Who says studio monitors are "cold and analytical"?


Who says studio monitors are "cold and analytical"?  Does that mean audiophile speakers are warm/colored and distorted?   If Studio Monitors main goal is low distortion, does that mean low distortion is not something audiophiles want?  They want what, high distortion?  "Pretty" sounding distortion?  Or find pretty sounding speakers that make bad recordings sound really good?  What is the point of searching out good recordings then?  They won't sound as intended on a highly colored distorted speaker!   

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@kenjit

you said:

“Its just WRONG. Dont be afraid to say it. There is no such thing as analytical. A speaker needs to reproduce the input signal. Either its right or wrong. Dont give me this hogwash about it being analytical or accurate or pleasing. I like to think in terms of is it RIGHT? or is it WRONG?”

totally again put your foot in your mouth. You constantly talk about tuning to one’s ears. Now it’s you think about things in right and wrong, black and white. You a dummy boy. 

According to discussions Ive read, Pro audio users do not want their speakers to sound good. If they sound good they are regarded as colored...They want their speakers to be accurate.  As a result of this market need, the studio monitor industry was created in order to satisfy these needs. So these studio monitors are not designed by audiophiles or music lovers. They are done by engineers who have no understanding of music. They rely on measurements to guide their design along with user feedback, But since the studio pros themselves are not audiophiles, it is a case of the blind leading the blind.

The first key statement in this, and is endemic of all of @kenjit posts is the part of “According to discussions I’ve read…”.  That’s pretty much all ya need to know.  Why?  Because according to kenjit all speakers are trash and are fatally flawed.  Note, he NEVER lists components in his own system.  Why?  Because that would pin him down and hold him accountable for his own ridiculous statements.  As for the rest of this absurd statement I’m not even gonna waste my time.  He’s trying to infer speakers are only constructed by engineers OR audiophiles, and I think that’s silly because all speaker designers are ,of necessity, both.  If u guys wanna continue to read more of kenjit’s backfilling and circular reasoning go ahead but I’m done.  Anything else he says from here you can reference my earlier retorts and see why they’re complete BS, but I refuse to waste anymore of my time on this.  Someone else can retort and state kenjit’s obvious contradictions.  Good luck with that, and Peace Out and Happy Hollidays to all.  Yes, even kenjit. 

Pro engineers care about translation. They want their mix to sound good on other systems.

That’s why the NS-10s became a standard - if a mix sounded good on them, it was going to sound good everywhere. 

Generally speaking, pro engineers want highly revealing speakers. They don’t want "bad sounding" speakers. But their goal is clarity above all else. NS-10s aren't really a standard anymore - what is more common is to have a pair of great speakers like PMCs or ATCs and then check your mix occasionally on a crappy speaker called an Auratone. 

Mastering engineers have crossed over with audiophiles for years as both B&W speakers and Dunlavy have been standards. ProAc 100s used to be standards in mix rooms. Dynaudio makes models for both markets. So does Amphion.

I am a newbie here but the notion that professional audio engineers and professional equipment designers don’t understand music is ludicrous.

One other point about nearfield studio monitors is that they are designed to sound good at only one point: the mix position. I would think that home audio designers would target a wider sound field.

Note that "distortion" is in fact highly prized in professional audio when it’s the pleasing type of distortion known as saturation. No one mixes a track without it these days. Formerly it was provided by tape and transformers; today it’s added back by plugins; it’s a big topic and a key part of modern sound.

 

I own the Harbeth 30.2 and they are certainly not cold, I find them to be very neutral, clean and clear. I listen for hours on end with no fatigue. I play guitar and piano (poorly I admit) and find the 30.2’s to be very accurate. Vocals sound like a human singing in front of me. 
I will be the first to admit that they do not sound great with heavy or death metal. They make AC/DC sound polite, although Ghost sounds quite good. Just my experience with BBC type monitors.

If you look at a comparable model in ATC’s home or pro market, the only difference is the cabinet. They don’t “tune” their speakers for either market any differently and have achieved success on both sides.

Which only proves how ignorant and clueless most audiophiles and mix engineers are. Its all marketing and these studio pros buy right into it.

Studio monitors are not designed for pleasure. Why is that so hard to understand? The studio monitor market was born out of the needs of studio engineers for speakers that were different to hifi monitors. The market responded by producing these studio monitors. They were not made by audiophiles for audiophiles. They were done by engineers who had no understanding of music or desire to create musical pleasure. When you buy a studio monitor the focus will always be on specs rather than sound quality. As I have just stated it is the blind leading the blind. If you ever point out to a studio engineer how bad their monitors sound they will shrug their shoulders and tell you they are not supposed to sound good but they are supposed to be truthful. It is this ignorant and wrong attitude which has driven the marketplace for these hideous studio monitors.

When you have to invoke ASR to make your lame point and infer that somehow overrides the exceptional commercial success ATC has had on both sides, you’ve lost dude.

You were the one that invoked the testimonial of an ATC engineer to try to support your contention about how great ATC are. Isnt that biased and lame too?

The market has spoken and you’re wrong.

The market is wrong and so are you. Studio engineers endorse every single studio monitor on the market and they usually own and use several pairs of different speakers. They are so ignorant that they cant even figure out which monitor is correct or not. We cannot rely on the endorsements of these so called studio pros to decide how successful a speaker company is.

Speakers can be tuned for both professional and home use and be equally successful.

No they cant. Why dont High end audiophile stores sell Yamaha Ns10s? or genelec alongside their Magicos or sonus faber? Maybe because they just dont sound good?

Why dont studio engineers use Magico or Wilson or Yg or B&W nautilus? Because they think they are colored and are ignorant thats why.

If all speakers were equally suited to hifi or pro use, then there would be no division of the marketplace into hifi and pro audio sectors. You are wrong.

Fact is, you have no data to back up your contention that studio speakers sound like crap

Most of ’em do. Any data regarding sound quality will be anecdotal. I consider myself a great audiophile. That alone is a compelling reason to believe my assertions. Just trust me I know what I’m talking about.

then you throw out a buncha BS to try to rescue your initially flawed and way too broad statement.

It was intended to be a broad statement and there will be exceptions. I never denied that. But the statement still holds true.