Who will survive? One last table til I die.

Rushton, I went back and read the Stereophile article which is the subject of so much discussion on this thread. If I had done that in the beginnig I would have ended my comments on this thread long ago. I will continue to read Raul's post but I have nothing else to say on this thread.

TBG... This is your first post on this thread. I can only assume you did not read my previous posts. I continually caution people not be sucked in by the spec of the month and the component that claims to be perfect because it claims to solve that problem. I continually caution people that the true evaluation of music reprodction is what you hear through your speaker in your room.

IMHO I have heard many systems come errily close to producing an accurate reproduction of one or more musical instruments. Unfortunately they disappointed me in other areas.

I have been involved in audio for thirty-something years. I am not so sure that there has been that much progress in the high end. Most of the "ground breaking" equipment has been either impractical or too expensive for me. What has changed over that period is my abilty to identify good source material, identify musical equipment and too wade through the bullshit that permeates so much of the high end. I also am able to spend a little more money.

I have stated before that we lack sufficent measurements to examine what music reproduction equipment is actually doing. Unlike mans law the laws of physics cannot be broken. We may not know how to quantify them, we may ignore them, but we can't break them.

Rushton... now I'm finished.

Gregadd, I like your posts, and frequently I agree with you (and sometimes I don't :-) ). I've been doing this for 30+ years also, but it seems to me that there have been some pretty significant improvements over that time (speaker driver design is one example, phono cartridges is another).

I absolutely agree with you that we still can't measure much of what our ears tell us. While many equipment manufacturers do an excellent job of actually listening to the equipment they are designing and then making changes based on what they hear, I continue to be amazed at how many people do not listen. For me, the adage "the proof is in the pudding" (in this case, the careful listening) has never been more true.
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TWL out.

Tired of banging head against wall.

It would be a dull world if everybody agreed.
I figured that comment about not much advancemt in audio would get me into trouble.

I say it because there is not that much new.
Moving coil cartridges? Not new.
Direct heated triodes? Not new.
Cables? Not new.
Speakers? Not new...etc.
I couldn't help but notice that the Linn turntable and Quad speakers won Stereophiles product of the year awards.
I thnk what has happened is the dust has settled on a lot of the theories. We have a lot better class of materials to work with. Finally the consumer has a lot more discretionary income to take advantage of exotic designs.
I thnk this would make a good article for a magazine. Put up a vintage system say AR SP 3/ D79, quad speakers/Linn tt/Lin itok arm shure V15 catrdige up against a comparble system of today. For source material you could pit Living Stereo or shaded dogs against some of the best vinyl of today.

Gregadd, Hmmm... Good points, all. I do agree that the vintage system you describe would acquit itself very well against systems today. As you note, quality of materials is probably the biggest change. My "modern" preamp uses a classic audio circuit with 12AX7 tubes: biggest difference from a Marantz 7 is power supply and parts quality.

And for source material, I'm listening right now to a 35 year old piece of vinyl that sounds as good as any contemporary recording, and probably better than most.

And, I'd have to say that the system I'm listening to tonight sounds qualitatively better than any I could have assembled 20-30 years ago, but the cause for that is mostly in execution of the design, not new design, and quality of materials, not the result of anything radically new.
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