JS, I apologize for contributing to dragging things off course. I know you've already had to step in once in this thread; if I've gone too far in giving a full response here, please let me know and I'll edit it down for you. For everyone else here for the CRI discussion, you may disregard this tangent and you won't miss any valuable contribution.
Perhaps you missed my point. Even an IPOD with the best earphones, is a comprise, because the very compressed sound files used in an IPOD are missing a lot of sonic information present in a real live performance, if you are lucky enough to hear one. . .Sure better earphones, like better speakers, make some difference, but they will never replace the weakest link in the chain, which in the case of IPODS is the compressed recorded file.
Hm, that seemed more contentious than called for. I made a friendly post in response to a topic I also enjoy, so I hope I wasn't as offensive as the tone of this response suggests and I'll try to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume I'm reading more into it than was intended. Perhaps you missed my point:
you're making a good analogy and I agree with it, but I'd like to interject a quick and polite comment on the reality of the view presented, since it's something that interests me and the one you provided is skewed a little to work better within the context of your analogy. To extend your "best earphones/compromise" back into the analogy of audio and flashlights, would it also be fair to say that even a pocketable flashlight with the best LED is still a compromise because it runs on low-quality, off-brand, PRC-manufactured CR123s? Of course not. It may still be a compromise (it's not the actual sun), but it's not entirely because of what it's filled with, though that is one potential problem. The user has the option of putting batteries of adequate quality in it, and they do exist. Perhaps somewhere you missed your own point? You're using a view that is generally true to broadly paint every member of a very large and diverse group. So, neverminding the fact that ipods and many other players can play lossless formats that make your argument against their compression irrelevant... Garbage in garbage out is true, obviously. If you're pushing a badly compressed file through a great system, you're only going to hear the flaws more clearly. But have you compared current generation mp3 files at various bitrates using audiophile quality home gear and reference headphones? Are you qualified to make such categorical judgments? Maybe you have. I have too. Maybe you're speaking based on your own unbiased test results, in which case it's perfectly valid, but only for you, and you'd be an exceptional case from the majority. Not only are my LAME encodings good, they're better than I'd ever need portably (whatever gear I might be using) since they're encoded with the idea that it can also be used as a more convenient home source hooked up to bigger gear without a huge loss of quality. They're not the weak link. So, as someone who has done too much time on head-fi, I can confidently say you're flat out wrong on that point. Compression will, by definition, reduce the quality of the audio file, but it has come a long way and it's no longer accurate to simply say that you lose "a lot," as long as you allow them the bitrate they need. In the case of an ipod, the bottleneck is not necessarily the encoded file, it's more likely the quality of the player's built in amp (but there are ways around that, of course). And in a home environment with solid equipment, I've found it does not take long before the limiting factor is actually the quality of the original recording (followed by quality of normal human ears). Not the compression, not the gear, not ignorance of what is objectively correct; the recording on the CD. Sometimes this is caused by a low budget (low quality equipment and engineers). More often this is caused by too high a budget (big record companies telling the mastering company to ruin it). That's actually what allowed me to reach something of an end in that hobby; I found a combination I liked the sound of and realized that the recordings I mostly listen to are already not as good as what I'm listening with, so there's no longer very strong justification to keep moving up the ladder. It's like having a flashlight that can already project across the longest distance you'll ever encounter in your daily world; why look for more throw. In the end, the hobby is about the music and the gear is only the medium between. Just as the flashlight hobby is, to me at least, about the illumination and use, not the highest specs and pursuit of the latest almost imperceptibly brighter led.
You only have to compare the sound reproduction of an IPOD to that of a a Super AUDIO CD recording played back on a quality sound system to hear what is sonically missing.
Yes and no. This assumes that the original master is good enough for SACD to provide benefit and that the listener has good enough ears and enough listening experience to pick up on the subtleties. I have mp3, I have CD, I have SACD, I have DVD-A, and I've worked on 96k/24bit in a professional studio. A better quality medium will provide better sound, naturally, but whether it is perceived by the listener is another matter. We're talking small detail differences if everything is done correctly and fairly. I've found in the past that I had a tendency to fool myself with "novel" formats. SACD blew my mind at first... until I later tried the same recording on CD and had to admit that the vast majority of what I was hearing was just that it was a fantastic recording to begin with, just as any legitimate SA recording should be. Since then, I've found more enjoyable CDs that are astonishingly well recorded than I've found SACDs of music I'm interested in listening to, so I've given up on the format, technically impressive though it is. To over-stress the obviousness of high res differences seems to go against your earlier point, that it can be difficult for someone inside a hobby to understand the insignificance of its finer details to those not on the same wavelength. The hi-res difference is dramatically smaller than the sundrop difference. In truth, both are rather insignificant to all but a few buyers/users, as you already were starting to say earlier.
Audiophiles spend a fortune to have as close to a live sound experience in their living rooms as they can get.
Again, this is basically true but a narrow-minded generalization of what it means to be an audiophile. If that's what it means to you, that's absolutely fine and perfectly valid, and I would even agree that what you're describing is the most pure form of audiophilia. However, it can take many forms in either direction from that. I long ago read that there are many audiophiles in, I believe, Hong Kong who don't even listen to music. They buy the gear and test it on tones and reference vocal samples, not music. That's pure gear fetishism and it disgusts me a little since it cuts out what I see as the most important aspect of the hobby, but I have to acknowledge that it is also a very pure expression of one aspect of the same thing. It could even be argued that it's the purest form, though I'd disagree simply because it removes it entirely from what I perceive to be the original intention, cutting out a fundamental aspect. On the other side, where I've ended up, are those who focus on euphony and want excellent quality with a focus on the music more than a pursuit of some objective audio truth. I think it's elitist and condescending to try to exclude those who vary from one parochial view of the hobby, just as you would probably not like the test tone fellows saying their way is the one true way and your chosen form is heretical, and just as I don't care for the suggestion that my path is impure because it openly accepts personal preference and tastes instead of standing firm on only hardline neutrality. Your view is accurate in a generalized sense, but limited in scope.
That said, it should be acknowledged that we both have our biases. You seem to have a focus on pure, objective neutrality in order to reproduce what you hear in live music. I also find live music to be best (and dislike the plastic-sounding sterility of overly produced studio work), but I have no problem admitting that I sometimes enjoy the clarity of a well recorded live performance over the more natural sonic blending of actually being there. That's the human element, not just on the performer's side but on the listener's as well; there is no sin in not making the utmost effort to plug the mic feed directly into your temporal lobes. We do it for enjoyment and should make a priority of our enjoyment.
A lot of the sound we hear is synthesized, distorted, and poorly amplified even before it is recorded. So that's where the garbage reallly starts, and why it often difficult to distinguish mp3 files from less compressed sound formats. The only real live music left in abundance is classical music or jazz, by which you can judge the qualitfy of sound recording and reproduction.) Perhaps, in some way it is a good thing we don't have real live performances. It is a lot easier and lot cheaper when we don't know what we are missing with our IPODS.
A lot of modern music is synthesized, but I don't think that justifies passing judgement over it as not "real" music. Is jazz not real because it makes use of an electric guitar? There's a big difference between an amplified instrument and a synthesizer, but judging one to be fake because of that difference requires choosing where to draw the line, which usually ends up being nothing more than a reflection of our personal tastes. Many who do not care for jazz might question whether it is "real" music, but for very different reasons. It sounds like you'd disagree with the line their tastes have drawn.
If he is happy, who is such a snob that he should should say he shouldn't be?
Agreed. Exactly.
And I've reached the point where I realize we're just thread crapping now. But I'm really curious, why do you make it sound like we live in some live music free dystopia? Is there really so little wherever you are? I attend and record live concerts pretty regularly (much of it unamplified classical guitar lately) and could go to far far more if I desired. I've never viewed that as so uncommon, or the live music scene as so dead, but maybe I'm in a fortunate area. I'm curious to hear an answer to that last part, but if you feel like you must continue the rest of this discussion further, please do it privately so we don't splash any more mud on JS's fine thread. Sorry that ended up being such a rant; I just want to get my points across and respond to what I take issue with, but I have a couple years of stupid head-fi bickering bottled up.
