Would you buy a pair of speakers by just looking at the measured freq. response?

While the ears can tell the difference in sound between a paper cone, aluminum, ceramic, soft dome vs. hard dome, is there a measurement out there that can measure these things?

The original question in this post is an important one, vitally so for an ambiguous assumption inherently made in its wording, and taken up by the many responses that follow. This assumption concerns the phrase “to listen first”, generally interpreted to mean, anywhere.

It is my sense of things that an accurate listening for change, both better or worse, can only happen specifically, a single component change at a time, in the familiarity of one’s own system; with one’s established knowledge of its specifically selected components; of amps, DACs, servers, preamps, cabling, isolation, grounding, sources, and power supplies; within the familiarity of one’s own listening space and its unique pattern of reverberant air. Each our listening abilities is built on this foundation of familiarity.

It is also rarely discussed that never do the systems at dealer showrooms or elsewhere sound as good, or half as good, than that of our own systems. Of course it can only seem so - never mind the common fact of improper set-up, the psychological bias of familiarity immediately puts us in a position of compromise in our not being as capable of perceiving the nuance of something new and unaccustomed, and in typically taking preference for the known and comfortable.

Now, never mind one’s lack of familiarity with the entire ‘system’, a simple consideration of just one component in that entire unfamiliar system in its unfamiliar room would render any personal gauge of how it sounds, irrelevant; there being­ just too many unknown variables to account for.

It is for this reason of contextual familiarity that I only seek out those reviews, either professional or by those select members of audio forums who have established systems and listening rooms to gauge their findings by. In turn, I too base my abilities to listen on specificity, on my listening muscle memory of a system I built with the resonant intimacy of a room I know, through my ears and in my listening place.

All other kinds of general ways I ‘first’ listen, do not and cannot count, in my journey to understanding what anything one speaker, component, or room sounds like.

In friendship, kevin.

OP yes…there is a German company that makes a laser scanner of the cone or diaphragm in motion in comparison to the input signal…. You might be surprised how poorly some materials do at reproducing the input…..

@tomic601 

Ot would be really interesting to hear if the comparison has a direct positive correlation with perceived sound quality. Microphone flat frequency certainly does not. 

@ghdprentice this issue is other confounding variables. The scanner is measuring cone breakup modes … sometimes the ( in the example i am most familiar with a very popular and expensive paper 5” mid is often out of phase with the input…. So add in a mid cabinet, inert or not, a large or small baffle and even a simole filter network and correlation…might prove elusive….

My prefered designer is a measure and listen guy….. ( since 1977 )