Vacceo
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Since this house hosts several technology developers, extremelly-well informed enthusiasts and professionals, I am super curios to ask for clarification at times of extreme uncertainty.
Music reproduction technology seems to progress very slowly on the side of speakers. From an outsider´s perspective, the development seems to be going at a really slow pace compared to other reproduction technologies, particularly for image (OLED, laser projectors, micro-led...). The most logical cause is that physics applied to the field are well-known and hence, you can only archive tiny increments on very, very mature technologies. The other aspect I can think of could be a matter of cost-benefit: why dumping a ton of cash on R&D when a massive pool of customers is happy with current speakers?
However, lockdowns seem to have renewed the interest on media reproduction gear. With energy prices on the rise, it seems like investing in stuff you can enjoy at home may rise, scarcity allowing of course.
From what I have been reading, Purifi seems to have taken a huge, huge step into hardware improvement. Perhaps I´m suffering from tunnel vision, but it seems both their amps and speaker drivers are the kind of step ahead that get you Benchmark-level amplification (and Hypex is not that far) while being more efficient and powerful. On the side of drivers, from Erin´s tests, they seem to trade blows with absolute monsters like Kii or Genelec for a potential fraction of the price. Both developments seem to potentially benefit the niche of car audio even further, as the difference over there between amp classes is clear (even when acoustics inside a vehicle are an absolute nightmare to work with) and speakers.
On the side of electronics, the implementation of HDMI 2.1 seems to be an absolute mess, same for Bluetooth 5.2, but that seems to have a lot to do with chip scarcity. For HDMI 2.1 the massive difference is for those who play videogames, while for sound is not that huge. However, I have never listened to the difference between a Bluetooth 5.2 and a 5.0, so the change may be more marketing than real metrics.
I imagine researchers and developers having a ton of test projects and designs on the bench and drawing board waiting for manufacturing and logistics to get a semblance of normalcy, but for us consumers, is it worth waiting for year, year and half to purchase upgrades on gear that, let´s be realistic, even if it replaces a decade and half old tech, will not make a huge improvement? And no, I´m not talking about going from something like a Q series from Kef to a Reference series (I use Kef speakers and I have listened to Blades, they esentially laugh at my humble IQ´s) or from a Sonus Faber Lumina series to a Olympica Nova series; because that is something I can do now, funds allowing.
So sumarizing, what would be your call for gear such as amps, speakers, av receivers/processors or headphones? Save and wait for 12 to 16 months or browse through current options?
Music reproduction technology seems to progress very slowly on the side of speakers. From an outsider´s perspective, the development seems to be going at a really slow pace compared to other reproduction technologies, particularly for image (OLED, laser projectors, micro-led...). The most logical cause is that physics applied to the field are well-known and hence, you can only archive tiny increments on very, very mature technologies. The other aspect I can think of could be a matter of cost-benefit: why dumping a ton of cash on R&D when a massive pool of customers is happy with current speakers?
However, lockdowns seem to have renewed the interest on media reproduction gear. With energy prices on the rise, it seems like investing in stuff you can enjoy at home may rise, scarcity allowing of course.
From what I have been reading, Purifi seems to have taken a huge, huge step into hardware improvement. Perhaps I´m suffering from tunnel vision, but it seems both their amps and speaker drivers are the kind of step ahead that get you Benchmark-level amplification (and Hypex is not that far) while being more efficient and powerful. On the side of drivers, from Erin´s tests, they seem to trade blows with absolute monsters like Kii or Genelec for a potential fraction of the price. Both developments seem to potentially benefit the niche of car audio even further, as the difference over there between amp classes is clear (even when acoustics inside a vehicle are an absolute nightmare to work with) and speakers.
On the side of electronics, the implementation of HDMI 2.1 seems to be an absolute mess, same for Bluetooth 5.2, but that seems to have a lot to do with chip scarcity. For HDMI 2.1 the massive difference is for those who play videogames, while for sound is not that huge. However, I have never listened to the difference between a Bluetooth 5.2 and a 5.0, so the change may be more marketing than real metrics.
I imagine researchers and developers having a ton of test projects and designs on the bench and drawing board waiting for manufacturing and logistics to get a semblance of normalcy, but for us consumers, is it worth waiting for year, year and half to purchase upgrades on gear that, let´s be realistic, even if it replaces a decade and half old tech, will not make a huge improvement? And no, I´m not talking about going from something like a Q series from Kef to a Reference series (I use Kef speakers and I have listened to Blades, they esentially laugh at my humble IQ´s) or from a Sonus Faber Lumina series to a Olympica Nova series; because that is something I can do now, funds allowing.
So sumarizing, what would be your call for gear such as amps, speakers, av receivers/processors or headphones? Save and wait for 12 to 16 months or browse through current options?