Audiophiles mostly aren’t music fans

[spiritofmusic]

"Big green shirt w skinny brown pants"
God only knows what this equates to in the hifi world.

 

[bonzo75]

Guys in this hobby will never get what they are after. That is the hobby. To chase. Like a dog after cars and to let go the car when caught. If they get it they should find themselves another hobby, preferably an outdoors one this time.

Marc, this does not include you, because you made it clear that you were finally satisfied and will not be changing gear. You said so two years ago, 21 months ago, 18 months ago, 15 months ago, 12 months ago, and even very recently.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Yeah Ked, what IS it that I keep smoking? Maybe yr Frequent Flyer Miles receipts.

 

[JackD201]

Guys in this hobby will never get what they are after. That is the hobby. To chase. Like a dog after cars and to let go the car when caught. If they get it they should find themselves another hobby, preferably an outdoors one this time.

Marc, this does not include you, because you made it clear that you were finally satisfied and will not be changing gear. You said so two years ago, 21 months ago, 18 months ago, 15 months ago, 12 months ago, and even very recently.

There will always be stuff we might lust after. That is a certainty. Then again, here alone I see many members that are for the most part satisfied with our particular status quo's. Aaaaaah software never ends though. I have two main fantasies in life. The first involves being a cop and giving tickets to all the idiot drivers I see on the road. The second is pulling off a heist of Blue Danube records in Vienna albeit the General's looks like a place to hit too.

It's funny though how my good bud the new local ARC dealer asked me why in the world I placed a reservation for the upcoming CH L10 and M10 monos given how L1 and M1s already sound. For the life of me I didn't know because I really have no complaints to speak of. After a pregnant silence what came out of my mouth spontaneously was, "because I can?". LOL It really was just that and he knew EXACTLY where I was coming from. We both had a great laugh after that. With all honesty however, getting the stars aligned took A LOT of work as well as outside help.

 

[JackD201]

"Big green shirt w skinny brown pants"
God only knows what this equates to in the hifi world.

Oh Lord I don't even want to think about that LOL

 

[spiritofmusic]

Well, I have seen it on the golf course. Maybe Bose? LOL.

Don't worry about Ked. He's happy being the permanent voyeur. After a while he might even convince himself he might want to play some lps at home. Y'know, like everyone else in the world w lps does.

 

[microstrip]

A lot of words to admit that there is no $1800 turntable that can deliver the musical enjoyment of a Garrard 401.

I have got much more musical enjoyment from a Scheu Premier II with 80mm thick platter that I got for 1000 euros than from the Garrard 401 with slate plinth that unfortunately still sits in my garage. And when you consider the full economics of owning a perfect Garrard 401 you will find that it costs a lot more than $1800.

BTW, Lenco's L75 or L78 sell here for euro 250...

 

[asiufy]

A lot of words to admit that there is no $1800 turntable that can deliver the musical enjoyment of a Garrard 401.

Of course I didn't say that.
The OP doesn't need a $1800 Garrard. This is what this thread is about, not mine or your preferences.
There's plenty of tables at $1800 (or less) that will give the OP the music enjoyment that was lacking with the Avid. I just thought I wouldn't mention specific brands, as that would be unfair, since there is truly a very wide assortment.

 

[bonzo75]

The avid is very high resolution, clean sounding highs. Not as much grounded sound or body. So if someone owns it it needs to be used in balance

 

[zerostargeneral]

Golf you say,

May I suggest 18 holes of double automatic press for $100 a point?

Preferred venues;Les Bordes,Seminole Landing,Cypress Point.

As for the equipment suggestions,they are simply ideas.The Scott amp with built in phono stage is a true giant slayer.
The 401 seemed good value as it has a parallel tracker with an SME type bayonet head shell.

Ideally best partnered with Harbeth 40.1 or Rogers LS 5/8(passive) or Spendor SP 1.

The NS 2000 are great bang for buck and I was budget conscious.

Kindest regards,G.

 

[ddk]

Audiophiles are in love with sound. Music fans are in love with music.

It’s not the same. Not even close.

And I am a music fan. Hands down. And proud.

for years I’ve had a pair of large advents, a marantz 2240b, a gold ring turntable, and adcom 555.

And it’s been great. Maybe cost me 1500 bucks in all.

I decided to step up and got a set of mordaunt short high end speakers, a classe amp, halo parasound phono preamp, and an avid turntable. TOTALLY broke the bank for me. Used it was a 10k investment.


And it was a huge mistake.

The good stuff sounds AMAZING. BUT, the average stuff sounds awful. Zero middle ground. That’s just dumb. Made me listening to only certain music. And I became searching for what didn’t sound like crap. The opposite of what I hoped.

I was so disappointed. I am selling all the new high end stuff and going right back with my old set up. A setup that makes 95% of my albums just kick ass. The high end stuff made like 15% of my collection listenable.

Apparently I am not an audiophile despite having played professional guitar all over the world. And recording in the best studios in the USA. And being a tone junky.

Eye opener.

You bought poor sounding equipment and honestly looking at your purchases I'm surprised you can even find that 15% listenable, this has nothing to do with your conclusion about people enjoying music or not. It would be the same if someone bought a crap sounding guitar with shitty pedal and amp and then said electric guitars aren't for real musicians.

david

 

[RogerD]

Guys in this hobby will never get what they are after. That is the hobby. To chase. Like a dog after cars and to let go the car when caught. If they get it they should find themselves another hobby, preferably an outdoors one this time.

Marc, this does not include you, because you made it clear that you were finally satisfied and will not be changing gear. You said so two years ago, 21 months ago, 18 months ago, 15 months ago, 12 months ago, and even very recently.

I am very satisfied and haven’t changed gear in 30 years except adding a DAC. I have just found ways to improve the system...low cost. It’s all subjective anyway, although some systems do improve with changing gear.I for one like the challenge of working the system.

 

[caesar]

You bought poor sounding equipment and honestly looking at your purchases I'm surprised you can even find that 15% listenable, this has nothing to do with your conclusion about people enjoying music or not. It would be the same if someone bought a crap sounding guitar with shitty pedal and amp and then said electric guitars aren't for real musicians.

david

Well said!

In addition to having money to participate in this hobby, one needs luck in having a good room.

And also luck in running into people who share one's taste that can help discover the proper gear.

 

[caesar]

In my case, an audiophile, I’m in love with music and the better it sounds the more emotional and deeply satisfying the experience. The problem with good gear is its high resolution. When that gear isn’t set up really well, what one component resolves, another might loose. All it takes is a bad connector, bad mains supply, poorly constructed cable, poor room with lots of reflections or furniture to cause imbalances and diffraction. Poor vibratIon control, noisy power supplies, poor network etc. What then happens is that highly resolved detail like timbre, venue acoustics, ambient ‘air’ in the soundstage is lost, reabsorbed into other sounds so instead of say a voice with lots of ambience, you get a harsh sounding voice as the HF ambience contribution is heard as part of the voice.
You’ll notice that whenever you replace a component that has greater resolution, you’ll also notice a corresponding reduction in harshness, hardness or digital ‘edge’

I respect what you are saying, but you are stating your preference. Unfortunately, I have found the opposite. I have come to strongly dislike "high resolution" box speakers like Wilson and Magico for anything but 2% of the best recordings. I would not participate in this hobby either if all we had was this type of sound.

For normal, "non-audiophile"-recorded music, I favor of high efficiency speakers which excel in dynamics, rich, lifelike tone, and PRAT.

 

[caesar]

Guys in this hobby will never get what they are after. That is the hobby. To chase. Like a dog after cars and to let go the car when caught. If they get it they should find themselves another hobby, preferably an outdoors one this time.

To borrow from the Great Books and greek mythology, audiophilia a lot of times seems Sisyphean. It can never be completed. Like Sisyphus, us, audiophiles, roll up the same big rock up the hill with every "upgrade"...

And from a psychological perspective, comparing to live music is dangerous because that standard can never be met, and that can't feel too good for those who find that our after spending a lot of time and money chasing that.

Nor should one compare to guys who have better systems than they do.

Instead, to feel good psychologically about the hobby, guys should be comparing to the shmuck with a lesser system or the schlemiel listening to beats headphones.

 

[Al M.]

I respect what you are saying, but you are stating your preference. Unfortunately, I have found the opposite. I have come to strongly dislike "high resolution" box speakers like Wilson and Magico for anything but 2% of the best recordings. I would not participate in this hobby either if all we had was this type of sound.

For normal, "non-audiophile"-recorded music, I favor of high efficiency speakers which excel in dynamics, rich, lifelike tone, and PRAT.

You can have both worlds.

 

[caesar]

You can have both worlds.

I know what you mean. My bi-amped MBL system does the audiophile stuff, yet sounds like a high-efficiency system run by a SET. But it took a long, long, long, long, long, time... and $$$$$$$$

And, of course, there are personal tastes...

 

[Blackmorec]

I respect what you are saying, but you are stating your preference. Unfortunately, I have found the opposite. I have come to strongly dislike "high resolution" box speakers like Wilson and Magico for anything but 2% of the best recordings. I would not participate in this hobby either if all we had was this type of sound.

For normal, "non-audiophile"-recorded music, I favor of high efficiency speakers which excel in dynamics, rich, lifelike tone, and PRAT.

Nothing whatsoever to do with my preference or with speaker brands. If a recording includes a lot of detail, you ALWAYS hear that detail, either as clearly, well resolved musical and acoustic detail, or as unresolved distortion. When a new component brings additional detail and resolution, it doesn’t suddenly magic that detail out of the ether. It simply separates it from where it was before, namely incorrectly combined with other parts of the music. High resolution shouldn’t have a sound that you like or dislike....that’s an identity and a coloration. High resolution should reflect exactly what’s on the recording, so if there’s warmth, richness and lifelike tone on the recording, that’s how it should sound when replayed.
A well set-up pair of Magicos should have no identifiable sound of their own and what you hear should be exactly what is on the recording, with no editorialising. That’s precisely what you’re paying all the money for. If you want your speakers to add character then they’re going to add that character to every recording. If you need this type of character-adding speaker for your system to sound good on more than 2% of recordings then typically you’re compensating for shortcomings elsewhere in your system or room. Similarly if a pair of Magicos don’t absolutely wow you, the problem isn’t with the speakers but rather with the room or with the lack of synergy with partnering components.
Take your system.....it sounds wonderful on a wide range of recordings BECAUSE a wide range of recordings sound wonderful and your system does nothing to destroy or mask that beauty. But if you do get the odd really bad recording and I do mean odd and bad, that’s how it should sound, even on your system. If the majority of recordings sound bad, there’s a problem and typically its caused by bad room, a faulty or insufficient component or poorly matched hardware

 

[RogerD]

I respect what you are saying, but you are stating your preference. Unfortunately, I have found the opposite. I have come to strongly dislike "high resolution" box speakers like Wilson and Magico for anything but 2% of the best recordings. I would not participate in this hobby either if all we had was this type of sound.

For normal, "non-audiophile"-recorded music, I favor of high efficiency speakers which excel in dynamics, rich, lifelike tone, and PRAT.

Resolution is the ability to discern a recording in a life like manner.
Anyway that’s my definition off the top of my head.
It is the total sum of the system.
I agree that it is a life’s work and it can be subjective like in your case...but systems are complex and i’d be surprised that the speakers mentioned could not in a well designed system achieve a high level of musical resolution. IMHO

 

[asiufy]

Well said!
And also luck in running into people who share one's taste that can help discover the proper gear.

There's also this thing called "dealers". They're supposed to be there to help exactly in such cases, and help people avoid these mistakes.
But the lure of the cheap used "deals" is too strong, and most people just end up putting together a mix of stuff they got for cheap. And when things don't quite end up the way they wanted, the blame will lie on the hobby/business, instead of on his own choices.
As I said earlier, there's a ridiculous amount of good sounding entry-level gear out there. It's a great time to enter the hobby. You just gotta know where and how.