It seems to me that the OP wasn't really in a personal quandary about upgrading, but more trying to provoke a conversation about it.
Are advances in technology making speakers better?
B&w every few years upgrades there speaker line and other manufacturers do this to. But because I have the earlier version does this mean it's inferior? Cable manufactures do the same thing.
How much more effort is required too perfect a speaker? my speaker is several years old and all the gear and the speaker are all broken in. And now I'm being told to upgrade.
I am so confused what should I do?
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As said by most if you like it.. that’s the one. Just know there is better, but also a lot of mass market junk. There’s the silly tin can with 100 speakers or real Technology advancement like the aspen FR30 for example. What ever floats your boat is the way to go. And don’t forget Spectacular from the past it’s still D… good today. |
Maybe I look at this differently. I never upgrade unless I can jump up another level. So if I found the very best for my budget… say fifteen years ago… I look for the very best I can buy at a minimum of 2x cost. This way what ever advances (yes, largely material science in speakers as @millercarbon says) occur are included with my purchase of a higher level product. I want my decision to result in a much better sound. It always does. I wouldn’t for instance buy brand x for $10k and ten years later buy the same brand x for whatever. Would it sound better? Yes… but the increment might not be worth it to my ears/brain… and that is what I am trying to satisfy. |
Everybody’s different. Some like to seek out the latest design/technology innovations in an attempt to stay or get ahead of the pack. Others choose a well tested design and stick with it for years. I started with a pair of used B & O BeoLab 8000 active speakers, which ceased production in 2010. I added 12in and 15in sealed subs. I’m pleased with the sound and look to my other components for upgrades. |
"Advances in technology always makes technical products better" well....... advances mean an improvement in one or many aspects. Which then have to be applied to the product in a way that it improves the product. Not trivial at all. The famous story is with the Ferrari F40: when the F50 came out, with better measurements in every aspect than the F40, it was still slower. Engineers spent months trying to figure out why. At the end they just conceded, sometimes awesome design is just hard to beat, it's not only about improvements. |
I'm still running with Epi 100 speakers in two of my systems (Minnesota cabin and bedroom suite) from 1979... still excellent, w new caps and binding posts, and of course woofer foam or new woofer from Human Speakers. Not trendy, and neutral rich pleasing enjoyable speakers; no need to get new. They, or should I say Winslow Burhoe the designer, had found a "sweet spot" design, that model, and then later iterations degraded it. And, as the other posters have pointed out: a lot of times newer models are simply for marketing, because the companies are expected to bring out new stuff to sell... doesn't necessarily mean it's better stuff. Likewise the very first Bose 301 bookshelf was, and is, a pretty darn good, enjoyable speaker for almost everybody except perhaps discerning audiophiles, but even I still like it for general casual listening... but the LATER versions of the 301, the II, III, and IV, were not as good... so newer again certainly does not necessarily mean better. That said, the new Klipsch Heritage line, the mk IV, are supposedly better than the previous I, II, and III... so, progress can be made. Likewise the newer JBL 100 and the KLH model 5 are supposedly better, according to various critics, than the older versions... but note (as @skyscraper points out) that the new models were a LONG time coming because the old models were already excellent. And, all that said, I think one thing that HAS occurred is that we are now in a new golden age when it comes to the LESS EXPENSIVE speakers out there, the lowers in the lines, so to speak(er), as they have inherited trickle down tech. Examples are the low-cost Andrew Jones-designed Pioneers,,, or perhaps the Q-Acoustics Concept 50 at $3000 which borrows from the Concept 500 and apparently from what I've read might actually be even an improvement over the Concept 500 at $7000... $3000 isn't really inexpensive, but it illustrates a point. Another example is the Polk R700, which has garnered stellar reviews vs. higher cost speakers including the higher cost Polks and again has inherited "high end tech" genes. But speakers under $1000 these days if you choose carefully can be stunningly good for most home applications. and, I do agree with what most of the posters here are saying: why switch out if you like what you have? my 1994 Lexus 300 is comfortable and reliable and still runs beautifully.. sure a plug-in hybrid would be nice, but at what price? I'm rolling w my old Lexus as long as possible. |
They'd need to prove to you first that what they are offering to upgrade to is significantly better for you. With the ongoing materials and components shortages, this may be not the case. For instance, I remember a decade ago neodymium magnets were used in many new speakers, even budget ones. Now they are rarer. Ferrite rules. |
Upgrade everything every forty years whether you need to or not. Donate your speakers and all the rest of your old equipment to an unwary, yet appreciative neighbor. You’ll experience a 100% sucess rate with this procedure and wont have to worry about it again for decades. Makes for a good nights sleep and spares the drummer any possible inconvenience. |
@jumia wrote:
You're not being told what to do, if anything you're letting someone tell you what they would like you to do. Don't let their business (incl. marketing crap) dictate your choice, instead make it the other way 'round and/or cut loose of it all and use what's available (from past/present, 2nd hand/new, DIY/preassembled, pro/domestic, etc.) to make your own preferred sonic meal - so-called advances in technology, peer pressure, dogma and paradigm be damned. It's about physics, implementation and quality/type of design. The first two are about scaling and the effort you/they out into getting the different pieces/parameters to intermingle properly, and the latter have been around for decades in a variety of shapes with nothing essentially new under the sun. Mostly what it's about is no different now than it was many years ago. There have been important advances in digital tools, and class D amplifiers make for more compact active speakers (with the aid of digital tools) with potentially tons of wattages. Indeed, DSP tooling is a great asset with active speakers, and they needn't be small nor bundled solutions. At the core of things though what's out there is generally streamlined business ventures meant to make money from a package too small and wrapped in different yet stereotypical looking clothing to distinguish themselves and have excuses for design "upgrades." Any advances that are are not least about making something smaller with the least negative impact, but with speakers there's ultimately no escaping physics. My guess: if you were to hear and realize what even fairly priced, and perhaps in particular older, properly sized high efficiency speakers could do, you'd step off the merry-go-round of the "small, new and expensive" speaker category that seeks of you to make progressively deeper digs in your pockets and invest in their going-in-circles business hierarchy. Once the basics are right it's really about the implementation, and suddenly much if not most of the fancy new stuff just becomes irrelevant. |
What should you do? First of all, relax. You are always being told to upgrade. We all are. Why? Because, in order to stay in business they have to sell, and people who have already demonstrated desire (existing customers) are always the best market. Hopefully you bought what you bought because you liked the sound. As long as you continue to be happy with the sound then it really doesn't matter what they do and so you can just sit back and relax. Now, about that technology. It really isn't speaker technology now, is it? Its materials technology. Lighter, stiffer, less resonant, more magnetic, that kind of thing. This is not speaker technology. This is important to distinguish because among other reasons it means you can upgrade yours any time you like. Inside pretty much every speaker ever made are some disturbingly cheap crossover parts- caps, resistors, inductors. Very old technology that being stuck deep inside nobody ever sees and so being audiophiles we think that stuff either doesn't matter or is black magic, or even both- being audiophiles logic seldom enters the frame. But the truth is all they have to do is spend an extra $5 more per cap and this alone is enough for anyone to notice. But again, that's not speaker technology. That's materials, craftsmanship even. Speaker technology is something rarely ever comes along. Electrostatics, horns, those are speaker technology. A new technology, genuine speaker technology, would be to find a way to make something like a lot of small tweeters functionally equivalent to a single 9" midrange driver. THAT would be some new technology! Unless I guess your name is Eric Alexander, and then audiophiles don't even get that it really is new, they just see a lot of drivers. Technology is hard. I'd enjoy what I've got if I were you. |