What can one say about a speaker

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....just by listening? Say you're listening to a CD that you are
familiar with over unknown and unseen speakers. What can you say
about that speaker? I'm not asking here about your reaction to the
sound; just about the speakers themselves. For instance, could you
confidently predict the MSRP range, say under $200 or over $2000?

Norm Strong

 

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In article <MrrCc.97734$Sw.8008@attbi_s51>,
normanstrong <normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote:
>...just by listening? Say you're listening to a CD that you are
>familiar with over unknown and unseen speakers. What can you say
>about that speaker? I'm not asking here about your reaction to the
>sound; just about the speakers themselves. For instance, could you
>confidently predict the MSRP range, say under $200 or over $2000?

No. There are expensive speakers that won't suit your tastes and ones from
smaller/internet manufacturers that are priced less than the typical MSRP of
5-10X parts cost. Some one could also throw in a DIY ringer with a zero
markup disregarding their time.

You can judge frequency response on and off-axis, dynamic abilities, distortion,
imaging, and sweet spot size. With the right source material you could also
get a feel for bass extension/quality.

Looking gets you whether anything special is required for amplification
(like outboard XO + multi-amplification) and size/shape/finish.

What else is there?

--
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Life is a terminal sexually transmitted disease.

 

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"normanstrong" <normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:MrrCc.97734$Sw.8008@attbi_s51...
> ...just by listening? Say you're listening to a CD that you are
> familiar with over unknown and unseen speakers. What can you say
> about that speaker? I'm not asking here about your reaction to the
> sound; just about the speakers themselves. For instance, could you
> confidently predict the MSRP range, say under $200 or over $2000?
>
No, but if the MSRP of two speakers differs by one order of magnitude ($200
vs $2000) I could pick the more costly.

 

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"normanstrong" <normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:MrrCc.97734$Sw.8008@attbi_s51...
> ...just by listening? Say you're listening to a CD that you are
> familiar with over unknown and unseen speakers. What can you say
> about that speaker? I'm not asking here about your reaction to the
> sound; just about the speakers themselves. For instance, could you
> confidently predict the MSRP range, say under $200 or over $2000?
>
> Norm Strong

Nope. If I were blindfolded and heard a set of B&W's at any price
range, I'd swear I was listening to a set of "white van" speakers.
I've listened to B&W's (every line of theirs) and still to this day ,no
matter the style of music, I can't believe people buy these things. They
are neither accurate or pleasant sounding. I was shocked to hear such
deformed music reproduction. There's just something wrong with B&W's to
my ear. YMMV
Same store I bought my Revels at carries (carried) the B&W line,
especially since the store owner is British. Everyone that came in to
buy B&W's would invariably walk out with the equivalent Revels if they
took a moment to listen. I watched one man go nuts as he came in to Buy
B&W's since he had read so much about them only to be totally shocked by
how poor they sounded. He kept walking to the Revels which he had never
heard about. He left angry.
He came back 2 days later. Listened again. Left.
Came back mad as he wasn't getting what he expected. Left again mad. He
had raed so much on B&W in various magazines apparently. (net too?)
Came back and bought the Revels.
The salesman, who is now a district rep for another speaker company well
known on here, said it happened all the time. B&W is one of the worlds
most well known speaker companies and spend more on research than any
one else, yet......
Now the store has little in the way of B&W, only ordering on customer
request with payment in full up front. They've narrowed their whole line
down in favor of Revels and V/S's (VS's are very popular now, flavor of
the month so to speak).
John

 

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"normanstrong" <normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:MrrCc.97734$Sw.8008@attbi_s51...
> ...just by listening? Say you're listening to a CD that you are
> familiar with over unknown and unseen speakers. What can you say
> about that speaker? I'm not asking here about your reaction to the
> sound; just about the speakers themselves. For instance, could you
> confidently predict the MSRP range, say under $200 or over $2000?
>
> Norm Strong

Fortunately the quackery factor isn't so prevalent that the range would
spread a factor of 10. You still +/- get what you pay for. (at least I hope
so) Except of course ultra exotica. I think between $10,000 and $100,000
that it might be possible to get 'em mixed up.

I'm guessing between $200 and $2000 that you could probably reliably put
loudspeakers in 3 categories. Of course keeping listening environment
constant.

>

 

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normanstrong <normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote:
> ...just by listening? Say you're listening to a CD that you are
> familiar with over unknown and unseen speakers. What can you say
> about that speaker? I'm not asking here about your reaction to the
> sound; just about the speakers themselves. For instance, could you
> confidently predict the MSRP range, say under $200 or over $2000?

Take a look at the white paper at:
http://www.harman.com/wp/index.jsp?articleId=121
http://www.harman.com/wp/pdf/Loudspeakers&RoomsPt2.pdf

Pages 17-20 have frequency response measurements of various speakers
ranging from $300/pair to $10000/pair. In page 18 it is shown that such
measurements are correlated to listener preferences in blind tests *.

As the author writes: "When we combine the subjective with the
objective data, it is clear that the loudspeakers that yielded the
best set of technical data, also were preferred by the listeners.
It works!"

* the subjective test setup is described in more detail at:
http://www.harman.com/wp/index.jsp?articleId=1018
http://www.harman.com/wp/pdf/HarmanWhitePaperMLLListeningLab.pdf

Although among the good speakers price seems to be correlated with
performance (one type of $10000/pair speakers is better than 2 of
the $8000/pair speakers, which are in turn better than the $5000/pair
speakers), there are counter examples, like speakers which cost
$300/pair, $700/pair, $1800/pair, $2000/pair being better than
speakers which cost $460/pair, $900/pair, $1800/pair, $8000/pair
and $10000/pair.

So, someone listening (blindly) to the $300/pair and to the "bad"
$8000/pair speakers (both bookshelf-type speakers) could guess that
the $300/pair were the expensive ones. The $10000/pair "bad" speakers
have more low-end bass, which would be a clue that they would be
probably more expensive.

--
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Europe | Villeneuve 50-82, Toivonen 56-86, Senna 60-94