What about "Pro" vs. Audiophile ?????

There is a lot the audiophile community could learn from "pro" gear. However, the goals of the two are not the same at all. Take the design of a studio control room vs a listening room. The studio control room is designed to give the engineer exactly what is coming from the mics with no coloration due to the room, and usually in a small environment. This is not the goal of the audiophile's listening room. The room is part of the equation and provides the "spaciousness" to re-create the experience. That being said, it becomes easy to understand why some mastering sounds much better than others. Some engineers understand more about the playback than others. And, in some cases, the engineering is done for optimized playback in a $500 stereo in a car (not your audiophile CD I can assure you). Well, I'm a bit off track, but the point is there are two goals that are distinctly different. However, much of the means and knowledge in achieving these two goals are similar. Interestingly enough, all of the products from our company are engineered by those in the "pro" audio business (but they are all audiophiles as well).

I think most of the previous posts address the actual equipment used by the recording engineer. But the mics, amps, cabling, etc. of the musicians are also part of the "weakest link" question that lps2cd is raising.

Three observations to add to those above. 1) Sometimes, in great recordings, the weakest link is actually pretty strong and requires great equipment to do it justice, 2) All equipment adds some sort of coloration and some types are more pleasing to each listener than others -- it's a matter of trade-offs in an imperfect world, and 3) While not an expert, I wonder if psycho-acoustics comes into play -- do the ears fill in or compensate for the weakest link and will some equipment aid in that? My three cents.

Thought provoking question! I look forward to other responses since it does seem odd that equipment differences at the end of the chain are so meaningful.

As speakers and rooms are interactive devices the needs may differ. Some recordings are monitored with this in mind. If you listen to a lot of these recordings, it may well be a good idea to listen to some pro gear. Ironicaly, when this is the case it seems as though the recording monitors were actually audiophile gear. Another thing about pro vs. audiophile gear is the emphasis put on durability. Pro gear may be treated quite less gently than the way audiophiles baby their gear. Some very good pro ideas see limited use in audiophile gear for reasons I don't understand. Balanced wiring makes sense to me (at least at the upper end of the price spectum). Putting cross-overs before amps seems like a good idea to me. Putting musicians in plexiglass boxes with a multitude of microphones doesn't.

I have done a bit of recording and mixing, I'm one of those guys with a home studio. I have also taken a few recording classes from the college in my area. The class took place in a proffesional local recording studio and the teacher was the owner of that studio. The playback system (amps and monitors) was just horrible, muffled bass dull treble, and absolutley no imaging. I couldn't believe anyone could make choices based on the sound of that system. Of course I didn't say what I thought to the teacher, but he made it very clear to the class how lucky we were to be able to get a listen to a playback system like this. Personally I don't think most pro audio guys even know that hifi plaback is so much better. I think the playback system is the most important link in the recording studio. I have applied all the tweaks and tricks we know as audiophiles to the recording studio and they do as much to the sound of the recording as they do to the playback of that recording.

What prompted me to start this thread..I recently bought some "Pro Gear" a MOTU (Mark of the Unicorn) A/D computer I/O and a "Pro" Marantz Cd Player. Seems this got me on the mailing lists for every Pro Audio catalog there is. Cut to the chase... in looking through these catalogs there isn't a single interconnect that sells for more that $79.99. It just makes justiying $5000.00 or even $500.00 for a pair of RCA interconnects (not even 1/4" balanced, another topic entirely) seem ridiculous! Haven't we all claimed " a system is only as good as it's weakest link"

Is the sound we (audiophiles) achieve actually better, more revealing, more accurate, or merely different ??