There seems to be very wide opinions on this point. Some believe that the older legacy stuff sounds great, even better than today. Others believe that they only get better and better, even stuff for which most valid data says that the "good" products are inaudible - how can you improve on "inaudible"? I was simply asking what "better" means to others. The answer that I get seems to be: What the masses say it is. Fair enough, but that's not not my definition.
Old stuff sounds better (sometimes) because older technologies was often really better but less convenient.
Some people like what is to them a little euphonic distortion. One's taste in that may be learned from exposure long ago. To such a person, inaudible distortion may be something like bland tasting food.
On the subject of audibility, what is inaudible to whom under what circumstances and how to best measure that, there seems to be reason to believe we aren't fully there yet in terms of our knowledge (although others may disagree).
This is true. So the proposed test will not tell us what is objectively better, it will tell us which speaker people prefer; A, B, or neither.
Plus people will prefer the speaker that has more bass, or maybe the one with a little extra"sparkle" in the treble, or the one that sound more like the audio system they grew up with, etc.
You could provide objective criteria for evaluation, like bass cutoff frequency, power compression, etc that would not predict which speaker people would prefer. You could predict that they might prefer more bass extension, less power compression, etc and survey for that. But knowing human nature, your predictions might be wrong.
An art expert might say one painting is "better" than another based on composition, tonal balance, etc. But that still won't predict which painting the man on the street might prefer.
Plus, people don't necessarily buy the best sounding speaker anyway. You could audition a set of Klipsch Hereseys for a group and they love them, but they're still going to buy a pair of 6.5" two ways or maybe one of the popular tower speakers, because there's no way they're going to shoehorn a pair of Hereseys into their living room.
Yes. In the end what matters is whether you are connected emotionally to the music.
dave
Earlier today I sat down and a song came on and a smile came over my face.
I was truly enjoying the music, I did not care if my system was perfect or if
the room was balanced, I was enjoying the music and the joy it brought me.
I think that we know 95% of the answers, its just that many people don't like the answers. Like THD is inaudible ... does not sit well with many.
You guys are confounding the "art" with the "reproduction". I can look at a poor photo of a Matisse painting and still get shivers from it, but I'd still prefer a better rendition for better enjoyment. And the closer the rendition is to the original the better.
But whats really sad , in my opinion , is spending thousands on a system , hundreds more on those audiophile recordings by artists you don't even like , then discovering that the technically ' perfect ' equipment you own bores you to tears simply because shock horror you actually prefer a ' bright , warm , bassy , etc ' sound far more than than the
impeccably neutral ' audiophile ' one that someone else insisted is the only way you can possibly enjoy music .
Personally i have one test that tells me how good a system is... are my toes tapping ?
Possibly to a degree, but I believe you can also fail to enjoy the
art right in front of you in your quest for the better rendition.
I used to be a perfectionist, Then I realized that in my search
for perfection I was failing to enjoy what I already had.
Remember pause often and enjoy the music in your quest.
Some THD is pretty inaudible, I would agree. Don't know about all of it. Also, where there is THD, there is IMD. Would you claim IMD is inaudible?
I dare say that of the posters in this thread, if anyone best knows the answers to what levels various nonlinear distortions become audible, it would be Mr. Geddess.
GedLee LLC
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