Did your pursuit for "perfection" die over time?

[Code Rookie]

What I meant was, when you first get your new set-up or a new component to add on to your set-up, you tend to be more conscious of the performance of your set-up. You try to track its characterisitics, think of tweaks possible, and what-nots .... but as you played on, you became more accustomed to it and cooled down on tweaks, inspections and other nots ....?

 

I tend to be like this. It seem to follow some sort of sine curve where my attention of my set-up's "minor" details are magnified at times, and then cooled down, and heightened again later.

 

Just want to see if you guys share the same "interest curve"?

 

 

[hw]

i think that's pretty normal..(though i really don't quite catch the gist)

[Guest hifi1]

Hi

Used to be that way when I have a piece of new equipment. Nowadays I get more 'kick' if I find a good cd and get more excitement slotting in a new cd into my cdp than changing a pair of interconnects. When u come to my age, new and more expensive equipment is not so important after all and on 'hindsight', if I have the 'wisdom' of today yesteryear, I would prob settled for a much cheaper system and lots more software.

But still if that ML 32 or Burmester B97 comes up .......

[Code Rookie]

you are right about the software part. :)

 

feel the same too.

[Aiky]

I agree with Hifi1.....same experience although I don't know if I am as venerable as he is ::)

 

I have gone one full circle with separates, racks and all but have since sold everything and 'downgraded' to a micro, which still does wonders for me at a fraction of the $$$.

 

Its hard to say, but I may yet fall into the addiction again. ;D Lets keep my fingers crossed.

[Marc]

I stumbled upon this thread but find it so relevant to where I'm at now. I 'got it bad', and was on the endless cycle of upgrades for around 10 years - the same I've witnessed so many here do. At some point I cared less about the music and more about the gear. In COVID times, with more time on my hands, I started appreciating the music again which led me to look deeper, and realise I cared for the music more than the gear - but only after a certain point.

 

The law of diminishing returns kicks in at some point. Perhaps it's advice for newcomers to the hobby - set your ceiling early on - your limit you can afford in the quest for good sound. Stick to it, and spend the rest on what you will consume with it. How much one can afford and/or justify will differ from one person to the next, of course.

 

I've seen too many become too (over?) invested, and then fall out of love with the hobby entirely. I can think of a handful of prominent members over the years who completely moved on for this very reason.

 

I'm simplifying my system these days and designing a system around our needs and how we live in a new home that we are in the design stages of. But I've stopped analysing the sound and started appreciating the music once again. Most of the stuff I like is not "audiophile" production and recording quality, and it stopped me listening to it for a few years. I've missed it.

[Jakeyb77_Redux]

18 minutes ago, Marc said:

I stumbled upon this thread but find it so relevant to where I'm at now. I 'got it bad', and was on the endless cycle of upgrades for around 10 years - the same I've witnessed so many here do. At some point I cared less about the music and more about the gear. In COVID times, with more time on my hands, I started appreciating the music again which led me to look deeper, and realise I cared for the music more than the gear - but only after a certain point.

 

The law of diminishing returns kicks in at some point. Perhaps it's advice for newcomers to the hobby - set your ceiling early on - your limit you can afford in the quest for good sound. Stick to it, and spend the rest on what you will consume with it. How much one can afford and/or justify will differ from one person to the next, of course.

 

I've seen too many become too (over?) invested, and then fall out of love with the hobby entirely. I can think of a handful of prominent members over the years who completely moved on for this very reason.

 

I'm simplifying my system these days and designing a system around our needs and how we live in a new home that we are in the design stages of. But I've stopped analysing the sound and started appreciating the music once again. Most of the stuff I like is not "audiophile" production and recording quality, and it stopped me listening to it for a few years. I've missed it.

A few years ago I came to a personal revelation that constant upgrades were a “way of thinking” that could never cease given the chance. 
I was flamed pretty hard at the time when I expressed it on the forum.

I will say that if you enjoy the chase then more power to you.

I came to the same realisation as you @Marc 

I would scour ads constantly and be unhappy if I missed something I was after.

I enjoy my system now but I’m also happy to stream direct to my Sonos or through my headphones while walking. I’ve even let my Audirvana and Qobuz subscriptions lapse and am using Spotify only. 
I find spending the cash on my kids and family a much more rewarding pastime these days. 

[Marc]

Great reply, thanks Jake.
I still scour the ads, but FOMO isn't a thing for me any more.

Except for those Line Magnetic speakers. I wanted those merely for looks. I don't even know how they sound

[muon*]

I'm in a lower budget area to some, but I think this is relevant no matter what level you play in.

 

On reflection often upgrades were just sideways moves and even sometimes slightly backwards, yes some were forwards but I think we can easily over state the degree of the changes. I see chasing for better in this hobby can reach a place where the hobby becomes more like an addiction to substances, an endless cycle of chasing what we will never attain, costing money and consuming much of our time and thoughts, without much else.

Edited March 8 by muon*
Damn it! typo

[Mr 57]

Quite a few wise “seasoned” heads,  with comments above, pretty much agree with them all. The chasing has stopped for me too, it’s just the music now. And after all the buying, selling, tearing up money on repairs etc….it’s amazing what one can be happy with. 
But it’s (was) a hobby, and feeding that hobby is what we did, in pursuit of better things. The grass may look greener on the other side…, but you still have to cut it when you get there.

[MTL]

Yes I guess I’m also happy at this stage but it’s become a habit to scour the ads. A bad habit that’s hard to break

[muon*]

My system has sounded better in the past compared to now, yet I still enjoy it, It's different not better now.

 

But I am at peace knowing I don't need to continue the chase, and that is also very satisfying.

[Grizaudio]

Music first always!!

 

I think this statement online sums things up nicely…

 

“Perfectionism is often linked to anxiety and depression, and can even be associated with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) for some people.”  
 

Not surprising when you consider how many members would be neuro spicy…https://mindfulhealthsolutions.com/8-unexpected-reasons-why-perfectionism-is-bad-for-your-mental-health/#:~:text=Perfectionism is often linked to,some tips for overcoming it.

 

My solution to the madness, was buying neutrality and controlled directivity, manifesting in a powerful full range speaker system.  I apply DSP from there. 

Edited March 8 by Grizaudio

[Grizaudio]

I'll add, I'm just as happy listening to the latest electronica release on my desktop Logi speakers as my JBL m2's. 

Its really about the music and music discovery for me...........but................the JBL's are magic, and music they make is exceptional [next level]. End game for sure.  

 

 

 

[Grizaudio]

3 hours ago, Mr 57 said:

….it’s amazing what one can be happy with. 

 

The man speaks the truth.... 110%

[Phill451]

I love listening to my somewhat modest main system, and really treasure the few hours a week I do this. On the other hand I listen to music a great deal more by other means. I’ll most likely never stop trying to improve that main system within my limited resources but in the end it could  be an 80s style clock radio and I’ll still be wanting to hear the next song.

[PicoWattson]

I've been happy with my hardware ever since I've rebuilt the room around it to showcase how good it could have sounded all along. The software side not so much, when shapeshifting electrons don't always behave the same way they should. I seem to be enrolled in  a perpetual course of networking 101 homeschooling just to keep everything communicating with each other over the ether.

[Dr.Funk]

My esteemed colleagues, I hope I can add more sound words of wisdom, to those already before me. I hope this post does not paint me in a conceited light.

 

I have been a member of AA (Audiophiles Anonymous) for longer than I care to remember. From the age of 16 to around 50, I had the highs and lows that would ordinarily suit the description of a person suffering bipolar. The manic lows when nothing seems to gel, or that feeling in your gut when, having sold everything but your kidney (or the missus) you realise that your monies have gone into a black hole; and I don't mean the sound deadening fabric!

The highs seemed all to fleeting, but oh sweet mother of mine, when they came, so did I.

 

Over the years I have met many, many people who are into this hobby. A pattern has emerged over the years of various camps to which people fall into. Some blindly, others with full intention. It is not my intention to offend anyone, but, spoiler alert, the Monty Python slap around the head with a wet fish, maybe looming in the next few sentences!

 

Camp A; you are financially well off, but have no direction. Therefore you throw endless money swapping gear over and over, chasing the Holy Grail, but not knowing what it looks and sounds like.

 

Camp B; you are financially well off but don't care about direction. You are there for the hunt, constantly changing the system, because you can. Your enjoyment is not from chasing the Holy Grail of sound, but from the experience of hearing the myriad different ways of presenting the same source. To this end, congratulations, you are fulfilled, or are you?

 

Camp C; same as Camp A, but you are not financially well off. Same symptoms, same result.

 

Camp D; same as Camp B, but you are not financially well off, therefore your hunting ground is The Classifieds, eBay, Gumtree etc. Same symptoms, same result.

 

Now I can hear the lynch mob coming up my driveway, with their lanterns and pitchforks, screaming " I have direction, I know where I am going and the sound that I want!"

"Hang the Audiology blasphemer"

 

Hear my sage words, whether you are from Camp A, B, C or D, if you don't have the patience to allow the equipment to prove its spiritual alchemy (or not), you have no direction!

There are so many adverts here on the SNA Classifieds, where people have purchased seriously high end gear, mere weeks or a couple of months ago, stating the reason for sale; change of direction!

 

We are emotive creatures to whom sound is subjective. Our choice of music may steer our direction, we may like the sound neutral, warm, lean and dynamic.

This is not a 100m, get there in under 10 seconds, it's a marathon, the journey is as important as the finish line. The equipment allows one to listen to the music, nothing more, nothing less, the interpretation belongs to you.

 

Because I took the time to understand what sound I wanted, my direction became clear. Hence I have had the same speakers since 1991, turntable and tonearm since 1992, pre/ monobloc amps since 2000. Yes I have tweaked the components, but that was to reduce the background noise, not the fundamental sound.

Even when I entered the digital streaming realm, my direction was clear, I didn't want a lean sound because that would be too analytical and 'digital' sounding. So I read up on the DAC chips and their 'sounds'. I knew I wanted to stick with a Wolfson chip set, because it has a warmer sound than a Sabre chip set. I bought a second hand Lumin A1 from a member here, which has a Wolfson chip set, the result is an analogue sounding digital front end.

 

My nickname is Dr. Funk, given to me because I would ask the 'patient' what ails them, what were the symptoms (too harsh, no bass, no depth or separation etc). Then, find out how much money they had for treatment and prescribe a 'tonic'. My success rate is about 95%.

My 'patients' have become friends and we listen to music, pure and simple.

Cheers

[MTL]

Ok how many of us read the above words of wisdom and then went straight to the classifieds

[Hydrology]

My pursuit for perfection is only ever constrained by my financial status - unfortunately more often than not this seems to be a problem!

[Marc]

I was an audiophile from around age 7, though I never knew it until around age 17-18. I was given no choice, as Dad was an audiophile, and I am glad for that. I still recall talking with him at around age 11 or 12 about which tweeters sounded better - from memory it was a choice between Realistic bullet tweeters and some generic ones he'd pinched from some other generic loudspeakers (likely picked up for a few dollars at one of the trash and treasure markets). Fortunately, his ear became more refined in the years that followed and I learned to appreciate good sound.

 

I found myself a few short years later with my own system. As we lived in an old Victorian home, we were blessed with stupidly big bedrooms and I got to experiment with speaker and listening positioning, and spent hundreds of hours extracting the best sound possible, all before the internet and the distractions of gaming and particular websites that teenage boys probably spend hundreds of hours on now instead. 

 

I loved the music then more than ever. It was all new. The music of the time was everything to me, but then discovering decades of music that predated me, it was like an endless ocean. I'd picked up guitar by now, and then fell in love with the bass. Playing in a band led me to the studio, and after just one rehearsal session I eyed the other side of the window - the desk! For me, that was it. I wanted to be an audio engineer. The very next Saturday I was volunteering at the studio, and every Saturday after that. For me, school was just something I had to get through each week before I could get back to the studio. It was here I learned about room acoustics. I remember thinking Neal (the owner and engineer) was absolutely mad. He was walking around the room talking about bass nodes, and talking about where instruments were placed on what I believed to be a ficticious 'soundstage'. But like looking at 3D images for the first time, the ones where you have to make yourself go cross-eyed, and then miraculously it appears, the same happened to me one Saturday afternoon. It was like I had gone from listening to dual mono, sound from the L and sound from the R, to this blended sound that had 180 degree placement. It was an absolute revelation, and made me have to go back and relisten to everything I'd ever heard. 

 

Some years earlier, Dad had picked me up a portable record player. Cheap, plastic junk, from the same trash and treasure market he'd found all his other treasures. It was faded baby blue, and had a needle I reckon you couldn't break if you tried. It ran on D size batteries and someone had left a set in the player for a few years - a bit of a mess. My task was to pull the thing apart and make it work again. I'd never touched a soldering iron before then, but knew how it worked and what it did. I spent the day bringing it back to life, and the only record I had was a 45 RPM Theme from Local Hero, Going Home - Mark Knofler. I didn't know the song at the time. I can't quite recall whether it had one or two speakers. I think one may have been lost prior. After firing it up for the first time, I still recall that exact moment I clumsily dropped the needle into the groove, and while the sound was likely worse than even the cheapest Bluetooth speakers of today, I was emotional. That song, to this day, remains one of my most treasured tracks, and can still bring a tear to my eye like it did that day. I sat out under the carport listening to it over and over again. That moment probably shaped my entire life, at least on the career side.

 

In the ensuing years, my love of audio continued beyond working in the recording studio, but after studying mechanical engineering (boring), and unsuccessfully applying for audio engineering courses, I turned my attention to cars and my love of audio. Mid-20's I'd opened a large car audio shop. This is where I really learned about active crossovers, DSP, acoustics (yes), and eventually founded the largest national competition for (automotive) sound quality. Complete with trained judges, and travelling all around the country running events. We even built Australia's "loudest car" - a Mini panel van with 4 x custom built 15" woofers, 20,000w RMS of power, 16 batteries, 4" thick concrete floor and 2" thick perspex windows. I think there was enough cable in the system to stretch from Melbourne to Albuury. That record stood for many years. We learned so much about sound and how it works through those projects. It was a great time, even if just for the social side of it, which much like StereoNET itself today, brought together like-minded people who often felt isolated with their chosen hobby. @Keith_W, @~Spyne~, @Sierra were around for some/all of that fun.

 

Life goes on, and you start spending less time in cars and more in your home by the time you start your own family. It was now I revisited hi-fi, and that journey was documented here in threads shortly after I started Planet Audio / StereoNET. My first real speakers were Genesis III that I picked up from the classifieds here, from IIRC, @fatgen. Many of you saw my journey that then followed - endless upgrades, sidegrades, and as @Dr.Funk so eloquently described, lack of direction. My knowledge grew fast, and it had to as StereoNET itself evolved. I was fortunate to play with an endless selection of gear, and as part of my job, travel much of the world hearing some of the "greatest" systems. Some were many times the cost of my home - and equally, many of them were really not that impressive. Without understanding much of the scientific background of how and why things do what they do, but instead relying on ears alone, I think it's a long way to travel to get to the same destination. Those with a good understanding of science, tend to arrive faster - this I've come to learn and observe on StereoNET over the years. Still, in all those upgrades and system evolutions, not once did I again experience that emotional response like I did to Local Hero that afternoon. That way my holy grail. It was like a drug I was craving and just wanted to feel that again, no matter the financial cost.

 

Then the actual world changed, and mine did too. A pandemic sent us all into our homes, and hi-fi became an even more enjoyable interest for many, and a brand new interest for even more. The forum traffic was in overdrive. Despite all our extra time, we couldn't even keep up with the New Member Introduction approvals, and the amount of mail order buying/selling going on in the classifieds. I spent more time listening to my own system then ever before. Then I got COVID, and a double ear infection on the end of it. Then another double ear infection a few months later. And finally, a third bout in late 2021. This last one took its toll. My ears never really felt like they cleared up and after a few visits to an ENT and then an audiologist, it was confirmed - my hearing had taken a beating. Compounding the problem was everyone was wearing masks, and all of a sudden I had gone from what I considered to be an audiophile's ear (you know we can hear better than everyone else!), to barely making out what people were saying and having to turn the TV volume up a few more clicks than usual. I went soul-searching, and to a degree, what would seem to trivial for others, felt life-changing for me. How could someone who runs a Hi-Fi website, reviews equipment and makes a living from audio, have hearing damage. To me it was a like a champion marathon runner losing a leg. It was dark and lonely. Something I still haven't talked about openly until now. Obviously I stopped reviewing equipment, and I entirely fell out of love with audio and music. Things just didn't sound the same anymore.

 

About this time last year, I was driving home from the audiologist on a sunny Tuesday afternoon. I'd just been told my upper frequency hearing loss was likely permanent, and I was contemplating my future. I couldn't help but feel a bit like an imposter. An audiophile with hearing loss! I was contemplating selling StereoNET, all my gear, and looking for a new direction in life, so devestating was the news to me. As I wound down the window for fresh air, lo and behold, you'll never guess what track came on the radio - the only time I have ever heard it played on radio my entire life. Going Home, Theme from Local Hero. The emotion came flooding back. As I cranked it up, it was like I imagine a shot of heroin must feel like to an addict - I felt the warmth totally envelop me from head to toe. The weight on my shoulders had lifted, the sun was shining, the car was floating on clouds, and the tears rolled down my face. This, was what I had been chasing for around thirty years. It was being played back on a sub-par car radio, and yet, it didn't matter one bit. It wasn't about the sound. It was about the music, and those tracks that grip you like a vice, but comfort you with a warm embrace just the same.

 

Despite the setback, my love of audio has not wavered, but my love of the music itself has taken over. It took me quite some time (and still is) to adjust to what is the new normal for me, and to what things sound like now. I almost need to forget what I already know and how I remember things sounding. The human brain is exceptional at adapting, and even better at filling in blanks over time. I no longer care so much if it's pinpoint accurate, or if the snare sounds like that one I mic'd up and recorded one Saturday afternoon decades ago back at the studio. 

 

To answer the question posed by the OP, "Did your pursuit for "perfection" die over time?" No, but I learned over time that it had always been about the music. It just took me 30 years and a medical issue to realise. If you've read this far, then thank you. It's taken me quite some time and courage to put this out there on the forum.

[Grizaudio]

4 hours ago, Hydrology said:

My pursuit for perfection is only ever constrained by my financial status - unfortunately more often than not this seems to be a problem!

Hifi is subjective, so can perfection even exist within this domain? I don’t think it can. Perfection in this game is intangible at best. 
 

Most individuals are not making objective comparisons or decisions. So perfection can only be relative and meaningful to an individuals subjective exposure, understanding and interpretation of what’s better at that point in time. 
 

The pursuit of “the best” just doesn’t exist IMHO. 
 

…….but I can get behind the pursuit of different styles of sound reproduction and technical capability certainly…. There’s a lot to explore. 

Edited March 9 by Grizaudio

[Grizaudio]

3 hours ago, Marc said:

I was an audiophile from around age 7, though I never knew it until around age 17-18. I was given no choice, as Dad was an audiophile, and I am glad for that. I still recall talking with him at around age 11 or 12 about which tweeters sounded better - from memory it was a choice between Realistic bullet tweeters and some generic ones he'd pinched from some other generic loudspeakers (likely picked up for a few dollars at one of the trash and treasure markets). Fortunately, his ear became more refined in the years that followed and I learned to appreciate good sound.

 

I found myself a few short years later with my own system. As we lived in an old Victorian home, we were blessed with stupidly big bedrooms and I got to experiment with speaker and listening positioning, and spent hundreds of hours extracting the best sound possible, all before the internet and the distractions of gaming and particular websites that teenage boys probably spend hundreds of hours on now instead. 

 

I loved the music then more than ever. It was all new. The music of the time was everything to me, but then discovering decades of music that predated me, it was like an endless ocean. I'd picked up guitar by now, and then fell in love with the bass. Playing in a band led me to the studio, and after just one rehearsal session I eyed the other side of the window - the desk! For me, that was it. I wanted to be an audio engineer. The very next Saturday I was volunteering at the studio, and every Saturday after that. For me, school was just something I had to get through each week before I could get back to the studio. It was here I learned about room acoustics. I remember thinking Neal (the owner and engineer) was absolutely mad. He was walking around the room talking about bass nodes, and talking about where instruments were placed on what I believed to be a ficticious 'soundstage'. But like looking at 3D images for the first time, the ones where you have to make yourself go cross-eyed, and then miraculously it appears, the same happened to me one Saturday afternoon. It was like I had gone from listening to dual mono, sound from the L and sound from the R, to this blended sound that had 180 degree placement. It was an absolute revelation, and made me have to go back and relisten to everything I'd ever heard. 

 

Some years earlier, Dad had picked me up a portable record player. Cheap, plastic junk, from the same trash and treasure market he'd found all his other treasures. It was faded baby blue, and had a needle I reckon you couldn't break if you tried. It ran on D size batteries and someone had left a set in the player for a few years - a bit of a mess. My task was to pull the thing apart and make it work again. I'd never touched a soldering iron before then, but knew how it worked and what it did. I spent the day bringing it back to life, and the only record I had was a 45 RPM Theme from Local Hero, Going Home - Mark Knofler. I didn't know the song at the time. I can't quite recall whether it had one or two speakers. I think one may have been lost prior. After firing it up for the first time, I still recall that exact moment I clumsily dropped the needle into the groove, and while the sound was likely worse than even the cheapest Bluetooth speakers of today, I was emotional. That song, to this day, remains one of my most treasured tracks, and can still bring a tear to my eye like it did that day. I sat out under the carport listening to it over and over again. That moment probably shaped my entire life, at least on the career side.

 

In the ensuing years, my love of audio continued beyond working in the recording studio, but after studying mechanical engineering (boring), and unsuccessfully applying for audio engineering courses, I turned my attention to cars and my love of audio. Mid-20's I'd opened a large car audio shop. This is where I really learned about active crossovers, DSP, acoustics (yes), and eventually founded the largest national competition for (automotive) sound quality. Complete with trained judges, and travelling all around the country running events. We even built Australia's "loudest car" - a Mini panel van with 4 x custom built 15" woofers, 20,000w RMS of power, 16 batteries, 4" thick concrete floor and 2" thick perspex windows. I think there was enough cable in the system to stretch from Melbourne to Albuury. That record stood for many years. We learned so much about sound and how it works through those projects. It was a great time, even if just for the social side of it, which much like StereoNET itself today, brought together like-minded people who often felt isolated with their chosen hobby. @Keith_W, @~Spyne~, @Sierra were around for some/all of that fun.

 

Life goes on, and you start spending less time in cars and more in your home by the time you start your own family. It was now I revisited hi-fi, and that journey was documented here in threads shortly after I started Planet Audio / StereoNET. My first real speakers were Genesis III that I picked up from the classifieds here, from IIRC, @fatgen. Many of you saw my journey that then followed - endless upgrades, sidegrades, and as @Dr.Funk so eloquently described, lack of direction. My knowledge grew fast, and it had to as StereoNET itself evolved. I was fortunate to play with an endless selection of gear, and as part of my job, travel much of the world hearing some of the "greatest" systems. Some were many times the cost of my home - and equally, many of them were really not that impressive. Without understanding much of the scientific background of how and why things do what they do, but instead relying on ears alone, I think it's a long way to travel to get to the same destination. Those with a good understanding of science, tend to arrive faster - this I've come to learn and observe on StereoNET over the years. Still, in all those upgrades and system evolutions, not once did I again experience that emotional response like I did to Local Hero that afternoon. That way my holy grail. It was like a drug I was craving and just wanted to feel that again, no matter the financial cost.

 

Then the actual world changed, and mine did too. A pandemic sent us all into our homes, and hi-fi became an even more enjoyable interest for many, and a brand new interest for even more. The forum traffic was in overdrive. Despite all our extra time, we couldn't even keep up with the New Member Introduction approvals, and the amount of mail order buying/selling going on in the classifieds. I spent more time listening to my own system then ever before. Then I got COVID, and a double ear infection on the end of it. Then another double ear infection a few months later. And finally, a third bout in late 2021. This last one took its toll. My ears never really felt like they cleared up and after a few visits to an ENT and then an audiologist, it was confirmed - my hearing had taken a beating. Compounding the problem was everyone was wearing masks, and all of a sudden I had gone from what I considered to be an audiophile's ear (you know we can hear better than everyone else!), to barely making out what people were saying and having to turn the TV volume up a few more clicks than usual. I went soul-searching, and to a degree, what would seem to trivial for others, felt life-changing for me. How could someone who runs a Hi-Fi website, reviews equipment and makes a living from audio, have hearing damage. To me it was a like a champion marathon runner losing a leg. It was dark and lonely. Something I still haven't talked about openly until now. Obviously I stopped reviewing equipment, and I entirely fell out of love with audio and music. Things just didn't sound the same anymore.

 

About this time last year, I was driving home from the audiologist on a sunny Tuesday afternoon. I'd just been told my upper frequency hearing loss was likely permanent, and I was contemplating my future. I couldn't help but feel a bit like an imposter. An audiophile with hearing loss! I was contemplating selling StereoNET, all my gear, and looking for a new direction in life, so devestating was the news to me. As I wound down the window for fresh air, lo and behold, you'll never guess what track came on the radio - the only time I have ever heard it played on radio my entire life. Going Home, Theme from Local Hero. The emotion came flooding back. As I cranked it up, it was like I imagine a shot of heroin must feel like to an addict - I felt the warmth totally envelop me from head to toe. The weight on my shoulders had lifted, the sun was shining, the car was floating on clouds, and the tears rolled down my face. This, was what I had been chasing for around thirty years. It was being played back on a sub-par car radio, and yet, it didn't matter one bit. It wasn't about the sound. It was about the music, and those tracks that grip you like a vice, but comfort you with a warm embrace just the same.

 

Despite the setback, my love of audio has not wavered, but my love of the music itself has taken over. It took me quite some time (and still is) to adjust to what is the new normal for me, and to what things sound like now. I almost need to forget what I already know and how I remember things sounding. The human brain is exceptional at adapting, and even better at filling in blanks over time. I no longer care so much if it's pinpoint accurate, or if the snare sounds like that one I mic'd up and recorded one Saturday afternoon decades ago back at the studio. 

 

To answer the question posed by the OP, "Did your pursuit for "perfection" die over time?" No, but I learned over time that it had always been about the music. It just took me 30 years and a medical issue to realise. If you've read this far, then thank you. It's taken me quite some time and courage to put this out there on the forum.

Thanks for sharing Marc, as we all age I think many of us can relate to your feelings, frustrations and experiences.
 

I personally have issues with pressure equalisation in my eustachian tubes. sometimes this means I have reduced hearing, off centre hearing, and other days I’m rocking. 

 

I hope you find solace in the music. You don’t need perfect hearing to disappear in a sound scape or enjoy the discovery of new music. 

Edited March 9 by Grizaudio

[Hydrology]

17 minutes ago, Grizaudio said:

The pursuit of “the best” just doesn’t exist IMHO.

 

"The Best" doesn't exist.

The pursuit does.

[Keith_W]

Did my pursuit ever die? No. But it has gone through long periods of stagnation. I was happy with the sound, did not go visit other audiophiles, so the system was left the way it was. IMO the worst cause of "upgraditis" is being around other audiophiles. You visit them and hear something amazing and think to yourself "gee, I wish my system sounded like that". 

 

After a while, I started to realize that many of these "upgrades" were not upgrades at all. They were more like switching one preference for another. Example of a REAL upgrade - buying an amplifier that does not clip when it drives your speakers. Or buying a good subwoofer and using it properly. Or buying an objectively better turntable to replace your current JB Hifi special. Or improving your listening room. Example of a sideways non-upgrade: buying DAC A when DAC B already performs adequately. Is it an upgrade to switch to DCS from MSB? I would argue not, both are excellent DAC's and you are only switching one tonality for another. Or SNA's favourite can of worms - all kinds of cable. Then there are many examples of misguided upgrades which are actually downgrades - just because you hear a difference does not mean it is an upgrade. For example, are you sure all that room treatment is helping or killing your sound? Is it introducing spectral distortion by selectively deadening some frequencies and leaving others alone? I have certainly been to some over-deadened listening rooms (no names mentioned) which would benefit from having some of the installed room treatments removed. 

 

I have completed all my "real" upgrades from audio purchases. Every piece of equipment in my audio chain performs very well. This does not mean that I can not find improvements, e.g. I can try to get the DSP working better (the source of most of my improvements these days). I recently rearranged my listening room and THAT has made a bigger difference than any audio purchase ever did. I want to get rid of that power hungry Class A/B amplifier that is wasted on driving only the woofers and replace it with a Class D amp (saving money on electricity bills is also an upgrade). 

 

I suppose the one goal I have pursued all my life has been clarity and transparency. I rate this audio virtue above all other virtues. This all started early in my journey, when I was listening to complex orchestral music on computer speakers driven by a Sony Walkman. The sound was muddy as all heck, and my motivation for buying my first hi-fi system was so that I can actually hear what was going on. 

 

Other audiophiles are more focused on tone, or imaging, or dynamics. Nothing wrong with that - it's a function of your music and what you like. I recently heard a system with a pair of small ProAc bookshelf speakers and the imaging was like nothing else. It was so real, as if the performers were in front of you. That's what the owner prioritized and he succeeded. But it could not go very loud, and when it did, it started to lose clarity. I think that system was great for his preference, but for me it lacked a sense of scale. I am sure that he would think the opposite of my system, that it has clarity and scale, but imaging is nowhere as good as his ProAc's. And that's the truth - it just isn't. 

 

I have never heard a system that has it all. Every system is compromised, but where the compromises are depends on the owner and their preference. There is no such thing as perfection because of the inherent limitations of speakers, listening rooms, and the recordings themselves. I think the key to "perfection" is to understand yourself, what do you think is perfect? What goal are you going to pursue, and what compromises are you going to make? 

Edited March 9 by Keith_W