Oceans 2K wrote:

OK, I am starting to see your POV. But I will respectfully agree to
disagree.

Fair enough, though hardly in the spirit of the proceedings! ;-)

I remember many articles on this topic back when AUDIO Magazine was
around. ( I read that mag cover to cover every month! Sad to see it go
years back.)

I notice one of the conditions of the "test" is flat freq response in human
audio spectrum (20hz-20Khz). Most of the mid-fi components I swear sound
different...do. But that is because the output signal has some bumps and
dips at specific frequencies. That Onkyo I spoke of had a definite bump at
about 150Hz causing my normally flat NHT 2.5i's to give a James Taylor
concert some West Coast rap-like boom. That's what my wife noticed.

Really? You actually measured this? I'm not a measurer, myself, but people
who are tell me that most name-brand SS amps are pretty much ruler-flat
these days. They'd certainly be flatter than any speaker, including that
NHT. (That's no knock on a fine speaker, by the way.)

So I see the objectivist's point. Esp the psychological aspect. My only
hang up is: don't most amplifier designers put a sonic signature (aka:
bumps and dips in freq resp) on their designs? This would explain the
glaring differences when I inserted my brother's Adcom 545 into my normal
Carver TFM-15 setup.

Well, you'd have to measure both of them to know for sure. As for sonic
signatures, I'm sure some do. Others just do a lousy job of engineering, and
get one as a matter of course. But producing an amp with flat FR is not
rocket science (just audio science), and you really have to wonder why
anyone would do otherwise. If you want sonic signatures like that, you
should buy a flat amp and an equalizer, and roll your own.

Excellent debate.

You ARE new here. ;-)

bob

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