound/ ER, move away critical distance.
I fear those better effects on audio are related to this more than other sources of perturbations ( and i agree outdoor is probably one of the best condition to evaluate loudspeakers, hemianechoic conditions).
Understood. However, the magnitude of the crime is in significant part how much ill gotten gains the perpetrators end up with, not how much take each victim for. Otherwise skimming less than one cent each from millions of banking transactions would only be an infraction of the law, not even a misdemeanor.
Also, the tape sellers wanted people to believe the implication of their advertising; that the breaking glass was a demonstration of the tape's superiority. When I was a teen, well before I went to college, I probably believed exactly as they intended. So did a lot of other people.
BTW, the reason for me bringing up the tape and cables as examples was merely to bring to mind that most of the difference between the two cases is how we choose to think about it. The old tape commercials were nostalgic. That gave some people here a positive feeling about them before it was brought up that the advertising was not actually some scientifically verified technical evidence of a superior tape, it was only to fool non-technical people into believing that.
IOW, I don't think its simply that the tape sellers and cable sellers are truth-tellers and liars, respectively. A large part of it is how we are predisposed/biased to look at the two, including the priming effect of a little pleasant nostalgia occurring first in the tape case.
Last edited:
Don't buy that. If flooby cables was a highly competitive market, as tapes were in the day and were selling for $6 a meter you might have a point, but instead they are an industry scam as the dealers make most of their profit on selling cables. Even the best buys of this world are in on it trying to sell $150 HDMI cables with a new TV.
CS43131 (probably also CS43198) seems to have noise floor modulation that may well be audible:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/is-the-cs43198-a-same-fake.403352/
Performance with single sine is top-notch (DR 130dBA) but with even 2 sine signals (IMD) or multitone the noise floor rises at least 20dB. Amazing that many vendors are selling DACs with this chip.
IIUC in the old days of hi fi shops, it was often the margin on cables that kept them in business. Even today with the Best Buys trying to keep their doors open while competing with Amazon, they probably need the higher margin on cables to make any money at all. That may not be enough profits to save them from going out of business either.
Also, if profit margin is the measure of a scam, then jewelry and costume jewelry must be one of the biggest. In addition, upscale cars carry a higher profit margin than entry level models. So I guess car manufactures and sellers are scammers too. Doesn't matter if the entry level market is very low profit and they need upscale car profit margins to make enough money to stay in business?
Last edited:
I have $150 HDMI cables. They’re great AND they’re controlled for directionality. Does that surprise you? AudioQuest Carbon HDMI cables. Accept no substitutes.
Incidentally, you can make more money selling run of the mill bog standard cables than selling Uber expensive ones. Much more. Do the math.
Incidentally, you can make more money selling run of the mill bog standard cables than selling Uber expensive ones. Much more. Do the math.
Last edited:
I don't know the big volume prices but the CS43131 is about $10 in hundreds the ESS9028PRO is 4 times that. So it's probably simple economics in a lot of cases. Personally I am not worried about things 100dB down as I have bigger issues in my system so the cheaper DAC might suit me.
In many cases yes. Same number of parts in a cheap car as an expensive one. But at least the upscale ones usually are actually more comfortable/faster/more space as well as acting as a rolling status symbol.
Apologies for using an off-the-cuff phrase as a jumping off point, it doesn't as far as I can see reflect your thinking, but you touch on something of wider import.
That narrative is conspiratorial in a way that damages science adoption. Telling someone a $150 cable probably won't make a difference or "did you watch Linus Tech Talks technical analysis of HDMI cables" is one thing. Self proclaimed science advocates shifting to an evidence free grand cabal of evil hifi grifters pushing snake oil is more likely to leave them asking "are they in the room with us now?" Doubling down by insisting on the privilege of a nebulous objective standpoint just pushes them further away. This is not hyperbole. The always superior, never demonstrated duped-consumer/cynical-manufacturer world view often comprises the bulk of participant comment on forums claiming to defend audio science whenever a review is poor.
The wider public are unlikely to ever know Karl Popper from a cartoon character but people can sniff out credible limits to knowledge and self-aggrandisement instinctively. Best Buy probably saw a market and filled a niche.
Last edited:
You are right, I chose my words badly there. I was trying to split luxury branding, where you buy something knowing it's expensive for what it is (think giant wristwatch when a $50 casio is more accurate and reliable) vs a hifi cable or gold plated half the price of the TV HDMI lead where some people see it as a status symbol but others are persuaded it will somehow improve things.
Mind you the day I see an advert with a topless male model with speaker cable draped over their torso I'll know the world has gone mad. (seen a perfume advert recently?)
Mind you the day I see an advert with a topless male model with speaker cable draped over their torso I'll know the world has gone mad. (seen a perfume advert recently?)
rdf wrote,
“Apologies for using an off-the-cuff phrase as a jumping off point, it doesn't as far as I can see reflect your thinking, but you touch on something of wider import. That narrative is conspiratorial in a way that damages science adoption. Telling someone a $150 cable probably won't make a difference or "did you watch Linus Tech Talks technical analysis of HDMI cables" is one thing. Self proclaimed science advocates shifting to an evidence free grand cabal of evil hifi grifters pushing snake oil is more likely to leave them asking "are they in the room with us now?" Doubling down by insisting on the privilege of a nebulous objective standpoint just pushes them further away. This is not hyperbole. The always superior, never demonstrated duped-consumer/cynical-manufacturer world view often comprises the bulk of participant comment on forums claiming to defend audio science whenever a review is poor. The wider public are unlikely to ever know Karl Popper from a cartoon character but people can sniff out credible limits to knowledge and self-aggrandisement instinctively. Best Buy probably saw a market and filled a niche.”
Yikes!!
“Apologies for using an off-the-cuff phrase as a jumping off point, it doesn't as far as I can see reflect your thinking, but you touch on something of wider import. That narrative is conspiratorial in a way that damages science adoption. Telling someone a $150 cable probably won't make a difference or "did you watch Linus Tech Talks technical analysis of HDMI cables" is one thing. Self proclaimed science advocates shifting to an evidence free grand cabal of evil hifi grifters pushing snake oil is more likely to leave them asking "are they in the room with us now?" Doubling down by insisting on the privilege of a nebulous objective standpoint just pushes them further away. This is not hyperbole. The always superior, never demonstrated duped-consumer/cynical-manufacturer world view often comprises the bulk of participant comment on forums claiming to defend audio science whenever a review is poor. The wider public are unlikely to ever know Karl Popper from a cartoon character but people can sniff out credible limits to knowledge and self-aggrandisement instinctively. Best Buy probably saw a market and filled a niche.”
Yikes!!
Some food for thought,
excerot from Scientific American Sept. 7 2020 regarding the dodgy subject of falsifiability,
“The Haldane story, though apocryphal, is one of many in the scientific folklore that suggest that falsification is the defining characteristic of science. As expressed by astrophysicist Mario Livio in his book Brilliant Blunders: "[E]ver since the seminal work of philosopher of science Karl Popper, for a scientific theory to be worthy of its name, it has to be falsifiable by experiments or observations. This requirement has become the foundation of the ‘scientific method.’
But the field known as science studies (comprising the history, philosophy and sociology of science) has shown that falsification cannot work even in principle. This is because an experimental result is not a simple fact obtained directly from nature. Identifying and dating Haldane's bone involves using many other theories from diverse fields, including physics, chemistry and geology. Similarly, a theoretical prediction is never the product of a single theory but also requires using many other theories. When a “theoretical” prediction disagrees with “experimental” data, what this tells us is that that there is a disagreement between two sets of theories, so we cannot say that any particular theory is falsified.
Fortunately, falsification—or any other philosophy of science—is not necessary for the actual practice of science. The physicist Paul Dirac was right when he said, "Philosophy will never lead to important discoveries. It is just a way of talking about discoveries which have already been made.” Actual scientific history reveals that scientists break all the rules all the time, including falsification. As philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn noted, Newton's laws were retained despite the fact that they were contradicted for decades by the motions of the perihelion of Mercury and the perigee of the moon. It is the single-minded focus on finding what works that gives science its strength, not any philosophy. Albert Einstein said that scientists are not, and should not be, driven by any single perspective but should be willing to go wherever experiment dictates and adopt whatever works.”
excerot from Scientific American Sept. 7 2020 regarding the dodgy subject of falsifiability,
“The Haldane story, though apocryphal, is one of many in the scientific folklore that suggest that falsification is the defining characteristic of science. As expressed by astrophysicist Mario Livio in his book Brilliant Blunders: "[E]ver since the seminal work of philosopher of science Karl Popper, for a scientific theory to be worthy of its name, it has to be falsifiable by experiments or observations. This requirement has become the foundation of the ‘scientific method.’
But the field known as science studies (comprising the history, philosophy and sociology of science) has shown that falsification cannot work even in principle. This is because an experimental result is not a simple fact obtained directly from nature. Identifying and dating Haldane's bone involves using many other theories from diverse fields, including physics, chemistry and geology. Similarly, a theoretical prediction is never the product of a single theory but also requires using many other theories. When a “theoretical” prediction disagrees with “experimental” data, what this tells us is that that there is a disagreement between two sets of theories, so we cannot say that any particular theory is falsified.
Fortunately, falsification—or any other philosophy of science—is not necessary for the actual practice of science. The physicist Paul Dirac was right when he said, "Philosophy will never lead to important discoveries. It is just a way of talking about discoveries which have already been made.” Actual scientific history reveals that scientists break all the rules all the time, including falsification. As philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn noted, Newton's laws were retained despite the fact that they were contradicted for decades by the motions of the perihelion of Mercury and the perigee of the moon. It is the single-minded focus on finding what works that gives science its strength, not any philosophy. Albert Einstein said that scientists are not, and should not be, driven by any single perspective but should be willing to go wherever experiment dictates and adopt whatever works.”
They'd figure it out in a few moments, unless they were Philosophy PhDs....
You may not be up to speed on the internal social dynamics within Scientific American. Shermer is a founder of the Skeptic's movement, not exactly a crystal spinner: https://michaelshermer.substack.com/p/scientific-american-goes-woke
The quote from Scientific American appears to be written with a certain tilt. Probably the Logical Positivism wiki gives a better overview of philosophy of science history relative to issues such as verification, the views of Popper, etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_positivism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_positivism
- Status
- Not open for further replies.