Where have we gone wrong.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Much about hi-fi music reproduction has got better over the last 40 years from the so called golden age of hi-fi. For me the biggest one has been the realisation of how important cable is in a system. So where have we gone wrong, for me it is loudspeaker design, it has become more and more about image and less about substance. They look nice now but the build quality and materials and concepts are shite. And there is so much bullshit leading them around, the worst companies at it have varied over the time but at the moment the biggest bullshitter is Harbeth. Take *everything* that company says and reverse it and you may be getting somewhere back into reality.

[Fretless]

Speaker design nowadays seems to be 90% WAF and 'Impress Your Friends'. The constant and limitless availability of music from internet seems to have devalued the idea of actually sitting down and appreciating it. Music and Hifi have become 'lifestyle accessories'.

From what I can see the most people walk around all day with nasty little white Apple earbuds listening to lo-fi MP3 or Spotify, they don't know what Hifi is - and don't know that they are missing out. Audio equipment, like TV's, has to be integrated into the furnishings of the modern living room and mustn't stand out (preferably not be seen at all). And remotely controlled with a smartphone App.

The Music Industry is also fighting for survival in a changing market - going for quantity and a quick sell in place of quality. Then they just re-hash the back catalogue for those who want something else than the latest Pop-hype.

The upcoming High Quality services like Tidal are the way forward, along with a resurgence of interest in Vinyl (although most of the new generation have no idea how to treat an LP or get the best out of it). Their idea of HiFi is based on Sonos and Bose (God forbid) and anything that can be run via Bluetooth (yuk).

The hifi world is waiting for a new hype that is small, cheap, fashionable and sounds entirely different - Cubette's perhaps ?

[alfafan123]

I think the budget end of the market in the US is moving the way Fretless suggests albeit slowly e.g. Roth OLI RA1, Micca MB42x and Pioneer BS22 LR etc with fibre glass mid bass drivers at affordable prices for the economically and spatially challenged but agree that the traditional UK speaker houses keep serving up the same old same old and the recent price increases seem hard to justify. For example Rega R1 was £298/pr and now their RX1 is I believe £798/pr. Neat Acoustics prices have also increased significantly. How can that be justified? Things must be bad because even the no p/x here Audio T have recently announced 20% off new speakers and now offer p/x for the old ones as well.

what is the world coming to?

[Macca]

Nothing has really changed. The ipod and its 'dock' have simply replaced the personal cassette player and the portable stereo tape deck or 'boom box'. In the 1980s the majority of people had a midi system from Amstrad, Saisho or if they were 'serious' JVC, Sony or Aiwa. Speakers were made of thin chipboard and had one full range driver (sometimes with other drivers 'painted' onto the grilles).

Listening to music on quality hi-fi seperates has always been very much a minority pursuit.

Speakers that measure flat and are domestically acceptable have always outsold the alternatives and still do. if you want to build a high quality speaker, in the UK it will cost huge amounts compared to the Chinese built competetion, it will be out of the price range of most enthusiasts and those who are not enthusiasts will be unlikely to ever learn of its existence.

I don't see any way that it is possible to square the circle on this. Personally I don't care if the pursuit of hi-fidelity remains a minority interest, but then I am not a dealer or a manufacturer.

[alfafan123]

PS, my little P50 has shown how much colouration traditional pre-amps contribute to the sound and have given my Stirling Broadcast MS-88s (LS3/5a clones using Monacor polypropylene coned mid bass and scanspeak HF drivers...yes I know you don't rate then Doc) a new lease of life but I am still aware of the dumbing down of the dynamics.

I wonder how you can achieve a flat response in a small design without a complex crossover that throttle dynamics, screws up phase and wastes energy?

Also I can't understand why people try and recreate old designs like the LS3/5a using all the old technology including Bextrene cones which age?

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

It *should* be a minority interest, the hi-fi as mainstream time was an anomaly. I am not talking about the cheap stuff and yes of course you are right cheap rack system - boom box - iPod or Bose Wave. That is not hi-fi, we forget the reason for the name. I am talking about the companies that claim the higher ground like Harbeth, born in bullshit and live in bullshit, and my point is that is all we have now, there are no more *hi-fi* mainstream speaker manufacturers who aren't all badly made bullshit. People judge by the outside, you have to know what you are looking at to really know.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Also I can't understand why people try and recreate old designs like the LS3/5a using all the old technology including Bextrene cones which age?

Exactly!

[_D_S_J_R_]

at the moment the biggest bullshitter is Harbeth. Take *everything* that company says and reverse it and you may be getting somewhere back into reality.

Hang on a minute. Where do you get that one from, apart from to make me cross???

Harbeth's boxes may be thin-wall, but they're a VERY different thing from what Rogers and Spendor were/are doing all those years ago. Internal wiring is now Van Damme 'Blue' 2.5mm and recent work on the crossovers has halved their in-line impedance, as the designer now accepts the importance of the amp's output impedance, relative to 'seeing' the drivers behind the crossover network - Damping factor to you and me. The tonal balance is also being gradually brought round from the BBC Down-tilt that had become fashionable in the 1970's and 1980's - yes, to suit themselves, not the general public who couldn't buy their monitors until they were being sold off some years ago.

The guy's learning as we ALL are, but doing it in a very methodical manner. I can't say I've appreciated the sanctimonious patronising I've suffered at that forum's hands on occasion, but the audible results in the new models speak for themselves - and sales are up despite price-hikes sadly.

I have to defend Harbeth's speakers, as most who've heard the current crop really love them and many buy them as their 'final speaker.' One reason you don't see so many for sale on the used market.

All my reply above doesn't mean to say I love the Cubix design any the less, but credit where it's due etc.......

[Classicrock]

I have to say that Harbeth remain some of the better speakers I've heard in recent years and there aren't many really good ones about that don't cost an astronomical amount. Sound a lot better than the old BBC designs so a lot of work has obviously been done. Can't condemn them due to the company owners persona and adherence to the thin wall cabinet principle. There is more than one way to make a decent sounding speaker. The main problem is that anything affordable out there is made on the cheap in a Chinese factory. Picking the wrong target here Doc and they certainly aren't designed to be WAF friendly. I've heard some terrible sounding new thin/small designs at shows that cost more than most Harbeth models. £5k speakers that look and sound south of £500.

[Lindsayt]

Too many recordings with too much compression doesn't help.

No new exciting musical genre for quite a few years now. Probably due to no new musical instruments being introduced to stimulate musical experimentation.

Interest in hi-fi, to some extent follows on from an interest in recorded music. Both of which seem to be down on their peak in the 1970's to mid 1980's.


Belt drive TT's and the dropping of DD and Idlers.

I agree about speaker design. Far too many slimline ported designs.

Speakers with adequately sized bass drivers have gone way out of fashion too.


There's also the persistent marketing bullshit that has always been around and is about as bad now as it's always been - except that there are a broader range of manufacturers that have gained success via marketing over substance.


In general, the dropping of too many valid techniques / technologies due to manufacturing costs - and not due to the sound quality offered.