A brief look back at my audio learnings, decoding “Upgraditis” and what I wish I knew early on

[Analogous]

I can suggest a much easier way… I believe almost everyone here is familiar with Pink Floyd’s ‘Animals’.
Using an excellent source (my reference is a British 1980s pressing LP , but it can be a SACD as well ) , play the track ‘ Dogs’.. around 5mins 30s into the track , with acoustic guitar playing , and sound of a dog barking from the phantom centre , there is a sudden drum kick , followed by Gilmour’s piercing electric guitar which should fill your entire soundstage wall to wall , floor to ceiling.
If you have achieved audio gear-nirvana, that moment ought to knock your socks off even if you have never heard of Floyd before. If it elicits a ‘well ,‘it’s good but nothing remarkable’ or a ‘meh’ , then you are not there yet (with your gear) ….

Sounds like a good test.
The question that has been bothering me is if a set up plays this (Dogs) song really well, would it play other types of music as wonderfully too?
My current set up plays sparsely recorded music with vocals and a couple of instruments fabulously well and struggles with complex, densely recorded music (grunge- death metal) badly.
Or maybe some generes are wrongly classified as music

most people upgrade because they're dissatisfied with the sound (but don't understand the root cause)

This has been true often in my case.

 

[Bloom@83]

Sounds like a good test.
The question that has been bothering me is if a set up plays this (Dogs) song really well, would it play other types of music as wonderfully too?
My current set up plays sparsely recorded music with vocals and a couple of instruments fabulously well and struggles with complex, densely recorded music (grunge- death metal) badly.
Or maybe some generes are wrongly classified as music

It would IME. All setups play sparse music well (sax with strings , vocals with double bass , acoustic guitar and vocals etc etc ). Real mettle of a system is when you throw complex tracks at it with jarring strings , drums , cymbal crash , horns , vocal harmony et all and it yet performs with aplomb (proper separation, dynamic , detailed and last but not the least - makes your foot tap ).

 

[Decadent_Spectre]

Measurements only alleviate upgraditis for people who aspire to a measurement, not good (to their ears) sound. If such is one's shallow definition of good sound then buy any cheap speakers, use PC based DSP and beat the response into submission. These people tend to follow ASR and AVS.

 

[liverpool_for_life]

This has been true often in my case.

Awareness is the first step. Worthwhile upgrading requires honesty.

Do I know what's missing? Do I understand why? Will the proposed upgrade give me what's missing? Otherwise, it's pretty much a roll of the dice. At best. No amount of subjective handwaving can wish away the answers to those critical questions.

 

[arj]

Awareness is the first step. Worthwhile upgrading requires honesty.

Do I know what's missing? Do I understand why? Will the proposed upgrade give me what's missing? Otherwise, it's pretty much a roll of the dice. At best. No amount of subjective handwaving can wish away the answers to those critical questions.

bingo.
Need to identify a problem to know how to fix it. How one does it is a different matter thought. if there is less salt in a dish, my mother in law can identify from smell, i will need to taste but my son has to follow the recipe in terms of measurement.

Hence how one does it is ones own approach ie by just listening, by playing test tracks or by measuring.

 

[Analogous]

bingo.
Need to identify a problem to know how to fix it. How one does it is a different matter thought. if there is less salt in a dish, my mother in law can identify from smell, i will need to taste but my son has to follow the recipe in terms of measurement.

Hence how one does it is ones own approach ie by just listening, by playing test tracks or by measuring.

And as the Beatles sang…With a little help from my friends

 

[Bloom@83]

bingo.
Need to identify a problem to know how to fix it. How one does it is a different matter thought. if there is less salt in a dish, my mother in law can identify from smell, i will need to taste but my son has to follow the recipe in terms of measurement.

Hence how one does it is ones own approach ie by just listening, by playing test tracks or by measuring.

Your MIA is zen level, comes with lifetime of experience.

 

[arj]

Your MIA is zen level, comes with lifetime of experience.

Yup and there are people here in this forum who in the first 15 sec of playtime will tell you if the system is sounding right or not and whats wrong. takes me an hour or sometimes days to decipher.

Measurement is not an option for me since I really do not know what to measure..while there are folks who know what to do to identify the issue.

 

[Fiftyfifty]

I am so very happy with my current set up consisting of a MHDT Havana DAC, feeding the Croft line integrated amplifier which drives a pair of Harbeth P3ES and supplemented by a KEF KC62 subwoofer.
This suits my dedicated 15x15’ den nicely and I really enjoy listening to my music every day for a few hours.

However reaching this involved a tortuous journey, I arrived at this configuration after several trials with a variety of brands. The journey was often frustrating as several big name brands and well reviewed individual components did not live up to expectations. It was also somewhat expensive, but good learning too.
At certain times I had three different amplifiers and similar numbers of speaker pairs. I realised I had a problem.

I started off believing that more expensive components would always result in better sound.
I did not know clearly what kind of audio experience I was seeking.
I was blindly trying out different combinations, approaches hoping to hit some elusive benchmark.

I had a case of Upgraditis.

Then, I slowly started understanding room acoustics and a bit of how sound waves behave in closed spaces and the importance of the room proportions, early reflections, reverbs, phase cancellations etc. Bold experimentation with speaker placement, listening position changes resulted in some amazing zero cost insights and sonic benefits.
I wish I had known this early on.

I struggled mightily trying to reconcile the visual aesthetic vs sonic benefit and came to the conclusion that it is not possible to have both every time. Sometimes one speaker placed closer or angled more inwards than the other sounds better even if it looks wonky.

I discovered that Pulling the speakers out well into the room (the so called near field position) can help eliminate much of problematic room acoustics (delayed reflections, milliseconds later arrival and the brain filters it out). How far to pull them out to experiment is only limited by my imagination and length of my speaker cables. The looks of Speakers pulled well into the room, training wires- is not going to please anyone. That is until the music starts playing.

The hard choice is between audio aesthetic and visual aesthetic. So best to have modest expectations if the primary set up is in a multifunctional living room. More expensive gear is unlikely to result in great satisfaction.

This helped slow the Upgraditis.

My biggest discovery was the importance of “synergy” for exceptional audio quality. This is a secret hiding in plain sight. Some combination of components in the chain tend to work much better together and how well an amp and a speaker work in synergy can not be predicted by published measurements. It’s mostly trials and auditions, preferably in our listening spaces. As we all know, Given the circumstances we have in Indiya, home auditions and such are a dream. Buying “used” was a good option (with occasional disappointment part of the deal). I did spend a considerable amount and time buying and trying well reviewed components that sounded disappointing.

One way to select components that sound fabulous is to search online using terms like “great audio synergy between amplifiers and speakers” etc. The other way is to seek advice and suggestions from experienced audiophiles who have travelled the path before us and are thoughtful and generous with their suggestions.

Finally I have discovered that my set up, even if sounds really good to me does not excel in all generes of music. I am trying to figure this out or it’s back to Upgraditis…

Very valid observations @Analogous . I'm sure many of us will find parallels in their own journey.

As in any hobby, it's a worthwhile journey if it adds to our enjoyment of music or good sound without hurting the bank balance or relationships at home and in society. We make mistakes and learn lessons, but we keep moving forward, even if it is 'to arrive at the very beginning and know it for the first time'.

But on the other hand, if it becomes an obsession that drives us into making irrational choices that harm other aspects of our life, or if we seek only to impress peers (read 'FMs') with our possessions, then we are getting into 'neurotic' territory and may need therapy. Let's start a de-addiction program for such people?

Cheers!

 

[Analogous]

One of the issues that I struggled with mightily was the conflict between aesthetics and audio quality for speaker placement.

The need for visual symmetry is deep seated and seems to cause a lot of unease if not adhered to; whereas I found better audio outcomes when I overcame this obsession….

Anyone have thoughts or experiences with this?

 

[Fiftyfifty]

Awareness is the first step. Worthwhile upgrading requires honesty.

Do I know what's missing? Do I understand why? Will the proposed upgrade give me what's missing? Otherwise, it's pretty much a roll of the dice. At best. No amount of subjective handwaving can wish away the answers to those critical questions.

Your third question is the one most difficult to answer. In the absence of home demos of equipment, or choice is based on reviews, opinions of others in a different setting, specs, etc. , none of which provide a guaranteed answer. Therefore, a bit of trial and error is inevitable.

 

[mbhangui]

The need for visual symmetry is deep seated and seems to cause a lot of unease if not adhered to; whereas I found better audio outcomes when I overcame this obsession….

I too have this problem. I think we are born with this desire for symmetry. Evolution has decided that we should have two eyes, two nostrils two hands, two legs. We have a single nose and that has been placed in the middle. We see symmetry all around us and anything unsymmetrical appears as unnatural. I have a L shapped music room and my current setup for my main listening speaker has been setup symmetrically. But that is not what gives me the best sound, but to me, symmetry is more important than the sound. I don't care how the amp looks., the speaker looks or how they are placed, but somehow there is a mind block which forces me to put the speakers symmetrically in the room.

 

[prem]

Mine is also a weird shaped room. For lack of a better term, you can call it L shaped. I have always had symmetrical placement of speakers in this room and have never had a problem.

 

[Analogous]

I too have this problem. I think we are born with this desire for symmetry. Evolution has decided that we should have two eyes, two nostrils two hands, two legs. We have a single nose and that has been placed in the middle. We see symmetry all around us and anything unsymmetrical appears as unnatural. I have a L shapped music room and my current setup for my main listening speaker has been setup symmetrically. But that is not what gives me the best sound, but to me, symmetry is more important than the sound. I don't care how the amp looks., the speaker looks or how they are placed, but somehow there is a mind block which forces me to put the speakers symmetrically in the room.

You missed “two ears” in the list above.
The conflict is between the eyes and ears?

 

[Hari Iyer]

Awareness is the first step. Worthwhile upgrading requires honesty.

Do I know what's missing? Do I understand why? Will the proposed upgrade give me what's missing? Otherwise, it's pretty much a roll of the dice. At best. No amount of subjective handwaving can wish away the answers to those critical questions.

I quite early in my audio life understood that upgrading was not an option for me as most upgrades usually are heavier on your wallet. I also strongly believe that a best sounding setup ( for me)can't be bought commercially, but only can be made. Hence I went the DIY route. My academics helped me to read schematics and understand their issues or even better them, may be in power supplies, bypasses and coupling stages, inputxand output stages. There was or isn't a single gear that I am have bought commercially that i have not modified for better SQ and 99% I have been successful. This helped me to not only get the sound that I was looking for butxalsofwas within my budget. I always looked at the VFM factor which is critical for me. I never have bought any commercial product who don't publish their service manual, as after the warranty period gets over, i usually start upgrading them by tweaking them.

 

[Analogous]

Paul McGowan (I do realise he is not the final word on acoustics or most popular …) says:

The trouble with symmetry – PS Audio

www.psaudio.com

 

[jls001]

My current set up plays sparsely recorded music with vocals and a couple of instruments fabulously well and struggles with complex, densely recorded music (grunge- death metal) badly.

The need for visual symmetry is deep seated and seems to cause a lot of unease if not adhered to; whereas I found better audio outcomes when I overcame this obsession….

Anyone have thoughts or experiences with this?

If you're forced to place your speakers assymetrically it implies that you've monkeyed around quite a bit with speaker placements (an essential thing to do, IMO).

Like you, I also felt very uncomfortable seeing the speakers toed-in at unequal angles or having to sit further from one speaker than the other, though my ears told me the sound was better than symmetric placement. One way to alleviate this problem is to use left-right balance control knob (if available) because often the SPL from one speaker is louder in a symmetric placement, most probably due to uneven room gain.

Speaking of upgraditis, the one thing that makes it so hard is the fact that most of us can't even verbalise what we want in an upgrade. It is also essential to know which component is lacking (and what it is lacking) so that the upgrade can be more focused on one or two things instead of guessing. This will give a fair idea of the "how to" upgrade. Without some known destination ("this upgrade must give me better so and so...") we are again shooting in the dark. How do we know we have achieved our goal/goals unless we had set them beforehand?

Answering these two questions before spending money ought to give us better success.

 

[Hari Iyer]

When upgrading many things the golden rule is to upgrade only one thing at a given time and NOT multiple things simultaneously. For instance - if you have planned for an IC cable change, speaker cable change, some room treatment + speaker position change - don't ever do all of this simultaneously. If you did, you won't know which components are causing the change in SQ- good or bad. Space out these mods atleast a week apart or more for you to quantify them.

 

[Decadent_Spectre]

Symmetry is an extension of "order" and "predictability" that we crave, humans are averse to the unknown and unpredictable. It is a survival mechanism that extends into all facets of our life where our minds make decisions based on these natural aversions without us realising it. Symmetry appears to us as order and predictable, hence "safe". Music itself is based on this where sometimes when we hear a song for the first time we are expecting the next note and when it comes as we expect it is rewarding, especially so when we have heard a song once or a few times and we like the order of the song ( or arrangement if you will) and we know what to expect, when we get what we expect it is rewarding for us as we anticipate each note, particularly the parts we like, most pleasure works like this where we are happy when we get what we expect. It applies to all facets of life from audio,video to food,drink to travel to clothes to anything else you can think of. Getting what we expect is what happiness is based on at its core, not what we want (thats a little different, as we often know we are not getting what we want). Hope this helps the curious among you, you know who you are

 

[aeroash]

The question that has been bothering me is if a set up plays this (Dogs) song really well, would it play other types of music as wonderfully too?
My current set up plays sparsely recorded music with vocals and a couple of instruments fabulously well and struggles with complex, densely recorded music (grunge- death metal) badly.

Tuning a setup that plays dense, fast, and hard music well, will always be a battle. To begin with, most, unconventional, or obscure (non-mainstream, underground) metal music is poorly recorded, at least the artists I listen to. When the recording or the mastering itself is poor, there's only so much one can do.

For this specific reason, I have a separate playlist with only well-mastered recordings to enjoy on the main system. The double bass (kick drum) beats should be tight, precise, with quick decay and should not smear or overlap with the rest of the music. Ditto for the fast bass guitar lines. They should be clear, and not appear muddled.

It'll be interesting to know how the rest of the metal heads in this forum are managing this.

Or maybe some generes are wrongly classified as music