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Too much information

More is better?

By John Groom

October 2004

Psychobabble is a column to explore the twilight zone of hi-fi. That strange place where the improbable meets the impossible, the fussy meets the obsessional, and the physical meets the psychological.

I have made a lot of mistakes in my years of messing with hi-fi gear. Some of these mistakes arose from my misunderstanding about information. I thought simply that less information was a bad thing and therefore more information was automatically a good thing. I gave little thought at that stage to how the information was arranged, questions of emphasis, or the need to filter.

A no-brainer?

A practical example of my logic was as follows: large, stiff housing mains cable mostly carries the mains power to my wall socket. The cable from the wall socket to my CD player is soft and built more like an extension cord. So first I inserted an extension cord into the system and sure enough, the sound became softer and less present. The next step was to build the CD player its own short stiff cable from the identical wire that was in the wall. Why hadn’t anyone thought of it before?

Well I was right: there was more information, it seemed louder and with more detail. However, over time I tired of the sound. It was literally more fatiguing and it was a harsher sound that was poorly integrated. So out the cable went.

A little of what you like

Recently I have been thinking of the obvious thing… that hi-fi equipment is designed by people, who at the end of the day have to make subjective decisions about components. Each component has a different sound according to who manufactures it, how it is arranged or its relationship to other components, ie, its synergy. It is a deep understanding of these principles that has given the Naim school such consistent results and such a dedicated following.

For simple examples of what I am saying; try swapping the IEC cord from your computer onto your hi-fi. Hopefully the hi-fi one should sound better, but certainly they will sound different. If you have easy access to the fuse in the back of the amplifier, try reversing the fuse. It will sound better in one direction. For the more adventuresome try swapping the Asian mains plug for an old fashioned NZ piggy- back mains plug. In these examples the more informative experience is also the ‘right’ one.

It touches the heart strings

Hi-fi will remain part science and part magic; and it needs to. When we are evaluating system changes at home Juliet has one simple criterion. When she plays certain Beethoven and Mozart pieces, does the music have the power to bring her to tears? (This process made courtship very simple.) She is responding to the system’s ability to evoke emotion.

Fortunately for my bank balance, this quality is present in quite modest equipment. She is quite happy with the sound from my dated Pioneer cd player and Harmon Kardon amplifier.

It isn’t just to do with the equipment however. This emotional quality depends on having the right power supply, interconnect, equipment stand and even having the cables suspended. In these examples it is certainly not a matter of ‘more’ information but how that information is packaged.

Not all sounds are created equal

The brain is not wired to treat all information evenly. As long ago as the 1930s the Fletcher Munsen curve was developed to show how selective our hearing is. We give much more emphasis to the information around the mid-band. Imagine an upturned U-curve with its peak around 2kHz and dropping away quite sharply towards the bass and treble. When the volume drops these phenomena become acute. Most ‘loudness’ switches boost the bass and treble, and cheap speakers can sometimes impress initially, though ‘boom and tizz’.

In selecting speakers for myself I have chosen the Royd Albions essentially for their ability to produce an informative and balanced sound picture at quite low sound levels. In the past I was impressed by the Gail 401 loudspeakers for their open (but coloured) mids and the little Quad 22 amplifier for its liquid mid range.

Do it with a friend

No, I am not suggesting that hi-fi is all about the midrange. I do suspect however that the ‘emotional’ quality that Juliet is picking up on may be a slightly full and forward upper midrange sound. Certainly sound that is receded in the midrange can be inoffensive to the point of boredom.

On a practical level I am suggesting that when you are buying or evaluating equipment, trust the intuitive and feeling part of yourself. It is simply telling you which part of the musical information you are naturally drawn to.

For an even better decision-making process, take your partner with you and listen ‘through their ears’. As I have suggested, evaluating music this way will save you a lot of money, as you are not chasing the latest and greatest way to tweak the last ounce of information out of the performance. The danger is you may just learn to lie back and enjoy what you have.

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John Groom is a psychologist working in private practice on Auckland's North Shore. John has over three decades experience in both hi-fi and psychology.