[Neli wants me to verify that everyone understands these descriptions are, necessarily, characerchers, very short descriptions of what are real people – real people who cannot be described by one sentence, or a million. OK. Now I can tell Neli that everyone understands this, ….right? 🙂 ]

Each reviewer has preferences.

Because they have limited funds they only have limited access to a wide variety of equipment which arrives serially – i.e. they may have had both Lamm amplifiers and Wilson speakers in their listening room – but probably not at the same time. And it would be difficult for them to consciously schedule to have them both at the same time in order to hear them at the same time. So they kind of just hear a lot of components in a hodge-podge random order. One or two at a time. In their existing system, whatever that may be.

So what this means is that although reviewers have access over time to a lot of equipment – their system building is often a long and somewhat random winding road, and they typically do not have a lot of experience with consciously building a system that suits their taste, living with it for awhile, then making a better system, living with THAT for awhile, etc..

[This is unlike the dew dealers who collect best of breed equipment and can freely mix and match to create their Wonder Systems – and unlike many audiophiles who also try lots of various pieces of equipment, although most audiophiles still focus on ONE PIECE of equipment that will finally DO IT – instead of a SYSTEM that will do it – probably because they read too many reviews… which rarely focus on the fact that it TAKE A SYSTEM to sound good].

They also, almost across the board, stay in whatever house they have lived in since they were a child (kidding) and whatever compromised listening room they found pre-existing in that house.

Mike Fremer – Stereophile

MF has reputedly a very small room with severe bass resonance issues. He prefers a very detailed and very neutral sound with tight, detailed bass. His system consists of permanent residences the Musical Fidelity electronics and Wilson Maxx II speakers.
This is all one needs to know in order to predict what Mike will like or not like. He gravitates between preferring of-a-kind equipment (like SME turntables, Rockport speakers) and equipment way over on the other side that balances his system (like Zanden digital and Sonus Faber speakers). He probably will only BUY of-a-kind equipment: neutral to cold, very detailed sounding gear.

Srajan Ebean – 6moons

Srajan just moved – and I believe he has his pick of several rooms to put music in. So his rooms do not suck. He prefers equipment that is reasonably priced, first and foremost, which is fairly dynamic, and eschews sophistication – prefers real but puts up with an ‘affected’ sound – a sound that entertains him. Enjoyable.

His system at one time consisted of Avantgarde Duo horns and, to balance these very forward, harmonic-free speakers and laid back, somewhat dull sounding front end. Equipment he reviewed went into this system with very predictable outcomes [Speakers had to be quite dynamic and not too revealing of the flaws upstream. Components had to be warm and not too detailed or neutral or the speakers would show off their inherent coolness and over-aggressiveness].

He now has the more or less reasonably priced Zu Audio speakers, last I checked – which are a heart pure Enjoyment with some good dynamic capability. These speakers do not like a sophisticated front end (shows off their flaws) and their owner will probably prefer a tube amp or a laid back solid-state amplification.

Srajan will prefer equipment with good value that is enjoyable, and has decent dynamic capabilities, or is interesting intellectually. He will pan equipment that is seemingly too expensive, or detailed, Sophisticated, or boring (from a reviewer’s point of view).
HP – Absolute Sound

HP has quite small rooms at Sea Cliff – ones that he has learned to make the most of.

HP likes a BIG SOUND. His systems are somewhat of a balancing act, much like Srajan. Big, open sounding, dynamic, not very sophisticated speakers (ALON/NOLA, Pipedreams, Wisdom way back when) are paired with amps that are excellent (ASL, Edge), but do not intrude on the overall character of the speaker, with cables that are neutral and not used as tuning devices (Nordost Valhalla), and a very high-quality source (the old Burmester $60K transport and DAC pair, Emmlabs CDSD and DCC2, and the best turntables when he can get them – ignore the Clearaudio, it is just a stand-in).

HP more than any reviewer, consciously builds a system around speakers he likes. Just like we do, and maybe one or two other dealers, and a lot of the audiophiles who consciously build their systems to achieve the sound they want. [Even if you do not have, cannot afford, the speakers you want today – you can think ahead and improve your current system, today, with less expensive equipment – like powercords, vibration control, cables – with a eye on how it will work with your system tomorrow, when you CAN put the speakers you want into your system].

JV – Absolute Sound

JV’s room is kind of unbalanced, last picture I saw, with a door in the front wall. Not aware of any other particular problems.

As mentioned last post – for many years JV’s system sucked, like most reviewer’s systems, but then he got a Walker and then, after the ridiculous underpowered Tenor amp / Rockport speaker love affair, heard the Tenor OTL on the Kharma 3.2 speaker. This is one of those GREAT systems. Finally, a reviewer with a real state-of-the-art system – and one that will fit in ordinary sized rooms to boot.

JV prefers – interesting sounds. Of all reviewers, I think he gets bored the easiest. This is why I think he kind of careens from one relatively good sounding piece of equipment to another, perhaps not as good sounding piece of equipment – because the new piece sounds interesting and DIFFERENT and is entertaining.

So, JV will like things that do not suck and that are interesting sonically. Otherwise he is hard to predict.

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All of these reviewers must publish in order to put food on the table. They will in general say good things about something in order to not ruffle feathers.

None of these reviewers pays any attention to vibration control, except perhaps JV who has a Walker Audio rack and Srajan who has a Grand Prix Monaco rack.

I think only MF pays attention to powercords. HP just experienced his first diamond tweeter a few months ago.

Most reviewers, and these are no exception, are quite a bit behind the experience curve of most network-savvy audiophiles who have some extra cash to burn.

But I like these guys and we will follow closely and comment on what they have to say.