WatchWhen it comes to audio technology...
Do you think since the invention of the audio speaker... Has their been a significant advancement in it's improvement?
Whether they are speakers, headphones or amplifiers, do you think more innovation, discovery and advancement is close to the near future?
Or has the technology peaked generally with very little significant advancement to be seen in let's say 20 years?
What are you favorite brands of audio companies? (Please no Beats By Dre garbage, Bose overpriced stuff or any Skullcandy junk.)
Any of you like Sennheiser, BeyerDynamic, V-Moda, Grados, AKG or Audio-Technica?
What equipment do you own? Speakers? Headphones? Amplifiers?
I mainly use mid-range headphones that are very good and decent sound quality but not audiophile. The audio company I have headphones from is V-Moda (American) and Sennheiser (German).
Do you think japanese vs german vs american audio have their typical strengths and weaknesses like car manufacturers from japan, germany or US?
I hear germans are weak in electronics but strong in mechanical engineering. Sennheiser, a very well-respected german audio company though makes very excellent headphones. Perhaps... Headphones are also mechanically engineered technology that doesn't just require good electronics. (The drivers are not just a electric component but a mechanical as well.)
Audio-Technica, on the other hand is japanese and also is a excellent respected company. Japanese are very good in electronics but not as good as Germans are with mechanically engineering.
It's seems to me like speakers and headphones are like cars. The electronics matter a lot but the mechanically engineering also matters a lot.
What's your take on audio technology these days and in the possible future?
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I think unless one has a dedicated soundroom and very well trained ears most people would be hard pressed to hear the difference in sound quality between high end 1980s equipment and similar equipment on the market today. Likely even if a difference was noticed it would not be critical. The value in today's equipment is features. If all one want is great stereo sound a quality 1980's reciever and speakers will likely fit the bill just fine. Digital tuners were a huge advancement. CDs still sound awesome. It is nice though to have a remote, room tuning, etc.
If one is going to put money into good sound that money may be best applied to improving the room acoustics. Sound deadening, interior wall insulation, solid core doors, carpet, as much as one can get away with without the significant other throwing a fit. That or a nice pair of comfortable headphones.
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Best: Stax electrostatics, requires separate amplifier, non portable. Look for an older Lambda normal bias or 3n/5n type for a few hundred with amp transformers for best bang for buck.
Dynamic; Ultrasone Edition 8, Sennheiser HD800, mucho expensivo but the Ed8 will make an ipod sound like a high end music system with outstanding bass and isolation.
Earbuds: Etymotic HF5 on Amazon for 99 bucks, stone bargain, outstanding neutral/portable sound from compact earbuds that can be taken on the road anywhere, great all arounder, spending more might be counter productive for small gains.
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Favorite headphone feature is Bluetooth, although pairing wastes a lot of time. If someone makes an efficient Bluetooth product or alternative, I'm all ears.
The two biggest advances I've seen since the 1980s are Bluetooth and noise cancelling. The old infrared headphones were not as good, and the old 900MHz were terrible, and those long cords were a nuisance. Noise cancelling, introduced by Bose but now available for less $, can make a big difference on airplanes. Otherwise the audio quality doesn't seem to have changed much.
There is a big difference between $1 store gear and respectable brand name gear, but diminishing returns above that.
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The most experienced audio engineer I know (AR; Scott; Apt - I have a manual for the Apt Holman pre-amp with his signature on the inspection page for the pre that it shipped with) says BeyerDynamic are fine it for any application. I have a pair for travel finding the sonics neutral and build quality sturdier than the Sennheisers I had to retire. I recently did an arm chair audio test of a upper-middle range set of Beyer's on an Android tablet running a high bit radio feed. It was, I have to say, an enjoyable listening experience, really far better than I expected - which was kinda low since I will be using these mainly for Skype conference calls.
Improved?
By an order of magnitude since the glory days. The miracle of science delivered materials that could not have been dreamed about in the 60s and 70s, no matter what your budget. Advents and AR speaker drivers were paper and glue and a lot of journeyman's engineering tricks. Today, you can find a materials for any specification at affordable prices that will allow for scale of manufacturing and price competitiveness. Today, yes, today, is the glory days of vinyl. You can HEAR everything that made it into the pressing. 30 years ago, likely not everything, at best most. If you've got good vinyl, modern cartridge and turntable today, you can enjoy a level of fidelity in playback for small bucks that could not be matched at any money 30 years ago.
Right now, I am running a hybrid stereo with Nikko power amp and Apt Holman pre into Paradigm speakers with vinyl, analog FM, HD FM and CD sources. I retired a set of Infinity QEs about 7 years ago and I have to tell you, the new kit completely blew away a relatively high end set of speakers, increasingly putting the QEs to shame as the frequencies got lower. When the tympani and double basses and lower brass are queued by the conductor, oh, fuck, you are THERE.
The old Japanese electronics from the glory days were mostly very well designed and a lot of it was apparently similarly designed because the Japanese companies were honestly pragmatic manufacturers. Really, if you can get some old Sansui, Pioneer, Nikko, Kenwood gear and you know a competent technician who can update and upgrade the worn electronics, you'd have pieces of kit that are well in front of anything you could get at Best Buy or the Fuck the Yuppie Audio Store.
Speaks - go with new and talk to techs you trust about their opinions of sonic fidelity, driver quality, etc. I like my Paradigms but there are a lot of new speaker companies out there, a number from Canada who rode into development from research done at Canada NRC years and years ago.
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The peak audio experience will be an app that directly stimulates the audio processing center of your brain. Sound directly beamed into your mind, bypassing the ears.
Advantages:
1. Perfect audio.
2. No ear damage regardless of volume.
3. Perfect sensitivity to all audio ranges even high pitch ones regardless of your age.
4. Private listening.
5. Full 360° x 180° surround sound audio.
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The British are well known for their speakers. I myself use some Tannoy's which are fairly inexpensive and from Scotland. They are the leader for studio monitors.
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I miss tubes and point to point wired components.
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CaptainShuddup says
The market place has a lot of options now, from a lot of smaller vendors. If you're a tube guy, it's the Golden Age. New stuff from a number of manufacturers is coming on line every year - using state of the art tubes and electronics - and the Scott, McIntosh, Fisher, etc kit is so well built it can still be repaired with new and NOS kit.
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hands down? mcintosh labs. These are the Rolls Royce of sound equipment. They are handmade in the USA and they offer both modern solid state and tube powered amps. They will literally last a lifetime. I've only seen a few in the flesh a few times: They are spendy units.
As for myself, I own mostly 1970's and early 80's equipment. I have a very nice Marantz tuner with a few 1970's KLH speakers.
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APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
Did they get away from printed circuit boards?
I had a Fender Blues Jr. one of the tubes shorted out on the green board. I had to retrace the leads by painting it back with solder.
It worked fine for a while now it buzzes, I'm not sure it needs biasing or or the caps on the plate are leaking.
On an eyelet board it would be much easier to see the caps in question, but when they are spread out on a PCB, and using small compact tiny semiconductors, it's hard to know what's what.
I know that's music amplification and not audiophile components. But even Marshal Amps these days have a PCB board, and likely a SS preamp stage as well.
Back in the mid 90's I remember as an adult for the first time having 1200 bucks I could dedicate to a stereo rack system. I went down to Incredible Universe(remember that place?) and the sales man laughed at me. "Everything is about the compact book shelf systems with CD and tuner built in. There aren't any turntables any more."
I did buy a AIWA ns9000 with like 7 speakers and a sub woofer.
It would peel the paint off the neighbors house, but it just didn't sound the same. Which is more a failing of CD's I suppose.
I remember listening to Judas Priest on a Kenwood tower, the bass and drums track sounded like a Harley idling. I never got that effect from a CD rendition of that song. Also the outro to Nazereth Hair of the Dog, is missing the guy whispering "Son of a Bitch" in the back ground for the last four bars.
I've been threatening to get back into audio. It's a shame what is now considered high end, used to just be considered standard.
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I don't buy anything from the late 80's on up because I do have the ability to rebuild these simply because the components are easier to replace. Ideally I would have tube amp equipment from the 50's or 60's because at that point it was still wired versus stuck in a board. What usually happens is that the electrolytic capacitors will often go bad and you'll get a ton of AC hum since the caps aren't filtering anymore. That and resistors go out of value and in the old units sometimes ( but surprisingly not often) a tube might go bad. In a wired set you can "re-cap" an entire set in a few hours. PCB boards are a pain. The 60's boards are the worst. The new stuff is pretty much unrepairable unless you go with something nicer- like the Mcintosh amp I mentioned. Those are still easy to repair.
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How about your soundrooms? Anything special there?
Better question, how do your SFs react to your buying expensive audio equipment?
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Dan8267 says
Not quite your dream but getting there:
http://www.design42day.com/media-partnerships/listing/the-charm-of-science%E2%80%94audio-tooth-implant/
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Abilene, TX
too many questions.....i itch..
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I had a made in Germany pair of Sennheiser headphones that I bought in the early 80's that I used a lot until it recently died. The Made in China headphones I can buy now maybe only last a year.
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CaptainShuddup says
No, the PCB are still there but quality kit will be repairable. Had a big Sansui with a hairline crack that was almost invisible but completely through the board, edge to edge.
The 1990s was a very bad time for quality audio. The consumer stuff had been reduced to black plastic crap (BPC) and anything that maintained the quality of good Japanese kit from the 1970s was suddenly slapped with designer badge and a ridiculous price.
I cruised through that period with a Nikko NR-1015 that I bought at a going out of business sale in like 1979. First time I had to have it serviced in 2006, the guy sneered at it. Then he opened it up and was blown away by the amp and tuner design. (I had no idea but I did love the sound quality of the tuner, just lush.) He said the parts quality was first rate surprisingly as Nikko was sort of dismissed from its later life as a producer of cheap house-badged products and the basic tuner parts would cost over $200 today alone.
When I upgraded, and got into separates, I went straight to vintage. The new high-end audio places are insane, just a place for crazy people to throw money at sales people who are nasty and dismissive to them.
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zzyzzx says
Sennheiser at least though has the decency to make most of their headphones I believe in Ireland. With the high-end ones, made in Germany & hand assembled by a professional.
I do believe their really cheap budget headphones are made in china but from what I've heard & experienced build is not bad at all & still actually good.
Most made in china stuff is mass produced mainstream crap with pitiable build quality *cough* Beats By Dre *cough*....
However, a few times something decent with respectable build quality comes from China. But otherwise, most 99%: Is junk.
How did the headphones die? Cable related? If so, it can be fixed & is not dead completely. Or did the drivers fail/blow out?
Do not trash them. If it is German made, it can usually be fixed. Even if the drivers have been blown. Keep them, because the body of the headphones is premium materials & you may even be able to install new drivers into them.
If not yourself or someone you know, you can fix these headphones with whatever problem they have from an authorized Sennheiser service center.
But please do not trash them.
Speaking of German made, I've been thinking of buying the Beyer DT 990 Premium 600 omh. Even before ApocalypseFuck mentioned owning them, I had my covetous eye on them since 5 months back when I was browsing Amazon for decent audio gear.
Ah fuck it, I'll buy them eventually at the end of this year with a decent amp\dac & source gear. Before or as soon as 2013 starts.
But for now I'll just enjoy my decent non-audiophile two pairs of Sennheisers & two pairs of V-Moda's.
But defiantly, ApocalypseFuck... We have a duty to take a massive monster shit on Bose, Beats By Dre, Soul By Ludacris, Sync By 50 & Skullcandy along with all it's supporters & fanboy customers listening to 128kpbs garbage source material mainstream produced garbage music.
Doesn't it seem like audio & sound technology is being stifled due to the popular mainstream garbage music? All you need is auto-tune & a feminine faggot face these days to be the next talentless worthless musical scam-artist.
Seems like garbage music is what is making the dumb sheep think Beats By Dre is worth $300-$400... The price of fucking German made high end Beyers. Instead these worthless cockroach serfs & peasants spend it on Chinese made low-quality filmsy plastic headphones with pathetic frequency response & horrible dynamics in sound production of the source material.
Sennheisers cheap models at least come with a high quality plastic build & much better respectable sound while price is a fraction yet easily 3 times better in sound quality plus durability.
Germans do it the best. Adolf Hitler was ahead of his time to see this & realize that they are superior by race.
Neo-nazi cannibals are going to fight against this atrocity of insultingly inferior audio equipment out today.
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Abilene, TX
trash em'.
i have a pair of Rwanda sntp-495a1 quadrophonics with interfrequency isolation.
made in 74, these babies are still cookin up the tunes with the added benefit of migrating your ear wax to the periphery of the canal. easy to scoop it up that way..
Robber Baron Elite Scum says
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Nothing more lovely than to see someone head over to the Apple store, unzip their pants & stand on the the table with Bose & Beats headphones while taking a monster shit on them while all the fanboys of chinese overpriced shit watch in horror.
I bet Apple would leave them still on display to demo & the fanboys would still test them out while having a monster rotting turd on their head.
Listening to the next pop talentless auto-tune faggot star.
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New renter says
Darn, site is down. I'll try back later.
Robber Baron Elite Scum says
I've been a fan of Grados headphones for about 12 years. I've had the SR60 series and found them to be very good. I know use the SR325 series and I'd call them the best headphones without an amp I've every used. My pair has a gold finish, not the silver one shown on the previous link. It came with a 6.5 mm to 3.5 mm jack converter because the upper end headphones all have 6.5 mm jacks -- I think that's really about marketing, not quality. But the sound is awesome from these things.
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I bought a Music hall MMF 2.2 record player a few years back, I'm not into all this new crap. It was a good purchase, you can tell higher end audio equipment as it holds it's value.
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I have Beats Audio on my HTC Rezound. Using the earsbuds that came with the phone, it's not too bad.
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Dan8267 says
I hope someone is working on a sound system to completely eliminate the ringing from tinnitus--not a white noise machine.
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"Germans do it the best. Adolf Hitler was ahead of his time to see this & realize that they are superior by race."
If the German engineering is so awesome then why is it everyone I know who owns or has owned a German designed or built car have all kinds of stupid crap break on them? German cars are so complicated and/or require specialized tools such that most shade tree mechanics can't work on them. I've heard of mercedes electrical insulation disintigrating after a few years, BMW door handles breaking, door seals failing repeatedly, etc. Given the reputation of "German engineering" I'd expect a modern German car to be a bitproblematic more reliable than a mid 80s Caviler.
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As far as stuff being made today, Mark Levinson kills McIntosh. My son has owned a set up for over a decade and it is simply superlative. Looks the best of anything out there, too.
I still use the old single-ended tube junk with my horns, except for a brief dalliance with some ESLs -- still the only speaker design capable of reproducing perfectly a square wave -- but it's too damn dry out here in the desert for them.
I speaking of speakers -- the commenter who said speaker cones were just 'paper' -- they were anything but! That's today's junk. In the 40's-60's, they were typically comprised of a complicated composite material consisting of viscose and other organic materials (even asbestos) and baked in a kiln. Those old speakers with their original cones are worth as much as they are for a reason! Nothing touches the Tannoy Red!
As for tubes...go NOS. The QC & tolerances on new tube production today is a joke. Look at a picture of a tube manufacturing facility today in China and compare it with pictures from the old Telefunken factory or even the old WE plants. It's just fucking disgusting.
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APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
Nikko was good shit.
I went through a solid state fling in the 80's with the very great SAE and GAS lines by Bongiorno. I would pay top dollar for a Son of Ampzilla in clean condition.
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After having numerous cord issues with several headphones, I did finally get a pair of wireless headphones which work great for TV viewing and I haven't had a problem with them since. I would want something better for listening to a CD though.
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Los Angeles, CA
JodyChunder says
This is indicative of the general quality of most audio equipment today (*most*).
What has happened is nobody even listens to music open air in a room anymore, so the average person couldn't care less about speakers, receiver, components, etc. Everybody has been conditioned to listen to music on earbuds or docking station tweeters, from second-quality iTunes files.
It's a shame. There's nothing like a room filled to the brim with vibrant sound, produced by real speakers and equipment. Future generations won't know or care.
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JodyChunder says
All I'll say is this: Most any Mcintosh you buy will easily last 40-50 years without any issues. In fact, about the only issues they "had" ( I say had because they have since remedied the problem) was that the older style incandescent lights they used to light the dials would burn out after 3-4 decades while the rest of the amp kept right on going. Now the new ones use LEDs hence no more burning out. They are extremely well-built, very durable products.
I actually work on and repair electronics, including a lot of vintage equipment from the 30's-60's. The quality of construction of Mcintosh is some of the best I've seen and they use very nice, high quality components. Its not how it looks. Its how its made.
Course' they're a lot of money and I don't own one myself, but I have worked on them and electronics-wise they're a work of art.
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zzyzzx says
You can buy detachable cable headphones as well. With wireless, the problem I have is with charging & battery changing.
Even if you buy rechargeable ion batteries, You still have to end up changing batteries and buying new batteries eventually.
Then they other problem is with the poor audio quality with wireless. And lastly I do not want brain cancer.
With the detachable cables, if the cable goes bad... Your entire headphones are not messed up.
You just buy a new cable and plug it right in.
V-moda sells kevlar reinforced cables for $10 bucks I think. 1,000,000 million times you will have to bend it in order to damage the cable. Industry standard is only 10,000. 100 times more durable.
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Robber Baron Elite Scum says
My Sennheiser wireless headphones use standard nimh AAA batteries. Yes, the charger doesn't work as good as I would like, but I keep spare low discharge AAA nimh batteries around and can charge the ones that came with the headphones in my regular battery charger, but I do not have to do this often.
Robber Baron Elite Scum says
That's why I said that they were good for watching TV. You see, I can be watching TV, and then, for example, take a dump and at least still be listening to TV.
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zzyzzx says
Makes sense then I guess.
I guess it depends and varies what is best for each individual. Not my cup of tea though.
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Abilene, TX
i got an LCD 19" in each bathroom.
All dumps and puking are in 1080p
zzyzzx says
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edvard2 says
Not knocking McIntosh. I have owned it all and I am telling you Mark Levinson is paramount. The VANGUARD! It also happens to look the best. My Uncle worked at Ampex and later Altec back in the day so I cut my teeth on this stuff from early on and have been a nut ever since.
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Philistine says
It's a real weird backward regression. It all started when the marketing gurus figured out how to make the public pay more for convenience and care less about the pursuit of perfection, if you ask me.
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zzyzzx says
or you could pause the dvr...
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robertoaribas says
You would be amazed at the number of TV shows where if you don't see all of it but hear the whole thing, you have missed nothing.
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Philistine says
Future generations won't be able to afford a trailer much less a house that can showcase such a sound system.