I use the BMS 4592nd on an Edgar horn by Volti Audio and Fostex t500 AMKIII tweeters in a modified Klipschorn. I'm ready to go active, but I'm unsure if I will keep the khorn bass bin or look for a better solution. The speakers are beautiful and for me the efficiency and effortless FR is what keeps me on this path. Wish I had more time to tinker.
Audiophiles or audiofools? The latter will continue to mix and match technologically outdated components and hide behind "whatever sounds best to you" and "it's a hobby" or "enjoyment is subjective".
One of these days I'm gonna open my mind and my wallet to get some first class highly directive gear as I'm dying to go BAACH and immerse myself in a gorgeous soundscape with unfettered dynamics that make you wonder if it is live. I get that and wish you the best. Until then it's all a reasonable facsimile.
You've got a point. My ht is modest 5.2 and I haven't kept up with the state of the art. I would think a completely wireless mesh system should be possible unless Sonos' patents are stifling innovation. It took 20 years for 5.2 channel mastering to get commonly decent. Even if object-oriented mixing makes Atmos easier, I'm in no hurry to triple the speaker count.
However the term high fidelity has a much narrower definition. Audiofools are in search of pleasing coloration, not fidelity.
I would love some ABX testing with some of the hard liners around here trying to blindly pick out the 'highest fidelity' system.
Although its possible that they have had colored systems from the beginning and by sheer coincidence they find a tweak which restores the system to something resembling accuracy, and they find that they like that, even though that was not their conscious goal. Anything's possible.
The fidelity high or low is a fantasy.
You can however measure how close your system is capable of reproducing what is on the recording. That is the point. What happens in the mixing studio is a completely separate matter.
The problem with this approach is that you end up with multiple systems where each specializes on a specific type of recordings. Just get an accurate system, use room treatment and EQ for neutral sound, and then use tone controls to change the sound to taste.
Who cares what label is placed on it? There is no reason for home audio to be about anything other than pleasure.
Words have meanings. Fidelity is clearly defined.
And compared to the rest on this list of super speakers with no realistic limits to loudness, the JTR 215's are relatively affordable at 7k/pr. And it's great to see horn loaded speakers reach this level of excellence in all respects! And interestingly the majority of these dragon slayer systems are active.
I'm tackling the third edition of Toole's book Sound Reproduction: The Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers and Rooms (Audio Engineering Society Presents). It's a point he hammers hard in the opening chapters as to the lack of any standards in studios re playback. But until such day and I imagine it's becoming more uniform (no more mastering using 10 dollar headphones stories), what recourse does one have but to make our systems as linear as possible. With the exceptionally accurate studio monitors available these days, it's a crime for any studio not to use them. One benefit of many of our home active systems is the utility of being able to apply very accurate PEQ and save it for those recordings to otherwise die for should one be so inclined.
Love that description and the mental image it conjures. Something to strive for indeed.
Beyond the threshold of audibility there are no differences to hear, making any ABX tests pointless in that realm. The problem arises when subjectivists claim their ears are more sensitive than an APx555, when the reality has more to do with imagination than hearing.
