What Neutral Means in Reviews & Our Discussions? Are We Confusing Tame/Flat For Neutral?
Does tame or flat = neutral? Shouldn’t "neutral" in describing audio sound mean uncolored and accurate to what the artists sounded like to the naked ear at the time of the master recording? Or is neutral, as used in our community, intended to mean a lack of crescendo, or the like?
I realize this may get controversial, so lets be mindful of other’s experiences and insight. I’m going to use Dynaudio as an example. They’re often touted as being amongst the most neutral of speaker lines. Monitor Audio is another example of such reviews. I’ve listened to several middle of the line Dynaudio’s, including many times at my brother’s house, where he has them mated to an EAD Power Master 1000 thru MIT cables. They do sound beautiful, airy, smooth, and even slightly warm to my ear (though the touch of warmth could easily be the MITs and EAD). His common statement supporting how great they are is, the audio recording industry sound engineers prefer them as their monitors. But I’ve read that the reason audio engineers prefer them is because they are smooth and "flat" or "level", enabling the engineers to hear the difference of the nuances which they create as they manipulate sound during the editing process. Apparently lively or musical monitors, many engineers find to be a distractor, with too much information over riding what they want to focus on as they edit the sound.
I’ve enjoyed watching live bands at small venues for over 3 decades. Anything from a pianist, to cover bands, to original artists of anything from rock, blues, jazz, etc. My personal listening preference for home audio is dynamic sound which brings the live event to me ... soundstage, detail, with air, transparency AND depth. I want it all, as close as it can get for each given $. When I’ve listened to Dynaudios, Ive always come away with one feeling ... they’re very nice to listen too; they’re smooth and pleasing, airy ... and tame.
Recently while reading a pro review of the latest Magico S7 (I’ve never heard them), a speaker commonly referenced as amazingly neutral, the reviewer mentioned how, while capable of genuine dynamics, they seem to deliberately supress dynamics to enough of an extent that they favor a more pleasurable easy going listening experience.
That’s what jarred my thought. Does "neutral" mean tame/flat; does it mean accurate without audible peaks in db of one frequency over another, which is not on the recording; or is it something we’ve minced words about and have lost the genuine meaning of in the name of some audio form of political correctness?
My two cents: I have always thought in terms of three primary audiophile presentations warm/ euphonic neutral/true to the source cool/ analytical/ etched This general scheme has been helpful in guiding me in choices of components to consider and in achieving a system balance that meets my personal standard. |
Every profession has jargon and this is one of them in audiophile world. A practical definition of "neutral" imho is "all frequencies are measured in approximately similar sound pressure levels (SPL) within the specified tolerance between the low bass and high treble natural roll-of limits from a transducer in an anechoic setting." It sounds mouthful but several key phrases need be noted. First off, "similar sound pressure level" implies no drivers are perfectly linear and there is no perfect measurement method. As such, the measured SPL will fluctuate and no truely flat response curve exist in reality. Second, "within the specified tolerance" implies one needs to specify the tolerance interval, e.g., +-3dB, in order to render an objective assessment if a transducer is neutral. Third, "between the low bass and high treble natural roll-off limits" implies that we only assess the response curve bet. the natural roll-off limits of the high and low ends, again, within the specified tolerance. For example, we could still call the response curve neutral even there is steep roll off below the natural roll-off limit for bass. Often time, we see the mid-bass is boosted in order to get a better bass extension and the response curve will not be considered neutral if the boosted mid-bass exceeds to the specified tolerance. Lastly, the measurement needs to be conducted in an anechoic setting. Sorry for being mouthful. Please advise if I mess up something. There is another jargon for you guys. What does "organic" sound mean? |
Hi @newbee . Unfortunately you’ve misinterpreted the vast majority of what I was saying in my post. To bring clarity for all, here follows. I didn’t want to drag on so long that no one wants to read my examples. I’m very familiar with the EAD Powermaster and MIT cables, having heard them both on a variety of speakers. They are both known for a slight lean to warmth. Therefore, I stated that the Dynaudio’s at my brothers, that I hear regularly, may seem warm because of them. You also mentioned that I did not attribute the possibility of the power amp in my perception of the Dynaudios. The EAD Powermaster is the power amp. As for the room,,,yes,,,could be that to a degree. He has a large room carpeted room, with ample leather and upholstery seating, about 15x22, which would all prevent excess sound deflection and diffraction, which can lead to brightness. Yet, with that, I’ve heard a decent number of Dynaudios, and walk away with similar impressions regardless of the source equipment and cables, thus I believed it to be an excellent example to use for this discussion. While I did mention what I thought the term neutral (in audio) should mean, I also presented 2 general possibilities of its meaning, and asked which is correct, or are we all defining in different ways (option 3). I don’t understand why you seemed to ’get on me’ about my reluctance to accept a different definition. This post, in my mind, makes it clear I am not reluctant to accept a different definition, since I am very open to listening to people throughout the community. I put up this post so we can all realize we all define it differently (in my observation, anyway), thus when we speak to one another or read a review, we are not communicating clearly with one another. Communication = the sender of information + the receiver of information + feedback. We often skip the feedback portion, thus leaving the sender and receiver with two different understandings of what was sent. This post can help clarify to myself and all, if not even guide us, to understand what ’neutral’ means when it is used, or what it should mean. Thanks for your feedback. For any one person that has a thought which they express, there are likely many others with the same thought. Thus you’ve prompted me to clarify and be more specific about where I’m coming from and my intent. Appreciated. |
@ghdprentice Thank you! I’ve done all of what you suggested, also for about 4 decades. I’ve also noticed the change of meaning in terms over those decades, including neutral and warm. I agree with you spot on, about the change of the term ’warm’. Part of my confusion, and my ability to notice different meanings being ascribed to ’neutral’ is that it used to be used in a different way, going back to the 70s and 80s, then it seems to be used in more recent times. ’Neutral’, without a shred of doubt in my mind, used to mean (in the audio world), a highly aspiring lofty, yet unattainable goal, of anechonically perfectly flat between what comes out of the speaker, relative to what is coming out of the audio source (CD, vinyl, radio signal, etc.). Now it does seem to often be used, as you stated, to mean flat in sound, without emphasis, regardless of the signal coming from the source audio component. Yet to be certain of that, and to bring clarity to myself and all, I created this post. I’m loving the discussion and input going on here, and I think it makes my point, that we all interpret it differently, which means when a pro-reviewer tells us how wonderfully neutral a speaker is, we all are receiving that to mean something different, which impacts our auditioning and buying decisions. Based on the way this thread is going, I’m finding it unfortunate that @newbee seems to be correct in his assertion that the term ’neutral’, along with many other terms we commonly use, are subjective. In my mind, they should only be subjective as to what extent we hear things when auditioning, but not subjective to the definition of what those things mean when we speak about them. Perhaps I wish too much for a perfect world. If someone with some umpa in the community, like Steve Hoffman, were to publish a pamphlet of subjective definitions, I think the audiophile community might just gulp it up, and it would benefit the hobby on the whole. Oh man...lets please not get into a discussion about whether or not I am right about that. lol. |
@erik_squires You are correct ... no one has a sound like the master recording. I chose my wording poorly in that regard. Better stated would have been to say, the source recording of what was being played, ie, SACD, LP, Radio, etc.
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