Listen for any differences. No particular focus as I would have known how a particular track would sound like having played it many times over. Having said that, differences I usually perceive when swapping amps are;
Overall presentation (looser/diffused/rounded/smeared sound or more focused/solid/defined edges)
Overall clarity and detail
Bass quality where the difference is partly due to the current capability of the amp in driving the speakers(mushy, soft or smeared bass may indicate underpowered amp whilst defined and textured bass with wallop and punch may suggest adequate power)
Treble quality. For instance with piano, either a more lit or luminated energy where the decay of notes hang in the air, or the decay is cut short and notes do not sound as lit which contribute to a duller sound.
Tone of instruments
Sound of percussion, some sound like the real thing, some sound metallic or like tin can
Thwack of drums. Some sound sharp and real, some sound duller without sting
I don’t usually listen to the same track because it is a chore to keep swapping speaker cables between amps whilst listening to the same track. The amp needs time to warm up too for critical evaluation. I don’t focus on one part of the track, usually the whole track as described above.
I rarely take notes but I previously did take some. No volume matching.
I just demoed an NDX2, and it was quite simple to compare against my ND5 XS2 playing the same streamed track, and switching channels.
I expect it would be quite easy to be trained to hear the difference, but you know what, I really don’t want to know how, as there is a danger that you are always listening for precision, rather than enjoying the music. So I sort or just trust my ears and the feeling I get when listening.
My tried and trusted method is to play a few records or CDs and if it sounds better than before the change, I just keep on playing more records and CDs!
This hifi lark is pretty simple if you want it to be.
I listen to a range of tracks covering the music styles I like (classical to heavy rock, including clear female vocal and piano, and with full range music including deep bass), and just try to decide which sounds better.
It is critical to volume match as far as possible.
I do find it a difficult task, perhaps because I really struggle to focus on tiny things in the music to remember and compare, instead tending to get drawn into the music.
When auditioning at home, once I have reached a point of having decided which is better, unless so blindingly obvious that a near-deaf person would recognise (but such big differences are rareI engage one of my sons to swap over(or not) for blind listening as confirmation. He enjoys the challenge of trying to catch me out - e.g. volume matching, but sometimes one, sometimes the other a tad louder. If no evident difference whichever is lowest cost to me wins.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Probably trying to listen as whole is the best way to do this, as overall coherence leads to better enjoyment of the music. I think i may have zoomed in too far sometimes to get a proper evulation.
Yeah that is a sign that you enjoy presentation A better than presentation B. At the end that is what counts.
Sometimes i think it is not easy to hear differences. They may be so subtle that once the mind gets something to hook on, it will continiously search for these cues and probably find them, leading to a certain biased conclusion. If the conclusion at the end is: i do not hear a difference, than it is safe to say that staying with the cheaper and/or more practicable option is the way to go.
Ultimately i understand that whatever works for someone at whatever cost gets a justification. Maybe i am too much of an “optimiser” wanting always to be at the threshold between best cost to performance ratio. Of course my system is already way above it and dimishing returns have already found its way into it.
It’s good to keep an open mind. I admit most changes for me has been piecemeal. Things really only changing and getting better subtly to taste.
Although I am optimistic that perhaps something can come my way that could question things and push me to re-evaluate.
It’s a really difficult call - particularly as I guess most of us have days where our system sounds a a bit off or a bit better on a day for no apparent reason. I think most of us are pretty good at picking up ‘gains’ - better bass, soundstage, treble, etc. - but I bet none of us ever pick up, on an initial listen at least, any downsides. It is down to expectation bias - we think we know what improvements we are seeking so we tend to hear them (unless they are not there at all) and miss or ignore any downsides. To do things properly you probably need a proper extended blind comparison - preferably at home. Not an easy thing.
I presume that is just as a tool forming part of your assessment? The reason for my querying is because one of your compatriots used to push that in discussions over comparisons, seemingly as the be-all and end-all of the comparison: if you can follow the tune better through item X, then it is the better item. But if I understand correctly, Tune-dem only addresses sound quality from the angle of following the tune, yet there are many other aspects that contribute to its sound quality playing music.
For speakers I use a half dozen or so tracks at the dealers from different genres. Important. I was listening to a pair of speakers with only jazz and thinking pretty good. Switched to a Cat Power song which sound entirely different than I’d ever heard it before, like a different mix. Terrible. Next. The ultimate and most important is at home, but one can get a pretty good sense of what will work or not at the dealers. Be sure to push them against or away from the wall, etc. to try and emulate your home. I have my speakers wide and sit on the floor and near(ish) a lot so that is what I try when auditioning (and I love my Audio Physic Compact Classics).
For cable changes etc best to focus on one or two tracks (and you’ll get sick of them). The best one for me has been Ahmad Jamal’s “Ahmad’s Blues” title track. It’s pretty much bass and piano, with some really distinct long trebly rolls at the beginning. So I would just ask myself does it sound more or less like a piano? How mushed together (or not) are the separate trills? How easy is to follow, where is it in the room, etc. And then do the same for the bass.
I guess I use a sort of sub-conscious tune-dem as well: how easy it is to follow any particular instrument which tends to signify more separation and drop in the ‘noise’ floor, and also how much more or less fatiguing and/or tinnitus triggering over longer term or louder listening.
Thanks for your comment. Speakers are the easiest thing to hear, especially in a dealer space where they can be positioned to work as they are intended (which is not always possible at home).
Cables, amplifiers, source components: That is where it becomes subtle and listening to tracks with just a few instruments, especially piano or guitar, should show you some things as decaying notes and overtones that some systems will be masked or not be reproduced at all.
Lot’s of good advice here, to which I would add the following. It’s worthwhile to enlist a second set of ears belonging to someone whose musical judgement you trust, but who is entirely disinterested in, and therefore not distracted by, technospeak or arcane audiophile jargon. For me, this would be my wife. She has saved me on several occasions from shelling out for minor incremental improvements in favour of upgrades with significant impact.
Yes indeed that can be useful, helping identify if what I think I’m hearing is real, and for tge better. As an extreme example, when I first heard Dave DAC my cellist son was with me on the trip and came in just out of curiosity, uninterested in hifi but instead of sitting in the car for a couple of hours. Started with hearing my Hugo, as the base point, then TT, about which he made some favourable comments at the end, but when Dave started playing it was only just into about the second bar when my son said “wow” under his breath but just loud enough for me to hear - like an echo of my own reaction.
