If there's any standard, consumer audio has none but not pro-sound. Pro-sound treats the equipment as an instrument, they all dressed up in a utilitarian black box. I kind of like them for never drawing attention to themselves. The fancy metalwork, the glossy aluminium, the blink-blink looks cold as ice to me. Anyway, I listen in the dark, theses aesthetics are glaring in my sight. On sound, the ball is at your court eventually unless you end there, doing nothing more. Relax fella, who needs policing! Your listening volume and room size are vital to your choice of equipment, you make your educated speaker selection from there on, then follow by the amp.
Let's not deny that you were as blind as a bat in your early years. Learning takes time, it's largely influenced by your peers since the beginning. Time will develop your own taste of sound. Only then, you enter the realm of voicing your system for a simple reason, you know exactly you want, you have your preferences. Boys to men, this marks the exciting time for an audiophile to part from his peers and find his own destiny. Absolutely pointless to argue the taste of sound, don't you think so? It's absolutely an elephant in the room to talk about the taste of sound. He likes what he likes, he cares less if you don't like it. After all, he lives with his system, not you but that doesn't stop you from talking about it.
Some of us look up to pro-sound. Pro-sound has known for maximum dynamic and a balanced sound, they try hard to never throw off the balance, tipping to either side. This is one area we ought to bend over backwards for you can't go wrong. You and I are the victims of bad recording, especially the Chinese ones. How often you feel the justice is served to listen to American, EU or even Taiwanese recordings. Man! I do. The comparison is as clear as daylight, I can't help thinking this is a cultural thing or at worst, substandard. The Chinese recordings sound unreal, deliberately cooked up but if you like the music of the artist, bite your nails until the Chinese recording companies up their game one day.
The recording is where fidelity begins. Silly me. I should have invested in good recordings since the early days, they appreciate in value. Rarity rockets prices. As you can see, using bad recordings for tuning can lead to ill sound despite it sounds good on that said recording. About audiophile recordings, they're for the sound enthusiasts, not music lover so much I feel bored listening to them. They serve as a test disc to exhibit what their system is capable of. The system calibre is the battlefield particularly the manufacturers in their efforts to outdo the competition. Unknowingly, they dissect the music. What they do, the repro lacks the necessary binding element to hold the notes together. I care very much about the music of the same cloth, natural, cohesive and balanced, texture is important.
We, audiophiles let crazy ideas to mess up our mind in our course of producing a better sound. Hence, we search on the internet to check if someone shares the same experience, we often end up with polarised opinions. End of the day, admit it we choose to believe what is aligned with our thoughts. We have predetermined our decision. Isn't that right? Nothing beats equipment loan, you get to listen to how the equipment sounds in your system, what you hear is what you get. As the competition heats up, we have some dealers oblige to home demo.
I can't explain my fetish for sound except that sound is fascinating, it has a personality. Putting the equipment together that sings well is a flair. A friend told me acoustics is a difficult subject, you don't know what you will get. Not really, you get the hang of it if you put some efforts in it. The other told me that by a mere millimetre adjustment, the sound changes dramatically. I'm flattered.
Never neglect the contribution of the cables, it goes as far as no cables, no sound. You can stack up some high-end equipment but with the wrong cable, the sound comes short. What's the missing puzzle? Your listening intelligence. It hurts to hear a cheaper system beats big boys. Depends on which side of the fence you're at, big boys believe in you get what you pay while cheap and cheerful hope for the messiah (a giant killer). I urge you to look beyond preamp output impedance, power amplifier input impedance and the speaker demeanour in system building. It's not that easy. Leave some room for human intervention. The magic(sound) will resonate in your heart, I trust that your first high fidelity experience lasts quite some time!
Coming from mainstream audio, I collect the benefits of simple circuitry, passive preamplification, high-efficiency speaker and a minimalist system, never turn back since. Makes me a minor in today's audio community. My sound plodding comes at a cost, a young mechanic learns his skills. You don't expect his work for free. In audio and as in life, you learn either what's work or not working. Direct, clear and transient attack, my synonym of the life of music, my brand of sound. My heart melts discerning micro-dynamic like the guitar plucking and hammering of the keyboards, I know what it's like thanks to years of going to live concert. I kind of expect something from the musicians or a twist of music, a good conductor stands out from mediocre conductors. I can now comprehend music critics better, you couldn't have learned if you listen to your stereo in your man cave. Live music has much more fidelity than our system. Essentially, life is about relearning what you already knew. Laws are frequently rewritten, theories are frequently re-established, nothing is static.
The matter of facts is bass reach and extension is my kryptonite. Big symphonic pieces will definitely make my system belly up, the speakers ill behave. In retrospect, sonic purity (of simple music) is more than makes up for my bass limitation. Furthermore, I don't have a room that's capable of 20Hz. To get 20Hz, I need 28.3 feet in length. Without good integration, reaching down 20Hz is merely a self-consolation. You got high drinking by yourself.
Perhaps today's sound is heavily weighted to details. I don't know about you, I'm done with 2 hours high-resolution listening session. My brain is exhausted processing a huge amount of information. To balance details, sonic density is a remarkable quality to crow about. The British sound, roll-off at the top, forward mid, dense tone and soft bass still get a lot of following or audiophiles shy talking about? Every audiophile plays that poker face once in a while, you never know who's on who's side.
My system suffers downtime since last month, it's a nightmare. Got lucky if my speakers didn't blow up, otherwise, everything is chicken feet. Boring without music. If everything is as planned, my system should be playing music by this posting. That doesn't stop me greeting you all Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
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