Type of speaker liked

[Moh]

I am a novice at audio. I was wondering if there is a preferance of what type of speaker sound people like.  If you used speakers in your young age that were bass/mid heavy, your mind focuses on bass/mid when you listen and the highs become "background". Those who grew up with speakers that emphasized highs, their mind tends to listen to the mid/highs and the "base" becomes background...The Klipsh speakers which tend to emphasize the highs tend to be liked more by the latter group.  I wonder if we become "wired" with these preferences 

at younger age and that is why people like particular brand of speakers and this "wired" state does not really change once you are older... I know some older people that dislike Klipsch but love brands that emphasize the lower frequencies.  Any truth to this or  opinions?

 

Thanks.

[CWOReilly]

When I was younger I wanted it loud. Then I realized how bad distortion really is and wanted clear. So now with my current setup(s) I have both. Louder than anyone should and clear as a bell. As for real preferences I think it depends on what kind of music you enjoy. I have Klipsch and Polks in the same room. Both sound amazing, but different.

[Moh]

I have never tried polk.. How would you describe the sound? I realize some of what I am asking is subjective.

I listen to pop music at low volume.

Edited March 17, 2022 by Moh

[CWOReilly]

My Polks are the vintage flagship SDA SRS. They are huge and have a very large soundstage. Very detailed and almost like surround sound with only 2 towers. They tend to be bright at times and need gobs of power to shine. 

[wuzzzer]

It all depends on your ears, your room, your source.  Yes, you will become accustomed to the sound of a particular type of speaker the longer you listen to them.  That doesn't mean you like them the best, you're just used to their sound.

[garyrc]

11 hours ago, Moh said:

I wonder if we become "wired" with these preferences 

at younger age and that is why people like particular brand of speakers and this "wired" state does not really change once you are older... I know some older people that dislike Klipsch but love brands that emphasize the lower frequencies.  Any truth to this or  opinions?

 

Responding to @Moh

 

Maybe some truth, but ...

 

Let's go back to the Paleolithic of "wired" preferences.  My parent's generation rarely attended live concerts -- mostly marching bands (outside, at a distance from the road or the bandstand) and the school orchestra when I came along.  We had a piano.  While the piano's highs were beautiful, they were never as "zingy" as brass or strings.  Mostly they heard the radio, which had a single, so called, tone control which was really a "hash filter" that cut out the treble that was full of distortion most of the time, and mono/optical movie soundtracks that had a curve like this: Even when the projectors were maintained, optical movie sound of those days lacked highs and dynamics and sounded deader than a door nail.  So, the generation that was young from about the 1920s to the very late 1940s got used to sound with muffled highs, and absent deep lows.  They got "wired," for sound with little in the way of highs above about 3K (movies), or 5K (radio broadcasts on a very good day, through speakers with very poor high frequency response), and virtually no deep bass.

 

Some very good things happened in about 1946-48.  Columbia introduced the 33 1/3 RPM Lp record, which often had highs up to 12K, 15K, or even higher, RCA introduced the 45 RPM disc which could handle, theoretically, even higher highs, Telefunken introduced the U47 condenser microphone, and Ampex, with an assist from Bing Crosby, made a series of Tape  recorders for mastering, and a little later for the home, that had low distortion and wide frequency response, and Paul Klipsch introduced early Klipschorns.  But almost nobody had home tape decks and almost nobody had speakers that were able to reproduce much of the bottom or the top.

 

Starting in 1952, with This is Cinerama, my parents and their peers began to hear reproduced sound with highs and lows.  Multiple magnetic stripes, as good as on magnetic tape, sprang up on Cinerama, CinemaScope (1953), Todd-AO (1955), followed by all the other 'scopes, visions, ramas, etc.   My family ate them up, and my parents heard "full" range sound.  When we tried to duplicate that in the home, many of us bought "extended range" loudspeakers, usually with no tweeter -- more anti-treble "wiring," occurred, even for my generation.   In the '60s, those who could afford them, got two-way or three-way speakers.  Many sweet and great sounding ones, such as the ones from Bozak, still had somewhat attenuated highs. 

 

Nowadays, it seems to me, good speakers fall into two categories:

1. Those which are slightly veiled, but would almost never give offense, even with all but the harshest, nastiest recording.  Here are two of them, in a reviewer's listening room:

   

    

   YGA Sonja 1.3, spatially averaged, 1/6-octave response in JA's listening room (red) approx $106,000; and of Vandersteen Treo (blue).
2. Those that are not veiled, sound live, more close up, but may be less tolerant of bad recordings.  Klipsch may be considered one of these.  They concentrate on low distortion and wide dynamics, rather than protecting the listener from bad recordings.  My ears are totally "wired" for  these!  Here is a depiction of the highest frequency response (4.5K Hz to 17K Hz) of one of my Klipschorns at 13 feet (main divisions on the graph are 5 dB), in our listening  room.  We have a fairly acoustically dead room with wall to wall carpeting, a 5 seat stuffed couch, and a grille cloth covering the front wall (to hide a Belle Klipsch center channel in a cavity in the middle of it). Please notice that, even though brighter than the Yg or the Vandersteen, there is roll-off in the extreme highs above 12.27K Hz where it crosses the 0 line, but it is less veiling, nonetheless.

At 9K Hz, it is about 1 dB "hot" as opposed to 2 dB down for the Yg and almost 5 dB down for the Vandersteen.   At 17K Hz (about as high as most of us can hear), our Klipschorn is about 4 dB below the 0 line (the dark horizontal one), Vandersteen about -7 and the Yg is almost - 10 dB.  The Klipschorn is bright enough so a few CDs (especially the early ones) are too harsh.  Most CDs, Vinyl, SACDs and Blu-rays are fine, and exciting!

 

  

[Moh]

 Wow Garyrc, That is a detailed response.. Thanks I appreciate it and I am sure it is a good read for others on the board as well.

[Love My Klipsch]

I started running commercial sound systems and pretty much everything were Klipsch speakers.

I have 4-RF82's, 2 SB2's and 2 XL 23's, Klipsch center channel and Klipsch 600 watt subwoofer.

The last SB2's and XL23 mentioned are for use in my Dolby ATMOS setup.

Even with just 2 ATMOS speakers in the front the sound and imaging in the front is just, wow!

[Audio Flynn]

Garyrc had an excellent historical focus.

 

It was awesome!

[billybob]

10 hours ago, Moh said:

 Wow Garyrc, That is a detailed response.. Thanks I appreciate it and I am sure it is a good read for others on the board as well.

Yes, he is good...

[Tony Whitlow]

I am a novice at audio. I was wondering if there is a preferance of what type of speaker sound people like.  If you used speakers in your young age that were bass/mid heavy, your mind focuses on bass/mid when you listen and the highs become "background". Those who grew up with speakers that emphasized highs, their mind tends to listen to the mid/highs and the "base" becomes background...The Klipsh speakers which tend to emphasize the highs tend to be liked more by the latter group.  I wonder if we become "wired" with these preferences 
at younger age and that is why people like particular brand of speakers and this "wired" state does not really change once you are older... I know some older people that dislike Klipsch but love brands that emphasize the lower frequencies.  Any truth to this or  opinions?
 
Thanks.

Klipsch speakers don’t emphasize any frequency. They have a flat response and reproduce the music as close to original as possible.


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