Music Lovers Speaker vs. Audiophile Speaker


In my quest for a new set of speakers to replace the Paradigm 5se I've had for 25+ years I've come across a couple of terms I'd like clarified: the musical speaker and the audiophile speaker.

What's the difference? 

I can think of two analogies, both of which may be way off mark.

One is the "mp3" analogy. mp3's dumb down the music, but capture what a music lover may consider to be the important stuff. The audiophile version is the CD.

So in this case, the musical speaker doesn't perform as well as the audiophile speaker, but it is at the right price point or has other features (particularly finish) that the listener desires.

The other analogy is the "radio station" analogy. The station doesn't dumb down the music, but it does intentionally change the sound to suit the audience. Classic rock is bass heavy, and dynamic range may be compressed to raise the overall level. An easy-listening station will have a lighter sound with different frequencies emphasized.

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128x128jimspov

Showing 1 response by coli

I found at an considerable expense after buying/selling 20k+ of audiophile equipments, that there are two main types of speakers.

Accurate speakers/active monitors. Especially the 2-way horn/woofer designs. You can hear the difference between mp3 vs aac easily with these. You can also hear the difference between resampling vs no resampling. They let you hear what was actually recorded, and how your component actually sounds like. The JBL 3 series is a very good example at an incredible value.

Inaccurate speakers. These are all over the place. Audiophile speaker belongs here. They try to make things sound better than they are. The Pioneer FS52 is one such speaker that is worth a special mention at $120 each, oh boy does it make everything sound so good!

The expensive 4k+ stuffs are in generally not worth mentioning. Oh and btw, the room is the most important piece, a bad room will never sound good, regardless of how much money you throw at it, and an awesome room will make even el cheapo setups sound like a million bucks (and therefore there is no need to spend more).