[seamon]

Sometimes we headfiers have a tendency to become overly analytic resulting in missing the gestalt. For instance for those who have not heard the Vega they will ask how is the soundstage or the treble when compare to the Andro or other iems etc. Then the answers will become something like this " oh the soundstage is not as wide, or tall or deep as the Andro, or the treble is not as smooth or clean but it is the bass, wow that bass that you should notice" etc. It is equivalent to using a magnifying glass to look at every square mm of a Van Gogh's painting and by doing so may miss the beauty of the painting. Sometime it is hard to convey the whole sound signature by examining its components. Sometimes you can cut a chicken up into parts but when you put all the parts together they do not necessary add up to the chichen because the damn thing is dead. Even though it may be true that the sound stage may not be as big but I can tell you that when I am listening to the Vega my thoughts are not on the sound stage. I am just enjoying what the Vega is doing to me. It is kind of like when you are watching a magic show in Cesear Palace in Vegas the last thing you will notice is how large the stage is. You are being entertained by the magician and his act and you will care less about the size of the stage at that moment. When I listen to the Vega, I am so amazed at the things the Vega can do like I can see into the singer's voice like she is singing specially to me. Sometimes we headfiers will chase after those things that are not there and thereby missing the beautiful things that are there for us to enjoy.

Ok. By that logic, almost every TOTL IEM is the da beast and when someone who has never heard a TOTL IEM will never be able to decide on one as all IEMs are the best. Some of us are here for the nuances in sound of these to decide on our next purchase because we cannot have the luxury of trying them all out. Sure if you go to an magic show, you may relax and enjoy the great show. However, it is the job of the professional critic to compare and examine two TOTL magic shows for people who cannot afford to go for both. 

 

[fzman]

  Ok. By that logic, almost every TOTL IEM is the da beast and when someone who has never heard a TOTL IEM will never be able to decide on one as all IEMs are the best. Some of us are here for the nuances in sound of these to decide on our next purchase because we cannot have the luxury of trying them all out. Sure if you go to an magic show, you may relax and enjoy the great show. However, it is the job of the professional critic to compare and examine two TOTL magic shows for people who cannot afford to go for both. 

 
I think you have thoroughly missed the point here.  Jalo is not suggesting that people should not ask questions or share their experiences.  What I believe he IS suggesting, is that people try to better understand how the wording of a question can create misleading/incomplete answers, for example, if you are trying to figure out the relative monetary value of American coins, and you ask which one is bigger.  
 
There is a concept of a 'level of description' that does come into play here. We do sometimes have to describe things in ways that dissect the whole, and may therefore lose the forest for the trees...    This occurs quite frequently in the reviews done by so-called 'professional critics'.  (I will mostly ignore the fact that these days, the phrase pretty much means anybody with a keyboard and an internet connection.) I read so many reviews that have paragraph headings like 'bass' , 'treble', midrange, etc. and do not see much about how the thing actually plays music. Over time, people start to compartmentalize their opinions about gear into these tidy categories, and sometimes even competely miss the point--how does it play music-how does it communicate the composer's/musicians' message to me?  Reminds me of the old joke about how removing all of the limbs from XX made it go deaf.
 
It is almost like reading a detailed review of the controls, the highly polished metal, the elegant shape, the length of the cord of a toaster in a review, and not ever really being told that the toast it makes tastes like crap, and it almost always burns it..... Or, alternately, that it makes me want to rush home from work every day so I can enjoy some toast it made....    

 

[seamon]

   
I think you have thoroughly missed the point here.  Jalo is not suggesting that people should not ask questions or share their experiences.  What I believe he IS suggesting, is that people try to better understand how the wording of a question can create misleading/incomplete answers, for example, if you are trying to figure out the relative monetary value of American coins, and you ask which one is bigger.  
 
There is a concept of a 'level of description' that does come into play here. We do sometimes have to describe things in ways that dissect the whole, and may therefore lose the forest for the trees...    This occurs quite frequently in the reviews done by so-called 'professional critics'.  (I will mostly ignore the fact that these days, the phrase pretty much means anybody with a keyboard and an internet connection.) I read so many reviews that have paragraph headings like 'bass' , 'treble', midrange, etc. and do not see much about how the thing actually plays music. Over time, people start to compartmentalize their opinions about gear into these tidy categories, and sometimes even competely miss the point--how does it play music-how does it communicate the composer's/musicians' message to me?  Reminds me of the old joke about how removing all of the limbs from XX made it go deaf.
 
It is almost like reading a detailed review of the controls, the highly polished metal, the elegant shape, the length of the cord of a toaster in a review, and not ever really being told that the toast it makes tastes like crap, and it almost always burns it..... Or, alternately, that it makes me want to rush home from work every day so I can enjoy some toast it made....    

I agree. Nitpicking particular aspects of the sound without considering the context of the larger picture can lead to misleading answers by 'professional critics'.

 

[Jalo]

Thank you Fzman for your understanding of my post. @Seamon, sorry I should have made my point clearer. Clearly I do not mean that we should not be talking about fq range, bass, mid range and treble, sound stage etc. Your point is well taken that those are the things that we can talk about on these forums short of having an audition of the real thing but at the same time we should not be so myoptic (just in general and not referring to you) as to think those descriptions represent the sound. Another analogy is that I can share with you my chicken soup recipe or ingredients but knowing the ingredients will not let you know the taste of my soup until you try it. Yes it is true knowing the ingredients help and sometime is important as you may not like certain ingredient in a recipe but sometimes we tend to define the sound base on certain attributes and missing the whole experience. For instance a few posts back where Obsidyen was saying if the Vega has more treble than the K10 then he probably will not like it. Well first of all treble can probably be defined by more than one dimension ( meaning more treble does not necessary mean more sibilance), second by looking only at the treble I think ones will miss the whole experience that the Vega has to offer. One more analogy, someone once said dissecting a joke is like dissecting a frog, you can do it but the thing dies in the process.

That is just all I am saying.

 

[warrior1975]

Jalo Excellent post bro, couldn't agree more. As a whole, Vegas are pretty damn incredible.

 

[ngoshawk]

Sometimes we headfiers have a tendency to become overly analytic resulting in missing the gestalt. For instance for those who have not heard the Vega they will ask how is the soundstage or the treble when compare to the Andro or other iems etc. Then the answers will become something like this " oh the soundstage is not as wide, or tall or deep as the Andro, or the treble is not as smooth or clean but it is the bass, wow that bass that you should notice" etc. It is equivalent to using a magnifying glass to look at every square mm of a Van Gogh's painting and by doing so may miss the beauty of the painting. Sometime it is hard to convey the whole sound signature by examining its components. Sometimes you can cut a chicken up into parts but when you put all the parts together they do not necessary add up to the chichen because the damn thing is dead. Even though it may be true that the sound stage may not be as big but I can tell you that when I am listening to the Vega my thoughts are not on the sound stage. I am just enjoying what the Vega is doing to me. It is kind of like when you are watching a magic show in Cesear Palace in Vegas the last thing you will notice is how large the stage is. You are being entertained by the magician and his act and you will care less about the size of the stage at that moment. When I listen to the Vega, I am so amazed at the things the Vega can do like I can see into the singer's voice like she is singing specially to me. Sometimes we headfiers will chase after those things that are not there and thereby missing the beautiful things that are there for us to enjoy.

Well said...and you know I really should be happy with my CA Novas (and I thoroughly am!!!); but the descriptions given by more than one user/reviewer of the new CA line makes me want to go shovel driveways in the winter, and now lawns in the summer so I can purchase them! And I'm old!

I absolutely love the passion reviews. This to me is where I make my decisions. As I did in my Nova review, if the IEM/gear item makes me think of other items well beyond the realm of music, it has succeeded. If it inspires passion in me, it has won me over. The Nova did that; and the Cayin i5 is doing the same.

I really need to stop reading this darn site; my bank account can't afford it. Guess I will be saving pennies for the Vega!

Keep up the passionate responses, and reviews. To me passion is the very heart of our hobby. Cheers.

 

[seamon]

I tried the Vega and the Andromeda today courtesy of my friend who owns both pairs. I am going into these from the JVC FX-850. I tried the Vega first. At first, I wasn't really impressed. I could tell that the coherency of the sound was much greater. Then I listened to "True Colors - Dark Souls 3 version" and then it struck me, the Vega is everything that I have been looking for. The intimacy of the sound really caught me. It was just so damn good. I am a basshead and new to his hobby and with me were 2 seasoned audiophiles. Vega bass was their biggest gripe about these but I though that it was the best bass I have ever listened to. It was everything the FX-850 bass is all about just refined 10 times so. With the FX-850, there were subtle peaks which really bothered me and those kept adding up. With the Vegas, they were gone. The vocals were the best part. I was used to recessed mids and these were like a breath of fresh air. So damn good.
 
Then I tried the Andromeda. Sorry but I didn't like them at all. Bass was just too thin. Soundstage was definitely larger but they were not my cup of tea. I am definitely a basshead. In true colors, I was forever waiting for that bass to hit but nope. That left a very bad taste in my mouth. I was actually frustrated. Even the overall sound was kinda thin. Maybe this was just because I am very much accustomed to similar to Vega headphones/IEMs. 
 
Meanwhile, my 2 seasoned audiophile friends were bashing the Vega(just because of the bass) and saying that the Andromeda was some of the best they have ever heard. They were trying to explain to me why they preferred the Andromeda sound in terms of newbie terms. It was something along the lines that it's the same reason why people like the HD800. 
 
At the end of the day and in the words of @KB, listening to music is like sitting alone in front of a Campfire, dazzled and lost in its beauty, forgetting the world around you, and the only thing that exists is the music and you. The Vega really helped me feel that.
 
I'm buying a pair next week.

 

[Jalo]

@Warrior, thanks and I appreciate that.

@Ngoshawk, yes like I said before if what we listened to does not raise an emotional response then it doesn't matter, it's all just sound. It's because the passion of one man ( Ken Ball) that we have the Vega.

@Seamon, well if you can sense the intimacy of the sound, if you can discern the refinement of the bass, and enjoy the vocal, you are no newbie. You have great taste and I am glad you finally meet Vega and found her. Please share further thoughts after you acquire her.

 

[audio123]

  Meanwhile, my 2 seasoned audiophile friends were bashing the Vega(just because of the bass) and saying that the Andromeda was some of the best they have ever heard. They were trying to explain to me why they preferred the Andromeda sound in terms of newbie terms. It was something along the lines that it's the same reason why people like the HD800.

i know quite a number of seasoned audiophiles bash the Vega too bc of the bass. For me, Andromeda is more refined.

 

[jmills8]

i know quite a number of seasoned audiophiles bash the Vega too bc of the bass. For me, Andromeda is more refined.

many so called audiophiles follow the guy with the most gears and the best vocabulary. The one who looks down on bass and enjoys listening to Celine Dion. ☺

 

[nmatheis]

many so called audiophiles follow the guy with the most gears and the best vocabulary. The one who looks down on bass and enjoys listening to Celine Dion. ☺

LOL. And owns two or three pairs of HD800

 

[jmills8]

LOL. And owns two or three pairs of HD800

good one and says the hd800 has too much bass.

 

[nmatheis]

good one and says the hd800 has too much bass.

And could use a bit more treble :wink_face:

 

[jmills8]

And could use a bit more treble :wink_face:

Must get stuffer ear pads to allow the Treble to breath.

 

[Mimouille]

many so called audiophiles follow the guy with the most gears and the best vocabulary. The one who looks down on bass and enjoys listening to Celine Dion. ☺

Only listens to the same 10 albums including audiophile voices and jazz at the pawnshop. Or even sometimes just listens to sine sweeps.