Speakers forum?

[The Vinyl Adventure]

I'm with ya... Makes sence!
I have always worked on a source first principle myself ... It's always seemed obvious that even with the best speakers and amps in the world if you play you 128kb mp3 ... ... Or dab radio ... ... through it you shooting you self in the foot! Bit when i have said "source first" before people have said it's a daft aproach and that i should concentrate on the system as a whole!
I guess your saying "concentrate on the system as a whole, but concentrate on on it from the bottom up..."
pretty obvious when you think about it I supose ....
As you were...

[Steve Toy]

Yep the holistic approch from the bottom up would be about right.

I'm off to Montpellier next week and there is department store over there called FNAC that sells some really nice speakers upto around the 2k mark. Unfortunately they hook them up to budget components using freebie interconnects, well I doubt much has changed since 2003 when I was last there.

If I recall thay had the likes of B&W, Focal, Triangle and Cabasse. Great speakers! I may pop in and see if I gan get a shop assistant to quote me some frequency response and sensitivity measurements....

Perhaps we could have a speaker room. We could call it La FNAC!

Not wishing to be derogatory about that department store, it's a great place to buy CDs. I usually found stuff in there (pre-Amazon days) that I'd been hunting for to no avail elsewhere.

[Labarum]

If the source sucks how can amplifying a bad signal even with the best amp make it better? No, it can't.The speakers can't make it better and even in a great room it will still sound like crap.The further you go down the path the bigger the problem becomes.

Start with a great source and then get a better amp later better speakers.
Most people build there audio systum backwards but I was shown early on the mistakes in that approch.

Ah yes, the "rubbish in, rubbish out" approach.

In my youth (he says stroking his white beard) conventional wisdom said the greatest problems were with the transducers - microphones and phono cartridges at one end and loudspeakers at the other. For playback systems that meant turntable/arm/cartridge and speakers. The amplifier was benign in comparison with the errors introduced by the mechanical transducers.

Enter digital sources and the problems of a front end mechanical transducer in the playback system disappeared. A digital source is now so good as is the following electronics that even ordinary production electronics will feed a decent signal to a loudspeaker. That is where the big gains are to be had by upgrading - put the cash in the only mechanical transducer in the home - the speaker.

Abandon all the compromises of a mechanical transducer at the front end and the signal is pure and undefiled all the way to the speaker which is where the problems are, and where the resources should be committed.

A decent digital source solves the "rubbish in" problem immediately.

Now I know many will disagree - but that's life.

[Marco]

Hi Brian,

Enter digital sources and the problems of a front end mechanical transducer in the playback system disappeared. A digital source is now so good as is the following electronics that even ordinary production electronics will feed a decent signal to a loudspeaker.

Meh!! If only things were so simple....

A decent digital source solves the "rubbish in" problem immediately.

[Double] meh!!!

Now I know many will disagree - but that's life.

<Cough!> Indeed. I don't even know where to start!!

I'll educate you in the errors of your ways once I've finished watching Spain vs. Switzerland in the World Cup!

Marco.

[Steve Toy]

I think it's the perfect sound for ever argument succeeded by the all cheap modern digital sources are good argument.

Actual experience (as opposed to idle theory) begs to differ. Digital transports vary in performance as does transfer from other forms of digital storage. Then there is the quality of the DAC and its power supplies and how well everything is isolated from mechanical vibration (and how well internal vibration is grounded in the case of moving components like CD or DVD transports).

Then you've got the preamp - a lot of info and dynamics can be lost there not to mention through cabling and that's before we even reach power amplification let alone the transducers at the back end.

[Labarum]

I think it's the perfect sound for ever argument succeeded by the all cheap modern digital sources are good argument.

I have read the above words five or six times, Steve, but your precise meaning eludes me. Please elucidate.

[Joe]

All this 'source first' stuff is a bit daft, really. Sticking mediocre speakers in front of a good source and amplification is just as useless as sticking good speakers in front of a mediocre source and amplification. In both cases the system will only be as good as its weakest link.

Speakers are the hardest part of a system to get right, IMO, mainly because of the vagaries of speaker/room interaction, which is why I've often preferred listening via headphones if the room is less than ideal.

[Steve Toy]

In the Eighties CD was almost the panacea and in their marketing Phiips stated it was "perfect sound forever."

It became an accepted truism from the late Eighties through the Nineties and well inot the new millenium that CD was far from perfect although the implementation of this imperfect tecchnology was improving but really good, musical and natural sounding CD players were rather expensive. They were certainly no cheaper than decent turntables.

Then in recent years the "perfect sound forever" mantra was reborn on the more objectivist audio forums on the purely theoretical basis that somehow the technology developed to make CD work properly had somehow trickled down to the budget end of the market.

It hadn't for the simple reason that it was old technology that was making digital sound pleasing to the ear in the way that power supplies were implemented and these have never been cheap and never will be unless a way is found to manufacture low-cost yet stiff, stable and quiet switch-mode power supplies. This hasn't happened yet.

Output stages are also a major challenge for designers of DACs.

The chips themselves are only a small part of the story.

Joe, it's a presentation versus communication thing. To my ears a system with good amp/speaker room interaction that sounds good but coveys the musical message in an obviously flawed fashion would do my head in for serious listening. Also, bass boom for example is more often a timing glitch at source than a speaker/room issue.

[Joe]

Joe, it's a presentation versus communication thing. To my ears a system with good amp/speaker room interaction that sounds good but coveys the musical message in an obviously flawed fashion would do my head in for serious listening. Also, bass boom for example is more often a timing glitch at source than a speaker/room issue.

I wouldn't want to listen to anything 'obviously flawed' either, Steve, but what I'm saying is that the flaw is just as likely to be in the speaker as it is in the source or amplification, so there's no point compromising on any part of the listening chain because it will compromise the whole system.

[Marco]

Joe, it's a presentation versus communication thing.

Spot on; that's it in a nutshell

I'd suggest that some people digest that one slowly.

In my experience, people tend to place too much importance on the former, and not enough on the latter when building a system (just read the type of adjectives used when folk are describing what their system priorities are), often to the detriment of their musical enjoyment, which manifests itself in the chagrin so often expressed on audio forums.

To my ears a system with good amp/speaker room interaction that sounds good but coveys the musical message in an obviously flawed fashion would do my head in for serious listening.

Me too! As they say, some get it early, some late - and some never..........

Marco.