What is Digg?90 Comments
- pcgeek101, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6If I had a million bucks, you know what I'd do? Two chicks at the same time
- CombatWombat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I somewhat agree with n3tfury on this. Just because there are a lot of con artists out there who aim for audiophiles, doesn't mean that all audiophiles are morons who fall for this stuff.
As long as there is a demand in any market, audio or not, there will con artists to prey on the uninformed or gullible, because there's money to be made. See - "weight loss medicine". Just because there are a lot of con artists out there trying to push their latest miracle weight loss drug, it doesn't mean that everyone who wants to lose weight is a moron.
And please, in the future, let's not just call any old post you make on your website "newsworthy". - vuzman, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4The reason for using gold on connections is not due to gold's electrical properties (as stated above, silver and even copper have better properties), but due to gold's resistance to oxidation (i.e. corrosion).
- tempusrob, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I use my stereo to listen to music. Audiophiles use music to listen to their stereos.
/not an audiophile - byrons, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"As an audiophile, I find the comments here hilarious. You guys obviously haven't heard what a $10,000 system actually sounds like compared to your $50 GPX Wal-Mart special."
lol! I have a feeling you'd pay $2000 for a wooden knob and a 3 foot kettle cable too. - fuzzyfuzz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I like to have gold tipped connectors on my optical cables.
- genetic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2the funny thig is some ***** is sitting is some room with a 6 thousand dollar volume knob thinking to himself what an improvement from his previous 3thousand dollar volume knob... this makes me sick
- sonar_un, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2System Episode 3... make your own cables.
http://revision3.com/systm/avcabling/ - Sirocco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Funny how people will pay an extra 10k just to get a system that will give them that extra 5% performance increase. Besides, by the time someone can afford one of these systems, initial hearing loss will have already set in ;)
- Swift2, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Hey, there are a lot of Circuit City customers who fall for Monster speaker cables, too. Know what? For one-tenth the price, you can get 12 gauge lamp cord. Double-blind testing proves that nobody can hear the difference. Nobody.
- tokyopimp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2This doesn't surprise me, I consider myself a audio snob, maybe not an audiophile. But I have fairly high end stuff connected to my PC. Probably about 1,000 dollars worth of audio equipment.
But I would never ever buy anything so stupid. Believe me you can be an audiophile and not spend thousands. You may be looked down upon by the super rich jerk-o-philes that spend thousands on speaker cable though. - tremor_tj, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2What I'd like to know is, how do supposed "audiophiles" know what the original REALLY sounds like. You can talk warmth and depth and blah blah blah all day long, but how can you reporduce what the actual performance sounded like if you weren't actually there? Strive for perfection all you want, but you're only striving for YOUR idea of what that is.
I've never, ever, EVER heard a recording sound like what a true performance sounds like. It's just not the same. Sit in the middle of the orchestra, as I've done many times (since, you know, I'm a music lover and PLAY music) and compare your best recording of the same performance, from the same exact location, on the best possible audio playback equipment, and guess what....the experience is not the same. It's not even close. - saifrc, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2After studying audio technology and acoustics for years, I can truthfully say this: no matter how much money you spend trying to get your audio to be "perfect," you'll never be able to undo the horrible acoustics associated with the presence of your human body in the room. Unless audiophiles are now undergoing elective surgery to replace parts of their body with expensive beech wood...this is why I just use high-quality headphones...
I appreciate good audio quality, but the fact of the matter is that it's the music itself, as well as the ideas and expressions in it, that really make music worth listening to. If audiophiles were musicians, we'd never have breathy tenor saxes, or distortion guitar, or overdriven electric organs, or anything that gives music its *style*. - Antarctica, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Wait, I’ve got a proposition for anyone who is truly interested in any of these devices. For 500 dollars, I’ll pull your head out of your ass. That should improve your sound quality considerably.
- Chango_Family, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I still laugh when I see min. salaried grocery clerks load up their 1994 Honda Civic with 10,000$ car systems to listen to .... dance music.
- suburbia75, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I agree with placebored. Audiophiles are not "music lovers." Most of the audiophiles I've known have had the worst ***** taste in music. Any idiot who thinks he needs to pay for a volume knob is a knob himself.
- ksgant, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2If I had a million bucks, you know what I'd do? Nothing. I'd relax, I would sit on my ass all day, I would do nothing.
Well you don't need a million dollars to do nothing, man. Just take a look at my cousin, he's broke, don't do *****. - Dhalgren, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The reason these guys can prey on these audiophiles is because sound quality is so amporphorous. They use all these nonsense words like "warmth" and "deep, rich, tones." What does that mean? You are relying on testimonials. Never, ever buy anything based on a testimonial of someone you don't know personally. Instead, they should be talking about % of distortion as measured by calibrated devices. A human ear is not a calibrated device. If you want to see more of this audiophile type debunking, take a gander at http://www.randi.org
- rm999, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1What's the point of gold connections? Silver offers the least resistance. Hell, even copper has less resistance than gold!
- theone3, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"I have a million bucks, what should I get first? The wooden knob or the intelligent chip?" I'll sell you a wooden knob for $200 extra with additional resonance warmth, and a fuller soundstage. It was hand crafted in Bolivia by a monk with no arms.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Gold connectors make sense - low oxidisation, high conductivity - ever wonder what trace connectors on ICs are made of? Gold.
On the other hand, I seem to remember seeing somebody selling rocks that you put under your chair to make your stereo sound better, for about $5000 a piece. They looked like a great buy. Because you could beat your worthless brains out with one of them, once you realise you've been had. - wheels999, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I thought "monster" cable was an outrageous rip-off of the stupid... but they not only have been topped... they've been owned!
- n3tfury, on 10/12/2007, -6/+7not all Audiophiles fall for the high dollar pit traps, idiot. guess what you can have Audiophiles that actually do alot of DIY. sigh, kids.
- ManiacFive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I love the wooden volume knobs that affect sound quality. Oh yes, wood, over bakelite, will have a differemce. ahhhhhh. genius
- Rouss, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1try placing an "order" for the knobs, its fun i "ordered" 11101011999 of them and it costs $5,383,990,819,515.00. it will actually go through.
- Fish5, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The power cord review is pretty crazy
'With the Clairvoyant handling AC, music leapt out of the speakers and created a see-through window into the recording that held me rapt throughout the review period.'
I can't believe a $1500 power cord is going to make that much difference. - placebored, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Audiophiles are not "music lovers" electrosoccertu. They are audio gear lovers. Notice that the demand created by their apparently considerable amount of expendable money creates niches like this in the in the audio gear market, not in the music market. At the end of the day, audiophiles are buying the same CDs, LPs and audio DVDs as the rest of us. If they were music lovers, there would be some kind of audiophile class recording standard floating around out there. Audiophiles are just caught up in a grand pissing contest with each other over who can get the best gear. That has nothing to do with music. A real music lover would spend his money in a way that would accumulate the most music ...like collecting enough mp3s to fill up a big hard drive. Sure they might not sound as great on an iPod as an uncompressed recording would on that expensive audiophile rig, but the $9000 the real music lover didn't spend on stupid speaker cable got turned into 9090 songs from iTunes, with 90c left over. So who's the real music lover?
- Johnbinarystar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Audiophile + large expendable money supply = con artist paradise.
- gaspero1, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"...how many wooden knobs..."
I worked in television and music studios, and I've had my own music studio. Even though some of the stuff listed on that site is frivolous, I've worked with cable that costs $2000 a foot. I didn't buy it, but in 1992, fiber optic lines were the state of the art for moving digital video or audio around. Acoustic foam can easily cost $75 a square foot, but if you are building a studio in an apartment or an office building, it's the most cost effective way to block any sounds from the outside from getting in to your recording. - kevinmoore, on 06/13/2009, -0/+1gaspero1, I'd love to pit your $10,000 system against my $1,000 DIY setup.
- zelig, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Yeah, love the "Silver Rock Signature Knob". Anyone with a basic knowledge of acoustics and electronics is gonna laugh themselves silly.
- Fish5, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I can see the value of a $10,000 system but the items in this list are more in the $100,000 - $200,000+ system range
- laughterkillsme, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This is a horrible new story, worthy of Jack Thompson even.
- DWatch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I once stood in a Circuit City speaker sales area (you know the ones with the separate room with nothing but speakers and amps), and listened to a few speakers, while some goober was talking to a salesman about an amp. He claimed to be an 'audiophile', and was telling the salesman about all kinds of technical stuff the average shopper would never want to know. He then tells the salesman he would never buy any of the 'junk' they had on the showroom floor, and that he spent over 10 grand getting his equipment from specialty dealers. Now here's the sad, sad part of this conversation. He was only there to buy a couple of CDs, which he had in his hands; the latest Brittany Spears and Madonna (this was a few years ago). I almost broke out laughing, then I realized he was just another rich jerk who didn't mind being ripped off.
I can spend a grand and get decent enough audio for my ears, the extra 9 grand spent to get me up over that last few percentage points of 'audio quality' just ain't worth it. I'll buy a car instead. - ardbeg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1A few points:
Placebo: If the drug companies and the FDA used the same standards these audio reviewers do, every single drug that didn't kill people would be approved, because there is almost always a placebo effect. In many cases, these improvements are “real�: people don't just think they are getting better, they actually do get better. If you don't have a blind control, you haven't learned anything. You need blind, repeated tests.
Grammar: The title Audiophile Idiocy does not imply that all "audiophiles" are idiots; it is just describing the area of idiocy covered. Otherwise the title “Idiocy� would imply everyone is an idiot. Many high-end audio devices actually do offer perceptibly improved sound (if not economically). None of these devices appear to be in that category.
Metallurgy: As discussed, gold connectors (or plating) can prevent corrosion. However, the connection between the gold and the wire must be completely insulated, otherwise you are just moving the location of the oxidation, not eliminating it. Also, some metals corrode in contact with gold even absent air (though not copper). Trimming the wire and cleaning the terminals works in a pinch.
Superiority: Most audiophiles just like to have an area where they can feel superior to most people. Similarly, many people who criticize audiophiles and others just like to have an area where they can feel superior to most people. Behind that unpleasantness, there is the matter of the truth, however. One can be smug and right or smug and wrong. And one can also be right by dumb luck without having any knowledge to back it up. - pdlevin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1hilarious.
- Zeush8su, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Funny thing is I know some people that would actually buy this crap,"TUBE-O-LATOR LACQUER"now that's ***** stupid.So called audiophile's must have had dog/bat ears implanted in order to be able to hear those humming DA/AD converters....sheesh
- JimButtitta, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Golden eared posers with more money than brains
- binarypower, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I would love to do a blindfolded test from amateurs to pros and see if they can tell the difference of a $100,000 system and a $1,000 system.
- MaxFrost, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0ooookay....no speakers whatsoever cept the tweeters? I know wood is supposed to have the best resonance out there, but come on!! thats absurd!!
- Dingle, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0God i love fights in the comment section.
IMO I'd rather blow my money in other areas then paying thousands of dollars for stereo equipment that a few hundered would suffice. Most of it is in your head anyways. If you think it doesn't sound good then it won't. - verse101, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I have relatives who are audiophiles, probably $30k-50k of equipment. I think it's a waste of money. There's a difference between $2 cables and $15 cables, but anything above that is useless. Audiophiles care more about the quality of the sound and forget the whole point of audio equipment, the music! If you enjoy the song, it doesnt matter if you're listening to it on FM radio, MP3 or CD. Why not just listen to a live band, that's the ultimate audio reproduction.
- spectre_25gt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Vultures... F'ing vultures.
- Bluezdood, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Ha, suckers!
- pdrap, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0True videophiles only use VCR's, not DVD, because they know that the analog signal from the VCR looks better because of the analog warmth. This is exactly like tubes vs. semiconductors, where the analog warmth of tubes is obviously far superior to the the digital coldness of semiconductor transistors.
If you can use that idea to rip o^H^H^H^H^Hmake some money, send me a dollar. - siouxmoux, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Anything from Bose, Monster Cable or Yamaha are over priced junk. Even Leo once admitted that he bought one of those $500 dollar Bose Alarm Clocks from on those TV shopping channels. What a wastes of money for consumer electronics!
- OrangeTide, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0What can I say. some audiophiles belong to the religion of audio worship. And there is some mysticism involved. After an audiophile has bought the highest end speaker and amplifier available. And has redesigned his/her listening room to be acoustically ideal, what is he/she going to spend their money on next? Wooden knobs, magic chips, and cable elevators.
I once had the luxury of watching someone take a part this large metal block that you put on top of your amplifier to improve it's quality. The manufacture said the warranty was void if you took it apart and that taking it apart would negate all of it's audio enhancing properties. But after a double blind test we determined it was not doing anything and took it apart anyways. It was a metal box that looked like it was designed for holding a circuit board. but there was another piece of metal inside, which seemed to be a thin sheet of steel (the box was aluminum). Who knows maybe ours was just defective from the start and the thing actually does work (hahah) - mikeyG9x, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0All I can say is that I am in the wrong industry. It is absolutely amazing what people with too much money will spend it on.
Anyone want to start a business supplying Audiophiles with the very latest cable technology? Plastic tubes filled with super low resistance silicone fluid that actually speeds up the audio! It makes it so you can hear the audio before the CD player has even begun to play the disc! That's just the beginning because you will need one type of fluid for the preamp signals and another type of fluid for the speaker level signals.
I can just smell the money... - Dhalgren, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@ trueblood
I do have a clue, I have a degree in Electrical Engineering, how about you?
As far as music leaping out at me, I'd prefer to continue to listen to my music instead of it giving me psycadelic trips...
My point is that all of these "magic" audio devices are not scientifically tested. If you insist on relying on the human ear, lets do multiple blind tests to see if anyone can really hear a difference when you add all of these expensive add-ons. That would be the scientific method instead of trying to explain how the sound "tastes" better, "feels" better, or "looks" better.
@sonofalink
paying $500 for a video card may be stupid, but at least you know what you are getting for that money. You can read reviews where that card has been compared against other cards with accepted benchmarks. Where are those scientific reviews for this audiophile equipment.
I don't believe audiophiles are idiots, but some of them are suckers. If you believe that a piece of plastic with metal in it can improve the sound of a cd just by you placing it on top of a cd player, then maybe you should buy it to go along with that gold sticker you have under your cell phone battery. - subhuman, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I know gold is used as it is inert, but isn't silver too?
The control knob and the "intelligent chip" were the best. -
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