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It sounds better

Posted by Stephen R (A) on June 7, 2021 at 13:31:30

If you inhabit forums, then "it sounds better" comes up a lot and although it probably means something to the person that wrote it, what does it mean. What's the "it" and what does "better" mean?

The folk here occupy a spectrum from "can't measure it, can't be happening" through to "solder needs to break in" with everyone else occupying the middle ground between.

The cap break in thread recently highlighted these two extremes. If you can't measure it then it can't be heard is a common line to dismiss anyone that hears something that can't be technically explained. I have yet to see anyone come up with a technical measurement to confirm sound quality outside gross errors in frequency, phase or distortion measurements. So this leads to the conclusion that all competently designed amplifiers, given equal specs must sound the same or else the listener is delusional.

The main issue I have is not to deride the technical measurements we know about and can easily perform to determine basic performance. That's the easy bit and relevant. But there are a whole raft of things we hear that just can't be determined by easy measurements or with gear the average person round here has access to.

And in the end, why would most bother? This is a listening hobby as well as a technical one. Sure this brings up another spectrum. Those that are in it for the technical aspects at one end and those that are just here to get a sound that pleases them. And the rest of us lie somewhere in between.

If we look a bit closer at what we're doing for the most part it's listening to music. We don't just "hear" music with our ears but also with our body. Everyone's ears are different. Stick your fingers in your ears and you can still hear. Most folk are disarmed to hear what they sound like on a recording. That's not the recording's fault but a perception issue of the individual. Just one feature of the "mix of listening"

Resonant cavities unique to our own body add peaks and troughs into the mix. And that's all before a person's "unique microphone" sends electrical signals to the brain. The brain then processes the signal based on a whole bunch of concepts, culture, taste and preconceived ideas to produce a result of "what it sounds like" in our head.

Obviously there is no relateable standard by which we can compare this between folk. We are not calibrated and the calibration can change from one monent to the next as the variables invloved in processing is too much. That any of us can agree on anything is incredible in itself.

Add into the mix that we like different music, interpret from that music different aspects with different priorities in what we listen for, then the idea of an improvement is also up for grabs.

With all that complexity, the idea that a simple suite of measurements, once a general level of goodness is reached is going to be relevant to what we hear or can't hear or how "it's sounding" is a bit far fetched.

And for completeness, I have measurement equipment, come from an engineering background and believe in "technical excellence" at a level that is appropriate for what I'm doing or trying to achieve. There are no absolutes in life so why should there be any here?

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