Mike, some posts are just too silly to even bother replying.
1 Like
Does it? What does outperform mean in this context?
With cables, with differences arising from different one people are tuning their system to either correct negative sound aspects of the rest of their system fundamentally including room and ears, or are altering ro produce a sound that they prefer even if it is not the sound as recorded. (Re te latter, as I’ve said before, to my mind tone controls, prefereably in the form of DSP with its greater flexibility, would be far preferable because then you can know what you’re altering, tweak it fully to suit, and even alter to improve poor recordings.)
Some hifi kit does outperforn some pro monitoring kit, primarily I think in terms of detail resolution, as evidenced by the recent Naim videos with a musician listening. In such cases presumably the artist was happy with what they produced (though once they have heard heir own music better they might seek better monitoring gear!), just that listeners might find the improved tail they can hear more enjoyable. (Or potentially less enjoyable!)
1 Like
The only interesting part of that series of videos for me. His kit was low end pro. Not home recording but not studio. He got more detail from the Naim session. It remains unclear how much satisfaction he got from hearing stuff in his mix that he’d now do differently having heard it on Naim. Laid waste to the idea that home audio is about reproducing what people hear in a studio. That makes as much sense as aspiring to live sound when live sound wasn’t what was recorded, is generally poor and doesn’t contain the spatial clues people assert. Ditto “reproducing what the artist intended”.
In that case poor old Roger discovered that what he’d intended wasn’t what he now heard so, erm…
Instead perhaps, hearing what was recorded as encapsulated in the recording as sold. Highest Fidelity to the recording. And that indeed could be with more detail than the artist has heard.
1 Like
Yes, exactly that.
Your guarantee would be incorrect.
Mike, you are making as broad of an over-generalization as I’ve seen. One that happens to be false.
If my real world experience completely unfounds your assertions, you should make better ones instead of trying to attach labels to me.
Please could members refrain from ad hominem judging, labelling or calling members names. Thanks.
2 Likes
I’ve said that your experience does not reflect mine at all. Nothing to be added there but especially as your posts suggest that actually it’s not the norm and only exists as a thing amongst an elite you happen to admire and believe to be true artists i.e. it’s the very minority pursuit I said it was in the first place.
Just been talking to the offspring. They’ve access to about 20 studios around the Sheffield area at present for one example. Vintage desks in maybe 2. Bog standard cables in every single one of them including the 3 used exclusively by classical ensembles. This includes the very place used by Richard Hawley, studios used by Pulp etc. Presumably not “true” enough eh.
You made an absolute statement. Your statement wasn’t true. You’re now attempting to apply edge cases to prove that your sweeping generalizations are correct. Anything else you wanna add?
I feel our interactions have become circular and are coming to a conclusion.
I had a Quad 304 pre amp back in the day , with a device that could shift frequency response. I loved this Quad set up and used it until it became unrepairable.
( I see crazy prices for these on HiFi Shark)
I agree that something like the tone controls on my old Quad, might save a lot of headaches for people trying to fix sound in their listening rooms, with hit and mis attempts with cables room conditioning and such.
Do tone controls on an amp really degrade the sound?
Second point. At what point does the fact that our system outperform the equipment used to make our music, become irrelevant. Or is the big problem our listening rooms?
So why do we spend more than is sensible on HiFi gear?
I listen to a lot of acoustic music. My goal is to obtain a sound as close as possible to what I heard live.
1 Like
I just like to enjoy the music, however it was produced or replayed on my system. I don’t obsess about cables or anything else much. Sure, I’ll upgrade further at some point, but for now I’m happy to be happy with what I have. First world problems?
3 Likes
That is a quote I never understand on a hi-fi forum, as by its very nature everything hi-fi is a first world thing - which does not make any problems any less for someone who does have them, while such a comment could be felt to be condescending as well as dismissive. However I don’t think this thread is about problems, rather people trying in some way or other to maximise their enjoyment, whether the enjoyment comes from hearing music the best they can, or having fun playing with their systems, or indeed seeking thoughts, knowledge, experience, information - and maybe even amusement - discussing with others on a forum such as this!
1 Like
It was more of a ‘chill’ comment as things were getting a little heated 
. But my point is simply there is much more in this world to worry or stress about and good music often helps me in how I feel about it all. Of course YMMV.
3 Likes
On the first of your two points, they were said to, but whether actually audible to people in normal circumstances I don’t know – but certainly a recording where the bass or treble are rolled off, or excessively boosted, I am sure greater enjoyment could be had suffering the minuscule degradation of the to control while compensating for the recording deficiencies. As I suggested earlier a tone cancel switch would remove any adverse effect of having the controls in circuit, albeit with one more switch contact in each signal path.
On your second point, I suppose it’s only becomes irrelevant when the individual ceases to find it provides greater enjoyment and or appreciation of the music. And I suspect that in many rooms not having had consideration of, and where appropriate suitable treatment for, adverse acoustic effects, the room may be limiting the quality of sound, and people may be trying to compensate by playing with things in the system rather than solving the cause.
1 Like
Who is to say it’s more than sensible?
I’ve always spent to the edge of my budget and I’ve zero interest in whether a system reproduces live sound, accurate sound or whatever. Fools errand.
The only question is whether the sound you like is delivered by your system. I like timbral depth, some soundstage where it exists, PRaT and mid strong warmth. I’m also big on coherence, which is why I believe that less speaker drivers is “more” etc.
That’ll be someone’s idea of heaven and another persons idea of hell. Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter if it’s “accurate” or whatever. One persons accurate is another’s clinical and so on.
You’ve only spent more than is sensible when you’ve lost your sense
of value for money.
1 Like
That’s an assertion rather than a fact. I don’t doubt your experience for a second but it’s easy to decide your experience is the norm when that may not be the case.
I don’t believe I’ve given an “edge case”. It was simply a real world example with numbers attached to give an idea of scale.
The offspring is playing a gig in Sheffield tonight but they assure me that tomorrow when we catch up briefly on my way back from Leicester they can if needed reel off all 20 studio spaces they’ve access to, name consoles, monitors and patch cables.
Amusingly the most expensive they’ve come across is Mogami Gold at what used to be Tesla (can’t remember what it’s been rebadged as) but the use case was absolutely lifespan rather than audio quality.
I’ve recorded in maybe ten studios over the years in various bands and occasionally engineering or arranging. My experience of that very much mirrors that of my offspring.
Also had a brief conversation with a school friend I’d caught up with for the first time in 40 odd years last Friday when I recognised him playing cornet for the BBC Philharmonic (not his normal gig. He was filling in).
Raised this issue with him in subsequent text conversation and his take was interesting. A number of them play jazz as well as classical. Where there is an interest at all it’s in microphone and microphone placement. Zero interest in the cable attached to it.
1 Like
I did pay silly money on cables (not exactly Nordost), went Mogami and now with Naim.
What I learnt from Naim is, with the Source, Amps (pre+power) and speakers all being well matched the cables isn’t important at all. As long as the cables are ‘voiced’ for the system you are good to go.
If I don’t like the sound of my system (which eventually happens) I would rather save the cable budget for a change of the ‘big 3’. Or if there is a slight bit of unsatisfying sound I’ll first check with the setup (speaker position, rack’s setup and levelling, cable dressing) and cable would be the last resort.
Cables don’t add ‘magic’, sources do. Or if cables do, they add the ‘magic’ to everything and probably some music don’t listenable anymore. So mostly tradeoff.
Right before Naim I purchase my personal matching source, amps and speakers, connect only with Mogami interconnect and speaker cables, they are transparent sounding with a touch of copper sounding which is good for both listening and debugging the setup of my system.
But yeah if you are into HiFi quality cables could do what you want.
4 Likes
Humour! It was a humorous quip.
BTW. Our ears are remarkably good at adjusting to different sounding audio.
You will “get used to” the tuning on certain headphones.
1 Like