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Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

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Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#151
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“The difference between a collector and a hoarder is a display case.” -John Hodgman

Does that mean that by definition it is not possible to hoard display cases?

No, you have to put the display cases inside another, larger display case for it to not count as hoarding.

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#152

The 82-year-old lawyer already had a $60,000 American-made amplifier, 1960s German loudspeakers that once belonged to a theater, Japanese audio cables threaded with gold and silver, and other pricey equipment. Meanwhile, my wife plays her Dean Martin records through her own personal 15-watt AM radio station in the closet, picked up on vintage tube radios scattered around the house so the music sounds like it was inte…

At least your wife's perspective makes sense—it's treating music as deeply experiential and contextual.

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#153
When marketing a product one must consider the four basic segments: the smart rich, the stupid rich, the smart poor and the stupid poor.

Obviously you are not going to make any money selling to the poor, so strike them. Good luck trying to separate the smart rich from their money- they tend to save. Thus we are left with the stupid rich. High end audiophile products are a perfect fit for this lucrative segment.

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#154

I don't understand this type of audiophiles. I also have a fairly high end, vintage audio system at home, but I'd never do anything like that in the name of audio quality. There's a quote I love about these people: A normal person uses the audio system to listen music, while an audiophile uses music to listen to his audio system.

You don't understand the power of naivety, placebo effect, dreams and stupidity composed (multiply all). Not in any way intended to insult these people, I know a few (not as rich) and they simply do not want to understand the basic principles behind digital signals, error corrections etc. I know people that work in IT and still pretend that audio transmission over USB can add jitter to music and that a DAC can "open"…

To me, my iPod Shuffles, launch day iPhone, and modern iPhone all sound very different from one another when I play the same song. (I prefer the Shuffles.)

Is this a real thing, or should I upgrade to a better brand of crack?

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#155

I don't understand this type of audiophiles. I also have a fairly high end, vintage audio system at home, but I'd never do anything like that in the name of audio quality. There's a quote I love about these people: A normal person uses the audio system to listen music, while an audiophile uses music to listen to his audio system.

You don't understand the power of naivety, placebo effect, dreams and stupidity composed (multiply all). Not in any way intended to insult these people, I know a few (not as rich) and they simply do not want to understand the basic principles behind digital signals, error corrections etc. I know people that work in IT and still pretend that audio transmission over USB can add jitter to music and that a DAC can "open"…

> a DAC can "open" or "close" "the stage" by low quality processing of the signal

In principle a low enough quality DAC certainly could affect "the stage", but in reality even cheap ones are likely good enough.

> There is no way to convince these people they are wrong

I'm pretty sure many of them don't want to be convinced since it would make their hobby pretty boring. I also wouldn't be surprised if industry players actively spread myths like these to sell more (expensive) products.

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#156

Tubes, cables now this. It seems more like religion or superstition than technology IMHO. If you want to take it to the limit, hire someone to come into your home and perform live for you, then you can eliminate all the sources of distortion. Not only would you be hearing the ultimate perfect sound, you would be providing employment for artists. Seems like a win - win to me :)

But you won’t be able to play it at leisure then :P

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a double-conversion UPS: AC to DC, a small siphon for batteries and control hardware, and then DC to AC out. I imagine an audiophile would say that the sine wave generated by such a setup wouldn’t be smooth enough. They’d want something like a double-rotary converter, so that a spinning generator is making the final sine wave.

But the amp converts that AC back to a flat DC anyway! In any case, PSRR ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_supply_rejection_ratio ) is a real, measurable thing.

Such audiophiles don't believe in real, measurable things. And they certainly don't understand how power supplies really work.

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heavy metal batteries. Classical batteries. If only there was a genre of music called “deep cycle” we’d be on the gravy train for life. (Ref: HHGG)

solid state pop

(sound of capacitor popping)

Re: Audiophiles in Japan Are Installing Their Own Power Poles

#159
post #3

When I'm playing music on my stereo from my PC through USB, turning off the lights on my bathroom on the other side of the wall will momentarily kill my USB driver and as a result Spotify stops working. Electromagnetic interference is no joke.

I had a similar problem with an aluminum Silverstone case. Turned out there was a grounding washer connected by wire to the front panel that had to be attached to a screw on the motherboard (I think). Fixed USB disconnecting issues right up.

(See: https://superuser.com/questions/64098/static-when-metal-usb-...)

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