The focus and air lie


There always have been some kind of fashion in the way a system sounds and since a few years it seems that more and more people are looking for details, air and pinpoint focus / soundstaging.
There's a lot of components, accessories and speakers designed to fill full that demand... Halcro, dCS, Esoteric, Nordost, BW, GamuT are some examples.

This sound does NOT exist in real life, when you're at a concert the sound is full not airy, the soundstage exist of course but it's definitely not as focused as many of the systems you can hear in the hifi shops, it just fill the room.

To get that focus and air hifi components cheats, it's all in the meds and high meds, a bit less meds, a bit more high meds and you get the details, the air, the focus BUT you loose timbral accuracy, fullness.
It's evident for someone accustomed to unamplified concert that a lot of systems are lean and far from sounding real.

Those systems are also very picky about recordings : good recordings will be ok but everything else will be more difficult...
That's a shame because a hifi system should be able to trasmit music soul even on bad recording.
In 2008 this is a very rare quality.

So why does this happened ?

Did audiophiles stopped to listen unamplified music and lost contact with the real thing ?

Is it easier for shops to sell components that sounds so "detailled and impressive" during their 30mins or 1 hour demo ?
ndeslions

Showing 4 responses by dpac996

"You can feel the air in your face and body if you are seating in front rows"
ahh that would be something else...make sure you don't inhale---anymore

hi-fi systems are not necessary to get the "soul" of the music...you are either moved emotionally by a song or not. How many of you heard a song for the first time on a high end system and felt emotional with it right then and there, vs the stuff you hear on radios, cars, stores, live venues....etc. For me, everything that I love i've heard 99.9% elsewhere (outside of my system).

Most hi-fi systems that i've heard and assembled (until now) snare us to listen to the top recordings only, and head for the door, or volume ctrl on inferior recordings (wide, flat bandwidth, neutral equipment...etc).
For me there is usally an inverse relationship b/t recording quality and how I REALLY feel about the music. So, the typical high-end vision of the "purist" approach has screwed me somewhat; I love the equipment, love those times when the magic combination is in play, but i'm sometimes repulsed by the expense and effort to, in the end not, have something that brings me maximum joy for the music I love the most. The large scale abandonment of truly high quality analog tone circuits is one primary cause to the merry go round, I suspect for a lot of folks.
Shad, I was wondering about that too...looks like there was some inside scoop and the powers that be, well, beed.
Too bad as that was one of the better exchanges we've seen in some time.
Mrt/Trel, right on the money.
What's funny/sad is that there is a body of audiophools who assume they are more passionate about music than the dude jamming on an iPod (plain old snobbery)...in any event who cares. We all listen differently, and as Shad pointed out he likes listening piecewise to determine the elements that constitute the 'sound'. Me, I like hitting play and not thinking, but just content to be immersed in a wall of sound.
Lately, however, i've been really bent and upset with the approach i've taken over the years, that of the "purist". I've since discovered DEQ/DRC and my eyes/ears have been opened. Played out, are my days (of) obsessing about power cords, subtle differences among line level "neutral" preamps, or interconnect minutia. I'm so burned out by this approach I almost ditched it all. These tiny "voicing" inflections PALE in comparison to the real changes (hugely positive) I've been experiencing with DSP equalisation. Sorry if I seem like i'm shouting, but this is way too cool and important to not share. If this approach is embraced by more of us it will gain traction. There are a few experienced audiphiles here that have embraced this technology already. I would love to see a whole new category on audiogon about this. In turn, of course, we will generate new details ( do i have the optimal filter functions, what filter lengths are best, how clean was the phantom power supply to my recording mic) to feed our obsession -lol
Happy trails



have you all gone mad? Who cares? Why not just shut up, stop typing and listen to the damen thing that makes you so-called happy?