The Audiophoolery Thread.

[GrimJosef]

Originally Posted by ajgriff

... None of which proves that such sites are anything other than complete fabrications based on having a laugh after a good night out ...

I have a customer who owns three Shakti stones (he bought them second hand at a good deal less than list price). This fact is well known on the audio forum of which he and I are members and he does get a fair amount of ribbing about them, along with his love for Krell muscle amps. I've never seen the stones myself but quite a few people that I trust have. The jury's divided about their effectiveness .

Cheers,

GJ

[ajgriff]

Glad the customer got them cheap GJ. Is buying pre-owned stones a good idea? Some of the magic may have been lost through use.

Alan

[Refugee]

Those Shankti stones remind me of some things like car bonnet badges that a firm I worked for were offered a sample of with an offer to become a wholesaler.
They were supposed to radiate snake oil through the fuel lines into the fuel.
The creators had gone a little bit further than polishing a block of stone.
The item was like a bonnet badge with a rubber fill in it.
I was tasked with reverse engineering the sample and found that inside the rubber part was several squares of braid to make the "magic chip" look like a real chip if placed in an X-ray machine.
I found nothing else.

[Radio Wrangler]

Maybe his stones haven't broken-in yet?

Stone takes a geological age to change much, so he could have a long wait.

Otherwise, is there anywhere he can send them to to have them re-magicked if they've run down, or been corrupted by being too close to poor equipment?

David

[m0cemdave]

I do understand how having magic stones (or other expensive artifacts) in the room can improve the owner's experience by making them feel better about being there. Which means they get greater enjoyment from whatever they use the room for, including listening to music.

The problem arises when bogus (and, it has to be said, fraudulent) claims are made of objective improvements to sound reproduction.

[G8HQP Dave]

You would need to find a friendly Maxwell demon; he could re-arrange the energy paths through the stone. Unfortunately, Maxwell demons are expensive and difficult to train (like cats, but much much smaller!)

[GrimJosef]

Originally Posted by m0cemdave

... objective improvements to sound reproduction.

Given that the point of sound reproduction is either to create an illusion of performance reality or, when there's no 'reality' (e.g. when the music is largely synthesised), to recreate what someone (composer, performer, recording engineer, even the listener) thinks the music should sound like, I'm not sure this phrase will ever have a meaning that everyone can agree on.

Perhaps the best we can do is to complain about claims that a device makes a difference to the sound when measurements say it doesn't. The argument then boils down to how small a difference affects our experience of the sound, either consciously or unconsciously.

Cheers,

GJ

Maxwell demons are expensive and difficult to train (like cats, but much much smaller!)

I find a cat sitting on my lap, a glass of my favourite dram and a good piece of radio (probably a play) works a treat. I bet I could fit thousands of Daemons on my lap but would they be as strokeable? My lap would also overheat or overcool, perhaps with lots of daemons it would even out.

The best audio upgrade I managed to get (only just managed too) was to ask SHMBO not to disturb me while a play is on, only took 30 years!

[jamesperrett]

Originally Posted by m0cemdave

I wish I could have kept this one, and transferred it to my house (and just for fun James, try dating it from the equipment fit):

The Juno 106 synth makes it post 1984. Looks like a Soundtracs desk with a Soundcraft multitrack in the corner but they were around from the early 80's onwards if I remember right. Not sure when those ATC monitors were introduced but something very similar is still available today (at a price). The BBC computer in the foreground makes me think that it is probably earlier than 1990 as most people were using Ataris or Macs by then (though we went straight for a PC in our studio). So I couldn't be more specific than late 80's.

[Herald1360]

What's a SHMBO?

An audiophool's SWMBO?

Or is there a dialect version of who spelled hoo?

[Ted Kendall]

And then there's SWIMBO...

[Craig Sawyers]

Or the old ham radio acronym for his wife: XYL (ex young lady).

Now we really are off-topic!

Back on. Indeed in audio is usually forgotten that the music that is on the CD/vinyl/stream has been though at least an analogue mixing desk and many kilometers of regular vanilla balanced cable. And has been mixed by a human via a pair of speakers in the studio. And that does not count digital desks, or the multiple A-D/D-A converters.

Craig

['LIVEWIRE?']

Surely SHMBO = She must be obeyed, whilst SWMBO= She who must be obeyed, but for what does the 'I' in SWIMBO stand?

[Herald1360]

Hmmm.... maybe the audiophool's setup is akin to the guitarist's amplifier- simply a part of the overall musical instrument and chosen for the sound it makes rather than how precisely it turns the input signal into sound.

Dr G came up with She Who Insists Must Be Obeyed for SWIMBO. I reckon the "I" just turns a marginally pronounceable acronym into a simple word.

[Craig Sawyers]

Ivor Tiefenbrun (Linn founder) has the catchphrase "If it sounds better, that is because it is better". Not that it is more or less accurate - just that it sounds better. Which is a statement that what sounds good to your ears and music taste is subjective, as well as conforming to good engineering principles of course. Which the LP12 does.

I was working as a Saturday sales guy in J G Windows in Newcastle aged 16, when 26 year old broad Glaswegian Ivor was touring the country with his first Sondek. He would plonk it down and challenge the staff to say whether his deck sounded better than any other one in the shop. Of course in 1972 it was streets ahead of most things, and actually sounded better than the suspended sub-chassis deck on which it was based (the Thorens TD150).

You can now spend a whole lot of money on an LP12, and whole rafts of upgrade options, so it is far less affordable in real terms than it was in the 70's

Craig

[Beobloke]

Originally Posted by Craig Sawyers

Which is a statement that what sounds good to your ears and music taste is subjective, as well as conforming to good engineering principles of course. Which the LP12 does.

Does it? What about the fact that it uses three springs that are fundamentally unstable because they are in compression and basically fighting against each other all the time? I understand this is why you have to check the setup of the suspension every other week to see if it has drifted off-tune! Compare that to something like the Michell Gyrodec - here the deck is hung from the springs so thaey are in tension and are much more stable. The last time I gave the suspension a once-over on my own Gyro SE, I hadn't touched it for over a year and everything was still spot on.

The quote I prefer about the LP12 and Ittok combo is "a series of engineering compromises that mostly cancel each other out to give a half decent result"!

[Radio Wrangler]

I rather like the LP12. It's a piece of decent engineering.

It's quite possible to appreciate the engineering without having to subscribe to the cult which built up around them. I don't believe Ivor started the wave of adulation around his turntable, but he certainly went surfing afterwards

"The source is most important"... "A chain is no stronger than it's weakest link" Ignore them. We live a fifth of the way into the 21st century. We are people interested in finding and restoring interesting bits of entertainment machinery. We can be choosy!

We can take our pick out of the best things of the past. Wax cylinders, big Studers or 5:1 class D. Whatever takes our fancy. We have freedom! We don't have to slavishly follow gurus, prophets or charlatans. We are free to think our own thoughts and hold our own opinions.

If I had to replace my audio gear after some disaster, I'd probably find an LP12. But I'd stick an SME 3009 on it and probably a V15 on that.

We are probably the luckiest people ever to listen to reproduced music.

David

[DonaldStott]

Hi Craig

Couldn't resist replying as your Post had too many trigger words/phrases for me to ignore: -

Linn
Ivor Tiefenbrun
LP12
J G Windows
Glaswegian
Sondek

I live about 10 minutes drive from the Linn Products factory which I have visited on numerous occasions over the years. Good to know that they still define themselves as a Precision Engineering Company and not a Hi-fi Manufacturer.

I've also spent more time than I should have visiting J G Windows - I assume you worked in Central Arcade?

Currently enjoying my Akurate LP12 playing through my Linn system - "Source First".

But in the interests of balance at the weekend I was cleaning and then playing some 78s on my HMV Portable 101 gramophone!

Another of Linn's oft quoted catchphrases is "Just Listen" - cuts through most of the "Audiophoolery" we see far too often these days!

[ekjdm14]

Originally Posted by DonaldStott

Another of Linn's oft quoted catchphrases is "Just Listen" - cuts through most of the "Audiophoolery" we see far too often these days!

This & David (RW)'s post just about sums it up nicely, we all have free will (or at least what we believe to be free will ) and can choose what we want from our audio equipment.

Most if not all of us here are gathered because we have an interest in/passion for technologies of the past, including (but not limited to by any means) "old radios" as a catch-all phrase. Some hi-fi, some not-much-fi-at-all & some even with strange flickering pictures, nay colours, on their fronts but what brings us together is the enjoyment of repairing and using this kit for it's intended purpose.

If someone wants to blow thousands on equipment and bits of stone, that's their choice too but I sincerely wish they could take a moment to stop chasing rainbows and as quoted above, just listen

[Craig Sawyers]

Yes - Central Arcade. Mind you it is a long time since I lived in the North East. Left in '74 to go to Southampton University (Electronics then Laser Physics) and never returned. Just to occasionally visit.

Windows is still there, still has a music sales area and is the go-to place for musical instruments and sheet music. Mark Knopfler (a Geordie; like Sting) bought his first guitar there.

The hifi and TV areas are a pale shadow of what they once were, because they are competing now with Richer Sounds on the one hand and the likes of John Lewis on the other. So they are playing instead to their decades long unique strengths.

Craig