Why is black so popular for components?


A current post about the looks of gear got me thinking. How did black become the most popular color for audiophile gear? I can see it being popular for home theater where the gear might be at the front of a room where you want it as dark as possible but black was the color of choice well before home theater. Maybe it is as simple as people just like it but if that were the case I would think it would also be the most popular in other consumer items such as motor vehicles.  I remember when I wasn’t always fortunate to have a dedicated stereo room and my wife would ask me why I purchased black equipment because she thought it was ugly and I agreed with her but usually, I had no choice.  For manufacturers offering additional colors may be costlier but I am willing to pay for it. Fortunately , some companies that I like offer silver usually in the face plates which works for me. Odyssey Audio has numerous color options available for their faceplates for a nominal fee but as far as I know they are an exception.  A lot of speaker manufacturers offer different colors which is great, especially if you have to place them in a communal space like a living room.  So in summary why did black become the color for stereo gear ? How many of you would prefer color options?

128x128lwin

Showing 1 response by teo_audio

black anodization is the only functional color or tone when it comes to anodizing.

Colors are difficult to affect to the same tonality when repeated, and they are subject to fading as they are all basically dyes.

thus no set of ’purple’ components will ever be the same tonality of purple, nor will they fade at the same rate or end up looking like the same purple in their various aspects of individual aging. Same for cyan, blue, red, green, orange, magenta, and any other color that can be anodized into existence.

Black is a dye but the dye is opaque.

One leaves the object or faceplate in the dye long enough and it emerges as a uniform black. same for all others that are dyed back via anodization. the tonalities match well, as they don’t deal with color, just shades.

So, when making audio gear and one is a neophyte, the maker of the chassis (CNC and anodization, all the machining,etc).. has to explain all of this to you.

That for sheer functional effectiveness in the market, there is only one color, and it is black.

Everything else, all colors and so on...are a non-repeatable variable.

the only other one that works, is at the other end of the spectrum, which is clear anodization.

So you get two choices, silver and black.

Faceplates that are metal and painted, like the NAD stuff, are subject to chipping damage. Which most of them have. So that's not a solution, either.