The Pain of Neutral Sound

[struth]

Guess monitors are more for close position listening, and dont usually do big scale imaging in same way. Maybe thats what folk are ascribing to as different.

[Pharos]

I didn't mean to imply a deliberate design divergence, just that as resolution increases we can hear more detail than the art necessities.

Alan Shaw of Harbeth says that the true test of a speaker is listening in the near field, and that almost any can sound reasonable in the middle or far field.

Newell and Holland have a thesis in their book on why the NS10 is used so much, absence of early reflections, and surprisingly low fatigue, to come to mind.

[Reffc]

I don't get any of this thread at all. The idea that studio monitors are a different beast from domestic speakers and designed to do a different job is in my opinion completely wrong and is a fairly recent idea - a product of the marketing departments of manufacturers whose target market is the the home recording/ small studio fraternity. To my mind there is only one type of speaker and that type ranges from poor at one end of the spectrum to very good at the other. There isn't one type for "listening to music" and another for "analysing the recording". Up until the late 1990s it was common for studios and domestic consumers to use the same speakers. LS3/5As, Spendors, Tannoys etc. could all be found in studios and in hi-fi shops. The Yamaha NS10s are classic example of the re-writing of history. They were never designed to be studio monitors, they were just designed to be speakers, and because there was a large market for hi-fi at the time they were sold as domestic hi-fi speakers. Now the hi-fi market is much smaller and the home studio market is much bigger and NS10s and their lookalikes are targeted at home studio owners and sold as monitors to people who believe that makes them different from other speakers. I don't believe it.

Of course, I could be wrong

BTW, I thinks NS10s sound horrible, and that isn't because they're accurate/neutral/analytical - it's because they're just horrible.

Spot on Andrew, couldn't have put it better myself.

There is a lot of guff spouted about "studio monitor sound". Speakers are either well designed and have an accurate response, or they're not. There are various degrees of "right" dependant upon quality and cost, but even el cheapo drive units carefully selected and put in well thought out budget cabinets can be made to sound surprisingly good. Conversely, very expensive drive units put into ill conceived cabinets with ill conceived crossovers will probably sound awful. People seem to confuse inaccuracy and brightness with "transparency", which is much misaligned term in its' own right (one I don't particularly like or understand since none of us know what the live mic feed or mastered recording sounded like in the first place).

Accuracy is about an input signal at any level, at any audible frequency being output at a level commensurate with the system sensitivity, to match the same input level as all other audible frequencies at output; to do that preserving the overtones and harmonic data; to do that phase correct between drive units; to do that with a smooth roll-off of the polar response (no big dips or spikes) and to do that with acceptably low distortion (which is typically audibly 2nd and 3rd order, worse in the bass region where excursion is highest and at cone break-up/driver resonance point). The latter means picking the right drive units and ensuring they're rolled off within their smooth response envelope and/or that any break up spikes are filtered out. Many woofers use specially treated cones to help smooth response, especially at resonance. Typical THD in the bass would be as high as 1 to 2% for what most would consider well designed speakers. The best drive units will manage just under 1% at full excursion.

All this is considered prior to cabinet design and crossover design.

What separates loudspeakers is not the moniker of "studio" or "home" but of design and implementation. Bright, horribly voiced 'speakers are just that....bright, horribly forward sounding speakers .

If speakers are highlighting what's happening upstream (they're doing their job) and the sound is "off" then the answer is to change the offending component which clearly is the source of trouble. If the recording sounds awful then bin it instead of blaming the speakers. when your system is revealing you will note that there is a world of difference between recordings, good and bad, but this is one area where you have little control so it becomes a filtering exercise, sometimes over many years, to build a library of music you love. It's part of the journey.

[Clive]

Alan Shaw of Harbeth says that the true test of a speaker is listening in the near field, and that almost any can sound reasonable in the middle or far field.

Very true, near field you're listening mostly to the speaker, mid or far field you're listening to the room as much as the speaker.

I've never been keen on a neutral sound though recently I've tried some equipment which is very neutral but unlike some kit it's not antiseptic. There's a difference between unpleasantly neutral and pleasantly pure. Too much of what is called neutral is to my ears not that, it's often just a bit bright or lacking timbre.

[Reffc]

Very true, near field you're listening mostly to the speaker, mid or far field you're listening to the room as much as the speaker.

I've never been keen on a neutral sound though recently I've tried some equipment which is very neutral but unlike some kit it's not antiseptic. There's a difference between unpleasantly neutral and pleasantly pure. Too much of what is called neutral is to my ears not that, it's often just a bit bright or lacking timbre.

In which case Clive, such speakers are NOT neutral but are simply "...bright and lacking in timbre".

"Neutral", "Accurate" are banded about by too many when they actually mean "bright". As above, an accurate speaker should preserve everything about the input signal to produce a timbrel-accurate natural sound. That is what "Neutral" or "Accurate" really mean.

[Joe]

This is one one of those hoary old chestnuts that crop up on all hifi forums from time to time. It poses a question that cannot be answered: what constitutes 'accurate' or 'faithful' sound reproduction? The answer, in theory, is an audio signal that has as little as possible added to it, or taken away from it, by the system through which it is played. Again, in theory, 'accurate' and 'neutral' would be the same thing, and we'd all want, and own, the same (type of) system. But of course, we don't.

After much to-ing and fro-ing, what all such discussions eventually boil down to is 'I like the sound my system makes, therefore it must be accurate/faithful to the recording, otherwise I wouldn't like it'.

[struth]

Precicely. Everyone is different, and hence their perceptions are too. One mans beautiful whisky is anothers poison etc. If you dont like the taste then why chase after it?

[Clive]

In which case Clive, such speakers are NOT neutral but are simply "...bright and lacking in timbre".

"Neutral", "Accurate" are banded about by too many when they actually mean "bright". As above, an accurate speaker should preserve everything about the input signal to produce a timbrel-accurate natural sound. That is what "Neutral" or "Accurate" really mean.

Hi Paul,

In an ideal world I'd agree with you. Do you sense a "but" coming?

But...for amplifiers it's possible to design which is very faithful to the truth, ie very low distortion. Most such amplifiers sound quite similar. Loudspeakers are not similarly blessed with low distortion today so even the lowest distortion speakers are not as true to the original sound as amplifiers can achieve. Is there such a thing as an accurate speaker? Some are more accurate than others but do most notionally "accurate" speakers sound the same? Similar perhaps but isn't that as far as it goes with today's technology?

[petrat]

BTW, I thinks NS10s sound horrible, and that isn't because they're accurate/neutral/analytical - it's because they're just horrible.

I thought they were originally used for studio playback in order to hear what the mix might sound like through a typical, crappy, transistor radio ... which most 'pop-pickers' were using back in the day.

BTW, I think this thread has the best subject title I've seen on the site

Yes, I've lived with the pain, with active studio monitors, fed by a very 'correct' digital source. I used to sit there, marvelling how they dissected the music into its component sounds and noises. Least enjoyable system I ever had.

[Pharos]

Joe,
"'I like the sound my system makes, therefore it must be accurate/faithful to the recording, otherwise I wouldn't like it'. "

This is of course sophism. (No syllogism)

I think we al; seek the perfection, and then ameliorate the nasties we get in the attempt, if we can.

I have over the last few years gradually reduced the number of CDs which I had considered as impeccable, because as my system has improved faults have been revealed in many