I have read the links that Klaus posted earlier. They are all about the problems faced by equipment designers trying to establish exactly which measurable parameters really affect the reproduction quality - and how to measure them and which measurement values are better or worse. This is all fine and I TOTALLY agree with them - we don't have a good understanding of the parameters that affect quality beyond the obvious ones of distortion, noise, dynamic range and frequency response - and obviously these don't tell anywhere near the whole story.
I've always believed this - well, ever since I first heard an amp in the 70's that had fantastic "specs" and sounded really bad. So let me be clear to anyone reading this thread - when I talk about "measurements" I do NOT mean these types of measurements - the ones that would help us measure "better" or "worse". I personally only ever refer to the (ADM-style) null test which lets us detect if there has really been a CHANGE or a DIFFERENCE. I'm going to stop calling this a "measurement" because it isn't really - it is a "test". Changes can be tested to see if they have any detectable effect. This doesn't directly help anyone build better equipment but it can expose the snake oil and false claims. All other "measurements" are very different animals and clearly flawed, as explained by the links Klaus. Just to be crystal clear in this;: I do NOT believe in conventional measurements helping us determine how to construct better systems - if they did we would already have built the best system imaginable and there would be no discussion. I absolutely believe that the null test can detect changes/no change and that it is valid and useful to use this type of test to challenge reports of huge subjective improvements from all manner of "tweaks". This can help us move away from "does it do anything" to "is it better or worse" - which is ultimately more useful! (As an aside) Personally I think we have too many physicists and electrical engineers looking at this problem and not enough physiologists/human biologists. I don't think we will ever understand the key parameters, how to measure them and what they mean for "better" or "worse" until we understand much more about how the ear/brain works and what REALLY makes us prefer some systems/components over others. I think we need to put down the soldering iron and the Jitter Analyser for a while and turn to psycho-acoustics for some progress... -- Phil Leigh You want to see the signal path BEFORE it gets onto a CD/vinyl...it ain't what you'd call minimal... Touch(wired/W7)+Teddy Pardo PSU - Audiolense 3.3/2.0+INGUZ DRC - MF M1 DAC - Linn 5103 - full Aktiv 5.1 system (6x LK140's, ESPEK/TRIKAN/KATAN/SEIZMIK 10.5), Pekin Tuner, Townsend Supertweeters,VdH Toslink,Kimber 8TC Speaker & Chord Signature Plus Interconnect cables Stax4070+SRM7/II phones Kitchen Boom, Outdoors: SB Radio, Harmony One remote for everything. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Phil Leigh's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=85 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=93236 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/audiophiles
