Return to Nirvana.
Hi Guys,
If I'm being a PITA by returning to this subject so quickly then I'm sure the Mods will so advise me and remove the post. I am in no way being divisive but I do plead guilty to trying to provoke another discussion around the (vain) pursuit of audio Nirvana (as it is generally understood, rather than Varun's technically correct translation - nobody's looking for extinction 
).
I have been giving this subject a bit of further thought since I last raised it and I'd like to present another 'slant' on my opinion. We are all aware of how powerful the human brain is at convincing/persuading us that black is white, up is down and right is wrong if we are at all predisposed to believe it - witness the rise of the Nazis in the 30s and early 40s, but not all Germans were inhuman bastards, they just got caught up in the mass hysteria, if everybody else believes it it must be true, sort of thing.
A few examples from my own experience: -
1) I am told that the human eye actually sees things upside down rather than as they really are and the brain makes us 'see' the scene as it really is.
2) When I was very young and lived at home I grew up with a large clock on the wall with a pendulum - clockwork and needed winding every few days - step-father's pride and joy - visitors to the house would often comment on how did we put up with the extremely loud 'tick-tock' of this clock. The answer was that we never heard it, we were so used to it our brains permanently and automatically filtered out the continual noise and we all had to concentrate on it to hear it, and it was indeed loud, but a few seconds later it had 'disappeared' again.
3) From the age of 11 to leaving home at 26 to get married I was continually needing to do homework. Unfortunately, with only one room downstairs, other than an unheated kitchen, and a deaf step-father, there was no escaping to any quiet room in the house. Because of prolonged periods of trying to concentrate in this atmosphere I subconciously developed the ability to 'shut out' all extraneous noise and focus on what I was doing. This became automatic and continued throughout my working life, such that, in a crowded noisy and open office, I could shut everything else out and concentrate on what I was supposed to be doing - embarrassing when the boss comes in and calls your name to attend a meeting 
.
So to audio matters.
We add something to our system and listen. If it is worse we remove it and resort to as it was. However if it is not worse, but different or better, we leave it in place and continue listening to it. After a while it becomes the norm and we forget what it sounded like previously. The process is then repeated the next time we add something, ad infinitum in many cases. IMHO many of these additions must be merely change, rather than improvement. It just is not possible to keep adding improvement on improvement ad infinitum. Some will be genuine improvements I have no doubt, but, I respectfully suggest, not as many as we would like to believe.
Our brains are continually kidding us - discuss.
DaveK.
My System:
Power: Belkin PF40, Custom.hifi.cables Hydra and DC PSUs.
Sources: Self built HTPC with Xonar ST sound card, NAD T585 multi disc player, Sony BDP-S350, Squeezebox Touch, Techncs SL1210 (mod'd) + Nagaoka MP30, Thomson Sky HD box.
Amps etc.: 2 x Mini-T amps, MF-X10D Valve buffer clone, StanDAC 7520/Caiman (mod'd).
Speakers: Mission 774s with added super tweeters
Cables: best I can afford and likely to change except Homar's RF attenuated co-ax's and Mark Grant USB and HDMI cables. I also like silver i/cs and speaker cable.
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Originally Posted by Marco
