[Mr Rick]

   
Beethoven was completely deaf. 

 
Beethoven lost his hearing later in life.  And, the music he wrote he heard in his head, as well as with his ears.

 

[ImperialBlade]

   
Beethoven was completely deaf. 

Xiphmont,
 
I have to ask the obvious question here, do you own a Pono? Have you listed to it? Have you based your opinions after your evaluation of this product?
Just wondering....
 
 
Regards,
Eric

 

[xiphmont]

   
That explains why those symphonies are so loud!
All joking aside - he certainly used other senses to come up with all that great music (that must have been the case since I don't remember reading anywhere about his use of DR charts either).

Ha, there have been many jokes about that yes   An ethnomusicologist once told me that even in Beethoven's time there were detractors of the newfangled 'pianoforte' that blamed the instrument for his deafness.  Many at the time saw the mechanization and rationalization of musical instruments as a corruption of the purity of music.
 
As for charts, they tell you specific things.  Gathering data is at best ever half the battle.  You have to know what it's telling you, and what it isn't.  Judging music solely by a DR chart is insane.

 

[xiphmont]

  Xiphmont,
 
I have to ask the obvious question here, do you own a Pono? Have you listed to it? Have you based your opinions after your evaluation of this product?

 
I already said I did not (and have asked here and other places if someone was willing to lend me one for testing).  I'd love to know how it does on my intermodulation test samples. 
 
I have never written anything specifically about the Pono, aside to say that there was a brief consultation between me and the team that was developing it several years ago.  Later on, the Pono marketing splash was just a trigger to writing an article about high-rate audio.

 

[RRod]

All I know is that I don't want Beethoven designing my hardware or compression formats. People act like engineers and physicists can't tell us anything about how digital audio works.

 

[olddude]

Beethoven WENT deaf.  He wasn't deaf to start with.  He used his other senses to write after he went deaf.  Art.  
 
No, you did not precisely call me a fool.  I believe the word used in your post was "silly,"  It only becomes personal when you make bold statements about how you are on the side of rightness and others are not.  I'm glad you think science is everything when it comes to listening to music.  I disagree.  I'm not using words like "silly" towards you, I just disagree with your statements.  I may FEEL sorry that your premise is entirely based on science, as I FEEL that art can be enjoyed on many levels.  So if I FEEL that I can enjoy art in 24 bit, then I don't need you telling me it doesn't matter what I like, that it doesn't truly exist under your scientific rigor.  If I like it, let me enjoy it.  Don't go around harshing people's, as they say, mellow.  No one likes a killjoy.  
 
Besides, it's my twenty bucks.  I can spend it on whatever I want.  Just like I can buy a bottle of wine for twenty bucks or a hundred bucks and, scientifically, they should be the same.  But they aren't. Or how I can buy two things made at a factory at exactly the same time in exactly the same way and one is really much better than the other.  Variation can be art.  
 
Did you know that Neil Young has about a hundred little guitar amps, all the same brand and model, but only one of them pleases him.  All the same but one different.  Where's the science in that?  Art.
 
I enjoy all types of art.  I especially like looking at Impressionism paintings.  Oh, and I have a BFA in Fine Art, and a teaching credential in Art, and I was a professional photographer for thirty years.  So I guess that makes me a "professional."  I love Seurat and his pointillist style.  I understand what he is doing, scientifically; I've even seen close-up photos of his colored dots and how he uses them to create color and line where there really are only a whole bunch of different-colored dots. When I go to museums and look at his work, I can scientifically understand what he has done to create his images.  But the FEELING I get is not the same thing.  Emotionally I take away a lot more from the experience than just admiring his dot placement.  Art. 

 

[xiphmont]

  Beethoven WENT deaf.  He wasn't deaf to start with. 

 
The logic I was responding to was 'Neil Young has GREAT ears--- the proof is his amazing music'
 
So Beethoven must have had great ears when he wrote his most famous works, except he didn't. He was deaf.  The assertion that Neil Young has great ears today because he wrote great music doesn't follow.  Neil could be mostly deaf today and no one would know. Or he could have the ears of an 18 year old.  His music lends little evidence to either.
 

 Besides, it's my twenty bucks.  I can spend it on whatever I want.

 
Of course you can.  Did I, anywhere at any time, suggest you shouldn't?  I just spent $6k on headphones, because I could, and I wanted to.
 
I do object to passing off demonstrably incorrect rationalizations as fact, mainly because of those annoying wrong professionals you mention who pick up these notions and use them as if they're true.  Digital audio (and human hearing) are not deep dark mysteries no one can understand.  Alongside the subjective enjoyment of music and equipment, there are objective facts.  Not knowing everything is not the same thing as knowing nothing.

 

[Ableza]

As usual, this thread has dissolved into ********.

 

[AUDIOBREEDER]

^^Agreed.
The music matters most.

 

[olddude]

   
The logic I was responding to was 'Neil Young has GREAT ears--- the proof is his amazing music'
 
So Beethoven must have had great ears when he wrote his most famous works, except he didn't. He was deaf.  The assertion that Neil Young has great ears today because he wrote great music doesn't follow.  Neil could be mostly deaf today and no one would know. Or he could have the ears of an 18 year old.  His music lends little evidence to either.
 
 
Of course you can.  Did I, anywhere at any time, suggest you shouldn't?  I just spent $6k on headphones, because I could, and I wanted to.
 
I do object to passing off demonstrably incorrect rationalizations as fact, mainly because of those annoying wrong professionals you mention who pick up these notions and use them as if they're true.  Digital audio (and human hearing) are not deep dark mysteries no one can understand.  Alongside the subjective enjoyment of music and equipment, there are objective facts.  Not knowing everything is not the same thing as knowing nothing.

Last response-  Beethoven HAD hearing, he lost it, he used his other senses to continue writing.  Nothing to do with NY or his ears in that sentence.
 
In fact, I have NEVER made a comment, pro or con, about Neil Young's hearing.  Ever,  here on these threads or in my personal life.  In fact, I haven't, with one exception, purchased any of his albums recorded after about 1971 (I did recently get the Pono remaster of Comes A Time).  His music stopped speaking to me.  Ah, but when it did....
 
I have passed off NO rationalizations anywhere here about any professionals in the audio area.  I have merely stated that I like, I have, and I listen to hi-res formats as well as CD format, happily.  
 
I have simply stated that I like the Pono, I think it is a good player, and I don't care about marketing claims.
 
Oh, and I have repeatedly stated that music is based on science but there are ephemerals of art to it that can't be quantified.  Otherwise, all music would be simply scales, test tones and chopsticks.  What a sad world that would be.
 
Enjoy your $6K earphones.  I'll enjoy my $400 (well, it was a gift) Pono.  

 

[Kerouac]

Just curious, are there many Pono users out there who use it in balanced mode? I would like to read more opinions on that...
 
When I read olddude's comment some time ago about his Silver Dragon balanced iem cable it got me interested, but I was a bit sceptic (only in my head, not on hf

) and thought that the upgrade in sq was probably mainly due to the quality of the silver...
Now I have recenty bought me a Sony MDR-Z7 which comes with 2 cables, one of them single ended and the other balanced. I'm pretty sure the cables themself share the same quality. But when I heard the difference between them I was almost in shock (in a positive way) by the way the sq scaled up from Pono in balanced mode...hearing = believing => highly recommended!!!

 

[olddude]

Pretty interesting, isn't it?  I hear it's more dramatic in a home system but haven't got the equipment to try it. There are a number of us here that use balanced with the Pono.  Only possible downside is battery duration per charge, but that seems to be a small price to pay.  
 
Glad you are enjoying the experience.  

 

[drew911d]

I get my FBI Silver Litz balanced cables on Friday according to tracking number.
 
Pono -> Silver Litz balanced -> Noble K10.  I'll post some comments when I get some time with them.
 
 
Sam Smith on now with stock cables.  CD rip sounds pretty darn good..

 

[olddude]

Good master=great sound on the Pono.  

 
Came across the 1st generation Pono prototype on the Pono site.   
 
(For those of you under 55, thats a 45rpm record (single) with a yellow spindle.  Loved those spindles.)
 

 

[doctorjazz]

Just read the Tyll article, man, I think he really nails it. The improvements are objectively small, subjectively can be all the difference in the world. And, no, while the difference between players is objectively small (pianos don't sound like piccolos on an iPhone, say), the small improvement and the overall smoothness and rightness just make it the player I reach for 99% of the time (and I have, as previously stated, the DX90, X3, iPod Touch and iPad 3, Samsung YPP, had some others). A small objective difference, when it's the RIGHT one, can lead to a really big increase in enjoyment.
Have to go for balanced cables one of these days...just a question of deciding the headphones to get them from, too many toys, too little time (1st world problem, as they say). But, I'm waiting for delivery of the acs Encore ciem, if I can get a cable that is balanced for that, that may be it...