Do you trust your system?
I was constantly upgrading gear, demoing songs, reading reviews, trying to find out why I had the feeling that the song I was playing shouldn’t sound the way it does. Something off or lacking, I luckily found a set of equipment and a room setup that if a song is off, it’s likely recorded that way. I trust my system to do a decent job. I wonder do others get to a point where they are more critical of mastering techniques than something wrong with their equipment? Admittedly, it’s easier to say how a piece of gear or cable made some significant difference, but in what exactly since the music sources are so wildly manipulated by engineers?
Yes I trust my system and I know why that is reality. There was no luck involved. Should I one day go down the Class D path, I will trust my choice there for the same reason. My system is invariant between different recordings/mastering/genres etc. I don't have streaming where I understand that music is deliberately coloured by the use of MQA and other tricks and so the system may have to be tuned or whatever to accommodate this technology. |
I trust my system more than my cats. They like to run behind the system and pull wires loose. Since LPS are way in the past for me, I am streaming. I got my system. Flying solo since I don't have a local dealer. The good thing was I found good deals. Every time I changed, sold, bought, moved something I kept saying. Wow it sounds better. Now, 2 1/2 yrs later, I think it is more dialed in. I have not located others who have systems to compare to or been to a trade show. The store I have been to made me realize I could spend a lot more for not much more. I haven't been to a small venue is sometime. It shows me what instruments sound like before electronic modification. I do find many recordings that make me wonder what the recording engineers are thinking of. I have seen some concerts where I could not believe the sound quality. Tool, Weather Report, George Benson, Chick Corea, Recently a Dead and Company concert in an amphitheatre sounded fantastic. Not loud, no earplugs, but clean wonderful sound. And then just to prove it, they send out a couple bass notes during their "Drums" version that rocked your world, and mine. Lately, I have been just listening to the music. And I enjoy some of the newer 3D stuff. But also some old school recordings. So many voices have been messed with. |
"I think that worrying about the performance of your system after you have dedicated the necessary effort to dial it in (which may take time) is a symptom of audio nervosa" whart pretty much summed things up. Get your setup optimized including the room. After that, play the best recordings possible and enjoy. No cable, fuse or audiophoolery necessary. Not that there's anything wrong with that... |
