Well I will be glad to bring up the second one, from personal experience. We as objectivists always look at measurements as a defining factor and as stated by
@Purité Audio that something that measures well does sound good. I pointed out already two things I personally heard that have phenomanal measurements and absolutely did not sound good to me, I own the 887 and I have heard the ABH2 three times and did not enjoy it even in bridged configuration which would clearly create more noise/distortion/etc.
As stated originally, IT IS NOT BAD SOUNDING, so with Purite's point I see eye to eye. It just does not sound typical to everything else and may come off as unnatural, and again I pointed out the HPA4 which is using the 888 technology I believe and is very clean measurement wise does sound good. I also have a FiiO Q5s with the THX AMD amp module which is amazing too and clean as well.
But back to the topic at hand, the second thing I have realized in my audio journey which has only been just over 2 years now. Is that even products with HORRIBLE sinad, for example less than -40 db DO NOT sound as bad as you would imagine. However the threshold we seek is at least-110db and Amir at -115 for clearly inaudible issues.
I have two stereo setups at my home, one is my main with everything "flagship" measurements and it is extremely enjoyable. My other system is just for background music and sometimes "critical" listening or full attention listening. My second system has a component which does measure at less than -40 db. The dac and speakers are garbage too. So overall the entire system is crap.. and it cost me about 220 just for context. So even with these extremely poor measurements I still enjoy critical listening on this system. It absolutely doesn't bother me..
The thing that got me is this, I never knew what measurements of my chain were on this secondary system and I would listen and have a pleasant experience. Then all of sudden I found out this amplifier was actually measured and the results were grotesque. It's probably one of the worst measuring amps in every aspect and undoubtly the bottleneck of my system.
So this now raised the question, how bad is bad really? Before I saw these measurements I was having a great time listening and even after these findings it still did not bother me. Have you yourself owned any components which are this bad and also had a "flagship" system to compare. Clearly this -40 db sinad amp should be the definition of bad but when it comes to perception it actually doesn't sound "bad". I am not sure how else to get my point across for you to understand what I mean.
I am in no way saying the poor measuring system is better than my main system. Yes the tweeter does hiss and a lot of nasty things are audible but when the music is playing to me it's not as bad as I would of thought it would be based on these measurements and personally I do not hate it and it does not in any way make me want to not want to listen anymore.
I cannot complete a blind test, but what I can do is literally play music in my main listening room and just walk into my living room and switch that very same track and listen to it on this trash system. I cannot tell you a quantified amount of how much improvement I hear even though it does exist without a doubt, but all I am saying is it is not as bad you would imagine.
Furthermore, this tells me that when these people come in here saying this sounded amazing exactly like what brought this exact threat back into discussion, and that these measurements are BS this is the exact reason why they are saying that. I can see where those people are coming from and also that if you had for example an amp or equipment which is -80 db sinad you would surely be satisfied with that if -40 isn't as bothersome as you would assume or hypothesize.
In addition, this would make sense as well when you look at so many subjective reviews when people say my god this is an amazing dac or amp. Yet as soon as we see the measured performance of the unit we are like omg that's total crap and overpriced junk. That's exactly how all these companies have for years gotten away with selling you mid grade performance for a high price tag.
Lastly, with all of this in mind, you as a consumer should have an even harder time being able to differentiate the difference between products -80 to -120 cause I am telling you from experience the difference between -40 and -120[my main system] is not as crazy as it may seem or be perceived. You would think that something that is that poorly implemented would have a dramatic difference and that it would make the experience unpleasant.
The only reason I preach this is because I feel most people have never had this experience and you should experience it, hell you should have a blind test to really understand it better. 10 out of 10 times you will know which system is better measuring even if you aren't a pro listener but AGAIN the point is it's not that bad. Clearly this is my opinion, and if you really want to sit there and dissect everything bad rather than listen and enjoy the music you're going to have a miserable time with this poor measuring system
This entire post is not for the purpose for people to stop looking at measurements or ignore objectivity, it is merely a learning experience and for me it created a foundation of what the difference between a "floor" and ceiling in audio measurements truly are.