Hifi Mags

I used to enjoy HiFi Answers in the '70s as a teenager. I would be lying if I said I hadn't looked at a HiFi mag since, but I really can't be bothered now. If I want inane drivel, I know a great place to look that costs me nothing.

JMW

Yes the Mana forum is now dominated by the intellectually challenged Mr Pig, I agree it is now 100% inane drivel.

Regards

Mick

Mick

I am surprised that it has taken a person like you to realise the foolhardiness of subscribing to such things. Unless you enjoy getting letters published on the correspondence page that start with the words:

"As an avid hifi user of many decades and can remember when Leak equipment was made in London and Wharfedale loudspeakers came from Yorkshire - - etc etc"

Derek

Hifi+ was fairly good in its early days and Paul Messenger came in with some fairly good articles.

He seems to have gone leaving a bunch of second raters to cope. Now it is just plain repetitive and boring.

Regards

Mick

i keep my old mags in the loo where they belong

quote:

Originally posted by Derek Wright:
.... when Leak equipment was made in London and Wharfedale loudspeakers came from Yorkshire - -

Those were the days, my friend.
We thought they've never end.

And Garrard had a factory in Swindon ......

And the best sound around was the Ferrograph



Some HiFi comics are fun - if you don't take them too seriously and start to believe that the Leak Troughline is still the best tuner on the planet and direct drive turntables still rule the roost. Always ignore the recommendations, of course, and you'll be safe.

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:
if you don't take them too seriously and start to believe that the Leak Troughline is still the best tuner on the planet and direct drive turntables still rule the roost. Always ignore the recommendations, of course, and you'll be safe.

HiFi World then, ROTF?

To be honest I still buy them all (apart from What HiFi which isn't about hifi at all) but I don't really know why I do. They mostly go unread apart from 1 or 2 articles and are a huge waste of money for me.

Unfortunately I can't really help it.

Mark

From 1971 until the early to mid eighties I read every one from cover to cover, every month. Every ad included. And then I'd read them all again. Most of them are still piled in a corner in my garage. However one April, perhaps 83 or 84, I realised I couldn't spot the annual April Fool articles in amongst the rest of the mystical mumbo-jumbo that passed as hifi journalism at the time. Since then I only dip in occasionally if there's something of particular interest.

I stopped buying them after I had a personal spat with Ken Kessler, who I believe to be a hypocritical tosser of the first order.

I still subscribe to a hifi mag.
Much like putting an LP on a TT compared to using CD's, I still prefer reading a hard copy as opposed to leafing through similar copy on a computer screen.
Used as entertainment & a guide, rather than a definitive bible, I still think they are OK. The music reviews can open my eyes(ears) to artists I hadn't heard of previously.
I think other review mags, eg for cars, other hobbies may well be as guilty.
Matt.

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

HiFi World then, ROTF?

You could be right - I owned a TL and I can't believe anybody would think it better than than the Linn tuner I currently use. The TL wasn't awful, it was pleasant to listen to - but a bit of the pace by modern tuner standards.

Still I now know that with an Achroplat that a Rega P3 is almost a match for the SME 10A. This transformation didn't seem to happen with my own P25 so I must be going mad. Perhaps I'll throw the lot away and buy a Vertex DD turntable and put an ARO on it with obligatory Ortofon cartridge.

quote:

To be honest I still buy them all (apart from What HiFi which isn't about hifi at all) but I don't really know why I do. .... are a huge waste of money for me.

Unfortunately I can't really help it.

Mark

Same here - though I only buy one regularly - I think it is part of catastrophe theory that once we start doing something, we continue because we don't want to lose out on our original investment even though we know there is no point to continue to waste money in this way. Perhaps that confirms I am mad; still at least I had enough sense to invest in England winning the world cup when they were 80-1, only a few matches to go

ATB Rotf

I tend to read them all. Still waiting to get 'moved along' from the newsagents. Obviously i don't part with my hard earned to read them

I usually spend my holliday rereading my various 1970's HiFi mags.

Particulary the yearly returning twelve page cassette tape tests with measurements on everything are very a interesting read. Not.

But, more seriously, with hindsight they are often quite fun to read. Remember when nobody bothered about cables?

Most of todays mags are more or less like Mick describes it, loooong arrays of words that doesn't tell anything more than that the reviewer seem to own lot's of expensive cables.

JohanR

quote:

To be honest I still buy them all (apart from What HiFi which isn't about hifi at all)

Same as. It's harmless and relatively cheap as far as hobbies go, keeps me abreast of goings on and frankly I just like reading about Hi-Fi and music (I get Uncut, Mojo, The Word and Q, even though it's crap too). Being in the loop so to speak. And they did point me in the right direction for some new replacement 'budget' floorstanders for the study system recently, more as a result of gleaned cummulative opinions and knowledge rather than a single review and after listening to a shortlist, they were more or less about right (I ended up with some AE aegis neo 3s).

I do however find some of it is (often recycled) twaddle and particularly some of the mini editorials by various contributors at the front are pathetic, non articles (what they did or didn't do at the weekend or why they couldn't think of anything to write about this issue seem to be common themes). And half of them are filled with ads, some of them indirect. And Jesus, if there is one more piece about why the Ipod is or isn't hifi, I'll scream. There is often a huge difference of opinion as to what does and doesn't make a worthwhile improvement in a system. And clearly some open dislike between different writers.

Hang on, this all seems uncannily familiar...

I read em all - free, gratis and for nothing while sitting in Starbucks in Borders bookshop (ok I have to buy a coffee first)- to say they are all totally useless is totally silly - some perspective is needed as always.

I find Hi-Fi+ a pleasant way to pretend to aspire to the "top-end" and I'll periodically read any of the others if, for example, they have Naim reviews or I am looking for something in particular, however, I could never conceive of subscribing to one ever, ever or ever.

Hi-fi is about music. No more and no less. You only need hi-fi mags as additional assistance when buying or unless you are disciplined enough to read and think for yourself at the same time. If you subscribe then you have probably become addicted to the means rather than the end.

Mike

Quote ... If you subscribe then you have probably become addicted to the means rather than the end.

That is a very accurate statement.

I think the mags have a major problem in that a reader can get better and a more broad based assessment of kit from this and other fora.

The professional reviewers are slowly being exposed as being slightly self opinionated whereas on the fora, you do get a wide range of views in normal English.

I would expect one or two of them to cease publication over the next few years.

Regards

Mick

quote:

Originally posted by Mick Parry:



I think the mags have a major problem in that a reader can get better and a more broad based assessment of kit from this and other fora.



Mick

Mick,


I'm quite shocked that you believe that you get better info about kit from fora with the agendas and short sightedness from many of the main protagonists and the "my opinion is the only opinion and that's a fact" crowd that inhabit most of the different fora. There are of course many good intentioned posters out there but many get drowned out in the who can undermine the other persons opinion and experience quickest in repetitive cyclical arguments. Examples being the "if it hasn't passed a Double blind ABX'ed test then its all in you head" crowd. Oh yeah and Naim, Linn, MF, Meridian is all crap you must own some esoteric Japanese battleship build behemoths or you ain't really into HiFi. I thought you did not take any nonsense like that. People on fora can all be big, clever and right behind a keyboard, right?



Bloody Hell what am I doing talking to all you Losers, I must be mad and sad. I think I'll go and read about some super Knobs or rub some cream on me magnets, Ooo eer misses. .



Dean..

quote:

Originally posted by acad tsunami:
I read em all - free, gratis and for nothing while sitting in Starbucks in Borders bookshop (ok I have to buy a coffee first)- to say they are all totally useless is totally silly - some perspective is needed as always.

x2. entertainment for me. i like and subscribe to Stereophile. i've discovered a lot of excellent music and products - worth the $12 a year for me. like any opinion, you need to put it in context and take it with a grain of salt.

PACE

It's amazing that you all suddenly appear intelligent enough to realise that reviews/tests in mags are a waste of time when it comes to hifi.

Why do you continue to be thick as *#!* by reading camera reviews?

A couple of observations: 1)Most press is valuable if it serves the reader. Falling circulations mean that most of the hi-fi press now appears to serve advertisers. 2) If I remember, Hi-Fi Answers used to be entertaining to read. This appears to be a lost art. 3) The cracks are really showing when publications have to devote large amounts of space to explaining their reviewing policies and trying to justify their existance.

However, there is a bright note. Next time you are in a newsagent, just check out the wonderful range and number of titles devoted to music which are now available - and they're not hidden away at the back of the bottom shelf because no-one buys them

I see I've made a couple three - sorry!

quote:

Originally posted by JamieWednesday:
keeps me abreast of goings on ... Being in the loop so to speak

I think this is the way to approach hi-fi mags. Rather than dismissing them totally, they do provide information that I would've missed (such as the existence Dynaudio 2-way-with-10"-driver DM2/10). Yes there's the net, but it's information overload there.

quote:

Originally posted by fishski13:
like any opinion, you need to put it in context and take it with a grain of salt.

Yup, and learn to read between the lines. This is true for forums also.

Hi Asp,

Sure, the mags provide information. The problem I have is paying £5 a month to be told what manufacturers are doing...isn't that advertising? I also have a problem with paying for a product in which I have to 'read between the lines'. Why should I, as a consumer and magazine buyer, have to do this? Who are the journalists on these titles serving?