And we strive for..... what ?

Not trying to start anything as I have no idea of what as close to the original means in home systems or amplified music of any type. I can only assume that your tastes in music are of limited scope (In which case I guess I would have to agree pretty much)...or that you don't have much knowledge of the behind the scene action that takes place in recordings and even live events. I think that if you strip away the enhancements layer by layer and go acappella so to speak, we would find that a good many of the popular artist would not be so popular. I do get your point and understand were your at on this as I have wrestled with this in my mind many times. As of late I have be trying to come to some consensus in my mind on how multichannel music should sound...at home in my room. Should it sound like it does when I go out and listen to it up on the stage? OR, should it sound like I have them live in my room which puts me more in the middle of things type of perspective. There are recordings that give both views of the picture, I find that I like both somewhat, which is more "Original" would depend on my imaginary needs for that time and place in my mind I guess? Which brings me to my point

Dave

Something similar to this has been used since the mid 1980's (it went by another name then "syn-something").

A guy I know (one of the first few operators of the unit) worked with Frank Zappa and Michael Jackson, to name a few. It was used both live and in studio.

I got to play around with it once and somehow it could alter pitch while maintaining the original time signature/tempo of the music.

Dekay,
I just finished a couple of books on Zappa. The device is called a synclavier. He loved it, he said, because he could type notes in and push a button to immediately play it back.

Part of the love, I take it from the books, is that he had a terrible time getting orchestras (I'm not talking about his bands here; they were another story) to rehearse sufficiently and then do a good job playing his pieces. He noted the primary limitations of the synclavier as being that it cannot improvise (of course) and cannot reproduce emotion absent a level of complexity of the data inputted that was debilitatingly time-consuming--I'm sure folks could argue about the latter forever. I'm no expert; this is just what I've read in the last two days.

I acknowledge your points. But for me, what we are doing is both a "hobby" and a "passion". This two gives me hope to strive for the better. Provides me a means of outlet during rough days. Provides me joy and pride for my accomplishments and the accumulation of knowledge learned from others.

...those things are good enough for me.....I for one cannot forsee when I will stop striving for the better....it is not in my blood.....

...thanks for the reminders though....

This comes as no surprise, unfortunately. I do take exception to the statement made:

"The driving force behind this trend has been the fans themselves, who now have a more educated ear and can tell if something is off-key, industry experts said."

This is laughable.

Charlie