What is "Good Sound"? (1 Viewer)

[Anthony Chiu]

Ok, here I am sitting in my new "family room".
My "family room" consists of: a 65" Mitsubishi WS, a Pioneer VSX-912 110 watt per channel receiver, and a new set of Axiom speakers 5.1.

Picture this......
We're all sitting in the "family room" watching a DVD, when my wife says:
What is it that sounds so good? They sound as good as any other system I've heard.

Ok, how do I sell my $$$$$ investment...after the fact?

 

[ChrisWiggles]

Play music, sit in the sweet spot, and close your eyes.

 

[reed]

you can say: it's warm, sweet, pure or anything else your feelings

like yourself in the scene maybe.

 

[Garrett Lundy]

Good sound is easiest for newbies to recognize in stereo. Just play a few albums your wife is familiar with and see if she comes 'round. The subwoofer however, no matter how inexpensive or small, will never be rationalized by most wives (At least from what I've heard from everyone).

 

[Andrew*L]

In my case, my wife was the absolute acid test for my sound system. When she insisted (with threats of bodily harm ) that I keep the stereo Linn Nexus speakers we've had for many years, instead of replacing them with a 5.1 Boston Acoustics speaker set I was considering, I knew I had "Good Sound". Sonically (and maritally ), I have never regretted that decision. She has also proven her listening abilty by distinguishing sound between CD players.

I read somewhere (haven't verified this yet) that women have more sensitive ears than men, and can therefore discern quality sound more easily.

If I had to explain this unscientifically, I'd say that women are not impressed with equipment, and therefore are immune to the petty details we men salivate over when it comes to gear. Instead, they just listen to the music and make up their own mind what sounds better...simple huh?

So if I were you Anthony, I'd start paying attention to what your wife is saying . There may be something to it....(It doesn't hurt either to play material your wife likes to listen to...)

 

[Brett DiMichele]

Just look her in the eye and say Honey, Sweetie Pie..
You are a girl, you just wouldn't get it...

Hope the couch is comfortable!

 

[dave alan]

Though the talk of the boards has always been centered around the bright, forward, warm, laid back, tight, deep, etc., adjectives, my number 1 criteria has always been CLEAN.

This entails the whole picture.

Source, cables, preamp, amp, speakers, placement, time/phase alignment and room EQ/treatments.

I have found that I can adapt to sonic signature, but it HAS to be CLEAN.

This has more to do with distortion (THD, IMD, curve distortion, phase/time distortion, EQ distortion) than with sonic signature, in my experience.

Track it down, however long it takes, and eliminate the offender at all cost, and I will definitely like the sound, sonic signature is always the final tweak, and MUCH less important to me.

 

[Jeremy:L]

If I had to explain this unscientifically, I'd say that women are not impressed with equipment, and therefore are immune to the petty details we men salivate over when it comes to gear. Instead, they just listen to the music and make up their own mind what sounds better...simple huh?

I agree with this to some extent. But it is also possible that women's opinions of the sound may be tainted in a negative way by the cost of the equipment. They may have already made up their mind beforehand that, "For $X,000, nothing can sound that good!".

 

[John S]

After last night, I think my significant other is now more excited about our recent TV size and HDTV upgrade.

She went on and on and on about it, all night....


This is good, cause she was fighting me all the way on the new 60" HDTV. So the attitude change was most welcome.

Once she seen some desert, and archetectual stuff on PBS, in HDTV on the new set, she was imediately sold it would seem.

With the lights down, the TV dissapeared and the video just seemed to jump off of the screen, right into the middle of the living room. It looked like you could of walked right into the HDTV location being viewed. Really quite impressive.

This is also good, because now she wants to get as close to that as possible on DVD's. And I want a newer higher end player for sure.