A Confused streaming system - Mutec / SOtM Ultra

[zdenes]

How about getting a few astute mates around to listen with you. I have often found that really helpful. I have several friends who seem to hear things as I do. Their input, over the years has been invaluable.

That is true. I often have my audiophile friends over and vica versa for "test" sessions. I often ask my teenage kids to give an objective opinion. They do. As they don't know what I changed and they don't give a flying **** about my hobby. I actually value their opinion more for a number of reasons (some just mentioned) including their better hearing. 
What I am saying is that hearing doesn't age well... and by the time most people can afford and appreciate a decent system, their hearing is somewhat impaired. 

If you're over thirty-five and thinking 'not me', that is either you're one of the very lucky few or you haven't had your hearing tested. Two stories here:

- About a good ten years ago we tested 'whatever' in a friend's or my system. I don't remember what it was - may have been an Altmann DAC - but I clearly remember our disagreement, especially concerning high frequencies. I thought they 'did not bite enough' (probably I just made up that phrase, sorry). He insisted that everything sounded like in a live venue. 

Anyway, a few months later it turned out he didn't hear much above 8000Hz. The conclusion of this is that OF COURSE it sounded to him as a live venue as he would not hear above 8000Hz, so he wouldn't miss them on a recording. 

Second story. I had to take a hearing test myself. It turned out that my hearing is good up to 12.000Hz ( it was in a clinic not an audiophile lab - so that was the highest frequency).
But I have a relatively large - around 10db - dip around 4000Hz. So my view cannot be trusted in the 3500Hz-4500Hz range   

Consequences of the conclusions: 
- If you want some sort of objectivity you need at least 6-8 subjective views. 
- Don't trust reviewers as long it is THEIR opinion before they also publish the result of their hearing test. 
- Subconlsion of the above is that I value these forums a lot more than any reviews in a magazine on- or offline ( and I haven't even taken the 'incentive' to reach a certain conclusion).  
- Anybody will be better off choosing a system that they like even if some of their audiophile friends disagree. This is because their hearing might be impaired, or yours, or both but in different ways.

 Why do you care? If you found a piece of audio equipment that delivers everything perfectly - better than anything else - up to 8000Hz and nothing above - but you cannot hear it anyway, why not go for it? 

OK, joking aside, the problem is really there. We are all sensitive to certain frequencies and are not to others (i.e. we cannot hear them). This can easily result in disagreement about any audio product including even the recording itself. As the recording/editing engineer also faced the same issues...  (Except they may have been more deaf. My ENT specialist said at the hearing test that her patients with a hearing problem are mostly musicians and people in the music industry (apart from old age hearing problems). 

So we have two choices. 
- Trust our ears. May not be the most accurate but we have to live with them. Unfortunately, this means borrowing stuff before buying - which is not always possible.
- Go with the (online) crowd. Hearing problems will average out and if most people favour one thing, your best first shot is to hope that you are also in the majority.  

Sorry, this got a bit off 'thread title'. 


Zoltan