My findings on Magico V2.....what now?
jtein -- Tue, 02/02/2010 - 10:23
Last week I drove 250km to audition the Magico V2. The V2's were driven by the awesome Soulution 720 preamp and 710 power amp. The source used was a Soulution 745 disc player. Needless to say, the sound was GREAT.....but I sat there in the auditioning chair like a rock. To my surprise, I found myself unmoved and unstirred. By the 4th CD, I started to get bored. I felt almost none of the wonderful emotions I got when I auditioned the Avantgarde Uno G2 driven by Audio Note Meishu SET amp.
Should this experience be conclusive and enough for me to make my decision to go for the Avantgarde? Should I further explore the V2 with other amps? Unfortunately the Magico dealer (the only one in my country) that I visited carries only a couple of brands of amps (which are not in my shortlist) so it's impossible for me to listen to the V2 with the ones I'm interested in - Pass XA.5 series or Spectral.
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Unfortunately, that is precisely what you are saying, taken to its logical conclusion.
If we base a reference point on measurement, it eliminates products that perform well but measure badly. In an ideal world, measurement and listening would perfectly correlate and in maybe three-quarters of the time with three-quarters of the listener base, exactly that happens. But not every time, and not to every listener.
Listener education is an all-round good thing, but what if, despite that listener education, someone decides that they just like the sound of a speaker with more coloration?
If we reject products on the grounds of measurement alone, how does that serve the listeners who prefer the sound of those products? Given JA's own predilections (he seems to really, really like those Amatis, pesky bad measurement notwithstanding), should he be reeducated too?
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
I do see Roy point. If all we read is reviewers "personal favorites", and they are all over the map when it comes to "taste", then how are we suppose to know what are WE going to like? BTW, in Europe, many magazine do "score" products. Not a bad idea, unless everyone gets good grades and we are back where we started...
I've worked on magazines that score products and it causes more problems than it solves. For example, if the score is based on price and performance, does a $1,000 product at 92% sound better or worse than a $10,000 product at 93%? OTOH, if the score is based on performance alone, who's going to buy entry-level kit rated at 45%? Also bear in mind that a percentage or star-rating score makes no qualitative judgment on a product - do you mark 'vivid' higher or lower than 'refined'?
There's also the problem of score creep. The last year I worked on a magazine that scores, the lowest score was 87% and the highest 98%. Nine percentage points to separate more than 240 products ranging from super-budget to mid-high-end. Another well-known scoring reviewer is currently up to 105 out of a possible 30 (given he started his scoring back in the late 1970s, this is not as odd as it sounds).
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
Tend to agree. Hi Fi Choice gives ratings. They gave the the Boulder 865 "4 1/2", versus "5" for the Nait XS. They gave the Esoteric X03-SE "4 1/2", versus "5" for the X05. Obviously there's a "value for money" category factored into the rating, but unless you group products into classes explicitly, it's hard to make much sense of the ratings. On the other hand, in a comparison review, I think ratings are good.
In the digital photography world, I kind of like dpreviews "Higly Recommended", "Recommended", "Above Average" ratings, although there's clearly scope creep, if it's not in "Highly Recommended", it's probably not worth considering, and "Above Average" basically means no good. Although I got some of my best JPEGs that I've taken from a small camera using the Ricoh GR, which only got an "Above Average" rating, but clearly not a camera for everyone.
-- Daniel
There is a lot to say for "listening education". When I first heard the V3 at a friend house, I did not care for it much. Coming from a big ported loudspeaker, I felt I was missing a part of visceral experience I had become custom to. Over time, I started to hear things on my friend system that I have never heard before. Going back to my system, I found myself, more and more, longing to the experiences I had listening to the V3. It took about 6 months for me to hear, what my friend heard on the first note. Not all our friends feel the same, but I was not alone in that evolutionary process. There were quite a few ported, high glossed loudspeaker for sale in our country within a year of debuting the V3. What really troubles me is the fact that now, I can't imagine what it was that I liked before in my old setup. I hear all its flaws so clearly now. I can imagine, that one day, I may feel the same way about the V3? Food for thoughts...
MARC PHILLIP
welcome to the club......you've fully learn't to listen ...it's really beautiful to actually experience an audiopphile's graduation ceremony.....oh & by the way......The new VANDY's can make you ask yourself that very question about your V3
Interesting comments about "audiophile education". I heard both the mini2 and the v3 in the same room with same equipment. Within a song I knew that v3 was crap made for "audiophiles" but not for me. Within the same song I loved the mini and knew I could live with it!
Why does anyone need to "get educated" and to "graduate"? Am I missing something - or are you?
For Mr.Alan Sircom...It seems you have a high opinion of the recently released Devialet class AD integrated amplifier. Could you please describe how this amp sounds and how it differs from other top amps mentioned in this thread (Spectral/Pass/Soulution/DarTZeel). Have you heard it drfed by its analog or digital inputs? How was the sound quality of the buillt in DAC if you had a chance to listen to that? There is not much info. about its sound quality yet. Is there a review in the works? I have read about their concept and on paper it is brilliant to have a low power class A amp act as the "brains" of the amplifier (voltage controller) while letting class D amps supply most of the current required . However, as usual all sorts of devils lie in the details and the implementaion.
It's way too early to say definitively. I've heard the D-Premier twice now. Once into a pair of SF Elipsa and once into a pair of Magico M5. That's about two or three hours listening time. Both times I've heard it through the digital inputs, but neither time was in my own system. I've also heard repeated reports of it making very good sounds in the Crystal Cable/Siltech room at CES.
A review will be in the works, probably out mid-year. I have to get the product home first.
From my few hours listening, I think it ranks up there with the best of the best and lives up to its on-paper claims. It's very different from anything I've heard and it will take some time to work out whether this is 'Telarc 1812' (initially wow... followed by a sense of being over-glossed) or whether this is 'Audiophile 2.0' (initially wow... followed by WOW!).
My first reaction though is that it is the real deal, and that singing Tiffany pizza box will be a game-changer.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
matt ,
The Pass do work well with ceramic type based speakers, like the Avalon and the Tidal. It seems to help in masking some of these drivers breakups mode. Not my kind of medicine but if you must, it is not a bad choice for an amp.
I've been using the Pass XA100.5 with Wilson X-2s, Wilson Sashas, YG Acoustics Kipod Studios, and the Volent Paragon VL-2, all sucessfully.
Mr Plus
You can kill any argument by taking it to its extreme. Measurement and listening do not need to perfectly correlate, but a broad 10db suck-out right in the middle of the midrange would be audible. Perhaps people who can't hear that, should not be reviewers? How does one become an audio reviewer anyway? Do you need any special skills that puts you in a better position to asses these products? Don't a car reviewer need to know something about the way a car works?
"...it eliminates products that perform well but measure badly"
Can you explain how it is possible? Why would a badly measured product would perform well? Can a broken car perform well? Can a camera with a faulty light meter take good pictures?
" Listener education is an all-round good thing, but what if, despite that listener education, someone decides that they just like the sound of a speaker with more coloration?"
Nothing wrong with that, but I assure you that you will see less of it once one understand what he is hearing and likeing.
I do appreciate your response, and I mean absolutely no disrespect to your profession. I am simply pointing out to some major flaws in the way reviews are getting done these days. I have not read a bad review in years. If it is all good, then it might as well be all bad. Please see RH reply to the Pass amp. Can you imagine him saying anything else??
Not only is it possible that a product can perform well and measure badly, the reverse is also true. It's a common 'rights of passage' test for newbie speaker designers; give them the lab, an anechoic chamber and get them to design the best measuring loudspeaker they possibly can from an on paper/lab perspective. Then they take their prize possession - ruler flat from DC to light, nice and easy impedance curve, no nasty phase angles, good on and off axis directivity and the rest - put it in a domestic listening environment and... it sounds like a clock radio.
There are many reasons why a poor measuring loudspeaker will sound good. A 20dB lift at 80Hz will give a small loudspeaker an impression of deep bass and speaker size, where a more natural roll off makes the loudspeaker sound small and thin. OTOH, a loudspeaker with a dip in the upper bass will sound better than a neutral design when used in a room with four brick walls (such as in Europe).
You seem to presume that a loudspeaker with poor measurement is broken. This is a significant flaw in your thinking about this. These are not faults (like a camera with a broken light meter), but deliberate criteria woven into the design (like a camera with a macro or soft focus lens). And to continue the analogy, your quest for a reference point is as absurd as suggesting the only 'right' lens is a standard lens.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
So you are saying that a suck-out in the midrange due to phase cancellation between different drivers that are clearly not fallowing any meaningful “transfer function” is not a mistake? Why bother even building a XO network then? I am sure someone will prefer the sound of drivers mixing uncontrollably with each other right? BTW, what speaker has a all these great attributes you casually described and yet sound like a clock radio? And to whom does it sound like that? There are very few speakers out there that will fit the bill. None of them sound like a clock radio. It is a cliché, going back to the THD wars of the early 70’s. If you and your colleges were a bit more discriminating there would have been more of these rare products. As it stand, everyone and their mother can build speakers, it is all a matter of taste right?
If the phase cancellation is an intrinsic function of the design, and the design works on listening test, it's a solution to the interaction between drivers. It may not be a common solution and I can think of more elegant solutions, but if it works (and JA clearly thought it worked) so be it.
Interestingly, the 'why bother even building XO network' question has been troubling me ever since I heard the Epos ES11's nearly 20 years ago. This two way used a single capacitor across the tweeter and left the drive units to their own devices. This also had a port that would honk and chuff if you drove the speaker too hard. On the other hand, this loudspeaker was one of the most consistently loved loudspeakers of its time, was constantly one of the top seller loudspeakers for more than a decade and only went out of production because the company could no longer obtain the drivers. If you visit a loudspeaker manufacturer, you'll find a pair in their listening lab (along with a pair of Quad ELS-63) as part of their own set of reference points.
In most cases, it would be difficult or even impossible to rely on the mechanics of the drive units to dictate their own crossover as much as the Epos ES11. The task becomes all the more difficult with more drivers in the system. However, the ES11 demonstrates that it is not impossible and 'the sound of drivers mixing uncontrollably' can prove immensely popular... far more so than similarly-sized and priced alternatives of the time with a far more 'controlled' outlook to crossover design.
As to the measures good and sounds bad project, no such speaker would ever make it to market, anymore. It's a design exercise, often given to neophyte loudspeaker engineers and designers to prevent them from making the mistake of thinking measurement alone is the key to good sound.
And to whom does the loudspeaker with the good measurements sound bad? The designer, of course.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
ROY PAN,
one one hand you champion a somewhat rational approach to everything audio...yet your ratinality blinds you from accepting the fact that your fields of analogy (auto, etc) lack a critical criteria (emotional & sensory -aspects of listening)...you even go on to sacastically dismiss RH's genuine comment about his findings regarding the Pass Amp.
I'll tell you what...why don't you find a dealer and really spend some time with the same amp and tell us your review..i'd love to read your findings(respectfully)
Zead,
Fair points, but a reference can and should still be established. I used to get excited by many products that I no longer care for. How would you know at what point of my “evolution” you can relate to? That is why it doesn’t really matter what I think about the Pass amp. As far as anyone is concerned, I may be deaf, or hard of hearing or have stocks in Passlab. I am not saying that RH comments are not genuine. I do not think that reviewers have “agendas” in particular, I simply think that without a reference, even to an amp he dislikes, that comment means nothing.
OK then, if you think a reference can be established, go ahead and describe how you'd establish it.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
A good start will be agreeing that a speaker has a job to do other than just make you feel good! Like transferring ALL that is coming into it in the most linear lossless way possible.
Problem is, you've just got past the first rung on the ladder. Pretty soon, you start to fall off the ladder.
Let's imagine you have determined an objective set of benchmarks that eliminate all but three loudspeakers out of the whole pantheon of loudspeakers on the market as being capable of doing as you say - 'transferring ALL that is coming into it in the most linear lossless way possible'.
Now you listen to the three (using whatever kind of listening test you decide appropriate), and find they sound different. Not wildly different, but slightly different. One appears to place emphasis on the bass, one on the midrange, one on the treble. You arrange another listening test, with a different listener or listening panel and once again you conclude that one places emphasis on the bass, one on the midrange and one on the treble.
You continue to run listening tests to determine which of these three loudspeakers is the true reference point, but the more people you test, the further you get from a definitive reference loudspeaker. Worse still, many say they'd prefer a bit more bass, for example. Some of those listeners can be trained to like a more balanced overall sound (although they may still prefer the specific emphasis they initially liked) but some still want more bass.
So, despite finding that there are only three loudspeakers that meet your criteria, you find that a number of even trained listeners prefer loudspeakers outside those criteria you have set. The further you go from trained listeners, the more people prefer loudspeakers that deviate from those criteria.
Worst of all, put these three references in the shops and just watch how poorly they sell in the real world.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
And ROY PAN,
you seriously believe that JA, RH, JV, MR PLUS, etc do not at present strive from such trajectories in their analysis?
If they do, how is it that a speaker with a sucked up midrange get a clean bill of health?
"I could end up making a recommendation that involved amplifier from dealer A and loudspeaker from dealer B. This might work wonders, or it might not. If it didn't, do you return the amplifier or the speakers? Or both?"
Mr. Plus, if it didn't work, I'll sell them on Audiogon! No such thing as returning stuff here in this part of the world. Anyway, I hope to make a 800km trip down south and visit a shopping mall in Singapore which houses over 30 dealers with hundreds of different makes. So, pray tell!
BTW, since we're talking about reference equipment now, I've always wondered how it works. The M5 is JV's reference speaker now. The Thiel CS3.7 is reviewed in TAS: "More important, it boasts reference-quality sound with flat response, superb resolution and transient response, bass depth and power just short of the most expensive super-speakers, and excellent soundstaging and imaging." Since both are reference speakers, the logical choice would be to go for the Thiel since it's $76k cheaper, right? The Avantgardes are (or were) Robert Deutsche's (of Stereophile) reference speakers. I'm still relatively new to all this and this thought has been messing with my head lately.
Yes I'm making some sweeping generalizations, in part to help the viscosity of this thread. It's already getting stodgy and opaque to many people, and I'm trying to keep specifics out of the way if possible.
And yes, I agree that we shouldn't assume room interaction when designing speakers. That doesn't make it both happen and - in some respects - produce a good product. Loudspeakers like the original Linn Kan were designed specifically to take boundary interaction in small brick-walled houses into account and voiced accordingly. As a consequence, they were incredibly colored and incredibly popular.
When it comes to 'reference' points, reviewers tend to use this term when they should be using something closer to 'benchmark', IMO. The products I use (at any given price point) are a benchmark, because I use them to compare to other products. That does not make them a 'reference'. A product might deliver a wider or narrower soundstage than that benchmark (for example). If a product performs so much better than the benchmark that any future evaluations would be undermined by not using the new product, I will change benchmarks (I also tend to keep these benchmarks to current products, because there's little reader relevance in comparing the latest turntable to something that was last produced in 1969). That happens relatively rarely.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
Dear Mr. Sircom,
I am very sorry but one of your basic assumptions is simply wrong, human hearing mechanize and acoustical measurement has proven correlation.
The ability to hear though all room interaction, acoustic inferences etc is discussed in details in the reference mention below.
In this field where usually top class speaker designers keep the information to them self, A year and half ago one of the biggest researches in the world of high end loudspeaker wrote his knowledge black on white in simple words on a book:
Sound Reproduction: The Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers and Rooms. (Author: Floyd Toole, PhD, Former VP acoustical engineering Harman international Inc.)
You are uninformed Mr. Sircom, As the rising star of audio journalism , instead of reviewing the next speakers with phase cancelation between his two drivers read Mr. Toole book , it will give you an insight many people don't want to have.
Tools are out there to measure and simulate everything, the issue is how many of the famous high end speaker designers know how to operate them?
How many high end speakers are made using Solid works design process? How many high end drivers are measured using latest available tools like Klippel R&D System? How many of Mr. Toole competitors read his book? (Or hundreds of scientific publication on the subject all available on line?)
For example, On Issue No.4 Vol 3 of HIFI Citric martin columns published a review on the Wilson Sasha , he measured 1.5 ohm impedance at 80Hz ( a load every amplifier will suffer from) , plus one of the worst ever off axis responses he measured. If he was referring to Dr. Toole research it will correlate to bad sounding speaker according to 20 years research in a controlled listening environment using proven static models. Yet he found his way to credit this design as a great sounding speaker.
Today, knowledge is available on line from sources like the AES e –library.
Today - Voodoo is no longer an option.
All The best
Jeff
I have nothing but respect for the work Dr Floyd Toole has done in the audio industry, and have read his book carefully and with great consideration. It has been widely read by many in the audio industry, including the vast majority of high end loudspeaker designers (in a similar vein, practically every amplifier designer has read 'Science and Subjectivism in Audio' by Douglas Self).
My biggest criticism (not necessarily of Dr F-T's book, but by those who support it with an almost religious zeal) is the implication that good loudspeaker design is restricted to those companies large enough to support a scientific research team. In audio, that pretty much limits the field to Harman companies (JBL, Infinity, Revel) and companies that can access the NRC facilities (Axiom, Energy, Paradigm, PSB, etc), along with B&W, KEF and a few others. All of these companies make extremely fine loudspeakers, but they are not the only companies making fine loudspeakers; companies like ATC and Magico can achieve admirable levels of performance (in both objective and subjective camps) without calling on a huge R&D team.
As to how many high-end manufacturers use Klippel's R&D suite? Less than use Audio Precision or Brüel & Kjær in design, although a lot use the QC suite, but Klippel's experiments are well-known to speaker designers. As to SolidWorks, I don't know how many use that particular CAD package, but I know that there are very, very few manufacturers who don't use some kind of CAD/CAM these days.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
Dear Mr. Sircom,
Thank you for your kind and fast reply.
I admire your high diplomatic skills, as always a Top class journalists are great diplomats.
Again, the issue is whether there is a correlation between human hearing and acoustical measurements? Scientific research done by Dr Floyd Toole proves the correlation exists.
As far as I know, Dr Floyd Toole has PHD in physics, he is not a priest, and we are talking about science not religion.
I mention Mr. Column's measurements to emphasis you don’t need an anechoic chamber or 20 people team to check for basic mistakes like the ones I mentioned in my last post.
Our goal should be the copycatting the Car industry; No one will sell a car without checking it first on an engineering basis and only than fine-tune it while driving. (The term "fine tuning" comes from the car industry…)
And don’t forget in the car industry we have the Ferrari's (Magico) , Mercedes (Ravel) and VW (B&W) , all of them makes car that makes the same basics , yet are totally different .
IMHO , the only way our beloved hobby will be survive is the we will put the voodoo to rest and support the real engineers , physicists and acoustician do their Job.
Kind Regards
Jeff
My 'religious zeal' comment was not directed at Dr Floyd Toole, or his book. My comment was directed at those who view the publication as something to be taken up with enthusiastic diligence and unquestioning acceptance. This is in great contrast with the scientific exploration into audio made by the good Doctor and others.
It's not about whether measurement and human hearing correlate. That's an altogether different argument. It's whether people choose products on the basis of something more than 'neutrality', and from there, does a non-neutral transducer represent a 'bad' design or merely an 'idiosyncratic' one?
The lab research by Floyd Tool, Olive, etc, suggests that non-neutral transducers do not fare well and that most listeners reject such designs. Point-of-sale research suggests otherwise and points to people actively selecting non-neutral transducers because 'they like the sound'.
In the case of the Wilson Sasha, its off-axis performance is mitigated by the installation procedures Wilson insists upon as part of the overall 'package'. Moreover, reducing off-axis energy appears to be a deliberate part of Wilson's design criteria (the Duette's front baffle for example has spongy material specifically designed to absorb off-axis emission) rather than an 'error', Harman, NRC and Archimedes/EUreka research notwithstanding.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
What the research performed and cited by Dr. Toole shows is that it is impossible for anyone to judge a product simply on how it sounds under anything but blind conditions.
When a customer goes into a hifi shop to purchase a new pair of speakers or an amplifier there are many more things that factor into the final purchasing decision other than the sound being reproduced.
Unfortunately, many reviewers and audiophiles still claim that they can judge sound without bias. I know I can't.
Halleluiah, Jeff! I have not read Toole book but I can't wait to do so. I do however, think that anyone with basic engineering sensibility, would have dismissed 90% of the loudspeakers we are discussing here. I also believe that as a whole, the reviewer community had let us all down by allowing anyone to pass thru the gate. You will notice, Jeff, that no one will pick up on your challenge to at least read the book. It is simply too much to ask of anyone to do before he recommend, or buy a $20K plus product...
“How many high end speakers are made using Solid works design process? How many high end drivers are measured using latest available tools like Klippel R&D System?”
At least one company I know of, and it is the subject of this thread. Turned out, due to basically a universal recognition, that most reviewers do hear the differences when presented with such a product. What is interesting is that very few of them are willing to step forward and say just that. I do have to give credit to JV of TAS for sticking his head further than anyone. SO let’s not be too harsh on the media…
I have the Magico v2 s at home, powered by darTZeel and to me they are getting better and better. Thankfully I tried the speakers at home first as they have sounded rubbish at the hifi shows. Proves the necessity of a home demo given the unpredictable way speakers react with the room.
Mr Plus, thanks for recommending the Wilson Sophia 2 and the Reference 3A Grand Veena.
The Sophia 2's look similar to the WATT/Puppy Series 8. What are the sonic differences between the two? And what amps would match the Wilsons?
When the two were current, I preferred the Sophia 2 to the W/P 8. The W/P 8 had a more dynamic delivery with better bass extension, but the Sophia 2 presented a more integrated sound. The W/P 8 is also the more demanding loudspeaker, both in terms of amplifier requirements (it had a higher sensitivity, but some significant dips in the impedance plot) and room (it essentially makes the WASP - Wilson Audio Set-up Procedure - positioning schema mandatory).
This is made both better (more integrated sound across the midband) and worse (more punishing impedance plot, off-axis performance demanding WASP installation) as the W/P 8 was replaced by the Sasha W/P.
Amplifiers that go well with the Wilsons are traditionally Krell and Audio Research, although DarTZeel, Pass and VTL are also popular choices.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
What a concept, get the basics right and then tune it to a certain goal. Unheard-of. That will put 90% of speaker builders out of business. Imagine of all innovations that we could have seen if all the funds going to voodoo land went to the real things.
Mr. Plus,
As Jeff said, you are avoiding the real issues. Sounds to me that you (and other reviewers) are trying to stay relevant, but I do not see how you can without seriously addressing the issues on hand.
Jtein,
Why do you think that Mr. Plus understanding of the differences between the speakers that you are referring to will match your understanding? It is all a matter of taste right? I think that you are in the wrong place. You may want to start a new thread.
BenY, due to great difficulty in auditioning speakers and electronics where I live, I'm trying to gather as much info, any info, as I possibly can so that when I do go for my audition rounds, the info I've gathered will hopefully help me listen intelligently as well as with my heart. I'm still relatively new to all this and trying my best to grope around in this weird and wonderful high-end world
If you want to choose a loudspeaker based purely on objective measurement... go for it. Simply pick the product with the best set of measurements at any given price point and you can save a lot of time in auditioning. However, a proportion of the speaker-buying community don't share your world-view and choose to buy on audition. From a not inconsiderable amount of time in the field, I'd say more than half of those who choose to buy on audition will purchase a loudspeaker that performs well from both a subjective and objective standing. With up-front listener training prior to purchase, you could probably make more buyers choose more objectively coherent designs, but you'd lose a lot of potential buyers unwilling to be re-educated in the process.
An interesting (to my mind, at least) and well-documented factor is those who engage in the hobby in the real world tend to diverge, rather than naturally move to an objectively better-performing system. This is most commonly seen in amplifiers, but applies just as much to loudspeaker designs. People who bought their first 'hi-fi' in the 1980s were likely to have bought good budget equipment, but they were very, very unlikely to have started their audio journey on a tube amp. Some of these people are still engaged in the hobby and continue to upgrade - although from a purely objective viewpoint, the move from a well-designed solid-state integrated amplifier of 25 years ago to a single-ended triode design is a major step in the wrong direction. And many of those who own these amplifiers not only know their products will perform badly in the lab, but revel in the fact.
While this is not a universal - and many do choose a path of increasingly better-performing products from an objective and subjective standing - there is a significant proportion of the audiophile community that chooses products on subjective performance alone. Personally, I think this can lead to the odd consequence of applying a filter to the musical options open to the listener - if one chooses audio on the basis of its sonic 'niceness', you tend to buy music that reflects that. A more neutral transducer delivers the good and the bad in music without favor. However, I also know many, many audiophiles disagree strongly.
Whether this desire for products that deviate from the objective/subjective path comes down to those products sounding 'better', sounding 'nice', sounding 'good' to certain listeners, baby boomer rebellion, cognitive dissonance, reviewer influence, peer pressure, upbringing, atavism, history or one of a hundred different reasons is moot (in the case of the SET amplifier revival, that isn't even something that could be put down to 'reviewer influence', as it was driven by an underground movement long before audio magazines got wise to the concept). Fact remains, a lot of people still derive a lot of pleasure out of what could be considered 'objectively redundant' technologies.
Would you deny them a voice, simply because they choose not to follow the same path as you?
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
"If you want to choose a loudspeaker based purely on objective measurement... go for it. "
And where exactly these " objective measurement" and clear explanations of their merit to the lame man can be found? JA over the years consistently measured badly design, therefore measured loudspeakers and claim them to be just fine. So who will tell us what is "truly" fine?
Well, you can find the lay explanation in 'Sound Reproduction - Loudspeakers and Rooms' by Floyd E Toole (Elsevier/Focal Press) ISBN: 978-0-240-52009-4.
As to objective measurements, SoundStage.com draws upon the resources of the NRC. Of course, the NRC does not provide subjective assessment of products and that part of the reviews are given to reviewers, who often come up with results that don't tally with measurement either. You can also draw on the reviews published in any magazine that routinely prints measurement alongside subjective reviews to see how little they correlate with the objective part.
From here, you can either come to the conclusion that (a) all subjective reviewing is nonsense, or (b) maybe the subjective part is adding some useful information, too. The path from (a) to (b) usually takes between six months and two years, depending on how often you listen to your system and the systems of others.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
>>From here, you can either come to the conclusion that (a) all subjective reviewing is nonsense, or (b) maybe the subjective part is adding some useful information, too.<<
Or an equally long 6 months to 2 years corollary path to True Audio Knowledge, that is, from (a) all measurements sound the same to (b) maybe there's something to this Ding An Sich stuff after all, but first, play that cut again. ;->
Perhaps we are getting somewhere. Imagine a review, that has all the necessary objective data plus a subjective analysis as to how the data correlates to one impression? Let's take for example recent review of a certain loudspeakers. Although a VERY flat FR, total harmonics distortions (THD) according to SS measurements, creeps in at an alarming rate at not so high volume. Clearly a big issue form an objective point of view for a $30K plus loudspeakers. RH who reviewed these as well, pointed out, very diplomatically, that these speakers should not be driven too hard, or play in a big room. He clearly heard what SS measured, but had no way to correlate his subjective finding with and objective one. His overall conclusion, great speakers but do not play very loud, was wrong because of it. These are clearly NOT great and do have serious design faults that need addressing (Well, if someone out there still likes the sound of high THD, he at least now knows where to go). Perhaps, if the designer was held accountable, he would make a better speaker next time around right?
Given that I don't wish to question the findings of my colleagues and counterparts without having some knowledge of the product, I really don't feel comfortable discussing this at length. However, you seem to be saying that RH should be criticized for getting his facts right. This seems odd.
If this relates to the product I suspect it relates to, the company's aim has been to produce a loudspeaker designed to deliver full-range sound into a small room, and one of the unfortunate limitations that laudable goal imposes on the designer is very limited operating headroom. As someone who has tried - and failed - to get full-range performance in a small room, the limited headroom issue, really isn't an issue.
Put another way, if the choice comes down to bandwidth or volume levels, I'd at least like to have the choice.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
"..one of the unfortunate limitations that laudable goal imposes on the designer is very limited operating headroom. "
What is the relationship between FR range and operating headroom? Remember, we are not talking about a single driver here.
Can't you have both for a $30K plus loudspeakers?
I think it's very difficult, perhaps impossible, to get a full-range response in a small room without sacrifice. Even with a room made of bass traps, you are still going to excite a lot of room modes and their harmonics; in real world settings, this is a major issue. You can overcome some of this by not putting anything like the normal amount of energy in the room, but then you face driver interaction issues and non-linearities in the drivers at minimal excursion. If a loudspeaker is designed specifically for that task, even at the expense of the loud end of the scale, that sounds like a Manhattanite's dream.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
“However, you seem to be saying that RH should be criticized for getting his facts right. This seems odd.”
I am not criticizing his facts, I am criticizing his conclusions. JA is also very good at saying “yes, it measures poorly but it sounds just fine."
"the choice comes down to bandwidth or volume levels"
You must be kidding, right??
Do you really not understand why it is absolutely not acceptable to have such poor THD figures at 90db. You are going to call that a "design choice"? Who in his right mind will choose such a path and for what reason?
Have a look at a $4000 PSB which has a wider freq response, better power response, cleaner impedance curve and play much louder with fraction of THD then the $37K YG (Yes, we can mention names). They also, to my ears, sound a lot better. They will play equally good in a small/big room. The only difference will be in the room gain.
Are you sure you have the same YG product in both cases? The Kipod Studio has been reviewed here, but I don't see it elsewhere with measurements. SS tested the previous model of the Anat Reference main module.
As it seems pointless comparing the measurements of one loudspeaker with the review of another, I'm calling a halt to this discussion now. It's merely gainsaying what the other person has to say and is a serious piece of thread crapping.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com
I agree, it is surly now a thread crapping. You seems to, consistently, avoid the issues at stake. There were quite a few examples of what will constitute a "bad design" in this thread but in your book, there is no such thing as "bad" speakers. There are only speakers that one may or may not like. Rather safe position to take I guess. But the question you need to really ask yourself is "are you relevant" with that approach in mind? I am not sure that you and your colleges are. If you do not believe me, look at your subscription numbers. Look at the numbers of "hits" on the CES show reports. Compare them to last year, or the year before. I remember when the Magico Mini came out, there were over 70 thousands hits on the forum with probably close to 100 participants. Look at this thread now? It is manly you, I and 2, 3 others... Yes, some of it is sign of the times but a big part of it is "content". It is simply not that interesting... You do not need to win this argument, I am on your side and I only hope you can consider what I am trying to say.
Ha! You should listen to the Harry Pearson RMAF Keynote posted on this site...Part 2 gets at some of the things you raise.
Happy user of V3...
but magico and alan wolf got lost in their own success story...M5 took 1 + years to develop...with financing from their dealers...they ship the M5s and then 6-9 months later they introduced Q5 which will ultimately kill the M5 before it was born...so the hype and excitement that alan wolf got when he introduced mini II vs Q5 is his own mistake..
V2 on the other hand is alsoa giant killer in my view...but one thing is for certain whatever the brand is you need power power power with the magicos....
i think that magicos really shine with very powerful tube amps and Audio research is a perfect match...dont rule out the V2 until u hear it with a very powerful amp...
There's a back story to this, I'm led to believe. The M5 represents the pinnacle of development a company like Magico could produce, given it had to subcontract aluminum fabrication out to a third party.
The Q5 on the other hand represents the pinnacle of development Magico could produce, now that it owns the aluminum fabricating factory.
From what I gather, if the Q5 were made a year or two ago, the amount of aluminum work going on in that cabinet would make it cost more than the M5, if the aluminum work was outsourced. Not so much in the per-unit cost of each loudspeaker, but the back-and-forth aluminum work in the R&D stage would have made designing the speaker prohibitive.
Releasing the Q5 so soon after the M5 was a difficult decision for Magico, and the team is well aware of the potential for negative feelings the Q5 might engender. But, if the product is designed, would it have been better to leave the new design on the 'drawing board' for two or three years?
There is another thing though; even if the Q5 ends up being the 'better' speaker, it doesn't suddenly make the M5 'bad'... it will remain one of the best loudspeakers ever produced.
I hope Magico learns from this. It has a stunning range of loudspeakers now. If these models are to move from being remarkable products to true classics, they need to be around long enough to make their presence felt.
Alan Sircom
Editor, Hi-Fi Plus Magazine
London, England
editor [at] hifiplus [dot] com