The hydrologic evolution of oceanic crust, from vigorous hydrothermal circulation in young, permeable volcanic crust to reduced circulation in old, cooler crust, is thought to cause a corresponding evolution of geophysical properties such as velocity, density, and resistivity. This geophysical aging has been studied previously by comparing young and old crust formed at a slow spreading rate, as well as young crust formed at a moderate-to-fast spreading rate. Here we extend this analysis to the upper 131 m of volcanic crust at Hole 801C-old crust formed at a spreading rate faster than that of crust in previous studies. The geophysical aging of the upper basaltic crust at Hole 801C includes competing changes on intergranular and intraflow scales. At the intergranular scale, as seen by laboratory measurements on 2.5-cm core plugs, greater basalt alteration increases porosity and decreases matrix velocity and matrix density; alteration therefore dramatically decreases bulk velocity and bulk density. The same alteration effects on matrix properties are evident at the intraflow and interflow scale, as seen by logging tools with ~0.5-m vertical resolution, although that scale includes macroporosity unsampled by core plugs. Average velocities and densities measured in plugs and logs agree, possibly because alteration has filled cracks and interpiUow voids, thereby reducing macroporosity and increasing velocity and density. This meter-scale increase in velocity and density may dominate the plug-scale reductions, so that the average upper crustal properties at Hole 801C are as expected for very old crust: substantial alteration resulting in layer-2b velocities. Alternatively, the agreement between plugs and logs, as well as the observation of layer-2b velocities, may primarily be the result of the strong predominance of flows over pillows, because flows have much lower initial porosity than do pillows. Geochemical and geophysical logs discriminate three zones in the logged basement interval at Hole 801C: an upper sequence of altered alkalic basalts, a lower interval of tholeiites, and an intervening zone of hydrothermal precipitate and associated extensive basalt alteration. Imaging logs delineate the pervasive horizontal layering of filled fractures and of flow boundaries. A fossil hydrothermal zone, with predominantly silicon and iron composition and with extremely heterogeneous geophysical properties, includes some porosities and conductivities that are far above those expected in old oceanic crust.