It’s hard to imagine cooking a fine meal without ever tasting the food, or designing a speaker without listening to the final product. That sort of arms-length-design is more a crapshoot than a surefire success.
Yet, when we talk about PS Audio’s design process for electronics that spends more time on voicing than measurement, eyes roll.
I can’t think another engineered product category other than audio that makes people so nuts when it comes to design by use. We wouldn’t expect a car company to deliver a vehicle they didn’t test drive or a drug that wasn’t tried on real people. Why the guffaws and snark smiles when it comes to voicing amplifiers, CD players, and DACs?
Do we honestly believe measurements say it all? That in this one tiny piece of the universe all is known and no tasting, listening, experiencing, is necessary?
It hardly seems to make sense.
I’ve put a little video together on just how we voice our equipment and why. You can watch it here.
Paul McGowan
