Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler all AMP'S sound the same

Chris ,you always manage to keep a thread neutral while still making your point. I really wonder how many have read that whole article ,rather than cherry pick the information that supports their belief system. All amps sound the same seems to have morphed into all amps are the same.

This thread begins with rather odd terminology, i.e., "Seems of late, to be a real push by a select few people", when what is being questioned is long-established in audio technology. Amplification adds voltage to make the weak incoming voltage strong enough to drive speakers at loud levels. If this is done with audibly level frequency response and inaudibly low noise and distortion(easily done these days in even units of modest cost), the job's been done and nothing more is possible. The editor of the Audio Critic summarized this nicely here in "Electronic Signal Paths Do Not Have a Personality!" .

Of course contrary opinions abound, but when put to the only type of tests which can be taken seriously when scientific accuracy is essential, i.e., carefully controlled double-blind listening tests, no support for them is found. The classic Stereo Review blind listening tests showed that differences described in some rather flowery detail before the blind sessions began disappeared when the brand labels and price tags did(including the comparison of the $220 Pioneer receiver with the $12,000 pair of tube amplifiers). Although in the past "audiophiles" expressed some interest in participating in such tests, now their general level of enthusiasm is about the same as a vampire has for sunlight.

A great thing about the current audio scene is the availability of receivers for a few hundred dollars which perform the basic amplification function with audible transparency. Amplifiers certainly don't measure identically with instruments far more sensitive than our ears, but that isn't the point. As has been pointed out, we listen with ears and brains, not a microphone and electronic analysers, and we're limited in what we can in reality hear.

so why do we keep buying these superfluous pieces of electronics.Are we really this easily decieved? Most of my listening is done at levels of less than 10 watts. I bought my amp solely because my denon is not 4 ohm rated and i bought the M80's afterwards and i wanted the added peice of mind. I did not purchase it as a means of improving the sound though i admit i was sure it had somehow enhanced what i was hearing.

Until i am a subject to said test i will hang on to my beliefs.

Your Denon would have no issues driving all your speakers, even upto 100watts now and then.

People that know me best, make fun of my level of interest in movies featuring con jobs and heists. I also have had, since I was a kid, an interest in magic and optical (and once I found out about them, auditory) illusions. Basically I have a huge interest in demonstrations of how our mind and senses are mislead. I don't perform magic myself (at least not for a long time), instead I like to watch, and tear apart tricks. The same with sensory illusions. I'm not saying I'm not misdirected initially, even with the level of exposure I've had throughout my entire life, with expectations of being mislead, I still fall for these tricks, and I love it.

People make the human body out to be the pinnacle of perfection. And then there are some who believe their sensory abilities lie far beyond that of the average person (either innately, or via training). I see our senses as a bunch of shortcuts that are optimized for the usual case, because 99% of the world falls into that usual case. Expectations about what you're seeing, hearing, even touching, tasting, and smelling, can easily override the actual fact of the situation. There really is a lot going on around us, so our brains cheat to sort it all out. If a line looks straight, even if it's passing behind another object, the safe assumption is that it continues unbroken. If you buy a shiny new piece of equipment, the safe assumption is that it sounds better.

Even though I know how the trick works, doesn't mean I don't enjoy the show immensely. I just try not to spend more for cost of admission, than my level of entertainment is worth.

Well put

Case in point: Denon Amp Vs. Ext. AudioSource; no discernible difference; not even with a mind melt. No surprise with the help of this forum. But, it's a nice and easy connect for my outdoor speakers (B) a welcome ancillary function.

Sadly, yes.


That's fine.

Clubneon. You are one articulate dude. The body is a truly amazing instrument, both in how sensitive it can be, and in how easily it can be fooled.

Maybe we are being fooled into them sounding the same....

I've thought about that too. And there's some truth to it, if you're predisposed into thinking there's no change, it's more likely you won't hear a change. That's why some scientific method needs to be involved.

On the forum for the music software I use, a really smart guy (this is me saying that. ), was schooling some people on sampling rates. Saying there's no audible difference between 48 and 96 kHz or higher. I agreed that any content above 24 kHz is useless, but made the mistake of thinking that 96 kHz can more accurately describe lower frequency content too.

This wasn't just a gut instinct, I had done the math, and was sure I had even heard a difference in the very software the forum was dedicated to discussing. So I output two wave files, each reproducing the same signal (three slightly detuned saw waves around 10 kHz), and tested them with the ABX Comparator plugin for Foobar.

OK, the point of this story. A lot of people don't understand the purpose of, or how an ABX trial works. First, it's purpose isn't to find out which of two things is better. It's only to find if there is a difference between them. Performing the test is very easy, on the other hand setting up the test to be truly double-blind can be incredible difficult. So in my case I loaded the two files, and told Foobar to test them on me. It randomly selects one of the files, that'll end up being X. Then I'm freely able to play A and B, the two files being tested. I just have to decide which one is X. I did 10 trials, and didn't look at the results until the end. Boom! 10 out of 10. There absolutely was a very different sound between the two, and I could match one to the other every single time.*

I've heard people say ABX trials are stressful, and they can't focus well enough for the test to be accurate. But in the case of amps, these same people say there is a huge difference between two amps. Night and day, right? If the differences are so great, that you can remember after minutes of silence while connections are changed, it should be no problem to identify one vs. the other when you can switch instantly. That's how it was in my test, it usually went this way, "play A, play B, play X, I think X is B, play B, play X, pick X is B, next trial." Toward the end I was so used to the differences, I'd go, "play A, play X, pick X is B." It comes down to, if the differences are great, the trial is easy, but if the two samples are so alike that even is straining and stressing, and wearing yourself down with the time spent on each iteration of the trial, you're basically left to guess which is which...you're guessing, and the samples are the same within your detectable limits.

*How could I tell the difference between a 96 kHz file and a 48 Khz file so easily? That's another story.