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Topic: Newbie mistake #21... (Read 3561 times) previous topic - next topic
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Newbie mistake #21...

Ugh!      I don't know why, but I climbed into this thread on the Quintessential Player forum.  Challenging one of their regulars, who preaches that "ABX is useless", and that he can easily hear differences between decoders used by different players (QCD, Winamp, foobar2000, etc.) only because of his well-endowed hardware.

How could this happen to me?  I was doing just fine.  Skipping right past most of the top 20 (or so) newbie mistakes by knowing when to talk and when to keep my mouth shut, but then I do something like this.  I know there have been marginal differences noted on occasion between some decoders, but nothing the average listener will ever detect.  If I remember correctly, it involved Garf placing pillows around his PC to muffle fan and disk noise in order to barely note a variance between MAD and FhG decoders?

The bulk of my argument is, rather, pushing the concept of ABX.  Why?  Why?  Why?  No one there will care anyway...and certainly not the guy who's bashing ABX.  Why am I preaching such philosophies on other sites?  It would be OK for someone who's been around a while to do this, but not for me.

I gotta start remembering...it's not just what you're saying, but who you're saying it to.  Being right only counts if the target audience cares (a few actually do, but probably not most).  What a waste.  Geez...being a newbie sucks sometimes.  HA should have a new sticky:

[span style='font-size:11pt;line-height:100%']The Top 100 Newbie Mistakes, And How To Avoid Them[/span]
#1 Slow down! Read the FAQ and use Search before you post anything.
...
#6 Don't try to teach the regulars!  Look at the "Joined" dates of other members.  You know less than those who joined before you, but not always more than those who joined after you.  Act accordingly.
...
#21 Don't try to preach concepts you learn at HA to other forums.
...
#100 Once you don't make any newbie mistakes for at least six months, then you're no longer considered a newbie.  But rules #6 and #21 still apply.

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #1 –
It's OK, ScorLibran.

To use the words of the same said individual: "Pearls before swine."

I believe it was best said:

"The only thing that evil men need to have in order to conquer in this world is for good men to do nothing."

It isn't your fault if you try and teach others.  It requires both patience and tolerance.  Just keep your facts straight and have refer to sources/data to back up your claims.
In Case Of Bose, Break Glass
Flac yuo in teh ASIO!

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #2 –
Quote
Isn't it interesting that the author of Foobar saw fit to create his own decoder modelled on mpg123 instead of using either the stock FhG decoder others have used or MAD?


  Wow.
  It's a conspiracy, call Mulder and Sculley!

  It looks like this fellow is convinced that there are "obviously" audible differences between decoders, but isn't willing to test such a concept in a blind scenario.

    Here I thought foobar2000 was built more with technical accuracy in mind, not under the supposition that one particular decoder is going to be audibly better than Fraunhofer.
    Maybe I'm just stupid.

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #3 –
This person seems to make a lot of technical / programming-related statements, and yet completely doesn't understand how different MP3 decoders are licensed.
Microsoft Windows: We can't script here, this is bat country.

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #4 –
Hmm, I wonder if the winAMP developers chose the $60,000 flat fee over the $0.75/unit rate.

  Download.com has the winamp 2.91 medium install downloaded about 23.3 million times.  I'd say they took the flat-fee option. 

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #5 –
Quote
This person seems to make a lot of technical / programming-related statements, and yet completely doesn't understand how different MP3 decoders are licensed.

I dunno... To most people (myself included, at one point) open source means "anyone can use it". Most people either don't know or don't care about the virality of the GPL. The  thought must have been something like this: "MAD is open source, why can't foobar use it?"

*shrugs* Whilst I made plenty of newbie mistakes, one I never made was doubting ABX tests. It always seemed right. And I figured right off the bat that transcoding was bad. Still, though, ScorLibran, you didn't do half bad. I doubt I could have explained everything half as cogently as you did. It really sounds like this roj guy is trying way too hard to be one of thse "cognoscenti" that he appears to loathe. He's got his opinions, and he's found people that feel the same way, so he's happy. He cites Usenet, of all places, as a source of high-quality information. Bleh.

Anyone care to validate the ABX results there? The guy seemed to hear a difference, but IIRC, ABX probabilites aren't decreasing right there, from my experience with ABC/HR. Are WinABX's probabilities different?

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #7 –
Quote
Anyone care to validate the ABX results there? The guy seemed to hear a difference, but IIRC, ABX probabilites aren't decreasing right there, from my experience with ABC/HR. Are WinABX's probabilities different?

Results seem right, WinABX probabilities work same way as abc/hr ones. He is hearing a difference. What should be checked now is what are these differences due to. It could be some actual difference at the decoders, but it could also be just a loudness difference. Maybe fb2k is replaygaining the file, maybe he has DSP attenuator (or other) activated. If so, it will be decoded at a softer volume. He must make sure replaygain and DSP are disbled at fb2k. I don't know it there's something similar at the other player.

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #8 –
Quote
It's OK, ScorLibran.

To use the words of the same said individual: "Pearls before swine."

I believe it was best said:

"The only thing that evil men need to have in order to conquer in this world is for good men to do nothing."

It isn't your fault if you try and teach others.  It requires both patience and tolerance.  Just keep your facts straight and have refer to sources/data to back up your claims.

Thanks!  That makes me feel better.  I was just feeling like I stepped off into a hole for a while there.  I have a bad habit of letting philosophy guide me more than just logic sometimes.

The good news is that there seems to have been a positive effect to my efforts.  I expected to go check on the thread and find bashing, but instead I found a series of test results and (mostly) reconciliations instead.  So I left a nice, long "thank you" post in return.

@KikeG:  Concerning DSP and ReplayGain, after reading your post I left another post there pointing out that those (and any other such) settings must be deactivated to insure test integrity.

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #9 –
There are some strange people out there.

Being misguided and misinformed is one thing. But you will also find those who probably know enough to know that they are wrong, but just enjoying arguing, so will try to convince everyone that white is black, just to provoke a response.

Some of these folks can seem quite plausible at first. It's sad, but before I answer or help anyone out on UseNet now, I do a quick search for their name, email, and/or signature - just to check that they're not a troll. It's amazing how many are.

You can try a similar thing on message boards - you've got to know when you're up against someone who is completely beyond hope, or at least is going to take far too much time to convince. If that's the case, point them to relevant threads here, and leave it. Life's too short.

Cheers,
David.

P.S. - that should be a FAQ or wiki entry - common newbie mistakes, and why they're wrong. They're all in the FAQ already, but maybe a collection that google would easily find would be good! e.g.

joint stereo is bad
VBR is bad
128kbps mp3 is transparent
320kbps mp3 isn't transparent
etc etc etc

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #10 –
I don't think I'ld call it a "stupid" mistake. It led to an interesting discussion, and you made some great points.

Shoot . . . I make stupid remarks in this forum all the time, and nobody's hammered me too bad yet.   

Dex

Newbie mistake #21...

Reply #11 –
Quote
Thanks!  That makes me feel better.  I was just feeling like I stepped off into a hole for a while there.  I have a bad habit of letting philosophy guide me more than just logic sometimes.

If you think that's bad, you should try encouraging ABX/AB/double blind tests to other things. Like Astrology, Palm Reading (the fortune telling, not physically reading a PDA), Talking to the Dead, etc.

The people who support those REALLY get pissy when you ask them to provide double blind test results.