Why the probelm with large English brand names?

I did just that yesterday, while demming the ATC sca2 preamp...
Started off with Cyrus monoblocks powering some ATC SCM35s. OKish on rock, though they had a recessed midband and bass that sounded initially full and impressive, but proved to have absolutely no definition - you couldn't tell the difference between a bass guitar and bass drum! And this combo sounded terrible on a Shostakovich piano concerto. Possibly to do with a mis-match, or are Cyrus as bad as I always remembered them?
So we swapped to active ATC scm50s. Much better! Great overall tonal accuracy, and surprisingly similar sound to my Dittons though without much of the lowest octave. However, they gave a very good impression of what was ther without actually noticeably playing it, if you know warrimean. After a while though, I did find them a little tiring, but the dem room did have a large french window which could have contributed to the slight glassy sheen. Still, the ATC pre is possibly near the top of my list - though the cheap remote and flimsy case did let it down somewhat..

 

Leonard, buy a CA2. Even ATC dealers of my acquaintance say it doesn't sound any different from the SCA2.

-- Ian

 

Try them on Mana stands, Leonard. If you want a bit more bass, try the SCM100As - again best on Mana.

And yes, I do know what you mean about their "effortless" presentation.

 

Sorry m8 - I'm quite happy with my Dittons.. They do that bit more than the ATC 50s did without me having to shell out £8kish! Though I'm sure the 100s will be that smidge better than the 50s..
Besides, it's a pre-amp I'm in the market for. If I come home with speakers as well my mrs will feed my nadgers to the dog.
(Though if I find a 2nd hand car at the right price I might have some extra to play with :JPS: )

 

There's no need to be sorry, I don't mind what you do. I can't understand why you were auditioning the speakers if you are happy with whatever you are using.

 

Interesting view in this months HFN,that the more money you spend the more idiosyncratic the gear gets,or more specifically,the sound from it.By that I assume they mean that 'accuracy',whatever that is,becomes a more personal and individual concept.He went on to say that most high end kit sounds totally different to each other,unlike 'low end'.
This implies that the more money you spend the less accurate the equipment sounds,assuming accuracy is not about replicating live music.
So the more accurate your system sounds to you,the more personal the sound has become,hence why there seems to be so many spats in here.If everyone had a Rotel amp I think this forum would become a love in,as it stands,this thread has been an excellent read.
A very good read HFN this month,imho.

 

I was auditioning pre-amps - the speakers were a means of making the [patronising mode]electrical signal from the cdp into sound[/patronising mode]
Just happened they did ATC speakers as well, and the active 50 was the best he could be arsed to wheel into the room...

 

How can you tell what the preamp 'sounds like' with unfamiliar speakers in an unfamiliar room?

 

Aye, there's the rub...
All you can tell is that:
a) it's within your price range
b) it sounds fine in that room with that gear
c) whether you could live with that sound (as much as you can tell) or what it looks like (i.e whether the mrs will de-todge you or not)
d) whether you want to take it home to demo properly.
All I decided was the ATC pre was a nice piece of kit, but possibly overpriced for it's build quality - especially bearing in mind Bob's comments of earlier.
Might take it home depending on what I find either 2nd hand, or at MAX or SOM.
Perhaps I should take my passive pre along to those dems to see if I need to spend money in that area? Perhaps all I need is to save the wedge and take the Mrs to Amsterdam for her birthday (hifi always sounds great there )

 

It's in the June/July 2004 issue of the German diy speaker magazine Klang + Ton. If you're interested, I could send you a photocopy of the article; IIRC your wife is German and could translate for you?

 

That would be great, thanks. I'll PM you.

 

To be more accurate I don't care about size.

You're assuming that everything else is equal. I was suggesting that (for example) accurate mid range is more important than extended bass, especially if that extended bass is 'lumpy' or one note, or any of the other types that seem common. That in the context of achieving the closest approach to absolute accuracy there is a heirarchy of tradeoffs.

BTW the perspective I had in mind was that in hifi terms you're operating at the not-a-lot-of-real-bass entry-level. And even then for the price of the Quads you could have much deeper bass...

Paul

 

Again, you seem to be mistaking this discussion for some kind of appendage-waving contest - I really don't see how my speakers being "entry-level" comes into it. Since you bring them up again though, I could also have had much less deep bass for the same money - I'd have been able to spend the same amount of money on standmounts, or a pair of ESL57s or perhaps 63s from Ebay, and I'd have ended up with a sound that was more beautiful in some respects but rather compromised in others, and certainly not definitively "more accurate".

 

Your continual reference to your choice of speakers and their ability to render a couple of significant bass notes was the trigger.

Your personal trade off is substantial distortion everywhere for a small amount of bass 'welly'. I think it's hard to make a rational argument for that being more accurate, even if it's more enjoyable to you personally.

Paul

 

The trigger for your personal vendetta against my speakers? I'm sure if they could read your posts they'd be mortally offended, but I only allow them to read the reviews on Quad's website so as to keep them in a state of blissful ignorance.

I brought up my speakers because when I chose them I had spent some time considering exactly the dichotomy we've been talking about here. I don't think I ever claimed they were "accurate" in any absolute sense, which of course they're not - and especially not in my smaller-than-ideal room - but that's not really relevant, nor is whether or not they're "entry-level", nor really is a pejorative assessment of my "personal trade-off". Arguing from authority - here specifically in terms of my 'perspective' being of 'entry-level' components - is pretty weak in any case, and particularly pointless here as I've already made clear my perspective is based on live music, not on my own system.

Still, to discuss the point you mention above, and to bring it vaguely on topic: the 22Ls do indeed render "a couple of significant bass notes" - in fact, they have decent output right down to more-or-less the bottom of the audio band, albeit not entirely smooth in my room (and perhaps not entirely smooth in any room, although some of the reviews seem to report a pretty smooth response IIRC).

That's not what you were suggesting originally. Establishing any kind of definitive hierarchy of the importance of different hifi parameters is likely to be rather difficult, and it's not what we were talking about originally, which, if you remember, largely came down to whether uneven but deep bass was more or less accurate than smoother but rolled-off bass, with something about dynamic range along vaguely similar lines.

I'm not interested in bass 'welly' in the rude-boy in-car sub sense - however, I am interested in at least being able to hear most-to-all of the audio frequency range, even if I have to tolerate a lumpy frequency response at the bottom end to be able to do it.

And BTW if you're really interested, to adopt your own turn of phrase I'd describe it more as "a substantial amount of bass extension for a small amount of distortion everywhere".

 

Pete,

Dont argue with Paul, he knows best. After all, he uses briks.........

 

Robbo,

I thought Paul was using Quads

Still, regardless of whether they are 57's or 63's, they still represent a trade off in the way that most sub £10K speakers do. In the Quad's case, they offer believable timbre in the midrange but cannot portray the realistic dynamic range of large scale works, nor resolve the bottom octave.

For Paul these are obviously compromises he is happy to make. Lovers of Mahler, Underworld & Eat Static would be less enamoured with their performance. It is merely a question of priorities, which are governed by our musical preferences. To suggest ESL's are anything other than a different set of compromises is misleading IMO.

 

I have no vendetta against your speakers. It's just that they appear limited in bass and loudness capability....

Originally I gave two examples of what I would consider trade offs between accuracy and effects. I can't work out whether you agree with me or not. For example for the price of your speakers you could have had deeper bass but at a cost elsewhere in the performance, so maybe you do?

Paul

 

All is compromise. I was asserting that we can rank compromises for accuracy although I don't expect universal agreement...

Before I used Quads I believed what I'd read about them being limited in volume, bass, whatever. In practice it's a rare piece of bass that gets them into trouble and although I have no environmental limits on volume I hardly ever play them as loud as they'll go, there's no point it's just ear damaging. My music playing habits have not veered towards the small orchestral and learning to appreciate Deep Purple with the intellect is ennervating.

Paul

 

Yes, all is compromise and I suspect there would be almost as many ranking systems as forum members.

I think the Quads are absolutely superb but I think that Merlin's right when he talks about scale and I think that it can be detected at lower volumes, not just when the system is playing near its max.

I noticed this when I heard the JBL K2s (I think that's what they were called) and, as Merlin has said previously, to get large scale you need large drivers (or something like that).

I'm not implying that 'scale' is the 'be all and end all' or even that it's more important than tonal balance, soundstage, speed or any other qualities. As I said, I think the Quads are superb.