How does everyone listen to and evaluate hi-fi systems?

[Macca]

I don't ever have music on as background unless I have got people round. I'm either giving it 100% attention or I switch it off and do something else. Years ago I would sometimes have the TV on with the sound turned down but I don't do that anymore. The music would quite often fit the visuals it could be quite funny sometimes how it matched up.

[MartinT]

I'm either giving it 100% attention or I switch it off and do something else.

Exactly that for me too.

[Effem]

I'm either giving it 100% attention or I switch it off and do something else.

Not a multi-tasking man then Martin?

I do like it playing behind me when I am fannying about on the internet, usually with a CD playing drawn at random out of the rack that I couldn't find the time to listen to at any other time during a "proper" sesh.

[Macca]

If its not sounding good enough to demand my whole attention then I quickly get bored. That's why I go through so much kit, i'm always trying to push it a bit further but then things go faulty and I have to swap them out and re-calibrate everything else to compensate. I have a standard it has to reach and if I am not happy with the sound it actually effects my health so I don't listen any more until I make another change. When it is all working right I can listen for eight to ten hours straight. But I buy vintage and bargain used kit pretty much exclusivley so things do go wrong quite often and with a lot of this stuff you cant just get another.

[Tim]

I don't ever have music on as background . . .

Never really been that sure what 'background music' is Martin, if I'm at home no matter what I am doing (unless I'm watching a film), I have music playing. At the office I have headphones on for a good part of the day and I walk to work with a Sansa Clip listening to the two Bob Harris shows (4 hours) I have recorded from the previous week. As for evaluating Hi-Fi . . . . you can keep that TBH. I like to evaluate the music I own, discover new music and generally immerse myself in it. I only tend to concentrate 100% on new purchases and that's hard enough to keep up with at times - however, late at night sessions get my full undivided attention and I do those every night at some point if I'm at home. I do 60+ gigs a year normally, as well as a couple of festivals.

I don't have listening sessions as my whole life is a listening session

[NRG]

Exactly that for me too.

You two are missing out then , its great to be in the kitchen cooking something great, glass of wine on the go and music filtering through from your gear in the background ....even better with friends around for Dinner.

[Tim]

You two are missing out then , its great to be in the kitchen cooking something great, glass of wine on the go and music filtering through from your gear in the background

just done that exact thing - been making a big pot of yellow split pea dahl soup, with Willie Nelson playing and a glass of red. Nothing better.

[Macca]

I don't cook anymore and I like to watchTV when I'm eating. I couldn't go out with headphones on, or work. Although I do like having the radio on if working but I can't do that where I am now. Music has its own place for me I don't want it all the time. There is no point fir me if I am doing something I blot everything else out. I only notice background music when it stops so no point in it for me.

[nat8808]

The first part of your OP Frank is all about social interaction and dynamics and psychology - all complex stuff, different ways people conduct themselves in public, how they think they should behave. Some love to assert their difference in view and attempt a new leadership claim for the "different opinion" tribe etc etc.

I'm sure it's perfectly possible to listen just as attentively with a poker face and no need to express anything or join in socially with the group dynamics.

Why should people have such different opinions aside from the above?

Well, some people love marmite, some people hate it (and there are the majority in between those extremes, despite the claims of the adverts). Why wouldn't it be any different for our aural senses too? Physiological differences in our hearing organs and real brain differences in how we process sounds as well as our associations on many levels due to our aural histories that have shaped our brains and lives.

I tend to just listen in the dark and try not to think about things, try to concentrate on my senses like a bit of meditation. I try not to think about what I hear else you can convince yourself of differences which are nothing more than a shift of your own attention. If differences aren't fairly instinctively noticable then I tend to think that they're not real.

Hence the cable listening sessions people do with swapping them out just wouldn't work with me with subtle differences - the swapping in and out is such a disturbance that it's too easy for your sonic memory to no-longer be a memory but instead a very concious construct based on what you happened to consiously note to yourself about the sound. Must be completely impossible in a social situation!

[Tim]

I don't cook anymore and I like to watchTV when I'm eating. I couldn't go out with headphones on, or work. Although I do like having the radio on if working but I can't do that where I am now. Music has its own place for me I don't want it all the time. There is no point fir me if I am doing something I blot everything else out. I only notice background music when it stops so no point in it for me.

The whole thing is uniquely fascinating - not only do music tastes very wildly, but also the systems we listen on and the way they present the music. Some like smooth and easy, others dynamic and in yer' face with bags of detail and some don't seem to be able to make up their minds, or even care. But not only that, the way we actually listen and enjoy music varies wildly too But there is one common denominator, the music

Fascinating . . .