A stereo reviewer is an audiophile with knowledge, experience, and the chops to write about it.
They are essential community assets.
Theirs is a tough job. Imagine the challenge of reviewing speakers. It's hard enough for any of us to get a new pair of speakers and set them up properly. It must be a magnitude more difficult to do this for a review. Get the setup wrong and readers get an unfair evaluation of the speaker.
And then there's the challenge of passion. A dispassionate clinical review—one that's not clouded by personal bias—is what most of us think we're after. To quote Sgt. Friday, "give us just the facts".
But honestly, how many of us don't thrill to a reviewer's passion? It's actually what I look for. Their level of excitement tells me more about a product's virtues than any technical description or dispassionate analysis.
I care about how the equipment made them feel.
Because how the equipment makes us feel is what it's all about anyway.
