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Lessons learnt over a few years along the ‘Hi Fi / Vinyl’ Journey!

What I’ve learned, opinions are just that, opinions, no matter how didactically they are enunciated.
If Jed likes Picasso more than Vermeer that doesn’t mean I’ll sell all my Vermeer.

.sjb
 
I only ever spend "shrug money" on hifi. I enjoy the kit just as much as the music. I have loads of fun with my hifi and the fantastic guys on this forum.
Anyone who is boring, rude or likes to 'explain' what I'm hearing goes on ignore for a good while.
Sorted!
 
We’ve got two chaps at work. One is 45 and calls himself an ‘audiophile’. One is 21 and loves music. The older one hangs guitars he doesn’t play off his walls and spoke for 10 minutes about what difference new banana plugs made to his system. The younger guy loves music so much he plays it endlessly through his phone’s speaker wherever he is. He just wants to listen. The older guy asks me what phono stage I’m using, the younger guy asks me what albums he should listen to. Both are equally valid approaches, I know with which one I agree most.
 
Only works for classical music and if you can read, but score reading has given me more out of music than any concert hall or hi-fi. The information is all there even even if you can't initially hear it on mediocre gear, but when you see it written down your ears know what to listen to and pick it up. Especially on complex works. I would never do this in an actual concert hall, and hate people who do, but great in your own home.

As for the vinyl journey, I gave it up when I got the Gyrodec twenty-something years ago. Nothing I have plugged into it has ever sounded bad. No doubt there are better TTs, and I have a 401 and TD125 lying around the house, but they will never usurp it. I still mess around with Pis and streaming and stuff, mainly for curiosity and fun, and streaming can sound sound very good.
 
The room makes the biggest difference to how a hifi system sounds. A good room can make a modest hifi sound better than a mega-buck system in a crap room. I hypothesise a correlation between propensity to upgrade and room acoustics. As a sample of one for that hypothesis, I have not felt any urge to upgrade since moving into a house with a purpose built and acoustically treated room about nine years ago.
 
Bob McC said:
I like my system.
I enjoy what it does.
But I don’t fool myself that it in anyway comes close to hearing Mahler’s Resurrection symphony in the flesh.
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Agree.

What I have learned then:

We will never get there (as in 'sounds like the real thing'), it's impossible. But striving for it is a good thing and I'm certainly enjoying the ride!
 
Vinyl Journey -

Don’t leave a load of records soaking in a sink full of water, the labels suffer.
(1986)

Don’t loan records to people when you are drunk. You will forget and never see those albums again. (twice in the 1990’s)

Do keep notes on sound quality/mastering on the inner sleeve ( not the original o_O)
date the entry and years later you can agree or disagree with yourself.

Before considering selling records, consider the regret you may feel a year or so later when you want to hear the record you sold. (1980’s and 2012)

Wash your hands before handling records. Do not blow on records to remove a speck of dust, you may be spitting inadvertently on the vinyl. Never blow on a stylus when it is playing (or not playing) as it may skate across the record. I haven’t done this, but know someone who has. Fool.

HiFi Journey

Do not assume that anyone else gives a fig about HiFi reproduction or even music. Much to my surprise, there are a lot of people who don’t care about either. This still amazes me.

Loud doesn’t equate to quality.

(as mentioned already) The room and listening position make night/day differences. Depending on your priorities, make this the top of any list.

Get some Rug Action.

Demo HiFi at home if at all possible. Listen don’t hear.

Trust you ears. Nothing will correct a poor recording.
 
Countryman said:
We’ve got two chaps at work. One is 45 and calls himself an ‘audiophile’. One is 21 and loves music. The older one hangs guitars he doesn’t play off his walls and spoke for 10 minutes about what difference new banana plugs made to his system. The younger guy loves music so much he plays it endlessly through his phone’s speaker wherever he is. He just wants to listen. The older guy asks me what phono stage I’m using, the younger guy asks me what albums he should listen to. Both are equally valid approaches, I know with which one I agree most.
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Yea.... But here we are again. The music lover is pure and virtuous, while the audiophile is some sort of sad banana plug geek. This is a hifi forum, we are all audiophiles, like it or not. It doesn't matter as long as its entertaining and fun.
 
^^^^ I'd also add that phone speakers sound bloody awful, probably the worst thing I've ever heard, even on speech, Tracy listens to quite alot of podcasts on hers and it sounds truly woeful.
 
I have a very different mindset now that I’m older.
I presume this isn’t unusual. My Mam and Dad played music but didn’t have what you might term Hi-fi. I heard their music, a splash of everything from Johnny Cash to Mahler and Rachmaninov. My grandmother played the piano and listened to classical. I remember a mate giving me a Pioneer turntable and I played it through a cheap system. I played old recordings of Mahler and Nielsen I remember.
My first kit was a wedding/ house warming gift and it started my upgrade journey. It’s easy to get hooked in and you lust after stuff that others possess or stuff you hear in passing. Selling my Naim took me back to the pride of owning my first kit and the discovery of music that came with it. I delved into the world of second hand kit and realised that there were vfm opportunities that gave me the same satisfaction as any kit I’d ever had. Music again became my first pleasure and the kit just transported me there.
I have no hankering to change what I have which tells me that I’m where I want to be. Even when I have momentary distractions, I fall back and resist any urge.I find it a nice place to be.
Yesterday I bought a lovely classical music companion that explains music whilst you listen. That’s where I am now.
 
The main requirement is to retain both a sense of humour and a sense of proportion. I went through a phase of frowning intensity about the whole hifi thing, until I realised how little it really mattered.
 
  • Expensive does not, neccesarily, mean better
  • Good software is essential - mastering is king and old records will, invariably, sound better than new records
  • There is a perfect pair of speakers for every domestic room
  • The differences in sound quality between competently designed power amps or DACs are extremely marginal
  • The best measure of an audio system is how keen it makes you to listen to music
  • Bits are bits
  • Wire is wire
  • Only your ears matter
  • If you notice someone utterly absorbed in the music floating out of your system at a party - don't ruin it by banging on about your speakers.
  • Coldplay and U2 really ARE shit.
 
Arkless Electronics said:
Yes you do need to go to live concerts, pub gigs (remember those?), jam sessions of unamplified instruments and some classical concerts to know what real music and instruments sound like.

The purpose of hi fi is NOT to sound "nice", Impressive", "pleasurable" etc etc but to most realistically recreate reality.
The near reality of the sound of the musicians doing their thing is what should bring the pleasure. (no doubt the "unless you were in the studio you when it was recorded blah blah" brigade will be along.... I strongly disagree with them!)
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I agree with you Jez, but conversely when I go to a gig I don't want the performance to sound like the record, I'm looking for "something else"
I'm sure that's the opinion of many on here
 
fegs said:
I agree with you Jez, but conversely when I go to a gig I don't want the performance to sound like the record, I'm looking for "something else"
I'm sure that's the opinion of many on here
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I don’t expect or want a studio album to sound like a live performance and vice versa.
I am unable to see the point.
I expect the studio album to sound like the artist wants it to sound, and a live performance to be different.
 
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