FUD, intellectual honesty, digital facts, and the TAS articles...

[Phil Leigh]

Sorry, forgot about the Kivor, similarly the Cyrus systems. Never saw the point of the all-in-one. As you described difficulties of computer systems affecting audio, and why put quickly obsolete storage stuff in with relatively stable network and audio technology.

Clearly Linn et al cames to their senses too... :-)

£5k was a lot of money for a PC in 2001 - still is...

[totoro]

Have we stopped believing this now? Wow, you stop paying attention for 5 minutes.......

(Sorry - I agreed with every other word of your post )

Got me. It was late, I somehow switched earth and sun. Sorry about that, I do this kind of switcheroo in code occasionally as well, which is one of the reasons I like strongly typed programming languages.

[totoro]

Perhaps. However, in this thread, just by saying I can hear a difference in two USB cables between a particular machine and a particular DAC, I have been told I have been brainwashed by a cult.

Not by me, as I hope you noticed .

[totoro]

Here we fundamentally differ. If someone thinks they hear a difference, then they do hear a difference. It is just asinine to say the don't, and serves no purpose.

Unless that 'someone' is a company or trying to sell you something, or trying to come off as an authority, or tell you what to do, or something along those lines. Then it is just good sense

I'm sorry, but at this point in the argument (ok, discussion ) you seem to be pretty much ignoring the fact that there is a well established literature on the way we humans trick ourselves. There are some videos on youtube by Ethan Winer and Poppy Crum illustrating how this works for audio at least to some degree. The fact that we do this has resulted in the pharma industry having to adopt fairly rigorous blinding for their studies.

I mentioned before that I find it mysterious that people think that audio is so radically different than medicine in this regard.

As for USB cables, try some. if you personally do or do not hear a difference, I will believe you. I do not actually find you abrasive. I am a little amused that some would equate me with Xinu or whatever, over a USB cable.

Have you tried listening to different cables to see if you hear a difference?

Paul

Isn't Xenu a great galactic emperor who committed a huge genocide (by putting people in volcanoes and setting them of with hydrogen bombs if I remember)? I'm pretty sure if _he_ found a difference he wasn't expecting, he would kill everyone involved in the making of all of them .

The only place I ever use a usb cable for anything audio related is at work, and I have randomly chosen usb cables out of a box a couple times there: never noticed a difference. But I wouldn't take that as evidence either way, given the environment there (kind of noisy, not particularly good headpone amp/dac) and the fact that I wasn't trying to discern a difference.

In my normal audio use outside of work, I use an sb touch connected to a wireless network. I could try using a usb cable between an external hard drive and my server box, but I have a really hard time imagining how this would affect anything.

As far as the claims by the TAS guys about rippers go: the differences between the sound of the files HAVE to be different as a result of the ripper being used for their "findings" to be of any value at all. If the differences are due to accidents about the state of the hd and could be changed by moving the files, then the whole thing goes straight down the toilet.

[paul.raulerson]

No, it means you're human. Surprise!

However, a husband and wife working together to confirm what the husband believes he already hears hardly qualifies as a "blind" test. Just another variant of the old "even my wife could hear it!" proof.

You sir, do not know my wife. (grin) She could quite easily make the buffalo on a nickel squeal for mercy...

Actually, we set up the tests so that they were blind, in fact as well as in principal, and I have high confidence in them.

Moreover, this is the crux of the matter - it honestly doesn't matter what I think about your system or beliefs, or what you think about mine. I am not out to convince you of anything at all.

I am quite happy to spend $50 on a USB cable I believe to the best of my admittedly small ability, makes my system sound better and increases my enjoyment.

As noted, Cordelia Fine's book is a great read and very enlightening. And it doesn't contain a single example based on audio. However, we don't cease being subject to our human frailties just because the subject turns to audio.

It isn't bad. On the other hand, it is a bit sensationalized I think. Just my opinion though, YMMV.

[paul.raulerson]

Pretty much 100% agree Phil. Except of course, a Squeezebox sounds better if the LMS is running on Linux or MacOS instead of Windows.

-Paul



(grin - you realize I am pulling your chain right? )

[paul.raulerson]

I'm sorry, but at this point in the argument (ok, discussion ) you seem to be pretty much ignoring the fact that there is a well established literature on the way we humans trick ourselves. There are some videos on youtube by Ethan Winer and Poppy Crum illustrating how this works for audio at least to some degree. The fact that we do this has resulted in the pharma industry having to adopt fairly rigorous blinding for their studies.

I mentioned before that I find it mysterious that people think that audio is so radically different than medicine in this regard.

I am not ignoring it, but honestly, I don't think it matters all that much here. The human ear is a wonderfully sensitive instrument. And in home audio, we are using it to judge how much we enjoy something, not trying to do scientific proof of one thing or another. Quite literally, it doesn't matter why you hear an improvement, as long as you do so consistently.

It could be a real difference caused by power or noise or something, it could be something to do with environmental cues, it could be the color of the jacket on the cable.

A friend of mine has a saying he is fond of, and that is that none of this is a life or death type of issue - we are not killing babies here. He's right.

And in some sense, home audio should be treated like art. Two people can look at a painting and see totally different things. They honestly do "see" different things, even though the pigment has not changed color.

Music is in the same kind of thing I think. It is not sensible to me to fume and fuss over it and insist that one cable is better than the other. Or insist that all cables sound alike. Or indeed, insist that measurements re everything.

The SBT is a great example of that - hooked to a good DAC is flat competitive with CD transports and Digital Players that cost many multiples of the combined price of the player and the DAC. It really is *that* good.

When we get reliable and pop/click free USB running from it, I expect it will sound even better. (At least, with the right USB cable! )

That isn't to say that testing and results are not important, because they certainly are. But you have to draw a line somewhere. I draw that line with my ears, moderate testing if I am unsure of my ears, and with my checkbook. The more you want from my checkbook, the more of that testing and proof I want. Everyone will be a little different here.

Isn't Xenu a great galactic emperor who committed a huge genocide (by putting people in volcanoes and setting them of with hydrogen bombs if I remember)? I'm pretty sure if _he_ found a difference he wasn't expecting, he would kill everyone involved in the making of all of them .

Yep, I can see we really agree 100% on that subject. He would have been pissed that SBTs are so inexpensive. (grin)

In my normal audio use outside of work, I use an sb touch connected to a wireless network. I could try using a usb cable between an external hard drive and my server box, but I have a really hard time imagining how this would affect anything.

Well we utterly agree here. I meant between a computer and a DAC, or between a SBT and a DAC. You would not believe what a SBT sounds like through a really good USB DAC. Well, if you ignore the pops and clicks.

As far as the claims by the TAS guys about rippers go: the differences between the sound of the files HAVE to be different as a result of the ripper being used for their "findings" to be of any value at all. If the differences are due to accidents about the state of the hd and could be changed by moving the files, then the whole thing goes straight down the toilet.

Going out on a limb here, but some folks I know claim that emailing a file can "change" it and make it sound different. I would normally discount that out of hand, but this came from a very noted record producer and engineer with her own studio. That gives me serious pause.

I also have a friend who is convinced that the power supply makes a difference when ripping. I have listened to a bit of his stuff, and darned if I didn't think I heard a difference. Note - "think" - I am NOT convinced I actually did hear a difference. Unlike with the USB cables.

-Paul

[Phil Leigh]

Pretty much 100% agree Phil. Except of course, a Squeezebox sounds better if the LMS is running on Linux or MacOS instead of Windows.

-Paul



(grin - you realize I am pulling your chain right? )

:-) oh yeah... nearly got me!

[Wombat]

Going out on a limb here, but some folks I know claim that emailing a file can "change" it and make it sound different. I would normally discount that out of hand, but this came from a very noted record producer and engineer with her own studio. That gives me serious pause.

I also have a friend who is convinced that the power supply makes a difference when ripping. I have listened to a bit of his stuff, and darned if I didn't think I heard a difference. Note - "think" - I am NOT convinced I actually did hear a difference. Unlike with the USB cables.

-Paul

At least we now can imagine were your gullibility comes from if you correspond with such people.
20 years back these people were some fellows in "circles" and for sure they had some fun underneath.
Unfortunately these days such people can pestilate the internet and there is not much we can do.
Even here in the Slimdevices forum where many rational thinking people all the time do nice argueing the sheer mass of people with assertions without substance becomes tiring.
Even the term ABX test gets used inflationary without any evidense by the ones that claim they have done it.
Reading that bullshit became a waste of time.
I think i am done with this section of the forum. Several other members that had to say really interesting stuff don´t post since long already

[paul.raulerson]

At least we now can imagine were your gullibility comes from if you correspond with such people.

Ah, and you make my point about the ugly trolls prowling around the Internet. I said that the people I was talking with are respectable enough to make me at least think about it, and you chime in with your comment.

Brilliant example!

Do you think me gullible enough to fall for your kind of thinking?

Paul