Robert Harley on "How to Choose Loudspeakers"

[Ron Resnick]

Robert advises:

The place to start loudspeaker shopping, therefore, is in the pages of a reputable magazine with high standards for what constitutes good loudspeaker performance. After you’ve read lots of loudspeaker reviews, make up your short list of products to audition from the crème de la crème. There are several criteria to apply in making this short list to ensure that you get the best loudspeaker for your individual needs. As you apply each criterion described, the list of candidate loudspeakers will get shorter and shorter, thus easing your decision-making process. If you find yourself with too few choices at the end of the process, go back and revise your criteria.

How to Choose Loudspeakers — the absolute sound

Choosing just the right loudspeaker for your system, tastes, and home is much more challenging than picking, say, a power amplifier. Loudspeakers come in a wider range of sonic “flavors” than do other components; they must be matched electrically to your power amplifier for the best performance...

apple.news

What?!?!

You select a loudspeaker by reading a lot of reviews, and then you make up a "short list" of audition candidates based on other criteria you read about?

When do you walk into a high-end audio store and listen to a speaker? Auditioning is the last step before you write a check?

No, no, no, Robert! I want people to learn about loudspeakers by walking into high-end audio stores and listening to everything in the store and learning about different types of speakers and beginning to figure out the kind of sound one likes and beginning to understand how their favorite recordings sound different when played back on different types of speakers!

 

[Kingrex]

Yea, I feel Robert missed the mark on this one.

 

[Another Johnson]

Many people do not have even one high end store within 200 miles of their house. Most people are not going to be able to audition every speaker in a high end store, for lack of patience (either their own or the store staffs’).

The magazines give entertaining suggestions for preparation of a short list, as do forums.

For those whose lives do not revolve around trying to find the best at any cost, Harley’s advice is as good a starting point as any, and relatively inexpensive. It’s just a starting point, and it’s just a magazine. Why pick a fight over every one of his editorial positions?

 

[Ron Resnick]

Why pick a fight over every one of his editorial positions?

Please re-count your evidence. Every one? 12 times per year? No.

More like once every three years. Only on issues I feel strongly about.

 

[bonzo75]

Robert advises:

The place to start loudspeaker shopping, therefore, is in the pages of a reputable magazine with high standards for what constitutes good loudspeaker performance. After you’ve read lots of loudspeaker reviews, make up your short list of products to audition from the crème de la crème. There are several criteria to apply in making this short list to ensure that you get the best loudspeaker for your individual needs. As you apply each criterion described, the list of candidate loudspeakers will get shorter and shorter, thus easing your decision-making process. If you find yourself with too few choices at the end of the process, go back and revise your criteria.

How to Choose Loudspeakers — the absolute sound

Choosing just the right loudspeaker for your system, tastes, and home is much more challenging than picking, say, a power amplifier. Loudspeakers come in a wider range of sonic “flavors” than do other components; they must be matched electrically to your power amplifier for the best performance...

apple.news

What?!?!

You select a loudspeaker by reading a lot of reviews, and then you make up a "short list" of audition candidates based on other criteria you read about?

When do you walk into a high-end audio store and listen to a speaker? Auditioning is the last step before you write a check?

No, no, no, Robert! I want people to learn about loudspeakers by walking into high-end audio stores and listening to everything in the store and learning about different types of speakers and beginning to figure out the kind of sound one likes and beginning to understand how their favorite recordings sound different when played back on different types of speakers!

did RH ever date as a teenager? Lots of criteria, kept changing, wanted to try out blondes, brunettes, redheads, different nationalities and body types, at work, at university, random women that popped up on hifi shark, and finally settled in late 30s. Only if everyone knew what the exact criteria to marry was even they were teens

 

[DetroitVinylRob]

This is why public discourse, exchanging viewpoints, and debating ideas is so necessary. Why except anything without understanding it? And better yet, why settle for someone else’s choice without experiencing it??

So selecting a loudspeaker is like picking a girlfriend…

I get it. Makes total sense, and sounds like fun.

Ironically in this hobby I have said for literally decades that loudspeakers, power amplifiers, cartridges, are like picking a girlfriend. You don’t pick what does it for me, and I won’t pick what does it for you. That would be absurd. Enough said.

 

[abeidrov]

I think RH gives a sound advice. There is no point going to any hi-end store without doing your homework first. You might end up with whatever a dealer carries at a time. And you’ll be lucky if it’s WA or Magico or other well-known brand with a good resell value.

 

[bonzo75]

I think RH gives a sound advice. There is no point going to any hi-end store without doing your homework first. You might end up with whatever a dealer carries at a time. And you’ll be lucky if it’s WA or Magico or other well-known brand with a good resell value.

so you expect high end stores to store many speakers not rated by magazines?

also, how will you do your homework if you don’t go to high end stores to listen? Just based on ratings, budget, and looks?

what about those who have money, but because of lack of exposure, they don’t know the worth of a 1k speaker, 10k speaker, 100k, how much should they spend, what kind of sound they like, what to listen for. Even magazine or forum jargon cannot be followed until you experience those hifi attributes yourself.

just check the long term journey changes here of people who both listen and read

 

[Another Johnson]

Please re-count your evidence. Every one? 12 times per year? No.

More like once every three years. Only on issues I feel strongly about.

My question is rhetorical. It’s your forum. What better place than here to air grievances? (Also rhetorical).

This is at least the third RH bashing thread in recent history. Maybe he and TAS are important enough to generate interest. RH and TAS represent the influencer establishment. WBF represents the future of influencing.

I can guarantee you that your approach to choosing and obtaining the Danish Pendragons is not a common one. Your willingness to wait for years before installing them may be unique. You are a patient man with resources to sustain your patience.

 

[bonzo75]

My question is rhetorical. It’s your forum. What better place than here to air grievances? (Also rhetorical).

This is at least the third RH bashing thread in recent history. Maybe he and TAS are important enough to generate interest. RH and TAS represent the influencer establishment. WBF represents the future of influencing.

I can guarantee you that your approach to choosing and obtaining the Danish Pendragons is not a common one. Your willingness to wait for years before installing them may be unique. You are a patient man with resources to sustain your patience.

I think it’s fair to keep supposed influencers like TAS in check. These guys need to justify the influencing based on content, not take it for granted because of no. of readers who sign up for entertainment. With great power comes great responsibility, and if RH wants to be an Avenger he should act for the betterment of the audiophile society rather than writing such gibberish

Agree with Fremer’s listening or not, I think he is a good example of being a responsible writer/influencer.

 

[Ron Resnick]

My question is rhetorical. It’s your forum. What better place than here to air grievances? (Also rhetorical).

This is at least the third RH bashing thread in recent history. Maybe he and TAS are important enough to generate interest. RH and TAS represent the influencer establishment. WBF represents the future of influencing.

I am genuinely interested in your opinion. I certainly want to know if members think I am doing something unfair by commenting on another publication's editorial. I truly do not conceive of a thread counter-commenting on a major topic in our hobby as airing a grievance.

I do not consider my long reply to Robert's editorial about long-term loans to constitute "bashing." At the serious risk of breaking my arm patting myself on the back I think my reply to Robert's editorial about long-term loans was comprehensive, thoughtful and detailed. Do you disagree?

Why isn't debating policies and challenging different viewpoints an interesting intellectual aspect of the hobby?

 

[steve59]

RH only recommended reading up before listening and that's not a bad idea, especially regarding hifi speakers.

 

[abeidrov]

so you expect high end stores to store many speakers not rated by magazines?

also, how will you do your homework if you don’t go to high end stores to listen? Just based on ratings, budget, and looks?

what about those who have money, but because of lack of exposure, they don’t know the worth of a 1k speaker, 10k speaker, 100k, how much should they spend, what kind of sound they like, what to listen for. Even magazine or forum jargon cannot be followed until you experience those hifi attributes yourself.

just check the long term journey changes here of people who both listen and read

No, I do not expect any high end store to carry a variety of speakers rated or not rated does not matter. There is no store that would showcase WA, Steinhem, Karma, Devore, Cessaro, Zellaton, Sigma, Rockport, AER at the same time. These are just some of the brands I would like to audition. You gain experience by reading magazines, forums, talking to other audiophile and the dealers you trust. Then you select specific brands and models you are after, and if you are very lucky, you may find them available for audition.

Going to a random hi-end store and asking them: show me your best speakers is pretty useless imho.

 

[bonzo75]

Going to a random hi-end store and asking them: show me your best speakers is pretty useless imho.

Agreed, but if you go to a few random stores and a few random audiophiles, you will sooner or later start becoming more efficient at it.

You do not know what is required to live to 125, that does not mean you should take up chain smoking and drinking vodka non stop.

if one does not know the answer to something, putting a specious process around it that too in an editorial is just bad

 

[Republicoftexas69]

I am genuinely interested in your opinion. I certainly want to know if members think I am doing something unfair by commenting on another publication's editorial. I truly do not conceive of a thread counter-commenting on a major topic in our hobby as airing a grievance.

I do not consider my long reply to Robert's editorial about long-term loans to constitute "bashing." At the serious risk of breaking my arm patting myself on the back I think my reply to Robert's editorial about long-term loans was comprehensive, thoughtful and detailed. Do you disagree?

Why isn't debating policies and challenging different viewpoints an interesting intellectual aspect of the hobby?

Personally I agree with your commentary Ron. RH and AS article can be taken into consideration as part of the selection process, but should not be the all deciding formula. You are not wrong IMOH.

 

[bonzo75]

I am genuinely interested in your opinion. I certainly want to know if members think I am doing something unfair by commenting on another publication's editorial. I truly do not conceive of a thread counter-commenting on a major topic in our hobby as airing a grievance.

I do not consider my long reply to Robert's editorial about long-term loans to constitute "bashing." At the serious risk of breaking my arm patting myself on the back I think my reply to Robert's editorial about long-term loans was comprehensive, thoughtful and detailed. Do you disagree?

Why isn't debating policies and challenging different viewpoints an interesting intellectual aspect of the hobby?

your comments are fair, it is no RH bashing. There are people here who have made decisions based on TAS write ups and share equipment in common with the reviewers they might be sensitive

 

[Ron Resnick]

Going to a random hi-end store and asking them: show me your best speakers is pretty useless imho.

Respectfully, "show me your best speakers" is not my suggestion. My suggestion is more like "may I please wander around and hear everything in the store."

 

[ssfas]

Robert advises:

The place to start loudspeaker shopping, therefore, is in the pages of a reputable magazine with high standards for what constitutes good loudspeaker performance. After you’ve read lots of loudspeaker reviews, make up your short list of products to audition from the crème de la crème. There are several criteria to apply in making this short list to ensure that you get the best loudspeaker for your individual needs. As you apply each criterion described, the list of candidate loudspeakers will get shorter and shorter, thus easing your decision-making process. If you find yourself with too few choices at the end of the process, go back and revise your criteria.

How to Choose Loudspeakers — the absolute sound

Choosing just the right loudspeaker for your system, tastes, and home is much more challenging than picking, say, a power amplifier. Loudspeakers come in a wider range of sonic “flavors” than do other components; they must be matched electrically to your power amplifier for the best performance...

apple.news

What?!?!

You select a loudspeaker by reading a lot of reviews, and then you make up a "short list" of audition candidates based on other criteria you read about?

When do you walk into a high-end audio store and listen to a speaker? Auditioning is the last step before you write a check?

No, no, no, Robert! I want people to learn about loudspeakers by walking into high-end audio stores and listening to everything in the store and learning about different types of speakers and beginning to figure out the kind of sound one likes and beginning to understand how their favorite recordings sound different when played back on different types of speakers!

I suspect he wrote that for the benefit of the magazine owner who pays his wages. Skip on a couple of pages to page 120 in his book and he gives diametrically opposite advice, exactly as you suggest should be the way to choose speakers.

The alternative approach is further down the web page, but they have taken out the headings that are in the book, so you would probably have stopped reading in disgust and without the headings the context is lost.

Of the speakers I've owned since 2009/10, I never read a review before buying, including my current Wilson speakers. The speakers before that I bought in 1999 and I can't remember that far back.

 

[microstrip]

Robert advises:

The place to start loudspeaker shopping, therefore, is in the pages of a reputable magazine with high standards for what constitutes good loudspeaker performance. After you’ve read lots of loudspeaker reviews, make up your short list of products to audition from the crème de la crème. There are several criteria to apply in making this short list to ensure that you get the best loudspeaker for your individual needs. As you apply each criterion described, the list of candidate loudspeakers will get shorter and shorter, thus easing your decision-making process. If you find yourself with too few choices at the end of the process, go back and revise your criteria.

How to Choose Loudspeakers — the absolute sound

Choosing just the right loudspeaker for your system, tastes, and home is much more challenging than picking, say, a power amplifier. Loudspeakers come in a wider range of sonic “flavors” than do other components; they must be matched electrically to your power amplifier for the best performance...

apple.news

What?!?!

You select a loudspeaker by reading a lot of reviews, and then you make up a "short list" of audition candidates based on other criteria you read about?

When do you walk into a high-end audio store and listen to a speaker? Auditioning is the last step before you write a check?

No, no, no, Robert! I want people to learn about loudspeakers by walking into high-end audio stores and listening to everything in the store and learning about different types of speakers and beginning to figure out the kind of sound one likes and beginning to understand how their favorite recordings sound different when played back on different types of speakers!

Well, I must statistically agree with RH perspective, that is is directed to his tens of thousands of readers scattered around the world, not a few extremely impassioned inhabitants of California that can easily afford listening to most speakers in excellent conditions just walking around. It is a realistic and valid perspective, that will successfully work to most people.

IMO your perspective is only valid to a few aficionados. Most people do not come to this hobby to learn, but to enjoy music and the social aspects of high end.

 

[Another Johnson]

Respectfully, "show me your best speakers" is not my suggestion. My suggestion is more like "may I please wander around and hear everything in the store."

It must be a great experience to “wander around “ and play common, familiar programs with equivalent wires and electronics on “every speaker “ in the store.

It can’t be done without salesperson assistance here. I can arrange for a similar demo of a few candidates if I call in advance.

What do you really expect to learn by listening to Sonus Faber driven by McIntosh in one room compared to Wilson driven by Burmester in another? Especially when the McIntosh system is being fed by one TT/cartridge combo, and the Burmester is being fed by another? For the literalists, that’s just one example of the myriad of combinations one can find in demo systems.

Frankly I never feel like I know much about a speaker until it’s broken in and I’ve heard it at home. I can quickly decide what it sounds like in the demo … but that rarely matches, for good OR bad, what it sounds like in my own system.