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It all comes down to demand I guess... Most people seem to like Beats headphones or think their Airpods have top quality sound and don't care that $200 headphon
by Fwirt 4y ago
It all comes down to demand I guess... Most people seem to like Beats headphones or think their Airpods have top quality sound and don't care that $200 headphones exist that blow them out of the water. Most people use bluetooth with low quality codecs that distort the sound. In addition, most people listen to their music on streaming services that compress the heck out of tracks that are already heavily (dynamic range) compressed. So it's a case of (a) people never having been exposed to "hi-fi" and (b) people ceasing to care/being willing to sacrifice audio quality (which is heavily subjective anyway) for convenience. So it is the same as phone cameras, people are willing to sacrifice image quality and control for the convenience of having a camera in their pocket all the time.
I personally care about audio to a reasonable degree, but I also think that AVRs in their current form are a weird mix of "too much" and "not enough". I wanted to have a 5.1.2 system that wasn't a soundbar with tiny, tinny speakers that bounce off the ceiling and a tiny sub that moves hardly any air. But in order to drive decent speakers you need a decent amp. But in order to get a decent amp you have to buy a unit that has a million connectors, spatial audio processing, etc. Out of the gigantic array of connectors on the back of my AVR, (7 HDMI ports, phono plugs, component, composite) I am currently using 3 HDMI ports because I play most media off an HTPC anyway. I feel like I'm using less than 30% of what it has to offer, and there is a growing divide between people who want convenience and people who want uncompromising quality at any cost, so low end AVRs aren't much better than a soundbar, and high end AVRs aren't affordable for the average consumer.
- JKCalhoun 4y agoI built modern thing a little like the old console stereo units. Used high end full-range drivers for the left/center/right and built in a sub. The thing looks like furniture but has your 3.1 covered. I think there's a Yamaha receiver in there but it isn't too crazy with regards to connectors and such. I like to think the console stereo could come back for people who want higher quality speakers/audio.
- initplus 4y agoStreaming services don't compress dynamic range, rather the opposite - because every streaming service employs loudness normalization the loudness wars have largely ended. Compressing your track to hell in an effort to get it to sound louder doesn't work anymore because every streaming service will just normalize it anyway. Spotify at least uses 320kbps vorbis for their "high quality" setting which is at the point where I don't believe it's humanly possible to distinguish from a lossless encoding.
- PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago> Compressing your track to hell in an effort to get it to sound louder doesn't work anymore because every streaming service will just normalize it anyway. This is a bit of confused remark. "Normalization" means applying some constant gain factor to the signal so that the loudest level is 0dBFS. Compression applies a varying gain factor to the signal to meet some parameters. Normalizing audio will generally make it louder (unless the loudest level is already at 0dBFS), but it does not change the dynamic range of the signal. The "loudness wars" were all about using compression, and this does change the dynamic range of the signal (you end up with less difference between the quietest and loudest parts of the signal - hence the term compression). You can still "sound louder" by using compression, even if the peak volume is still 0dBFS.
- initplus 4y agoModern volume normalization isn't done based on the highest peak of the track. Instead they normalize based on the average perceived loudness of the whole track (to a level below 0 so there is headroom for peaks). It's intentionally designed to avoid the exact issue you describe. If this was not done users of streaming services would have to be constantly adjusting the volume to deal with perceived volume differences between tracks due to different levels of dynamic range compression.
- _carbyau_ 4y agoI don't have to change the volume between shows. But for a while, every action show required I down volume the noisy bits and up volume the talking bits. I understand dynamic range is a thing and people with reasonable stereos and a place to use them should enjoy. But in an apartment with a sleeping toddler I simply want to hear it without waking my kid. I now run: Windows Loudness Equalisation, Clear Voice on the sound bar, every show is subtitles on.
- PaulDavisThe1st 4y agoSure, peak-to-N-dBFS is not what the streaming services do. But what they do is not normalization. I'm the author of a DAW that allows normalization, compression and loudness control. The first one is more different from the last two than they are from each other.
- leokennis 4y agoI’ve been a headphone mid-fi buyer for at least 15 years now (think Denon AH-D2000, B&W P5 etc.) and it’s just also the case that lower-fi audio has greatly improved. The sound quality AirPods or the Samsung buds deliver are simply very very competent for the price. They’re good sounding, convenient, dependable. Contrast to the crap you used to get included with your iPod or the entry level IEM’s that were 99% bass and 100% ear pain and snapped cables. It’s not that people enjoy crap these days. It’s just that previously you needed to spend Onkyo levels of money to get decent sound, and these days a lot less.
- formercoder 4y agoI recently wanted up upgrade from 2 to 5 channels. Previously I just had 2 powered studio monitors hooked up to my tv via 1/8th inch. All I wanted was a D2A box that took the atmos signal and let me plug in more speakers. Turns out these are crazy expensive and it’s way cheaper to buy the giant box.
- brokenmachine 4y agoYou don't really need Atmos for 5 channels - you could probably pick up an old surround AVR sans Atmos for pretty cheap.