The best audio system on earth?

[Filian]

It's clearer and clearer that a big part of audio naysaying has more to do with price envy than how close the stuff gets to sounding musical.

 

[cb01]

How about we start with some very large Tannoys with DSP, or some ESLs. I am very sure that one or both of those will do *some things* "better" than the oligarch specials. Just like a single seat racing car will make a Rolls Royce look stupid on a track.

I haven't heard the oligarch specials, but I know that we don't all hear the same things, and that price is no guarantee of quality. So is a $100k speaker "the best in the world, at everything"? I doubt it very much.

Okay, so are you guessing or is this actionable information that somebody could use to make a purchase decision?

Liberte, egalite, fraternite aside.....what can you tell me about how some large Tannoy's or ESL's would actually compare?

Also, bad news, there were no $100k Borresons at the show. Two of the pairs were 1/5 that or less.

 

[Columbo]

Maybe they were, I think that this is an indicator of where a section of the hifi industry is going. Watches and cars have done the same for men, just as shoes and handbags have for women. Fine. If a Russian oligarch wants to swan about in a Rolls while his wife has a $1M handbag or two and some shoes for $100k, let them. If he wants a $100k set of speakers, it's his money, and he can buy a Richard Mille watch with jewels, moon dust or I don't give too much of a toss what. The enthusiasts are, or should be, spending less on something that performs better.

Your point is valid, there are tons of brands targeting a luxury consumer with cash to splash and not necessarily getting better sound for their money but instead buying "stuff" like funky finishes, exotic materials, bragging rights if that's your thing etc. Not for me, mainly cos I'm not an oil baron.

But Boressen seems like an odd one to dig out; they have stuff nearer the slightly more attainable end of the spectrum like the X1 for £5k with all that silly-money-tech trickling down.

 

[cb01]

What music were they playing?

They played quite a few passages in the large, end-opposed room. Some show fodder, some electronic, some live acoustic stuff. Dozens of songs that I heard. The smaller room with the stand mounts was playing a more acoustic music bent but also included some electronic stuff.

I happened to be in the room when Mark Henninger was recording the YT video for Stereophile on the Borreson X6's. Seated about 3 rows behind him and his camera.

 

[cb01]

Your point is valid, there are tons of brands targeting a luxury consumer with cash to splash and not necessarily getting better sound for their money but instead buying "stuff" like funky finishes, exotic materials, bragging rights if that's your thing etc. Not for me, mainly cos I'm not an oil baron.

But Boressen seems like an odd one to dig out; they have stuff nearer the slightly more attainable end of the spectrum like the X1 for £5k with all that silly-money-tech trickling down.

I heard the X1's. Very impressive.

And, yes there are tons of personal motivations for why people make ourchase decisions of luxury goods. This entire hobby is a luxury. That's the news for everyone here; anything past a pair of AirPods is a luxury audio purchase.

But this hobby is also peculiar. I am also into horology and I just don't find people who buy AP, Patek, A Lange, Vacheron, etc getting absolutely grilled about their decision to purchase mechanical wrist watches that cost in excess of $300k. There just isn't the judgment or vitriol. Not sure why it is so strong in audio.

 

[Filian]

But this hobby is also peculiar. I am also into horology and I just don't find people who buy AP, Patek, A Lange, Vacheron, etc getting absolutely grilled about their decision to purchase mechanical wrist watches that cost in excess of $300k. There just isn't the judgment or vitriol. Not sure why it is so strong in audio.

Maybe because the air of technical sophistication bestowed upon oneself is another strong bias.

To be fair, the gulf between real wonderment at the special sound of top systems and just spinning a CD for some music in the house is absolutely enormous. The good thing is that high-enders don't tend to gatekeep the hell out of more pedestrian systems, components, or their listeners.

 

[Columbo]

I heard the X1's. Very impressive.

And, yes there are tons of personal motivations for why people make ourchase decisions of luxury goods. This entire hobby is a luxury. That's the news for everyone here; anything past a pair of AirPods is a luxury audio purchase.

But this hobby is also peculiar. I am also into horology and I just don't find people who buy AP, Patek, A Lange, Vacheron, etc getting absolutely grilled about their decision to purchase mechanical wrist watches that cost in excess of $300k. There just isn't the judgment or vitriol. Not sure why it is so strong in audio.

Fully fledged bastard of a point. Once I got past £500 on speakers I stopped telling my mates how much they were worth for fear of ridicule. They would think I am mad for spending more than £1k on speakers. Maybe they are right.

Mind you, people who buy Richard Mille should definitely and thoroughly be grilled

 

[herb]

I look at a Creationist who tells me that the world is less than 20,000 years old.

I see that the latest theory to dismiss the dark matter problem is to suggest that the universe is actually 23.7 billion years old. Sorry OT.

 

[Yank]

Also, bad news, there were no $100k Borresons at the show. Two of the pairs were 1/5 that or less.

And one pair five times that, no?

 

[Columbo]

And one pair five times that, no?

 

[Alex S]

I’m always curious what technology or innovation the LOLprice stuff is bringing to the table. I’ve no real issue with paying for genuine innovation. Sadly almost always the answer is none and it is just 1950s or 60s technology dressed up with a load of unnecessary mass and bling so it looks like it belongs in Trump, Putin or some Saudi monarch’s apartment. Gold plate, alligator skin and diamonds doesn’t make a better Leica or Rolex, yet some will pay for that vulgarity. This tier of audio holds zero interest for me. It is just Veblen goods, and to my mind actually damaging to the industry as it just shouts wealth and exclusion to anyone just popping in to see if home audio is for them.

All well and good, Tony, but this thread started as an opinion on a specific expensive system that to many who actually listened to it was the best they had heard and to all others sounded really good.

 

[cb01]

Fully fledged bastard of a point. Once I got past £500 on speakers I stopped telling my mates how much they were worth for fear of ridicule. They would think I am mad for spending more than £1k on speakers. Maybe they are right.

Mind you, people who buy Richard Mille should definitely and thoroughly be grilled

Yeah RM doesn't count. Though I have seen one in person...nicest owner. Visually struck me as a bit of Tiffany's-for-Men. But, to each their own.

And one pair five times that, no?

Yes I think one was $485k or something like that. The M6, IIRC? Other side of the room from the X2

 

[cb01]

I find it odd to pick on Borreson because they are a fully vertically integrated company for every single product they make. From a metal foundry that they partially own to making their own circuit boards (and partnering with a few silicon OEMs), winding their own voicecoils, desiging and making their own complex honeycomb cone structures (a mix of CF & Titanium in some models), fully bespoke constrained layer CF cabinets (including some forged-CF, IIRC), they are now branching into additive manufacturing, etc.

Are they good value for money? I think it's safe to say they aren't for most of what they make. Are they doing SpaceX levels of design and manufacturing (including hiring former SpaceX engineers, IIRC)? That is an empirical "yes".

I'm no in the market for a Bugatti Chiron or a Murray T50. Doesn't mean I have to dump on them.

 

[Tony L]

It's clearer and clearer that a big part of audio naysaying has more to do with price envy than how close the stuff gets to sounding musical.

Find me a studio that uses any of this oligarch stuff. That is the point of creation. That is what the artists sign-off. Chances are these days it is a very nice big pair of ATCs, MEGs, JBLs or whatever. I’ll take that as my reference point. Proper sound engineering minus the bling, and attainable for a large number of people too.

This has been how I’ve looked at audio for a long while now. I know it isn’t for everyone, but I am comfortable knowing that the system in my front room is much the same as that used to create much of my favourite music. Why go any further? What “further” is more “right” than the tools of creation. Whatever audio is I’ve got the 1950s Les Paul or Strat of it! A genuine reference point.

PS None of this is envy. Sure, I’d love to have that sort of money, but if I did I doubt my system would change at all. It would just be in a far nicer house and likely in another country. If I wanted another system for another room it would likely be based around a pair of MEG 901K or if a truly huge room a nicely restored pair of Altec VOTT. Nothing ostentatious about any of that. Just real sound engineering.

 

[booja30]

After the recent Southwest Audio Fest in Dallas, a lot of people were talking about Borresen speakers. Even their stand-mounts are $100K/pair.

If they’re charging that much they must be worth it. Prove me wrong!

 

[stevec67]

Okay, so are you guessing or is this actionable information that somebody could use to make a purchase decision?

That is most certainly actionable information that somebody could use to make a decision, just as they could base their decision on the fact that they are very expensive and sound nice, so they must be the best available, or close to that.

Liberte, egalite, fraternite aside.....what can you tell me about how some large Tannoy's or ESL's would actually compare?

Tu veux que j'ecrive en francais? Je peux bien. En anglais: The large Tannoys and or ESLs would compare differently. They wouldn't lose on every front, I'd strongly suspect they would win on a couple of points. You'd ahve to try them, and I suspect further that if you took 10 people into the room individually you'd get more than one opinion as to which was best overall and best in parts. Which would you or I prefer? I wouldn't know.

Also, bad news, there were no $100k Borresons at the show. Two of the pairs were 1/5 that or less.

$100k, $20k, who cares? I'm not interested in the oligarch stuff. As Tony says, it's often old technology in a posh frock.

 

[tpetsch]

I think the best system on earth I ever heard was a used 1st Gen NAIT into a beat up pair of KAN's above our shop workbench that we used to checkout newly set up turntables sometime in the mid 90's on a cold & rainy September day .

 

[Bob McC]

Not everything *will* make a difference. Whether you use imperial or metric fasteners to hold down the transformer won't make a difference. Some things will make a difference. Not every difference will have an effect. However, like our bicycle racing example, we might be concentrating on paint jobs rather than mechanical components.

This does of course bring up a complex question; if the rider *thinks* that the fancy paint job makes his bike faster, then this will almost certainly contribute to his belief that he has the best bike for the job, and be a 0.1% contribution to his marginal gains. On that basis, given that hifi appreciation is about perceived subjective improvements, belief plays a big part. If a hifi owner believes that cable supports and shakri stones improve his system, then for him they do, becaise it's about his belief and not the engineering. Again this is like cycling. Until recently TdF racers used to have to get changed after races in the back of cars, in sheds and so on. Now they have proper changing rooms on the bus, showers and comfortable seats to sit in. It's a marginal gain. It makes no difference at all to the bike, but it helps the rider no end. He feels better, so it makes a difference.

Oh, and this *does* work for foo. If I genuinely believe that my packets of fairy dust on my cables improve the system, then for me they do and it's real. It's as real as it needs to be. In that it's like any belief system. Christians believe that their god gives them strength and support, so they feel stronger. I'm an atheist, I'm on my own. So when the chips are down, one of us takes comfort from a diety, he can do it because God's on his side but I'm out there in the wind. So who's the mug now?

Is a diety a cannibalistic god?

 

[cb01]

Find me a studio that uses any of this oligarch stuff. That is the point of creation. That is what the artists sign-off. Chances are these days it is a very nice big pair of ATCs, MEGs, JBLs or whatever. I’ll take that as my reference point. Proper sound engineering minus the bling, and attainable for a large number of people too.

This has been how I’ve looked at audio for a long while now. I know it isn’t for everyone, but I am comfortable knowing that the system in my front room is much the same as that used to create much of my favourite music. Why go any further? What “further” is more “right” than the tools of creation. Whatever audio is I’ve got the 1950s Les Paul or Strat of it! A genuine reference point.

PS None of this is envy. Sure, I’d love to have that sort of money, but if I did I doubt my system would change at all. It would just be in a far nicer house and likely in another country. If I wanted another system for another room it would likely be based around a pair of MEG 901K or if a truly huge room a nicely restored pair of Altec VOTT. Nothing ostentatious about any of that. Just real sound engineering.

Tony, you and I have VERY similar mental models on this. I remain a huge fan of that big studio stuff.

BUT, and maybe this is a semantic difference, though the big baddies were used to help inform the mixing and mastering decisions that made it onto Shellac or tape.....they weren't in the recording loop. Therefore any limitations that they may have actually don't serve to hard-limit the information in the final recording.....just the ability of the mixing/mastering engineer's ability to steer it in the direction they wanted.

But, yeah, a fully restored VotT A5/A7, or Lansing Iconic remains my desert island setup if I had to pick one.

 

[Columbo]

Find me a studio that uses any of this oligarch stuff. That is the point of creation. That is what the artists sign-off. Chances are these days it is a very nice big pair of ATCs, MEGs, JBLs or whatever. I’ll take that as my reference point. Proper sound engineering minus the bling, and attainable for a large number of people too.

This has been how I’ve looked at audio for a long while now. I know it isn’t for everyone, but I am comfortable knowing that the system in my front room is much the same as that used to create much of my favourite music. Why go any further? What “further” is more “right” than the tools of creation. Whatever audio is I’ve got the 1950s Les Paul or Strat of it! A genuine reference point.

PS None of this is envy. Sure, I’d love to have that sort of money, but if I did I doubt my system would change at all. It would just be in a far nicer house and likely in another country. If I wanted another system for another room it would likely be based around a pair of MEG 901K or if a truly huge room a nicely restored pair of Altec VOTT. Nothing ostentatious about any of that. Just real sound engineering.

I used to be in a band in my youth and when cutting a few demos distinctly remember those mixing rooms often sounding pretty dead, it's very odd presentation of music I assume for specific mixing benefits? Or maybe I just frequented crappy mixing studios? Also, generally a nearfield set-up with a whacking great mixing console between the speaker. Tons of variables that don't translate to semi-normal listening rooms?