What's wrong with Redbook, really?
- Thread starter Phelonious Ponk
- Start date
You are the one that “threw down” with your baseless challenge that I got tired of hearing about so I called you out on it. I’m surprised someone hadn’t called you out on it before. There is no way you are going to cobble together a system for a few thousand or whatever your new revised figure is now that is going to sound better than a “very high-end” system. You revised your challenge to spending under $10k in order to beat a “very high-end” system so that could mean $9999.99 vs. the “few thousand” that you started your challenge with.
And do tell, what is the “pro gear” in your world beater system? The only thing that remotely came close based on your description was your “pro speakers.” However, just because a speaker has a couple of plate amps and the frequency response takes a dive starting at 60 Hz hardly makes it a “pro speaker.” My computer speakers that sit on top of my desk would almost qualify using your liberal definition for “pro speakers.” If your “pro speakers” aren’t used by any pros in the recording industry, they hardly qualify for that moniker.
What is your point?? I’m not even sure anymore. I thought your original point was that you could cobble together a system for a “few thousand dollars” using “pro gear” and beat “many very high-end” systems. Now that seems not to be the case anymore. It seems now what you meant was that you could cobble together a system for under $10K that would beat a high-end system of your choosing and you would pick all of the worst measuring components known to man so you could hold up you spec sheets and declare Charlie Sheen-like “Winner!”
Big deal. Talk about strawman arguments. You should have been the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz.
Realistic? We've been down this road before too, but it bears repeating in this context. The only reality your reproduction system knows is the recording. Period. The most accurate reproduction of that recording is the most realistic reproduction your system can give. Everything else -- everything -- is preference. Sorry to say that so definitively, as if there is no room for disagreement, but I really don't see how there can be.
Imaging and dynamics? For a lot of fundamental design reasons, I'd put good active monitors up against almost anything on both of those counts as well. I've never really had a clue what "micro" dynamics, but micro, macro or in between, individual amplifiers engineered for individual drivers with not network of passive crossover resistance to push through is one of the best ways to get speed and driver control. That and a quiet background will get you your dynamics.
Tim
To get back on Topic. There is nothing wrong with Redbook if placed properly in its evolutionary chain of digital development. But when measured against an absolute it's left wanting. Oh wait, that's another meandering thread.
Curious, Tim. If you put a good recording of piano sonatas on your current system, do you think anyone, including yourself would be fooled if they were around an obstacle, such as a doorway, so they couldn't see the system? And if not, why not?
Frank
OK, Mark. Let's go with Bruce's Genelecs. I believe the latest incarnation is the 8050A, $2k each. Add an appropriately-sized Genelec sub, another $1K, and a Benchmark DAC1 Pre, $1800. I'm not counting the MacBook as it's already paid for and earns its keep without ever being used as an audio source.
Sound? You like what you like and so do I. That's irrelevant. By any objective measure, the $6800 I just imagined spending above is going to take a whole lot of high end dollars to beat. Got a really big room, it's going to cost more, but most people don't. And acknowledging that great sound is accessible to most people, most music lovers, instead of stomping our feet and insisting that our taste is the only objective reality and that it's impossible to achieve competitive performance without tens of thousands of dollars and a ton of iron in a dedicated room...that was my point.
Tim
Sound? You like what you like and so do I. That's irrelevant. By any objective measure, the $6800 I just imagined spending above is going to take a whole lot of high end dollars to beat. Got a really big room, it's going to cost more, but most people don't. And acknowledging that great sound is accessible to most people, most music lovers, instead of stomping our feet and insisting that our taste is the only objective reality and that it's impossible to achieve competitive performance without tens of thousands of dollars and a ton of iron in a dedicated room...that was my point.
Tim
But a good meander! I'm still throwing out the line that just altering the sample rate of a Redbook track to hi-res can may make a big difference, but no-one's biting so far ..
Frank
You're kidding right Tim? If those Pro monitoring speakers are so damn good, how come the best mastering places use high-end speakers????? Places like Bruce's Puget Sound Studios, Bernie Grundman, Paul Stubblebine, Bob Ludwig, Snow Ghost, The Mormon Tabernacle Choir, a studio in Nashville (Pipedreams) that escape my memory right now, etc....... Ask yourself why that Cello, Wilson, B&W, Duntech, Pipedreams, Focal, Magico, etc. are found in these studios--esp. given their cost!
You also totally discount the reason that pro places uses dreck like Genelecs. It's that they play loud, you can hear if there's rumble and you can hear detail up the wazoo...... Thanks but no thanks!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xIyQHD98aM&feature=player_embedded
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Tim,
Rob kindly supplied this list of measurements :
Loudspeaker Resolution ETC and Waterfall plots, Distortion and Frequency Response
Dynamic Contrast Dynamic Linearity and Power Compression
Harmonic Texture Frequency Response on and Off Axis
Have you checked and compared the Genelec in all of them versus other speakers?
I'm trying to take your arguments seriously, but with statements (and opinions?) like this you make it really hard. How do you (or anyone) know what the "recording" sounds like? By hearing "live" whatever was recorded as it was recorded. No one at this forum would ever mistake the original live sound with the recording, even around the corner in the hallway; I have to believe you know this if we're going to take anything you post seriously. "Accurate" does mean reproduction as close as possible to this original, but as I posted above, since NO system is going to be completely accurate, the differences from accurate are going to be perceived and prioritized differently by individual listeners. If you can't get your mind around this concept...
I thought we weren’t talking about a desk top system Tim. Those little Genelec 8050A speakers are 17” tall and are designed to sit on a desk, not be stand mounted and be part of an audiophile’s stereo system loading a typical room. It’s a little two-way speaker. They might be great on a desk, but they are not going to take the place of any speaker that would be found in a “very high-end system” by any means. Those little 28 lb jobbies aren’t going to cut the mustard in a normal listening room.
You would have to count the cost of the MacBook as someone would have to purchase it if they were going to follow your advice and assemble a system that would “beat” a “very high-end” system.
No it won’t. If all we are comparing is a digital front end system against another digital front end system, I could match you dollar for dollar and come up with something that would play into a room vice being designed to play on top of a desk. Your Genelec speakers aren’t going to get the job done loading into a room. But none of this cuts to the chase of your original post. And that was that you could assemble a system for a few thousand dollars that would beat “many very high-end systems.” If wishes were horses, beggars would ride as they say.
Aside from the fact that you would have to define what “great sound” is, no one is saying that you can’t assemble a very good sounding system with only a digital front end for a far cheaper price than one could assemble a full range system that has the capability to play more than one front end source.
It's not a tough concept at all. I get it. I don't know what the signal sounds like. You don't know what the signal sounds like. We don't know what the recording sounds like. But the signal is still all the playback system has or knows. It can reproduce that signal with more or less accuracy; that's all it's got. How we interpret the sound, in our listening rooms, and whether or not we imagine that sound is closer or farther from out personal notions of what is "natural" is all preference and perception. If we all want to admit to that, we're done here; nothing left to talk about. But personally, I'm just like that reproduction system. I don't expect and bunch of circuits and wires to create something, to make more of the recording than it is given. I figure, like that reproduction system, all I've got is the recording and the best I can do is reproduce it the best I can. So I go for flat frequency response, low distortion, low noise, great driver control -- accurate reproduction of the signal -- then I try to get the room under some semblance of control and call that "accurate." If you can't get your mind around this concept...
How about these as talking points?
Loudspeaker Resolution ETC and Waterfall plots, Distortion and Frequency Response
Dynamic Contrast Dynamic Linearity and Power Compression
Harmonic Texture Frequency Response on and Off Axis
Spatial Projection That’s a tuff one related to Dispersion and the interaction with the room.
Should read Toole on that one
Of course paired measurements are meaningless.
Read Tooles book. They can tell you quite a bit enough so you can predict what the typical inroom response will be. Go look at Revels measurements. They have an inroom curve as part of their published specifications. They are unusual in this respect and many companies simply don't have the facilities for that type of measurements.
Rob
Thanks Rob
OK here is an example. You don't have a waterfall or ETC but you have an impulse to see how things look in the time domain. Other than that it's a decent set of measurements. It's a non powered midfield monitor and the second is a powered 8" near field
http://www.jblpro.com/catalog/support/getfile.aspx?doctype=3&docid=569
http://www.jblpro.com/catalog/support/getfile.aspx?doctype=3&docid=568
Rob
OK here is an example. You don't have a waterfall or ETC but you have an impulse to see how things look in the time domain. Other than that it's a decent set of measurements. It's a non powered midfield monitor and the second is a powered 8" near field
http://www.jblpro.com/catalog/support/getfile.aspx?doctype=3&docid=569
http://www.jblpro.com/catalog/support/getfile.aspx?doctype=3&docid=568
Rob
When was the last time you bought a pair of speaker based on measurements?
We're not, Mark, you are. The Genelec's in question would work above a console, but are pretty big for a desktop system. You seem to have this idea that all studio monitors are somehow limited to near field. They're not. Maybe some are, but most, even those made and marketed as near field monitors, do not have particularly narrow dispersion, an inability to project beyond a few meters, or any other limitations that would make them dysfunctional on stands, listened to from several meters away. I haven't even heard the Genelecs in question, but I've heard a lot of monitors and it's a pretty good guess that you could put them on stands and they'd do just fine in most domestic listening spaces. They have 8" mid/bass drivers, with -2db response down to 38hz, 270 watts per channel of power, they put out 120 dB spl music peaks, and are specifically designed and known for very even off-axis response. And all of that is without a sub. I think they will pressurize a normal listening room just fine.
Sorry, I didn't read the rest of your post. you're wearing on me. This comparison was about objective criteria -- yes, measurements, and the point is made. You don't accept the criteria and, therefore, the point. OK, I guess we're done, then, because there's no point in discussing our preferences. You've been clear that you wouldn't like listening to what I listen to and I've heard many, many hours of Def Techs and would not choose them for myself, so there's really not much for us to discuss.
Tim
See for yourself
http://www.audioheritage.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?10643-1400-Array
Well the last pair of clones I made I did sight unseen or heard based on the measurements. I am very happy with the results. Because the measurement set was so complete I could actually use them as a reference against my own measurements when I made my own pair. So the measurements can be very useful depending on how much information is divulged in them by the manufacturer
Rob
I did, problem is, I don't have the skills to compare by looking at the graphs Rob. I was hoping for a layman's translation from a speaker builder like yourself.
These are speakers by the same company, one for the home and one for the studios. Measurements are clearly not identical. So if one were to just look at measurements, what's better?
These are speakers by the same company, one for the home and one for the studios. Measurements are clearly not identical. So if one were to just look at measurements, what's better?
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