I agree with the responses from Jafant and Hifiman5. I’ve found that improvements in accuracy, especially with respect to resolution of fine detail, can make mediocre or poor recordings sound more enjoyable. As well as improving the reproduction of great recordings, of course.
A good example of that would be an orchestral recording having overly bright string sound. I’ve found that the brightness will be less objectionable if the sound of massed strings is reproduced in an accurate and detailed manner than if it is reproduced with less resolution of detail, and consequently in a more homogenized manner.
I’ll mention also that I’ve come to believe that time coherence can be a significant contributor to achieving that. Most speakers are not time coherent, including all speakers having crossover slopes that are more than 6 db/octave, which means nearly all speakers that have crossovers and are not made by Vandersteen, Thiel, Green Mountain Audio, and perhaps one or two others. And the addition of a DEQX to my system a couple of years ago, which can bring any speaker that is not time coherent significantly closer to being so, has helped to firm up that conclusion in my mind. Another member here who is very experienced with time coherent speakers had made a similar point here in the long-running
DEQX thread. Comparisons I’ve made between listening via speakers and listening via my highly detailed and time coherent Stax electrostatic headphones have also led me to that conclusion.
Best regards,
-- Al
