well maybe they do and maybe they dont and please excuse my entirely personal and subjective ramblings and musings on the subject but i have a hard time believing that right now because ive just spent the last 6 or 7 hours in the company of Randy Crawford, Spyrogyra, Michael Buble', Najee and my great old buddy Lee Ritenour and you know what - i could probably last another 6 or 7 hours more - I really dont feel tired at all and my ears dont feel like they tried to run a 20 kilometer marathon at a 100 metre sprint pace
my speakers are basically about running in (just around 100 hours or so of playback right now) - the CD player is around almost close to 20 years old so if it isnt run in by now i dont know when it ever will be and ditto for my MIT cables which are half the age of the CD player but they are not infants either - the amplification is a plain old Denon AVR 2808 and by golly i am wondering why i was considering replacing it cos listening to it last night was almost like an epiphany
sure the bass isnt as tight as it could be because i dont have a subwoofer that matches the main speakers for pace and the high frequencies are marginally peaky (speakers fault .... its a long story but i reckon it has to do with the crossover point between the ribbons and domes) BUT the speakers i have excel in two aspects and those are :
1) they have a gorgeous silky smooth midrange ..... and
2) they have this incredibly detailed extremely three dimensional soundstage whereby the speakers simply disappear
so yes i was sitting there with the lights off so you can easily say "no shit sherlock - you cant see them so they disappear" but trust me when you hear a sound from where you know the speakers are you definitely know they are there and right now the soundstage is going so far beyond the speaker boundaries i cant believe that the sound im hearing is from a system thats as inexpensive as mine is
AND a huge resounding yes that a more expensive high end system with better stuff would be more transparent as well as have better detail recovery and with that it would probably sound warmer and you would be able to describe it with loads more superlatives than i can describe mine ..... but hey for a system thats got stuff in it as old as mine which is as cheap as mine IMHO it still manages to really kick some newer more expensive gear right in their well dentured pearly whites
im still not 100% convinced that using a stereo only amplifier will improve it by a helluva lot (and sure that leaves the possibility that it might) but maybe some day if i can get my hands on a (reputably) decent stereo amplifier to either prove or disprove my theory that whilst it may be better it is so negligibly so that it doesnt really seriously matter but till then im just going to enjoy the music that mine manages to dish out in spades when utilized in stereo mode - im even now having serious second thoughts about wanting to upgrade up to the Pioneer SC-LX83 that ive been thinking would have been a nice step up but right now im only thinking that if i do that upgrade it will only be to get the 6 HDMI inputs as opposed to the 2 of the Denon and also the fact that it has two HDMI outputs so i can possibly use it as a HDMI matrix unit or even as a multi-zone setup utilising some HDMI to ethernet adapters so i can seriously play all the sources in the lounge in my room too .... but honestly after this latest listening session im thinking theres still life in this combo that i have yet
i love it when all the stuff i have just starts working good and this is one of those times ;D
my speakers are basically about running in (just around 100 hours or so of playback right now) - the CD player is around almost close to 20 years old so if it isnt run in by now i dont know when it ever will be and ditto for my MIT cables which are half the age of the CD player but they are not infants either - the amplification is a plain old Denon AVR 2808 and by golly i am wondering why i was considering replacing it cos listening to it last night was almost like an epiphany
sure the bass isnt as tight as it could be because i dont have a subwoofer that matches the main speakers for pace and the high frequencies are marginally peaky (speakers fault .... its a long story but i reckon it has to do with the crossover point between the ribbons and domes) BUT the speakers i have excel in two aspects and those are :
1) they have a gorgeous silky smooth midrange ..... and
2) they have this incredibly detailed extremely three dimensional soundstage whereby the speakers simply disappear
so yes i was sitting there with the lights off so you can easily say "no shit sherlock - you cant see them so they disappear" but trust me when you hear a sound from where you know the speakers are you definitely know they are there and right now the soundstage is going so far beyond the speaker boundaries i cant believe that the sound im hearing is from a system thats as inexpensive as mine is
AND a huge resounding yes that a more expensive high end system with better stuff would be more transparent as well as have better detail recovery and with that it would probably sound warmer and you would be able to describe it with loads more superlatives than i can describe mine ..... but hey for a system thats got stuff in it as old as mine which is as cheap as mine IMHO it still manages to really kick some newer more expensive gear right in their well dentured pearly whites
im still not 100% convinced that using a stereo only amplifier will improve it by a helluva lot (and sure that leaves the possibility that it might) but maybe some day if i can get my hands on a (reputably) decent stereo amplifier to either prove or disprove my theory that whilst it may be better it is so negligibly so that it doesnt really seriously matter but till then im just going to enjoy the music that mine manages to dish out in spades when utilized in stereo mode - im even now having serious second thoughts about wanting to upgrade up to the Pioneer SC-LX83 that ive been thinking would have been a nice step up but right now im only thinking that if i do that upgrade it will only be to get the 6 HDMI inputs as opposed to the 2 of the Denon and also the fact that it has two HDMI outputs so i can possibly use it as a HDMI matrix unit or even as a multi-zone setup utilising some HDMI to ethernet adapters so i can seriously play all the sources in the lounge in my room too .... but honestly after this latest listening session im thinking theres still life in this combo that i have yet
i love it when all the stuff i have just starts working good and this is one of those times ;D
