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From: rdp@teddy.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.audio
Subject: Re: level matching and a-b comparisons
Message-ID: <1213@teddy.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 28-Aug-85 12:29:45 EDT
Article-I.D.: teddy.1213
Posted: Wed Aug 28 12:29:45 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 31-Aug-85 05:01:40 EDT
References: <729@charm.UUCP> <4212@alice.UUCP> <6179@duke.UUCP>
Reply-To: rdp@teddy.UUCP (Richard D. Pierce)
Organization: GenRad, Inc., Concord, Mass.
Lines: 40
Summary: 

In article <6179@duke.UUCP> mgv@duke.UUCP (Marco G. Valtorta) writes:
>Some people (including a former salesperson) on the net have claimed
>that subjectively louder will always sound better.  Someone else
>concluded that therefore one could as well buy cheaper equipment,
>play it a little louder, and enjoy sound which is subjectively
>better than sound played on more expensive equipment played at slightly
>lower levels.  The only reply that I have seen to this is that
>in reality slight *differences* in sound level make slight differences
>in perceived sound quality.  Would any of the people (there were
>several) who argued that louder is *better*  (not just *different*)
>care to comment on this?
>
>					Marco Valtorta
>					mgv@duke

I believe I am one of those people (I may even be the "former salesperson")

The one example I gave did in fact fool people into thinking that the louder
was better, but in that case, the only difference was loudness, as the
equipment was otherwise identical.

I hope that I did not imply, other than for the one experiment, that louder
is automatically better, as this does not bear out in actual experience.

However, in many cases, especially with less than very experienced
listeners, the immediate difference perceivable is loudness, and often
this is enough to make a person ignore other, seemingly greater, differences.

The point of the article I submitted is that valid comparisons cannot be
made without first reducing all extraneous variables to a minimum. Audio
tests and comparisons, on the whole, are done in a most inexact and
unscientific manner, and invite all sorts of biases and fraud.

If it were indeed true that louder is better, than recordings made of my
harpsichord played much louder than my harpsichord should sound much better
than my harpsichord.

Ah, well...

Dick Pierce