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Will the sound quality deminish over the years?

I bought a set of used B&W 802N and see a lot of nice speakers for sale here. I wondered if the age of the speaker would cause the sound to degrade. Sure, I have heard people state how great their 40 yo speakers sound, but could that be like shocks on a car? You won't notice how much less they are until it is changed.Just a curious thought as to 10 - 20 years down the road, can I expect the speakers to sound as good, especially when laying out a lot of quag.
lmr
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
As you bring more LPs, more DVDs, more books, more magazines and more of anything with barcodes on them into the house the sound will degrade to the point where it sounds very compressed, very generic and very amusical. Kind of like it sounds right now, most likely, now that I think about it. No offense intended.
nonoise's avatar
nonoise
11,142 posts
 
Mceljo-good point. My first reaction was something like "who covered my speakers in cheesecloth?", it was that big of a difference. Although I've written off the tuner since I got it for so little, I'm still not used to the trade off in sound. Having a bigger and fuller mid to bass response is nice but it seems to dominate the already limited frequencies in a disproportionate way. I guess one can say it has that classic Marantz house sound from the 70s. I once inserted an old Marantz receiver (I believe it was a 2030) into my system and the sound was very similar: big, full and wooly.

Like Kotta pointed out, different tuners will sound different in the context of any given system, just like any other component.

All the best,
Nonoise
zd542
5,339 posts
 
"11-09-14: Phasecorrect
Hate to be a buzzkill...but FM frequency cuts out @ 15 kHz...so the improvements attributed to the Nad are largely imaginative...that said, its a very good tuner."

"11-10-14: Mceljo
Nonoise - I like how your perspective shifted from the Marantz lacking the highs to it adding mid and bass. The change in perspective caused you to no longer think of it as not sounding as good as the NAD. Now that your assumption has changed for the Marantz, you will likely enjoy it rather than wish it sounded like the NAD. You may still prefer the NAD, but I am fascinated by how our brains work."

Why the assumption that the change is imagined? That's pretty far fetched. He listened to the NAD tuner on a regular basis for over 20 years. I think its far more likely his guess that the extension in the HF's are too blame is wrong, and that there is some other real cause for the difference between the 2 tuners.
roccl007's avatar
roccl007
205 posts
 
Hello folks you are far away from the initial subject: degradation of a pair of speakers over the years not the ears ..........
bifwynne
2,206 posts
 
Perhaps a another way to phrase the OP's Q is whether current model speakers use better materials and employ better technology that the SOTA of 40 years ago. And hence, sound better than the old stuff.

I suspect the answer is in the affirmative. Stated differently, if the OP was to stack an old pair of B&Ws against an equivalent current model, I surmise the newer model very well might sound better.

Technology has advanced across the board.
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