Describe the "new HiFi sound"?

@decooney

to me the newer sound is u-shaped freq response across the range

the old ’sizzle boom’ more overt detail, less effort to ’hear into the music’

perfect synopsis of this is to compare the old school spendor classic 100/sp100/r2 sound vs their modern sound d9 or d7 series

Whether it’s due to recording, mastering, or the playback equipment, the new HiFi sound has lots of sparkle and definition, often due to a boost around 8-14 kHz. It’s far more detailed than listening to an acoustic instrument in a natural environment.

Placing microphones inside a piano, or right next to a guitar, tends to exaggerate detail.

I would say since vinyl has surpassed CD sales that would qualify as "new" :)

Sounds like B.S. to me.

If I were to try to decipher the root causes of “this new hifi sound”, I’d say it has nothing to do with intentional frequency dips or peaks. Instead I see a few factors:

1. Advancements in speaker driver technologies and engineering, as well as in improvements in crossover designs and implementations that altogether in a speaker design reduce “breakup” or distortion to deliver a cleaner sound and more articulate imaging. Borresen Acoustics is a great example of this. 

2. As much as I hate to say it, the Class D revolution, accompanied by other Class A and A/B solid state amplifiers that are providing lower distortion and better control to the speakers, which are also contributing to improved imaging and performance. I don’t believe most Class D is there yet, but at least not all of it is painful to the ears and the design is becoming more refined and musical by the day. Aavik, AGD Productions, Atma-Sphere and Bel Canto are all great examples of this. On the other hand, Class A and AB are also improving with speed and clarity while continuing to balance musicality. Westminster Labs, Thrax, T+A amongst many others are pushing the boundaries here. 

3. Digital sources continue to improve with lower noise floor while keeping the full integrity of the digital signal to deliver detail with effortlessness thanks to well designed power supplies, improved isolation, and clocking. 

Of course improvements to cabling, rack and isolation, and power filtering all contribute to the final result as well. But I think the new hifi sound you mention is a result of a combination of the main points above. 
 

About "musical."

Language can be used in all kinds of ways, so I will remain open to uses of "musical."

The logical part of my brain cannot stop hearing the "beg the question" fallacy in the use of the word.

Wikipedia:

To "beg the question" (also called petitio principii) is to attempt to support a claim with a premise that itself restates or presupposes the claim. It is an attempt to prove a proposition while simultaneously taking the proposition for granted.

When the fallacy involves only a single variable, it is sometimes called a hysteron proteron (Greek for "later earlier"), a rhetorical device, as in the statement:

Opium induces sleep because it has a soporific quality.

[The speakers sound good because they have a musical quality.]

Reading this sentence, the only thing one can learn is a new word in a more classical style (soporific), for referring to a more common action (induces sleep), but it does not explain why it causes that effect.

Hey, keep your hysteron proterons to yourself. 😄

All kidding aside, this comes up every now and then but there does seem to be a trend like blisshifi alluded to in his post. Case in point: my new speakers are much more revealing, have more air, ambience and room/studio presence in the recording but there's no etch, shrillness, or harshness to speak of. The mids are enhanced with brass, winds, strings, chimes and percussion that don't ever shade the sound but seem to burnish it, imbuing them with body that project out into the room. And the bass is propulsive, tight and expansive with all the sound emanating out from the speakers to the point where they can face with minor toe it, allowing a very wide sweet spot. 

All of that is only possible with new driver technology that hasn't been tried before. Throw in a wonderful sounding all digital amp that "hears" deeply into a recording and you have the recipe for some truly engaging sound.

That would be my definition of some "new hifi sound" as I haven't heard it performed this way in all the years I've been in this hobby. 

All the best,
Nonoise

@kota1 Sorry to burst your bubble, but that statement is totally false.

Technology is better and so is the sound.  

While everyone spends time determining what musical means, look up all of the definitions via the web, and you will see what it truly means. Years ago, I presented a question on this subject on another thread somewhere. Take a favorite, well seasoned musician of yours....keeping it simple, let us use Elton John. Now, take another piano player / singer.....just an average Joe newbie, who is 1st learning to play/sing ( who is " not as masterful " as Elton ). This is the interesting part......ready.......Would you rather listen to Elton play in an airport boarding area, or the newbie play Elton material, in Carnegie Hall, sitting in the best seat, of your selection. Which would you consider to be the more musical ? Think about this, and state your thinking. I go for Elton playing in the airport, as it is my opinion, this would be the more musical. Enjoy ! Always, MrD.

Maybe just go to a few more live events? 

There is no new hi fi sound. The sound of real music hasn't changed so why would there be a new hi fi sound. Just sayin...

@hilde45 

+1 no, make that +1000.  :)

In my case, when I slowly migrated through 70s-90s velvety sounding mosfet solid state amplifiers I then moved towards EL34 / KT88 ultralinear and other triode tube amps still holding some of that same type of familiar golden era velvety sound. Speakers are all over the map. I’ll won't digress into a rabbit hole too much.

Later I jumped into newer generation point-to-point wired mono tube amplifiers with modern transformers and KT150 output tubes, a more ’linear sound" or new "HiFi Sound" comments started to surface in different tube amp forum circles.

I probably align with prior posts about how more clarity, transparency, and resulting detail could be characterized by some as being a new/different type of sound compared to the older "golden era" days of equipment and HiFi sound.

Fortunately, keeping preamps / amps / tubes / speakers of both types around.

Thanks for the fun and interesting replies so far - keep them coming folks! 👍

Never knew there existed a "new hifi sound"...what do I know...I'll keep my "old hifi sound" thank you very much...😁

Well, the so-called youngsters believe that anything older than themselves is garbage and needs to be redesigned and redefined. The poor manic depressives, they have my sympathy. They need to get a life and stop being so introverted.
 

@gryphongryph

Its fact that vinyl has surpassed CD sales and fact that people born after 2000 (or late nineties), and to people who were born and raised with the CD vinyl is new. My teenager was watching an old movie with me and when they played a record in a scene he was shocked, "What’s that, how can that play music"? (he is so used to have a screen or an LED display):

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/riaa-vinyl-units-surpass-cds-1234693223/

Musical is a useless term. It means I like it.

New Hi Fi Sound is an oxymoron. The goal of hi fi is reproduction of live sound. Live sound hasn't changed. So there can't be new hi fi sound.

Musical, has sufficient dynamic contrast across the frequency range to reasonably present music as live even if studio recorded. Oddly, some of the most obvious are backing soundtracks to advertisements... that somehow seem to have to most obvious dynamic contrasts not just elevated volume... a bit like the production of Muddy waters album, Folk Singer. Dramatically differentiated instruments that have punch, contrast. Rather like the power of contrast ratio in tv's...

For me, it seems my "new hi-fi music" digs so much more detail out of recorded music, no matter the format, compared to my systems of old. And that also goes for playback of "older" recorded music. There is so much more information to hear. I go through my classic rock, R&B and jazz and I’m jaw-dropped with discovering so many more layers of sound from these recordings. I’m listening now to Sting’s album, "Brand New Day", (streaming via Tidal Masters), that I’ve listened to hundreds of times, but, tonight, there is music in those tracks that's totally "new" to me.

lots of silly banter about the words here, as i read the responses...

i think what @decooney is asking about is whether newer, higher end speakers tend to portray the sound of the music they are playing differently than older top-line speakers... am sure he will correct me if i am wrong on this

the answer is pretty clear for anyone who has kept up with new stuff, gone to shows/showrooms, heard the hotshot newer stuff from the big boys

more detail up front (refined as it may be), more ability to play loud cleanly, less cabinet resonances, more ’accuracy’ so to speak, but imo arguably at the expense of musicality

as such. more of a tendency to pull the musical pieceparts apart, disaggregated, as opposed to giving a more holistic sense of the performance

Harry Pearson appraised audio equipment by its ability to approximate the sound heard from the best seat in the best concert hall, presumably under conditions of optimal temperature and humidity.

The "new" sound is something entirely different. It aims not to simulate live concert performance, but to do aurally what molecular gastronomy does gustatorily: to create, via sophisticated technology, sensory experiences NOT to be found outside the laboratory. Visual media, of course, achieved this first, in all those movies I have no wish ever to see. ("I hold most dear my sight; yet would I choose / to hear no more the music of your voice? Or could I bear the thought that I might lose / the touch of you? I could not make a choice.")  

*S* I’ve noticed a preference in the way I’ll tweak the eq ’off flat’...and 8k > 14k is about right.  *tizz 'n sizzle*  Feel it on ones' skin. ;)

Partially due to aged ears and synapse to match, it’s just ’how’ I prefer it; esp. with ’older muzac’ that still bemuses’...

@nonoise , and very much that. *5s’*

It sounds better...because it is, and it’s being reproduced (on average...a broad one, but...) Better, overall.

A win... *G*

@jjss49 ... perfect synopsis of this is to compare the old school spendor classic 100/sp100/r2 sound vs their modern sound d9 or d7 series

..."am sure he will correct me if i am wrong on this"

 

Nope, not wrong at all, no correction necessary. Spot on. And, I thought your example is a good one.

Reading responses here in this thread, perhaps I tend to prefer a "natural" and "neutral" presentation from a system - one that does not sound forced or call any particular attention to itself. 

The somewhat recent integration of subwoofers and sub arrays into many systems, including my own has significantly changed the "sound" of those systems. Consequently, my musical tastes have evolved to maximize this. 

 "New HiFi Sound" is being mildly disappointed in the gear you've just bought and hoping it's going to blossom once it's broken in.

@pedroeb Generalize much?

Listen to the New Sound

Same as the Old Sound

Don't get fooled again 

An inexperienced individual with money is liable to do or say just about anything imaginable.  The problem is most of it will be meaningless.

Find YOUR truth and enjoy!

I agree that today’s sound is different and I believe it is because everything it’s went through analog mixing boards and now they’re digital.  Everything was recorded on tape and now is digital. Electronics have been “Improved”. Speakers have been “improved”.  Turntables, arms, cartridges, wires, phono preamps etc, have been “improved”. And the list goes on.

Save for the fact there is little pure analogue being sold today (i.e. very few LPs are recorded AAA any more) there is no generic 'new hi-fi sound.

There has always been a wide range of 'sounds' and will continue to be.

And if it is suggested a 'new' sound is better than what came before, modern equipment does not always sound better than old.

@kota1 

https://youtu.be/wTc2NjMjMUI

I have older recordings that used tube microphones and were completely analog…they are full of life and color dynamic range.  How things are executed is more important than the Tech DuJour!

There are really two different discussions happening here. I'm still thinking about "musical" and not "new hifi sound."

That said...

Case in point: my new speakers are much more revealing, have more air, ambience and room/studio presence in the recording but there's no etch, shrillness, or harshness to speak of. The mids are enhanced with brass, winds, strings, chimes and percussion that don't ever shade the sound but seem to burnish it, imbuing them with body that project out into the room. And the bass is propulsive, tight and expansive with all the sound emanating out from the speakers to the point where they can face with minor toe it, allowing a very wide sweet spot. 

This is the kind of description which delivers information rather than repeating the word "musical." It is doing *work.*

Would you rather listen to Elton play in an airport boarding area, or the newbie play Elton material, in Carnegie Hall, sitting in the best seat, of your selection. Which would you consider to be the more musical ?

This is another use of musical, but it's still begging the question. In this case, it's standing in for a description of the qualities which make Elton's playing aesthetically, semantically better — and that requires further unpacking. And notice — this example has nothing to do, any longer, with acoustics. So, the word "musical" has already facilitated drift of topic because of its (question-begging) vagueness.

Musical is a useless term. It means I like it.

I would agree that this is one way people use the term "musical." It's dodging the question of trying to find the words to say what is specifically happening.  I would argue there are more useful functions intended by folks who use the word "musical" — though they're only intentions and not more than that.

perhaps I tend to prefer a "natural" and "neutral" presentation from a system - one that does not sound forced or call any particular attention to itself. 

Isn't one man's "neutral" another's "forced"? I guess the question I'd pose is this: Is there actually anyone who goes into an audio showroom and says, "Give me something that is really "forced" and "unnatural"? Doesn't everyone say they want something "natural," or "musical"?

@dave_b 

Could you give a couple of your LP's that have that tube life, color and dynamic range? 

The "new" sound is something entirely different. It aims not to simulate live concert performance, but to do aurally what molecular gastronomy does gustatorily: to create, via sophisticated technology, sensory experiences NOT to be found outside the laboratory.

Ohhhh, I get it, I LOVE the "new" sound then. Atmos music has brought semsory experiences to a level that you can’t achieve with stereo, or even "surround sound". Artists can create stuff with a new "technological" approach. Check out this video of Deadmaus talking about his atmos mixes "its more of a technical process than a creative process":

https://youtu.be/pp8RPrBWYEo

First thought…

Thelonius Monk -Criss Cross

Columbia Records

Check out skeptical audiophile review!

Coltrane Live at the village vanguard is superb on many levels!

So many…I’m gonna go re visit them;)

@gryphongryph 

I watched the video, at 12 min:

"This is not meant to be a super serious video"

The point I'm making is that for people who grew up in the digital era, vinyl is "new" and CD's are for "the parents" old school stuff:

Sonny Rollins. Way Out West

Right now listening to Bartok…Concerto for Orchestra Saito Kinen Orchestra Seiji Ozawa conducting on SACD!  Modern tasty treat…listen for The Shining music :()

Above on Phillips ^

Hey dave_b, I just call it the way it is. Sorry, you're offended, but that's reality.

Try new glasses or clean off the old ones

People like to put things in boxes.  It makes them feel more in control and often slightly superior.

We are all in the same box

@dave_b

I have older recordings that used tube microphones and were completely analog

I have newer recordings that used those same microphones, you think this is somehow important? That is like a look back at your baby pictures, LOL. The "new sound" is better, clearer, you just need a proper (as in 7.1.4) atmos rig to play it back. Anyone clinging to this nostalgia BS has clearly got brain lock, and refuse to adopt the coming tech. I say goodbye and good riddance to the antique limitations of (yech) stereo. The engineers that mix will tell you that atmos has opened up a palate and they have finally been given object based audio after choking in channel based for the last century. What part of this modern studio is somehow inferior to the dinosaurs of the past :

https://youtube.com/shorts/SsYrnDvfO6k?feature=share

Someone using Elton John as an example of a pianist is what's wrong with civilians talking about music.

re: "tube microphones", there is a well known amplifier manufacturer in the USA, who's last designer left the company to go form his own company designing and building new tube microphones after his hobby turned in to a business. Still a bit underground at the moment, but kinda cool in any case.  

Some of these great inventions in audio seem to resurface because the were/are simply that "good". Some of the Old is becoming New again too :) 

@secretguy

"Someone using Elton John as an example of a pianist is what’s wrong with civilians talking about music."

Ain't that the truth!

@kota1 You have my condolences 💐 

BTW…you are missing the point!