Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 19:39:55

I took the ABX test as devised and produced by the group and I got five of five identifications correct. My editor, John Atkinson got 4 of 5 correct.

I am no expert, but I can certainly believe this if one's ears are trained enough to pick up the non-linear clipping and/or higher levels of second-order harmonic distortion of a tube amp.

Edit: Sorry. please disregard this. I misread the original message.

Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on 2009-04-16 16:32:19

Unlike most people who post here, I've had the *privilege* of meeting Michael Fremer in the flesh. Well sort of. This was in 2005.  After a few seconds in my presence, he started loudly screaming profanities about an ABX demo that some of my friends did at an AES meeting back in the very early 1990s.  His friends had to forcably restrain him and drag him out of the room.

  I am totally speechless. I don't know whether to laugh or cry at such ignorance.

Please be so kind & go post some ABX logs you can hear the difference between an mp3 & a Wav file,

I'm not really sure Fremer and Mahoney actually doing much damage with this piece, besides priming young iPod people to buy megabuck systems later in life. I'm not sure if I can get much bent out of shape about convincing people to go lossless, buy a decent home system, etc.

But some of the Gizmodo commenters are asking if Fremer could provide a low end recommended system. He is the absolute last person you should ask for that. It's more important than ever to maintain an objective eye with the low end, and Fremer is likely to just run off into the weeds and choose some horifically underperforming system because it provides a better match for his ears alone.

Quote from: krabapple on 2009-04-16 16:16:10

Sad to read how many commenters there thought it was a 'great article' and 'real in-depth journalism'.

I'm sure it's better journalism as far as Gizmodo is concerned. Maybe someday they'll grow enough to hire people with actual journalism degrees and such.

Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on 2009-04-16 16:32:19

Unlike most people who post here, I've had the *privilege* of meeting Michael Fremer in the flesh. Well sort of. This was in 2005.  After a few seconds in my presence, he started loudly screaming profanities about an ABX demo that some of my friends did at an AES meeting back in the very early 1990s.  His friends had to forcably restrain him and drag him out of the room.

That wasn't the infamous "cable" test, was it?

There are a few stories like that about Fremer's attitude. Salvatore's exchange with him is pretty fun (although Salvatore is easily just as much of a pompous windbag as Fremer is). There's also that long-standing alleged fight between Fremer and the NYT over vinyl coverage...

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My first question is who paid $350,000 for the equipment Fremer uses?  It is worth that today?  Is he a trust-fund baby? Does he get paid that much by Stereopihile? Or, has Fremer fanned the flames of Fremer-celebrity or possbily Fremer-fear so well that enough high end audio dealers and/or manufacters have been cowed into giving or loaning him most if not all of that equipment?

No, only Steve Hoffman does that. *rimshot*

I'm no longer thinking malice on Stereophile's part in the context of loans and reviewers' pricing. I think it's plain to see that the economic status of its editors and reviewers is substantially less than the audience it is actually gearing its reviews too. Long term loans and preferred pricing are more justifiable in such a situation.

Quote from: krabapple on 2009-04-16 17:02:57

IN his 'real life' Fremer was/is a psychiatrist, and in in NYC that can pay pretty well.

Fremer is a psychiatrist? That joke writes itself. Multiple times over actually. Heh.

Quote from: krabapple on 2009-04-16 18:03:34

Indeed. Fremer's pricey system didn't restore his ability to hear the LP hiss that the reporter heard.

Nor does it guarentee that his LPs play back with a speed tolerance of any less than 0.6%, as I observed a few days ago with some needledrops he posted.

Next time you hear an audiophile claim that high-mass turntables do not have speed issues, pour that into their cornflakes and shove it up their ass.

The vinyl vs. digital debate really is telling: for instance Roy Halee, who engineered  many classical music albums for Columbia in the 1960s and is best known for recording all of the great Simon and Garfunkel albums along with Bob Dylan, The Byrds, The Lovin' Spoonful and many others certainly knows what a master tape sounds like---better than anyone here I'm sure--and what does he prefer? Vinyl. He's an analog guy. He doesn't like CD sound and he's of course dismissive of compressed audio formats. He's to be taken seriously, I assure you.

When I read some of the self-satisfied wise guys here, who purport to be "objective," I have to laugh. They are every bit as narcissistic and self-satisfied as they accuse "audiophiles" of being. I think there's a level of self-loathing going on here that's in need of some study!

In every field and/or hobby, there are enthusiasts...for cars, wine, watches, whatever. The greater the enthusiasm, the better in those fields. No one tries to "prove" all cars drive alike or "measure the same," yet when it comes to audio, there's this rear guard, as exemplified on this site, that spends it's time mocking enthusiasts, and reducing everything to a very low common denominator. When I read people here actually mocking the idea of a holographic soundstage, I know they have allowed their orthodoxy to deprive them of a really incredible experience. The kid who came to do the Gizmodo story was all set to write a mocking story....then he sat down and I put on a record. That's all I did....it took him two minutes to realize what he was hearing was amazing! It was sensory overload great and not to be denied....so he wrote about it that way and look at some of the responses here. I'm sorry, but there's something wrong when a site about audio throws out such condescension and ugliness about someone else's enthusiasm. He heard what he heard and someone posts it's "misinformation?"  I don't get it.....

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 21:52:56

My contention is that this kind of back and forth testing is not appropriate to judging audio gear...it's the methodology that was used to develop MP3s, wasn't it? Throw away data do A/B and "prove" nothing audible was lost...but in the end compare the final compressed audio to full resolution and the difference is easily heard....it's a kind of death by tiny slices.

Well your rhetoric is great. Just the logic is flawed. Even if MP3 was a flawed technology, one tool used to develop it is not inferentially proven to be flawed. The principle of redundancy isn't flawed either, if both a main power source and its backup fail - a bad application does not invalidate a methodology.

ABX is a great opportunity for an interested individual to differentiate those reviewers, who actually really have excellent ears, from those with average ears but great imagination and rhetoric skills (while in reality they cannot even hear a difference between two products compared). If you are a honest reviewer, you should be lucky to accept the challenge for a public ABX test and show your real skills. Of course 5/5 and better results would have to be counted in your favor. There is nothing wrong with ABX testing, they don't take a single piece of sound away from you, everything you should need is there. What could ever be wrong with that?

You would probably answer again, that you don't have to prove anything. Your votaries like B0RK may accept that blindly. But as a judicious man you will surely understand that it seems highly suspicious, when somebody who should review the sound of a product, insists this wouldn't be possible properly if he wasn't allowed to use his eyes.

Quote from: cpchan on 2009-04-16 21:24:33

Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on 2009-04-16 16:32:19

Unlike most people who post here, I've had the *privilege* of meeting Michael Fremer in the flesh. Well sort of. This was in 2005.  After a few seconds in my presence, he started loudly screaming profanities about an ABX demo that some of my friends did at an AES meeting back in the very early 1990s.  His friends had to forcably restrain him and drag him out of the room.

  I am totally speechless. I don't know whether to laugh or cry at such ignorance.

Cry: you're believing a total liar. Krueger lied. No such encounter ever occurred.

Absence of hiss doesn't necessarily equal good sound....

Don't you see? Krueger is rational and scientic..until you issue the slighest bit of a challenge to his orthodoxy Then he goes for the personal attack.

Am I "wrong" in preferring analog to digital?

I'm in very good company with many, many top recording engineers who prefer to record and listen on analog gear...so please tell me where I'm "wrong" as opposed to having an opinion that differs from yours.

Cry: you're believing a total liar. Krueger lied. No such encounter ever occurred.

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 20:57:11

The vinyl vs. digital debate really is telling: for instance Roy Halee, who engineered  many classical music albums for Columbia in the 1960s and is best known for recording all of the great Simon and Garfunkel albums along with Bob Dylan, The Byrds, The Lovin' Spoonful and many others certainly knows what a master tape sounds like---better than anyone here I'm sure--and what does he prefer? Vinyl. He's an analog guy. He doesn't like CD sound and he's of course dismissive of compressed audio formats. He's to be taken seriously, I assure you.

Of course Mr. Engineer From the 60s gets to prefer vinyl, after all, it *does* usually sound different from CD.  So?  Let's leave aside that the guy may have some emotional ties to the medium (d'ya think?).  In terms of signal in/signal out, it's a less accurate medium in the audible band.  But some people like its particular euphonic distortions.  Some people like the 'warmth' of some tube amps too.  Given that, what gives you the yarbles to diss people don't find the supposed 'sound' of mp3s objectionable?    (let's leave aside too, the choice of vinyl as an alternative to the use of heinous amounts of compression on CDs , which of course you know is a production CHOICE, not an inherent part of anything digital. We can leave that aside because you've and your ilk have been blowing your tiresome 'analog' trumpet since the first CDs were released, long before the loudness wars began)

Mr. Fremer, I realize this is the way you roll, and I'm afraid it doesn't fly. I assure you, I couldn't care less about THIS particular argument from authority: "Mr. Famous Recording Engineer says digital just can't match vinyl".  I've seen too many audio 'engineers' make absurd, scientifically *wrong* claims about digital and about comparison methods, to take them at their word *simply on the basis of their jobs as knob-pushers*.  Now, if they also happen to show technical acumen as regards digital --- like, say, Bob Katz -- then I take them waaay more seriously.  And of course there's the strong probability that you couldn't tell a Redbook recording from an LP, from the LP itself, in a fair comparison.  Which kinda blows the whole 'digital can't match an LP ' argument right out of the water.  (And that's even making sure the LP was properly *demagnetized* first.)

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When I read some of the self-satisfied wise guys here, who purport to be "objective," I have to laugh. They are every bit as narcissistic and self-satisfied as they accuse "audiophiles" of being. I think there's a level of self-loathing going on here that's in need of some study!

Pointing and laughing at you is 'self-loathing'...check.

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In every field and/or hobby, there are enthusiasts...for cars, wine, watches, whatever. The greater the enthusiasm, the better in those fields. No one tries to "prove" all cars drive alike or "measure the same," yet when it comes to audio, there's this rear guard, as exemplified on this site, that spends it's time mocking enthusiasts, and reducing everything to a very low common denominator. When I read people here actually mocking the idea of a holographic soundstage, I know they have allowed their orthodoxy to deprive them of a really incredible experience. The kid who came to do the Gizmodo story was all set to write a mocking story....then he sat down and I put on a record. That's all I did....it took him two minutes to realize what he was hearing was amazing! It was sensory overload great and not to be denied....so he wrote about it that way and look at some of the responses here. I'm sorry, but there's something wrong when a site about audio throws out such condescension and ugliness about someone else's enthusiasm. He heard what he heard and someone posts it's "misinformation?"  I don't get it.....

Oh, look, there's the *car* analogy.    It must be *that time* in the debate.   

You're part of what's wrong with this hobby, not what's right.

...I have a track record that speaks for itself. The people here who think reviews in Stereophile are just spouted opinions don't read the magazine and so don't understand it...

My contention But as a judicious man you will surely understand that it seems highly suspicious, when somebody who should review the sound of a product, insists this wouldn't be possible properly if he wasn't allowed to use his eyes.

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 20:11:25

Absence of hiss doesn't necessarily equal good sound....

Yet if all other factors are equal, does a lower noise floor, and, thus, a greater possible dynamic range, equal good sound, in your opinion? Isn't hiss a detractor to achieving good sound? If so, why is vinyl central to any fidelity-oriented pursuit?

I have never said vinyl is "central" to any fidelity-oriented pursuit. It's just my preference and that of many others. Hiss is not a good thing but neither does it destroy good sound. If you remember in the early days of CD engineers were so determined to remove hiss from analog recordings, they took way a good deal of the HF information too. Later remasterings left it in and most observers agreed the results sounded better. Hiss is what it is. Recordings are flawed, regardless of the medium. Choose your poison. A lower noise floor does equal wider dynamic range but so does increasing bits from 20 to 24 and higher resolution digital sounds better than 16 bit/44.1K sampled digital. Look, when the first digital rock recording was issued (Ry Cooder's "Bop 'til you Drop") was issued I was at the record store when it opened. I had every reason to love it. I was well prepped for no hiss, no scrape flutter etc. Unfortunately that record sounded terrible in ways I'd never heard before. Ry Cooder himself ended up thinking the same thing--and it wasn't the microphones...so I waited for the CD and the first demo I heard was awful. It was an album I was very familiar with: Roxy Music's "Avalon." This was an AES demo before there was a real CD player. It sounded awful! I figured it was early in the technology and people would say "ugh, that's bad, but it will get better." Instead, they said "Wow, that's great!"  That's when I made my bumper sticker. I'm not anti-digital and CD technology has improved greatly: better filters, lower jitter, etc. as the technology matured but i still think it's second rate compared to good vinyl...that's my opinion.

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 21:02:47

Am I "wrong" in preferring analog to digital?

Not at all. There's no "wrong" in individual preference. You may very well prefer lying on a bed of nails rather than a memory foam mattress, for instance, and nobody should have any particular issue with that (other than having concern for the well-being of your skin, of course).

The issue, however, is the perpetration of the myth that all forms of analog media, such as the vinyl record, are superior to any form of digital media, such as the CD or the SACD. If such a myth had knees, the proper course of action would be to take a sledgehammer to them: I feel the perpetration of this myth is really that dangerous to the pursuit of "sonic excellence".

I mean, as the article says, you drove around with a bumper sticker that read "COMPACT DISCS SUCK". We're to believe that this was intended to be merely an expression of your own opinion?

That was 1983! The CDs I heard sounded awful. Worse, the reaction to clearly awful sound was positive. There's always a technological learning curve. I was against bad sound being declared good. I have never said all forms of analog media are superior to any form of digital media. Never! I've been an SACD enthusiast from the beginning. Had CDs been 96/24 from the beginning I would have been supportive but to watch the entire history of recorded sound up until 1984 or so being transferred to an inferior, barely adequate digital format was alarming. The great recording engineer Robert Fine addressed the AES in the 1960s I believe and implored his fellow engineers to not accept a digital format unless and until it could sample 100K...I think he was correct.

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 21:02:47

I'm in very good company with many, many top recording engineers who prefer to record and listen on analog gear...so please tell me where I'm "wrong" as opposed to having an opinion that differs from yours.

And I can assemble a large number of people who believe the United States faked the Apollo moon landings. That's a "fair" belief, and I won't attack those who hold it (unless they invite me to), but it speaks nothing to the actual historical reality of the Apollo missions and what was accomplished during those years.

This is not a matter of one's opinion but another matter entirely.


I never tell anyone they are "wrong" for preferring anything. I think good vinyl playback sounds far more like live music than good CD playback. That's just my opinion. No one who thinks otherwise is right or wrong...these are subjective opinions. That's all.

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 23:15:38

Cry: you're believing a total liar. Krueger lied. No such encounter ever occurred.

Have you met Krueger, though? Is that much true?

Quote from: analogcorner on 2009-04-24 23:57:42

...I have a track record that speaks for itself. The people here who think reviews in Stereophile are just spouted opinions don't read the magazine and so don't understand it...

Well, that all sounds a lot less lunatic than you have been pictured here. Still this simple criticism stays unanswered:

Quote from: rpp3po on 2009-04-24 22:48:37

My contention But as a judicious man you will surely understand that it seems highly suspicious, when somebody who should review the sound of a product, insists this wouldn't be possible properly if he wasn't allowed to use his eyes.

I never said it would be impossible! Nor that it might be preferable. It's just not practical.

There has been so much research about how easily an ear can be fooled by optical anticipation, slight difference of volume, etc. For example, an amp A with 0.6db higher output volume than B will sound richer to most ears (while both can appear to deliver the same volume)... But you will know all that.

The question remains: when it is so easy to apply at least some basic scientific methodology and exclude those influences, why are you still neglecting it?

It is not so easy to apply scientific methodology given what we do. We insert a piece of gear into our system and describe what it sounds like. That's the job. If you don't think there's any value to that, fine. Tens of thousand of people do, especially because when they buy something that's what they do! No doubt there are pitfalls to what I do...but when most engineers can't hear the difference between a tube amp and a solid state amp on a double blind test, when the differences are obvious, clearly there are pitfalls there too!

That is suspicious to any critical observer. Not that I think that there is a great conspiracy or that you intentionally fool your customers - but employing scientific testing approaches would just severely limit your possibilities of "literary expression", and I think that is why you are omitting them.

It would be impossible and impractical to employ scientific testing approaches to this or to do "double blind" automobile tests! You know it's a Farrari when you get in to drive it.... THERE I GO AGAIN WITH THE CAR ANALOGIES...

It would be impossible and impractical to employ scientific testing approaches to this or to do "double blind" automobile tests! You know it's a Farrari when you get in to drive it.... THERE I GO AGAIN WITH THE CAR ANALOGIES...

Krueger was at the AES where I got the 5/5 identifications correct. That part is true....that's the only part.

The argument between Arny Krueger and Michael Fremer occurred after the debate I organized at HE2005.

It would be impossible and impractical to employ scientific testing approaches to this or to do "double blind" automobile tests! You know it's a Farrari when you get in to drive it.... THERE I GO AGAIN WITH THE CAR ANALOGIES...

Oh, man. There will be blood on the dance floor when Krueger returns and they clash...

Put on some nice music, get some popcorn, sit back and enjoy reading!

I'm so glad, that the mods have resisted to close this thread, when it fell off a little earlier. What a priceless ending act for this story! Fremer & Atkinson show up to fight back and kick up their heels.

I'm so glad, that the mods have resisted to close this thread, when it fell off a little earlier. What a priceless ending act for this story! Fremer & Atkinson show up to fight back and kick up their heels.

for you, it's another relentless flaming thread.

The fact that you & the Lossy Forever crue marked HA as a Hateful bunch of degenerate wackos in front of the entire world means little to you.

People making self indulgent baseless assumptions, accusations, & rants, about people they never met & gear they have never seen.

The fact that you & the Lossy Forever crue marked HA as a Hateful bunch of degenerate wackos in front of the entire world means little to you.

The fact that you & the Lossy Forever crue marked HA as a Hateful bunch of degenerate wackos in front of the entire world means little to you.