A Terrific Tube Preamplifier From Korea, And A - Ultra High Fidelity ...

The most frequently-quoted
“law” in the domain of high
end audio (and home theatre
as well) is the Law of Diminishing
Returns. As you spend more and
more, each dollar buys you smaller and
smaller improvements, and so beyond a
certain point you should just let it go.
Corollary to the law: only people with
ultra-sensitive trained ears can hear the
tiny improvements that really expensive
gear can bring.
Let me leave aside, for the purpose
of this column, the question of whether
certain expensive products bring any
improvement at all. Lots of them don’t,
and we know that, but let’s consider
products that do, however slight the
improvements may be.
We know that physical laws are
commonly proved mathematically, and
so the proponents of the Law of Diminishing
Returns use numbers to illustrate
their thesis. Example: beyond a certain
amount of money (on which everyone
does not agree, by the by), spending 30%
more will bring you only a 10% or even
a 5% improvement. You’ve heard that,
right?
Where do those figures come from?
Do you figure they get political polling
organizations to determine those
numbers? Are their results accurate to
within plus or minus 2.3%, 19 times out
of 20…
The problem is this. It’s easy to do
math on product prices, and therefore
to calculate that one product costs 15%
more than another product, at least if
we ignore street price. So far so good,
but how do you attach figures to the
sound? What does it mean to say that
one product sounds “15% better” than
another? How do you put number on
what is — or should be — an emotional
experience? Can you determine that
your spouse loves you 12.7% more than
your previous paramour?
Better not go there.
You can’t use math on sound quality,
or music, or love, because such things
are qualitative, not quantitative. And
once you understand that difference, you
82 ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine
State of the Art
by Gerard Rejskind
will understand what is wrong with not
only the “Law of Diminishing Returns,”
but also the mindset of those who call
themselves objective reviewers.
We actually have different grammar
to differentiate between the qualitative
and the quantitative. If you haven’t
repressed everything your teachers told
you, you’ll recall that you got rapped
on the knuckles, if only figuratively, for
such phrases as, “There’s less people
downtown this weekend.” You don’t use
“less” for anything that can be counted,
such as people or chocolates.
The next time you’re listening to
music and feeling mellow, think about
the many qualitative values that don’t
lend themselves to mathematical evaluation.
There’s the music you’re actually
listening to, obviously, but what else?
I’ve already mentioned love, or even
affection. Do you like friend A more
than friend B? Perhaps, but would you
feel comfortable saying that you like
him/her 32% more? Of course not.
Would you say your daughter is 18.3%
more courteous than your son? Would
you say your best friend is 42.8% more
STATE OF THE ART:
THE BOOK
Get the 258-page book
containing the State of the Art
columns from the first 60 issues
of UHF, with all-new introductions.
See page 6.
understanding than… But that way lies
madness.
Let’s return to music reproduction.
You may judge that an amplifier you’re
thinking of buying sounds better than
your current amplifier, and perhaps
you’re right. What does it mean to say
that it’s better? You might judge that you
enjoy your music more when you listen
with that amplifier, but how much more?
Can you put a figure on it?
In fact that’s not what you need to do
at all. Listen to your amp, and then the
one you’re thinking of buying, and sure
enough the second one sounds better.
After a while come back to your own
amplifier (that’s the sort of thing we
do all the time), and see how much of a
comedown it is. Is it 19% less good? Is
that the same percentage you would have
given when switching the other way?
When you want to improve the quality
(I repeat, the quality) of your music,
you evaluate whether the music touches
you more than it did before, or gets you
more involved in its magic. These are
the reasons you might spend money on
a good system, and they are not things
you can put figures on.
Yes, I know, we do try to put figures
on everything today. The earthquake
in Chile, or in Haiti, is the strongest
since… Check Wikipedia, and you’ve
got the answer. Or check Craigslist and
you’ll see that a potential lover’s appeal is
often reduced to measurements of height
and maybe chest size. Is it a coincidence
that digital audio, the major innovation
of our era, is one that transforms music
into a series of numbers? Charles Seife,
in his book Proofiness: The Dark Arts
of Mathematical Deception, writes that
“If you want to get people to believe
something really, really stupid, just stick
a number on it.”
That’s what’s wrong with the Law
of Diminishing Returns, and with the
attempt by some reviewers to give a
product a numerical score. We know
that, at the threshold of the bedroom, it
is time to leave the numbers behind. It’s
the same when you open the door of the
listening room.