The "is there a difference" Hi-Fi/Home Cinema Discussion thread

[oli collett]

In response to some of my recent posts i thought it would be best to start a separate thread to discuss whether certain pieces of hi-fi/home cinema equipment sound or look different to one another.

This thread is not intended to prove that you cannot tell the difference between such equipment because it is virtually impossible to do so. It is intended to provide evidence and opinion, both for and against the argument.

To start with I thought i'd post some resources with information on A/B/X testing.

What ABX Testing is all about

Audio Wisdom - a useful resource

Do all Amplifiers sound the same?

Speaker Cable - Can you tell the difference


"Do coat hangers sound as good as monster cables?"


The Audio Critic - Excellent online magazine

A simple way to perform an A/B comparison of audio hardware

Is this the truth about audio reviews?

I'll find some more later when i get the chance.

 

[oli collett]

Here's some evidence of there being a difference between say low end and high end kit.

For example, Naim audio had annual turnover of an estimated £9m last year:
http://www.swmas.co.uk/Case_Studies/CaseStudy_Master.php?Company_ID=540
The source might be the most reputable, but it's fair to say that they clearly have reasonable turnover.

The implications are that they sold quite a lot of kit to either:
1. People who genuinely felt that it sounded better than a base level amplifier from say Richer sounds, or
2. That hi-fi shops can miraculously hypnotise enough people to blow that amount of money on something with no significant benefit

I've no idea what the true high-end market value is across the world, but with the existence of kit costing well into 6 figures from top end manufacturers, I'm assuming that it's not small.

Good points. There's no doubt these manufacturers sell a huge amount of kit to people and there are a huge number of satisfied customers.

For those who are interested (probably few of you) I began researching this stuff months ago when looking at upgrading my current setup. I was becoming increasingly frustrated by hi-fi magazines ranting about effects of certain items which defied logic (the common example being HDMI cables making colours more vivid etc). I then started to wonder if there was such a difference between a lot of hi-fi equipment as manufacturers and magazines claim, or whether it's all hype. I'm open to the idea that a lot of this stuff can make a difference, it's just that i've yet to see it being demonstrated in a controlled environment.

I was actually looking at getting a Naim amp, when i get the chance to i'd like to try and do some blind listening comparisons at a local dealer but it's not going to be easy to set up.

 

[oli collett]

Getting a dealer dem of a Naim amp should be dead easy. I remember giving my local dealer a call a number of years back and he was quite happy to dem a Nait5 vs the Arcam, Meridian and Cyrus equivalents.

I know that getting a demo will be easy - i mean setting up a double blind demo might not be so easy, and an A/B/X demo i would think would be impossible. I would love to do one alongside the dealer though and see how they score with a Nait vs a £200 amp..

It's a bit of a problem with hi-fi testing - to create any kind of worthwhile test is so much sodding effort that you might as well just buy it based on whatever looks nicest in your living room!

 

[oli collett]

You mean you don't feel confident in your own ability to discern sonic differences?
Go have a listen. When I did my first test like that (though not blind) I took my brother along. It was a pretty unanimous decision.

I don't feel confident in anyone's ability to discern sonic differences. If people can not tell the difference between equipment when you take out so called placebo effects, then who's to say there is such a difference? I would like to partake in an ABX test myself to see but as i say, it's not exactly easy to do.

 

[oli collett]

Well put it this way, I have better things to do than waste my time with blind testing.

I bought a Lyngdorf amp to replace my arcam and it made my ATC speakers sound like they were playing music and not a recording on a disc. Before hand with the arcam when i switched it back after a while it sounded like the speakers were submerged in a peat bog. I don't need to prove my methodology or any scientific reason coupled with multiple blind tests using drugged up, cancer ridden, drunk, monkeys or anyone else to get a representive sample of scientific and perceived differences. No argueing over the difference, it was truly massive 11111

What I did in upgrading made a massive difference, and even a blind person would be able to tell that. With blind testing anyone with sight is biased so go get stevey wonder to demo some kit and devote some time then I'l listen.

il have a proper read of the links in the next few days, amp upgrade not affect the sound = pure BS, cables on the other hand I have not proved yet. Im about to make some enamelled copper cable to compare to my ixos stranded stuff, then I also have my solid core canare [mark grant] interconnect to compare to my fancy twisted DIY 99.99% silver thing with cotton. the interconnects cost the same and it doesn;'t matter to me which one sounds best, as all I care about is the sound. If it sounds better then it will stay in my system, and scientists can preach at me all day about their graphs and waves but there has been no concrete proof actually relating scientific measurments to sound differences. Have some poeple thought that these sound differences might actually not be picked up by equipment.

Im ranting no w so off to perv over the hot cyclon bird in battlestar. great series by the way, just about to finish the mini series.

I've been expecting you

Go and read the links and come back later!! I'm not disputing that ABX testing is a pain in the bum to do, but i haven't yet seen any reasonable argument to suggest there is anything flawed in the methodology. So if the method is sound and the results do not support the original hypothesis, then surely there is only one conclusion to make?

 

[oli collett]

hehehe you sound like darth vader, I'm coming for you father

I'l have a proper read at work tomorrow. Cables i still ahven't made my mind up on yet, but its just this silly ABXBX then some AB X, but even if done properly and documented etc etc someone will come along and say it was worthless as it isn't scientific proof.

this is the worst and best hobby in the world

lol

I don't think people can say ABX testing is worthless as it isn't scientific proof, it should be highly effective at proving something DOES make a difference. The arguments i've seen to the contrary all seem to stem from people not being able to accept the results of the test and tend to be irrational. How, for example, can someone suggest that the pressure and environment of an ABX test affects the results whilst completely ignoring psycological affects of a normal subjective test!

I think the amplifier test makes the most interesting reading - note the difference in peoples perceptions and comments when listening to the test before and during. The comments before all seem to be as you would expect given the amplifiers peidgree, yet under controlled conditions the amplifiers all sounded so similar!

 

[oli collett]

source, amps, cables and speakers.

Almost always speakers tend to be the weakest link, especially in more expensive systems.

IMO you need to get the best speakers you can as there are very small gains (if any) to be had when upgrading source, amp or cables.

I completely agree - yet this is the exact opposite of what hi-fi magazines say!

 

[oli collett]

I'll argue with that on the grounds of "garbage in, garbage out".
Having great speakers on the back of "ok" amp and source will just result in the speakers showing up how pants the rest of the kit is.
My experiences suggest that the speakers need to be bought to suit your personal preferences. The real "musical" improvements are in the source.

Ref ABX testing, I do see one key fatal flaw in the idea, which is regarding getting used to the kit and long term testing.
Comparing short clips has always seemed to be effective in noticing the differences in say bass and treble outputs. Being able to spot the additional "nuances" is often lost in that area. For one thing, my own system doesn't sound it's best until it's had 30 mins of use to warm it up. If you were to keep powering bits of it down to allow a swap of kit, you'd lose some of that consistency of sound.

1) GIGO - it's a fair point, but looking at the physics of what the individual parts of the system do will tell you that the difference made by a poor CD player compared to a poor set of speakers is huge. I'm willing to bet that a £100K Classe CD system with a pair of £100 speakers will not compare to a £30,000 pair of speakers hooked up to a £100 CD player. The audio critic is a good site about this theory:
http://www.theaudiocritic.com/

This issue in particular is v good:
http://www.theaudiocritic.com/back_issues/The_Audio_Critic_26_r.pdf

2) If you read the 2 tests i had in the first post everything was warmed up! If you're doing A/B/X i'm pretty sure that everything is still playing so you are switching why they are still warm.

 

[oli collett]

Its weird, every now and again these topics come up on forums, people intent on saying all hi-fi's clearly sound the same, they have links to various reports which prove this conclusivly. Seriously, if a £100 amp sounded the same as a £1000 amp then no one would buy the more expensive product, its that simple. I admit that some areas in hi-fi are very subjective and hard to quantify such as speaker cables and to an even greater extent power cables etc. but in my all be it limted experiance the core componants of Source-Amp-Speakers make a huge differnce to the sound. This really isnt difficult to prove. got to any decent hi-fi shop and ask to demo the same CD player and speakers hooked up to a Cyrus amp first, them an Arcam 2nd, the differance is night and day.

What I would say is that the higher up the price range you get the less bang you get for your buck, I have heard a 1k cd player demod then onto a 5k player and the differance was very negligable, differnt yes, but 4k better, not IMO

I'm not intent on saying all hi-fi's sound the same - far from it. If i thought that i would have sold all my stuff. The idea that if something sounded the same as another then no-one would buy it is however nonsence - that's how advertisers make their money!!!

I've merely provided some links to some scientifically conducted subjective tests which do not seem to prove that one amp sounds different to another. This is not about a 20wpc amp trying to compete with a 1KW krell powering some 2 Ohm speakers, if you read the test the amps are set at the same level within their limits of power. Of course, if you drive an amp past what it can take it's going to distort, so if you've got a seriously hefty pair of speakers it's unlikely you can get away with a cheap amp whilst not having a huge amount of distortion. Your point with regards to the sony amp sounding cheap and lifeless sounds to me like a lack of power.

With regards to something not being difficult to prove, you are right, it isn't. But the test you are describing is not proving anything. The tests i linked to at the start of the thread have been setup in a controlled manner and contradict what people are saying in this post with regards to certain components making a difference in the system. These tests take out all possible psycological effects which might effect the listeners opinion and are coming out with a different conclusion. If you go down to a hi-fi shop and demo with your dealer you are prone to all kinds of psychological effects.

 

[oli collett]

The methodology is flawed to some extent in that it only tells you the number of people that prefer one system to the other. It tells you very little about how much 'better' people consider the difference to be.

Also, does it not assume that both systems have been set to their 'optimum' settings? Where 'optimum' is a matter of preference. For example when comparing 2 systems, most people may decide that system A is better because it sounds slightly louder, or has better bass. But obviously these things could be changed easily on either system and so would not be an indicator of which system is actually better, just an indicator of which system was configured 'better' during the test.

ABX has nothing to do with who prefers what, it is about identifying what X is. Preference has nothing to do with it.

Systems are setup level matched, that's all! If A has better bass than B, then you should be able to identify X as one or the other and therefore you will score 100% in the test. If you look at the test results in the amplifier comparison the results are nearer to 50% which puts choice down to chance.

Please do not bring "what sounds better" and personal preference into this - this is not the argument here, it's about whether you can hear a difference between the two under controlled conditions.

 

[oli collett]

I do believe that people accustomed to using better systems find it easier to tell the difference between kit, almost like the way that wine experts can. My guess is that in normal day to day listening, that we become used to automatically compensating for cheap TV, tannoy announcements and similar. If that really is true, then you need to ask the question on DBTs on just who is doing the reviewing.

You cannot compare wine experts to hi-fi experts. It's very easy to setup a double blind test of wine and it's very easy to prove that people taste a difference between wine A and B. It doesn't necessarily mean they can tell you exactly what it tastes of, why it tastes that way or anything, but it will tell you that a difference is there.

You now seem to be using the "golden ears" argument - if you look at who was undertaking the tests in the links i posted i don't believe this is valid. Personally, I think the whole "golden ears" thing is bobbins that is invented by hi-fi eliteists when people claim they cannot tell the difference between equipment.

 

[oli collett]

Btw, i've just discovered i was banned from the cables forum on AVforums, for being "negative". To me, that sets a rather worrying precedent where you cannot give an opinion on a subject if you do not follow the popular opinion. And it makes the world incredibly dull.

 

[oli collett]

lol oli you cable witch, we should stone you I love the word 'negative' used, hehe sounds harsh.

Right back to avforums, trying to sell my Kuro over there

Jehovah....


oops!

 

[oli collett]

Thought i'd post this.. slightly unrelated since it's software based but interesting anyway:

http://theaudiocritic.com/blog/index.php?op=ViewArticle&articleId=41&blogId=1

It's a shame the AES journals are not available online because i know they've done a lot of ABX tests in the past.

Also updating some links in the original post

 

[oli collett]

For a similar thread as this one? that's shocking if so....

Anyone who thinks double blind/ABX testing isn't a) valid b) the only real way of 'proving', may as well go and visit their nearest homeopath and give them lots of money in exchange for water. (I am of course aware there are some complications with Hi-Fi stuff that make it even trickier, room ambience, electrical interference, 'burn in' etc, but the principle is true)

I got banned because every time someone posted saying "should i spend £x on a cable?" i said it would be a waste of money and they would be better off looking at other things. It's bizzare that an attempt to save people some money would bring such a reaction, especially in todays climate, but i'm not bothered, i just don't use the site anymore (i had been a member for 6-7 years as well).

 

[oli collett]

I've got to ask, have your ever gone out and played with some different cables in a good system?

A reasonable question. I expect you know the answer, which is no. I've tried out different cables on my current system and never noticed any difference but it's hardly high end.

That is, however, irrelevant. If i listened to a system with platinum coated magnetised mermaid hair and thought it was better than bog standard copper, it would be meaningless. If i have a cold and feel better after eating a bar of chocolate, i don't start recommending it to everyone as a miracle cure.

The point is to look at tests of hi-fi equipment which are done in a way which eliminates all kinds of psychological effects to avoid bias. All of the tests i have seen so far of this type suggest that cables of sufficient build make no difference whatsoever to the sound of a system. If it wasn't for marketing people and hi-fi magazines, i think this would be the widely held belief amoungst hi-fi folk.

 

[oli collett]

Hey, it's OK guys, the world really is still flat, people do spontaneously combust when travelling at high speeds and the end of the world is nigh.

Talk about armchair sceptics.
How about actually getting out there and giving it a try sometime, instead of simply regurgitating stuff originally quoted by people that you've no idea about, or their motivations.

If you genuinely go give it a try and think that these things don't make any appreciable difference, that's cool, and you'll be able to talk from a position of strength. In the meantime, you're simply acting as forum trolls.

This is what really baffles me about hi-fi.

Seriously, there's some very clever people in Audio, and i'm not talking about the marketing people. I'm talking about people who have high paying jobs, brain surgeons, nuclear scientists and whatnot. Sure, not every "tweako" is the sharpest tool in the block but generally such people appear to be.

But here's the thing. When you point out that there is no credible evidence (i've still not seen anyone post any on this thread yet) that this stuff makes a difference, you are accused of heresy! I mean, you are comparing my views in your post to that of people who believe the world is flat. Do you not see the irony there? Wasn't that theory blown away through a mixture of science and common sense? How about the IT industry. Would you start buying new SATA cables at 5 times the price of a normal one if you read some reviews that said they thought it made file transfers a bit quicker, without them running any before/after comparison tests? I'd hope not.

Scientists don't come up with theories and just publish them along with a load of marketing rubbish without any evidence to back it up, but that's exactly what happened in the hi-fi industry when these products entered the market.

If these products do make a difference to your hi-fi, prove it. That's all I and all the other "armchair sceptics" are asking. That's not trolling, if anything it's the complete opposite.

 

[oli collett]

Nicely summed up Mr_S..... Too many myths for as against are born on the net, and then just trolled out by the many, who never actually get there hands dirty.... or should that be their ears damaged !!! lol .....

Well as an mechanical engineer, and some 25 years playing with HiFi kit as a hobby etc, a lot of it does make a difference...... Then for sure there are the con's about.... stuff like £1000 for a mains cable are a bit OTT....

Can you measure it..... To use a comment from an IT engineer I spoke with once..... He can see a "kink" in a CAT5 cable on a scope, as it causes a reflection in the signal !!!...... So do digital cables make a difference ?????... who knows..... try it and find out.

A thought to ponder, why do people believe what they see, but not what they hear ??? Is one sense more credible than the other ?...... Or are people to lazy to learn how to use their ears.......

9D

PS the world is flat all the way from Salisbury to Glasgow..

Myths propogated on the internet.. have you guys actually looked at any of the links i posted? I am not the one propogating myths here, i'm just pointing to some tests of audio equipment done under controlled conditions.

Can you measure it? Yes. It's called an A/B/X test. I've posted links in the beginning of the thread. I have not yet heard a credible argument to disprove these tests. Can't identify A vs B? then it's all in your head.

Why do people believe what they see? Have you heard of optical illusions? Magic tricks? Do you trust your sense of taste and smell? Do you trust all of your senses? I don't. Hi-fi enthusiasts are incredibly willing to dismiss the placebo affect, isn't that a bit odd when it is known to have such a powerful effect on your senses?

 

[oli collett]

Some of those links are talking as much BS as the Hifi mags.

?

 

[oli collett]

To quote a phrase, "the only person in life you can prove anything to, is yourself".

And believe it or not, I did. Do you really believe that I would spend the amount of money I did on kit (which is not great in high end circles), just because of some also equally biased/motivated review stating that "X" product was the dogs danglies.
Amazingly, I trust to the most useful way to define whether one piece of kit is better than another, i.e. my ears.

Let me put it another way, newbie joins the OCUK forums and comes looking on this forum for thoughts. Reads your thread and feels even more confused because of your comments.
Whilst you may well be getting a kick out of creating a pointless argument on here, you're actually doing a disservice to other forum goers with information based on 2nd and 3rd hand comments.

I really don't care about how you made your decisions - you are free to do so at your own will.

I seriously think you have got my intentions entirely wrong - this thread was started to have a discussion on whether certain aspects of hi-fi actually are what they say they are or not. This came about because i noticed an increasing number of people discussing HDMI cables and how people were happy to accept one HDMI cable does not look/sound any different to another (providing it works etc.). This goes completely against what the mass hi-fi media will tell you. I started this thread to point out that maybe it's not just HDMI cables and that you cannot trust everything you read in a magazine.

As for your last point - what is wrong with suggesting to someone new to hi-fi that they don't need to spend a fortune on cables and other bits? As for quoting 2nd/3rd party sources, are you now telling me that we should only post personal opinion and not bother referencing anything?

I really think you have my intentions completely wrong here - and i don't want to let this thread descend into people hurling insults at one another. If you don't agree with my opinion, fine, if you want to put across your side of the argument, fine. But this thread is not about "i know A sounds better than B because i heard it", that's exactly what i was trying to get away from!