odigg
500+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2008
- Posts
- 868
- Likes
- 26
Some people don't like DBT. Some people don't like total subjectivity with no controls whatsoever. I'm not trying to debate either point in this thread so don't interpret this post as an attack or support of either stance.
For all the people on this forum audio a is a great hobby. At the same time, finding "quality" information can be a pain. You don't know who to trust, what people have heard, a person's hearing ability, or much of anything else about many members. The exceptions are the members who have been here for a while and established their credentials and ability.
At least to me, part of the problem is that there seems to be no real standard for people to go by when they test/compare equipment and report differences. I understand people want compare equipment in a way that allows them to be comfortable. We don't want to limit ourselves with how we explore our hardware and be caught in burdensome standards of testing.
But having no proper standard seems to kill the quality of the information on this board. When I first came here to Head-Fi I took in everything everybody said. Now I've identified a few people I trust and follow what they say. A lot of other stuff is really just "lesiure" reading.
Before somebody says there are no standards on Head-Fi and there should not be, let me point out that there are some basic standards here. Even if Head-Fi members say "Everybody hears differently" we still do believe there are some objective answers. If somebody said "The K701 has way too much bass" many people would wonder from what viewpoint such a statement could be made. The K701 is known to be many things, but most certainly not a bassy headphone.
So I've been thinking about a standard people can use to compare equipment so that everybody has a basic reference point to think about when they read reviews and make comments.
The standard I'm thinking of comes from the following statement about human perception.
"Increases in volume are perceived as increases in sound quality."
This has been established by scientific research. I've read a lot of stuff about this in the past. I wanted to find some links so that people could not just take my word for it, but of course I've been searching for a little while and I cannot find a good article/paper on it right now. If only the Wikipedia search engine was a little better
I think this statement of how we perceive volume changes is easy enough for people to test for themselves. Lower your headphone volume. Listen for a while. Then stop your music and turn up the volume. Now listen to music at this higher volume. Does it sound better? Unless the volume change is very small, it certainly does for me.
I think this point becomes even more pertinent when we compare two sonically different headphones like the Denon D2000 and the AKG K701. Most, if not all, people would say the D2000 has more bass than the K701. Yet, if you listen to the D2000 at a low volume and the K701 at a high volume, the differences may not be so easily apparent. The higher volume of the K701 has made the bass louder since the overall volume is louder.
There's obviously a lot more to the last two paragraphs than I've stated. I'm just trying to be concise.
Given this little bit of information about how human beings perceive volume changes, it seems to me that performing volume matched comparisons between equipment would help the overall quality of reviews on Head-Fi. That way we can remove the differences we hear simply because of a volume difference and focus and report on the actual differences between equipment.
Volume matching is easy. If you've got a multimeter you can do it that way. If you've got an SPL (volume) meter you can match volumes that way as well. You could even use your ears, but I don't think our ears were designed to judge volumes accurately. If they were nobody would ever destroy their hearing at an incredibly loud rock concert because they would be able to accurately judge how loud it was in that concert hall.
Personally, I do volume matched comparisons between all my equipment. I've built myself a small box that has two inputs and a headphone out. I can easily switch between the two pieces of hardware using a toggle switch. I'm into electronics DIY so I have a multimeter and SPL meter. Although I admit on some days I just volume match with my ears. Getting all the wires and connectors together to use a multimeter can be a pain.
The switching box isn't required though. You can just as easily move your plugs/wires/headphones from once piece of equipment to another.
What do people think? Good idea?
For all the people on this forum audio a is a great hobby. At the same time, finding "quality" information can be a pain. You don't know who to trust, what people have heard, a person's hearing ability, or much of anything else about many members. The exceptions are the members who have been here for a while and established their credentials and ability.
At least to me, part of the problem is that there seems to be no real standard for people to go by when they test/compare equipment and report differences. I understand people want compare equipment in a way that allows them to be comfortable. We don't want to limit ourselves with how we explore our hardware and be caught in burdensome standards of testing.
But having no proper standard seems to kill the quality of the information on this board. When I first came here to Head-Fi I took in everything everybody said. Now I've identified a few people I trust and follow what they say. A lot of other stuff is really just "lesiure" reading.
Before somebody says there are no standards on Head-Fi and there should not be, let me point out that there are some basic standards here. Even if Head-Fi members say "Everybody hears differently" we still do believe there are some objective answers. If somebody said "The K701 has way too much bass" many people would wonder from what viewpoint such a statement could be made. The K701 is known to be many things, but most certainly not a bassy headphone.
So I've been thinking about a standard people can use to compare equipment so that everybody has a basic reference point to think about when they read reviews and make comments.
The standard I'm thinking of comes from the following statement about human perception.
"Increases in volume are perceived as increases in sound quality."
This has been established by scientific research. I've read a lot of stuff about this in the past. I wanted to find some links so that people could not just take my word for it, but of course I've been searching for a little while and I cannot find a good article/paper on it right now. If only the Wikipedia search engine was a little better
I think this statement of how we perceive volume changes is easy enough for people to test for themselves. Lower your headphone volume. Listen for a while. Then stop your music and turn up the volume. Now listen to music at this higher volume. Does it sound better? Unless the volume change is very small, it certainly does for me.
I think this point becomes even more pertinent when we compare two sonically different headphones like the Denon D2000 and the AKG K701. Most, if not all, people would say the D2000 has more bass than the K701. Yet, if you listen to the D2000 at a low volume and the K701 at a high volume, the differences may not be so easily apparent. The higher volume of the K701 has made the bass louder since the overall volume is louder.
There's obviously a lot more to the last two paragraphs than I've stated. I'm just trying to be concise.
Given this little bit of information about how human beings perceive volume changes, it seems to me that performing volume matched comparisons between equipment would help the overall quality of reviews on Head-Fi. That way we can remove the differences we hear simply because of a volume difference and focus and report on the actual differences between equipment.
Volume matching is easy. If you've got a multimeter you can do it that way. If you've got an SPL (volume) meter you can match volumes that way as well. You could even use your ears, but I don't think our ears were designed to judge volumes accurately. If they were nobody would ever destroy their hearing at an incredibly loud rock concert because they would be able to accurately judge how loud it was in that concert hall.
Personally, I do volume matched comparisons between all my equipment. I've built myself a small box that has two inputs and a headphone out. I can easily switch between the two pieces of hardware using a toggle switch. I'm into electronics DIY so I have a multimeter and SPL meter. Although I admit on some days I just volume match with my ears. Getting all the wires and connectors together to use a multimeter can be a pain.
The switching box isn't required though. You can just as easily move your plugs/wires/headphones from once piece of equipment to another.
What do people think? Good idea?
