Most hobbyists waste a lot of money. I have spent thousands on equipment for my cameras. I don't use it that much but when I use it, it makes me happy. Most people waste a lot of money on their cars. They could achieve the same results with a cheaper car but somehow it's worth it. Add to that watches, phones, clothing and many other things.
In a blind test, could you tell the difference between photos taken with that equipment and photos taken with less expensive equipment?
Most audiophiles can't do measurably better than 50% on an ABX test. That test is more about audio compression than cable quality, but there is a lot of superstition in audio.
> In a blind test, could you tell the difference between photos taken with that equipment and photos taken with less expensive equipment?
I can't speak for the OP, but I can certainly tell the difference between photos taken with my different camera gear. I have an iPhone, a Fuji T3, and a Nikon D810 to compare against.
The Nikon is 10 years old and still a lot sharper than the other ones, despite them all being years newer than the Nikon. In challenging conditions (wet, low light, etc.) the difference is even more noticeable.
For example, a picture like that one would be difficult to take on a phone because of the snow. First of all wet fingers would make using the phone nearly impossible. Even if it didn't, there's a good chance the focus would be off due to the snow in the foreground. And the sharpness of the Nikon blows the other cameras away. In the linked photo, do a 1:1 zoom of the fire department logo above/leftleft of the front wheel and you can read the text, including the small "EMS", "Colorado", etc. around the border. Phones just won't get that detail. And that's an old camera.
Besides the image quality, the DSLR is just easier and more comfortable to use once I learned the controls. There are no dumb menus and touch screens and I can adjust settings and take pictures with big mittens on even when it's wet/snowy/raining. Meanwhile, my iPhone is completely unusable with wet fingers.
I use my phone to take pictures most of the time, but if I'm going out intentionally to take pictures, I always take a real camera.
Here you are comparing a decent bluetooth speaker to a pretty good wireless active speaker to a hifi setup. I think the original comment about audiophiles is them wasting money on upgrading the hifi setup with all kinds of audio cabling, bi-wiring, etc.
That would be similar to upgrading to that one tiny bit sharper lens which otherwise has the same aperture etc.
Yes. I have Nikons and Lumix cameras and I can tell you the difference between the outputs from small sensors to larger sensors and full frame, and iPhone and phone camera output.
For audio it is more difficult. I used to work at a signal processor manufacturer (high end audio gear, clever chaps, I was merely a software man) where the guy was convinced he could hear the difference between 24bit WAVs and 320kbps MP3s. He was deluding himself. He was partly deaf and sitting 5 metres away from him in an office I could hear his earbuds blasting music all day long.
I can hear when clipping and resonances are introduced, and also hear terrible guitar cabinets and bad tubes in guitar amps, but that's because I have been playing bass and guitar for 30+ years and have very sensitive hearing. I detest heavy compression. You can feel your ears shutting down.
There is a critical difference with audiophiles: they suffer from a superstitious belief that their expensive cables and so forth actually make their systems sound better.
I've spent thousands on my PC, including a number of components that are overkill for any actual need I have. It would still be noteworthy (and I'd personally feel aggrieved) if comparative testing showed my overpriced fans are just as loud as any or my overpriced cooling system has indistinguishable thermal performance from the stock cooler.
I was going to post the exact first sentence you posted word for word and talk about my wasteful hobbies ... I do have project car hobbies and latest addiction is "gpu collection"
Having worked little bit on the music production side of things, I always find it funny how much some people spend for a couple of feet of a high-end cables at home, just to listen to records that have been made in studios where the signals went through dozens or hundreds of feet of standard run-of-the-mill cabling.
These articles are no fun anymore, because it's almost impossible to find anybody to take the other end of the claim, that there's any perceptible difference in sound quality from high-end cables. Every audiophile forum I could find talking about this video all said the same thing: "no shit, of course, everyone knows this already".
I have been mulling starting a high end audio gear company. The rationale is, making something worthy of spending on, because it's something you love- is the authentic experience. If I can make something that will still be liquid at some reduced depreciation in 10-20 years, that's an honest product. I used to be a writer for luxury media as well, and there is an extremely rare ability in luxury to make it actually real as opposed to merely vulgar and expensive.
These articles are a bit like saying scientists find expensive watches do not tell time in any appreciably better way, yet even technical founders who should "know better," are still wearing them with a t-shirt and flip flops after their exit. The economics of high end audio make more sense as an analogy to jewelry or art.
After volatility, haircuts, cap gains and other risk, there are so few productive assets to invest relatively small amounts in, where a store of value that depreciates less than inflation and purchasing power is a desirable thing.
If you love music, it's a way to build a shrine to it. Arguably, the real problem is consumer gear that simulates the experience of something valuable that won't end up in a landfill, but its just crap you throw away when you move house.
I've been an audiophile for a few years during early twenties because it was fun to check out new and used equipment every weekend in the store I frequented, listened to various great music, and read reviews in various magazines. I had enough disposable income to afford a nice set of highly regarded yet less hyped brands, and even once helped out set up a set with a pricetag of a good house.
Life changed and eventually gave up on the hobby while still being drawn to music and the technology behind audio. Then a "golden" kick out the door of one employer meant I could build the speaker set I had in mind based on Siegfried Linkwitz's knowledge. The total cost for the speakers was about 2000,- but it did take between 2000 and 3000 for a fully active setup with two subwoofer towers and two 3.5 way main towers, all open baffle.
I have never heard a more perfect three-dimensional soundstage before and after, and it still sounds like the artists are actually playing in the livingroom even from other parts of the house. This was kind of Siegfried's message about good sound, the speakers are what make it (electronics are more than good enough at low prices) as long as they're made on scientific grounds, and not another heavy set of hyped monkey coffins. I have reached my audiophile end goal without forking over a fortune. Also fun, I came across one of the only two or three Yamaha CD-1 players made for Europe back then as a trade-in, one rarity I kept as souvenir of those early years. ;-)
Electronics too! While there are measurable differences there are no audible differences between fancy DACs and the $10 dongle Apple sells, for prerecorded music at least. You had to pay thousands to get this kind of performance in the late 90's. https://www.kenrockwell.com/apple/lightning-adapter-audio-qu...
If you want good sound you can still spend money on big speakers and room treatments though. Physics.
in a previous life I went to school and qualified as an audio engineer, in Ottowa, which was then a hotbed of audio startups due to the ability to use the facilities at the NRC for testing and development, and there is most definitly certain characteristics that can be found in conductors, but no one at that time was suggesting that these were at the audible level, especialy for the very short lengths used in home or club systems.
But on the other hand if you had a 300 mile long coil of wire bieng used in an anolog delay line, then perfection was barely good enough.
Primary concern was shielding, and noise from power supplys, and generaly power supplys are still a huge source of noise.
Consensus was to eliminate anything not needed from the signal path, and take care in creating a noise (buzz) free listening environment, with good spatial seperation.
Major gear would have NO controls on the power amp, carefull ,carefull, everything in the preamp, cause it will launch your smoking speaker cones out where diagnosing the issue will be easy.
For some, tis not about Quality but about Control. "If x y z happens I feel safe/in control". Changing anything about it = unsafe/the sky may fall.
Same logic scales up to social level if you notice what large groups burn cash on. The only way to reduce the cash burn is to give them something else to do that makes them feel safe and in control. Which is not for the faint of heart.
Also, speakers can be different between people since we can all hear a little different.
Same goes for microphones, not all microphones are tuned for the same way, so what sounds great and clear could be a little different in a person's case and still be valid.
I like Tom's hardware, but the thought did creep to my mind if I'd be directed to a commissioned product link.
I used to receive a catalog every quarter for an audiophile magazine. They sold some very very expensive gold plated toslink cables. The gold planting was supposed to be for superior conductivity.
Toslink is an optical audio format, and a pair of fishing line would've even worked identical quality.
People who want fancy cables didn't necessarily waste money buying what they wanted just because they sound the same. People who spent time testing if the basic laws of phisics work in a $7 cable almost certainly did.
It's comparing cables, which everyone with some experience knows they make no difference.
I expected something more substantial, like a comparison of different IEM price tiers, or a comparison of different DAC chips, or something else that actually matters.
If it makes you happy, is it really wasted? People waste money on a lot of shit they don't need, but if they're financially responsible and not going into debt and becoming homeless, who's to say they shouldn't be buying overpriced audio gear? If people stopped spending their disposable income on stuff they don't need to survive, the economy would collapse.
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Most audiophiles can't do measurably better than 50% on an ABX test. That test is more about audio compression than cable quality, but there is a lot of superstition in audio.
> In a blind test, could you tell the difference between photos taken with that equipment and photos taken with less expensive equipment?
I can't speak for the OP, but I can certainly tell the difference between photos taken with my different camera gear. I have an iPhone, a Fuji T3, and a Nikon D810 to compare against.
The Nikon is 10 years old and still a lot sharper than the other ones, despite them all being years newer than the Nikon. In challenging conditions (wet, low light, etc.) the difference is even more noticeable.
https://photos.smugmug.com/Snowy-Davidson-Mesa-Ride/i-wGFDt5...
For example, a picture like that one would be difficult to take on a phone because of the snow. First of all wet fingers would make using the phone nearly impossible. Even if it didn't, there's a good chance the focus would be off due to the snow in the foreground. And the sharpness of the Nikon blows the other cameras away. In the linked photo, do a 1:1 zoom of the fire department logo above/leftleft of the front wheel and you can read the text, including the small "EMS", "Colorado", etc. around the border. Phones just won't get that detail. And that's an old camera.
Besides the image quality, the DSLR is just easier and more comfortable to use once I learned the controls. There are no dumb menus and touch screens and I can adjust settings and take pictures with big mittens on even when it's wet/snowy/raining. Meanwhile, my iPhone is completely unusable with wet fingers.
I use my phone to take pictures most of the time, but if I'm going out intentionally to take pictures, I always take a real camera.
That would be similar to upgrading to that one tiny bit sharper lens which otherwise has the same aperture etc.
For audio it is more difficult. I used to work at a signal processor manufacturer (high end audio gear, clever chaps, I was merely a software man) where the guy was convinced he could hear the difference between 24bit WAVs and 320kbps MP3s. He was deluding himself. He was partly deaf and sitting 5 metres away from him in an office I could hear his earbuds blasting music all day long.
I can hear when clipping and resonances are introduced, and also hear terrible guitar cabinets and bad tubes in guitar amps, but that's because I have been playing bass and guitar for 30+ years and have very sensitive hearing. I detest heavy compression. You can feel your ears shutting down.
Tested: Where Does The Tone Come From In An Electric Guitar? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n02tImce3AE
Tested: Where Does The Tone Come From In A Guitar Amplifier? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcBEOcPtlYk
These articles are a bit like saying scientists find expensive watches do not tell time in any appreciably better way, yet even technical founders who should "know better," are still wearing them with a t-shirt and flip flops after their exit. The economics of high end audio make more sense as an analogy to jewelry or art.
After volatility, haircuts, cap gains and other risk, there are so few productive assets to invest relatively small amounts in, where a store of value that depreciates less than inflation and purchasing power is a desirable thing.
If you love music, it's a way to build a shrine to it. Arguably, the real problem is consumer gear that simulates the experience of something valuable that won't end up in a landfill, but its just crap you throw away when you move house.
Life changed and eventually gave up on the hobby while still being drawn to music and the technology behind audio. Then a "golden" kick out the door of one employer meant I could build the speaker set I had in mind based on Siegfried Linkwitz's knowledge. The total cost for the speakers was about 2000,- but it did take between 2000 and 3000 for a fully active setup with two subwoofer towers and two 3.5 way main towers, all open baffle.
I have never heard a more perfect three-dimensional soundstage before and after, and it still sounds like the artists are actually playing in the livingroom even from other parts of the house. This was kind of Siegfried's message about good sound, the speakers are what make it (electronics are more than good enough at low prices) as long as they're made on scientific grounds, and not another heavy set of hyped monkey coffins. I have reached my audiophile end goal without forking over a fortune. Also fun, I came across one of the only two or three Yamaha CD-1 players made for Europe back then as a trade-in, one rarity I kept as souvenir of those early years. ;-)
Electronics too! While there are measurable differences there are no audible differences between fancy DACs and the $10 dongle Apple sells, for prerecorded music at least. You had to pay thousands to get this kind of performance in the late 90's. https://www.kenrockwell.com/apple/lightning-adapter-audio-qu...
If you want good sound you can still spend money on big speakers and room treatments though. Physics.
Same logic scales up to social level if you notice what large groups burn cash on. The only way to reduce the cash burn is to give them something else to do that makes them feel safe and in control. Which is not for the faint of heart.
Also, speakers can be different between people since we can all hear a little different.
Same goes for microphones, not all microphones are tuned for the same way, so what sounds great and clear could be a little different in a person's case and still be valid.
I like Tom's hardware, but the thought did creep to my mind if I'd be directed to a commissioned product link.
Toslink is an optical audio format, and a pair of fishing line would've even worked identical quality.
3-way stereo in closed box (not a phase inverter)
a few valves
power and output transformers
non-class D sound source (bobbin or vinyl)
All of this is not expencive at all. What is expencive - a library of the music you really wish to re-listen.
It's comparing cables, which everyone with some experience knows they make no difference.
I expected something more substantial, like a comparison of different IEM price tiers, or a comparison of different DAC chips, or something else that actually matters.