On Mon, 20 Oct 2003 15:44:23 GMT, RPS wrote:

This is inspired by the recent discussion on possible replacement for
my Spendor BC1's (thanks for all the comments in that thread):

Many of you have commented on a speaker being more or less
neutral/accurate than others.

If you were not present at the original recording session, with good
memory, how can you judge the accuracy of the reproduction?

I mean, I can tell that Spendor, Proac, and Dynaudio are sounding
different, but don't I need to be familiar with the actual original
sound to judge which one is accurate or uncolored?

There are many experienced audiophiles in this forum and I would
appreciate all comments, theoretical as well as how you approach
auditions personally.

Raghu

The main thing when auditioning a new speaker is this - if on first
hearing, you say "wow, that sounds great" then walk on by. That is not
a neutral speaker.

I remember my first hearing of a Quad electrostatic. I had been
expecting great things and I was frankly disappointed, it didn't
really seem to be much of anything. No booming bass, no fizzing highs.
But on further listening I realised that all that stuff was there,
just not overstated. It was clean.

I think that is the best way to sort out what is neutral - it should
not grab you by the throat in any regard - just carry on sounding
better the longer you listen to it.

d

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