[m104]

I think there are two main sects in audiophile-land, really: perfection and experience.

The perfection side has scopes, meters, and blind testing among its tools. The goal is in fact "perfect sound reproduction". The problem here is that between the original source (microphone, usually) and the listener's brain is all of this stuff that distorts the sound. Removing it completely is really hard, and replicating that quality repeatedly is even harder.

The experience side has experts, rituals, and demos. The goal there is to reach the limit of audio experience, literally to hear what wouldn't otherwise be heard with lesser systems. The problem on this end is that "near-perfect" systems deliver less exciting and engaging experiences than what the experience experts deem to be better. They don't enjoy the systems calibrated to perfection as much as their own custom systems with tweaks and rituals applied.

These two sides really are in a bit of opposition, but it's nice to have both to drive the high-end market of audio equipment.

[gknoy]

It reminds me a lot of Geordi talking to Data about a perfect shave needing to not be perfect.