bcoombes wrote:

You conclude that reviewers have abandoned the square
wave, but did they ever use it much anyway?

Without in anyway claiming to be an expert on these things
I vaguely seem to remember that most amp tests in the
HI-Fi mags of the 1970's and 80's had a square wave read
out printed somewhere in the test. I also *seem* to
remember these were at 1k ...but of course these are
distant and increasingly dim memories.

Could be...I only started looking in the 90s. I did have
some passing interest much earlier but memories are very dim
indeed. I have the impression that older hi-fi mags commonly
expected a narrower, more hands-on and informed audience,
and I guess some mags continued to address that audience
even when it had mostly disappeared.

The likes of Hi-Fi News now pander to the ignorant by merely
convincing them they've learned something, which apparently
is not hard to do. It no longer needs to be useful, because
readers won't actually use it. They also pride themselves on
posh purpose-designed test sets that produce nice
print-ready pictures. There's not much titillation in a
square wave.

It could also be that the kinds of problems highlighted by
square wave testing are no longer issues. How much variety
would be apparent in comparing square wave tests of various
audio amps these days?

Ian