Maggies and rolled off treble

Midrange is the unsung hero of good audio and happy audiophiles.

This is why Magneplanars, LS35a's, Quad ESL 57's, Celestion 600's and precious few others are legendary speakers, many years after they were first manufactured.

In the meantime, neurotic audiophiles spend fortunes on things like "extension" "air" "resolution" and and "transparency" making themselves miserable in the process and then spending another fortune on corrective measures like overpriced cables and silly tweaks.

As far as generalization go - and the obvious limitations of making gross generalizations - I agree fully with this one!

One of the principle reasons for chasing accurate bass response with low distortion - is NOT TO MESS UP the lower midrange!!!

Most people miss this point altogether and focus only on the flat to 20Hz nonsense with bass distortion easily above 10% and terrible impulse response from ridiculously small narrow and often ported boxes...great on brochures and spec sheets, impressively aesthetic, amazing room pounding bass that defies the box size and makes reviewers "Oooh and Aahhh" - but really this is very BAD sound from a musical integrity perspective.

Where are the classic massive Tannoys from yesteryear? Gone because they make ugly furniture - who cares anymore about the sound?

I am a great believer in rolled off bass rather than a bunch of harmonic distorted crap - if it means an electrostat then yes this is indeed a better choice than many commonly available box speakers.

However we must accept that midrange focussed audiophiles have become somewhat of a rarity in a world of BOOM BOOM TIZZ BOOM BOOM TIZZ...

Good point Cwlondon!

Jafox,

My intent is to give a counter-view as I suspect I would be classified as being in the neurotic camp where effort is made to refine a system in every way possible, including cables and tweaks.

And I respect where you are coming from. You are certain that an ordinary CD player will be woefully inadequate, as would an ordinary interconnect or cable. As the saying goes.....one bad apple and the whole lot will turn bad. It certainly has some logic to it.

However, I assure you that significant bass distortion is quite common in almost all popular aesthetic looking speakers with extreme LF response (small but sound big). Distortion is typically several orders of magnitude greater than what one would typically observe from a CD player or amplifier. Therefore you might consider this along with the CD player and wires in terms of what might need to be refined.