Hi firedog, I think most people would agree that DBTs are not needed for deciding personal preference, especially if there's a truly audible difference (although I can give you a few counterexamples). What they are generally used for is deciding whether there really is an audible difference at all. That relates to preference in so far as someone may say they strongly prefer A over B because of some characteristic of the sound, and then fail to be able to tell them apart blind. If so, it doesn't change the fact that they prefer A over B, but it tells you it's not because of the sound, it's for some other reason.
As for training and golden eared audiophiles, I'm not sure I follow why you think they pose a problem for DBT as a methodology. If you want to test trained listeners, give trained listeners a DBT. If you want to test a mixed group, give a mixed group a DBT. > > BTW, this has also been shown in research: random subjects were often > unable to differentiate between compressed and uncompressed files, but > "audiophiles" were. Reference please! -- opaqueice ------------------------------------------------------------------------ opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=82067 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/audiophiles
