Quote:
Originally Posted by bird72
Mr 61 you seem to explain it well and really hear the nuances that good stereo can do with analog. I know I'm in the bottom feeder grade of systems compared to the purist level but I am fine with that. But even on my cobbled together deal, I can hear some of what you discuss. I have tried to explain to people the piano that seems to come in at off right, kind of in back not front. If they have never heard something akin, or even close, the typical response involves glazed eyes, looks of scrutiny at my eyes, and quick changing of the subject. It probably is similar to the response when telling folk about your personal alien abduction experience. Or stint in prison.  I also believe some people can't hear the same as others. I am color defiecient (blind). I see color so I have no idea what it is, except I can't identify many colors, I can wear clothes that clash, and most people with red hair I can't tell. But Hey!!! I see color, and I am here to tell you that painting you rave about, due to colors, sucks!!!!!!!!!! Kinda like that (analogy of the feeble).....
so 61, if you haven't tried it, spring your analog analysis on a stranger in the check out line and let us know the response |
Cheaper, more current speakers will do it too, such as those $89 ea (when on sale) Pioneer FS52s. Speaker technology has come a very long ways over the last decade or so. What the high end could do 15 - 20 years ago, the technology and knowledge has filtered down to the cheaper stuff. In fact those super cheap Pioneers will image very well provided they're setup properly. What they sacrifice is the size of the sound stage, the ability to go real loud, bottom half octave, and some level of detail, but as far as neutrality and imaging with a smaller sound-stage goes for a smaller room, they're killer for the money spent.
What the big serious stuff of today does is gives you the wave front and size of the original acoustic instrument so you not only have the accurate, uncolored sound of a cello or baritone sax, etc., but you also have the three dimensional resonant body of that instrument or vocalist. Hard to explain, but with familiarity, spooky to hear.
"If they have never heard something akin, or even close, the typical response involves glazed eyes"
We sorta did something like that last night. Grandson came over to make dinner with me and brought two of his friends. Ricer, fart can Honduh driving Grandson tries real hard not to be interested, but one of his friends is getting curious about "vinyls" as he and they call it nowadays. He likes the crackly sound layered over the realism behind it. I told him the crackly, pops. bangs and clicks don't have to be part of it.
After dinner, I played the Fairfield Four that I linked above, and again, it was as it always is, with them wondering why they're not hearing anything at all coming 'out' of the speakers. One commented that they all (the vocalists) sound spread apart and that it sounded like it was way back about 20' versus anywhere near the plane where the speakers were. I showed them the youtube of them performing live, then we went back down to listen, and they started to get what this is all about ... well, guess what, they are all spread apart.
It's a completely new paradigm for them because they've never heard live acoustic music before .... just tweet tweet boom boom at 120 BPM with the license plate rattling of off their honduhs.
None of them and no one they know plays a musical instrument. Back in the day when I was kid, we almost all did. I played a tenor and baritone saxophone (that's why I'm a chapstick addict to this day). Same goes for music as it does with interest in the collector cars we love. It's mostly lost. I'm doing my wee little part to see that it isn't.
And regarding the 'crackly sound' the one kid professed to liking, I took an old early 50s mono Mercury I bought used and hadn't cleaned yet and played it cleaned with just the diskwasher brush. Yep, plenty of the noise he thought he would hear. This one needed some work and I had to clean it twice through the Okki Nokki, but once done the noise was almost gone with only a couple of light ticks on that side of the record.
So I'm sorta like a missionary with both the audio and the old cars to do my part in saving these hobbies for future generations.