Basic Audio Advice — These Are the Fundamentals of Good Sound
Our good customer Aaron wrote to tell us about a posting he saw on the Steve Hoffman forum. (Numerous edits have been made since I first wrote a reply.)
On the forums, I read a post by a guy who took my advice. He bought a hot stamper for $100, then bought the same deadwax on Discogs for $40. He mixed them up so he wouldn’t know which was which. He found your copy superior. His conclusion? “Now I know it’s for real, but I don’t think I’ll be buying any more…”
Unfortunately, the whole thread got deleted, so it’s not like you can go read it for yourself.
Regards, Aaron
Dear Aaron,
A hundred dollars? For an old record? Of course he’s not buying another one. He was crazy to buy the first one! No record is worth that.
Or at least that’s what I would expect to read in the follow-up comments.
On a more serious note, our Hot Stamper pressing could’ve been a lot better than the one this person bought off Discogs, a little better, or possibly even no better.
Stereo Bashing
That’s because nothing you read on the Hoffman forum can be taken seriously. The stereos these folks have – I’m assuming, since all the evidence points in that direction and no evidence points in any other direction — are not capable of reproducing music at a high level.
You’ll notice very few of them ever talk about their stereos, about the improvements they’ve made to them, or even the idea of challenging themselves to make any improvements to the quality of their playback.
Too Much Trouble
Why would they? It’s simply not what the forum is for. It is not for Hi-Fi types. It is for the mid-level audiophile who needs someone to tell him what he wants to hear in order to save him the trouble of working it all out for himself. (Of course he will never be able to do that, and at least part of the reason is that, out of the thousands of folks on this forum, there may not be a single one of them who understands audio and records at anything other than the most superficial level. If there is a person with deep knowledge of these subjects, outside of a select few of my customers who wasted their time posting there, I have yet to read him.)
A Cult of Personality
It is, furthermore, rather obviously and nakedly a personality cult, one built around the pretense that there exists someone in the professional world of audio who knows all the answers and, miracle of miracles, can be coaxed into emerging from his sacred cave to share some wisdom with the reverent masses who hang on his every word. His way must be the only way. Any hint of apostasy is swiftly punished by those who monitor the forum, along with the piling on by true believers itching to denounce anyone who fails to toe the line.
If none of that works, exile from the cult community must follow. No poisonous discussion of pressing variations is to be allowed (see below).
Software and Hardware
Clearly the forum is set up to allow music lovers to exchange opinions and information about software. The hardware side of it is none of your damn business.
The fact that the software is being placed into the equivalent of a long-out-of-date, poorly-functioning old computer doesn’t seem to be of concern to anyone.
And why should it?
All that stereo stuff costs a lot of money and takes a lot of time. It requires a dedicated room that I suspect few of the people on the forum have access to. Room treatments? You have to be kidding. What the hell for? Good software solves all your audio problems. You just need to know which version of it to buy and your troubles are over.
God forbid they would pull their speakers out from the wall and find another place to put the TV. That is just never going to happen.
For that and many other reasons –reasons that nobody really wants to talk about, or, worse, hear about — they are in no position to make judgments about the sound of any recording, on any format.
You won’t have to read many postings to get a painfully clear picture of how much work these folks have put into their setup, system and room in the pursuit of audio excellence. And that, more than anything written above, explains why they will continue to embrace one bad audiophile pressing after another, no matter how bad their sound.
Thanks for writing,
Best, TP
Further Reading