I'm making the transition from decades of taking the advice of dealers in selecting gear to understanding & using the measurements to get to a short list of gear. I'm thinking of a rather extreme example here, but I'd like to use this thought experiment to see if I'm catching on.
As a kid I listened to a handheld transistor radio. Later, I stuck an 8" driver in a plywood box and connected that to a table radio. The sounds were different. Since those years, I've heard large, full-range stereo loudspeakers costing tens of thousands of dollars & stand-mounts costing hundreds or less. The sounds were different!
My question relates to the over-used, subjective terms: "involving," "detail," "revealing." The sound I heard from the large, expensive speakers was clearly different from the sound from the radio. Are the measurements that dictate that difference primarily the SPL, frequency response and the distortion (or absence of distortion)? Are those the things that allow you to hear a sneeze in an orchestra on one system and miss it completely when the same recording is played on a "lesser performing" system?
If I bring the examples closer together so that I'm comparing Brand A at $1000 and Brand B at $5000, are the better measurements of SPL, frequency response & distortion the primary "predictors" of the gear that is likely to be more satisfying in one vs. the other?
If this is all too subjective or doesn't belong here, I'll trust a moderator to move or delete it. Or, if the question is already discussed in another thread, someone kindly point me toward that. Thanks for the usual help you folks provide.
As a kid I listened to a handheld transistor radio. Later, I stuck an 8" driver in a plywood box and connected that to a table radio. The sounds were different. Since those years, I've heard large, full-range stereo loudspeakers costing tens of thousands of dollars & stand-mounts costing hundreds or less. The sounds were different!
My question relates to the over-used, subjective terms: "involving," "detail," "revealing." The sound I heard from the large, expensive speakers was clearly different from the sound from the radio. Are the measurements that dictate that difference primarily the SPL, frequency response and the distortion (or absence of distortion)? Are those the things that allow you to hear a sneeze in an orchestra on one system and miss it completely when the same recording is played on a "lesser performing" system?
If I bring the examples closer together so that I'm comparing Brand A at $1000 and Brand B at $5000, are the better measurements of SPL, frequency response & distortion the primary "predictors" of the gear that is likely to be more satisfying in one vs. the other?
If this is all too subjective or doesn't belong here, I'll trust a moderator to move or delete it. Or, if the question is already discussed in another thread, someone kindly point me toward that. Thanks for the usual help you folks provide.