Benchmark Media Systems. Right or wrong

@audphile1  It is a daring position for a manufacturer to take. Good for them! It takes guts and conviction to describe the situation as accurately as they do. If more legitimate audio companies would state their convictions so distinctly audiophiles would be much better off and the illegitimate companies would disappear. 

@grislybutter  Butter or not? 

Benchmark equipment is not sterile, it is neutral, very nicely made and fairly priced. After that you can take it anywhere. Want an analog glow? Add a turntable with a tube phono stage. The difference with good electronics pales in comparison to the difference in speakers. 

On another note, having spoken with them, Benchmark is heavily into digital signal processing. They are currently using a MiniDSP SHD Studio with two of their own DACs and find the combination excellent. This is a Dirac Live platform which I have tested and it is a very effective and simple to use system. It is not as flexible as higher resolution designs, but it is amazingly cost effective. The only problem with the MiniDSP SHD is the DACs are not audiophile quality. Benchmark solved that problem by choosing the Studio version and using their own DACs. 

@jimmy2615 Speaker cables have to be matched to purpose. There are significant design issues particularly with low impedance speakers and subwoofers. If you use a bad cable for the job like using 24 gauge zip cord to drive subwoofers you will have a pretty poor result. I am sure Benchmark would readily agree. What they would say is there are many excellent affordable cables for any purpose and there is no need to buy designer cables at ridiculous prices. The very best wire is available to all of use and we can make our own cables for pennies on the dollar. Read up on cable design. Once you understand it you can design your own. You can even get the casing to make your cables look fancy. I'm old school. To me cables are something you do not want to see. They should be hidden. Another important issue is cables should always be as short as possible which you can not do with store bought cables. When you make your own you can cut them to exact size. 

In many instances a very neutral piece of equipment will expose deficiencies in a system. Someone with a system that is too "hot" will prefer a DAC that is rolled off.

A neutral system (flat frequency response curve) will sound too hot (sibilant) at higher volumes. This is why Loudness Compensation was so popular.

Most of the audible problems with stereos are issues of amplitude or frequency response. It only takes 0.5 dBFS at any given frequency between 100 Hz and 10 kHz to make an audible difference in sound quality. I think what we tend to do is compound errors to achieve a curve we like. You can accomplish the same thing with digital EQ and if you measure your system after you have achieved the sound you like you will be able to adjust your system to any component. This is called a target curve.   

@deep_333  Sterile? In relationship to most tube amps that would be better described as accurate. I suspect you would not like Boulder amps either. 

@jl35 Really? Do you have a measurement microphone? Do you have the experience of listening to systems with various target curves? Do you know what a flat response curve sounds like? Most audiophiles have never heard a system that images correctly. Many audiophiles are operating on mythology. 

IMHE, accurate equipment in summation leads to better performance in all respects. Many systems are the end product of compounding errors and will never perform at the state of the art. These systems may suite the taste of some listeners, but taste is a moving target. If a person's system is on the bright side when he or she hears an accurate system it will sound dull. If you listen carefully to the bright system the cymbals will be in your face like an ECM recording, not accurate. Not only this, but a system's characteristics change with volume. A system that sounds fine at 85 dB will sound harsh at 95dB. Then there are recordings that are mixed to various volumes. The Funkadelic recordings were mixed for high volume and sound awful at 85 dB, but turn the volume up to 95 dB and they sound great. ( for early 70's recordings)

When I see people trying one piece of electronics after another searching for a better sound it generally means they are not happy with their loudspeakers. You buy an amp that drives your chosen loudspeaker well. The rest of the electronics really do not matter that much. One might climb the ladder going from say a $5000 amp to a $20,000 amp, but I see people going endlessly sideways. IMHO that is wasting money that could have been spent on better loudspeakers which is where the real money is. Another possibility is adding a DSP preamp to the mix which will allow you to make a system sound any way you want. I have a close friend who was over listening to music and he mentioned that he wished he could turn his system up like my system, but when he did it got harsh and unlistenable. He has a very modest but well chosen system. We added a MiniDSP SHD and his system now sounds like one that should be 4 times as expensive and he can turn it up until his wife yells at him.  

@audphile1 Accuracy in electronics means conveying the original signal unchanged in any way except amplified. What musicians like in tube amps is the way they distort. The amp itself is a musical instrument. You like distortion and that is your business. The very best systems I have heard are accurate or as accurate as is possible with current tech. Benchmark gear gives you accuracy at a very competitive price. Whether or not one likes the AHB2 depends on the speaker. IMHO, modifying the sound in euphonic ways is unacceptable. I want what is on the record, nothing else.  

@jnovak Correct. There is no such thing as one amp for all. Amps have to be matched to the loudspeaker. 

@audphile1 If I blinded you you would never be able to tell the difference between most DACs.

What recordings sound like in the studio can not be used as a baseline. Most recordingings can not be used either. Only a few live recordings are acceptable. Only with experience and the most accurate loudspeaker/room combinations can you determine what a component is really doing as the differences with the vast majority of electronics is very minor. Amplifiers are a special case because they have to be matched to the loudspeaker, a mismatch at best will sound bad and at worst will blow up the amp which I have had the pleasure of doing. JC 1s RIP.

@macg19  That is why it was a brave thing to do. However, if all manufacturers of great equipment would take this stance instead of keeping their mouths shut, scared of losing sales, there would not be near as much mythology and people would have more money to spend on great equipment instead of pissing it away on garbage. People with an electronics engineering education can spot the BS right away. Most of us do not and we have a hard time filtering out the nonsense. However with some science background you can research almost anything on the net. It takes time and effort, but when spending serious money, worth it. I assume from the start that everything is marketing, and marketing is mythology designed to sell the product. Thus, it is up to me to validate any claims.