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ATC speakers / Monitors

Geert

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Thanks for the information on the correct terminology. I would say one thing about your comment on being close to a piano. Plenty of people, myself included, grew up with an upright piano in the home. It was a regular activity to be right next to the piano as it was being played when family/friends were singing. I’m sure richer people had baby or even grand pianos in the home

To be clear, we were talking grand piano's. Having a grand piano at home is very exceptional I think (compared to the total amount of people listening to music). An upright is a different instrument, not popular in classical music so more commonly close miked. An upright is overall far less popular in music recording.
 

goat76

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Thanks for the information on the correct terminology. I would say one thing about your comment on being close to a piano. Plenty of people, myself included, grew up with an upright piano in the home. It was a regular activity to be right next to the piano as it was being played when family/friends were singing. I’m sure richer people had baby or even grand pianos in the home, my grandparents did. A piano does not have to be played loudly. Yes, it takes some level of skill and control to play quietly involving using the weight of your arm and to transfer the weight from finger to finger smoothly and using minimum motion.
Or we can just call this type of recording hyper-realistic as I did, to begin with. :)
It exaggerates all the small details and gives a more distinct transient response because of the extreme close-up micing, there's nothing wrong with this type of recording, either you like it or you don't. There are no set rules for how a recording is supposed to be done, and I think the exaggerations that come with this type of close-up micing recording can be cool, it can serve as a replacement for the dynamic otherwise lost because most speakers can't translate the full dynamic swings of the original musical event.



And back to dynamics...
I find the aspect Klaus Heinz was talking about in the link I provided earlier to be highly interesting, something I think is overlooked in today's speaker designs (or they simply don't know how to solve it). He wants future developers to focus more on the speaker's ability to be able to translate a duplication of the input voltage to an equal duplication in the acoustic "area", a duplication of air movement so to speak.
That's something I also miss when listening to reproduced music. The dynamics are such an important part of the original musical event we like to replicate in our homes, not necessarily the dB level but at least more of that dynamic swing that's missing.
I attended a wedding party a few years ago and they had a band playing live, and damn those real dynamics got every single person in the building to dance in a circle, even the ones that normally never do. :)

And back to ATC from that...
I find my ATC speakers reproducing the dynamics better than most other similar-sized speakers do, but of course not even close to what Mr.Heinz was talking about, just a little better than the average speakers I've heard. I read somewhere that one of the set goals ATC had when they started developing their own speakers, was to combine the better dynamics of traditional PA speakers with the sound quality of HiFi speakers. I think that's one of the things many people like about their speakers. No magic, just an overlooked thing in the development of most speakers.
 

Puddingbuks

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The whole point is that ATC is crazy expensive, and shows little development/improvement in their products.
 

Torbachkristensen

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The whole point is that ATC is crazy expensive, and shows little development/improvement in their products.
Huh? My ATC110 cost 1000$ more than a pair of 8C, and are substantially more dynamically capable and in a completely different league when it comes to build quality. But no, they do not adjust themselves to the room, but then I would always want a good room first, DSP later :)
 

thewas

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Huh? My ATC110 cost 1000$ more than a pair of 8C, and are substantially more dynamically capable and in a completely different league when it comes to build quality. But no, they do not adjust themselves to the room, but then I would always want a good room first, DSP later :)
Are you sure these are current prices? Here in central Europe a pair of SCM 110 is almost double price than the black studio version of the D&D (18.739,00 vs 11.485,45€).
 

Torbachkristensen

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Are you sure these are current prices? Here in central Europe a pair of SCM 110 is almost double price than the black studio version of the D&D (18.739,00 vs 11.485,45€).
I don't think any Pro buyer pay those prices - here we probably have to take into account that ATC has a big Hi-Fi market where their speakers are finished in veneer and as towers with more material etc and hi-fi dealers are used to a huge overhead. So the list prices of the Pro series has to be close to their hi-fi equivalent, but let's just say those prices are not street prices in the pro world. I think Dutch operates with significantly higher production and R&D costs to recoupe, since they are a much younger company, so list and street price is pretty much the same.
 

Ilkless

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The whole point is that ATC is crazy expensive, and shows little development/improvement in their products.

The best part is when the fanboys talk about ATC performance in a dedicated optimised room, as if an actual state of the art speaker wouldn't destroy any ATC in a similarly optimised room.

But these guys would rather arrogantly claim their hearing literally operates on a fundamentally different mechanism from the human species rather than accept the vastly more valid empirical evidence that contradicts their anecdotal experience.
 

YSC

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I don't think any Pro buyer pay those prices - here we probably have to take into account that ATC has a big Hi-Fi market where their speakers are finished in veneer and as towers with more material etc and hi-fi dealers are used to a huge overhead. So the list prices of the Pro series has to be close to their hi-fi equivalent, but let's just say those prices are not street prices in the pro world. I think Dutch operates with significantly higher production and R&D costs to recoupe, since they are a much younger company, so list and street price is pretty much the same.
What? So you don’t think the pro buyers will pay full list price on atc but will need to do so with D&D?… both are marked price from eshops..
 

Torbachkristensen

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The best part is when the fanboys talk about ATC performance in a dedicated optimised room, as if an actual state of the art speaker wouldn't destroy any ATC in a similarly optimised room.

But these guys are literally arrogantly claiming their hearing operates on a fundamentally different mechanism from the human species without any evidence other than anecdotal experience, which doesn't fly here.
Measurements have been provided to show what a pro install can do - just show me 1 single freestanding speaker measurement that can supply that kind of waterfall plot and LF response at LP in-room. Until then, maybe you should lay off the childish unsubstantiated accusations.
 
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Torbachkristensen

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What? So you don’t think the pro buyers will pay full list price on atc but will need to do so with D&D?… both are marked price from eshops..
Well, I don't think that, I have tested and been quoted both in the time I build my studio - prosumers expect a sizable discount, and ATC offers that. Dutch only has 1 product atm aimed at both markets and the discount available is close to 0. And I think that is only fair since they are a fairly new, small company and a great product that has most likely been very costly in R&D. There is obviously a very different operating margin between the 2.
 

Frgirard

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Well, I don't think that, I have tested and been quoted both in the time I build my studio - prosumers expect a sizable discount, and ATC offers that. Dutch only has 1 product atm aimed at both markets and the discount available is close to 0. And I think that is only fair since they are a fairly new, small company and a great product that has most likely been very costly in R&D. There is obviously a very different operating margin between the 2.
Why they Buy ATC? for the discount.
Thanks to confirm.
 

YSC

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Measurements have been provided to show what a pro install can do - just show me 1 single freestanding speaker measurement that can supply that kind of waterfall plot and LF response at LP in-room. Until then, maybe you should lay off the childish unsubstantiated accusations.
So atc with pro installation can only win/compete with freestanding speakers?
Apples to apples, I would only compare atc pro install with other pro install, and free standing (which is crazy expensive and meh) vs free standing
 

Ilkless

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Measurements have been provided to show what a pro install can do - just show me 1 single freestanding speaker measurement that can supply that kind of waterfall plot and LF response at LP in-room. Until then, maybe you should lay off the childish unsubstantiated accusations.

Here's what a setup with actual, demonstrable state of the art, evidence-based design, rather than a cult of personality masquerading as engineering, looks like. Vastly more extended and smoother, more accurate in both time and frequency domain, across a broad position even without extensive treatment.


But the general point made throughout this thread was that extensive empirical evidence and peer-reviewed research was cited that directly disproved the premise of ATC's superiority you derived merely from intuition and anecdotal experience. And all you lot have done is double down with the apologetics with no evidence except appeals to authority unqualified in the physics and perceptual science involved, your anecdotal experience and intuition - as if one were just as valid as the other.

The perceived transient advantage (a claim not even made with reference to any real physical phenomenon or mechanism of "transients" but instead the perception of it in sighted listening, the intractable flaws of which shown in a peer-reviewed published review cited in this thread) is psychoacoustically inconsequential vs lumpy uneven dispersion of sound. And if we were relying on intuition, surely smooth dispersion sounds like a laudable goal.

Then you lot shift the goalposts to say that tradeoffs are needed for dispersion, the adverse effects of which outweigh its demonstrated consistency with how the human brain and ear processes sound in a room. And again no empirical evidence, just anecdotal experience. I refute the notion that all speakers are a zero-sum game and therefore any choice of speaker is equally valid as another. Legitimate differences exist. Smooth dispersion is the baseline, but wide or narrow, constant or tapering is still up for debate. To lower the bar further than what the evidence allows us to set it at just to comfort yourself of your choices and assert its unsubstantiated superiority is what we are speaking out against here.

I don't think you should expect applause for anti-intellectualism and science denialism, even if that is what you are used to getting in other forums, rather than refuted with a much higher level of evidence than elsewhere.
 

Ilkless

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Why they Buy ATC? for the discount.
Thanks to confirm.

And also, liking and using properly engineered speakers makes them feel less special about themselves. It's a common error in logic in audio reproduction that the more esoteric and arcane and inaccessible and difficult to optimise the design is, the higher the performance.

The blithe bravado and mental gymnastics needed to keep the cognitive dissonance going is quite sad.
 

Puddingbuks

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Huh? My ATC110 cost 1000$ more than a pair of 8C, and are substantially more dynamically capable and in a completely different league when it comes to build quality. But no, they do not adjust themselves to the room, but then I would always want a good room first, DSP later :)
You are comparing HUGE ATC’s at a much higher price point to the relatively small 8C’s.

The 8c’s are well capable of producing “dynamic” sound, from this review (https://www.erinsaudiocorner.com/loudspeakers/dutch_dutch_8c/):

Subjectively speaking, the maximum output SPL was approximately 100dB at the main listening position (4 meters away) for the pair of speakers playing full range (20Hz to 20kHz). Above this volume, I felt a bit apprehensive pushing the speaker further (I don’t own it and it isn’t cheap). 100dB full range at 4 meters is very loud.

And “build quality” of the 8C is superb. Yes, it does not have a HUGE cabinet, because it uses smarter ways to produce sound. The ATC looks (and is) a speaker from the 70s.

And your point of a treated room has nothing to do with the speakers.
 

Inner Space

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And also, liking and using properly engineered speakers makes them feel less special about themselves. It's a common error in logic in audio reproduction that the more esoteric and arcane and inaccessible and difficult to optimise the design is, the higher the performance.
What a silly comment this is. First, most people in this thread reporting positive value in ATC are working in audio production, not reproduction. Their needs and contexts are very different than yours.

Second, do you really believe that professionals choose things to make them feel special about themselves? Do accountants choose accounting software to make themselves feel special, or do they choose what does the job best? Cinema DPs and their lenses? Plumbers? Electricians? And so on ...

Your animus against certain brands is verging on the truly weird.
 

goat76

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You too are a discount hunter? The logo has a major impact on the sound perceived.
ABX.
Do you mean that's true for every single person out there buying an ATC speaker, wasn't Torbach describing earlier that he tried speakers from different manufacturers and in the end preferred the sound of the ATCs?

How did you go about selecting your speakers, did you do an ABX test to single out the ones you ended up with?
 
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