Analytical or Musical Which way to go?


The debate rages on. What are we to do? Designing a spealer that measures wellin all areas shoulkd be the goal manufacturer.
As allways limtiations abound. Time and again I read designers yo say the design the speaker to measure as best they can. But it just does not sound like music.

The question is of course is: what happens when the speaker sounds dull and lifeless.

Then enters a second speaker that sounds like real music but does not have optimum mesurements?

Many of course would argue, stop right there. If it does not measure well it can't sound good.

I pose the question then how can a spekeer that sounds lifeless be acurrate?

Would that pose yhis question. Does live music sound dull and lifeless?
If not how can we ever be be satisified with such a spseker no matter how well it measures?
gregadd
There are speakers that measure well and are musical. I don't think they're mutually exclusive ideals, I just think there aren't many designers who have both the ear and technical expertise to successfully accomplish both.
"musical" would be MY choice. I believe Richard Vandersteen would also agree since the setup for my 5A speakers was not a quest for straight line response (Richard told me that sounds awful)....but rather to simply eliminate the big peaks and valleys of the room.
I agree with Soix, the two don`t 'have' to be mutually exclusive. For me the choice has always been easy, I`ll always select the speaker or component that sounds the best and get me emotionally involved with the music. At that point measurements are quite meaningless to me.
I haven't heard live music sound dull and lifeless. It always sounds just the way live music is supposed to sound.
I don't reallly care how a speaker or anything else measures for that mastter. I am more interested in the overall performance. Maybe we should be measuring good sounding speakers so we know what to look for.