Talking to the EQ fundamentalists, most of them have never actually listened to switchable EQ, instead endlessly parroting the RIAA accord, compliance dates and apocryphal tales and hearsay ‘testimony’, while ignoring the fact that all the evidence they need is encoded in the grooves of the records themselves. Forget the whole ‘debate’, the spurious ‘facts’, the rights and wrongs, whether the results of switching EQ are actually more accurate and lifelike or simply a ‘tone control’. This is stupidly simple. If it sounds better it is better. If switching the EQ curve in your phono-stage generates a more intelligible, communicative, natural and engaging sound – to you – then that’s a good thing. If you don’t hear a benefit or only possess records pressed in the 21st Century, you don’t need, you shouldn’t invest in or use the facility. But if you do hear the difference and you have the LPs to benefit, then switchable EQ is like a whole new record collection and a massive new musical opportunity. Why anybody would want to bully you into ignoring that opportunity is beyond me.
Any company offering the facility should be able to demonstrate the benefits. If you own, buy or are thinking of starting to buy older records (pressed pre-’85) then this is a performance advantage you really don’t want to ignore. The really good news is that it’s a performance advantage that is becoming ever easier and in some cases, even more affordable to access.
Game changing products in the here and now…
On a positive note, for the first time the show featured not one but two of the long-heralded ‘next-generation’ products we’ve all heard so much about – and been waiting so long for. Even better, they came from opposite ends of the price spectrum and each offered a genuine shift in the price/performance equation.
One thing is for certain: moving forward, if high-performance audio is going to survive, it’s also going to change. You only need to look at show demographics to realise that the existing audience who buy existing products is aging fast – to the point where many established customers are now starting to down-size their systems and commitment. Economic pressures, ecological concerns and simple space constraints have long indicated a move to integrated solutions that use fewer boxes, less raw material, are more energy efficient and easier to accommodate. There have been plenty of attempts to deliver just such a product, but ultimately, for all their compact convenience, all have failed to deliver the required sound quality. Well, finally, not one but two companies have succeeded, both by taking a lateral approach to the problem.
On paper, the solution seems obvious, almost preordained by the necessary technology and what’s available: Digital inputs, a DSP active crossover and class D amplifiers. But in reality, things ain’t so simple. Taking a stereo digital signal and distributing its channels to separate, distant DACs isn’t as straightforward as it might seem. Likewise, active crossovers can introduce as many problems as they solve. In essence, they need to be built to the same standard as a line-stage (and that isn’t easy) while executing them in the digital domain just introduces a host of different issues. Perhaps this is the real reason why active speakers have failed to command the market share their theoretical advantages suggest.
