Was the D-Premier upgrade a waste of money?

[Eddye]

I think expectation bias plays a huge part, both ways. Without a doubt, it does for me. As is the case, I suspect, with just about all listeners and with just about all quality electronic audio equipment.

And, in my opinion, it goes hand in hand with why reviewers never submit themselves to robust blind tests (recognising as I do the imperfections of that process).

These things gladly keep much of the industry in place, and therefore lots of choice of big boys toys for us all.

I find the corollary of what you are saying rather depressing. It suggests we can't trust our own senses let alone the judgement of others. 

Guillaume

Well, you really can't trust your own senses. Your eyes have blindspots straight ahead. You just don't notice this because your brain fills in the missing parts. Your ears are easily deceived. Think about that strange noise you probably heard as a kid, that you thought was someone talking which turned out the wind through a branch or something like that. If you have a head cold you can't taste properly. Etc.

[Jwg1749]

I think expectation bias plays a huge part, both ways. Without a doubt, it does for me. As is the case, I suspect, with just about all listeners and with just about all quality electronic audio equipment.

And, in my opinion, it goes hand in hand with why reviewers never submit themselves to robust blind tests (recognising as I do the imperfections of that process).

These things gladly keep much of the industry in place, and therefore lots of choice of big boys toys for us all.

I find the corollary of what you are saying rather depressing. It suggests we can't trust our own senses let alone the judgement of others. 

Guillaume

Well, you really can't trust your own senses. Your eyes have blindspots straight ahead. You just don't notice this because your brain fills in the missing parts. Your ears are easily deceived. Think about that strange noise you probably heard as a kid, that you thought was someone talking which turned out the wind through a branch or something like that. If you have a head cold you can't taste properly. Etc.

On the contrary, in normal operation our senses are pretty trustworthy. It's our minds that aren't. 

I found that, having accepted that expectation bias can play a very significant role in our judgements, I experienced a kind of liberation. I mean a liberation from the view that one has continuously to invest effort and money in improving one's system. I don't want to be stuck on that treadmill.

So my presumption is that tweaking electronics generally makes no difference. I'm happy to try tweaks out, if they can be explained rationally. But in general my knowledge of human psychology (I work on the margins of academic psychology) tells me that a null result is most likely to be the truth.

A good test case for expectation bias is the efficacy of psychopharmaceuticals. The market for anti-depressants is worth billions annually. And they evidently do make lots of people feel better. Yet the evidence from properly conducted trials is inconclusive.

Matt

[f1eng]

I think expectation bias plays a huge part, both ways. Without a doubt, it does for me. As is the case, I suspect, with just about all listeners and with just about all quality electronic audio equipment.

And, in my opinion, it goes hand in hand with why reviewers never submit themselves to robust blind tests (recognising as I do the imperfections of that process).

These things gladly keep much of the industry in place, and therefore lots of choice of big boys toys for us all.

I find the corollary of what you are saying rather depressing. It suggests we can't trust our own senses let alone the judgement of others. 

Guillaume

Hi Guillaume

Well I'm sure my intention was not to imply the corollary is robust. 

It could have been better written, less extreme, maybe by saying that, I suggest that, for a material proportion of listeners, expectation bias may play a significant role.

And of course purchasers should trust their own senses (that is inevitable!) and make choices how to trust the view of others.

I quite agree. Audio memory is notoriously short, so almost all tests will have too long a gap between the listening to remember accurately what the first sound was.
The most important thing, though is how it seems to the individual. If you are convinced something is better it actually is, for you, and nobody else matters.

As an engineer who has made a few advances in my field I have never, ever, found any genuine change which can not be explained by physics and measured.
So there are several areas of popular hifi folklore, if you will, which I am completely unable to accept since there is no known, by me , mechanism by which they could possibly be taking place.
I always am interested in what people are trying, and why, though.
From an electrical standpoint audio is quite simple, and pretty well everything we know about it has been known for >50 years. From an acoustical point of view it is more complex to implement, but there is still pretty well nothing about it which wasn't known about 50 years ago.

[ogs]

@Music or sound: your comment re.: ...time phase adjustments (available for Totaldac, Holms etc.) is interesting, but as far as I know Totaldac has no correction capability built in, apart for the bass eq option which I believe is amplitude only. Have you got more info on this?

Here are the adjustment options for Totaldac crossover functions including delay range: http://www.totaldac.com/use_note.htm

Aha,  I see. I've seen this. It enables you to adjust timing between drive units when using the Totaldac crossover, but you can not apply timing correction to a complete speaker system via Totaldac the way Holm (or DEQX) does in their designs. Thanks for clarifying.

[devianet]

I didn't upgrade my D1 and have never regretted my decision. My speakers will only take around 100w anyway so no need for a better power supply. I stream via the XLR digital input so no need for ethernet. My speakers will probably not be SAMed so no need for the more powerful SHARC.

Typical of Devialet - the one simple thing I could really use they'll never provide and that's simple 3-band parametric EQ. Then I could get rid of the DEQ2496. But no, they'd rather provide an all-singing all-dancing turnkey alternative that required a very expensive upgrade. Of course they would.