I suspect this whole debate, a debate that pits one camp against another camp is probably a holdover from the 80s when such limited views of audio were developed and promulgated by audio magazines and reviewers and audiophiles. What is needed, I submit, is a paradigm shift away from these rather cliche views of sound and sound preferences toward a new definition of great or ideal sound, if there can be such a thing. And what is it audiophiles are really trying to achieve. Start with the premise we’re stuck with the recordings we’ve got, there’s no going back, for better or worse, and try to figure what is still wrong with playback system that keeps holding us back. There’s nothing that can be done with overly compressed CDs and vinyl save reissuing them in restored dynamics but that appears rather unlikely. Not everyone listens to iPods. But the die is cast.
Two Type of sound and listener preference are there more?
In our thirty years of professional audio system design and setup, we keep on running into two distinctly different types of sound and listeners.
Type One: Detail, clarity, soundstage, the high resolution/accuracy camp. People who fall into this camp are trying to reproduce the absolute sound and use live music as their guide.
Type Two: Musicality camp, who favors tone and listenability over the high resolution camp. Dynamics, spl capabilty, soundstaging are less important. The ability for a system to sound real is less important than the overall sound reproduced "sounds good."
Are there more then this as two distincly different camps?
We favor the real is good and not real is not good philosophy.
Some people who talk about Musicaility complain when a sytem sounds bright with bright music.
In our viewpoint if for example you go to a Wedding with a Live band full of brass instruments like horns, trumpts etc it hurts your ears, shouldn’t you want your system to sound like a mirror of what is really there? Isn’t the idea to bring you back to the recording itself?
Please discuss, you can cite examples of products or systems but keep to the topic of sound and nothing else.
Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ
Type One: Detail, clarity, soundstage, the high resolution/accuracy camp. People who fall into this camp are trying to reproduce the absolute sound and use live music as their guide.
Type Two: Musicality camp, who favors tone and listenability over the high resolution camp. Dynamics, spl capabilty, soundstaging are less important. The ability for a system to sound real is less important than the overall sound reproduced "sounds good."
Are there more then this as two distincly different camps?
We favor the real is good and not real is not good philosophy.
Some people who talk about Musicaility complain when a sytem sounds bright with bright music.
In our viewpoint if for example you go to a Wedding with a Live band full of brass instruments like horns, trumpts etc it hurts your ears, shouldn’t you want your system to sound like a mirror of what is really there? Isn’t the idea to bring you back to the recording itself?
Please discuss, you can cite examples of products or systems but keep to the topic of sound and nothing else.
Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ