There's definitely something to the dirty connections thread. I've built and restored a few tube
amplifiers in my time. One thing I always do is replace the ancient caked-with-oxidation RCA
connectors with new goldplate types. I also like to spray out the tube sockets with contact cleaner
once in a while. I also always replaced the old pots and switches, unless they were the sealed-back
types.

I disagree about calling $$$$$$ audiophile stuff "revealing" by nature. A lot of it is actually
"coloring" by nature, heaping on harmonic distortion and/or transformer-caused phase shifts in the
case of tube gear. It's fine if a listener (even a serious listener or critical listener) likes
colored sound, but an audio professional should seek as close to a straight wire with gain as
possible, because otherwise he can't honestly listen to hear what he needs to hear (ie what's wrong
or right with the audio he's working on).

Just to be clear, I still very much enjoy listening to vinyl records. But, I wouldn't ever say that
a vinyl record -- no matter how well mastered and manufactured -- is anywhere near output=input to
the source.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Stamler" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 10, 2015 2:15 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Geek question - is there any way to get Foobar2000 to automatically change
to a file's native sample/bitrate in Win7?


> On 11/9/2015 9:45 PM, Carl Pultz wrote:
>> A lot of pro gear isn't as revealing as audiophile stuff. Lately they
>> have been converging, so more pros are concerning themselves with
>> such matters.
>
> It may be that audiophile gear is more revealing of cable differences because it's more sensitive
> to cable differences, because a lot of audiophile gear is *unbalanced*. Almost all pro gear is
> balanced, and my experience has been that balanced connections show fewer differences between
> cables than unbalanced. They do show up dirty connectors, though.
>
> Peace,
> Paul
>
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