ekfruwhekrwhk (u/ekfruwhekrwhk)

Paul_S · 3 years ago

How can audiophiles continue to exist with knowledge being so easily available? And how can someone be clever enough to be a software engineer and not clever enough to figure out crystals in bags taped to cables do not affect music quality.

Just some nuggets from that thread:

"Sounds awesome, the previous version had a slight tendency to defuse the treble, but with VS2012 compile it is a much more complete sound with absolutely no digital harshness, some 16/44 albums I could hardly play before without getting a headache are now rendered in their full glory."

"It's just lazyness on the part of the player developers that they rely on the old methods, I guess they think bits are bits."

"Goto also sounds better than anything else I have tried." - the "Goto" in the quote means a goto in C used to replace a loop.

"also most players use malloc to get memory while new is the c++ method and sounds better."

ekfruwhekrwhk · 3 years ago

Every community has a fringe of crazies. I remember back when I first got into audio in high school, when I bought my first pair of >$10 headphones and suddenly I could hear details in music that weren't there before, and wondering how deep the rabbit hole went. I started reading audio forums and saw that most postings came from a small number of extremely active posters that made absurd, hyperbolic claims. There's a product review that has since become a meme, about some ridiculous $1000 RCA cables, how they sounded "smoky" and "danceable". I read that when it was first posted and felt disgusted. Then the moderators of the forum I read most often announced that any discussion of double-blind testing was banned and anyone who discussed it would immediately be banned. I deleted my account on that forum. What a disappointment. But the fact that fringe crazies exist doesn't mean the subject is all a joke. Car tuning is a legitimate hobby, even though I have idiot cousins who will physically assault anyone who questions the purpose of their undercarriage neon lights. And there is a difference between junk audio equipment and good audio equipment, even though there is also plenty of snake oil under the label "audiophile".

UniverseHacker · 3 years ago

I've always felt totally alone falling somewhere between hardcore audiophiles and the 'norm,' which seems to feel a cell phone or cheap laptop speaker is as good as anything else for music. I really notice the difference between cheap crap, and say an older used brand name receiver with freestanding floor speakers, the kind of system you can find on craigslist for about $100. But I cannot notice a major difference between the $100 system, and say a $100k system (or whatever audiophiles spend). I also do notice a big difference between a 96Kbps MP3 and 320Kbps, but not between 320Kbps and lossless.

ekfruwhekrwhk · 3 years ago

I can genuinely tell the difference between 320K MP3 and CD, and between CD and HD, (a group of enthusiasts got together and double-blind tested each other) but only in carefully controlled circumstances with a LOT of focus. As in, wearing really good headphones in a silent distraction-free room with my eyes closed and focusing on particular features like cymbals and chimes and staging, and even then only after switching back and forth between samples a dozen times. So after realizing that, I always aim to have CD quality, but I couldn't care less about HD audio. And like you said, $100 Craigslist systems from 1990 sound drastically better than modern consumer-grade systems. People started caring more about "smart" convenience features and less about sound quality a long time ago.