castleofargh
Sound Science Forum Moderator
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It's where Harman's work and little statistical analysis gave 3 main preference groups. Is there a market for a non-dominant group? Probably, but depending on tuning, it will rapidly aim at a niche within a niche, which would still be interesting as a market population for sure, if said population had any clue about what they need/look for. Which they almost never do.
Just looking at the push against the Harman target(mostly from a point of view of ignorance), when their work suggests it should be favored by nearly 2/3 of the population, gives food for thought about the risks of aiming at a target FR that pleases even fewer people in a hobby where everything has to be dumbed down to being either right or wrong.
Also, welcome all to Sound Science, or sorry that an interesting discussion, unusually full of pertinent information that all IEM/headphone users could benefit from, got moved here to die. I found myself identifying(a little too much) with the "fun at parties HRTF guy" in @Resolve's video. And I do think, people who stay long enough in the hobby will end in that group, because once you learn and understand how much impact the HRTF and FR in a simplified way, have on our subjective experience, it makes no sense to ignore it. With the obvious caveat that someone must actually want to learn about hearing, acoustic, and really, himself, which is strangely rare in a hobby that prides itself on having a passion for sound and listening.
A FR graph from a given coupler, taken by a given guy, is telling us about that system and that IEM(not the model, that pair in particular). Another coupler, IEM pair, tips, or another placement's habit will show some differences in the graph. We need to know that, where it's more likely to change something, and be cautious about directly associating a given graph with our subjective experience, because we're also "different couplers" with different insertion habits, different tips and different IEMs.
The issues found with graphs are found with listeners, it's an acoustic fact.
But listeners also have differences in perception from the missing HRTF cues, plus a sensitivity to psychological biases (audio and non audio), plus hearing loss, plus, in this hobby, quite the vague and flowery subjective ways of describing the frequency response and how it changed that listener's experience.
So when wondering if we'll purchase an IEM(so we can listen to it!), the feedback of a buddy or a review is in practice even less reliable about the FR than a graph. And given how FR is a main variable when it comes to preference and subjective experience, it feels really silly to argue against FR graphs. Sure listening is better, but again, that almost always happens later for the average Joe. In the meantime the false argument is to say that not relying on graph data is better than knowing more, which is a little dumb.
Of course FR isn't everything and as I just said a FR graph isn't perfect by any standard. But almost all audiophiles underestimate how much of their experience really is just a matter of FR. Of that much I am sure.
Just looking at the push against the Harman target(mostly from a point of view of ignorance), when their work suggests it should be favored by nearly 2/3 of the population, gives food for thought about the risks of aiming at a target FR that pleases even fewer people in a hobby where everything has to be dumbed down to being either right or wrong.
Also, welcome all to Sound Science, or sorry that an interesting discussion, unusually full of pertinent information that all IEM/headphone users could benefit from, got moved here to die. I found myself identifying(a little too much) with the "fun at parties HRTF guy" in @Resolve's video. And I do think, people who stay long enough in the hobby will end in that group, because once you learn and understand how much impact the HRTF and FR in a simplified way, have on our subjective experience, it makes no sense to ignore it. With the obvious caveat that someone must actually want to learn about hearing, acoustic, and really, himself, which is strangely rare in a hobby that prides itself on having a passion for sound and listening.
A FR graph from a given coupler, taken by a given guy, is telling us about that system and that IEM(not the model, that pair in particular). Another coupler, IEM pair, tips, or another placement's habit will show some differences in the graph. We need to know that, where it's more likely to change something, and be cautious about directly associating a given graph with our subjective experience, because we're also "different couplers" with different insertion habits, different tips and different IEMs.
The issues found with graphs are found with listeners, it's an acoustic fact.
But listeners also have differences in perception from the missing HRTF cues, plus a sensitivity to psychological biases (audio and non audio), plus hearing loss, plus, in this hobby, quite the vague and flowery subjective ways of describing the frequency response and how it changed that listener's experience.
So when wondering if we'll purchase an IEM(so we can listen to it!), the feedback of a buddy or a review is in practice even less reliable about the FR than a graph. And given how FR is a main variable when it comes to preference and subjective experience, it feels really silly to argue against FR graphs. Sure listening is better, but again, that almost always happens later for the average Joe. In the meantime the false argument is to say that not relying on graph data is better than knowing more, which is a little dumb.
Of course FR isn't everything and as I just said a FR graph isn't perfect by any standard. But almost all audiophiles underestimate how much of their experience really is just a matter of FR. Of that much I am sure.
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