I disagree with a couple of the premises. Particularly:
" objectively neutral speakers doesn’t come alive until the volume is turned up, but will lack the perception of detail, because those details come from exaggerated and often rough treble responses.""
Now I am crazy about treble, and clarity which is lots and lots of tiny detail, particularly in the treble.
I would say the details comes from LOSING the roughness in the treble. My experience has been only annoying treble, rough treble is what bothers folks. the moment the treble roughness, grunge, distortion is SOLVED, the same level of loudness that before was so annoying, is no longer bothersome or annoying at all.
Rough annoying treble is NEVER the speakers fault. It is always somewhere earlier in the signal chain. You can buy speakers which ameliorate the problem caused upstream, but that is just applying a band aid.
Then another issue is defining ’neutral’. What does the op mean by neutral? Flat frequency response? Then ’doesn’t come alive’. What is meant by ’coming alive’? that is does not sound ’good’ Who’s good? usually I want a little warmth in particularly the midrange. Without it, most music become one dimensional, flat. Analytical.
I am not trying to annoy.. I just am interested in the topic. But I think it is not about the speaker. it is about what the speaker gets!
My interest is mainly in clarity wanting all I can garner, and still not ’going lean’. which is always the problem (in my experience) of reaching for clarity.detail. Nearly everything that (in the past) I found to increase clarity, also brought a decrease in warmth, to the point of becoming lean sounding. A lot of what I buy is to get more clarity. detail, but NOT give up the midrange naturalness.
My speakers are Magnepan 20.7 BTW.
" objectively neutral speakers doesn’t come alive until the volume is turned up, but will lack the perception of detail, because those details come from exaggerated and often rough treble responses.""
Now I am crazy about treble, and clarity which is lots and lots of tiny detail, particularly in the treble.
I would say the details comes from LOSING the roughness in the treble. My experience has been only annoying treble, rough treble is what bothers folks. the moment the treble roughness, grunge, distortion is SOLVED, the same level of loudness that before was so annoying, is no longer bothersome or annoying at all.
Rough annoying treble is NEVER the speakers fault. It is always somewhere earlier in the signal chain. You can buy speakers which ameliorate the problem caused upstream, but that is just applying a band aid.
Then another issue is defining ’neutral’. What does the op mean by neutral? Flat frequency response? Then ’doesn’t come alive’. What is meant by ’coming alive’? that is does not sound ’good’ Who’s good? usually I want a little warmth in particularly the midrange. Without it, most music become one dimensional, flat. Analytical.
I am not trying to annoy.. I just am interested in the topic. But I think it is not about the speaker. it is about what the speaker gets!
My interest is mainly in clarity wanting all I can garner, and still not ’going lean’. which is always the problem (in my experience) of reaching for clarity.detail. Nearly everything that (in the past) I found to increase clarity, also brought a decrease in warmth, to the point of becoming lean sounding. A lot of what I buy is to get more clarity. detail, but NOT give up the midrange naturalness.
My speakers are Magnepan 20.7 BTW.