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DESIGNER'S RANT
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Tube amps with large amounts of distortion and undulating frequency response. I’ve been told by several people that they were on a long search for loudspeakers which would make their amps sound good. Flash!! Almost nobody makes loudspeakers that bad. Amps are relatively easy to get right in a system. Put the cart behind the horse.
All of these deliberate flaws are effects producers. They do not eliminate problems. They are one trick ponies designed to appeal to people who can be trained or brainwashed into listening for only one thing. One characteristic that is experienced and enjoyed against a backdrop of horribly compromised sound which is somehow ignored.
Think of Genghis Khan running for office on a platform of law and order. No credibility problem there, but once you get beyond that one issue, other areas look decidedly ugly.
Other peeves in no particular order.
Retailers or custom installers selling very expensive products which can be outperformed by much cheaper products. This is as old as markets themselves and I know these people have to make a living to stay in business and continue to deliver their service which is a net benefit to consumers. I just don’t like it.
Manufacturers who claim to listen to every unit they make and tweak it before it goes out the door. This is a formula for insanity if these things ever have to be repaired. Human ears are not better than modern test equipment for quality control purposes. If you think you have a problem, by all means check it out but your hearing changes every day. Colds, sinus congestion, heat, humidity, time of day, fight with the wife, allergies. If you change the sound of each unit based on how you are hearing on that occasion you are shipping radically variant products out the door. Get test gear you can trust.
Buffers (as used in analog audio) are filters. Deal with the real problem.
Speaker diaphragms made from wood like violins. See thin walled cabinets above.
Very stiff speaker diaphragms are great at higher than expected frequencies but you pay the price when they finally go south. Resonance peaks of 12 to 15dB are common. Even if these are 1 to 2 octaves above the driver cut-off point they are still very hard to deal with in the crossover. Balance is everything.
Very complicated gear and different formats are driving the hobbyist out of the hobby through sheer frustration. Let’s have setup systems that can be understood not only when you set it up but also when you want to tweak it 6 months later. Having visually identical discs which work all the time in all machines would be a bonus as well.
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