In my case, when I slowly migrated through 70s-90s velvety sounding mosfet solid state amplifiers I then moved towards EL34 / KT88 ultralinear and other triode tube amps still holding some of that same type of familiar golden era velvety sound. Speakers are all over the map. I’ll won't digress into a rabbit hole too much.
Later I jumped into newer generation point-to-point wired mono tube amplifiers with modern transformers and KT150 output tubes, a more ’linear sound" or new "HiFi Sound" comments started to surface in different tube amp forum circles.
I probably align with prior posts about how more clarity, transparency, and resulting detail could be characterized by some as being a new/different type of sound compared to the older "golden era" days of equipment and HiFi sound.
Fortunately, keeping preamps / amps / tubes / speakers of both types around.
Thanks for the fun and interesting replies so far - keep them coming folks! 👍
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@jjss49 ... perfect synopsis of this is to compare the old school spendor classic 100/sp100/r2 sound vs their modern sound d9 or d7 series
..."am sure he will correct me if i am wrong on this"
Nope, not wrong at all, no correction necessary. Spot on. And, I thought your example is a good one.
Reading responses here in this thread, perhaps I tend to prefer a "natural" and "neutral" presentation from a system - one that does not sound forced or call any particular attention to itself.
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re: "tube microphones", there is a well known amplifier manufacturer in the USA, who's last designer left the company to go form his own company designing and building new tube microphones after his hobby turned in to a business. Still a bit underground at the moment, but kinda cool in any case.
Some of these great inventions in audio seem to resurface because the were/are simply that "good". Some of the Old is becoming New again too :)
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@dave_b Watch Steve Guttenberg’s YT video “Are audiophiles BS ing themselves about sound? This sums it up for me!
SG: "recalibrate your expectations to what’s really going down", unquote.
Talking about old sound vs. new sound, ...has anyone noticed SG is starting to listen to tube gear again more recently? Just gotta love it, "personal taste" :)
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@mrdecibel @decooney I apologize to you. You stated in your post, " relative to amps and speakers ", and I took it somewhere else. My best ! MrD.
No apology necessary, no limits here ...this merely highlights there are many different factors involved from the original live performances, gear used in the old days too, pickups, mics, cabling, recordings, mastering, reproduction formats, amps, speakers and more.
Kinda funny - my buddy who just retired now uses a tube DAC in his recently completed commercial recording and mastering studio. Shhhh, dont tell anyone.
Sort of made me think again about what has changed past 50 years at all layers, from original sources to play back. All relevant discussion, enjoy! 👍
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@fsonicsmith by what I hear at audio shows, "the new hi-fi sound" is sterile, precise, cold, stainless-steel metallic, operating room bright.
Not all, but what predominates
In 2019 I attended a show and one room had a world renowned amplifier manufacturer paired with a recently popular speaker coming up through the ranks.
It was 1 of 87 rooms. If it was not last place, was close to it in my mind. Simply sounded horrible. Felt bad for both manufacturers knowing their gear sounds good when paired with other partners. Just not this pairing.
Wondered if people coming in to the room would think of it as a new take on sound.
Old or New theme, good pairing and setup can make a big difference.
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When the audience sits at the center of the performance, and the musicians play around them, encircling them, Atmos might make more sense for music listening.
Most music recordings start in stereo format. Hearing cymbols and instruments playing behind you and above you is odd when comparing to live performances.
@kota1 did you happen to read feedback comments below the video you shared?
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@kota1 yes I have, a good friend owns a recording and mastering studio. While that does not qualify me as any kind of an expert, I’ve heard it, and do not prefer Atmos (yet) for my regular music listening experience, personally. This all goes back to the original source, recordings, tracks (as you mentioned) and how it’s orchestrated from the get-go. And so what recrordings are optimized for this, that we like to listen to. Not much yet, is it evolving, yes. This is the underlying point I’m making for my own usage. You have your own opinion about Atmos, good for you.
I do run a full home theater at home. Tried Atmos, went back to 5.1 DD. Like it more and most of the content I watch or concerts is still Dolby 5.1 still today.
Also, with Atmos I did some additional in-room testing with a group after hours at a local magnolia store, just for fun and to see if the sales guys had ever really compared directly. Wanted to see what average mainstream Atmos systems sound like, what regular people use. We used a full Atmos setup, all ML speakers, listened to all kinds of movie tracks and concerts we all liked. Turned up the volume pretty good to make sure we were hearing everything well. It sounded okay, kinda confused in some ways. Some tracks better than others. Was not that enjoyable for concerts videos, and you can tell when the playback is not optimized for Atmos, or the simulation modes they had on was a mess. Not an optimum set up, but tried it for about three hours. In the end, we all agree what still sounded best to all of us.
We then set up two very larger Martin Logan electrostatic speakers, two subs, and started going through movies and concerts one by one. They were all shocked how good it really sounded in plain old vanilla stereo. 5 of 5 of us actually preferred the stereo playback to our own surprise. So, go figure, at least for the test samples we did. The big stereo format was more cohesive to all of us at louder volume levels - for whatever reason. Less confused sounding. Agree, is the content optimized for Atmos. Yes, agree, in absolutely perfect circumstances, it can sound nice, but is it better. Jury is still out for some on this topic.
Will it change more in the future for the type of listening I do/prefer, maybe, yet I still have yet to hear good Atmos for music, concerts. Maybe down the road. For music, back to 2ch class A and tube amp listening for me, for now. Best of luck with your Atmos research, keep up the good work👍
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@kota1 re-read my post, already tried it. Did not like it yet. Not yet.
Yes I’ve actually chatted with Brian Lucey some, we have had some tube amplifiers in common. For common music, still prefer really good 2-channel stereo for now.
Best of luck to you on your passion and research with Atmos. :)
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@kota1 @jjss49 Nice room, ...It looks like a recording studio with all the gear, multiple sets of speakers, etc.
Nice pics! All kinds of super nice 2ch stereo gear, amps, and stereo speakers. Would love to have a nice dedicated stereo listening room to test a bunch of different stereo gear like that. The Acoustic Recipe is to sit and listen. Minimal room treatment, very nice @jjss49 that’s what I wanna do when I grow up. Super Duper Stereo room that is, very cool. Just gotta love it! 👍
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@kota1 good experiment. Sounds like fun. Gotta ask.
Have you ever heard a dedicated 2-channel HiFi system with no software involved, no pre-processing, non-oversampling (NOS) dedicated DAC, dedicated preamplifier, paired with dedicated class-A amplifiers, and really good passive (non-powered) speakers before?
Do you have a reputable Audio Note dealer near you? If so, try to go listen.
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@kota1 no, had not before, and just checked it out, thanks. Nice. You enjoy it and that's what matters. As noted "on well recorded material". Gotcha. I listen to all sorts of different and inferior recordings, so that rules me out for immersive sound.
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@decooney
Whatever floats your boat, personally I couldn’t git ’er done with just 50% of the SQ I get from an immersive setup but whatever.
Yep. Was born mid-60s, still listen to old rock bands 60s, 70s, and some 80s stuff.
My former audiophile days of securing the perfect recordings and remastered tracks just to be able to sit and listen to how things sound - are over.
Back to listening to MUSIC again, most any type of average recording. Tube, old Class A solid state, whatever. It all works. Nice not to worry about that any more.
Learned all of this from my local audio shop, open 53 years. Been going there for 38 years, no joke. Has all tube, 2-channel systems, total bliss, pure music.
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Hey @kota1 I did not mean to confuse Was referring to the lower priced AN gear, and the idea of visiting a friendly dealer to just go for a fun demo listen. Did not mean to imply to go buy it. No, I don’t own any of the higher $ AN units. There are some lower priced units, some nice used stuff out there in the under $5-10k range used. Nope, I don’t own any of that higher priced AN gear. A friendly local dealer I’ve bought other gear from has listening sessions, and I sometimes look at and listen to some of the trade-up gear. If you get a chance, it’s fun to go listen to some of the low watt gear, efficient speakers, etc. I did drool over the Audio Note Meishu Tonmeister Phono integrated amplifier once, now discontinued. And the AN Ongaku amp is out of the stratosphere for me, but fun to listen to if you get a chance some day. Both a work of art on the inside. Yes, some of the upper line AN gear is ultra expensive, agree. Best of luck.
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@overthemoon "My interpretation is detail without coloration."
That about sums it up in the fewest words. This is what the OP was about, initially.
After a few decades of messing with caps and cables, and too many different amplifiers and tubes - recently went back to following and learning from a few different amp designers and hardcore techs. Have been revisiting, learning, and understanding voltage/current and associated manual re-biasing of amps opts, or tubes, reconfiguring to full Class-A operation, and how this impacts sound too. Interesting and rewarding.
I’ve come to the conclusion I still prefer a type of sound and presentation about half way between the old era of golden sound and the new era of hi-fi sound. Finding the preamp and amp designers who strive to achieve something close to this type of sound has been an interesting journey in itself. Ears and preferences vary.
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Thanks to all for the varied and interesting replies everyone, along with your own interpretations and examples! Its clear people enjoy hunting for the type of sound they prefer most and trying different components to help get there. Keep up the good work - as they say 👍
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@hoodjem re: "Tube preamps that don’t sound like tubes".
Watched a reviewer last week who reported something about a new tube integrated amp that sounded just like a basic solid state amp. Imagine if we had [new] vinyl records coming out which sounded like early 1980s CDs.
Is it new engineers lacking ears -or- possibly no reference to what a musical system can truly sound like? Maybe being true to music is not the goal for some, or simply making more noise pointed at the listener from 8 different directions is "quad" x 2 all over again. Different strokes for different folks. Well people keep on trying stuff to see what sticks, perhaps :) The consumers will decide.
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@mahgister wow, a very long description of the word "musical". Glad you are willing to tackle it more. Just for grins, I looked up the word in the dictionary.
mu·si·cal
adjective
- having a pleasant sound; melodious or tuneful.
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