[xsb7244]

Don't forget to read the comments.

http://audiophilereview.com/audiophile/lady-hi-fi-crazies.html

[FullRangeMan]

Of course it is, woman always have better earing than man.
Every husband knows it, this is established information, I surprised this reviewer writing as if it were a great find.

Afew years ago I entered a local music shop and there was a elderly lady which is a organist a music teacher.

She complait about the B3 from a friend as having too much treble, I explain her treble can be tuned down at the 38 tone bars on the upper keyboard, but she yet could prefer his small digital jap single keyboard.

[a.wayne]

If you want women to buy, just put  a " Sale"  recent mark down sign  on your product................. 

[FullRangeMan]

50% off

[stereocilia]

Hearing loss tends to affect high frequencies first, and men are about twice as likely to acquire high-frequency hearing loss than women. This is just a statistical tendency, and there are plenty of women with precipitous severe high-frequency hearing losses, and plenty of men with mild flat hearing losses. There are 80-year-olds with normal hearing, and children with profound hearing loss.

For men and women who don't have hearing loss there's no difference. Do most audiophiles have hearing loss? Maybe, but, do people with high-frequency hearing loss tend to be audiophiles more than people with normal hearing? I seriously doubt it, and even if it were true, there's no way that could account for the 99 to 1 ratio.

I think the idea that women are not audiophiles because they have better high-frequency hearing is silly.

I'm also not sure why this is in the "enclosures" circle.

[RDavidson]

This article is ridiculous, but it makes a good point in the early going.
If women are to become more interested in our hobby, they need to be properly introduced to it (if products can't really be made to cater to them specifically). There's a lot to our hobby that can be intimidating even to males. Accounting heavily for the technical, electrical, mechanical aspects of gear and you've scared away 99% of females from setting foot in a hi-fi shop to explore on their own.

There are a few companies that come to mind who have done well by increasing the ease-of-use factor (for everyone, including women) and moving the technical/mechanical (intimidating) aspects to the background : Apple, Sonos, & Bang and Olufsen. You see the problem here? None of these companies are making true hi-fi. Devialet might be attempting to bridge that gap with some of the things they're doing. They're similar to B&O, but with a focus on sound quality, not just fitting a lifestyle or looking pretty. We need more elegant products like Devialet, which women can happily display in the living room and enjoy using, but they also need to perform just as well as anything any of us (mostly dudes) would happily display in the living room and enjoy using.

Until more gear that bridges that gap comes along, we should invite the women in our lives to listen.

Yeah. Why is this in the "enclosures" circle? It's like the OP is telling us to tread lightly on the topic or we might end up in an "enclosure."

[stereocilia]

I am not convinced that that women are inherently less interested in technology, or, for that matter science, engineering, or math. It's completely unclear to me why almost all audiophiles are dudes.

[charmerci]

I think it's mostly the cold black or silver metallic "sameness" of the components with the technical jargon that goes with it and the big square box speakers.

From the stories that I've read - mostly here - that once you get a system that sounds close to the musicians in the room, the wives "finally gets it."

[stereocilia]

Most audiophiles are men, but let's face it: most men are not audiophiles, either.

[thunderbrick]

I am not convinced that that women are inherently less interested in technology, or, for that matter science, engineering, or math. It's completely unclear to me why almost all audiophiles are dudes.

Because we grew up with chemistry sets, Lionel trains, and Erector sets.  Now we have different toys to play with.

Woman are too busy being our adult supervision to have time to mess with our toys.

[RDavidson]

I am not convinced that that women are inherently less interested in technology, or, for that matter science, engineering, or math. It's completely unclear to me why almost all audiophiles are dudes.

You're painting with a broader brush and taking what I'm saying a bit out of context. chamerci is much more on the same page.

I think it's a combination of not just the techie and mechanical stuff going on, but the lack of approachability of most techie stuff due to the way most things look and function that I think disinterests women. Most gear is designed (both esthetically and functionally) by, guess who? Right! Dudes! So guess why gear tends to appeal to us. We're catering to ourselves, with really not a whole lot of consideration for the opposite sex. It seems that in the world of hi-fi, to get into the gear that at least appeals to women on an esthetic level, you have to spend $$$. As most of us dudes put performance in front of esthetics, black and silver boxes haven't needed to evolve all that much.....so the cycle continues of making black and silver boxes that are perfectly fine by dude standards, but uninteresting to women.

I've found that my wife won't even try to learn how to use any extraneous electronics in the house. As long as I'm around, she just leans on me to take care of it all and won't pay any attention to me showing her how to use things herself beyond the ABSOLUTE basics. I'm sure I'm not the only dude who deals with this "lack of interest / caring" attitude with home electronics from the spouse.

[RDavidson]

Because we grew up with chemistry sets, Lionel trains, and Erector sets.  Now we have different toys to play with.

Woman are too busy being our adult supervision to have time to mess with our toys.

thunderbrick, you're honestly not far from the truth. That's why girls now have "engineering" sets / toys catered toward them, like Goldiblox http://www.goldieblox.com/

http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-to-get-girls-into-engineering-let-them-build-their-own-toys-1408912053

[thunderbrick]

I work at an engineering university.  I don't think it's the science kits that guide women to science.  I think it's a ferocious desire to make the world a better place, and an unspoken belief that men have clearly screwed things up, so let 'em play with their audio/rc aircraft/fantasy sports/cars/guns, etc. while the women get our defecation consolidated for us. 

Probably more accurate, is the recent generations have encouraged (or at least didn't stand in the way of) women to non-girly things.  Sports, etc.

[charmerci]

There is also the aspect (shown in many studies) that girls are discouraged from pursuing science, technical subjects and math in classes. One top philosophy college graduate was told by her course adviser not to pursue a doctorate in philosophy!

[stereocilia]

Could it be that men tend to be more interested in competing against the physical problem of reproducing sound. We treat it like a problem that must be solved. We delight in solving the problem of distortion, and we especially enjoy finding new distortions to solve. So, maybe it's the problem solver component in our y chromosome combined some some other characteristic(s) that launch us into this hobby. Maybe that's why we hate that cds were marketed as "perfect sound forever."

I really doubt that women who prefer less-complex audio components feel that way because they don't like complex mechanical things, I think it might be the other way around. They see no benefit to the complexity, because a cheaper and simpler system (that may sound subjectively less real) is usually able to play the same song. Would we want to lift a 95-button, thirty-pound telephone to our ear each time if we could get dc to light bandwidth and crystal clear sound? Not me, I will take the 300 to 3 KHz lightweight model without a giant silver-clad cable because I can still hear the difference between different people's voices, and I can still get the whole conversation. I don't know, I'm just brainstorming.

[apollophono]

I would like to thank the op for the link.  It was an interesting read and
the comments were enlightening.  All in all I think there are differences
between men and women that some in this generation refuse to admit.
Of course there are exceptions to the rule.  I'm not sure you will ever
completely bridge the gap unless you appeal to things that women care
about.  Does it come in different colors (Apple).  Will make it easier to
interact socially? (Men can be loners).  Is there something about it that
can bring out the nurturer?  etc. etc. etc. 

[RDavidson]

I really doubt that women who prefer less-complex audio components feel that way because they don't like complex mechanical things, I think it might be the other way around. They see no benefit to the complexity, because a cheaper and simpler system (that may sound subjectively less real) is usually able to play the same song.

Right. You're echoing one aspect that I feel pretty strongly about with regard to womens' interest or lack thereof, of our hobby. I think, to them, the question is : Why have this stack of "ugly" components and multiple things to turn on and off and multiple remotes to simply play a song, when things like Devialet and B&O exist which provide the same functionality in a stream-lined and elegant fashion? It's not necessarily that women don't like complexity or mechanical things. I think they don't like things that seem to be unnecessarily complex, mechanical or inefficient. I think men are more "open" to extra complexity if they feel the benefit outweighs inconvenience, or in this case, aids our pursuit for the best possible in-home sound experience.

Just like with other things, such as cars, womens' perspectives (generally) differ quite a bit from men. It's not that they don't care how much horsepower a car has or what the engine is doing, it's that they're more focused on how the car looks and feels and how it makes them feel. Not saying men don't care about these things. Just saying that men and women will place more weight on differing aspects of the same car. I think it's the same with audio. It's not that women don't care about having great sound, it's that they place more weight on aspects that men don't. There are definitely overlaps. That's where opportunity lies. I think Devialet gets it. I honestly would like to see more companies approach the problem from a similar angle as Devialet, but perhaps have differing results. The American man in me has a hard time wrapping his mind around the idea of a Devialet unit replacing my stack of carefully chosen components ; BUT, I don't have a hard time wrapping my mind around the functional elegance. Note, I've never heard or used a Devialet myself. Perhaps I'd have an easier time wrapping my mind around it if I had. Naim has a pretty hi-end system that I think also falls into the gap-bridge area, but perhaps is more on the "macho" side of the fence than Devialet.

It's kind of funny thinking about this more, because I almost feel the Devialet is too elegant looking for me to give honest consideration, though I'm sure it sounds fantastic. I'm certain my wife would like it judging just by pictures of it.

[RDavidson]

I work at an engineering university.  I don't think it's the science kits that guide women to science.  I think it's a ferocious desire to make the world a better place, and an unspoken belief that men have clearly screwed things up, so let 'em play with their audio/rc aircraft/fantasy sports/cars/guns, etc. while the women get our defecation consolidated for us. 

Probably more accurate, is the recent generations have encouraged (or at least didn't stand in the way of) women to non-girly things.  Sports, etc.

Right. Science kits won't make women more interested in science BUT it doesn't help that science kits, over the years, have been targeted at a young male audience. Even the pictures on the fronts of the boxes show boys, not girls, messing with stuff. That's the point of these engineering toys for girls. The same way most boys, at a certain age, wouldn't dare play with girls' toys, I think the same is true for girls with regard to toys targeted at boys. It's about breaking down these falsely made gender barriers about what boys and girls should and shouldn't be interested in at a young age. But lets face it, boys and girls think and approach things differently and always will. Providing the tools to approach (what should be) a gender neutral interest in a way that is conducive to male/female differences in the way of learning and exploring is a good thing.

[JLM]

I understand audio as a balance between love of music and striving to obtain the best possible sound.  Men tend to be the gear-heads (perhaps to a fault) and thrill seekers while women give in to the social norms and overall are perhaps too passive.  Both can learn from the other. 

I do appreciate good product (industrial) design, ala the classic Coke bottle, Bang and Olufsen design the 70's, or Jaguar E-Type as well as form  following function and products that fit into our lives (versus the opposite).  And it seems that women appreciate those values too.  Men seem to go full steam into sound quality at the cost of all else (like a measure of one's manhood) while women are willing to accept trade-offs.  To each their own and again, hope we can all learn from one another.

Hard to comment on how women hear versus men, but women do seem to be built more for comfort and men more for roughing it (if "hot" highs are rough versus less fatiguing without).

[Russell Dawkins]

Woman are too busy being our adult supervision to have time to mess with our toys.

I think men are women's toys!

I also used to really pay attention to the opinion of women on the sound of my speakers back in the day when I built them in cottage industry numbers. Being typically completely uninterested in the technology, all they cared about was the sound and the appearance (and the price!). Men, on the other hand, would usually first ask how big the woofer was. I learned not to pay much attention to men's opinions on the sound (with one exception, and he was extremely dyslexic, which I assumed to be connected with his hearing acuity). In fact I altered one of my designs to have a 12" woofer when a 10" would have sounded better, just to sell to men!

It is said you can always tell the audiophile in the room when music is playing - they are the first to talk.