A large part of a speaker’s resolution is room acoustics, and some of it IMHO may be from drivers that go far from neutral.
In the right room, Sander’s Sound ESLs, and Magico are two I appreciate.
Some speakers are "resolving" in a way I really don’t want to listen to. Imagine a speaker that over emphasizes the crickets. :)
Smaller Magico’s are smooth, and resolving, but a bit cool.
I also always think about whether "resolving" is at all natural or neutral. I know some speakers which are great at "resolving" whether amp A has more current drive than amp B, but that doesn't make them better music players.
Best,
E |
I heard a pair of raidho 1.2 tiny stand mounts I would vote for. The big $225k wilsons would probably work, but it would be like killing a fly with a bazooka. |
resolving That for me depends on what I'm wanting to resolve. I like to explore almost every recording I put on so I take a variable approach to that piece of music. It's one of the reasons I design Tunable speakers. They allow me to focus on different parts of the recording, kind of like the focus on a camera. There's so much info on any recording that if a person wanted to they could open the soundstage up big enough to look at everything. Once you've got that huge stage around you it's a matter of how well you know your room/speaker combo and of course the rest of the chain. I tune my whole system so I can pick any part of the stage and focus it in or relax it. Honestly some of the best detail takes place when the stage is relaxed the most, which is surprising to those who start with brutally squeezed speaker settings. Michael Green www.michaelgreenaudio.net |
Quad 57's! Peter Walker got it right! |
Kyron Audio Kronos, Gaia or Pheonix, Simply outstanding. |
Avantegarde - any model. The best speakers I have ever heard
Detailed, balanace, neutral, dynamic and very efficient - the upper models are some of the nicest eye candy also, i.e. if you like that sort of thing
Regards
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it doesn't exist since you will not get any consensus |
As might be expected answers will vary widely based on the acceptance of the technology preferred by the user. Do not expect conformity or agreement on this. You will be far better off selecting the technology you accept as being able to recreate "real" sound first, then seek the best application of it that you can afford. |
KEF Blade/Blade2. You really can’t do noticeably better, I’ve talked to many people who have demoed dozens of well regarded high end speakers, they all said the Blade2 was better, and measurements back that up. Magico makes good speakers, but are simply way overpriced (paying Lamborghini prices for a Corvette), and no one should buy Wilson if transparency is what they are after.
You can’t measure in-room how resolving a speaker is, only the response and distortion. You would need quasi-anechoic measurements to look at the imaging, soundstage, compression (how the response changes at louder volumes), the group delay/spectral graph, etc. |
I would go for ATC SCM 100 Active, up until 2 years ago that is what I used as my daily listen. Until I had to relocate and now I use headphones only and they are even more resolving but as we are talking about speakers the ATCs were the ones I loved and it didn't matter how loud you went they just seemed to get more from your source than any other speaker I ever had.
As I was a classical guitarist in my youth they really had that abillity to resolve the good and the bad things about guitar playing. For instance some players are very noisy as they traverse the fretboards especially when they are playing on the three wire wound strings. The sweaks and finger noises were really bad but hey that is what a Classical guitar sounds like so it just sounds that more real. That is why I really loved to listen to John Williams as Jullian Bream gave you everything finger squeaks and hisses through teeth when things got a bit hairy but I wouldn't have given them up for anything. That is what big ATCs do extremely well. Don't get me started on orchestral music !!!
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Charney Audio Concerto!
Rear loaded horn based on the Tractrix theory. The Concerto produces a clean clear picture into the recording venue and studio recordings have a live presence due to the amount of detail retrieved. Of course this is all dependent on the front end and associated electronics. Room tuning is necessary but only to a minimum with Charney Audio horns. If you can't swing the Concerto the Companion with Lowther DX65 or Voxativ AF 2.6 will do the same with a little less bass.
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Quite easily a restored original ESL by Wayne Picquet |
I have actually found the general concept of "higher resolution speakers" to be somewhat overblown.
Once you get to a competent level of speaker design, not grossly colored so as to obscure parts of the spectrum, most speakers IMO produce most of the detail in the source.
Like every audiophile I've had that experience of listening to a speaker - uber expensive or not - and thinking "wow, listen to that detail, I don't think I've ever heard that before on that track."
But when I actually listen to the same track on another competent speaker, or on my home system...well...there it is. That oboe part in orchestra, that bell in the back of the hall, that finger picking strings...whatever...so long as it's within the frequency range of two different well designed speakers....I'll hear it.
Now, that doesn't mean that I think one speaker can not in principle or practice render "more" detail, or reduce distortion relative to another. Of course that can be the case. But in terms of perception I don't typically find the effect to be "hearing details or elements that I couldn't hear before" but rather on the presentation of details I can hear. In other words, a tiny bell in the background or a sax in the foreground will be similarly audible, but it may sound more "pure" or grain-free, and in that sense more realistic.
So for the most part, I don't hear "new things" in a "more resolving" speaker. I hear all the same things...but presented somewhat differently (which can of course also occur due to frequency response variations and other aspects of a speaker).
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