Zin_Ramu
100+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2002
- Posts
- 109
- Likes
- 0
Yesterday at the Boston meet, I realized that I lacked the vocabulary and auditioning skills to adequately describe differences I heard in the various equipment we tested. So I thought I’d start a new thread to get some “best practices” going for testing. I’ve looked at some of the better reviewers’ posts to try to determine their methodologies and put together some thoughts. I’d like to get other peoples ideas and suggests on this.
Set-up:
1) Make sure everything is common except for the item being tested. This includes, source, ICs, amp, headphone, and even small things like power cord or power supply.
2) If possible, do the test blind. No matter how hard you try, pre-conceived notions will influence your decisions.
3) Time. While there is a tendency to hurry to try as many different combinations as possible, to really do proper comparisons takes some time. Better to really compare two or three components than to half-ass many.
Music:
1) Choose music you are familiar with.
2) Listen to a few different artists. Try to listen to music that exposes male and female vocals, strings especially an acoustic piece, some drum work especially cymbals for testing hi-freq, and some bass.
Listening Checklist:
1) Soundstage: i) wide versus narrow, ii) focused versus blurry
2) Detail Retrieval: i) was it able to reach down and retrieve minute details or was there some blurriness
3) Instrument Separation: i) are instruments properly separated with an airiness around them or are they muddled
4) Presentation: i) forward versus a few rows back versus laidback
5) Silence: i) is it completely black or is there some hiss or humm
6) Bass: i) how is the attack speed, ii) is the bass tight or loose, iii) how is the bass extension
7) Mid-range: i) is the mid-range neutral or colored, ii) do the vocals sound natural or is timbre off, iii) is the sound sweet, liquid, seductive or too analytical
8) Hi-freq: i) is there proper hi-freq extension or does it roll off, ii) how is the attack speed, iii) do cymbal hits decay properly
9) Cohesion: i) is there smooth cohesion among the frequency ranges or are there dips, valleys, or peaks.
Anyway would love to hear if there’s other things people are listening for, or elaborations on what they feel some of these terms mean to them or better descriptions.
Zin
Set-up:
1) Make sure everything is common except for the item being tested. This includes, source, ICs, amp, headphone, and even small things like power cord or power supply.
2) If possible, do the test blind. No matter how hard you try, pre-conceived notions will influence your decisions.
3) Time. While there is a tendency to hurry to try as many different combinations as possible, to really do proper comparisons takes some time. Better to really compare two or three components than to half-ass many.
Music:
1) Choose music you are familiar with.
2) Listen to a few different artists. Try to listen to music that exposes male and female vocals, strings especially an acoustic piece, some drum work especially cymbals for testing hi-freq, and some bass.
Listening Checklist:
1) Soundstage: i) wide versus narrow, ii) focused versus blurry
2) Detail Retrieval: i) was it able to reach down and retrieve minute details or was there some blurriness
3) Instrument Separation: i) are instruments properly separated with an airiness around them or are they muddled
4) Presentation: i) forward versus a few rows back versus laidback
5) Silence: i) is it completely black or is there some hiss or humm
6) Bass: i) how is the attack speed, ii) is the bass tight or loose, iii) how is the bass extension
7) Mid-range: i) is the mid-range neutral or colored, ii) do the vocals sound natural or is timbre off, iii) is the sound sweet, liquid, seductive or too analytical
8) Hi-freq: i) is there proper hi-freq extension or does it roll off, ii) how is the attack speed, iii) do cymbal hits decay properly
9) Cohesion: i) is there smooth cohesion among the frequency ranges or are there dips, valleys, or peaks.
Anyway would love to hear if there’s other things people are listening for, or elaborations on what they feel some of these terms mean to them or better descriptions.
Zin
