Kijanki wrote:
"Well - I'm my own playback engineer and I choose the sound I like."
I think most of us do this to some extent, since we put a fair amount of effort into modifying our system and keep the changes that we think make things sound better.
But what makes things "sound better?" Sometimes it's a change in resolution. Sometimes it's a shift in tonal balance. Sometimes it's improved dynamics. And so on. In each case, we use our experience and our taste to make a judgment. The point of this thread is to talk about another aspect of one's system that may make things sound better.
We each weight these things as we see fit. Some people might not care about anything but resolution or pinpoint imaging, to the exclusion of everything else. Some people, like Newbee, don't think neutrality exists. So these people weight neutrality zero when considering system changes. You seem to prefer some degree of coloration, so there are at least some aspects of neutrality you don't care about. But to me, if I make a change and different instruments sound more different (while, obviously, remaining true to what they are), as Bryon suggested in his original post, then I've affected something that may make the music more enjoyable.
As for being one's own engineer, it's intriguing to think that we could individually EQ every song in our collection. It would even be worth the effort on some tracks. But, honestly, I think compression is our biggest enemy in the source, and I don't see a way to restore that without the cooperation of the record companies.
"Well - I'm my own playback engineer and I choose the sound I like."
I think most of us do this to some extent, since we put a fair amount of effort into modifying our system and keep the changes that we think make things sound better.
But what makes things "sound better?" Sometimes it's a change in resolution. Sometimes it's a shift in tonal balance. Sometimes it's improved dynamics. And so on. In each case, we use our experience and our taste to make a judgment. The point of this thread is to talk about another aspect of one's system that may make things sound better.
We each weight these things as we see fit. Some people might not care about anything but resolution or pinpoint imaging, to the exclusion of everything else. Some people, like Newbee, don't think neutrality exists. So these people weight neutrality zero when considering system changes. You seem to prefer some degree of coloration, so there are at least some aspects of neutrality you don't care about. But to me, if I make a change and different instruments sound more different (while, obviously, remaining true to what they are), as Bryon suggested in his original post, then I've affected something that may make the music more enjoyable.
As for being one's own engineer, it's intriguing to think that we could individually EQ every song in our collection. It would even be worth the effort on some tracks. But, honestly, I think compression is our biggest enemy in the source, and I don't see a way to restore that without the cooperation of the record companies.