I blow hot air.

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: July 6th, 2023

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  • Neat, more open competitive standards is nice, but it doesn’t matter how much your phone/tv “supports” spatial audio, it’s not going to sound any different from stereo coming out of the built-in speakers.

    Imo, the qualify differences are only really noticeable across these speaker setups:

    1. Built-in speakers $0 (mono/stereo, anything above is indistinguishable)
    2. Soundbar $200-$500 (mono/stereo)
    3. Basic soundbar with auxiliary surround sound speakers + subwoofer $500-$2000k (surround sound starts to matter) 3.5. Maybe speaker towers?? I have very little experience with those.
    4. Actual surround sound with near-professionally installed/positioned/calibrated speakers in a properly shaped room $3000k+ (Dolby/DTS:X starts to matter)

    In my experience, no audio track is going to break those barriers and ceiling reflected noise is basically placebo. You can fudge it decently well with headphones and fancy spatial audio tracks, but even that isn’t quite the same.

    I’m no audiophile, though, so your mileage may vary.







  • Groceries cost the same with or without a credit card. The store is paying the card every transaction, not the user. Annual fee cards need more scrutiny and are often not worth it unless you’re playing the travel points game (and what a game it is). No card in existence is worth it unless you pay it off in full every month.

    They even have non-cashback/points perks that are worthwhile, like rental car/travel/phone insurance. My family has saved hundreds with free phone insurance from a card. My screen stopped working, and I got a new one for $30 from an authorized repair joint, which otherwise would have cost like $300.

    So, yes, cards do give you free money so long as you don’t hold a balance.