Who says studio monitors are "cold and analytical"?

Studio monitors have a different purpose than “audiophile” speakers. Audio monitors present sound with the venue up fron (and are highly directional as pointed out above)… so very critical mixing choices can be made. The criteria is very different. Audiophiles are into the best possible playback focusing on musicality, natural sound etc. These are very different requirements.

I have a couple friends in the industry and installs Boulder and Mark Levenson in folks that want high end recording studios and stuff like Audio Research into audiophile’s homes as they want musical and natural sound.

And that 3" super midrange dome driver is just an engineering marvel, if you ask me.

It would be a marvel if it was a 1 inch dome and could go down to 400hz. Unfortunately it cant so its wrong. And because its wrong, you need to add another damn tweeter to it to extend its response. Its just an inferior solution passed off as a marvel.

Ghdprentice

i don’t think you have the purpose of studio monitors right at all, no matter your friends have inferred by sales to their clients.

A studio record is a sonic painting, from the mind of the artist working side by side with a skilled set of engineers (tracking and mix engineers may be the same or may be different)  who can make the artist’s sonic painting happen.  What artist wants playback to be anything other than sonically extraordinary?  
 

Brad
 

Directionality?  

phusis, waiting as my wife dresses for our night out I wish you a happy times ahead. I really enjoy your ability. 

m

What artist wants playback to be anything other than sonically extraordinary?  

Most commercial pop records have levels that are clipping and the artists dont care. All they want is the loudest mix so that it stands out. Quantity over quality. These pop recordings are enjoyed by millions of people on their ear buds or phones or laptops. Sound quality does not enter the equation. As long as it sells its considered a success. 

Most artists and musicians are not audiophiles. Ive said this before. They do not belong in our world nor do they understand it. 

Studio monitors are tuned in a certain way to focus in on certain areas of the mix. The NS10 is tuned to the mids. ATC are also similar in that respect. That is why every monitor sounds different. 

An audiophile speaker is designed for pleasure only. If mix engineers wanted to use audiophile speakers they would. But they dont want a good sounding speaker they want a bad sounding one. Hence the emergence of the studio monitor market.

If ATC were that good they would be the only choice. But there are dozens of monitors on the market and every engineer uses multiple monitors because each monitor is tuned to different parts of the spectrum. 

Theres plenty of complaints about ATC online you just need to do your research.