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In Reply to: Prop head posted by rp1@surfnetusa.com on April 10, 2007 at 00:02:27:
Neglecting for the moment this poster's self-assigned gatekeeper role... audio began as an engineers' hands-on hobby. All during the Twenties, Thirties, Forties and Fifties fellows were "tweaking" their systems without benefit of the massive numbers of integral equations found today in JAES. One could say the hobby was *all about* tweaking.Granted, from those experiences a few engineering rules did get formed, but audio was mostly "vest pocket" stuff practiced by connoisseur engineers.
Then came the revolution: The Academy usurped real audio and somewhere in the mid-Seventies the scene shifted from better sound to higher math -- the better to prove one's prowess at the blackboard. By 1980 no author who discussed actual sound was admitted to the pages of JAES, and the venerable, more useful IEEE transactions on Audio had fallen by the wayside.
Now from that lofty institution, the AES, we find the Professors of Propellor Head University declaiming the dogmas of Technical Religion and like Jim Austin PhD decrying "silly ideas" that needless to say they've never tried because they don't have to.
Finally they appoint themselves gatekeepers of what's proper to discuss on Prop Head and applaud enthusiastically when things "controversial" are shunted aside, because there can be NO CONTROVERSY about what they know damn well is right.
Follow Ups:
I don't recall getting any authority in the matter, I am just expressing an opinion; you know, like all the others.I agree that there was a more "human" excitement to things in the old days. With less ability to do the math (since the equations could be so hard to work in any real detail) there was a lot more trial-and-error. I remember more than one engineering text book giving the math...then saying it was easier to build the circuit and apply trial-and-error to get the proper values!
But the math is easy for the computer to do now and it is one hell of a lot easier to design the circuit you want to perform the way you want. Don't knock it, even John Curl uses it, along with his knowledge of what parts sound best in what applications. The math and engineering is the science, the knowing what to use where is the art. Even you, Clark, have to admit that the AVERAGE piece of gear being reviewed nowdays is better by far than the AVERAGE of yesteryear. The "best" is still arguable, since it is possible to stumble across something that may take years to quantify, if ever.
I agree that the JAES is suffering from hardening of the (intellectual) arteries. But there is NO shortage of folk experimenting and, yes, playing with, tweaks and designs. I just think that this room was supposed to be a room for engineering based disucssions.
That may indeed include cryoing parts and assemblies and so on. I would love to see the big guns here talking about that. But I don't think that things can be stretched to include foil haning in the air or paper under the feet of your gear, nor do I think that includes special oil scents and so on. Note, I am not adressing the efficacy of such things, only whether or not they belong in this particular room. (Yes, music does sound better if the room smells good! Humans are a unified organsism; one should not seperate our senses except for certain experiments to isolate hearing like DBT and so on.) There are rooms aplenty in AA for such discussions; it is not like the subjectivists (we ALL are to some degree) don't have forums for their ideas; most of AA is devoted to them! (As it should be, who would want to discuss "objectivist" music?)
It just seems that no engineering based forum lasts for very long until the pure subjectivists take it over and chase off the engineers. Great engineers have one foot in both camps; they do rely very much on the math, but also on intuition fed with years of experience and "feel" for their subject. But...they DO need to be rigorous in the logic of their craft. Talk of freezing cd's, or foil in the air or whatnot, tends to drive them off. (Even if they might employing such tricks at home.) It is the nature of the beast.
Give Me Ambiguity or Give Me Something Else!
...that the AVERAGE piece of gear being reviewed nowdays is better by far than the AVERAGE of yesteryear." I have to do no such thing! First of all, unlike yourself apparently, I'm not well acquainted with all that stuff. Second, I have heard mid-century tube gear with a few critical parts upgrades sound far better than, say, a Krell. Finally, I can't imagine how you objectivists determine your AVERAGEs. Now MEDIANS, I can understand."It just seems that no engineering based forum lasts for very long until the pure subjectivists take it over and chase off the engineers." Hmm... you mean, like Tech Square? Where there are no "subjectivists", and the place is dead dead dead? (Just askin'...)
Median is the proper word! &%#! smart alec writers.....I have actually enjoyed many a piece of old tube gear, and have DIY'ed lots of upgrades to them. But, nowdays, to me most commercial tube amps just sound murky, or if clear and clean, they sound mostly like good SS. I agree that Krell need not apply here. "I am Krell, I vill crush your puny flute solo....". The only exceptions are good SET's, they at least have SOMETHING that almost makes them worth the hassle.
At the shows the only gear that consistently attracts my ear is the Lamm gear...and he does it all by calculation. (I just read that in an interview!)
Give Me Ambiguity or Give Me Something Else!
z
Engineers must not especially like other engineers either.....
Give Me Ambiguity or Give Me Something Else!
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