Audio Science Review Review

Discussion in 'Audio Science' started by purr1n, Aug 30, 2020.

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  1. Hammy

    Hammy Friend

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    They're Daniel Hertz M1 Reference speakers. From Switzerland and designed by Mark Levinson. $100,000 per pair.
     
  2. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    CASE 8: Using apples-to-oranges methods to specific companies look bad

    That's unbelievable. He tested unbalanced at 2V with Motu gear but balanced at 4V for Motu's competition. Doing an apples to oranges on measurements to make Motu look bad. Adding as case #8 in the first post. It's what @ultrabike and I have been saying all along, the "randomness" of it all. And ultimately at the end of the day, most consumers will read ASR "prose" instead of noting these sneaky hatchet jobs on the measurements. I simply refuse to give ASR the benefit of the doubt now. Too many incidents of certain companies being on his shitlist (or favored list).

    Don't you love how his "handlers" protect him and deflect the issue with a joke rather than simply ask ASR if he could look into it (as would happen here - I've noted you guys will press me or @atomicbob on investigate further if something is missing or of further interest).

    Amir did a similar thing with the Yggdrasil by only testing the unbalanced outputs. Said he didn't have enough time and only measured the SE outputs in haste at a friend's house or something that like. He screwed up his linearity tests on Yggdrasil by not applying a bandpass filter. Jude with AP's help pointed this out and Amir and never went back to remove the borked measurements, redo them, or add a note, which would have been the proper thing to do.

    Amir subsequently started to do the linearity measurements properly, but never admitted his past mistakes, probably because having overseen 1000 employees, having highly certified trained ears, and winning an Emmy, he was too proud or saw himself as infallible or unassailable.

    Motu is based on the USA like Schiit. Sometimes wonder if Amir is on a mission to smear USA based companies. Or Maybe ASR asked Motu for "protection" and they refused.
     
    Last edited: Sep 7, 2020
  3. Deep Funk

    Deep Funk Deep thoughts - Friend

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    Read this thread.

    Read the ASR thread.



    We all have opinions. I do not see how SBAF and ASR are that different. What drew me and kept me here is the honesty. ASR is the offspring of Rock-Grotto (in a sense) which was charming but odd (also do not forget DIY-audio-heaven!). Well Rock-Grotto was taken over by Dale Thorn (the DT48-dude, quite nice in general actually). Too bad Rock Grotto became his venue for political rants.

    People want to belong and can accept an "us versus them" attitude because they like their new community and its perceived comforts.

    I consider this place Changstar V2, as I first hung out at Changstar. Guess what? A group of dorks is like a herd of cats and here we accept that. If you do not like that analogy, you need more cats in your life.

    [​IMG]
     
  4. Hammy

    Hammy Friend

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    The ASR review and measurements of the Liquid Platinum is another of his frustrating reviews. The Liquid Platinum is a balanced amp. Designed for best sound and performance using the balanced headphone output. But Amir goes on to measure and do his listening tests using the single-ended headphone output. The SINBAD number appears to be from the single-ended headphone measurements rather than balanced headphone measurements. He's unwilling to test and present the amp in it's best output for the way it was designed.

    The manual for the Liquid Platinum even mentions that the balanced headphone output is best

    From the manual:
    Yet Amir goes on to measure and listen to the LP in single-ended and pretty much ignore the balanced headphone output performance and sound quality.
     
  5. Yethal

    Yethal Facebook Friend

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    Yet he called balanced inputs on the Magnius "his favorite"
     
  6. Cspirou

    Cspirou They call me Sparky

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    He seems to do this quite often. Like the Yggdrasil
     
  7. yotacowboy

    yotacowboy McRibs Kind of Guy

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    [​IMG]
     
  8. Psalmanazar

    Psalmanazar Most improved member; A+

    Pyrate Slaytanic Cliff Clavin
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    He doesn’t know what the measurements correlate to Crossover issues, cabinet issues, his crown amp sucking, his placement sucking, etc. He’s obsessed with bass extension but has no idea what that means. The meat and knock of a kick is in the mids. Recommending something with a low mid trench is worse than bass extension to 60hz. It’s why old rap mixed quickly on high pass filtered SSLs (or let’s be honest, Mackies and Portastudios) on NS10s and Proacs sounds fatter than current subbassy v shaped boom boom digital tizz and fizz rap despite not having ball rumbling bass.

    808 kick samples are just a 50hz sine wave.
    The Yamaha subkicks are like 30-50hz.
    Both of those and resonance filters won’t save a troughed out kick. Shoving everything through an insane bass shelf in a shitty room just will blow up equipment.

    if someone gets a recommendation for anything with a cabinet or port issue in the lower mids or a low mid trench but has nice bass extension, it will be less accurate than the smaller speaker despite sounding bigger and better. Not that ASR can properly drive those with their bad class d and weird switcher amps. The magic is in the midrange. It’s how you can do it all with something that starts rolling off at 70-80hz. A switchable sub to fill out the room is nice but a lot of that is just subjective and it doesn’t help everything. Music from when bigger speakers were commonplace is more high pass filtered and better mixed than contemporary music.
     
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2020
  9. Psalmanazar

    Psalmanazar Most improved member; A+

    Pyrate Slaytanic Cliff Clavin
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    He misrepresents his experience all the time. He clearly barely knows how to use his own equipment which would be shocking if it was true that he has worked with AP analyzers for over 30 years.

    Higher end American audio companies that do good work don’t seem to send out free samples and rarely send out review samples to randos. They don’t need to. Unless you’re Stereophile or Sound on Sound, you’re not getting squat and they won’t even send out the most expensive stuff, which is often built to order. Even the companies that make under ten great things, or a bunch of decent speakers made from the same parts bin, for a reasonable price don’t send them out. They’re not selling $400-1400 bom speakers for $8000-80000 dollars so one sale won’t cover a dozen freebies and then some.

    I haven’t heard of MOTU doing anything for free except for replacing defective products, webinars, and t-shirts.
     
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2020
  10. Ruined

    Ruined HD700 ruined my ear holes

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  11. HotRatSalad

    HotRatSalad Friend

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    That's funny most people that didn't like magnius said the SE was a little better sounding.
     
  12. Degru

    Degru Facebook Friend

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    I had a chuckle over this..
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    Two days apart :) Aren't these things supposed to be indistinguishable?
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2020
  13. Baten

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    Gonna guess the excuse here would be second is ~$230 and first is ~$640
     
  14. Degru

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    Yep. But one is DAC/amp, while other is DAC only, and a barebones kit at that. I also noticed that he never bothered to measure low impedance load on the amp's balanced jack.. how long has he had now to build a 33 ohm balanced test load? It can't be that hard.
     
  15. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Based on the JBL LSR305 expose (keeping in mind the totally shit SINAD from the built-in class D amp):
    upload_2020-9-17_12-1-57.png
     
  16. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    His strategy isn't science, discovery, or even a proper review. It's throughput and monetization as a result of that. I have to hand it to him, he's one productive mofo with more than one review per day.
     
  17. Senorx12562

    Senorx12562 Case of the mondays

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    I believe the "science" in the name of the site refers not to methodology, but to the lack of passion for it's subject. Makes sense that he writes about it like he's writing about a dishwasher.
     
  18. Ruined

    Ruined HD700 ruined my ear holes

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    IMO the site uses the word "science" for "argument from authority" purposes. A terrible way to argue a point, but a way that is very effective with some audiences. Anyone who makes a cohesive logical argument i.e. "but I listened to the two of them side by side and the liquid platinum sounds nothing like the JDS atom amp" can be shouted down with argument from authority - "must have been your imagination as the science says they sound the same, here is the link to the measurements and analysis." Or " unless you can provide a differing measurement the science says they must sound identical."

    i.e. don't believe your lyin' ears 'cause the audio scientist says otherwise!
     
  19. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    Real scientists have plenty of passion.
     
  20. Acoustic Taser

    Acoustic Taser New

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    Unless something changed after the Yggdrasil kerfuffle, Amir has yet to publish his methods and said he uses his own secret sauce (methods he finds more appropriate to published standards of measurement). That snake oil salesman is the antithesis of what science is about.
     
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