No way can you get around room treatments. Acoustics dictate this. It is one of those physical things we live with. Can you make your voice sound the same in any enviroment? It sounds hollow in an empty room. It sounds better in a acoustical dead room. How could you possibly design a speaker that would perform well in all enviroments? It want happen. Sound reflects off of surfaces. How would you propose to stop that with a speaker. Sound venues spend a fortune with acoustical engineers trying to allow different speaker systems to sound good. Some manufacturers do build in equalizers to compensate for room acoustics. Not the best idea but I suppose better than nothing. People could spend more on room acoustics, buy cheaper speakers and have better sound than the kilo buck jobs in an average room. You just can't slap a speaker in any room and expect perfect sound without a little setup effort. Sorry, we don't live in a perfect world and science can only go so far. It is kinda like designing a tire that will work properly on every car, from a racer, dragster or whatever to the family sedan and work in all kinds of weather and conditions.
Should audiophiles be disappointed?...
I have read several reports on CES '04 and it seems to me many speakers were dependent on room treatments to realize their potential. Am I in the minority... if I'm going to pay $10-25K for a pair of speakers I would expect the design and execution of those speakers to sound outstanding in any environment and without costly room treatments to enhance their performance! Not too mention the fact if I'm laying out that kind of money I would expect the speakers to play all types of music with equal aplomb, which is not the case in some designs. I understand nearfield concepts, defraction and other room environmental conditions, but come on. If I was a speaker designer my goal would be to create a design that would sound superb right out of the box (& get better with time) and require very little set-up and tweaking.
It's discouraging to me to hear the variation in sound based on set-ups for so many of the speakers showing at CES. Maybe I expect too much, or perhaps the audiophiles of this world are expecting too little. Good speakers should sound good anywhere?
It's discouraging to me to hear the variation in sound based on set-ups for so many of the speakers showing at CES. Maybe I expect too much, or perhaps the audiophiles of this world are expecting too little. Good speakers should sound good anywhere?